Delays, delays, delays.
Sorry y'all, recently you guys have been getting the short end of the stick when it comes to updates compared to my other mainline stories. No excuses, I'll endeavor to be a bit more timely in the future.
I've got an announcement on the overall structure that this story is going to follow down towards the bottom of my usual commentary. I'll mark that section with a sentence entirely in bold for those who are only interested in the update and not the chapter commentary.
No more preamble, let's get into this.
Izuku sat in the last seat of the row, leaning his right arm across the shoulder rest and pressing his brow into the vertical pole ahead of him. The cool metal against his forehead acted as a soothing balm against the secondhand embarrassment he was currently feeling.
Hagakure and Minetta were causing a scene, in basic terms. The invisible girl was doing extensive pole maneuvers whilst their admittedly perverted friend was enthusiastically observing her efforts. On any other day, whilst this would have been a mortifying display for the green haired boy, it at least would have been a predictable one.
But rather than something titillating, Tooru was instead showing off her remarkable gymnastic skills, twisting, swerving, and flipping about the car's various hand rails with supreme dexterity. Several of the nearby commuters were staunchly fixated on the highschooler's display until noting the set of black spats Tooru wore beneath her silver/grey skirt. Their reception of the girl's behavior dwindled markedly after that revelation.
But Minoru had enough hype to make up for a hundred people. Not only was he standing on the seat opposite Izuku, periodically stomping up and down the row with exaggerated motions, but he'd pulled a notebook from his bag and was actively flinging balls of paper at the girl.
And, of course, Midoriya would be remiss to not mention the small boy's… "colorful" commentary.
"Steady men! The She-Ape may be of colossal size, able to crush our towers with little more than an errant step! But she can be hurt – can be felled! Loose the catapults!" And then, swinging his arms like imitation siege engines, the ball haired boy launched two paper projectiles in quick succession.
Hanging from an overhead bar, Hagakure swung out of the way of one paper wad. She caught the second ball with a spin kick, whipping her leg past the tips of Izuku's hair. Minetta took his own crumpled projectile right to the brow, bursting back into his seat like he'd just taken a bullet.
"Puny humans," the invisible ape woman bellowed out in cave-speak, "you no beat Haga-Haga, Haga-Haga is strongest!" Minoru sunk into an overly dramatic death display, complete with frightening convulsions and actual frothing at the mouth. The shaky hand-reaching-for-the-sky thing was just a bit too much, beyond the obvious fact that a headshot wouldn't allow for much of a death reaction.
The whole time Tooru, very much in character, boomed out a halting rhythm of evil laughter.
Midoriya groaned, pressing his eyes closed as he pushed his forehead further against the polished standing bar. He had originally made stuttering attempts to appeal to his friends' sense of propriety, the unwanted attention they were drawing overriding his natural meekness.
But whatever had a hold of Hagakure and Minetta was not letting go anytime soon. The most Izuku had gotten out of the two was that they had run into each other on their late morning rush, apparently learning they lived in the same neighborhood. They'd made a joint gamble on quick shots of some unpronounceable, foreign energy drink when they made it to their transfer station.
If nothing else, it certainly had them up and full of energy. Midoriya had pretty much resigned himself to this ridiculous scenario, forced to wait out whatever rush that concoction had instilled. He took some guilty pleasure in the knowledge that their impending crash was bound was to be catastrophic.
In an effort to further detach himself, Izuku raised his half lidded gaze to a man seated across the aisle, basically posted up on the rear corner of the train car. The majority of passengers had fled to separate compartments the moment his friends' antic began to escalate. About a dozen or so had made the brave decision to remain on the far side of the car, perhaps driven by some twisted curiosity. Only one had remained, like Midoriya, within active distance of the pair.
The salaryman, the very same one that had been observing them since their arrival on the tram, tipped back another swig straight from the flask. He wasn't even putting up a pretense at this point, the container's contents more than obvious. To be fair to him, Minoru had started making sputtering engine noises and pretending to be a fighter plane…
When the man lowered his drink, his dark eyes locked with the solid jade of Midoriya's. An absolute understanding was reached, no words needing to be exchanged. The older gentleman in his slate hued suit lifted his arm, giving the flask a light shake in offering.
