"You ready, Bakubaka?"
Bakugo Katsuki sends a searing glare at the girl coming off the bus behind him, feet landing heavily on the ground and aiming an elbow at her stomach that she dodges with a half grin.
"Shut the hell up, Raccoon Eyes," Katsuki hisses, settling his hands in his pants pockets while he takes in his surroundings.
More busses are around them, students filing out in other uniforms, chatter rising in the air in front of the exam arena.
"Come on, Bakubro, be nice," Kirishima Eijiro says with a sigh, stepping up beside Katsuki.
"Oh I don't mind, Kirishima-kun! The biting death threats bring flavor to my days," Yukimura says with a small smirk, settling in their class's growing crowd beside the bus with Hagakure Toru at her side.
"Settle down," Aizawa calls from where he's doing his head count. "Today is the day. Should you get your provisional licenses you'll graduate from novice eggs to chicks. Hatched into semi-pros. Do your best."
"Heck yeah, let's become chicks!" Kaminari Denki says, pumping his fist. Katsuki rolls his eyes.
Kirishima grins.
"All right, let's call the usual," Kirishima starts.
" Plus Ultra! " The class shouts, Katsuki begrudgingly joining in, glaring at the extra who's just wandered into their group and shouted it with them. Shiketsu uniform.
His classmates come wandering over chastising him, Inasa or some shit.
"Can we get to the part where we punch things yet?" Yukimura grumbles nearby to Hagakure, finishing with a yawn. "Being out in the open makes me nervous."
"What, you scared?" Katsuki says, looking over at her.
Yukimura hums. "Projecting is rude, Bakubaka, remember what the therapist said?"
Katsuki aims another elbow in her direction, he doesn't expect it to land.
He's been near the girl more often than he'd like, thanks to the group therapy bullshit UA had them doing together. Talking about their pansy feelings and shit.
Heroes aren't supposed to, break , or whatever it is Dr. Okabe is worried they'll do. Katsuki is the best , and so is Yukimura.
Heroes also shouldn't cause the retirement of the Number One Hero.
Katsuki's jaw clenches.
Yukimura pokes his side, and right before Katsuki starts cussing he spots the incoming class of students.
"Ketsubutsu Academy, second years. Class 2. They're my class, so please be kind!" Ms. Joke, who came wandering over to pester their teacher while Katsuki wasn't looking, says with a grin.
One of her students, dead eyed black haired fucker, takes Deku's hand with a happy smile.
"I'm Shindo! It seems like UA's had a lot of trouble this year, must've been tough for you."
He hops to the next person, Kaminari. Katsuki feels his eye twitch.
"But even so, you're all still aiming to become pro heroes, despite these heartships."
He grabs Jiro Kyoka's hands now.
"It's wonderful!"
"I say we get him first," Yukimura murmurs, Hagakure making a surprised noise at the suggestion.
Katsuki grunts in agreement.
He fucking hates liars.
"And you two." The boy turns to Katsuki and Yukimura, smile fake as hell. "It must've been hard for you, with that whole incident."
"Huh?"
"Today I'm going to try my best to learn from you," He says, holding out his hand specifically to Katsuki.
Katsuki bats it away, tsking.
"Buttering us up to create a false sense of security," Yukimura says idly, tone dry. "Cute."
"Hey, get your costumes and head to orientation, there's no time to waste," Aizawa cuts in, smelling the incoming fight from a mile away. "Move it."
A chorus of "Yes sensei!" follows, and they get a move on.
—
Todoroki Shoto had gone into this exam intending to go it alone.
Tap tap.
Ice intending to freeze any shoes nearby lashes out from his right side and he's turning to see—
Ah.
Kenzo drops to the ground with a lifted eyebrow under her helmet, avoiding his attack with ease by levitating above it.
Hm. He'll need to account for that next time.
"Wonderful greeting as always, Sho. Wanna team up?" Kenzo says, holding out a dark gloved hand to shake.
Shoto thinks on it, for a moment. He settles on "Why?"
Kenzo shrugs.
"You're the only other member of 1-A in the metal paradise."
Ah. The Industrial Zone is covered in metal, of course she would look for her prey here.
"I want to win this with my own power," Shoto states firmly, though there's no reason to. She of all people must understand the sentiment.
Kenzo nods, just once, a tilt of her head in acknowledgement, and likely understanding. "I get it. How about we both agree not to steal kills, and cover each other's weaknesses?"
"Whoever takes out more has to buy the other food," Shoto adds, already walking.
Kenzo laughs, slightly muffled under her gas mask.
