Chapter 27: What Did I Do?

Shinso had really been looking forwards to the term break. A week free of lessons and his classmates. Well, his lessons he didn't mind much, to be honest. Some part of him quite enjoyed them. Yes, he wasn't the best; could barely be compared to the model students that surrounded him. Regardless, they were a distraction; something to focus on and apply himself to.

If he could focus on those lessons, get what he needed to know into his head, then maybe, just maybe, he could get where he wanted to go. Shinso had a few options in mind. Firstly, he attempted the easy route – direct entry into UA's class 1-B, which obviously failed. He'd expected this, which is why he also applied for class 1-C, general studies. He didn't actually think he'd get in, but by some miracle, he scraped through. He survived the first term and did his best in the Sports Festival. The entire event was practically run by the villain class, 1-A, and for some reason they allowed him to do what he wanted and prove himself. If it were enough, the Principal would offer him a chance to transfer to the hero course come next year. If that didn't work, Shinso knew there must be other hero schools out there who would eagerly take up a UA alumni with a promising Sports Festival debut, right?

But although all this looked promising, there was one, major problem with associating himself with UA.

He'd toed the line of class 1-A before. He knew he had – his school had warned his parents that they'd sent a letter of recommendation to UA. After holding his breath for a few months, he received an automatic email response saying that class 1-A was filled with more needy applicants and they didn't feel as though Shinso's case was too dire. It was an utter relief. Attending class 1-A was an extremely risky move. Even if you graduate, the participation will sit on your permanent record, and was bound to bring up some problems in the future, even if you did manage to do well. Sure, UA boasted some star students, but everyone knew they were few and far between, and even they faced struggles from the ghosts of their pasts.

Getting into class 1-C meant that Shinso was still on UA's radar, and they definitely knew about his previous, unwilling application to class 1-A. It was rare that new students were moved into the villain class after the beginning of the year, because it could mess with the delicate system and dynamic. However, it certainly wasn't unheard of. And when Shinso overheard some of his classmates talk to Present Mic, their homeroom teacher, about Shinso possibly transferring to class 1-A, he knew he was in trouble.

What had he done, then? Well…

It all started when they found out about his Quirk.

At the beginning of term, Shinso was very quiet. He supposed it was a learnt behaviour. At his old school, people used to flinch at every word he uttered, bit their lips and clench their mouths shut as though to force themselves not to reply. That was how his Quirk was activated, after all. Respond to a question, and Shinso had complete control. It didn't help that he hadn't exactly practised it and so struggled to not take control, even for a second, before he could turn it off again.

He thought he'd gotten better at it, but a little slip up at lunch resulted in a classmate dropping their tray down the front of their shirt. Shinso stammered that it was an accident, but the person in question was quite a stubborn, headstrong soul, who squinted her eyes at him accusingly and demanded the truth. Shinso told them all in that following homeroom, insisting that he didn't have much control and that it was an accident, but he wasn't believed. It didn't help that he was quite sure the rest of his class whispered behind his back anyway, thinking that he was creepy or… whatever. Shinso tried not to pay much attention to it.

But then he started to get… frustrated! He didn't help himself by pulling the occasional trick on them when they got really infuriating – or forcing them to shut up when they just wouldn't. And so came that moment when they talked to Present Mic, and Shinso knew it hadn't been the first nor last time it would happen.

Then he started to notice the eyes of class A wander to his general direction. He knew all about their gold-banded class president – he'd looked him up. Izuku Midoriya, number 18, was completely Quirkless, and absolutely despised heroes, according to the internet, at least. The facts kind of added up, to be honest, and that short, unseeming boy radiated this… terrifying aura, magnified by his villainous classmates, especially number 15, the infamous Shoto Todoroki.

Then the Sports Festival came along and all that happened… It was weird, how closely Midoriya had clearly been paying attention to him. But actually, the class was pretty nice. Freaky, but nice.

Shinso was quite happy with the Sports Festival outcome. He found himself silently routing for class A the entire time, especially after he was finally knocked out of the competition (it was bound to happen eventually) – and he bested one of the last hero course members! He was pretty chuffed about that (class 1-C? Not so much).

And then came that weeklong break, and Shinso just had to go and screw himself over.

He lugged his belongings into the back of the class 1-A teacher's car and sighed as he clambered into the back seat. He didn't wave his parents goodbye as the car pulled away, although they stayed by the door and waved anyway. Shinso watched them fade into the distance, the car joining the main road. He didn't live particularly close to UA. It was half an hour by train and certainly longer by car. He'd be here for a while, with this strange teacher who he now desperately needed to impress if he wanted to get himself out of class 1-A anytime soon.

Mr Aizawa was an underground pro hero, who went by the name Eraser Head. He was pretty cool, actually. Shinso wanted to be a hero a lot like him, but he wouldn't admit that to his face – not a chance.

