Chapter Twenty-Two

Lightning Strikes

"That is all for today," Aizawa said as the evening bell rang, indicating that classes were over. "Remember, tomorrow we'll be taking a bus to the training site for your next lesson in hero work. Be sure you're dressed in your hero costumes and report to the front of the school. Failure to do so will result in a failed grade and you'll have to write a five-page essay about how not to be late for class." He said before leaving while everyone was getting their belongings to leave as well.

"Welp, tomorrow's going to be a busy day." She said before noticing Mina and Mineta walking over to her. "Nice to see you're back, Mineta. How did the examination go?"

"It went okay…for the most part." He said as Lily raised an eyebrow at him. "Artemis kept on breaking the syringe that Recovery Girl was using to take a sample of my blood to examine. Hence why it took me longer to get out of there."

"In my defense…She could be planning something that would hurt Mineta." Artemis said as it caused the trio to roll their eyes at her excuse.

"Yeah, cause an elderly lady would plan something behind our backs," Lily said in a sarcastic tone as she pulled herself up from her seat. "Anyway, I know I told Mina to practice while she's at home, but I want you to do the same. Specifically with your magic circuits."

"Ugh, as if the assignments that we have isn't going to be an issue, now we got servant training as well?" Mineta said as Lily chuckled at his comment.

"Remember, you have a divine spirit inside you that can help you fill out the answers to your work. Just fill out the work with Artemis's help and then focus on your training to figure out how your powers work before tomorrow." She said before making her way out of the classroom as Mina and Mineta followed after her.

"Should we meet at your place before heading over to the front of the school tomorrow?" Mineta asked as the bunny girl nodded.

"Mainly because I want to see how much you progressed during the night. Even if it's just a small bit of improvement, something is better than nothing."

"Have you ever thought about being a training instructor?" Mina asked as Lily shook her head.

"Hell no, I would make a horrible trainer. Especially if the person I'm training is a spoiled brat who's overconfident. My patience for people like that is short…like I will personally send them to the moon kind of short."

"Yet you're training us~," Mina asked, only for Lily to deadpan her. "What? It's true."

"That's because you both aren't like that. Plus you don't piss me off as most of the students in this school do." Lily said before walking off to her small home. "Now if you two will excuse me, I have to head home before Midnight says something about me being late or something." She said before waving goodbye to the two as she walked off. The moment she was gone, Mina felt her phone vibrate as she pulled it out.

"Who is it?" Mineta asked as Mina showed him the group chat they were in. "Oh…I forgot about that."

"The guys are in front of the school…I get the feeling it involves us gaining any information about Lily."

"Well, we can't tell them the truth. Do you know how crazy they'll think we are if we did? They'll think we're under some kind of mind control quirk, which we aren't."

"Right…we'll have to lie and try to avoid the answer if they ask us anything that we know," Mina said as Mineta nodded in agreement. "Alright, solid plan for the time being…who am I kidding. This isn't a solid plan, this is a horrible plan that's doomed to backfire!"

"Lily was right, we're not the smartest bunch of bananas in the class!" Mineta said as they both heard Artemis speak up.

"Not to cut in on this conversation, but you're being watched from down the hallway," Artemis said as Mina and Mineta were about to look behind themselves, but felt Kama and Artemis stop them from doing that. "Not a smart idea to do that."

"Mind telling us who it is?" Mineta whispered as he and Mina felt themselves move against their will as they began making their way down the hallway in a casual manner.

"Ectoplasm, or one of his clones that he made to follow Lily, but now he's following you two."

"He didn't hear us, did he?" Mina asked.

"No, seeing how you use the device the machine goddess gave you three," Kama said. "Seems to have the same ability to make copies of himself as I do, but they're not strong or durable."

"How do we lose him? I mean it's not like we can do the same thing that Lily does and move at super speed." Mina said as Kama rolled her eyes.

"You may not, but I can," She said as the moment Mina and Mineta turned the corner, they instantly fell into a pool similar to what happened to Mina when she met Kama. Within seconds, the duo appeared outside of the school as Momo, Uraraka, and Kaminari were taken by surprise by seeing Mina and Mineta appearing out of the cosmic pool-like water. "You're welcome."

"Dude…how did you two do that?" Kaminari said as Mina and Mineta looked at each other for a moment before the pink girl spoke up.

"I...don't know…I was just thinking about you guys and then the next thing we know, we found ourselves here…" She answered while chuckling nervously.

"So now only can you carry stuff within yourself, but you can also teleport," Momo said as she placed a hand on her chin before looking over at Mineta. "And from what you demonstrated in class this morning, you can make arrows from only just your hair?"

