A/N: Small announcement in the omake at the end. Don't have much else to say other than I hope each of you enjoys the chapter; it's been a hell of a day.

Phase 5: Chapter 13

In the Absence of a Hero

Eri stared at herself in the mirror, a little bemused by the sight of UA's student uniform hanging off of her body. Also odd to her searching gaze was the fact that her hair- while dyed black to help obscure her true identity- was shiny, clean, and soft to touch, the result of proper washing and care. Before her coming to the UA of her past, it had been a very long time since she had thought to put any care into her appearance beyond meeting the minimal requirements for hygiene. Probably not since her childhood, now that she thought about it.

In the future, safety and anonymity had always been the UA Hero Alliance's top priority, not whether everyone had been able to wash off that day. Eri considered it a miracle that she was even as educated as she was, though that was in no small way thanks to Akarui and Togata's combined efforts. Her growing up had been a bizarre mixture of running, hiding, training her quirk, and learning what she could about math, reading, writing, history, and science, all in the hopes that someday she would be able to put that learning to use in a better world.

She was snapped out of her reminiscing when there was a familiar knock at her door, preceding Mina's voice asking, "Eri? You good in there?"

"Yes, I'm all dressed," she answered as she moved to unlock and open the door to see Mina standing there with her backpack on. "Am I running late?"

"Not at all," the other girl replied as she looked her up and down. "Our uniform looks good on you, girl. You all ready for your first day at UA?"

Eri allowed a little smile to crease her face as she answered, "I'm pretty nervous. It's actually my first day of school, ever."

"Wait, what?"

"I didn't really have time for a normal education with all of us being on the run all the time in the future," she reminded the pink girl. "By the time I was old enough to be put into an actual school, we were marked for death by the Liberation Front. I never saw the inside of a classroom as an actual student."

"Oh, right…" Mina said as she scratched her hair awkwardly. "Sorry I brought it up."

"You don't need to apologize," Eri assured her. "There's no need to pretend that none of that stuff happened. If it hadn't, I wouldn't be the person I am now."

"The person you are now, huh?" Mina murmured, her gaze lowering as she thought something over.

"Are you okay?" the future girl inquired, noting that her clock told them that they had fifteen minutes to get to class.

"Yeah, I was just curious about something," Mina answered as she re-shouldered her backpack. "If you don't wanna answer, it's totally cool, but I was kinda wondering… what was I like in the future?"

Eri moved to get her own backpack, which had been provided for her- along with her bedding and basic wardrobe- by Aizawa. Doing so gave her enough time to formulate her response, though she had been expecting the inquiry for some time now, having been asked the same question by a few of the other students in their class.

As she moved to exit the room, she answered the pink girl, "You might not like what I tell you."

"I kinda figured," Mina said with a more rueful expression. "I'm guessing that Kurai staying dead didn't do me any favors in the future."

"To put it mildly," Eri nodded as she shut the door behind her. "I honestly can't remember a day when you smiled. When we first went on the run, I remember the others talking about how you used to be the one who smiled first in the group, and how you loved showing off your dance skills. I remember the concert you guys put on when I was little, and Creati told me that it had been you who put together the dance number that everyone worked so hard on, so I knew that they were telling the truth about how you used to be. But honestly, I never saw that person after what happened on Nabu Island. All I saw was someone full of hurt and resentment."

Mina wilted at those words before she mumbled, "Sounds like I turned out to be a real piece of work."

"I wouldn't say that," Eri replied as they reached the elevators. "You weren't cruel or even unkind to anyone in the alliance for as long as I knew you. Your resentment was entirely directed at our enemies, which apparently made you a terror on the battlefield. Outside of all the fighting, you just seemed sad all the time. At one point, I overheard Akarui chewing you out for trying to get yourself killed on what was supposed to be a hit-and-run mission. Judging from how much yelling was happening, it probably wasn't the first time you two had argued about it."

"I guess some things'll never change," Mina laughed hollowly as she pushed the button to summon the lift. "But… it makes sense that I would do that. That whole time that Kurai was dead, and I knew that I'd never get to see him again in this life, everything just seemed so… pointless. Makes sense that I'd try to do whatever I could to go and be with him." Perking up with another awkward smile, she added, "I guess that sounds pretty lame, right?"

"I wouldn't know," Eri answered honestly. "I don't think I know what it means to be in love, so I have no idea what losing someone who means everything to me would feel like. I've been scared to lose friends, and I've grieved for them when they've gone, but I doubt that any of that compares to what you lost, Ashid Queen."

"What's with the hero name?" Mina asked with a slight tilt of her head. "I've told you to call me 'Mina'."

"Sorry," Eri apologized as the elevator finally arrived. "In the future I only ever called all of you by your hero names. Using your actual names still feels weird to me."

"Better get used to it, now that we're classmates and all," her companion replied, still smiling.

"Going to school," Eri replied with a little laugh of her own as they stepped into the lift. "Here's something I never thought I'd get to do, and with my heroes, no less."

"Well, you should count yourself among those heroes while you're at it," Mina told her with a small nudge from her shoulder. "You brought Kurai back to me, and even if that makes me selfish, it makes you my hero."

Eri blushed at the praise, ducking her head as the doors closed in front of them. Even so, that didn't stop her from saying, "Thank you, Mina."

Classes were more difficult to sit through than Eri had initially thought they would be, but she said nothing in the way of a complaint, doing her best to take notes diligently and answer the few questions that were thrown her way throughout the day. She got most of the answers right, though she wasn't exactly sure if it was because the teachers were giving her easier questions or if the notes she was taking were making enough of a difference in her short-term memory to let her get by.

The strangest part of the experience of her first day was that she had been told to take Kurai's seat in each room, since it was now vacant. The old adage about walking a mile in someone else's shoes echoed in her head several times throughout the day as a result. It was with a trace of black humor that she also thought that it must be karmic justice for bringing Kurai back to life against his will, her now having to step up and take his place in more than one way.

When time came for combat practice and she went to change into her hero costume- the same getup she had been wearing when she had broken onto campus- she was surprised to find a pair of white bracelets in the case along with her tights and cape. Each one felt a little heavier than it looked, and had a small black button on the back, though she had no idea what purpose they were supposed to serve. She was about to put them back in the case when she noticed that there was a slip of paper clipped to the inside of the lid, so she pulled it out and unfolded it to find a note in familiar handwriting.

'Eri,' the note began, 'in addition to your repaired costume, you'll find a pair of compressed gloves that will assist you in controlling your quirk's physical applications. Midoriya used a similar support item when he fought alongside my brother and All Might on I-island in order to draw out his full power, and my version is more durable. Still, I advise not using a hundred percent of your quirk all the time- they're not as good as Kurai's arm.' There were also instructions on how to apply and take off the items after they had been activated, so she made sure to memorize them quickly.

"Thanks, Akarui," she murmured, a little smile decorating her lips as she put the note back and slipped the two bracelets on her wrists. The support items were a welcome addition to her costume- up until now, she had been using Rewind at the same time as One For All in order to keep from blasting her arms and legs off, but sometimes her concentration could slip, and she would end up needing an extra moment to focus on reversing the damage done to her body, which could prove fatal in a real battle. If these bracelets worked as intended, her reaction time and battle prowess would increase dramatically.

