People were getting used to Izuku's habit of spontaneously appearing between two objects. It was a little disappointing, but also rather wonderful since people were less prone to staring at him. Izuku slid out between two of the chairs in the bleachers, between Kaminari and Shoji. The first seemed a little surprised, while the second just moved his arms to give Izuku room to wiggle out.

He hopped over the seat in front of him and landed in it, right next to Ibara Shiozaki, who glanced at him sidelong and then nodded once. He was being acknowledged by his partner of necessity, at least. It was a step above her usual cold glares. He still wasn't sure what he had done to earn her ire in the past.

"What did I miss?" he asked. "Todoroki's in the hospital, but there's something I'll have to tell my class after."

Ibara glanced down at the arena below them.

"Tetsutetsu and your red headed classmate were defeated." she explained. "Quite handily. Not a punch was thrown."

Izuku blinked. Kirishima losing, without throwing a punch? His mind raced with theories. Had Yaoyorozu created a cannon of some kind, a ranged weapon with which to blast them away? Or maybe the purple haired boy had used his own Quirk, which Izuku knew nothing of? It was hard to say...

"The boy with the purple hair spoke to them, and they walked out of bounds." Ibara explained. "It was quite anticlimactic. We haven't seen either since their lost."

Izuku blinked. Spoke to them... and they just walked away? Curious... some sort of mind control Quirk, perhaps. They did exist, rare as they were. Villains such as Siren and Liar's Lament were known for using their own mind control Quirks to great effect in organized crime syndicates. There was even a hero in Africa who could sing to control her foes for a time. Was this boy like them? An interesting matchup for Bakugou then, mind games against brute force...

Izuku hummed softly.

"The next match is Sero and Itsuka against Blackmore and Tsuburaba." he noted. "I'm curious to see how well Blackmore performs. He hasn't quite had a chance to shine so far... a shame it isn't raining. That would have shown these folks something to see."

Ibara glared at him again, and he raised an eyebrow. Well, it did seem that her ire had something to do with Blackmore...

He froze. In his mind, puzzle pieces started to slowly click together. Blackmore's strange behaviour, his long looks into seemingly random crowds, the peace he had apparently found out of nowhere... and now this girl, who he knew to be a practicing Christian, which was a rare thing be in a world such as this, and rarer still in Japan. Blackmore was also...

"You care for him." Izuku said. "More than he knows."

"His soul is wounded." she replied. "Anybody can see that. He is hurt, lost, confused, and he hides behind a mask because he is afraid of inconveniencing those he considers better."

"He's much stronger than you know." Izuku said, shaking his head.

"He made an honest mistake after a traumatizing situation and his first instinct was to beat his head against a wall in penance." she told him, and Izuku froze again.

"He did what?"

Ibara cocked her head to one side, clearly confused.

"He is convinced he is in some way defective, and that if he shows it his 'master' will be displeased with him." she informed him. "And I have reason to suspect you are the master he fears so."

Izuku took that in stride for a moment, thinking. He had given Blackmore no reason to fear him, he believed; it wasn't as though he would turn the boy away if he failed. It was his responsibility to care for him; in a world where he was a stranger in a strange land, what sort of monster would take from him his only safe refuge? That would be impressively unheroic, and morally reprehensible to boot.

But did Blackmore know that, he wondered? He communed with Valentine for a moment, who said nothing, and narrowed his eyes. Perhaps…

"I don't know much about Blackmore's past… but I do know ;he didn't exactly have the most standard childhood." Izuku said. "Perhaps… perhaps this is something from his past. Something he chose not to tell me…"

Ibara stared at him for a time, analyzing his expression, before blinking as her expression shifted from accusatory to surprised. She touched a hand to his shoulder, drawing his attention, and then spoke.

"You truly did not know…" she said slowly, as if it were just occurring to her. "You had no idea he… oh, I've made assumptions once again, haven't I?"

"Yes." Izuku replied, nodding. "Though at least now I know why you kept glaring at me all day. And, in your defence... it wasn't as though you were without reason to suspect me. I am the only other person who regularly interacts with Blackmore, and he does live with me."

"He lives with you?"

"In the spare bedroom across the hall, yes." Izuku smiled. "My mother adores him. She signed adoption papers just last week."

"So that makes him-"

"My brother, yes. He was rather flustered when I first told him, so much so I thought he'd panic and run for a moment. He instead chose to stay with me, something for which my mother and I am extremely grateful."