"You get why this is happening, kid?" he asked after quite a while of radio silence between the two. Literally – he'd turned the radio off after about a minute of suffering through Present Mic's screaming on a re-run of one of his radio shows. Shinso was silently disappointed, he already missed his old homeroom teacher, in some weird, Stockholm Syndrome kind of way.

Shinso didn't reply. He just stared out the window and at his own reflection in it. It was getting dark already, and rain pitter-pattered against the glass whilst the traffic was at a halt.

Mr Aizawa was looking at him through the rear-view mirror; he tried not to catch his eye.

His new teacher sighed as the traffic started to move again, "First step towards graduating – figure out why you're here."

Now Shinso was just frustrated. "Well, it's not my fault," he hissed before he could stop himself.

Mr Aizawa didn't say anything, he just kept driving.

Shinso sighed, "You know why I'm here – and so do I."

"Then tell me."

He didn't reply for a moment, just frowning at his own reflection. "I screwed up," he admitted. "I shouldn't have gotten angry, alright? I just couldn't help it – people saw me in the Sports Festival with class A and now I'm more of a villain than ever. You don't get how bad it got – no one does, and no one believes me."

"They won't believe you if you don't tell them."

He rolled his eyes, "There's no point in trying. That's the thing with people. Everyone makes up their mind before they know all the facts – they judge the book by its cover, and there's nothing I can do about it."

"Kid, I've seen this case a thousand times before."

Shinso finally looked up to stare at the back of his head whilst he spoke.

"Whether it be at UA or working as a hero – there are far too many out there labelled as the bad guy because of their Quirk. Your new classmates would agree, and so do I. But one thing they don't get quite yet, is that judging a book by its cover can go both ways, alright? People judge you, and in turn, you judge them. Why do you think they're acting like that? Why are they being like this. Insecurities are skin deep. All you need to do is to open the book to page one."

"I knew those guys," Shinso interjected, now picking at his jeans. "They were from my old school; lived in my neighbourhood. I've known them for years – it's not like that. I'd tell you I was the victim – that it was self-defence, but I'm going to class A now so obviously I wasn't believed."

"It may have been self-defence at first, but you got carried away, didn't you?"

Shinso opened his mouth to reply, but quickly realised he had no valid response. He gritted his teeth and turned back to the window, mulling it over in his mind.

Ok, maybe he had gotten carried away. But he hadn't done much. So what if ordered one to drag the other into a fountain – and maybe he'd forgotten the little bit about drowning? It didn't get that far anyway! He just wanted to give them a scare. But someone else saw and called the police. There was a knock on Shinso's door not long after and two soaking teenagers watched with matching grins when the officer insisted that Shinso would have to come back with her to the police station until his parents, who were out at work, could arrive to sort out the situation.

Shinso really knew he was in deep trouble when that same officer laid out all his complaints and accusations of Quirk-based assault over the years and said there would have to be some kind of disciplinary action for this. But she recognised him from the Sports Festival and gave him an ultimatum – if she and his parents could talk this over with UA and convince them to transfer Shinso into class 1-A, then the system would pick him up and these charges could be dropped. No juvie for him.

And so, here he was.

"I know you're aiming for the hero course," Mr Aizawa continued, which made Shinso flinch. "But you can't be a hero if you act out in anger."

He didn't reply.

"Class A will help you. They're aiming for the hero course too."

…Wait, what?

Shinso looked up, furrowing his brow, "Wait, how?"

"They won the Sports Festival, didn't they?"

"Yes but –"

"Midoriya has been bargaining with Principal Nezu. They'll explain the rest."

They didn't speak again for the remainder of the car journey. Shinso wallowed in his own thoughts, trying to decipher what all this meant. That hopeful spark was rising up in his chest again – maybe this wouldn't be so bad…?

The car pulled into UA.

Whilst listening to rules that Mr Aizawa slowly listed off to him, Shinso unloaded his belongings from the back of the car. They waited for the support course teacher, Power Loader, to turn up with a tracking device that was soon secured around Shinso's ankle, meaning he couldn't leave the school grounds until the summer break.

The class A dorms, Heights Alliance, loomed over them. Shinso had seen it dozens of times before, but only in passing – he'd never been inside.

"They were planning some kind of welcome," Mr Aizawa warned Shinso as they approached. "But to my knowledge, they got a little distracted."

"O-Oh?" Shinso asked nervously. They were right at the door now.

"I haven't seen them much today," he admitted. "But their other teachers sensed some tension, and Midoriya didn't look too happy."

"…Not a good sign."

"…No, it isn't."

He opened the door and they stepped inside.

"Class?" Mr Aizawa called out. It was eerily silent inside, Shinso couldn't help but think that this was unusual.

"Oh!" the girl with the number 20 on her back hurried over. "Hello! And Shinso! Good to see you again, I'm assuming you're our new classmate?!"

"Yaoyorozu," Mr Aizawa sighed (ah, yes, that was her name, Shinso totally didn't forget, no, no – it's Yaoyorozu with the knife how could he forget?), "What happened this time?"