Once Eri was fully dressed, she tapped the button on her wrist, only being slightly surprised when the item glowed and expanded to cover her entire hand and forearm in white armor that moved smoothly with her hand and fingers. She could make a fist easily enough, but she did note that she wasn't exactly going to be able to write kanji since the finer motor points were slightly impeded by the light metal's presence. She was about to laugh to herself at the thought that Akarui was slipping up on his designs, but then she remembered that she was comparing the boy to a version of himself that had yet to come about.

With a sigh that expressed her sense of loss for her future friends, she shut the suitcase and put it in her locker- one of the few things she hadn't inherited from Kurai. Shaking off the morose thoughts, she went to join the other girls, who had already changed into their hero costumes, having finished well before her due to their speed earned from constant practice. That was okay, though- she was confident that she wouldn't be left behind when it came to the actual exercise.

That confidence turned out to be well-versed, thanks to her extensive training from Togata, Akarui, and even Bakugo whenever he had felt like it in her future.

Since everyone else had just come back from their first week of work studies for the new semester, the teachers had decided that it would be prudent to measure their students' progress against robots, as to see what they could do when they did not have to hold back. Officially, Eri was interning with Gran Torino, one of the few who knew the complete story about One For All and her appearance in this time. In actuality, she had been busy during the winter break taking a crash course designed by Akarui to help her get ready for school life- she hadn't even met the elderly hero yet.

Still, even though the others had further mastered their quirks with the help of their new mentors, Eri had an advantage that they didn't when it came to combat. The students of UA had studied how to use their powers and how to make the best use of them. Eri had grown up in a world where learning how to fight wasn't an option, even for a child- it was a way of life.

To a newly-strengthened Eri, the lumbering robots were nothing more than walking targets made of flimsy scrap metal. When she was given fifteen targets to take out as quickly as she could, she activated the gauntlets and went to work without a word, lightning crackling in the slipstream she left behind her. She punched straight through three of them without blinking before lashing out with a reverse kick that sent the pieces flying into another five of the drones, causing irreparable damage that left each of them as smoldering piles of junk. Almost simultaneously, she leaped up so that she wound up descending toward one of the zero-point robots from high above, her red cape swirling about her as she prepared her next move- something that she had admittedly not tried before, but now seemed as good a time as any.

Whirling herself like a high-speed corkscrew, she barreled toward the massive robot, lightning blazing in her eyes and across the right gauntlet as she drew her fist back. "Howitzer… SMASH!"

She went through the giant like a hot knife through butter, the lightning and wind pressure building up inside of it to cause a devastating explosion that destroyed it from the inside and sent its parts flying in every direction, leaving the remaining, smaller robots in a similar state by the time the screaming winds and heatwaves had settled down.

Once everything was still on the testing ground, Eri leaped out of the remnants and landed lightly in front of the instructors and other students, many of whom were looking stunned at her display. "Well done, Eri," Aizawa nodded before anyone else could speak.

This was enough to keep most of his students quiet with continued surprise, but of course, there was one student in particular who was irritated by the outcome. "Teacher's pet," Bakugo growled. "Where do you One For All losers get off on using my moves, huh?! Get your own style, quit stealing from mine!"

"I believe the saying goes that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery," Eri answered as she walked toward them, seemingly unperturbed by his negativity. "I learned from the best in the future, yourself included, Ground Zero. Now that I have the responsibility of wielding the greatest quirk in the world, I felt it made sense to model my fighting style after people like you and Lemillion."

For a second, it seemed like this would mollify the explosive teenager, but he was quick to shout, "If you're gonna copy me, then do it right! Don't call it a Howitzer unless it leaves the ground underneath you on fire!"

"Yes sir," Eri replied with a small incline of her head that left Bakugo looking befuddled.

Off to the side, Ochaco was asking, "Anyone else think this is kinda weird?"

Izuku grinned a little as he replied, "This actually make a lot of sense, if you think about it. Kacchan was one of the people who survived in the future for the longest, so it makes sense that she'd have grown up looking to him for approval, especially after he became the leader of the alliance."

"Maybe, but I'll bet you anything that your approval is the one she'll be after the most," Mina answered as Bakugo started going on a rant about what else Eri needed to do before she could even think about trying to pass her last attack off as an ultimate move derived from his fighting style. "You and Kurai saved her as a little girl, and you were the leader who lasted the longest against Shigaraki in her future. She thinks the world of you guys."

"She's got a point," Ochaco commented. "Little Eri always gets the most excited whenever you get to visit her, and I imagine that those feelings have only gotten stronger over time. You're her hero like All Might is your hero, Deku."

As if by coincidence, Eri lightly skipped over to where the three students had been talking among themselves before stopping in front of Izuku and asking, "How did I do, Deku?"

He immediately favored her with a smile and the words, "You were amazing, Eri. Or should I call you Lamillion?"

"Chronoa, actually," she grinned sheepishly as she bounced on the balls of her feet. "I figured it might be better for Lemillion's branding if he didn't have a heroine with the same name competing on the market after he graduates. So I came up with a different alias: Chronoa, the Temporal Heroine. I'll be the hero who turns back the hands of time for those who endure tragedy."

"Interesting," Izuku murmured. "You're telling people about your rewind power without actually calling it as such while also alluding to your ability to reverse time itself, which could be kinda risky, but seeing as All Might went forty years without ever revealing his quirk's name or origins to the public, it's not impossible to believe that she can create enough mystique to obscure her true power and its capabilities…"

As he continued to spiral into one of his mumbling episodes, Eri looked over at Ochaco and asked, "Has he always done this?"

"Ever since I've known him," the gravity girl answered with a grin. "It's been a while since I've seen him do it, though."

"Not since our matchup against Class B last semester, right?" Mina asked, which Ochaco confirmed. "Oh yeah, speaking of those guys, I heard that the other Americans are supposed to be arriving sometime this week. They'll be joining Mister Khan's class since we already got Team RWBY."

"I heard a lot about Team JNPR growing up, but I've never actually met any of them," Eri commented. "In my future, they were one of the key resistance groups in North America, kind of like how we were in Japan."

"If they're cut from the same cloth as everyone in Team RWBY, they've gotta be amazing," Ochaco murmured. "I wonder what they're like…?"

Eri opened her eyes and let out a frustrated sigh as she looked at the expectant face of All Might, which quickly took on a disappointed characteristic as he realized that she had been unable to succeed yet again. "I don't understand it," she sighed as she uncrossed her legs and set them on the floor in front of the couch in the teacher's lounge. "It's as if ever since I revived Kai, the vestiges won't talk to me." This wasn't the first time that she had tried to contact the past users of One For All within her subconscious without them replying, but now it was becoming worrying, and more than a little frustrating.

It had been a few days since she had started attending school with the other students when All Might had finally approached her about training One For All with the assistance of Izuku and Akarui. She had readily agreed, being aware that they knew more about how the quirk functioned than anyone else alive, sans Kurai, but he wasn't exactly in a position to help her right now.

