AN: Thanks for reading and leaving reviews everyone!
Dragonkiller453 - Himiko's hero costume was described in chapter 12. Additionally I had artwork made to show it off. While I can't share it on FFN, I am also posting this story on AO3. If you look up this story over there, the artwork is embedded in chapter 12.
As Himiko and Atsuko returned to class the following Monday, they saw their friends and classmates talking about their internships. Unfortunately, it appeared that Emily had already cornered Habiki and was questioning him, her hand flying across her tablet as she took notes. Spotting the two girls coming in, Habiki saw his opening and waved them over.
"Midoriya, Hotoko!" Habiki called out. "How were your internships?"
"What, our group chat wasn't enough?" Atsuko asked playfully.
"I'm sure Midoriya wants to tell us what happened in person," Habiki smiled at Himiko.
"You're lucky I'm in a good mood," Himiko said as she rolled her eyes. "And that little Kyoto was so cute." As she spoke, she was already reaching into her bag to retrieve her cell phone, before she showed her friends the lock screen. It was, in her opinion, the cutest photo out of all of them, with her kneeling and Kyoto standing proudly next to her, both of them flashing toothy smiles at the camera to show off their fangs.
"Hey!" Emily protested from behind Habiki. "I wasn't done yet!"
"I already told you all about the heroes at the agency," Habiki protested.
"Yes but what about that group of villains you fought? I want to know their quirks too!"
"Seriously?" Himiko gave the other girl a flat stare. "Who cares if they're locked up?"
"They won't be forever," Emily pointed her stylus accusingly at Himiko. "This could be valuable information in the future!"
"I could tell you about them later?" Habiki offered. "Personally I'd like to hear how everyone else's internships went."
Emily crossed her arms and glared at Habiki, before finally relenting. "Fine. Midoriya, what can you tell us about Mr. Brave's qui-"
"Nope!" Himiko declared. "I already had to deal with Izu yesterday, I'm not repeating myself."
"That's not fair! Why does your brother get that info while I don't?" Emily demanded.
"Do you seriously have to ask?" Himiko deadpanned as she glared at the girl through lidded eyes.
"Why don't I go first?" Atsuko suggested as she stepped between the two girls. "Maybe Himi will be willing to talk about it later this week?"
"I doubt it," Himiko said, grinning at her friend.
"We'll see about that," Emily countered.
"You know how she is," Habiki cautioned Himiko.
"And you know how I am," Himiko gave an all-to-satisfied smile before she looked at her best friend. "But yes! Tell us how your internship went!"
Atsuko watched Emily settle on a desk and prop her tablet up with her legs. Deciding to mimic her she sat down on another desk. "Takeshita was a bit absent-minded, but he meant well! His bamboo manipulation did give me a few ideas though!"
"Waitasec!" Emily said as she furiously hammered away at her tablet, pulling up something. "Ok, he can cause a small piece of bamboo to grow rapidly right? And he can manipulate its growth?"
"Yep," Atsuko replied. "He had these little bamboo kunai that he would throw into the ground, and then use them to grow all sorts of things! I saw him use them to capture a villain and to prop up a falling tree."
"He can grow things remotely?" Emily asked.
"Mhm," Atsuko nodded. "He needed to touch the bamboo to activate his quirk, but once he's done that he has a few minutes to manipulate it into any shape he wants."
Nodding along, Emily wrote down everything Atsuko told her. Himiko tried to listen intently but soon found herself getting bored of the quirk talk. "That's not important though. Tell us about what you did, Suko!"
"I thought you'd never ask," Atsuko smiled at her friend. "Lots of training, just like everyone else did. Takeshita liked doing early patrols, so we were out of the agency by 5 every morning."
"That sounds horrible," Himiko shuddered.
"It doesn't seem too bad," Habiki countered. "You'd be done nice and early in the day."
"If only it were that simple," Atsuko said. "Once patrol was done that's when the real training began."
"But you learned a lot, didn't you?" Emily asked, tapping on the screen to bring up her classmate's profile.
"Yep!" Atsuko agreed. "He would grow a simple shape out of bamboo and then he had me seal it in a barrier without disturbing the leaves. At first he started with simple shapes - cylinders and boxes, but then he started having me work with more complicated shapes."
"That's really smart," Emily said as she paused in her writing to look up at her friend. "And you're going to keep working at that, right?"
"Of course!" Atsuko feigned offense. "I may not be Little Miss Perfect like you are, but I'm not going to slack off either."
If Emily took offense to the jab, she didn't show it as she looked back at her tablet. "Were there any other heroes or interns at the agency?"
"Not that I ran into, no. Takeshita was very proud of the fact that he recently managed to start an agency by himself. It was small and he didn't have any full-time staff, but that didn't matter to him."
