Chapter 30

"They are getting more bold," Kazuki commented, glancing towards the classroom door while they waited for their next class. There were students from other classes at the door, peeking in as if they weren't as inconspicuous as a fire alarm. "It's very annoying," he added with a grimace.

He could feel their frustration, their envy, their anger.

These people really didn't like Class 1-A, for some reason. Kazuki could take a few guesses, but that didn't change the fact that it was grating on his nerves that these people persisted. It was disturbing the rest of his classmates by the day too.

On that note…

"You sure we can't do anything?" he asked Yaoyorozu. "Having some perks for being president and vice-president would be nice."

"They aren't doing anything to disturb our class," she repeated for what felt like the hundredth time. In response, all the group stared at her. The girl then coughed behind her fist. Kazuki picked up some embarrassment but also frustration. "Not enough. We can bring it up with a teacher again, but…"

"Yeah, that didn't go well last time," Hagakure commented, slightly bitter.

"People are starting to get antsy with the Sports Festival coming up," Jiro pointed out, even though they already knew that. Kazuki would know. For one, he was trying really hard to come up with ways to use the nodes in his negativity pool. He wasn't getting much progress done, but he thought that might be a key to an ace up his sleeve.

Or maybe he was heading to a dead end, but he liked hoping that it wasn't the case.

"Not that I blame them," Jiro added. "It's the most watched event in Japan. That's kind of… a lot of pressure."

"I try to focus on the fact that if things go well, it'll be great," Mineta commented, lying through his teeth. Kazuki knew he was just as nervous as everyone else, if not a little on the worse side. He'd keep his friend's secret though. Maybe he was trying to fake it till he made it?

"Just remember to keep your tendencies to yourself," Kazuki pointed out, drawing a roll of the boy's eyes even as he nodded. "Honestly, I'm more worried about-"

"It's pointless to try and check out the competition!" they heard Bakugo tell the people outside their door and Kazuki groaned. He'd felt the boy's anger rising, but that had spiked rather suddenly. He also could see, at that moment, how Yaoyorozu gave him a pleading look.

She really didn't like dealing with the troublesome bomber.

"You owe me so much," he hissed as he went to stand up.

"Thank you," the rich girl told him, to which he sighed.

"So why don't you just fuck off already?!" the aforementioned easily angered blonde continued. "You goddamn mob."

"That's enough, Bakugo," Kazuki said, giving the boy an annoyed look as he approached the door. He remained steadfast on the face of that anger being directed at him. "Just go back to your seat, alright? I'll try and get them to leave."

"Tch, I'm better than them anyway," Bakugo felt the need to add and Kazuki had to hold back a groan at the spike of emotions coming from outside. As if things weren't bad enough. If he didn't know any better, he'd have thought his classmate did that on purpose.

Actually, that might actually be the case.

"Didn't think the class that survived a villain attack would be so arrogant," a new voice said, stopping Bakugo before he could take more than a few steps. "Are all the students in Heroics the same? I gotta say I'm disillusioned."

Kazuki turned to look at a weary feeling and just as weary looking student. He was also oozing envy and frustration the same way Bakugo did anger or Midoriya did nervousness, which was the important part. 'Great, as if I didn't have enough with those two already,' he thought, taking a deep breath in.

"There's a lot of kids that end up in General Education or other courses because they failed the heroics test," the boy commented, rubbing the back of his neck. "Did you know that?"

"There are a lot of kids that fail a lot of tests, did you know that?" Kazuki asked, not seeing the point in the boy's speech.

"Robots," the boy commented, as if that answered or said anything. "Don't you think that's unfair for people with Quirks that work only humans, for example?"

"Hm, your case, I'm guessing," Kazuki commented, and the spike in emotions answered what the boy refused to. "So, I'm gonna ask you this. If you encountered a villain that you can't use your Quirk on, are you gonna complain to them about fairness?"