He had started by seeing what she could handle without using Rewind in tandem to repair the damage done to her body by higher levels of power output. It turned out that she could readily use about fifteen percent of the quirk without hurting herself, but pushing anything past about a third of the limit without Rewind or the support gauntlets was going to start breaking bones. Her toughened body gave her a respectable start, and unlike when Izuku had started his training, she already knew how to fight pretty well. She wasn't well-muscled, which would need to change if she was going to wield One For All at full power without the assistance of her first quirk, but that would only come with time. Other than that one drawback, it seemed like she would have a smooth track to mastering the quirk and all of its aspects.

Which of course is why her current predicament was frustrating to both her and the eighth wielder of the quirk. "Perhaps the vestiges are resting, or they don't think they need to say anything right now," All Might guessed as he looked down at his tea. "It may be hard for them to talk to you, young Eri. Young Midoriya needed to be able to control twenty-five percent of his power before the other users spoke with him, and they couldn't do it for very long. Maybe we need to wait until you're able to use the quirk more easily before they'll be able to manifest again."

"That just doesn't feel right," Eri said as she scowled down at her hands, which had clenched on her thighs. "They never said anything about me needing to unlock more of the power to maintain contact, which I feel like at least one of them would have mentioned before we lost touch. I'm starting to wonder if All For One's doctor didn't succeed in extracting the secondary quirks from yours'."

"We'll mention it to young Hikari to see if he has any theories on why the problem is persisting," All Might sighed. "My apologies for having you work for so long on a seemingly fruitless endeavor."

"No, I'm sorry I can't figure out what's wrong," Eri replied somberly. "I know I haven't had this power for long, but Kai and Deku and everyone else who had this power before entrusted it to me. I can't help but feel like I'm not living up to my potential as the eleventh wielder because I don't know what I'm doing." She had to admit to herself that it was strange to be sitting across from the man that everyone in the future had revered as a legend, only to find that he was a surprisingly normal person. She had seen him around when she was little at UA, but she'd never really had a reason to interact with him very much before he had been killed by the Liberation Front.

"Young Eri, let me tell you a little-known secret among us One For All wielders," the blond man said with a weak chuckle. "None of us really knew what we were doing, either. I think the one exception to that rule might be Young Midoriya, but it still stands."

"What do you mean, sir?"

"That boy always knew the 'why' of what he was doing whenever he used One For All," All Might sighed wistfully. "Every time he used it, he made sure that someone would be able to smile because of it, and for nothing else."

"I suppose that's true," Eri agreed with a faint smile of her own. "It's been years for me, but I can remember it as if it were yesterday when he took me up into the sky and gave me that smile that said everything would be okay." After a moment of thought, she added, "He never lost that smile, you know."

"Oh?"

"Up until the day he died, Deku smiled at people while he saved them," she informed her instructor. "He said that people who need rescuing have probably been through something really scary, and they need someone to show them that they're going to be okay. Maybe that's why it's so easy for me to remember how he saved me all those years ago- he just never stopped doing what he did best."

When All Might said nothing at first, Eri wondered if his thoughts had gone astray, but then she noticed the film of tears gathering in the corners of his eyes. "That's what my master told me when I was first learning how to use One For All," he said softly. "She told me that those who can always smile are the strongest…"

"And Deku was the strongest of all your students," Eri said with a sad smile of her own. "He lived out your ideals to the end of what can only be called the worst of times."

"The worst of times, huh…?" All Might murmured. His eyes suddenly sharpened, and he looked at Eri with a new level of interest as he asked, "Do you know what happened to All For One in your future? The man, not the quirk."

"I do," Eri nodded solemnly. "He was killed in prison the same day that the Liberation Front attacked UA."

"Wha-? By a guard?" All Might could barely form the words as they came.

"No," Eri said with a swift shake of her head. "I don't know all the details, but by all accounts, it was a freak accident." Before the retired pro could ask for details, she went on to say, "One of the automated turrets had a glitch and opened fire, killing him almost instantly. We lived in fear that the Front would try to jailbreak him for a while because we didn't find out about his death until after Deku had taken charge of the UA Alliance and started coordinating with other pockets of resistance. By then, of course, Shigaraki had revealed that he also had the power to take and give quirks, so it seemed like the heroes were just back at square one in terms of dealing with that particular problem. On the other hand, I'm sure a lot of them were relieved that they didn't have to deal with two of the same kind."

"I'm sure," All Might murmured, appearing troubled.

Seeing this, Eri asked, "Have I said something to upset you, sir?"

"No, no," All Might said as he waved the matter aside. "I'm sorry to keep making you relive what must be painful memories, Young Eri. I'm supposed to be helping you with One For All, and here I am essentially asking to trade war stories."

"Well, we've more or less hit a wall on what to do with One For All right now," Eri shrugged with a slightly rueful grin. "We should have Principal Nezu and Akarui observe during our next session if at all possible. Maybe they'll be able to see something that we're missing."

"It's worth a shot," All Might agreed as he stood up, his student moving quickly to do the same. "Thank you for your time, Young Eri. I'll keep doing what research I can on the past users of One For All. For now, concentrate on your studies- you're doing very well so far."

"Thank you, sir," she smiled before she bowed to him and took her leave. "I'll see you in class tomorrow!"

"You've talked about wanting to get better so that you can go home, which is an important step in recovery, but I think it's time we look at what that means for you." A young woman with bright red skin and sapphire eyes looked up from her notepad to see Kurai staring down at his folded hands, as he often did when he was deep in thought. "You've come along very well these last couple of weeks, Kayaba, considering all that you've been through. I honestly don't see you needing to stay with us for too long, which means that you need to start considering what direction you want your life to take once you leave our care. Since you no longer aspire to be a hero, what does progress outside of this hospital look like for you?"

The lady's name was Sayuri, and since Kurai had been put in Itomori Hospital, he had been seeing her twice a week for counseling sessions to help him restructure his thought process so that when the time came for him to leave, he would have a better hold on his emotional state. He had learned many coping mechanisms for dealing with his anger as he grew up, but Sayuri had been helping him apply those teachings to other excess emotions that could hinder his daily life if he did not get them under control.

Kurai didn't answer her question right away, and when he did, he spoke in a slow, methodical tone. "I actually talked about that with my closer friends before I even came here, and what I had in mind still seems like a good career for me," he murmured. "I was thinking about changing to a psychology major so that I can pursue counseling. Even if I can't fight on behalf of the innocent anymore, I still think that I'm meant to help others in another capacity." Despite his initial claims that he no longer wanted to focus on assisting others when his own life was such a mess, he had been unable to think of any other career paths that would sit well with his disposition. Talking his thoughts out and analyzing them in counseling had helped him to understand that even if his reckless tendencies had caused him to be so badly injured and killed, switching to a life that lacked the capacity to assist others in any manner was out of the question.

"Counseling?" Sayuri mused as she made another note. "Why do you feel as if that would be a good fit for you? Keep in mind that we are focusing on your well-being, and not that of others for the moment. It's admirable that you still feel the need to help those around you, but we're working to get you better before that can happen."

"It's what I've always done," Kurai answered with a shrug. "It's what my father taught me to do, and his father before him. That's not to say that I feel an obligation to follow in their footsteps- but it is a large part of my upbringing. It's too large a part of who I am to just set it aside in a half-hearted pursuit of some other career. I also know that empathy is a very powerful thing, especially in this kind of field of work. With everything that I've been made to endure, I think it'd be hard to find a person whose suffering I couldn't relate to." Looking up at his counselor with a wry smile, he added, "People will hardly listen to someone in these kinds of situations who hasn't suffered like they have, much less take their advice."