Her smile looked a little fixed, "Oh, nothing… It's fine…"

Mr Aizawa simply sighed again, "Well, I suppose you know Yaoyorozu, 19 – she's your vice president now."

It took Shinso a few moments to process that sentence. He thought Iida was vice president – but maybe that had changed. And wasn't Yaoyorozu number 20? Who was number – oh, oh – Shinso was number 19…

"Where is Midoriya?" Mr Aizawa asked Yaoyorozu.

"U-Um… well he just got back from detention. I think he's in the bathrooms…?"

"…He actually went to detention?"

"…I believe so?"

Shinso's eyes flicked around the common room area. It was pretty similar to class 1-C's, to be honest, although he'd always avoided that place unless he wanted coffee. God, he hoped class A had coffee.

His thoughts were interrupted by the slam of a door, which made a majority of the members of class A, scattered around the room, jump and look up. Midoriya stormed out of the bathrooms, absolutely soaking wet, like he'd been standing outside in the rain.

He didn't even look at Shinso, about to walk right past towards the stairs up to their individual rooms.

"18," Mr Aizawa almost snapped.

Midoriya hesitated by the bottom of the stairs, not even turning his head.

"Aren't you going to welcome Shinso?"

He whipped his head around, water dripping from his weighed-down hair, vibrant green eyes almost glowing in obvious anger.

"Welcome," he snapped.

Shinso's hands clenched around his suitcase as Midoriya marched up the stairs and out of sight.

"– to hell," scoffed someone else, just out of Shinso's line of sight.

He felt his heart beat a little faster.

It wasn't going to be coffee that stopped him from sleeping tonight.

It was a completely ordinary start to the day.

Relatively.

"RACOON EYES! I KNOW THAT WAS FREAKING YOU!"

Mina howled with laughed as she shrieked and ran into the sanctuary of the girls' bathrooms, avoiding Kacchan's wrath.

Midoriya blinked at the scene. It didn't take long for him to zero in on the whiteboard with their names on it and realising it had once again been vandalised to say KACCHAN in bright pink bubble font, surrounded by little flowers and stars.

Yaoyorozu put a cup of tea in Midoriya's hands, "Good morning!" she said cheerfully.

Midoriya noted the new silver bands on her blazar. He smiled and took a sip of the tea. He never thought he'd appreciate tea as much as he did now that it was Yaoyorozu-approved, and not the cheap stuff UA bought in bulk for them.

"Ashido! Please do not draw on the board with permanent pen!" cried out Iida, now lacking those silver bands.

She pocked her head out of the door just as Sero said, "You're not vice president anymore, Iida – we don't have to listen to you."

"Yeah!" Mina grinned, before yelling and slamming the door shut again when Kacchan threw a book at her. It hit the door and fell to the ground.

"He's… vice-vice?" Hagakure suggested.

Everyone looked to Yaoyorozu and Midoriya, who exchanged glances and shrugged.

"Sounds about right," Midoriya agreed.

"I'm not listening to vice-vice!" called out Mina's muffled voice, "I want to live!"

"Please leave the bathroom!" Iida attempted, "You are blocking its entrance to those who need it!"

"He just wants to see murder," Sero interjected.

This resulted in a lot more back and forth until Yaoyorozu finally stepped in. They did as she said immediately, probably just to irritate Iida.

"Here."

Midoriya blinked as his notebook was shoved into his arms.

Uraraka walked past him. She must have taken it again.

"U-Uraraka, are you ok?" he frowned. He'd been worried about her throughout the entire break, but Shoto's and Iida's situations kind of got in the way.

She ignored him as she glanced around the common room, finally settling on the floating uniform that represented Hagakure.

Uraraka tapped her on the shoulder.

"Yeah?" she asked as she turned around, "What's up?"

"You handed me in."

And that's when it all went wrong.

Midoriya had thought it was Kirishima, at first – the person that Uraraka had encountered before UA. But it just didn't add up. Now it was so much clearer – it was Hagakure.

Both girls had been active villains. Sure, they hadn't been in the same area, but they did the same job, and both moved around a lot. Uraraka was Hagakure's competition, and as it seems, Uraraka had little clue that the invisible girl had clocked her as a rival at all.

Everyone stared whilst Uraraka laid out her accusation. They obviously couldn't see the expression on Hagakure's face, but it wasn't hard to guess. She caved in quickly, admitting the truth.

"I-I didn't know you then!" Hagakure insisted, waving her arms about, evident by the movement of her sleeves, as she backed away from Uraraka.

Midoriya had never seen her look so furious.

"I didn't even realise you were Zero until the Sports Festival!" she continued. "I-It was just never mentioned! O-Or maybe I just never listened – I'm sorry, ok?!"

Midoriya put down his notebook and mug to jump in between them, facing Uraraka and holding his hands out, "H-Hold on," he insisted. "Why don't you… um, explain your thought process here –"

"She handed me over to the police!" Uraraka exclaimed, her outcry surprising anyone in the vicinity. "You should have seen the looks on my parents' faces when they turned up at the door!"

