A/N: Once again, if you read the last chapter immediately after it came out, I did wind up making slight edits; this time they took the form of some additions to the banter in the Service Club room to better match Bakugo's personality. Also, I'm proud to announce that I have officially finished NaNoWriMo for the first time! Thank you everyone for all of the reviews, revisions, thought-provoking questions, art, and everything else that you've given in response to my work. It really is the fuel that keeps my creative engines running. I do plan to keep this story going, but updates may get slower as I start having to pay more attention to things like 'Grad School' and 'Real Life'. Without futher ado, here's the chapter!

My homeroom teacher - Eraserhead - was a sort of person called an 'Underground Hero', a variant of the stereotypically fame-obsessed existence known as the 'Pro Hero' notable for choosing to operate in relative anonymity. In other words, you could call him a sort of hipster, the sort of person who only thinks certain things are cool when nobody else has heard of them or done them. Aizawa was so 'underground' and 'unique' that he came to work in a freaking sleeping bag, because resting whenever possible was more 'efficient' than actually being presentable. For all of his talk about 'not wasting a single day' to get us ready to be heroes? I'm pretty sure that we only skipped student orientation because attending it would have been too mainstream. (Alternately, it was possible that he was just lazy, and that finding pro heroes willing to work at a high school was too much trouble for the administration to bother replacing him, so he did it because he knew he could get away with it.)

Normally, I was the sort of person who wouldn't be caught dead affecting such an unnatural posture of indifference. If I liked something unpopular, it's because I was an unpopular person, and I was okay with that. Maintaining a rebellion against the status quo seemed like a lot of work, so naturally it was something that held no attraction to me. On the other hand, if the alternative to being a hipster was dealing with the media everyday, then I was starting to see the appeal of Aizawa-sensei's approach to things.

Ever since All Might had announced that he was going to be teaching at U.A., day after day, the crowds of media hanging about near the entrance had only grown. Not that I blamed them; it seemed like everybody and their dog wanted to know just what the strongest man in Japan was doing taking up a teaching position. U.A.'s official press releases stated that this was just an offer that All Might had been looking forward to taking for a while, but the unofficial rumor mills were full of wild theories ranging from a villain ring in Musutafu, to All Might having health issues and losing his power, to a secret engagement between All Might and Midnight. A few even correctly guessed the 'forbidden love child' angle, but so far Midoriya's secret was still safe - the number one candidate for their 'love child' theories was some American blonde over in 1-B named Tsunotori. In any case, All Might was avoiding the cameras for some reason, so the media was forced to try to get some information from other available sources - such as the students.

Naturally, as bad as the media's speculation had gotten, the student body was ten times worse. I had personally heard half-baked theories ranging from 'All Might is secretly an alien from another planet' to 'All Might is a scientifically created super-soldier, and U.A. has the formula' to 'Aizawa-sensei's Quirk Nullification abilities are the only thing able to turn off All Might's quirk for long enough that he can achieve sexual release'.

"Excuse me! Are you part of U.A.'s hero course?" Just keep walking, pretend they're talking to somebody else. "Young man! Young man!" All right, if they're going to step out in front of me, I can't exactly pretend, so I guess I'll have to answer.

I did my best to stifle a yawn. "Do you mind? I don't want to be late," I said dully, not slowing down in the slightest. I gave the woman the choice of either getting out of the wheel of my bike as I walked it into the school gate or getting run over, and unsurprisingly, she decided to move.

"Is All Might a stickler for punctuality?" She called out after me.

I just shrugged, letting her talk to my back as I walked through the door. "I dunno," I said, "I haven't been late to his class yet to find out."

"Young man, you were a survivor from the Tatooin incident last year, weren't you? Any comments about studying under the man who saved you?" For a second, my heart dropped into my stomach. I whirled around to explain to her that she had the wrong person - and saw that she was currently looking at Bakugo, who in turn was ignoring her completely. I didn't know whether to be relieved that she hadn't recognized me from the same incident or annoyed. On the other hand, if she had recognized me, some reporter probably would have showed up at my house by now, and I would have probably had to bribe Komachi with ice cream to keep her from 'accidentally' spilling my embarrassing personal secrets during an interview, so for the sake of my wallet I'd go with relief for the moment.