Sayuri returned the smile before saying, "I suppose you have a point."

Similar to Kurai, she had lost her parents to a villain attack when she was in middle school, though she had then been raised by her grandparents. The same attack had left her without her left hand's two small fingers, and a rough series of scars on the same side of her body. Kurai had no doubt that it was for those reasons that Doctor Kentaro had referred her as his attending counselor, but he also had to admit that it had lent him to heeding her words more than if she were just some person who had a degree in psychology.

Now she looked at him with a grim expression as she said, "I can see that you feel very strongly about this, which is often a good thing. However, I need to have you consider whether or not you would be able to handle the stress that comes with this kind of job. I can tell you that it isn't easy hearing about all of the atrocities that people have to endure in this superhuman society of ours'. It can wear on you, and given the degree to which you've broken down before coming here, it may not be healthy for you to take on those kinds of burdens. After all, you'd be responsible not only for maintaining your own well-being, but also that of the people who come to you for help."

Kurai's gaze fell back toward his lap as he answered, "You told me that it was important to have a support system at home that I trust, and I do. I trust them to keep me from getting to this point again."

"They weren't able to stop you this time," Sayuri reminded him, though not unkindly. "What makes you think that they can do so from now on?"

"We didn't know what was wrong with me last time," the boy responded quickly. "Even if we still don't have a diagnosis for whatever I've developed, I can't get out of here until my problem has been recognized and medicated appropriately. After that, they'll know what to be on the lookout for, and help me to safeguard against it. I don't intend to make them do all the work, but having them watching out for me would certainly help me feel more at ease and confident that I can get through the challenges that life throws at me- career or otherwise."

The counselor nodded before making another note as she said, "It's good that you can still place so much trust in other people… Most people who come to me trust no one but themselves."

"Which is probably what skews their perception in the first place," Kurai remarked dryly.

"Probably."

Eri had come in from another training session with All Might when she was surprised to see four newcomers in her dorm's common space. They were spread across the room, so she might have missed them if it weren't for the excited Ruby practically bouncing off the walls as she greeted the other teenagers as old friends.

Before Eri could make her way over, Izuku walked up with a smile and said, "Emiri, glad you could make it in time to meet our new schoolmates." To the newcomers, he added, "This is the friend I was telling you guys about. She's kinda new to our school, too."

The girl smiled politely in return as she realized that these people were probably the new transfers from America. "Hello," she said by way of greeting as she came to stand in front of the quartet, each of them wearing pleasant looks as they gathered to meet her. "I'm Emiri Hikota. It's nice to meet all of you."

"Hey," said a young man with blond hair and bright blue eyes. "I'm Jaune Arc, and the pleasure's all mine." He was well-muscled for their age group, though nowhere near as sculpted as Mirio. Even so, Eri could make out the beginnings of the images she had grown up seeing when people talked about the Immovable Hero, Huntsman.

"Hi there!" giggled a short girl with orange hair and a healthy dusting of freckles on her cheeks and nose. Her pale jade-colored eyes stared at Eri from very close until she stepped back and touched Eri on the nose as she chirped, "Boop!"

"Nora, we discussed this," Jaune sighed. "Name first, then touching faces- maybe."

"Sorry," the girl called Nora grinned as she hopped backward a full pace before addressing a confused-looking Eri again. "Back in the States, I'm commonly known as the 'Queen of the Castle'! My friends call me Nora, but I guess you guys go by last names here? So I guess I'm Valkyrie!" Putting her hands on her hips, she declared, "That's right, UA! Nora Valkyrie is here to dominate!"

"Er… Dominate what?" Eri asked in an aside to Izuku, who shrugged helplessly.

"No idea," he told her in a lowered tone. "She seems kinda out of it- she might be overtired from the jetlag."

"You're probably right," she murmured. Still, she found it hard to believe that the small, hyperactive, giggle machine in front of her was going to become the legendary heroine, Magnhild, who was said to be able to crush hundreds of villains with thunder itself. Even as Eri was recalling the tales concerning the woman, Nora ran off, something new having apparently seized her attention.

"Good evening," said a soft-spoken young man with long black hair that he kept tied back in a ponytail. "A pleasure to make your acquaintance. I am Lie Ren." A single magenta stripe ran through his bangs on the left side of his head that matched his eerily intense eyes. He's the Shinobi Hero, Tempest- or at least, he will be.

In the future, Tempest had been a hero who struck terror into the hearts of many villains all across North America. He was calculating, thorough, and some had even called him ruthless. Once he had a target, he never gave up the chase, and even unto Eri's last days in the future, no one but his closest friends had known what his quirk was, though many theorized it to be some kind of stealth ability. His enemies had described him as a storm that struck out of nowhere, annihilating everything in its path, only to fade into the horizon without a trace before it could be tamed.

"Hello, Hikota," now said a strikingly beautiful girl with bright red hair and emerald green eyes. "I am Pyrrha Nikos. It's very lovely to meet you." Her voice was soft, but there was an underlying strength that was also evident in her carriage- her back was perfectly straight, she maintained eye contact with no difficulty, and her pronunciation was fluid enough that Japanese could have been her first language. "I hope that being in different classes won't prevent any camaraderie between all of us."

"It's very nice to meet all of you," Eri replied as she inclined her head politely. So she's Axios…

Unlike the other members of Team JNPR, Pyrrha had not been known for her feats of daring in the war against villains the world over, but rather her sudden and tragic end at the very beginning of the never-ending battles. When the Paranormal Liberation Front overthrew the current government in Japan, other criminal organizations across the globe became emboldened to strike more openly. One such organization known as the 'White Fang' moved to destabilize things in Texas, and many heroes and students from Second Amendment were sent to fight. During the very first battle, Axios had died when she opted to stay behind and bought her allies enough time to retreat by holding off nearly a hundred villains on her own. Her name was immortalized, and many others took up the fight against the villains after that, having been enraged at the thought of a child hero being made to die in the place of far more capable heroes. Of course, that outrage could only last for so long, and before too long had passed, only her closest friends had continued to fight for the cause in her name.

Putting the thoughts aside, Eri reminded herself that these young people were going to go on to become different heroes than the ones she had heard tale of. After all, Team JNPR had never come to Japan to assist UA in her future, so their paths had already been drastically altered.

With that in mind, she brightened her smile and asked, "How was your flight coming here?"

"The flight went as smoothly as it could- for our team, anyway," Pyrrha said with a slightly knowing smile that Ren seemed to mirror, even if for only a second.

"Tell that to my dinner," Jaune grumbled as he rubbed his stomach. "Crow's driving took care of my lunch, too."

"That guy drives like a crazy rollercoaster!" Nora giggled as she ran by, apparently trying to catch Dark Shadow while Tokoyami could only look on in utter bewilderment. "Come back, birdy!"

"Sorry, but Dad coulda been driving, and it'd have the same results for their fearless leader," Yang chuckled as she approached the group. "Right, Vomit Boy?"

"I thought I told you not to call me that!" Jaune protested as he turned red with embarrassment.

"She's not wrong," Ruby said as she went running after Nora.

"Way to sell me out, Crater Face!"

"That explosion was an accident!"