Midoriya lowered his hands when he saw the tears welling in her eyes.

"T-They said it was alright – back at home last week! B-But I know they w-weren't telling the truth! You have no idea what that felt like!"

"Well I do," Hagakure retorted, leaning over Midoriya's shoulders. He could feel her hands grip the sides of his blazer. "I got caught too, remember?!"

"You were caught on the job!" Uraraka yelled – actually yelled. "Whilst I had to sit there and lie to their faces to try and get away with it! It's different with you because at least it wasn't unexpected!"

Midoriya heard her gasp by his ear, "Hey! What on Earth does that mean?! You think I could have never been anything else other than just a thief?!"

"That's what you thought!" Uraraka jabbed a finger at her, weaving around Midoriya. "That's why you did it! But I didn't have a choice! My mum and dad are struggling to pay rent now that they don't have my money! And they paid back as much as they could! You don't know h-how heart-breaking it was to see them like that and it's YOUR FAULT!" she sobbed.

Midoriya was just shocked. He hadn't expected this to happen – it came completely out of the blue.

Uraraka's reaction was far from logical. It must have been tough at home – really tough. The response was emotional. Also slightly terrifying, considering both Uraraka and Hagakure were very skilled fighters and Midoriya was standing between them.

"We're going to be late for homeroom…" Yaoyorozu inputted nervously.

"All I wanted w-was for them to live the life they deserved to have!" Uraraka cried, tears falling down her round cheeks like rivers. "I-I didn't want to be a villain – I was just trying to be their hero! But you! You did it on purpose! For fun; for your own benefit! A-And people look at me on the street a-and they know I'm a villain now; I'm on the news they talk about me! They're scared of me – because you made it a story – because you made it so that a bunch of officers had to arrest a teenager for a b-bunch of robberies, and I didn't even do all of them! But I couldn't prove that! I bet you haven't been stopped at a store, saying you can't go in because you're a convicted thief! And I can't do anything a-abo-out it-t!" she broke out into hysterical sobs, dropping to the floor with her head in her hands.

Slowly, Midoriya knelt down in front of her, reaching forwards to put a hand on her shoulder, "Hey… it's alright," he tried.

"N-No it's n-not."

"W-Well, you ended up here," Midoriya smiled softly. "And we all know that was bad at first but… well it wasn't that bad in the end, right? Surely you didn't want to go all your life as a villain?"

She didn't reply for a moment, her shoulders shaking. Eventually, hands still covering her face, she shook her head.

"I'm… I'm really sorry, Uraraka," Hagakure said in a tone that implied it was heart-felt. "I… I don't know what else to say…"

Clearly, it wasn't that, because Uraraka shot back up again, face red and covered in tears, fists clenched and shaking.

Midoriya leapt up in front of her, "Uraraka you have to remember that this is a class for people who made mistakes, alright?!"

She wavered, gaze returning to him.

"…Ok? A-And we're trying to figure out how to fix it. We've all done a lot of stuff we regret, and most of us are still trying to get their heads around that, me included. But we can't… we can't change what happened."

The anger faded from her expression again. She covered her face and shook her head, still sobbing with short, squeaky inhalations.

After a moment more, she sniffed and rubbed her eyes with the back of her arm, "Momo said we'll be late for class." Still crying, she picked up her backpack, pulled on her shoes, and hurried out the front door.

Everyone stood there in shock for about a minute. Without a single word between them, they all slowly gathered their things together and left for homeroom. By the time that Midoriya arrived, nearly everyone was there. Uraraka sat on the opposite side of the room to him. She had her head in a notebook – oh, that was his notebook, right, of course… wait when did she take that back from –

"Sit down, 18," insisted Mr Aizawa, and Midoriya scuttled across the room to take his seat.

"You're late," he snapped at the dwindling members of class A as they arrived, muttering their apologies.

He squinted at their expressions, perhaps realising that something was up. Regardless, he took the register, reminded them all that their new number 19 would be arriving after school hours that day, oh, and Midoriya would be starting his detention this week and Iida the next, and left them be to attend to his own business.

The day passed slowly. Midoriya tried to focus on his own work, especially with exams coming up. Their new timetable said that they would have also had their first hero-based lessons that day, but it didn't happen for one reason or another – possibly because Mr Aizawa was busy, or because the new student hadn't arrived yet, maybe because it was their first day of lessons. Anyway, it didn't matter – today wasn't the best day for it anyway.

And so came lunch.

They were quiet in the queue, up until the inevitable happened –

"So, I heard that the most prestigious members of class A were up to no good again!" Monoma laughed.

"Not now, Monoma," Midoriya told him, ignoring the glances that had been plaguing him and the others ever since they arrived at the hall.

"If Stain wanted to save you then you really must be –"

"I said not now!" Midoriya snapped.

He stopped talking, as did everyone else around him.

"…Ok," Monoma blinked, "…Sorry."

Midoriya sighed and turned back to the queue, his friends following suit. They got their food and sat down together, only to eat in silence.