"Of course, of course."
—
Just great. Fantastic. Wonderful.
The one student they were trying to avoid, and they run right into her, teaming up with the student that their plans to foil partially rely on metal.
Ishida Daichi grimaces under his uniform mask, sharing a glance with one of his classmates nearby.
"We need to overpower them," Daichi declares, and suddenly, the plan resumes. They're still working on thwarting Todoroki's flames and ice with Shingi and Yuuko's water and earth attacks, but with the additive of Class 1-A's top student ignoring Bakugou Katsuki—
Well.
They had to try .
Seijin students don't go down without a fight. They'll be heroes one day.
He hears Yukimura hum from where she's just sent Daichi's super grown bolts and nails away from her and her partner.
"I take one half, you take the other?" He hears her say nonchalantly, levitating off the ground in a show of magnetic power. How much of her focus does that take? Is she underestimating them?
They need weaknesses.
...or to run.
"I'll finish first," Todoroki replies, exhaling frost. "My favorite food is cold soba."
Shit.
—
12 wins, 12 losses.
Hm.
The waiting room for the examinees who passed hums with conversation.
"We really need to start carrying around a deck of cards or something," Kenzo says idly, chin propped up with one hand and her thumb on the other in a serious battle with his.
"I agree, we are too closely matched in this game," Shoto says, eyes not straying from their joined hands.
"I could make us some dice to roll," Kenzo says, dodging a solid and swift swipe at her evasive thumb. "Though you'd have to trust that I wouldn't cheat."
"You like winning too much to cheat," Shoto says blandly, not missing a beat, and Kenzo chuckles.
"Isn't that the point of cheating, though?"
"It's the challenge that makes victory sweet."
"Well said."
Shoto traps her thumb.
"13 to 12," Shoto says, giving her a serious look, before glancing around to see if their classmates have arrived yet.
( Arrived yet . Not if. He doesn't know when he gained such confidence in them, but there it lies in the privacy of his mind. )
Shoto finds his eyes locking on the back of the Shiketsu kid from before, again. Tastes the dislike he had felt from him before on his tongue.
"Hey, Sho?"
Shoto grunts, glancing back to lock eyes with Kenzo. Her helmet and gas mask sit on the table between them, leaving her face fully in view.
She's frowning, slightly.
Kenzo opens her mouth, as if to start speaking, but closes her mouth again with a click, frowning more deeply before it's gone. Face clear.
"Nevermind, dude. How about those dice?"
Something is definitely telling Shoto he's missing something, and that Kenzo wouldn't have opened her mouth if she didn't have something to say in the first place.
But Shoto can't handle so many strange interactions at once, and he trusts this one isn't from dislike. So Shiketsu boy it is.
"Alright."
Once they start talking about the ways Shoto's ice side could maybe make sculptures if he wanted to try, he can't almost forget it happened at all.
Almost.
—
"I'll focus on lifting debris in the City Zone, all of the concrete has metal through it," Kenzo says, looking at their surroundings. "Please everyone keep an eye out if you're staying in this area and direct me where needed."
It starts like that.
It's ends—
Whirling metal keeps jets of fire and air from hitting each other, a silhouette above, a deep purple cape flaring in the wind.
"The two of you need to focus on the main villain and work in tandem," Is ordered from Kenzo, Gang Orca has dodged their attack, peering at them with red red eyes.
To start, Shoto's been getting pissed off, he admits it. He doesn't even know Shiketsu boy and he's disrespecting him?
They need to hold the line so the others can evacuate the first aid station, because no exam can be as simple as "rescue bystanders" for them. Of course an additional attack would be added to spice things up.
"You should go, both of you, you're better suited to evacuate," Shoto says, not taking his eyes off Gang Orca.
But metal is already flying towards the number Ten Hero.
" We do not have time to argue, " Kenzo is firm in this, coming down from her height long enough to smack Shoto lightly upside the head. "Would you show a real villain that the team going against them is turbulent? Please pay attention to Wind Boy's attacks and try not to accidentally fuck this up."
And then she's gone from his side, pulling metal rods from the debris around them to try and wrap around the number ten and his henchmen, never staying in one place long enough to get hit by a sonar attack.
He tries. For her, his friend, he really tries.
But his next attack is ruined by the Shiketsu boy and he starts going on about how Shoto doesn't deserve the number one title, and Shoto gets pissed.
...and then he almost incinerates a fellow test taker and gets a sonar to the face.
He thinks he can hear a faint " Motherfucker ." nearby, but he's more focused on the rest right now.
—
And the third.