The media harassment had gotten so bad that the administration had taken to raising the anti-villain defense walls around the campus as soon as classes officially started for the day in order to keep the press from sneaking onto the grounds or trying to record classes through the windows. From the inside, it kind of gave the feeling of being in a castle under siege. Luckily, the media didn't appear to have any trebuchets, so as long as we could keep them from tossing dead bodies full of plague into our courtyard, we'd probably be fine.

Far more concerning than the media threat was the threat of homeroom with Aizawa-sensei. He had a nasty tendency to do things that would catch us off guard - handing out pop quizzes on materials that other teachers had taught, 'training our situational awareness' by asking us how many reporters had been at the front door in the morning and what they had been wearing, cancelling homeroom to lead us all in quirkless calisthenics because he felt like our other classes weren't getting us enough exercise, and so on - about half the time, anyway. The other half of the time, he just gave us something easy and pointless to do while he took a nap. Those first few minutes of homeroom before he showed up and told us whether we were going to be relaxed or scrambling about in a panic were always just a little tense. I didn't blame him; if I were a teacher, I would have set up some kind of system that let me take naps myself, but from the student perspective it generally made our mornings a little anxious.

For once, though, I was too tired to worry. I put my head down on my desk as I waited for class to start, enjoying the extra few minutes of shut-eye before I had to actually sit up and pay attention. Despite my borrowed sleep efficiency quirk, hours and hours of stockpiling quirks every night in the hopes of being ready for the next day's classwork was beginning to take its toll on me. It wasn't just that the hero class activities were tiring, which they were; there was also the fact that I had been diligently finding ways to copy the quirks of nearly everyone in my class, more than a few of the teachers, and even a few students from other classes that I could brush past in the halls. While this had obvious benefits, there were drawbacks as well. Instead of having maybe half a dozen pro-level quirks worth stockpiling, I had more like twenty or thirty, all of which needed to be practiced with and experimented with if they were going to be useful. So I did my best to ignore everyone else in the room until I heard the telltale noise of Aizawa-sensei clearing his throat.

"Settle down." Almost instantly, the room quieted down. I picked my head up to look at Aizawa, who thankfully was still half in his sleeping bag and holding a pile of papers. Good, probably not an active day then. "Before we get to today's activities," Or, maybe he's just not ready yet. Crap. "I've got the first week's results from your Hero Service projects." Ugh. The fact that he was giving them to us instead of Midnight-sensei doing it meant that we were probably going to be doing something strenuous later. "Group A," Aizawa continued, "You had a short deadline for this one, so you're actually finished with your first assignment. Well, you did alright, but some of you need to learn the difference between 'Plus Ultra' and just plain overdoing things." Curious, I looked around the room to see who had… ah. Midoriya's group, that made sense. Surprisingly, he, Uraraka, and Yaoyorozu all looked a little embarrassed, so maybe it wasn't just him? The only one who didn't look sheepish was Tokoyami, and it was possible that I just couldn't see the blush through his feathers.

"Group B," Aizawa said after he had passed down the feedback forms, moving on. I saw Todoroki straighten up, as well as Tobe, Mezo, and Hagakure - well, her clothes did, anyways. "Your client is a little bit unreasonable. Good job setting reasonable limits and refusing her more inappropriate requests, but it seems like you need more practice at rejecting people politely." My, the blushes were practically contagious there. How interesting. I would have to find out just what job they had gotten, especially if it meant that I could get some reciprocal blackmail on Mezo-san. As I considered the problem of how to acquire said information without asking straightforwardly like a novice at being lied to, Aizawa kept going. "Group C, I think you're finding that working with support companies - or a support student, as the case may be - can be tricky, especially when it comes to giving them requirements in the format they ask for. You did okay for students that haven't been trained for it yet, but there's room to improve. Make sure to pay extra attention to where you made mistakes when you get to Cementoss's lessons on the subject." Looking quite chagrined, Iida nodded determinedly, as did Kirishima, Ashido, and Asui.