"We are here to learn-"

"I really don't care," Kazuki interrupted. Maybe because Bakugo's anger was getting to him, or maybe because of the emotions of those outside, or maybe it was because of his own. At the end of the day, he didn't feel like putting up with bullshit. "I know people that faced disadvantage in the entrance exam and passed. So, go cry to someone who cares, ok?" Kazuki asked the boy, giving him a tired smile.

"So, you really are all like that."

"Didn't look like you needed confirmation before," Kazuki pointed out. "But if you feel so insulted, do your best in the Festival. There's an empty spot in our class, in case you didn't know," he explained, feeling a pang of hurt, both himself and from others in the class behind him. "Maybe you can take it, or maybe you'll take my place in Heroics instead. That's something that can happen. If you do, great. It means you deserved it and I didn't. If you fail though, maybe you should complain less and work out more, because that's not a hero body you've got there, just saying."

There was silence then. However, even though the boy kept his expression mostly blank, Kazuki knew better. His emotions were all over the place and he looked ready to explode at times. At others, they almost seemed to go away. 'Weird,' he mused.

"I'm sure one of the other hundred students that seem to peek into our classroom can tell you guys whatever you want. Maybe you can make a group chat for that. But please leave, because we are here to learn, not to put up with curious masses. I think that's a second year class or something," Kazuki commented dryly, looking at the rest of the gathering of students outside the classroom. A few of them had the decency to feel ashamed, but few of them even moved. "Well, I tried."

With that, he turned to walk inside the classroom and back to his seat.

"Good job, B-Movie," Bakugo commented, grinning widely. It made Kazuki wonder if he'd really done good or if he'd messed up. Surely it couldn't be good if the guy was complimenting him, right? It felt weird. "Damn extras should have tried harder instead of bitching and moaning."

"You realize that they are all going to hate us, right?" Kirishima pointed out then and Kazuki grimaced.

"It doesn't matter," Bakugo commented, looking almost bored as he answered. "None of it matters once you're at the top."

"Besides," Kazuki continued with a shrug. "They were going to aim for us anyway. It's our spots that they want," he added.

"Thanks for that, very reassuring," Kaminari replied weakly.

"You passed the entrance exam and they didn't. Maybe they had a super Quirk that they just couldn't use, but that hasn't stopped us, has it?" Kazuki asked with a shrug. "I remember that happening a bunch during Aizawa's Quirk Apprehension test, and yet we are all still here. If you've worked enough to be here, you'll be here. It's as simple as that."

"Very inspiring, man," Kirishima told him with a grin and a punch to the arm that was probably more painful than intended.

"Just telling it like I see it," he said with a shrug. "With that handled, Yaoyorozu is on cat herder duty now."

"Gee, thanks," Sero called from the side, but he had a grin on his face anyway. "Good thing you won that vote though, Endo. Better you than me."

"Why do you think I voted for someone else?" he grumbled, drawing some chuckles from his classmates. As he looked at them though, he stood where he was instead of walking back to his seat. He saw his group looking at him curiously. Even some of the other classmates seemed to notice but didn't really pay him any mind.

He didn't move, as he looked around and considered something. These people, they were his classmates. It was something he knew, but not something he thought much about. He cared about his group of friends, but beyond that, these people might as well be in another class, really. He interacted with them on occasion for his vice-president duties but other than that…

And yet, at that moment, when it became about their entire class more solidly, Kazuki was struck. He trusted these people. They'd survived USJ. They'd gotten rid of Aoyama. They were getting stronger, he knew. They were a group in their own right.

He moved towards the teacher's desk instead of his own. He looked towards the door as he did, noticing that the other students had left already. Class would start soon, so that made sense. That was good too, he wanted some privacy for this.

"Can I have your attention, guys?" he called, and everyone turned to look at him. At the back, the one to catch up the quickest seemed to be Mineta. Then again, the little guy seemed to understand him the best out of everyone. "There's something you should know, in case you don't."

He felt the change in some of them, which were some that he knew were aware and some that he didn't. That was expected though. He'd guessed there'd be more that had figured that out. Especially after the USJ. Still, he needed to get it out there for real. The Festival would surely bring it to the public, so it was better that those closest to him knew.