Sakamata Kūgo, or, Gang Orca turns from the Todoroki, and twists away from several thick metal rods torn from the cement around them.
This one, at least, isn't being distracted. There's hope she might pass.
Orca spares a glance to his "henchmen" all pinned down to the ground by metal and struggling.
He sends a sonar attack, moreso testing her ability to evade the attack than to hit her. This is one, like the boy he'd just taken out, he decided to watch out for.
Yukimura Kenzo.
She raises her gloved hands calling more and more metal to herself.
Magneto.
"You will fall like these fools all the same," Orca tests, thinking through his options. He'd taken his metal bracers off in preparation for this, but.
She has incapitated many of his men who dared go towards the evacuation, and with that much metal there is only so much he can avoid.
But, if he can endure until she runs out of stamina—
"That's fine."
He goes still.
"I was a distraction."
Wind and fire burst around him.
Ah.
He supposes this is his due for taking his eyes off of them.
A tornado bursts around him, drying his skin and making him breathe smoke.
"Your trap of wind and fire would work on any ordinary villain, they would break down to their knees and weep for mercy," He starts, pulling out one of his extra water packs.
And then the metal starts.
"My apologies if the metal gets hot, Gang Orca, I know you're a good guy despite the acting."
His water is knocked out of his hand, one thick wire taking its chance to wrap around him and—
Well.
He made one misstep, and now the rest will follow. No matter how he tries to struggle through the first rod. Damn, well, at least part of this can be blamed on his restraining gear.
The fire tornado falls.
The end of the exam horn blares.
—
"How did our two top students fail?!"
"Oi."
"Er, it was a given I wasn't talking about you Ken sorry."
" What makes it okay to talk about me ?! "
"Your shit rescue manners."
" Shut your mouth Raccoon Eyes! "
—
Ken stares down at her results, and her provisional license card.
Hagakure Toru sidles up beside her, peering down at it.
"How'd you do, Ken? I don't remember you mentioning it when we were in the arena."
Right now they're waiting for Aizawa-sensei to corale them all into a bus.
Ken looks over at Toru, and, with a sigh, slides her provisional card away from where it'd been covering her results.
Ninety-eight points.
"Holy cow," Toru says, wide eyed. "What did you lose points on?"
Ken sighs again, even deeper this time.
"I smacked Shoto upside the head when he was acting a fool."
Toru snorts, smacking her hand to her face to stifle giggles. "You know, only you could get that close to a perfect score and ruin it helping one of your classmates."
"Helping?" Ken says, lifting her dark eyebrows, half lidded eyes shining in the evening sun. "He definitely still failed the exam."
"I take it back," Toru says with a invisible roll of her eyes, looping her arm around Ken's with a huff. " Messing with one of us. It's predictable that would do you in."
With that, they start walking towards the busses, Ken easily giving into Toru's pulling her along.
"What did you get?" Ken asks, peering over at Hagakure.
"Eighty-two points," Toru says cheerfully. "Now it may not be a ninety-eight , but us plebeians have to live too."
Ken scoffs.
"Plebeians my ass. I'm just abnormal. And a chronic studier when I can't sleep."
"Studying doesn't mean you'll be good in practical application," Toru points out.
"The secret to not failing, my dear To, is don't give the examiners anything to work with," Ken says dryly. "How much can they criticize my technique if I can lift the entire section of debris they're stuck under, leaving nothing to fall over or go wrong?"
...hm. Point.
"Well, when we graduate I'll be sure to stick with you, Ken." Toru bumps their already close shoulders together. "I have a feeling you'll be very good PR for whatever agencies nab you."
Ken grins. "Darn, you beat me to it, Invisible Girl, I was going to offer my undying loyalty, sworn to follow you to the ends of—"
This time, Toru does the smacking upside the head.
"Mighty Mighty Magneto, make fun of me again and I'll— "
"Ahhhh, woe is me, someone, Sensei! Help! Toru's gone crazy! Where the hell is Tenya when you need him."
Kenzo is a good friend.
Toru peers up at the orange sky, listening to Ken start an argument with Bakugou nearby.
Toru looks back down with a sort of finality settling in her soul, staring at her new provisional license.
...She is The Invisible Girl, and she is going to be a hero.
" Plus Ultra ," Toru hums, tucking her card away into her wallet.
"Plus Ultra," Ken repeats, giving her a grin before returning to her task of goading their other top student on.
The conversation of class 1-A washes over her, conversation and laughter and that Shiketsu boy is back over again, slamming his head into the ground.
( She is The Invisible Girl, and she feels finally seen. )