The defeated teen… paused. His facial features remained still, but he had to actually take a minute to consider the proposition. Minetta shot by, releasing rapid fire cla-clacks in imitation of a heavy machine gun, "Haga-Haga" roaring in challenge and swiping at the "pesky gnat" – her words – as he passed.
Izuku held up a hand and shook his head. The salaryman inclined his brow, making his best effort to convey his respect and condolences even through his growing buzz. It was, after all, a hero's duty to face the evils of the world head on.
And more importantly, he couldn't risk either of the two eccentrics spotting him with the gift of an underage drink. The idea of them requesting one as well and getting tipsy on top of… this… It would lead to an incomprehensible scenario.
Then Tooru got the boy in a headlock and began dragging Midoriya towards one of the vertical poles. Dear God, he was now the damsel in distress in a monster movie!
"Mr. Senki," the middle aged man announced, his body stilled and his gaze never leaving the blackboard, "why is there an animal in your hands?"
Daichi mostly stopped, stepping to the side as Ranko strode into the room. She would most definitely have barreled him over without a second thought. The blonde glanced down at the sphere bound mammal in his hands. "Technically the ball is in my hands, the hamster is in the ball."
The teacher visibly inhaled, his round frame puffing out as he gathered his mounting stress. "Mr. Senki, why are you holding a hamster?"
"Because small animals get nervous when I handle them, Teach!" Ranko was seated on her desk, her backpack flopped into the chair and her searching paws rooting through the confines of a plastic shopping bag, her "spoils" from this morning's venture. Their instructor still didn't turn around, his form deflating as he calmly exhaled.
He them returned to his chalkboard equation, mumbling out a short, "Just keep it under control." Man had checked out before the first bell had even rung. He knew his class too well.
Daichi gave a pointless nod before moving to his desk. Ranko had her feet up on his table top, blocking the boy's route as she lobbed a stick of gum into her maw. He didn't even break stride as he walked through the barrier, his classmate spinning like a turnstile.
All the while, the unnamed hamster laid back within his ball, his pink nose hastily twitching as his sight snapped about the classroom. A trio of girls caught his gaze, the tiny click letting out unified "awws" as their eyes met. The small mammal turned away in an instant.
"That's so cute," one of the girls, a shorter one with wheat colored, shoulder length hair, cooed out, "look at that tiny patch of orange on his face!"
Daichi plopped onto his chair, taking a good deal more care in placing the hamster sphere down on his counter. The little guy turned to regard the teen, Daichi being the most familiar – and least intimidating – figure in the immediate vicinity.
Dark, shining blue eyes stared up through the violet tint of his housing. The white fur on his little snout bristled as the hamster continued breathing quickly. Three large patches of orange dotted his body, one across his upper back and another over his lower right side. The third, as stated by his classmates, covered his scalp, completely painting his rounded ears and circling his left eye.
He wouldn't say it out loud, but Daichi wholeheartedly agreed with the girls' "cute" observation.
"What's his name?" Daichi notably leaned away at the speaker's proximity, just realizing the three girls had walked up on him. His gesture hardly registered with them, the crowding teens focused intently on the ball bound pet.
The boy paused as the girl's question fully sunk in. This was definitely someone's pet so he had to have a proper name. But they had no way of knowing it and it would do to have something to call the little guy by…
"Taro," barked Ranko. A glance her way saw the dog girl laying back fully against her desk top, her inverted features oriented at Daichi and the gaggle of girls. Her tail was audibly wagging, her skirt clad rear hanging off the edge of the table and her toes pressed against the floor.
Daichi glanced past his friend. Half of the class, plenty of them boys, would have a pretty prime view of Ranko's panties. Not even one of them so much as strayed a glimpse in her direction. Nobody wanted to be on the girl's radar for any reason.
"You have no imagination at all," Daichi stated, turning back to Ranko. Unlike the rest, he had no choice in acquiring the girl's attention. No good deed could go unpunished.
The low growl sent his way was accompanied by her flattest expression. Daichi did his best not to blink as the half lidded glare bored into him. This let him catch the distinctive mouth movement, granting him a second of advanced warning.
Ranko spat the wad of gum she'd been chewing with an absurd level of precision. Not having the space to dodge, Daichi swung around the only defense he had in reach. The orange/white hamster flung himself to the rear of his housing as the lime green mess burst across the outside of the ball with a heavy SPLAT.