"I'm Kazuki Endo, but what's important right now is that I'm also… the one that caused the Black Rampage years ago," he said, trying his best to keep a strong front even as his nerves picked up inside him enough that he could almost match Midoriya. Some emotions spiked, some simply shifted. Regardless, he soldiered on. "You should know that. And if anyone thinks I should stop being vice-president, then I'll understand and I'm sure we can do something about that."

With that over, Kazuki just stood there for a second before nodding to himself and starting to walk back to his seat. He took some solace in the fact that his friends were feeling the same. He didn't expect them to turn on him now that he was being more public, but it was still nice to see.

"Endo," someone called him and he paused, turning to look at Sero. "I did say that it was better you had that position than me," the boy said, but his smile didn't quite feel as honest as before, more like he was forcing it. However, Kazuki noticed that he didn't quite feel so bad, actually. "I talked with a cousin of mine after the USJ. He said he didn't blame you for what happened."

"... Can I know his name?" Kazuki asked softly, taking a step closer to the other boy.

"Shoichi Mihara," Sero replied and he nodded immediately. 'Injured leg, permanent limp,' he remembered. That one he knew had been caused by one of his grimm.

"Tell him I'm sorry," Kazuki said softly.

"I told you what he thinks, right?" Sero pointed out.

"Still, I know what I did affected him. I know what happened to him," he told his classmate, not wanting to say more than that. He didn't want to go around spreading information like that in public, when the rest of the class was hearing. "So, just tell him anyway, yeah?"

"Yeah, I can do that."

"And thanks, for telling me that."

"Don't mention it, vice-president," Sero shot back, making Kazuki grin slightly.

[}-o-{]

"While I understand your frustration, I think you could have handled that situation better," Inui told him during their next session, after Kazuki told him of the day's events. "All in all, nothing that you should be worried about. Competition is a normal thing, especially in an institution as prestigious as this one. I'm just glad you didn't further antagonize them. You could have done much worse than you did, but you might have motivated some of them to do better too. So, overall, I think this might even be a positive thing. Don't take that as encouragement though."

"I won't. Honestly, it's just good to know I didn't screw up," Kazuki replied, slumping against his chair in relief. "And the other thing?" he asked, running his fingers through his hair.

"You are free to tell whoever you want, Kazuki," Inui reassured him kindly. "As you say, by the Festival, it's almost a sure thing that it'll be known who you are and what your general situation is like right now. We are prepared to deal with that. If we have any say in the matter, you won't even realize anything happened at all."

"I'm not expecting that kind of thing, but I just… I guess I'm nervous. I'm building a life now, one that I actually like," he commented leaning forward this time and resting his arms on his knees and then his forehead on his hands. "I don't want everything to crumble around me."

"It won't happen, Endo," the counselor told him softly but firmly. "I do believe your friends will stick by you even then. And if nothing else, you can count on this institution to have your back. Nezu likes you too much to let something happen."

"I guess I'll take that," Kazuki mumbled, sighing and standing up. He moved to the side of the room, where the water dispenser was, to take fill himself a plastic cup of water. "Was there anything else we had to talk about?"

"I don't believe so," Inui said, in that tone that Kazuki was coming to know as the one where he had more to say on the matter. "You did say something interesting there, if you don't mind me pointing that out," he added, and the boy had to hold back a flinch. "The part where you didn't know why you felt like you did. When you said that, it sounded like it was more important than you wanted to let on."

"..." Kazuki remained silent for a long moment after that, taking a gulp of the water as if that would get rid of his sudden bout of nerves. "You remember… I think it was our first session. I told you that I hated my Quirk."

"I do remember that, yes," Inui replied calmly.

"One of the reasons why I hate it, one of the most important ones, maybe even more than the whole nightmare creatures that cause massacres… Is that because of my Quirk, I don't know," Kazuki told the man, moving with his plastic cup to the side of the room with the windows facing outside.

"You don't know… what?" Inui prompted then.