"I wouldn't say just my hair," Mineta said as he reached into his pocket to pull out a pen. The magic circuits in his fingertips lit up as the pen he was holding turned into an arrow. "I can turn anything non-living into an arrow. Though I think the arrows that I make take on the form of that property, like how my arrow bounced around in class."

"Seriously, Lily's quirk is amazing!" Kaminari yelled as he moved next to Mina. "Say, have you ever tried fitting a person inside you before?"

"...You know, I never actually thought about that." She said before a grin appeared on her face. "Oh, we have to try that!"

"Absolutely no! For all we know, you might not be able to get out of her." Momo yelled as it caused Mina and Kaminari to huff in disappointment. "Plus, I'm sure she doesn't have full control over her new powers."

"She's not wrong. But she doesn't know about me~" Kama said as Mina rolled her eyes.

"Fine, we won't do anything like that until I have control over it," Mina said as she noticed a smile on Momo's face.

"Good, now the reason why I called you all here is about Lily. During my free time, I started gathering information about her…So far there wasn't a lot." She said which caused Mina and Mineta to gulp.

"Well, she did say she was trying to keep a low profile. So it's no surprise that there's not much info on her other than the news reports and internet forums," said Uraraka as Kaminari spoke up.

"I tried looking up the name Artoria to see if they were a real person, but so far, I got nothing on my search."

"As I feared, then my hunches might be right about her," Momo said as it caused Mina, Mineta, Kaminari, and Uraraka to raise their eyebrows at her. "This is just a hunch or two that I've been thinking about. She's either being controlled by someone with a quirk in secret without her knowing she's an experimental test subject that escaped from a villain's secret laboratory or a highly advanced android created by Artoria."

"What makes you think that?" Mineta asked as he and Mina heard Kama busting out laughing via the mental link Artemis made.

"Given how I'm sure none of us were able to find anything on this Artoria person, I can only assume they must be a scientist of some kind. Given how we live in a world full of quirks that can make anything possible, it wouldn't surprise me if Artoria was able to have a quirk to create Lily."

"You think Lily's a spy?" Kaminari asked as Momo shook her head.

"No, but I think she's being used as a device to spy on the heroes without her knowing."

"So we need to find proof that will tell us more about Lily," Mina said as Momo turned her attention to the pink girl. "I mean we're just going by hunches and assumptions. If we're going about this, then we need to talk to the source of it all. Lily."

"Mina's not wrong, but it's kind of hard to do that when she's not that willing to open up to us to some degree," Uraraka said as Mineta chimed in on the conversation.

"Yeah, but maybe proving that we're friends by doing stuff for her might help. I mean the weekend's coming up. Maybe getting her the stuff she needs might help?"

"And if it doesn't?"

"Then Mineta and I will see if we can persuade her into being a bit more open towards people," Mina said as Momo raised an eyebrow at them. "Well we have hung out with her a bit more, so it shouldn't be that hard to do…right?"

"If you say so. Until then, we'll keep looking around for more information on her. Remember, we need to keep this a secret from Lily. Less the person behind her finds out about what we're doing. Agreed?" Momo asked as they nodded. "Good, I'll send you all messages in the chatroom if I find something. Meeting adjourned." She said as Mineta and Mina went in the opposite direction of where Momo, Uraraka, and Kaminari were walking to. Once they were distanced from the others, they soon began to talk with each other.

"You do know we're going to have to tell Lily about this…right?" Mineta asked as Mina nodded.

"Not like we have a choice…I mean we do, but if we kept this a secret from Lily, then she'll most likely be pissed at us." He said as Mina let out a groan of annoyance. "Rock, paper, scissors for who has to tell Lily?"

"Fine," She said as they both padded their fists on the palm of their hands three times before displaying which one they chose. To Mina's misfortune, she drew paper, while Mineta drew scissors. "...two out of three."

"Nope, sorry but you're going to have to tell Lily about it after training tomorrow." He said as Mina huffed in annoyance. "Come on, what's the worst that can happen?"

"She might take her anger out on us during the training session tomorrow." She said as it caused Mineta to think for a moment before shuddering at the mental image of that happening.

"I-I'm sure sis wouldn't do that…at least I hope she doesn't….right?" He said as the two remained silent as they continued walking to their homes.

[hr]

Nighttime fell upon the city of Musutafu as the rain began pouring down on the city. There was a weather warning saying that there might be a ten percent chance of rain, but Kaminari didn't think anything of it seeing how it was a low chance of rain…now he's started to regret not bringing an umbrella with him. Because he was now soaking wet along with with his belongings

"Seriously, of all the times for it to rain, why now!" He yelled while running through the neighborhood that he lived in. As he was running through the rain, he soon looked up at the cloud-covered sky due to the sound of a thunderstorm coming in. Looking up, he noticed that the lightning was purple instead of the usual bleach white color. He found it weird that lightning would look like that, but he paid it no mind for the most part. Right now, he needs to get home before he gets any wetter than he already was. Within a matter of minutes, the young man made it to his home as he quickly opened the door and slammed it shut upon entering. "Next time, I'm gonna bring my umbrella with me at all times."