"Sorry Taro," the blonde teen mumbled, holding the stained sphere at arm's length and averting his eyes to the ceiling. Taro – Daichi unintentionally cementing the name – was hyperventilating, his sapphire orbs tracing a trail of saliva leaking from the splattered wad.
"Eww!"
The girl gaggle that had been fawning over the ball bound rodent finally caught up with the situation. The frankly disgusting display scattered the girls like panicked roaches, their dismayed shrieks carrying to every corner of the room.
Their teacher countered this noise by stabbing his chalk into the board, continuing to scribble out his lesson as loudly as possible. It did nothing to sort out the mayhem, but their instructor was still quite deep in his "checked-out" state, too done to turn and address anything.
It'd all be resolved in a couple seconds anyway.
The rising tension and general unease flooding the classroom came to an instantaneous end as someone in the back corner of the room slammed their desk into the floor. Almost every student's eyes shot towards the source of the sound, their forms turning rigidly stiff. Those who didn't look pitched their brows into their desk tops, one kid in the front row straight ducking entirely underneath his and curling into a ball.
Their teacher stopped writing on the board but still didn't look. It's not like he wasn't expecting this outcome.
A second slam, louder than the first, cracked the still air of the space. A third smash swiftly followed before the offending student roared in exertion, hauling his entire table up and over his head to fling it into the back wall. The steel and wood apparatus simply fell to pieces as it crashed back against the floor.
The wall was utterly unharmed, it having been reinforced for just such occasions.
Daichi's ears were ringing from the auditory overload. He could only imagine how it felt for Ranko, the dog girl's palms pressed tight against her ears and a pained wince etched onto her features. In silence, Daichi turned his gaze towards the red headed boy panting in the corner by the windows.
Despite the preceding brutish display, Jamie was probably the furthest thing from a thug or a meathead that someone could picture. While not what Daichi would call "fat," the white teen was certainly stouter than the average. He wasn't vertically inclined either, even among Japanese students he was on the short side.
Between that, his red hair, and their school's iconic uniform colors, Jamie was widely christened the title of "Head Elf" throughout their prefecture. To his credit, Jamie took the teasing in stride. He was actually quite good at ignoring things.
Anything that wasn't incessant noise, apparently.
Jamie took about twenty seconds to get his breathing back under control. As he came back to himself, the short boy raised a hand to his face. Sliding a finger up the bridge of his nose, Jamie pushed his square rimmed frames back into position.
He didn't look up as he addressed the room, "Quiet. Down." One of the fluorescent lights at the back of the class flickered briefly to emphasize the moment. Ranko couldn't hold back a snort, the air itself seeming to seize for a second. Jamie didn't acknowledge the sound, striding towards his ruined desk with eyes still downcast.
This was always Daichi's favorite part of one of the foreign boy's little blow-ups. As life very slowly flowed back to the rest of the students, the blond watched as Jamie stood over his demolished seat. His open hand drifted over the snapped bits for a second or two before a yellow glow appeared below his palm. This time, Daichi could actually spot the moment the circle of energy twisted sharply counter clockwise.
Jamie's spinning glow vanished instantly as its effect took hold in earnest. With a soft metallic groan the red head's splintered desk began to animate. The twisted, battered frame of the furnishing wound and shifted back into proper shape. Jamie stepped aside as the resurrected desk tumbled back into position, looking just as whole and worn as it had that morning.
Once the noise of recovery had died down, attentions were drawn to the front when the teacher tapped his chalk against the board three times. Jamie froze halfway into sitting down.
"Mr. Boyd, principal's office."
Jamie was already shoveling his effects into his satchel, his features measurably neutral. Daichi rolled his eyes heavily , leave it to Mr. Sato to step in only after everything was resolved.
As Jamie was languidly packing up, Ranko reached towards a semi aware Daichi and simply retrieved her spat gum from the side of Taro's ball. She was already loudly smacking her reclaimed treat before the boy even realized what was going on. The trio of girls from before saw the whole thing, their features going pale but their mouths remaining shut due to the still present threat of Jamie.