"If he's absentminded that could be trouble," Habiki pointed out.
"You caught that?" Atsuko smiled sheepishly at the boy. "I was a little worried, but he's hired a recently graduated business course student who comes by a couple hours a day to help out."
"That's a relief," Habiki said.
"Boring," Himiko interjected. "Tell us about the exciting stuff!"
Atsuko lit up as she looked at her best friend. "I was wondering when you were gonna ask about the fighting."
"Hey, nobody else got to participate in a raid," Himiko pointed out. "I want details!"
"Yes!" Emily agreed loudly.
"I sent you the news article," Atsuko playfully rolled her eyes. "Takeshita was contacted by Ingenium to act as crowd control and to keep the gang from escaping. So we never actually went into the building."
"Still!" Emily said. "You were there when the villains were arrested, what were their quirks? Who was there from Team Idaten?"
"Ingenium was there," Atsuko explained, "along with Enigma and Controller."
"Controller?" Emily's eyes lit up. "Did you get to meet her? I'd love to know more about her!"
"Who's that?" Himiko asked.
"How do you-" Emily scoffed and crossed her arms. "Her quirk is Machine Control. She fights via drones that she controls with her quirk! It's really cool!"
"I never thought that would be one of your favorites," Habiki admitted. "But when you explain it, I can see it."
"Of course," Emily had an all-to-satisfied look on her face. "There aren't many big-name heroes in Japan that rely on support gear - most prefer to simply use their quirks unaugmented."
"But doesn't she need the support gear to use her quirk?" Atsuko asked.
"Yes, but she has embraced it! Her whole outfit is full of support gear, not just drones," Emily explained.
"Once you're done fangirling, I'm sure Suko would like to continue," Himiko said.
"Fine," Emily rolled her eyes. "So what happened?"
"Once Controller verified everyone was inside, Takeshita and I blocked the entrances - well, Takeshita blocked all of them except for one back entrance, which we were both positioned by. Ingenium deemed that the most likely escape route, and so he had us monitor that one in person."
"So what happened?"
"Well Ingenium went in, and about five minutes later a pair of villains escaped - a man whose quirk allowed him to create razor blades out of his skin-" She paused to look at Himiko, seeing if her best friend wanted to respond. Himiko looked like she wanted to say something, but then she eyed Emily and thought better about it. Bobbing her head, Atsuko continued. "And a woman who could cause anything she touched to rocket forward."
"That sounds like an amazing quirk!" Emily said. "Why would she waste it being a villain?"
"Your guess is as good as mine," Atsuko said. "But I bet you can see where this is going…"
"I'd still like to hear it," Habiki said.
"Thanks," Atsuko smiled at the boy. "So Takeshita used his quirk to create a bamboo cage around them, and they quickly broke it, the woman even sent bamboo flying at us."
"That's how your arm got cut up, wasn't it?" Himiko asked.
"Yeah," Atsuko nodded solemnly. "But then as they were trying to run, Takeshita threw his second round of bamboo and told me that it was my turn. Just like our practice sessions, I built a cage around the bamboo.
"That's smart!" Emily said. "Because I bet neither of their quirks worked on your air barriers, did they?"
"Nope!" Atsuko smiled proudly. "Turns out that I can pretty much hard-counter any contact-based quirks with mine."
"That's great!" Habiki exclaimed. "I bet tons of heroes will be asking for your help once you graduate."
"Here's hoping," Atsuko said before she turned toward Habiki. "How about your internship?"
Habiki opened his mouth to speak when they heard the door open, revealing Kan and Tomoe. Turning to his friends, Habiki quickly whispered. "I'll tell you all at lunch," before he made his way to his seat.
Feeling slightly disappointed, Himiko went to her seat. Looking down at her phone, she smiled at the lock screen one last time before she shoved it into her bag. She'll just have to brag about her fan at lunch, then.
"I think that's enough for today!" Toshinori declared.
Relieved, Izuku collapsed onto the beach, like a puppet whose strings had been cut. Toshinori took one look around the beach at the progress that he made today before looking at his student. While it was impressive, Izuku seemed even more worn out than usual. Deciding to get to the bottom of this, he retrieved a bottle of water before walking over to his student and offering it to him.
"Thank you All Might," Izuku said as he grabbed the bottle. Pushing himself into a sitting position, he cracked the seal and drank half the bottle in a single gulp.
"You really have been pushing yourself as of late," Toshinori observed. "Is everything okay?"
"You've noticed?" Izuku asked sheepishly.
"Of course!" Toshinori exclaimed. "What kind of mentor would I be otherwise?"
Izuku held up his hands defensively, accidentally splashing himself with water in the process. "I've just-" Izuku lowered his hands slowly. "Ever since Himi showed the world her quirk at the Sports Festival, I've been thinking about my own motivation."