"Are… you feeling better?" Shoto nervously asked Uraraka. It wasn't like him to try and initiate conversation.

Uraraka must have appreciated it, because she stopped prodding her food and gave him a sniff and a smile, her face still a little pinker than usual, eyes a little redder. She nodded slightly and returned to not eating.

"…Good."

More silence.

"Maybe you should talk to her," Tsu suggested.

Uraraka shrugged.

"It could help."

Another shrug.

This was clearly going nowhere, and so she stopped trying.

Eventually, Midoriya couldn't take it anymore. He shovelled all the food he could stomach into his mouth and tidied away his tray, leaving before anyone could follow him. He didn't have anywhere to go other than their classroom, so that's where he went.

"– do I say anyway?" said Hagakure as Midoriya slid open the door. "There's nothing I can do! Oh, hi, Midoriya…"

"Hi," he replied glumly, sitting down in his place not far behind her. He reached into his bag to glance at his notebook – maybe at the page he'd done for Hagakure, but it wasn't there.

He sighed, "You need to talk to Uraraka," he told Hagakure.

"Yeah, we know," Ojiro nodded glumly. "We were just saying – but we're a little stuck."

"There's got to be something," Midoriya insisted, leaning back and staring at the ceiling, as though the answers would be up there.

Kacchan let out a small laugh.

Midoriya glared at the back of his head.

"What?!" he snapped as though he could feel his glare, turning around to glare right back at him. "The answer's freaking obvious."

"Oh yeah?" Midoriya raised an eyebrow.

He rolled his eyes, "Girls are so freaking emotional. Punch it out."

Midoriya let out a laugh of his own, "Not everything is solved by violence, Kacchan."

"Stop freaking calling me that!" he pointed a finger at him, "And I'm right, so stop acting all high and mighty because you're not."

"This has nothing to do with me."

"Maybe if you didn't stalk the entire class and write it in that bloody notebook then Round Face would never know!"

"It's not a bad thing that she knows!"

"She's freaking sobbing her head off!"

"Since when did you care about other people's emotions?!"

"Guys just stop!" yelled Hagakure, and Midoriya became suddenly aware that she was crying to, from the tone of her voice; the twitching of her floating uniform. "You just a-argue all the time!"

"Tell me I'm wrong," Kacchan snarled at them. Most of the class other than Midoriya's close friendship group was by Hagakure, trying to comfort her. "If that notebook didn't exist then this wouldn't have happened." He leant back in his chair casually, "None of this would have ever gone to hell if Invisible was able to go up to Round Face and explain it on her own freaking terms."

Midoriya shrunk a little into his chair – he hated how absolutely right he was. "Well… it's not my fault that Uraraka keeps stealing my notebook. And there wasn't even much in there! She could have figured it out herself. A-And we can fix this! Uraraka just needs some time to think it over and then I can –"

"For God's sake, you can't solve everything!" Kacchan yelled at him. "Just admit that you messed up and get rid of the fricking book!"

"No!" Midoriya exclaimed. "I'm not getting rid of my book! That's my –"

"Guys," interjected Kirishima.

Midoriya looked up at him as he gestured back at Hagakure.

"…Sorry," Midoriya muttered. Kacchan did no such thing.

Eventually, Uraraka returned behind everyone else. They all made their way to their seats in silence, and the rest of the day continued in the same theme that the rest of it had – tense and quiet.

Midoriya knew he needed to fix this. But that evening, he wasn't the one who spoke up first.

Before everyone could part ways, and were still in the common room area, Kirishima stood up and cleared his throat, "Ok, time to talk it out."

"W-What?" said Hagakure.

He put one hand on Hagakure's shoulder, and the other on Uraraka's before she could escape. In his solid grip, he pulled the two girls towards the door and opened it, "Just have a little chat? Please? Outside for just a moment. If it doesn't work, then I get it. But you both know you don't want to keep this up forever."

To Midoriya's surprise, they agreed to it. Hagakure went outside first, and after a little more hesitation from Uraraka, she too, put on her shoes and went outside. Kirishima closed the door behind them as they sat down on the front porch and he marched back over to the others.

"Wow, good job," blinked Kaminari.

Now on a roll, Kirishima put his hands on his hips and grinned, "Right, now Midoriya and Bakugo."

"What?" Midoriya said immediately.

"Not a chance in hell," Kacchan said in a low grumble, already heading back towards his room.

Kirishima put out an arm to stop him. "And you guys are gonna talk it out in here, because we can't trust one of you to punch the other."

The fact that wasn't aimed at just Kacchan, concerned Midoriya a little.

"U-Um… why are we talking?" Midoriya questioned nervously.

"Because you guys have had a bad relationship from the start!" Kirishima proclaimed. "Mr Aizawa even said that you can't graduate until you can get along, remember? And there's no way we can all be heroes if we can't put our past behind us – like Hagakure and Uraraka! So, we're getting to the bottom of this."

"We are abso-freaking-lutely not," Kacchan snapped at Kirishima.