Aizawa's gaze turned towards me, and I couldn't help but swallow nervously. Dammit, why did he have to announce results like this in front of the class? Okay, I knew why, it was a 'logical decision' to put pressure on us to work harder, but still! "Group D," he said ominously. "Your student reporter gave you very high marks, but don't get cocky. That just means they were too 'nice' to give you information on where you could stand to improve." Yeah, that sounded about right. Totsuka was a complete sweetheart, the sort of deredere girl who the protagonist should just give up all the other love interests for if he weren't a weak-willed idiot - wait, something wasn't right there! In any case, Totsuka not giving us criticism was unavoidable. Sure enough, the paperwork we got back was full of compliments and smiley faces, even in areas that we should have bombed in (like 'professional comportment' for Bakugo or 'heroic attitude' for me.) Aizawa's final advice for us was to "make sure your self-critique is more effective than the critique you received was." Hah, easy enough - self-criticism was practically my best skill!

"Team E, it seems like your students thought some of you contributed more than others. Those of you dominating the group, make sure to listen to your teammates and don't just talk over them. Those of you falling behind? Step up to the plate and don't just go with the flow. And if you're thinking right now that the culprit had to have been somebody else, then it was probably you, so cultivate some self-awareness." Having seen team E in action, that sounded about right - Kaminari and Jiro had been sort of like bystanders compared to the Riajuu Duo. Now that Aizawa was done motivating us, it was time for the moment of truth. Were we going to get the sadist, or the lazy bum? "Now that that's done…" Aizawa said, leaving us all on tenterhooks as he paused for dramatic effect, "today, you'll be picking a class president," the majority of the class let out a deep sigh of relief. And then pretty much everybody else in class all started shouting at once, while I put my head down on my desk to see if I could catch a few extra minutes of shut-eye. I didn't really care who got the honor of signing themselves up for a bunch of pointless busywork, as long as it wasn't me.

Predictably, Iida's voice was the first to make itself heard over the hubbub. "Quiet down, everyone!" Please do, I'm trying to take a nap here. "Leading the many is a task of heavy responsibility, but the ambition to take on that responsibility does not necessarily imply that one has the capability to discharge that responsibility effectively! This sacred office is too precious to be dealt with in a cavalier fashion! I hereby motion that our true leader be chosen by election!" I used to think that Iida was trying to be overly pompous in order to impress people, but slowly and with dawning horror, I was coming to realize that he was just like that all the time. That settled it. If it looked like he was going to be made class president, I was going to have to do something drastic to stop it. It was for his own good!

The rest of the class seemed to realize that something was off with Iida too, because there was stunned silence for a second, a conversational vacuum that our resident riajuu Hayama immediately rushed to fill. "Mmm, that's not a bad idea," Hayama said affably, "why don't we have everybody who wants to be president stand up and say a few words about why they think they'd be good at the job?"

"Whatever," Aizawa said, echoing my opinions on the matter. "Just make it quick."

"Yes, sensei," Hayama said, "in that case, I'll go first to set the example?" Nobody gainsaid him, so he took a deep breath and put on a bright smile. "I think I should be class president because I'm good at getting along with people, and because my quirk lets me fly up high to see the big picture, would make me a good candidate to lead us as a hero team."

After a pause, Aizawa didn't object, so Hayama sat back down and Iida stood up. "I think I should be class president because of my diligence and my respect for the position!" Then came Kirishima. "If I'm elected class president, I'll go at it with guts!" And so on.

"U-um, I d-don't know if I have much experience being a leader yet, but it's always been my dream, so I'd like to try!" Midoriya. Man, for the kid of somebody super famous, he sure is shy.

"Just because I've rejected the darkness in my heart doesn't mean that I don't understand the darkness in the hearts of villains. I believe that I am exceptionally well suited lead us in battle against the criminal element." … wow, he's way too serious about this too, but in a completely different way from Iida!