Izuku chuckled at her confusion, patting her shoulder with a hand while looking down toward the arena proper. The next match would likely be starting in a moment, and he didn't want to miss any of it. This was Blackmore's time to shine, to show the world he too was a hero worthy of standing beside the other students. Izuku watched with amusement as their opponents strode out onto the platform first; Sero and Kendo both looked rested and ready, the former stretching his hands over his head while the other cracked her knuckles.

And then Blackmore entered the field. He had his mask on, as was typical of him when entering battle. Beside him walked his partner, Tsuburaba, who had a grim, serious look on his face. Curious; he looked almost angry. Had Blackmore said something, perhaps? Izuku swallowed. He certainly hoped not. Beside him, Ibara was watching as the boy she had first seen falling from the sky in a rainstorm marched out into the sunlight, before a roaring crowd. They knew him already from his clash with Todoroki and his second place finish, for his foreign name and his foreign mannerisms. To the crowd he was a wildcard, an unknown element they couldn't predict.

Blackmore bowed his head when he was asked about his readiness. Kendo and Sero. He knew both; Kendo's strength and Sero's mobility, though on a flat plain such as this the latter would be challenged somewhat. The main threat he posed was the risk of immobilization, which Blackmore could easily avoid with his liquid state. As for Kendo... Blackmore had a plan for her. It wasn't a gentle plan, or a considerate plan. But it was a plan, and this was a battle. There was no room for gentleness or consideration. She had placed herself in the field of conflict with Blackmore; let her fight her way out, or fail trying.

"Let's have a good fight, yeah?" Sero said, offering them a thumbs up. Blackmore gave him a curt nod, and Tsuburaba just grunted.

"BEGIN!" Present Mic shouted, and Blackmore burst into motion.

A streak of white, of red and predominantly of blue hurtled through the air, fronted by an expressionless mask marked with a rainbow. Sero dodged away from the incoming attack, only to find himself assailed from behind when Blackmore reformed with his mask on the back of his head and kicked him in the spine. Itsuka came at him from the side, her fists expanding to cover her partner, but she ran face first into an invisible wall before she could get that far.

"Tag!" Tsuburaba called, as if in warning, and Blackmore went liquid again, streaking skyward for a moment before turning back and bringing himself down on Itsuka from above.

Tsuburaba blew himself a new wall and Sero's tape simply stuck to it rather than him, a definite improvement. Kendo caught Blackmore in one giant fist and then immediately recalled that liquid wasn't exactly something you could hold in a fist, letting him pour out of her grip and reform right in front of her. Considering her fist was already raised, she just brought her hand down, hoping to clobber him atop the head.

Blackmore turned into liquid and coursed behind her, between her legs, reforming and taking a backhand from a hand the size of a human being, sending him flying. His right side ached like absent mercy, but he ignored it in favour of landing, rolling and turning back into liquid form to approach her again. He reformed led with a jab, one which she snapped her head to the side to dodge before following up with a right hook that could likely take the head off an elephant. He dodged as well, reverting to liquid form.

The two danced back and forth like this for a short time, Blackmore slowly pushing her back with an endless series of quick attacks that forced her to backstep, until finally he went liquid again and shot straight up. Her eyes followed him, and so she missed Tsuburaba lunging at her from the front, having worked her way around. The boy rammed his shoulder into her, knocking her into his barrier behind her before blowing a new one into existence.

Then, Itsuka felt a pressure, all around her. She tried to turn her head and realized the truth; Tsuburaba had blown another wall into existence right behind her, trapping her between the two! She tried to move her hands, but her fists were too large and she could muster up the strength to break them from immobility. Blackmore turned into liquid and coursed over the wall, back toward Sero, who was in the middle of deducing just how many invisible walls were present by flinging his tape all around the arena. A clever enough move, marking his unseen obstacles... but also much, much too slow.

Blackmore came down on him with a crashing impact, landing on his shoulders feet first and driving him down into the ground. The air was knocked from his lungs by that move alone, but then Blackmore stayed on top of him, pinning him to the ground. He couldn't get a good angle with his tape and flat on the floor like this he couldn't get his arms under him for leverage. He was pinned, well and truly, as Blackmore sat on his back to spread the weight around.

"Yield." Blackmore demanded, voice low and cold. "You have-"

The word 'lost' never escaped his lips, cut off by the strange glass-like sound of Tsuburaba's barrier breaking. The boy called a warning, but Blackmore was a moment too slow to react, giving Kendo time to wrap her much more human sized arms and hands around his throat in a choke-hold. It was an impressive one at that; she had obviously been well trained by somebody, her muscles defined and powerful, much more so than any of Blackmore's own female classmates.