"Quit picking on my sister!" Yang growled as her eyes flared red, causing Jaune to yelp and hide behind Ren, who just looked on with a vague interest.

"Please don't fight in here!" Izuku pleaded. "Mister Aizawa will choke all of us with his scarf if we break something again!"

"Again?" Pyrrha asked, looking a little concerned. "Are fights very common at this school?"

"No!" Izuku said quickly. "We just… Well, we had an incident a few days before Christmas, and there was a big mess that the teachers had to clean up… We've kinda been walking on eggshells ever since."

"Please don't think badly of our school based on a single incident," Eri hurried to add. "It's actually really nice to live here."

"Fights don't really worry us," Jaune said as Yang moved on to break up an entanglement between Nora, Ruby, and Dark Shadow. Looking at Pyrrha and Ren, he asked, "Remember that food fight after Thanksgiving break?"

"How could we forget?" Ren replied dryly. "Ruby turned all of us into a modern art exhibit before Vice Principal Goodwitch showed up."

"At least the Headmaster convinced her to take it easy on us," Pyrrha reminded them. "Personally, I think he found it all rather amusing."

"What… did you guys do?" Izuku asked them with a quizzical tilt to his head.

"They lost," Yang grinned as she walked by, dragging Ruby by her collar while Nora clung stubbornly to a now-defeated Dark Shadow and Tokoyami.

"Says the girl who got chucked out the building!" Nora cackled as she was dragged.

As the other Americans laughed at their friends- or in Ren's case, simply smiled- Eri and Izuku could only look at one another with the thought that no matter when the Paranormal Liberation Front did decide to attack, they wouldn't be lacking for interesting times in the interim.

That weekend, she had her first formal training session with her younger self. The little girl was clearly nervous, and with good reason, but Eri was confident that she would be able to help her gain control of her power sooner rather than later.

In her time, she had been trained in secret by Akarui while under Togata's supervision. There had been some guesswork involved on his part, and it was difficult keeping the then-crippled boy alive, much less able to communicate while they hid from Shigaraki's forces. Still, after a few months of fumbling with control of her unstable quirk, she managed to develop a sense for how to release the power stored up in her horn, which eventually allowed her to restore Lemillion's quirk, as well as save Akarui's life by reverting his body to the state it had been in before he had forced Solar Intelligence into overdrive on I-island. She had been made to master her fears regarding her quirk and past in order to keep herself from using Rewind in an all-or-nothing manner, much like how Izuku had once struggled to properly utilize One For All at manageable levels.

In its natural state, her quirk amassed energy that could be vented either by her own will, or bursting out when her body could no longer contain the power. Initially this meant that her training periods had been somewhat sporadic, as her body did not always build up energy at the same pace, and it had to reach a certain level before she could try to forcefully activate it. However, as she got older, her body amassed the necessary power more quickly, allowing her to practice more often until she could use her quirk as easily as she could walk.

From there she had gone on to master specific aspects of Rewind, such as regenerating certain areas of the body while leaving others alone, or rewinding a person's body to the point before genetics had developed to create quirks without killing them as a byproduct of the reversal. She could even rewind her own body to repair damage done to her in battle, though her body did not replenish the energy she spent as a result of the reversal.

Over the years, she had also tried to increase her power limit in various ways, but had never been successful, even with Akarui's attempts to help. Now that she had One For All, though, she did not have to wait for her body to stockpile the energy needed for her quirk to function. She had all the power she could want to fuel the quirk- her horn could go from a small bump on her head to a full-sized protrusion in less than a second if she so wished it.

Still, that fact wasn't going to help her younger self right now, she had to remind herself. She would have to rely upon the lessons she had learned as a result of trial and error during her early childhood. At least she won't have to learn by making the same mistakes that I did, she thought with a slightly rueful grin as she plodded through the snow scape that had become UA.

It didn't take long for her to arrive at the teacher's dorm, and her smile brightened considerably when she saw a familiar face sitting on one of the benches out front. Togata gave her a cheery smile and a wave as she jogged over to stand within easy speaking distance. "Hi, Lemillion," she said once she had stopped moving.

"What's shakin', Eri?" he replied cheerfully. "The classes running you over yet?"

"A little bit, yes," she admitted as she cast her gaze downward for a moment. "School is a lot harder than I thought it would be. I always assumed that trying to find a safe house from villains was the hardest thing to master, but then Mister Ectoplasm handed us three pages of trigonometry…" She shuddered as she remembered the confusing swirl of numbers and letters that she had tried to make sense of for hours on end, with very limited success.

"Yeah, classes always kicked my butt like crazy, and I don't have the excuse of growing up in the apocalypse!" Mirio chuckled as he scratched his head abashedly. "Still, a hero's gotta do what hero's gotta do, am I right?"

"You are right," Eri grinned back at him. The expression became a little more rueful as she added, "Being in class with everyone I grew up looking to for guidance and protection… Now they're talking to me like an equal- it's… cool, but it kinda makes my head spin at the same time."

She resolved to tell him at a later time about her attempts to interact with the other students at their invitation during a less pressing time, because she was certain that he would get quite a laugh out of them. He'd probably like the bit about Red Riot trying to induct me into the 'horn buddies' club with Ashid Queen, she thought as she repressed a giggle at the memory of Kirishima insisting that the members of their group greeted one another by activating their quirks and then butting heads. She'd had the feeling that he was pulling her leg, but decided to oblige- and had later gotten a stern talking-to from Recovery Girl about why someone with One For All shouldn't go around head-butting her friends.

Talking to Lemillion was no different than it had been in the future, something that had aided her greatly in settling into the current time period. He had been taken aback by her story at first, but after the initial shock, he had accepted her with the same friendliness and warmth that he had her younger self. He made time for her whenever he could, provided that he wasn't busy with little Eri, and he always managed to make her laugh- or at least smile- with bad jokes and stories about his failures as Sir Nighteye's apprentice. He talked to her like she was another friend from UA, and not an oracle of doom like many others had regarded her as. She knew that it wasn't on purpose, so she bore no resentment for the fact, but she had noticed that in spite of their attempts to welcome her with open arms, the other students always had a slight edge in the way that they approached and interacted with her. Even Izuku, who she had enjoyed getting reacquainted with, always had just a hint of a shadow about him whenever they spoke, as if he felt guilty for his part in causing her to become the newest soldier in the war against All For One.

Mirio swept aside those thoughts as he gestured toward the doors in an excited fashion before saying, "We oughta go in and warm up, yeah? Little Eri's horn has been kinda achy, so Mister Aizawa figured it was time we start up her training for real. I'll make us some tea so we can have a tea party in her room while you two talk quirks, sound good?"

"Peachy," she grinned, causing him to laugh.

"You remembered!" he said with evident delight. "Don't worry, I made sure to get some apples for the two of you to snack on. I tried to get Sato from Class 1-A to make some candy apples, but Mister Aizawa was being a real Grumpy Gus and said that little Eri's had too much sugar this week. I'm like, come on, man! It's snowy outside, it's practically a rule that kids are supposed to have too much sugar when it's like this!"

"I'll see if I can't sneak some over the next time I come," Eri giggled, though she had to admit, her favorite snack was sounding pretty nice right about now. As they reached the doors, she found herself pausing before she turned to Togata and said, "Can I ask a question, Lemillion?"