"A job like class president requires a keen attention to detail and attention to paperwork, which are both qualities that I am very confident in." Yaoyorozu. She was clearly the best choice in my opinion, which of course meant that she was probably going to get screwed over by the fact that these things were always just popularity contests.

"I should be president because I won't accept doing anything less than the best job I can do." Bakugo, with a surprising lack of expletives. Guess all that practice with Totsuka was good for something after all.

"Oh, jeez, aaah, everybody's responses are so cool! Um, well, I think I should be president because it sounds super fun, and someone who enjoys their work is always a good choice for the job, right?" Sit down, Ashido. Work isn't fun, that's why they call it work.

"Hey, with me around paperwork just files itself! Haha, only sort of, I wish, that was a joke, but still, my quirk makes me great at handling stuff like this, so leave it to me!" Ugh. No. Having someone nominally in charge of me who won't shut up is bad enough when they're an adult. After Tobe came Asui, Kaminari, Miura, Hagakure, and Mezo; honestly, those of us who weren't in the running were clearly in the minority. Finally, when Mezo finished delivering his statement about his ability to multitask from the end of one of his tentacle mouths, nobody else stood up.

"Well then, should we take the vote?" Hayama asked, effortlessly re-dominating the flow of the classroom as if he were already in charge.

Suddenly, Yuigahama stood up. Oi, if you're going to give a speech, you shouldn't make people wait! Seriously, you had like fifteen speeches to figure it ou- "No wait, Hikki hasn't gone yet!" What.

My head snapped up to see an uncomfortable number of people looking at me with faces full of expectation. Before I could say anything, Midoriya chimed in with a "Even though I still wanted to try for myself, Hikigaya-san would be really good at it, wouldn't he," the little bastard. (Technically that was probably literally true, so to be clear, I meant it figuratively.)

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," I blurted out before anybody else could attempt to damn me with effusive praise, "I don't want to be class president!" The looks that everybody gave me were a mix of incomprehension and disappointment, which was really uncomfortable, so I quickly looked to the side and thought up an excuse. "... I'm too busy," I said eventually. "I wouldn't have time." It was even mostly true! I had quirks to stock, time to spend with my little sister, homework to do, television to watch, books to read - not that I'd done much of either of the last two over the past two weeks, but still, it was the principle of the matter. I was already running myself ragged trying to keep up with U.A., so why would I volunteer for even more work?

"Oh," Yuigahama said with disappointment, sitting back down. "That's too bad." The amount of murmured assent that she got in response to that statement was creepy. Oi, you don't all have to be so nice! It's a terrible idea, don't try and console her that it didn't work out!

"Hikigaya." Suddenly, Aizawa spoke up, interfering in the election for the first time. "Your quirk gives you low stamina."

I shrugged. "Yeah, so?" Technically it was a lie (as were most things that I said about myself these days) since I had nearly infinite stamina as long as I was using my quirk 'properly', but the way that I had sold my quirk was that pushing a single skill past its base level tired that quirk out, so in effect it was more or less true.

Aizawa glowered at me from his sleeping bag. "So most pro heroes spend their days on the street, using their quirks fairly consistently, and don't necessarily have any idea what they're doing behind a desk. You've got an opportunity at a training opportunity for a leadership position that would keep you from having to ration your quirk use. Consider reprioritizing."

Ah. Even after years of being reminded that my quirk was nearly useless, hearing it for the hundred thousandth time still stung. Maybe it was because I was hearing it from someone whose job it was to judge these sorts of things, instead of some random jerk in class. Still, he did have a point. Not the point that he thought he was making, but a point. Hadn't I wanted to get a comfy desk job from the beginning? And although a leadership position was 'a lot of responsibility' or whatever, looked at another way, wasn't it an opportunity for me to find ways to push off my work onto other people? And how hard could being class president be, if Aizawa was recommending me for the position? He was too lazy to encourage somebody like me if there was any chance that me screwing it up would actually cause him problems, so it had to be the sort of thing that any moron capable of winning a popularity contest could do. And so, despite my better instinct, I gave in. "...Fine," I said eventually.