"I don't know who I am, sometimes," Kazuki replied. "Most of the time, really, but sometimes I forget about that part. Sometimes I can pretend I know who I am."

"Why do you feel like that?"

"Because sometimes I wonder how much of what I feel, of what I think, is myself," Kazuki commented, his voice and expression turning flat, hollow. "Am I tired now, feeling tired, because this isn't something I want to talk about, because it's something draining. Or I am feeling and thinking that when in reality it's all because of the exhaustion I'm picking up from the training facilities?"

He didn't receive an answer to that, but he wasn't really expecting that. There was a lot to unpack from that alone, he supposed. Hound Dog had kind of been hit with it out of nowhere too, even if he'd asked for it.

"Am I feeling nervous about this whole thing because I'm nervous, or because I'm picking up on Midoriya's nerves and everyone else in my range? Was I really angry today or was it everyone else that made me angry with their own feelings?" Kazuki continued, smiling sadly as he looked outside the window. "Sometimes I wonder how much of me is… me, and how much of me is just everyone in my range. Am I Kazuki Endo or am I an amalgamation of everyone else? Is Kazuki Endo just the glue putting together the pieces of negativity that his Quirk picks up?"

He turned to regard the counselor once more, feeling the pity, sadness and a bit of horror rolling off of the man.

"Those questions keep me up at night sometimes," Kazuki admitted with a shrug before taking another sip from his cup. "I don't know if I want an answer to them either."

"If I may offer my opinion as someone that doesn't know a hundred percent what you go through…?" Inui asked, to which Kazuki looked at him and gave him a nod that might as well have been another shrug. "I believe that you are Kazuki Endo, a boy that has a Quirk that influences who he is more than most Quirks do. At the end of the day, you are you, Endo, Quirk or no Quirk. Everyone is shaped by what they experience, what happens to them, what they live through. It just so happens that your Quirk gives you more to be than what the normal person does."

"... You think so?" Kazuki asked, his voice soft, calm, even if he felt anything but. He tried, futilely, to keep himself from hoping.

"I do, but there's something simple we can do to try and help you understand better," Inui continued speaking then, drawing the boy's attention much more intently. "In a much calmer situation, it should help, I imagine."

Kazuki just tilted his head, a little confused.

[}-o-{]

"How is it that you didn't think to ask me, if you were having such thoughts?" Aizawa asked him that same day while Kazuki sat awkwardly at the other side of his table, back in his apartment. In his hands, he fidgeted with the cup of tea in his hands.

Truthfully…

"It… er, didn't occur to me?" he replied with an awkward smile. In response, he got an unimpressed look. "I really didn't… at least, I didn't before the USJ."

"And then?" the man urged and Kazuki looked to the side.

"I… didn't know if you would bother. I… It sounded… I thought it would be… Spoiled? Presumptuous? I don't think those are the words I'm looking for," he answered as best he could. He really didn't know what the real answer was. He wasn't sure why he hadn't gone to the man before, just that he… hadn't wanted to, despite very much wishing to.

"Why would you ask me to find your friend, but not ask me to erase your Quirk for a bit so that you can avoid having an identity crisis?" Aizawa bluntly, making Kazuki grimace. Yeah, he could tell why he wasn't a counselor and Inui was.

"I… the other thing felt more important?" he replied hesitantly with a nervous smile. In turn, he got a flat stare as a response from his teacher as they sat there in awkward silence.

"... You are not used to asking for things for yourself, are you?" he asked, looking around the apartment. "You bought the plants yourself. And the tank and the photos were done for you without having to ask."

"I guess… that could be a way to look at it?" Kazuki mumbled, his eyes locked on the liquid inside his cup before he brought it up for a sip. "I don't know, really," he added, shrugging.

He heard Aizawa sigh.