"Shoot," he said, drawing back from opening the door, having sensed that she wanted to finish the topic at hand before they went in.

"How do you find it in you to smile and make people feel better all the time?" she asked him. "I know your own life hasn't been easy, especially given what you lost trying to protect Kai and me, but you always made time to get me to smile, both now and in the future. How do you do it?"

Togata appeared to mull the question over for a moment before he shrugged and answered, "I guess that even though there's a bunch of reasons for me to be sad, I try to remember that the reasons I have to smile are more important. Your safety and happiness is more important than me having a superpower, so I do what I can to make sure that you and little Eri have a reason to smile. It's honestly that simple."

"That simple, huh?" Eri chuckled softly as she looked down at her snow-encrusted boots. "I don't know why I was expecting something more elaborate, but I guess the important things can often be easier to think about than we believe them to be."

"In concept, sure," Togata grinned ruefully. "Putting it into practice might be a little hard to follow through sometimes, but I think that it's worth it, especially when I get to see one of you two smiling back at me, you know?"

"Not really, but maybe I'll get some idea of what you're talking about once I can help her understand that she doesn't have to be afraid of our power," Eri admitted. "I never really got to save anyone in the future, unfortunately. I was able to heal our friends when I needed to, but it always felt like I was just postponing their deaths a little bit so that Shigaraki's thugs could have another shot at them later on. I feel like I never really got to save a life, and when I thought that I had saved Kai, it turns out that I only dragged him back into his personal hell."

Togata looked at her with a somber expression for a few seconds before he said, "You may not have been able to save Hikari the way that you imagined that you would be able to, but I'm pretty sure you saved everyone around him from a lot of misery and heartache in the long run. Sure, things were looking pretty rough there for a minute, but he's trying to get better for their sake, right? And that just might make the difference when Shigaraki and the Liberation Front come at us."

"Kai doesn't want to be a hero, though," Eri sighed as she moved to open the door. "So what does it matter, in the end?"

"I wasn't talking about Hikari when I said that it might make a difference," Togata told her as he kept his hand on the handle so that she was unable to enter just yet. "All of Hikari's friends know what he had to go through to save them, and now that he's back with them, I'm sure that they'll fight twice as hard to return that favor to him- and that's what'll make the difference that I was talking about. And when that comes to pass, who knows how many people they'll save with their efforts?" The senior beamed at her as he added, "When the sun rises on our friends' win, we'll all know that it was thanks to you and your courage, Eri."

The girl felt heat creeping into her face as her hero poured his praise for her at her feet, wanting to deny that her efforts would truly make such a difference, but she couldn't do it. Lemillion's encouragement and belief in her meant too much for her to just try and sweep them aside as mere fantasies. So she shuffled her feet awkwardly and managed to mumble out, "I'm glad you believe in me, even if I still can't bring myself to quite do it. That does mean a lot to me."

"Hey, come on," Togata laughed as he opened the door for her. "I can't have my favorite peach going sour on me, right? So let's go and make sure that it doesn't happen to either of you!" With that, he moved inside and made for the elevator that would lead him up to little Eri's room, where she was awaiting the heroes who could finally deliver her from the fear of her own accursed power.

The days continued to creep by slowly, with irregular contact from Kurai until the last week of January, when he was given permission to have his phone by his doctor. He had said that he believed Kurai had reached a point in his counseling where it would benefit him to have his support group on hand if he needed them, so the arrangements were made to have the device returned to him after nearly a month of having to write letters and exchanging brief calls with the lounge phone, where there was very little privacy. Mina had wanted to be the one to take the device to him, but her work schedule did not allow for it, so Eri and Ochaco had once again donned their disguises as Kurai's cousins in order to make the visit.

They weren't able to spend very long with him in person since the approval went through on a school night, but it was clear that he was glad to see them, even if for a little while. The visit also did Eri a lot of good, seeing her childhood hero on a path to recovery from the tragedy that she felt she had had inflicted upon him. While it wasn't safe to say that he was back to his old self, there were hints of his former confidence and humor emerging from the haunted, fragile shell he had become. He was also clearly glad to have a way to communicate more easily with his friends and family, and it was noticeable that once he had his phone back, Mina spent a fair amount of her limited free time in her room.

Free time in general had become a somewhat scarce commodity for the students in the hero course at UA, with all of them having to undertake a work study that took up a lot of their off hours. In Eri's case, she was being made to study extra hard during those hours under Aizawa's unforgiving gaze, and sometimes it felt as though her brain was going to burst from the amounts of information she was trying to retain. Even so, she never complained or voiced her frustrations, and her teacher eventually surprised her by asking her why that was after one particularly difficult Modern Art History exam.

"Why should I complain?" she shrugged as she gathered her things so that she could head back to the dorms. "There are people out there who are a lot worse off than I am, and there will be many more like them if we aren't ready when the war begins. I don't have time to be wasting on complaining about how hard this all is for me."

"You might want to rethink that," he said softly, which confused the girl. This was a man who tolerated no backtalk and even less complaining from his students, and now he was telling her that she should spend time bemoaning her lot in life?

Seeing the expression of bewilderment on her face, Aizawa sighed before he told her, "I've noticed that ever since Hikari was put in the hospital, you've kept to yourself to such a degree that I doubt is healthy, given your age and circumstances. I'm not saying that you should start wearing your heart on your sleeve, but it's not good for you to internalize everything, either. You need to have someone to talk to about the things that are getting to you, whether it's the upcoming battle with Shigaraki and his forces, or just that you can't stand to take another English test. I'm not even saying that it has to be me that you come to with these complaints. But bottling everything up inside doesn't end well for people with your set of responsibilities."

Eri smiled grimly and replied, "I don't know that I could vent about it if I tried, sir. In the future, we were barely able to mourn our dead, much less take the time to process how it made us feel."

"You're not in the future, Eri," Aizawa interrupted before she could continue explaining her habits. "You're in the present, and you have this time to take advantage of so that you can heal the wounds that you may have even forgotten about. You have people who care about you that are ready to help if you ask for it."

Eri finished packing her bag as images of Mirio, Izuku, and others in her class flickered in her mind, both from the present and future days. She knew that they would jump through any hoop to help her, which was also why she didn't feel right about asking them for help. I've already taken up enough of their time and efforts by bringing my problems with me, she decided as she shouldered her backpack. I know Dad is worried about me, but I'll be alright as long as I can keep working toward Shigaraki's downfall.

"Even heroes need rescuing sometimes," Aizawa said as she reached the door. "That doesn't stop just because you're no longer a little girl."

Eri paused and looked back over her shoulder, but her teacher was already looking down at the papers she had handed him on her way out. Hiking her backpack up on her shoulders, she exited the room, her mind laden with numerous conflicting thoughts.

She came back to the dorms to find that those from Endeavor, Gang Orca, and Fat Gum's agencies were the only ones who had the night off. Everyone else was still out, working hard under the watch of their pro mentors to keep Japan safe from the still-increasing criminal activities. Things had slowed down for a while following Kurai's nation-wide debut, but after his death was made public, crime had started to rise again, forcing the heroes to double down their efforts to keep the peace.