Delighted, Yuigahama beamed at me. "Okay! Haha! Hikki, give us your speech!"

Aaaagh, why did I agree to it! Shit, what do I say! Quick, think of something witty! No, no good. Think of something socially acceptable? No, can't do that either. Borrow a trite phrase from my dad? … It was the best I had, so it would have to do. "Well, you know what they say," I began, a slightly sarcastic smile appearing on my face, "if you want something done well, give it to somebody who's already busy. If other people are already asking a lot from them, there's probably a reason," such as the fact that they're probably too much of a pushover to say no, but I maybe won't include that last little bit regardless of how appropriate it feels at the moment. Well, it was a lame speech, but at least I didn't embarrass myself, and it wasn't like I had a lot invested in winning the president position. In fact, losing the election might even be preferable, Aizawa-sensei's points aside. I mean, even if being the student council president would be better for me personally, shouldn't it go to someone who actually deserved the position and wanted it?

According to my classmates, apparently not. Of the six people who didn't vote for themselves - Iida, Yuigahama, Todoroki, Uraraka, Kirishima, and Yukinoshita - four of them voted for me, one voted for Yaoyorozu, and one voted for Midoriya. That, or someone in that group voted for someone else who didn't vote for themselves, who then voted for one of the three of us; in the end, the result was that I had four votes, Yaoyorozu had three, one of which was mine, and Midoriya was in third place with two votes. Which made me the Class President. Fuck. Yaoyorozu and I went up to the front of the class, received a brief moment of cursory applause, and then we sat back down. Hooray for us. As we got back to our seats, Yaoyorozu leaned forward from the seat behind me. "I look forward to working with you, President Hikigaya," she said with a smile.

"Brrrr. Don't say that, it'll give me shivers." I replied, clutching my shoulders in only half-faked fright. "... But yeah. Glad to be working with you." I sighed. I raised my eyebrow at her. "Shouldn't you be, you know, angrier that you didn't get first? Objectively speaking, you're the better choice between the two of us."

Yaoyorozu blinked. "Hikigaya-san, were you perhaps… one of the people who voted for me?" When I nodded in confirmation, she surprisingly sagged slightly in her chair. "As I suspected…" she muttered. Oi, why does that make you depressed!? Aizawa was getting ready to start whatever lecture he had in mind for the remainder of homeroom, so rather than explaining in detail, Yaoyorozu just smiled at me and said, "No, Hikigaya, I think I'm pretty happy right where I am."

As expected of Yaoyorozu. Even talking in plain Japanese, she still somehow managed to be completely incomprehensible.

One of the biggest benefits to studying at U.A. was the cafeteria. Not only was the food delicious, but the quirks were delicious as well. Between the lunch lines, the crowded hallways, and the tables that encouraged sitting in large groups, it was very easy for me to 'accidentally' bump, nudge, or brush against other people in order to see what quirks they had and potentially to copy their tasty, tasty, pro-level quirks. It was almost enough to make up for the bad taste that winning the election had left in my mouth. Some days I made a game of it, trying to figure out whether someone was in the hero, business, support, or general courses just by their quirks alone.

A quirk that causes teeth to shine with brilliant light… probably called 'Megawatt Smile'? Almost certainly business.

What about you, skull-face guy? Hmm, you can give things you touch the consistency of quicksand? Let's go with hero, and I'm keeping that quirk to play with later.

Microscopic vision, with oil stains all over her face and uniform? Support.

The ability to pass through solid objects? General or hero, but since he's built like a brick house let's go with hero, even if I'm probably not going to keep my copy of his quirk, given that I like not having my clothes fall right through me.

Disguise yourself perfectly as someone else, as long as you ingest enough of their blood? Eww. Nope, getting rid of that quirk as soon as possible. Looking at the guy, he seemed perfectly ordinary, possibly even like I had seen him somewhere before, which I suppose just went to show that you couldn't judge a book by its cover. On the other hand, his body language seemed a little off - or maybe it was just my eyes playing tricks on me. I'm pretty sure U.A. isn't going to let its students go around drinking each other's blood just so they can use their quirks a little. The disease risk alone! Yeah, his's definitely just a no-keep quirk in general, let's replace his quirk with... hers.

