This was it, this was the moment he has been waiting for his entire life. He would get on the stage, brainwash his opponent, make him go over the bounds and go to another round, rinse and repeat two more times, win this fucking festival and get in the Hero Course of UA.
Easy.
Midoriya Izuku— he was the one who Hitoshi would have to beat first, no, who Hitoshi will beat first. The monkey guy did send him a sadistic grin when he realized it would be the green-head who Hitoshi is fighting with, but since he hasn't even bothered with telling him his quirk all was good with the world. Hah. Those 1-A fucks were really full of themselves huh?
But he would win, he deserved that much after all.
Present Mic called both of them on the stage, something about Midoriya being amazing and Hitoshi himself not amounting to much because he hasn't done much. Gee thanks.
Midoriya wasn't even looking at him, seemingly transfixed on Midnight. Pervert much? Or just a show of how low he thinks about other classes? Either way great just a fucking asshole. Why did he deserve to be put into Hero Course but not Hitoshi?
It just wasn't right.
Present Mic gave them a signal to prepare, Midoriya hasn't even moved a muscle. So fucking overconfident— Hitoshi would mop the floor with his tongue if he had time. But alas he didn't because he had to win and there was a chance the bastard would scrape his tongue and wake up from brainwashing.
Also, the festival was broadcasted on the national television and he had enough people telling him he's a villain without random passersby doing that.
Present Mic shouted again horribly loud and Midnight raised her whip, despite not really having to.
Huh, weird.
Well, Hitoshi had stuff to do.
"That Monkey was going on about his pride..."
"START!" Midnight cracked her whip exactly as Present Mic shouted.
"...but don't you think he was dumb for throwing away his chance?"
Hitoshi expected Midoriya to, well, react. Preferably reply.
But he just... charged, face carefully expressionless.
"Hey! Not gonna say anything to that?" Come on, answer, answer, answer—
Midoriya looked at him with a frown but otherwise hasn't reacted. Fuck.
Hitoshi tried to sidestep him, and block at the same time because he belatedly realized that he won't be fast enough. Fuck.
Midoriya hasn't slowed down, he just kicked him in the shins and planted a fist in his face. Hitoshi tried to react, he really did, but the boy just kicked him again as he was folding like a wet paper, and then hauled him up, flipped him through his back and bam, suddenly he was out of bounds. Fuck.
It all happened so fast...
"Shinsou is out of bounds! Midoriya wins!" shouted Midnight, wincing audibly. FUCK.
"Well, that was disappointing..." droned on Present Mic.
"Well, that was a bad match-up," countered Aizawa. Well no shit. "With Midoriya basically immune to Shinsou's quirk." Wait, what?
Midoriya suddenly appeared in his peripheral and he looked up at him, still on the ground.
"Um, sorry," It took him a second but he realized the boy was speaking and signing at the same time. "Your quirk is vocal-based, right?"
"Yeah..." he croaked bitterly.
"Ah, well... That really was a bad match-up. I'm hard of hearing."
Ah.
"Really now..." He started laughing bitterly. That's why the monkey was smiling. Fucking hell—
"You're trying to transfer to Hero Course, right? I'm sure this will be taken into account and the sheer fact that you got that far, further than some Hero Course kids, will mean something..." the broccoli rambled on.
Hitoshi rose from the ground and dusted himself. Midnight was giving them signals to move away either way. A robot appeared telling him to go to the infirmary.
Oh well.
He hasn't expected Midoriya to follow him though.
"Um, I'm sorry, could you tell me what your quirk is!?" It only registered when he hasn't had the screaming mess of spectators around him but Midoriya was speaking slightly louder than socially acceptable. Well, that would make sense.
He sighed and turned in his direction, and decided to not be an asshole.
... At least no more than he had to.
"Why do you care?" he spoke a little slower than usual, exaggerating the way his mouth moved, but not as much as to make it look ridiculous.
Midoriya practically beamed when he realized what he was doing.
"I love analyzing quirks! And the verbal ones are really rare!" Great, now he was shouting.
Hitoshi felt a headache coming.
"It's brainwashing," he replied simply. "I can control anyone who replies to me."
He expected Midoriya to turn tail by now. Or maybe excuse himself awkwardly and go away.
Not beam at him harder, shouting excitedly.
"THAT'S SO COOL!"
This just in: Hitoshi's eardrums were dead.
But... wait.
"Cool..?"
"YEAH! You could do so much with it? Like, take villains into custody without battle, or calm down civilians, or—" Wait what.
"You really think that?"
"YES!" Okay, okay wow.
"Um... thank you..." Fuck he felt a blush crawling on his face nonononono— "Could you stop shouting though?" Yeah, this was the right balance of niceness and assholery. Yeah, great. You've got it handled Hitoshi, you've got it handled.
"Oh!" Midoriya said, immediately quieter. "Sorry about that, I guess I got excited—" he admitted sheepishly. "I'm usually better at controlling my volume, I'm not completely deaf—" Great, now Hitoshi felt bad. "It's just, my hearing aids broke during the calvary battle you see—"
"Yeah, it's alright, whatever."
The robot from earlier reappeared, nudging him to go to the infirmary. He just tsked at it annoyed.
"You should go, you're bleeding." Wait, he was? Fuck.
"Where—"
"Your nose. I don't remember hitting you there so I'm guessing— Quirk Exhaustion?" The accurate guess would be scary if not how common the nose bleed seemed to be among quirk use side effects. But still, usually people asked him about injuries, stress, or a million different things before even considering Quirk Exhaustion.
Midoriya looked at him expectantly, patiently waiting for an answer. Something in his gaze made a chill go down Hitoshi's spine. A quiet chant of his instinct going "danger danger danger" made him want to put distance between himself and the smaller boy, but then the dangerous glint in his eyes was gone, replaced by gentleness, and his face split into a pitying smile.
"Ah, you're probably dizzy too, I heard it often happens with mental quirks. Quirk Exhaustion can lead to effect similar to concussion or heat daze and may render the user unable to focus completely until it goes away—" Midoriya's voice has been getting gentler and quieter as he went until the boy was mumbling softly under the breath, compassion radiating off him in waves.
That was… nice. Hitoshi didn't really remember what was the last time someone talked to him for that long without being forced to.
He couldn't stand there forever though.
"Um," he tried, but the boy didn't snap out of muttering storm. "Midoriya?" he tried again, a little louder. "Midoriya!" that made boy's eyes snap to him and he muttered something sheepishly before shutting up completely. "I should probably go to the infirmary but…" he didn't know what prompted him to continue, "I could give you my number? If you want. So you can ask about my quirk later. Of course." He felt like an idiot saying that, and he couldn't help but turn his gaze up to look at the ceiling. Not the smartest move considering he immediately tasted blood. Right, he was having a nosebleed. Huh.
An excited gasp from Midoriya made him look down quickly though. The greenhead was beaming at him, his eyes burning brightly like the stars on the night sky. Full of determination and curiosity, holding a promise of friendship.
Hitoshi swore his heart stopped at that moment. Something selfish whispered that it would very much like if the boy kept looking at him like that forever and Hitoshi didn't feel the immediate need to squash his evil characteristic down.
He couldn't agree with it more.