"Hey, Eri," Izuku said as he waved her over toward the kitchen. "We just finished making dinner, so I hope you're hungry!" Kirishima, Shoji, and Jiro were all poring over their math books with their bowls on the side, apparently trying to compile their work and eating time in order to keep a more efficient schedule.

"You idiots call this dinner?!" Bakugo shouted from where he was sitting alone, a half-empty bowl in front of him. Glaring at Todoroki, he then added, "You're a disgrace to your sister, Icy-Hot!"

Eri looked a question at her predecessor, who shook his head and sighed, "Long story."

As he was saying this, Todoroki approached the two of them with bowls full of the curry he had made before he said, "Here you go. Even if it's not the best, I hope it'll be filling."

"It smells great," Eri replied with a smile. "You're on your way to becoming the chef I knew in the future, Freezer Burn." The first time she had mentioned Todoroki's hero name to him, he had thought she was insulting him, leading her to explaining that he had chosen the name himself after deciding that he'd had enough of being called 'Icy-Hot' by Bakugo. The fact that the name was almost identical was never addressed by anyone, as they were glad that he had finally chosen something in the way of a hero name. After that, Todoroki had apparently changed his codename on the Hero Network, evidently having chosen to accept the name without any further protest on his part.

Now, he looked surprised at her latest revelation about his future self. "I was a good chef?" he inquired, to which she nodded quickly.

"Mhmm, we didn't always eat well, but whenever we were able to have the ingredients available, you made really good dinners for the alliance," she told him. "You never would tell me where you learned to cook, though."

"Probably my sister," Todoroki mused. "Both her and my brother, Natsuo, like making food, but she does it more often."

"I take it that she's really good?" Eri asked, now realizing what Bakugo had been yelling about when she came in.

"If Kacchan had it his way, they'd fire Lunch Rush and hire Todoroki's sister," Izuku chuckled.

"Damn right!" Bakugo shouted before he went back to tearing into his dinner with continuous grumbling.

As the thought of Todoroki learning from his sister- probably with a red-and-white apron involved- crossed Eri's mind, another thought interrupted her happier musings and caused the corners of her mouth to turn downward. Seeing this, Izuku asked her what was wrong, leading to her lowering her gaze and saying, "I know it's not really my business, but… Freezer Burn, have you told Endeavor about Dabi yet?"

The common space fell dead quiet at her question, and Eri cringed as she waited for the inevitable reprimand that she was no doubt in for. Instead of harsh words, however, Todoroki simply looked down at his food and answered, "I haven't really been able to bring it up. I can still hardly wrap my head around it as it is." He gestured with his head for a pensive Eri to follow him as he went on to say, "Thanks to my father, I didn't really have much interaction with any of my siblings until recent years, even though we all lived in the same house, and Toya was no exception to the rule. I honestly hardly knew him, and we all thought that he perished in a forest fire when I was just a little kid. I've been face-to-face with my brother, and I didn't even recognize him…"

His voice trailed off as he set his food down on the table, leading Izuku to pat his friend on the shoulder in a gesture of support. "It's not your fault, Todoroki," he said as they all began to sit. "It was dark that night, and based on the pictures we've seen of him as 'Dabi', he's clearly gone to considerable lengths to obscure his identity. He obviously didn't want anyone to recognize him, you included."

"I know that," Todoroki murmured as he sat heavily in his chair. "I just wish I knew how to break it to Endeavor and my mom… Not to mention Fuyumi and Natsuo…"

"If it would take the burden off your shoulders, I could explain it to them," Eri started to say, but Todoroki was already shaking his head in the negative.

"That would cause more problems than it would solve," he told her. "We don't really want to have to explain your identity to anyone that we don't absolutely have to. And something like this should come from a family member, even if I hardly qualify with my brother and sister."

"Ugh, shut up with the pity party!" Bakugo growled as he jammed his eating utensils into his empty bowl. "Your stupid old man might be one thing, but if your sister and brother heard that crap coming out of your mouth just now, they'd kick your ass almost as fast I can. Grow a pair and at least tell those two and your mom what they have a right to know! The asshat is gonna make it public sometime in the future anyway, isn't he?" He glared the last question at Eri, who squirmed uncomfortably under his gaze.

"He did make some kind of video release detailing his childhood after the war first began," she admitted. "I was little at the time, but Freezer Burn mentioned a couple of times that his goal always seemed to be aimed toward doing whatever he could to ruin their father's reputation, even long after he was dead."

Todoroki continued to stare at his food with a blank expression before he mumbled, "It's not as though my father doesn't deserve to have his crimes against his family exposed, but… Even I don't want him to be caught off-guard by this in public when the war begins. Unfortunate as it is, the heroes of this country need someone to rally behind, and he's the number one hero. There's no time to prop up another figurehead who can inspire others to act against Shigaraki's army when the time comes. So he needs to know what he's getting into before he goes out there." A slightly bitter smile creased the teen's face as he softly added, "For years, I wanted to see my father's actions come back and bite him, and now I'm actually going to be the one who delivers the news to him… There's a cautionary tale in getting what you wish for."

"I'm sorry I brought this up-"

Todoroki held up a hand to cut Eri off again before he said, "I've been running from the problem at hand- which I guess runs in the family?" Another wry expression crossed his face before he sobered up and muttered, "Whatever the reason, I'll eventually need to stop avoiding this mess and tell my father the truth." Flicking his gaze back and forth between the girl and Izuku, he finished by saying, "You two have a bad habit of forcing people to confront the ugly truths that they would rather avoid about themselves."

"Sorry…" the two One-For-All successors mumbled as they made an apologetic gesture almost simultaneously.

Bakugo snorted as he walked away while muttering, "You people spend way too much time apologizing for crap. If you can't back those up with actions, don't waste time with empty words."

"Sometimes the words are the only actions that are needed," Todoroki said over his shoulder.

"No one asked you, Icy-Hot!"

Around midnight that evening, a few of the work study students started to trickle in, Mina Ashido among them. She was rubbing her eyes to keep them open as she approached her room, only to nearly fall over as she stopped when she saw that there was someone standing in front of it. It took her tired eyes a few seconds to recognize Eri in a set of black pajamas that matched her dyed hair.

"You're looking more and more like Mister Aizawa, and it's starting to get kinda freaky," the pink girl mumbled as she shuffled toward her door, her feet fairly dragging along as she did. It had been a long evening on patrol with Hagakure and Aoyama under the stern eyes of the number nine hero, Yoroi Musha.

"Sorry to bother you so late," Eri apologized as she moved away from the door. "I just… needed someone to talk to."

Mina stopped with her hand on the doorknob before she looked at the other girl with bleary eyes and said, "Five sugars and cream."

"Huh?"

"If you wanna have some girl talk, I'm down, but I need some serious wake-up juice if I'm gonna keep my eyes open," she said when Eri simply looked befuddled. "I'ma get changed into my PJ's, so go make some coffee while I'm doing that, will ya?"

"With… a cream and five sugars?" Eri repeated. "Or was that five creams and one sugar?"

"Five sugars, one cream, one cup, five minutes," Mina mumbled as she opened her door and went inside. "At this time in the evening, I don't care if it's the crappy instant coffee that Iida swears by, I just need something to keep me up."

"Got it," Eri said as she moved down the hall to do as she had been instructed. "I'll be right back."