Size changing, huh? Not as powerful as Gigantify, but bidirectional, so it'd be a good combo with Gigantify to adjust things a little in either direction. Sure, why not, I'll keep it for now. She's probably a hero.

By the time I left the lunch line, I had picked up two new pro-level quirks, and one or two more that might be situationally useful; as far as I was concerned, after I had struggled with the fact that I had only six to eight in total for nearly ten months, that was by no means a bad thing. Of course, that just left me with a follow-up question, namely, where the heck should I sit? In middle school I would just take my lunch and eat outside alone, but the U.A. campus was a lot less convenient for that, and with the school defense walls up there was no breeze to be enjoyed anyways. Once or twice I had eaten with my service group so that Bakugo could lecture Totsuka about protein, but that had been a one-time thing and I didn't really feel like listening to Bakugo shout about not getting the president spot. Maybe…

"Ah! Hikigaya-kun!" I turned to see a vision of loveliness, short white hair and sparkling blue eyes over a smiling face, holding a plate loaded with chicken, rice, and beans. "Do you want to sit together for lunch?" Ah, it was like the springtime of my youth was beginning! If only it weren't an illusion! Still, sitting with some General Education students seemed like it'd be better for my sanity than listening to fake congratulations from my class, so I nodded. "Sure, that sounds fine."

Naturally, of course, Totsuka then led me over to a table where Yukinoshita, Yuigahama, Bakugo, and Yaoyorozu were already sitting, after it was too late for me to escape. Maybe I could eat quickly and excuse myself to the bathroom? "Yo," I mumbled as I took a seat.

"Yahello, Hikki!" Yuigahama chirped, "I saw Sai-chan and Aizawa-sensei talked about his report today so I invited him to eat with us!"

Sai-chan? I raised an eyebrow. "Oi, Yuigahama, I know you like nicknames, but don't be rude," I scolded her.

"Nnnn," Totosuka hummed, "It's okay, I don't mind. Actually, I've been meaning to ask…" I turned to look at him, and he squirmed shyly. "Would you… be alright if I called you Hachiman? And you can call me Saika?" He looked up at me imploringly through long, delicate eyelashes, his hands clasped in front of his chest. "I don't like being so formal…"

Don't blush don't blush why am I blushing! "Ah," I said, quickly taking a bite of my food to hide my discomfort, "sure, I guess."

"Thanks, Hachiman!" he said, smiling so sweetly that it almost looked like he should have a special effects halo of sparkles and rainbows in the background.

"A-ah," I said shakily. "Don't mention it... S-saika." By the end of my sentence, I was practically mumbling.

"Hah! What's with that?" Bakugo smirked, noisily butting in. "Do you just not know how call people by their first names or something?"

"Shut up, 'Kacchan'," I retorted sarcastically. So what if I was never close enough to anyone to call them by their first name before? I didn't need to hear that from him!

"Oi, you call me that shit again and I'm gonna kick your ass!" Katsuki growled.

"Ha ha ha aaaanyway can you believe that Aizawa-sensei? He didn't believe we did a good job at all!" Yuigahama said, desperately trying to change the subject before the two of us started bickering again.

Yukinoshita nodded. "To be fair, the idea of a group of new students performing flawlessly the first time is an unusual one," she said, "and it isn't as though we have prior successes for him to be able to evaluate a trend."

"If Totsuka-san hadn't defended his review of you all so vigorously, I might not have believed it either," Yaoyorozu agreed.

"Mou, Yukinon, Yaomomo, don't take Aizawa-sensei's side! We're totally awesome, and he should recognize that instead of being all 'recognize your own faults' like it was impossible for us to do good!" Yuigahama turned to me, asking "right Hikki?"