Daichi denied Ranko's existence for the moment, his attention instead on the terrified figure of the balled hamster in his grasp. Taro's level of panic had gone beyond absolute terror, the petrified rodent lain frozen against the bottom of his ball. Daichi couldn't even tell if the little guy was still breathing, his blue eyes gazing up with a complete lack of focus.
This lack of function was enough to draw Ranko's concern. "Yo, little Taro," the canine girl approached, poised to jab her furry finger against the plastic sphere, "what'chu doin-"
As soon as Ranko tapped her digit against the curved housing – her typical lack of restraint on full display – "little Taro" all but leapt back into consciousness. The shock of seeing the hamster jump like that was swiftly surpassed by the sudden glare of white light blazing from his widened eyes.
Taro was caught somehow in the exact center of his ball, floating in place. The class had maybe a second to marvel at this before the glow from his eyes focused into tight beams. A shifting haze of blurry shapes and colors manifested just beneath the ceiling.
And from that chaotic mass came voices.
"Why!? Wh… oing? You bas…!"
"… eep your han… pid bitch!"
"You gonna hit me!? Hu-?"
"Say… One more fuc-!"
"Mama!"
The lightshow cut off abruptly. Taro flopped to the bottom of his ball, eyes shut and breath heavy. Ranko's sights slowly shifted from the empty space that once held the projection, down towards the prone hamster. She herself had fallen down o the floor, knocking the back of her head against the edge of her own desk. Any ache she may have felt was sharply suppressed, every bit of Ranko's attention locked on the ball bound Taro.
It was a scene mirrored by nearly everyone in the class, even their stoic instructor looking rather startled by the goings on. The only person who didn't seem utterly cowed was Jamie, the bespectacled teen halted mid stride on his way towards the door. His verdant eyes were also on Taro's orb, but they held interest rather than fear.
"Mr. Senki, Ms. Hakubi," Mr. Sato grumbled, his tone already steadied, "take that… whatever it is and join Mr. Boyd to the principal's office."
Daichi, unmoving since Taro's eyes started glowing, sighed tiredly.
Izuku had, of course, noticed Kisuke and Ikaruga board the train near to their destination. If he hadn't been in the midst of Minetta and Hagakure's sugar induced episode, he may have mustered the courage to offer a wave, adhere to the basic tenants of social interaction.
Of course, this would have proved challenging given his continued captive status at the hands of the mighty Haga-Haga…
Kisuke was halfway to greeting the dead eyed boy himself, but Ikaruga swiftly slapped the rising limb down. Even with her glare not being directed at him, Midoriya understood exactly where his classmate stood: she wanted absolutely nothing to do with the absurdity unfolding on the far end of the train.
The remainder of their journey was spent as such, the newly arrived duo steering well clear of their classmates' unfortunate antics. Kurogane kept her seatmate occupied with some competitive gaming, something she readily and repeatedly dominated him in. The pair kept their heads down, one in silent focus and the other in stewing frustration, leaving them mostly beyond Minoru and Tooru's notice.
Izuku just couldn't summon the will to be annoyed with them.
But their commute had come to an end. The school's isolated station was laid out before them, their train already partway through the tunnel to its next destination. Several other teens in Aozora blue and silver along with some "variously dressed" faculty members traversed the underground station towards one of two exits.
Midoriya was finding it rather difficult to follow suit. On one hand, their no longer being trapped in an enclosed space for an expanse of time had given Ikaruga the all clear to let Uzuma loose. The boy with the red hair spike practically skipped over to offer greetings, the stoic spider girl pacing casually after him.
"Hey all! Have a good morning commute?"
Ikaruga snorted and Izuku had half a mind to actually display some anger. He was beaten to the punch by a duo of seething glares and bestial growls. Kisuke shot back, his violet haired classmate blocking him with a palm to the back of the skull before they could collide. She was outright laughing at this point, subdued as it was.
Hagakure and Minetta slowly turned their laser annoyance onto Kurogane. The attempt was abandoned pretty quickly as the spider girl completely ignored their presence. They also just didn't have the energy to put up a front any longer, the pair visibly wilting.