"I won't erase your Quirk for long. I could push it, but-"

"That's not necessary," Kazuki interrupted, not looking up. He knew where the man was going. He'd considered it already, but that was fine. "I just… I want to feel like myself… I want to know what it's like to feel like myself," he said, closing his eyes for a moment and spending a second frustrated, hating the emotions that came to him. "I just want to be without… this for a second. A second in which I won't have the weight of almost a second massacre on my shoulders."

"And villains around that wanted to kill you?" Aizawa asked.

"... Honestly… That part slipped my mind entirely at the moment. I was too busy replaying what I had done… almost done," Kazuki admitted with a guilty smile. "I guess that makes me self-centered."

"I'd say that it must have been a shock, to have that happen again. I think it's understandable that you focused on that," Aizawa told him, but he didn't really listen to that. In response to his silence, the teacher simply sighed. "Not that I mind just drinking tea, but how do you want to do this?"

Instead of answering, Kazuki brought the cup to his lips, took a sip and then set the thing down. He straightened himself on his seat and looked across the table at his teacher. Taking a deep breath in, he prepared himself. He had to make it count.

"I'm ready when you are," he said, and after Aizawa gave him a nod, he felt it.

The emotions disappeared.

The weight of the negativity in him vanished.

There were no foreign emotions tugging at his mind. There was no urge to release the darkness inside him onto the world. There were no grimm telling him to let them out. There was no desire to make the foreign feelings go away.

It was just… him.

Kazuki sat there for the few seconds the moment lasted, just… thinking. He thought, and he felt, and for once it was just him. He found himself… not that different from normal, surprisingly. He felt more or less the same but… free.

All too short, as most good things tended to be, the moment passed and his Quirk became active once again. As it happened and everything hit him once more, he closed his eyes. A lone tear fell from his black eye while he tried to remember that moment, to burn it in his memory.

That was what being Kazuki Endo felt like.

"Thank you," he mumbled, not opening his eyes as his mind continued replaying those seconds again and again.

"Don't mention it," Aizawa replied softly. "And we can do this again, you know? Just not too often."

"I hadn't even thought about asking for more," Kazuki said, lying through his teeth. He had thought about it, oh had he thought about it. He just hadn't wanted to.

"You are an entirely different type of problem child, aren't you?" the man asked, sounding both amused and frustrated. "I guess that's something to keep in mind when dealing with you."

"Sorry," Kazuki replied, opening his eyes again and giving the man a somewhat nervous, somewhat amused grin. Then the expression slipped from his face as he gripped at the cup between his hands. "Really, I… I can't thank you enough for this. That was…" he trailed off, his words failing him.

"I said not to mention it," Aizawa repeated, sounding slightly exasperated. "Back to this friend you wanted to find," he continued then, making Kazuki blink. "We found him," the man added, pulling a piece of paper from his pocket and passing it to Kazuki over the table.

"You did? That was… faster than I thought," he commented, surprised as he took the note and read it over. "I thought it'd take longer."

"When you are in the business as long as I've been, you get to know a few people," Aizawa offered as a way of explanation. Kazuki couldn't care less about how it had happened though.

"Thank you," he said, this time having to push to the side the conflicting emotions inside him. He'd asked for it, of course. However, he had almost wanted them to take longer. This… He didn't know how this was going to go.

"Not that it's any of my business… but he seems like he could use a friend right now," Aizawa said, making Kazuki look up. Those simple words were all he needed though.

He nodded.

[} Chapter End {]

Hey guys! How's it going?

I think there were at least some people waiting for the meeting between Kazuki and Shinso… And I'm pretty sure they didn't see it happening like that. Alas, that's how the muse has decided to have things happen.

Hopefully I did a good job with that and what came after. Especially what came after, since it's very important for Kazuki. Which I don't know if I managed to convey, but I'll be optimistic about that.

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed the chapter.

As always, if you can't wait until next week for next chapter, or if you just feel like supporting my writing, there's up to three new chapters in my Pa tre on:

P a treon . com (slash) AdrianKing

Discord Link: discord .gg/UTDransjJZ

Random Question: What do you prefer using, pencil (mechanical or not) or pens? I prefer pencils, mechanical before regular ones.

See you.