"Wrong," I said, rolling my eyes at her. "I mean for starters, just because we know Bakugo knows how to be polite when he gets serious doesn't mean that literally anybody else knows."

"Oi, screw you. I ain't that bad." Bakugo retorted, completely proving my point.

"And if Totsuka couldn't handle brutal honesty," I continued, my gaze tracking to Yukinoshita, "then at least half of Yukinoshita's 'encouragements' would have come across as incredibly offensive."

"Actually, Hikigaya, I think you'll find that my words are only offensive to offensive people." I raised one eyebrow, as if to say 'see?'.

"And then there's me, who… well..." just coming out and saying that I have no friends would come across as a bit desperate, which isn't what I mean at all, but surely it's obvious that -

"Oh, that reminds me," Yukinoshita cuts in. "Yaoyorozu-san, I invited you over to our table for lunch to let you know that if Hikigaya sexually harasses you in any way or tries to abuse his position as class president over you, let us know. We'll believe you."

I gave Yukinoshita a flat glare. "Oi, that joke gets less funny every time you tell it." Despite the fact that I said so, she was smiling smugly at me, and Yuigahama had put a hand up to her mouth in amusement.

For her part, Yaoyorozu looked between Yukinoshita and I, probably to make sure that Yukinoshita was in fact joking, before adopting a smug expression of her own. "I can take care of myself," Yaoyorozu reassured Yukinoshita, "you'd be surprised to know how useful the ability to extrude sharp objects from anywhere on my skin can be."

"Ugh." Outnumbered, I hung my head in defeat. Why had I sat here again?

"Oh, Hachiman-kun was elected as the class president? That's great!" I looked over at the pair of sparkling blue eyes and the wide smile to my left. Oh right, that's why. Because Totsuka, I mean, Saika is dangerously pretty. I quickly looked away, only for something else to catch my attention - I saw the ordinary-looking kid with the super creepy quirk stand up and excuse himself from the table before his lunch was finished. I hoped he wasn't being bullied or anything; I could see him pulling out his phone and putting it to his ear as though he had received a phone call, but I had personally used the same excuse to escape an uncomfortable situation more than once in the past, and he was walking away from the table pretty quickly. Well, if he was being bullied, then hopefully he'd make a hero request or tell a teacher or something, but still, something bothered me about him.

Actually… "Hey, Totsuka. I don't suppose that kid with the phone over there is in your class, is he?" I said, gesturing with my chin in the appropriate direction.

"The one leaving?" Totsuka asked. "I think so! I think that's Iwato-san. Why?"

I did not think this through. I can't just ask if he's being bullied for his quirk, can I? What about… "Is he the sort of person to talk about his quirk?"

"Oh yeah!" Totsuka said happily. "I think he said it was called Theme Song, or something like that? He can play music whenever he wants, it's pretty cool. Was it one you copied?"

"Yes, yes it was," I said slowly. I knew something had been bugging me about him! I'd copied that quirk before, a couple of days ago! "But when I bumped into him today at lunch, he had a disguise quirk instead."

Three things happened at once. 'Iwato' turned the corner, into the hallway. I stood up from my seat. And the alarms went off, all across the building.

VREEE! VREEE! VREEE! "Level Three Security has been broken. All students, please evacuate in an orderly fashion."

I immediately broke into a run, scrambling after the vanished form of 'Iwato'. After only a few steps, I was channeling Yuki-Onna and Vulture Flight, not wanting to lose control and bounce all over the room the way that Stockpile would cause, instead just eking out a little bit of extra forward velocity with my classmates' perks in order to get to the hallway before the mass of panicked students started crowding things and muddying 'Iwato's trail.

VREEE! VREEE! VREEE!

By the time I got to the hallway, 'Iwato' was already gone, clearly having taken a doorway - but which one? Come to think of it, did I really want to know? If they were a blood-drinking face-stealing villain, what was I going to do if I found them? I almost gave up, right then and there, but then I realized that all they had was a disguise quirk. God and Buddha help me, my first instinct was to think 'meh, I can take them.'