"Oh?" Toshinori asked, kneeling to be on Izuku's level. "And what have you discovered?"
Izuku took another drink from the bottle, taking a moment to gather his thoughts. "I guess I'm curious. I've read things about the time before All Might but - how bad was it?"
"Why the sudden interest in history?" Toshinori asked.
"It's just-" Izuku crushed the bottle in his hands. "I guess it's silly, but I was doubting myself. When I saw the real impact Himi was having on people's lives with her reveal at the Sports Festival, I was worried that by accepting One For All, I didn't think I was good enough."
"Young Midoriya-"
Izuku shook his head emphatically. "But I was thinking about it all wrong! I've realized- I want to do a lot more than Himi. So I guess, what I'm trying to say is that you were right, and I'm sorry for doubting you."
Toshinori gave a fond sigh as he looked at Izuku. "You're allowed to feel that way. There were times when I faltered as well."
"You too?" Izuku gasped.
Toshinori chuckled. "Is it so hard to believe?"
"I guess not…" Izuku admitted.
"The first few years were the hardest," Toshinori admitted. "When my mentor died, I was forced to flee Japan and finish my training in America."
Izuku gasped. "You fled?! But you always told people that you were simply studying abroad!"
"I did, and I was," Toshinori let out a weary sigh. "I had hoped to not trouble you with this because this has nothing to do with you, but there is far more to One For All than I have let on."
Izuku suddenly was laser focused on his mentor. "Is this about your battle from five years ago?"
Toshinori laughed so hard he had a coughing fit. Once he got under control he wiped the blood away from his mouth. "You are quite the perceptive one! Yes. You see, there is a counterpart quirk to One For All - a quirk called All For One. A quirk with the power to give and take quirks."
Izuku's eyes went wide. "That-" he pressed his thumb to his chin as he began thinking about the implications, "a quirk like that by itself is seemingly benign, but its power is entirely dependent on the quirks that the user was able to get their hands on."
"Precisely," Toshinori explained. "And there was one quirk All For One was unable to steal - his brother's."
"One For All," Izuku looked up to Toshinori.
"Exactly! And so the owners of those two quirks fought for almost two hundred years, since the dawn of quirks itself. Every time All For One inevitably overpowered the holder of One For All, killing them," He saw Izuku pale. "Until five years ago."
"You- you stopped All For One?" Izuku asked cautiously.
"I did," Toshinori nodded solemnly. "It was the culmination of thirty-five years of work, but I finally put an end to his reign of terror."
"That's… a lot," Izuku admitted.
"It was why I hoped to not burden you with it," Toshinori sighed. "Their conflict has cast a shadow over Japan for far too long, and it is time for Japan to move past that."
"I understand," Izuku nodded. "Thank you for telling me."
Toshinori smiled at his successor. "Now then, to continue my point - when I went to America I felt scared and alone. But I found friends and allies, people who believed in me. And when I faltered, I remembered their words. And I remembered Nana's words - to keep smiling. Before I knew it, I grew into the hero I wanted to be." Looking up, Toshinori's gaze swept across the beach. "Looking at how far you've come, I have no fear that you'll become a fine hero - that someday, you may even surpass me."
Izuku's face lit up in a bright crimson as he held his hands up defensively. "I- there's no way I could surpass you!"
"It's more likely than you think," Toshinori chuckled as he stood up. "As long as you don't hurt yourself before you even begin!"
"I-" Izuku dropped his hands in defeat. "You're right. I'll be more careful."
"Young Midoriya," Toshinori placed a hand on his shoulder. "Your desire to push yourself further is not bad. It is admirable even. But it is important to know your limits. You don't want to burn yourself out before you've even reached the starting line!"
Izuku nodded in understanding. "I promise if things get bad I'll cut back."
Toshinori gave his successor a warm smile. "That's all I can ask for."
Returning to his office at the top of Might Tower, Toshinori sat down at his desk with a weary sigh. Thinking back on his conversation with Izuku, he looked at the photos on the corner of his desk, until his eyes landed on one in particular.
With a fond smile, he picked up the photo and examined it. It was taken last time he was at I-Island visiting his friend David. Melissa had just gotten accepted into the Academy and he had rearranged his scheduled trip to overlap with her celebration. Toshinori was standing there in his muscular form, while his friend David was standing there smiling next to him, and his niece was standing in front of her dad.
"It really has been far too long since I have spoken with David. Perhaps… with All For One gone, I can take some time to see how they are doing," Toshinori smiled and nodded to himself. "And maybe I can see if he has any of his old designs lying around! Perhaps they could help Young Midoriya!"
Placing the picture back in its resting place, Toshinori picked up his phone and began making a long overdue phone call.