Unphased, Kirishima turned him around and steered him back into the common room, indicating at the chair opposite Midoriya at the table he was doing his maths homework at.

Kacchan crossed his arms and glared at Midoriya furiously.

Midoriya tried to return to his work, but Iida promptly arrived to gather it up and slide it out of reach, taking the pen right out of his hand.

Unsure, Midoriya tapped his fingers against each other, "Um…"

"I'm not doing this," Kacchan attempted – and failed – to leave. "For God's sake!" he yelled at Kirishima, "I hate his freaking guts and talking it out ain't gonna freaking change that!"

Midoriya frowned at him, "That's not very nice…"

Kacchan rolled his eyes, "Oh, that's not very nice – shut the hell up it's your freaking fault that I'm here in the first place."

Midoriya shrugged, "Yeah, but you deserved it."

He slammed his hands down on the table, "I DIDN'T DESERVE SH–"

"Come on, man," Kirishima intervened. "You can't just sit there and say you don't need to be in this class as much as the rest of us."

Kacchan crossed his arms again, not looking Midoriya in the eyes as he said, "I may have not been acting like the freaking hero I wanted to be before UA – I get it, I was a jerk."

Midoriya perked up a little.

"Don't give me that look!" Kacchan growled at him, "You weren't any better and you still ain't any better."

"I'm trying to help everyone here," Midoriya frowned, "and you're still calling me a villain."

"I think we've established that you can still be a villain whilst trying to help someone," he retorted, indicating towards the door that Uraraka and Hagakure were behind.

It was a reasonable point but didn't exactly apply.

The conversation had seemed to have run dry, so Kirishima took the chair next to Kacchan and said, "So… why do you dislike Midoriya so much?"

Midoriya really wasn't enjoying this conversation.

"'Cause he's a freaking Deku."

"Wow, I've missed that name," Midoriya said sarcastically.

Kacchan glared daggers at him, "And he's freaking delusional."

"What?!" Midoriya exclaimed, "Why am I delusional?!"

"Because you're a Quirkless Deku who still thinks he can be a hero."

Oh, the same old taunt. It didn't hurt any less.

"I can be a hero," Midoriya insisted. He'd had just enough of this accusation.

"No, you can't."

"I can – I thought we already got past this in the Sports Festival."

"You got that far in the freaking Sports Festival because we allowed it. You would have fell at the first hurdle without us!"

"You don't know that."

He barked a laugh, "I freaking do."

Midoriya slammed his hands down on the table and stood up, "I can be a hero and I've had it up to here with you telling me that I can't!"

"Because I'm just the only one who's freaking brave enough to speak up about it!"

All Might did too. And Shoto.

"Principal Nezu is going to let him take the licencing exam," acknowledged Tsu. "He wouldn't have even offered if he didn't think he could pass it."

Midoriya smiled at her.

"He would be a dead weight," Kacchan snapped back at her. "Heroes are people with the Quirks to help where other people can't! Deku doesn't freaking have that!"

"That doesn't mean I can't help," Midoriya insisted.

Kacchan whipped his head back around to him, "You'll die the second you face someone alone with a minutely strong Quirk – and ensure that no one with a weak Quirk will ever be allowed to get a hero licence again."

"You don't know that! Mr Aizawa made it! He fights Quirkless!"

"Ha! You know that's not the same freaking thing. You're in denial; you're delusional – have been ever since that bloody day you realised your Quirk was never coming! And you still think you're a hero! You're not! And it's freaking annoying! Do something useful with your life! Where you can for once not be the stinking Deku you've always been!"

Still standing up, Midoriya snarled at him, glaring with all the anger he could muster, "I will be a hero."

Kacchan finally stood up to, brushing Kirishima's hand away, "You will always be nothing – you don't deserve to be the freaking leader of this class – acting all high and mighty and powerful. YOU CANNOT BE A HERO – get it into your freaking head!"

"SO WHAT, HUH?!" Midoriya found himself yelling back at him, "I CAN BE A VILLAIN – but I can't be a hero. I can ruin, everything – but I'm not allowed to help. Why should you care if I'd be a good hero or not?! If I can save one person – then isn't it worth it?!"

"The only person you need to save is yourself. Get your head out of the clouds and stop ignoring everything that doesn't fit what you want! And that's why I freaking hate you – because you refuse to see! You'll get out of this school one day and realise that I was right, and you are and will always be NOTHING!"

"No! You are the one who's delusional!" Midoriya exclaimed, walking around the table to look the taller boy right in the eyes. He realised he was clutching at straws as he stammered, "T-Thinking you're always better than me and everyone else just because you were born with a big powerful Quirk and I wasn't!"

"Yeah," he scoffed, "I have a Quirk – one that can combat anyone in this class, and any villain out there – and you don't." The strange calmness of his voice was somehow worse than his shouting.

Kacchan glanced up at the clock on the wall, "Don't you have detention for playing hero?"