"Welcome home, sparky." said a female's voice as he looked up. Upon looking up, he saw a tall woman with long hair with similar features to Kaminari's hair, a black long sleeve shirt, blue jeans, and yellow Pikachu-style slippers on her feet. "Looks like I'm not the only one who didn't bring their umbrella as well."

"And yet you're dry as a bowl of cereal, Himeko?"

"I got home an hour early. Work was slow seeing how there's not a lot of criminal activity going on." She said while making her way down the stairs. "I mean, I'm all for peace and all, but this is kind of nerve-racking."

"That bad while on patrolling?"

"I'll say this. The only action that I got on the job was making sure a guy didn't run over a bunch of baby ducks and their mom." She said before reaching into the closet next to them as she handed Kaminari a towel to dry off. "I'm not saying that I don't mind the peace, but what's the point of having me go on patrol when nothing is going on? And even if I am on patrol, All Might or some other high-ranking hero took care of the problem."

"Can't you like, go to another agency or something?"

"Given my track record of accidentally causing power outages with my quirk, who would want to hire me." She said before heading off into the kitchen as Kaminari followed after her. "Seriously bro, you might have it better off than I have with the hero stuff."

"Okay, I know things are kind of tight, but look on the bright side. You still got me to have your back." He said as Himeko smiled at him.

"Nice to have someone as carefree to cheer me up….so how long before your friend's quirk takes effect again?" She asked as Kaminari shushed her.

"I only told you because you're the only person I trust who won't judge me for being friends with the villain killer."

"I'm surprised that U.A would allow her in…you think they're blackmailing her or something?"

"I don't think so…then again All Might is a teacher now, so that might have something to do with it."

"Yeah, that might do it for anyone if they know they can't beat Japan's greatest hero." She said before going towards the refrigerator. "I'll make us some frozen pizza. Also, it's your turn to take out the trash this time."

"No, it's not. It's your turn?" He said as Himeko looked over at Kaminari with a deadpan expression while raising an eyebrow at him. "Fine, I'll take the trash out."

"Thanks, bro, I owe you one~," She said as Kaminari rolled his eyes and began making his way outside in the pouring rain.

"Why do we even have the chore wheel, when she never takes the trash out." He said as he paused upon seeing the backyard flooded. "Gah! Seriously!? What is this? Make Kaminari's job more difficult than it has to be day or something?" Kaminari groaned in annoyance as he tossed his book bag off to the side in the kitchen as he made his way into the water of the flooded backyard and over towards the trash can. Once he was near the metal trash can, he started to drag it over to the front of the house while grumbling in annoyance. "Stupid surprise rain. It's bad enough I'm still soaking wet, now water is seeping into my shoes. Can this day get any worse!"

The moment he said that the sound of thunder echoed through the sky as lightning shot down from the sky and struck a tree nearby the house. The tree that was struck by the lightning exploded into a million pieces as it caused Kaminari to fall backward into the water of the flooded backyard. The young man flailed around a bit before quickly pulling himself up from the water while coughing due to accidentally swallowing some of the water.

"W-What the hell!?" He yelled while coughing up more water, but soon heard the sound of lightning crackling a bit along with a purple glow as he looked over to where it was coming from. Looking in front of him, he saw what appears to be a giant hammer embedded itself into the tree trunk of the tree that shattered into pieces. Out of curiosity, Kaminari stood up from where he was sitting as he carefully made his way over to the giant hammer. The moment he was getting close, the hammer lit up like a star before shooting a bolt of lightning through Kaminari's chest. At first, he screamed out of fear upon seeing this, but slowly stopped as it didn't hurt him at all. If anything, it made him feel warm….and oddly fuzzy inside. The lightning bolt soon vanished as he started touching the area where he was hit.

At first, there was nothing. But within a matter of seconds, he felt his body feeling heavy along with the sensation of feeling sleepy. He soon felt his knees give as he fell face-first onto the water. He soon looked up at the hammer as he saw a shadowy figure standing in front of him just as his vision was becoming blurry. The figure soon kneeled in front of Kaminari as it grinned, revealing its sharp teeth to him.

"Yes, you'll do nicely," it said before reaching down towards Kaminari. The moment its hand blocked his vision, everything around him turned into darkness as he passed out.