When she made it back with the requested item in hand, she thought that she had found Mina asleep sitting up against the wall on her bed. However, when she started to edge back out of the room, thinking that it might be better to try again on a day when the other girl wasn't just getting back from hero work, Mina perked up and said, "Bring that coffee back, if you know what's good for you, sweetie."

"Yes, ma'am!" Eri said as she quickly reentered the room and held out the mug for Mina to take, kicking the door shut behind her. "Sorry it took me so long."

"Relax, and call me Mina," the pink girl said as she cracked her heavy eyelids open and accepted the drink. "We've been over this."

"Right, sorry."

Mina let out a small sigh before she tentatively sipped at the coffee in the cup and then subsequently made a face. Seeing it, Eri winced and asked, "Is it that bad?"

"Not by any fault of yours'," Mina replied with a shrug before she tilted her head back and- much to Eri's surprise- quaffed the rest of the drink in one go. As the other girl set the mug down on her desk, she added, "I'm never trusting Iida when it comes to coffee again, though."

"Did- Didn't that burn you?" Eri gaped, still a little stunned at the fact that Mina had simply downed the hot beverage without even batting an eye.

"Helps keep me awake better," her friend shrugged. "Now that I am, what can I do for you? Boy troubles?"

"Wha-? No, nothing like that," the raven-haired teenager said with a rapid shake of her head.

"Then you, my friend, may be in the wrong room," Mina chuckled. Before Eri could take it too seriously, however, she said, "I'm kidding, what's up?"

"Well…" Eri hesitated for a moment, but knowing that it was already late and that Mina deserved a good night's sleep sooner rather than later, she pressed on to say, "Eraser- Mister Aizawa told me that he thinks I'm internalizing all my problems, and that I need to have someone to talk to about them. I've been trying to ignore it since I've never really done anything like that, but the thought just won't quit. I don't really know what talking about problems everyone already knows I have is going to do for me. I've already told everyone everything- and made some of their lives harder in the process." She cringed as she thought of Todoroki's face when he had firmed his resolve to confront his father regarding Dabi.

"Depending on your audience, it can make all the difference," Mina said, every manner of joking gone from her bearing as she looked at the other girl with sympathy. "Whenever you've talked about the future and One For All up to now, you've always done it in a group, with people looking to you for the answers. Every once in a while, you gotta take a minute and let yourself be the one to ask questions. You can't always have the answers, you know?"

"I don't have answers, though," Eri mumbled. "All I have are problems that I bring with me. I came here hoping that Kai would be the answer to those problems, but I just made things worse for him."

"But not for the rest of us," Mina insisted. "It's unfortunate that Kurai was taken from where he belonged, but the silver lining is that we get to have our time with him, again. I know that's selfish, but I just can't look at it any other way. I wanted him back more than anything else, and you made that happen, Eri. I know I'm not the only one who's grateful for that fact."

"I know," Eri sighed, thinking back on how Togata had told her much the same thing. Maybe they're right about all of this…

"What else is eating you?" the other girl inquired as she grabbed her pillow and hugged it against her chest. "You wouldn't have stayed up this late just to rehash some old stuff, would you? Something else is on your mind."

"Well…" Eri hesitated before ducking her head and saying, "It's just… Ever since Kai and Deku rescued me, I've always admired them. And while I got to know Deku well in the future, I only ever knew Kai through the stories that some of the others told about him. But they always talked about what kind of hero he was, not really the guy he was beneath the hero costume. And… well, you and Akarui knew him better than anyone, but neither of you ever really talked about him. I just… wanted to know more about my hero, I guess."

"And ya had to wait until the middle of the night to do that?" Mina deadpanned.

"This seemed like the only time when we weren't studying or you were out on a work study…" Eri mumbled, turning red as she did. "Sorry."

Mina let out a sigh before she said, "No, I'm sorry. I shouldn't be complaining about anything in front of you, of all people." Shifting in her seat so that her back was more flat against the wall, she then asked, "What about Kurai do you want to know? You said you know all about Kai, but not the man behind the myth."

"You're sure?" Eri asked hopefully as she perked up a little bit.

"I will guarantee you answers to five questions," Mina grinned tiredly. "After that, I may switch to talking in my sleep."

"Thank you, Ashi- Mina."

It was coming up on the end of January, and Eri was feeling better about her busy work schedule, when Mina approached her in the common space on a Sunday with a worried frown. "What's wrong?" Eri asked instantly. "Has something happened to Kai?"

"I dunno," Mina said with a negative shake of her head. "But Akarui just called, says he wants to meet in the teacher's lounge with Mister Aizawa, All Might, and Izuku. He said it concerns Kurai, but he wouldn't say what's happening over the phone."

"Then let's get going," Eri said as she stood up from her half-finished English homework. "With any luck, it's time for him to come home."

Deku: Uh... Where's Matar-?

Chronoa: Taking a personal day.

Deku: Oh... Guess that means we're doing a short segment, huh?

Akarui: Yup, but we're still announcing that the next chapter is the last one of Phase 5. Or, as some people on our Discrd server would probably call it, 'The Longest Chapter in the Big Book of Sad.'

Deku: Uh...?

Akarui: Don't worry about it. Point is, we're getting ready to kick things into a new gear!

Chronoa: And what better way to do that than to bring in the next movie arc?!

Deku: Wait, what?! Didn't we just do a movie arc?!

Akarui: Strictly speaking, no. We did include your guys' Christmas episode, and you and your pals have started training at Endeavor's agency, so that technically bridges the two movies, even if Mataras didn't go into detail with its coverage.

Deku: But what about me training to master Energon?! Is Endeavor going to help me with that at all?! I mean, I guess I could tell him that my quirk evolved because of the Quirk Singularity Theory, but would he buy that when Kurai's power is so unique and recognizable...?

Akarui: Next time- In the Absence of a Loved One

Chronoa: Mina, Go Beyond!

Nora: Plus Ultra!

Akarui: How did you get in here?!

Deku: Wait, if this phase is about to be over, will Kai be making a comeback?!

Kurai: Not if I have any say in it!

Nora: Boop!

Next time on Your Hero Academia...

Kurai was humming cheerily to himself as he walked out of the hospital's library, a handful of old 'Naruto' manga in hand. Knowing that he had to wait until the group attendant was also ready to leave with the other patients, he sat on a bench just outside the large room and promptly opened the first volume, as to keep himself entertained until it was time to go.

As he began to immerse himself in the narrative of Itachi's last battle, his ears picked up on the sounds of another small group approaching the library- adult patients, from the sound of things. Normally, the adult and adolescent patients didn't interact for any length of time, but it wasn't entirely unusual for them to pass each other in the halls as they went to and from their daily activities in different parts of the building. Because this was the case, Kurai didn't bother to look up from his comic until the group had passed him by, save for a solitary figure who had stopped to stand in front of him.

Raising his gaze to look at the person, Kurai was surprised to see a woman with white hair and soft brown eyes who was dressed as a patient of the ward. He could tell that the color of her tresses had nothing to do with her age- she couldn't have been any older than his mother, who was in her late forties. For whatever reason, her face stirred up a sense of familiarity that he couldn't quite place, especially since he was almost positive that he had never interacted with this person before.

"Can I help you?" he decided to ask as he marked his page and shut the book.