Shaking with fury, Midoriya swallowed the lump in his throat, turned, pulled on his shoes, and threw open the door.

"Midoriya!" Kirishima called out after him. He could just hear him telling Kacchan he'd been too harsh, clearly regretting initiating the interaction at all, as he walked away.

"Midoriya?" asked Hagakure as he stepped past her and out of the cover the porch provided.

"Deku, what happened?" Uraraka questioned, standing up.

"Don't call me that," he snapped, and trudged down the sodden pathway, letting the rain dampen his hair and mingle with his tears.

"Izuku! You're soaking wet!" proclaimed Toga when Midoriya stormed into the support labs.

The other students literally threw themselves out of his path as Midoriya stomped over to Toga's and Hatsume's corner of the lab.

"I know," he barely managed to say as he sat down in a spare chair.

The two girls exchanged glances as he slammed his head down on the desk.

"…You ok there?!" asked Hatsume over the sound of Toga slurping from a juice box, not dissimilar to Mr Aizawa, come to think of it.

Midoriya didn't reply, mainly because he was worried that if he spoke, he'd burst into tears, and that would be embarrassing.

"Troubles with good old class A?!" Mei guessed with a giggle, returning to whatever she was working on.

Midoriya shrugged, which was confirmation enough.

"Ooh, which one?" Toga asked eagerly. "Was it… explosion guy? You don't like him, right?"

"It's always him," Midoriya moaned, sitting up and wiping the water from his face.

"You should just get rid of him!" Toga joked happily, sitting down and spinning in the wheelie chair beside Mei.

"Considering it."

"Detentionee!" Mei suddenly exclaimed, holding out her hand, "Get me my screwdriver!"

"Oh, right," Midoriya sniffed, pushing off the desk and sliding across the room to find her tool kit, which was often spread liberally across the room. He found one on the floor and promptly handed it back to her.

"What did he do?" Toga asked.

"WRONG SCREWDRIVER!"

Midoriya took it back and tossed it to where he'd found it whilst he searched for a second, "Err… he just… I don't know – he's just annoying." He handed another option to Hatsume.

"What kind of annoying?"

"STILL WRONG!"

Midoriya hesitated before taking the screwdriver back. There was another one just below her hand. So, he swapped the two around.

"Um, just… always insisting I can't do anything because I'm Quirkless."

"PERFECT!" Mei sung happily as the screwdriver fit the piece she was tampering with.

Toga took one last sip of the juice box before tossing it at the bin (she missed. Evidently, she did that a lot), "Well, he sucks."

Midoriya shrugged, "It just… I hate it how he's… he's right."

Toga rolled her eyes, "He's not."

"But I-I can't be a real hero," Midoriya told her. He turned to face her, "…can I?"

She pulled a face and fiddled with the height of her chair, "Depends on what you mean by hero."

Midoriya groaned in frustration, pulling at his hair, "Why does this always happen to me?! Why do I keep going in this loop of you can and you can't!"

"Probably because you don't know what you want to do," she hummed. "You're stuck – it's a class A thing. I was the same."

Midoriya got up and started pacing back and forth, "When I arrived here, I'd made up my mind – the whole hero thing was stupid – all heroes were stupid – I hated UA and I just needed to get out. A-And then… I don't know! I changed my mind! I thought that maybe, just maybe – I wasn't so utterly useless after all!"

"You're not useless to us," Toga pouted.

"Yeah but – I-I-I – that's not… ugh! I don't know! It's heroes! The whole hero system! I-It doesn't work! It just creates this… this equilibrium of more heroes and more villains and back and forth and back and forth and I'm stuck in the middle of it!"

Toga pushed herself across the room on the wheelie chair, slowly drifting towards her mini fridge, "Hm…"

Midoriya continued to pace in circles, not caring that the other support course members were starting to look up and listen in. "I-It just makes me think – do I even want to continue like this? Even if I managed to become a hero – then what? I'd face the same problems I always have! The same… bigotry…"

There was silence for a moment, with Midoriya standing solemnly in the middle of the room, staring at his shoes.

Toga kicked the door of her mini fridge shut, "So, um, why are you in class A anyway?"

Midoriya sighed, pushing his hair out of his eyes, "I yelled at some heroes and stuff. There's probably a video of it online somewhere, I haven't looked."

"No, no, no," Toga smiled, rolling her eyes as she stabbed a straw through a juice box – wait, no, coconut milk… box? "Like, what are you supposed to be learning?"

Midoriya frowned at her.

She sighed, "At the start of the year, Mr Aizawa always does this thing where he's like oh, you'll graduate when you understand why you're really here," she said with a mockingly low and monotone voice. She paused to sip her drink, "And then you're like what?? It's so obviously why I'm here I did x, y and z. And then time goes on and you think oh, wait, I did that because I was feeling this, and I had to do that. And then you'll figure out what you wanna do about it and why it was wrong and then what you wanna do going forwards – and THEN you graduate, get it?"

He stared at her blankly.