Minetta was arguably worse off, what with a slumping Tooru claiming her rightful seat atop the boy's shoulders. Despite the fact that the invisible girl was at least twice his size as well as the obvious lethargy wracking his frame, Minoru held her up with little issue. Though he seemed a bit too frazzled to realize fully, his adolescent instincts understood that doing whatever it could to keep a girl's thighs wrapped around his skull was an endeavor of vital importance.
While seeing his friends so dejected did sour Midoriya's mood somewhat, the feeling was largely counteracted by vindication for the supreme embarrassment they'd caused him all the way here. Their sugar crash had hit them as hard as expected, hopefully severely enough that they would never try that devil's drink ever again. Izuku was fairly adamant that their friendship would not survive another such escapade.
Hagakure gave a deep sigh. "Minetti… just… get us to class." Her tiny teen mount needed a good moment to even begin to move forward. At this point Midoriya took a quick scan of the station and realized just how emptied it had gotten.
"Hey," Kisuke spoke, his pointed frond swaying back and forth, "everyone cleared out already." Izuku could see the arachnid girl standing behind him, debating whether or not to slap him in the back of the head.
Midoriya knew this was a problem. He was already behind schedule when he left the house and now they were trailing at the back of the late arrivals. Considering that they couldn't count on the halls being easily navigable, the chances of them reaching their class on time were growing slimmer by the second. They needed to get a move on.
But noting the sluggish pace Minetta was setting and Hagakure's unlikely capacity to serve as a reliable guide, the situation just grew grimmer and grimmer. Midoriya knew they would be dead weight, but he wasn't going to leave them behind. What kind of hero hopeful would that make him? What kind of friend would that make him?
"… I like your vibe, Tree-top." Izuku glanced at the arms crossed Uzuma, the red head favoring him with a cool grin. After a beat the greenette realized he'd gone into a mumble fit and promptly slapped his hand over his mouth. Kisuke's smile showed teeth.
"An-Anyway," Midoriya recovered, "we really need to get moving! I know you don't want to be late two days in a row." The reminder made Kisuke flinch.
"Yeah, that's a big 'do not recommend' from me. Definitely need to get a move on." The spike maned boy turned to take off, paused halfway through, and then faced Izuku again. "You know how to get there, right? Because I tried the 'trial and error' thing yesterday and… didn't go so well."
Midoriya's head tilted downwards. There was a long beat of silence as the boy stared at he floor, Kisuke watching on with a slowly waning smile on his face. Neither paid attention as Tooru kicked her heels into Minoru's sides, prompting him forward like a dutiful little mount.
Almost airily, Ikaruga posed, "What about that elevator that goes straight to the lecture hall?"
As their red haired schoolmate drifted a braindead "What about it?" Izuku's features brightened all at once. This caused Uzuma to glance back and forth between the greenette and the spider girl, his brow quirked.
"That might work," Izuku perked up, "if it's an area for the staff, its probably more straight forward than the hallways. No need to 'test' them."
Kisuke's confusion snapped into understanding, a zealous smile splitting his features as the solidly built boy began to bounce with excitement. The dark haired Kurogane allowed a grin of her own to show, a small contribution to the group's building energy.
Maybe, if he wasn't getting so caught up in his classmates' excitement, Midoriya would have considered why trespassing through the "staff only" space was actually a bad idea.
Instead, it was the teen with the spike pompadour who calmed enough to voice a concern, "Hold on though, how do we get back there?" Izuku's expression froze, Kisuke's demeanor plummeting once again.
Ikaruga loudly clicked her tongue. Once both boys were looking her way, she nodded towards a nearby wall. Beneath a crude excuse for graffiti stating simply "Do Not Pass" in near illegible font, the stacked frames of Hagakure and Minetta stared in silence at the tiled surface. After a short beat, the invisible girl swung her leg out in a wide sweep, her shoe scuffing across the floor of the platform due to her mount's miniscule height.
Tooru's sole smacked against a low point on the station's wall, planting itself hard against the boundary. The flat thud of impact echoed shortly through the emptied station. And then a section of the wall ground backwards, a block barely big enough for a human head to fit through. Hagakure pulled her foot back.
The wall crumbled backwards from that angular divot, folding inwards quickly to form an ever widening gap. In a matter of seconds, the process revealed an opening the size of a set of double doors, a dark corridor stretching out beyond it.