But she had apparently, in her desperate race to be free of Tsuburaba's trap, forgotten just who Blackmore was. He went liquid again, and coursed straight down and behind her once more. He predicted the counterstrike, with the mega sized backhand, and delayed his return to solidity until after her fist was passed before reforming and bringing his fist up into her solar-plexus with all the force he could muster.

The air left her lungs in a single wretched gasp, and he grabbed a fistful of her top to wrench her off balance, pulling her close as a shield against a streamer of tape from Sero's elbow. She struggled in vain, but the human body needed air to function and she couldn't quite get enough to manage anything more trying than continued consciousness. Sero was frozen for about half a second too long, and Blackmore shoved the off-balance Kendo toward him.

The two hit the ground sprawling, and Tsuburaba rushed at them from the side again, having made his way around his own divider wall, and blew a new wall into existence on top of them, a ceiling to pin them to the ground. Itsuka, being hardly able to breathe, couldn't say much, so it was up to Sero to admit defeat from under her, in spite of her rasped arguments that she could keep going.

"AND THAT'S A MATCH!" Present Mic shouted, the crowd going wild. "LADIES AND GENTLEMEN; RAYMOND BLACKMORE AND KOSEI TSUBURABA, YOUR WINNERS FOR THE ROUND!"

Blackmore bowed, and Tsuburaba punched the air with a fist, before Midnight strolled over to shatter his air-wall atop Sero and Kendo with a powerful stomp, smiling at the pair as she offered them a hand up. Sero took it, scarcely noticing the boobs in front of his face as he brought Kendo up with him. The redhead was still struggling to breathe; Blackmore could have killed her with that blow, though he had held back enough to ensure it was only a temporary debilitation instead.

"Hey... good job." Kosei said, offering Blackmore a hand to shake after catching his breath. "You... you did good. I'm sorry for what I said earlier..."

He trailed off when he noticed Blackmore wasn't paying attention; instead, the blonde's eyes seemed to be on the bleachers, one spot in particular being his focus. Kosei looked that way himself, noting that it was where the other students were sitting.

"Yeah, your classmates are probably pretty impressed." he said. "Mine too, actually. You wanna go get a drink?"

He touched a hand to the boy's shoulder, who once again said nothing. Blackmore looked him, and nodded, touching two fingers to his throat. He let out a rasping breath and Kosei blinked, before grinning.

"Oh, so that's your Quirks weakness..." he said, grinning. "It dries you out, huh? Can't say I'm surprised... let's go get some water."

The two walked off the stage, Blackmore leaning on Kosei slightly. He was very dry; consistently maintaining his liquid form was one thing, but swapping back and forth rapidly... in the supercooled air of the frozen arena Todoroki had made it was easier, but under the blazing midday sun he found the heat sapped his strength even more. He would need to be more careful in the next match, and conserve his stamina.

Izuku looked over at Ibara.

"He seems to have found someone else to trust." he said. "Like I said, he's stronger than he seems."

Ibara said nothing.

"We're up next," Izuku continued, standing up and offering her a hand. "I'd prefer we present a united front during our own match; Shoji and Kyoka may not be the top students of Class 1-A, but they're both diligent and dangerous if underestimated. Together they will likely pose quite a threat."

"A united front it is." she agreed.

Ibara took his hand, nodding as he pulled her up to her feet. She had that calm, graceful smile back on her face, a rather serene look. Izuku could understand now what Blackmore saw in her, though Funny was unconvinced.

'Too young.' the man said in Izuku's mind. 'An older woman who can keep up with you would suit you better. Like that teacher of yours; the one you pulled into this dimension.'

Izuku, to his credit, managed to keep his calm expression despite that little interjection.

AN:

I particularly enjoy writing a good fistfight between two fairly evenly matched characters, as the observant in the audience may be able to tell. I also happen to enjoy foreshadowing, so keep an eye out for that between brawls.

A shame about Kendo and Sero, but Catch the Rainbow and Hard Air have surprising synergy; the former offers great mobility and the latter fantastic field manipulation. Combining the two makes for a satisfying and efficient pairing as the first ensures the second can't debilitate the user all too much. Add to that the fact that Blackmore is a trained killer of men, and I imagine there are few who could match him in a one on one. Add to THAT superpowers, and while the field can be levelled somewhat, experience will always come out on top.

Izuku and Ibara are in for a fun showing after this; never underestimate the side cast. There will be a good fight next chapter. And after that... well, Bakugo has some stuff to deal with, and we haven't seen much of Shinso yet. Don't worry about that though; you'll get your fill soon enough.

Hope you all enjoyed!