"Ok, ok," she nodded, putting the carton down. "Ok. So, you shouted at some heroes or something. So… why did you do that?"

"Because… they deserved it?"

"Alright… and err, you've pretty much already answered this question – but why was doing that wrong?"

Midoriya blinked at her, "I… don't know if it was."

She nodded with a confident smile, "Yep! You're not ready to graduate."

"Well, I don't know about that – Mr Aizawa said I could transfer to this course a while back."

She waved the comment off, glancing over at what Mei was doing in the process, "He does that – lie – rational deceptions."

"You… think he lied?"

"Probably!"

She clearly thought that was the end of the conversation. Toga started chattering to Mei about whatever trinket they were working on whilst Midoriya furrowed his brow, lost in his thoughts.

It didn't matter too much if he wasn't ready to graduate. He… kind of expected it. The fact that he was currently standing in detention was a contributing factor. Back when he was talking with Mr Aizawa about all this, he was on that downward slope again – of not thinking he could be a hero. He supposed it made sense for Mr Aizawa to want to give him some incentive to keep going.

What was consuming his mind was more the thought of… he wasn't ready – because of the very same factor that started it all. He still didn't completely comprehend why he was here. He understood the fundamentals. He knew why Principal Nezu wanted him to be here; he knew why All Might did, and that the world thought he should be. Whether it was the right idea or not, no one could really know yet – but that didn't matter. What he didn't understand was… was… ugh – was putting Kacchan in UA wrong?! No! Was shouting at those heroes for not doing their job wrong? No! And was it his fault he knew All Might's secrets? Certainly not. So, how could he learn why those things were wrong, if they… if they weren't?!

"It doesn't make sense!" he suddenly exclaimed.

"Why not?!" Mei yelled in response, "Oh, wait – you're not talking about my wiring – never mind!"

Ignoring her, Midoriya started to pace again. "I know why they didn't like what I did – but it wasn't wrong!"

"You probably went about it in the wrong way," Toga hummed.

"No," Midoriya retorted firmly, "I didn't – and if I were to be sent back in time – I'd do it again!"

"And they'd send you back here."

"This isn't some place that the heroes can just chuck all their problems!"

Toga shrugged, "It works, though."

He let out a slight laugh, "Yeah, right. The whole system is corrupt."

Mei finally looked up from her work in progress to properly listen in alongside Toga. She wasn't the only one, but Midoriya just wasn't focusing on the eyes that stared at him from every angle.

"The only people that it really works for are those at the very top!" he snarled. "And everyone else just has to hope they'll get there! But me?! I'm never going to! I'm always going to be at the very bottom because of something I was born without! A power I can never get – and I-I'm not just going to sit there and suffer through life just because I don't fit into the perfect little mould society made out for me! And I'm not the only one, am I?! Someone has to do something about it – if it's not me, it doesn't look like it's going to be anyone! And if that means burning the bloody whole thing to the freaking ground, then so be it!"

Silence – filled only by the sound of Toga slurping her drink.

"Oh…" she suddenly said, with the tone of someone who had just come to a realisation. She clicked her fingers and smiled, "That's why you're here."

Midoriya blinked at her again, breath catching in his throat as he thought over what had just slipped out of his mouth.

He sounded an awful lot like a villain then. An awful lot like –

"I think we'd all get along so well if you gave us the chance. We have such similar motives."

Midoriya turned on his heel and marched away.

"Hey! Where are you going?!" Mei called out.

Midoriya didn't reply. He let the door to the lab slam behind him.

He blinked and he was standing out in the rain, in front of Height's Alliance.

What did… what did he do – why…? What did he do wrong?

He stared up at the sky for a moment, blinking furiously as the raindrops fell onto his eyelashes and dribbled down his face.

He was stuck in the same loop Shoto had been in. Only Shoto actually had a future.

Gritting his teeth, Midoriya stormed forwards. He threw open the door, tossed off his shoes, and marched right through the common room to the bathrooms. A few people tried to greet him, including Uraraka, but he ignored them.

He found himself standing before a mirror, hands gripping the sides of a sink. He stared at his own reflection. Mind blank, he just focused on the green of his own eyes, partially hidden by his soaked hair, appearing black with the water.

Eventually, he heard some commotion in the common room. The distant voice of Mr Aizawa reached his ears. No, he couldn't deal with this right now.

He stormed through the bathroom door, still dripping with rainwater, the weight on his shoulders greater than ever.

"18," Mr Aizawa snapped as he passed him.

Midoriya hesitated by the bottom of the stairs, refusing to turn and meet his eyes.

"Aren't you going to welcome Shinso?"

He turned around quickly, eyes settling on that of Shinso – the new member of class A.

He must have looked furious – frighting, even, from the suppressed yet panicked look that Shinso gave him in response.

"Welcome," Midoriya said, spitting the word like unintended venom.

Not caring to remedy the mistake, Midoriya turned and marched up the rest of the stairs. He just heard Sero's voice add to his welcome.

"– to hell."

Midoriya silently agreed.