Hagakure's upper half shifted in the manner one would when looking over their shoulder. From her unseen mouth, a zombie-esque moan bellowed over the remaining teens of average stature. With both feet, Tooru clicked her heels against Minoru's flanks. The small boy hiked forward in dutiful silence, bound to the whim of the now undead Haga-Haga.
Reflecting back to his earlier thoughts, Izuku opted to never again, under any circumstances, underestimate Hagakure's attention to detail.
Kisuke gave a brief little humm, "This reminds me of last week when me and my bro tried that Indian energy drink! That's when we learned his old fridge could float… kind of."
Izuku also made a mental note to never drink anything exotic. Boring was the only safe option.
I really can't explain this opening section at all. It's a "tactic" of mine to just kind of run through ideas, throw things at the wall and see what sticks out. I've got the broad strokes of where I want my works to go, but stitching those key moments together is a lot of character interaction, world building, and random insanity.
I'm sure that Izuku doesn't appreciate the things I put him through…
Spotlight on Daichi and crew for a bit, they're very much the A plot at this point. Don't worry though, our hero hopefuls will be in the wings when they inevitably get in over their heads. Everything centers on little Taro and whatever strange power he holds. I always liked the concept of animals with quirks so here it is as a major plot point.
Speaking of our rodent friend, let's talk character design: … it's Hamtaro. Literally, he's Hamtaro. As stated, Ranko has no imagination when it comes to naming, it's all her fault. Small tidbit: Ranko's last name is the same as Ryoko's from the Tenchi series.
We're also introduced to Jamie Boyd here who, appearance wise, I based somewhat off of Dexter. As in Dexter's Lab Dexter, not the guy who kills other killers… though there might be an idea or two there. Jamie's character has been tumbling around in my mind since the beginning of this, I always knew I wanted him to have a "selectively explosive" temper and that I wanted him to have that stereotypical nerd aesthetic. Making him a foreigner was a more recent development and it pretty much came about while I was deciding on his name. I just went with something English, it stuck, so now I'm writing around it. I am a slave to my own whims.
"Head Elf"… someone stop me…
Jamie's quirk allows him to "rewind" things, similar to Eri's though with one obvious difference. Well, at least it seems that way for now. Very useful for someone who has destructive habits.
Let me get on with my "structure announcement" for this story. I've dropped this message in my two other mainlines (Cloudchasing, Stoking Embers) but the overall plan is to make each arc of this story into its own, separate work. Basically like a series with very definite points of conclusion. One reason I'm doing this is to make the whole thing more digestible, having a series of "books" that are twenty-thirty chapters long being more approachable than some monster work with eighty-plus entries. I myself tend to shy away from any one story with that kind of length.
My other reason is to have these clear end points just… in case. The plan for this story is epic in length and combined with the pace I've set, this is gonna be a long endeavor. Years long. And I can't say now that I'll always be willing or even able to write this, so having these completed arcs can serve of some kind of "conclusion" should things pan out badly. And should the work itself ever reach a point where you guys, the readers, don't agree with the story's direction or just fall out of interest, you'll have these clear jump off points where you can say things ended in a "satisfactory" way.
And speaking of your, the readers', interests, I'm gonna address something else since I keep getting questions about it: pairings.
This piece isn't tagged as romance, there's no one in our character list with those little pairing brackets around them, this really isn't an entry too concerned with romantic relationships. It's meant to be an introduction and setting up our major characters, that's what you're going to get here.
Beyond this entry, we'll develop relationships between characters but romance itself probably won't become a focal point of the series for a long time. And even then, it'll probably be secondary at best. That said, there ain't gonna be any harem hijinx so if you were looking forward to that… no.
For those specifically interested in Izuku's pairing, what with him being the main character and all… I mean, I don't think I was being particularly subtle about me being IzuOcha trash? I figure anybody who was really concerned with that have already taken their leave. Those of you who were still hanging on waiting for a final confirmation, here it is. But again, not gonna be a thing for a while so if you're still interested in the plot itself, you've got some leeway until "The Terrible Awful" rears its ugly head.
Alright, that was long, I'm gonna wrap this up here.
Next time: The A plot moves to solve Taro's situation, even if they break a few rules doing so. And our hero hopefuls learn that poor planning leads to consequences. Til next time…