And so I tapped into Stockpile, and reached out to a quirk that I had stockpiled on a whim after a few of our teachers had started discussing civilian rescue operations. I was instantly glad that I was in front of the mob about to rush past me, because my nose suddenly melted and shifted into a significantly more doglike shape than it took on when I used the non-Stockpiled version of Bloodhound Nose. I inhaled through my newly transformed nose, and it was like the air took on color, thousands of sensations and flavors all hitting my brain at once; despite the fact that I had next to no practice with scent quirks, the smell I was looking for wasn't exactly a hard one to distinguish, and sure enough I found it - the faint scent of dried blood.

VREEE! VREEE! VREEE!

Still keeping Stockpile on, I darted forward to follow the scent, following it into a stairwell as it led up, away from the ground floor and the evacuation routes that we were supposed to be taking. I had worried a little bit that I had accidentally tracked an old scent trail of Vlad King's, but hearing a door several floors above me swing closed eliminated those concerns. I took the staircase up four stairs at a time, bounding up the stairway with superhuman speed. I was able to follow the scent to the fourth floor before my stockpile of Bloodhound Nose gave up the ghost, my nose contorting back to a more normal shape.

VREEE! VREEE! VREEE!

I threw the door open, having reached an unfamiliar floor. This space seemed to have been set aside for teachers' offices and specialized classrooms, somewhere I'd had no reason to come to until now. I dropped Stockpile for the moment, grabbing a pair of visual enhancement quirks that I had previously only ever used for perfectly normal and inoffensive purposes, but which I was now turning toward finding a clue, something, anything out of place.

VREEE! VREEE! VREEE!

Nothing down the left side of the corridor.

VREEE! VREEE! VREEE!

Halfway down the right side of the hallway, there was a door hanging ever so slightly ajar. Bingo. I turned Stockpile back on, and started pondering what second quirk to use once I caught them. Maybe I could use Yaoyorozu's Creation to make handcuffs or something? Or Yuigahama's Cloth Armor, sew their clothes together? I hadn't really practiced with telekinetic sewing or creating complicated items, though. Hmm. Maybe I should just knock them out?

I burst through the door of the open room, and immediately saw 'Iwato', who was standing in front of a computer workstation, one hand pressed to the ear, still holding the cellular phone. "Aha!" I shouted, "Stand down, 'Iwato', or ukh-"

VREEE! VREEE! VREEE!

'Iwato' had waved their free arm at me in a movement I hadn't recognized. For a second, I thought I had been punched, right in the chest, so hard that it had knocked the breath out of me. I looked down, and there was a knife sticking out of my U.A. uniform, red blood quickly staining the grey jacket around the impact location. I looked back at 'Iwato' in confusion, then back down at my chest, one hand slowly trying to reach up to touch the knife. As I tried to move my arm, the pain belatedly made its way through the adrenaline.

"ahhhhhhhh"
VREEE! VREEE! VREEE!

I wanted to scream in pain, fell down to my knees it was so intense, but all that would come out was a strangled whisper and a taste of blood in the back of my mouth, and then a searing pain deeper in my chest to go with the stab wound as my lungs started filling with something hot and liquid. I dropped down to my hands and knees, coughing blood out of my lungs as I frantically tried to draw a breath, my vision starting to go grey around the edges. Even through the pain, though, I could hear 'Iwato' talking on the phone, his voice slowly drifting upwards in register, becoming more feminine.

VREEE! VREEE! VREEE! "Hmm? Ah, just some dumb kid. A friend of Ayebeeneg's, maybe? I didn't see him in class this morning but he knew the skinbag's name, so whatever. VREEE! VREEE! VREEE! "Nah, no trouble, he was alone, and he was a bleeder." VREEE! VREEE! VREEE!" "Like, ohmigod, you are such a nag. Of course I'm gonna wipe the computer so they don't know what I took, really?" VREEE! VREEE! VREEE! "No, you're telling me how to do my job while I'm doing you a favor, and it's like, so rude." VREEE! VREEE! VREEE! "Hikki!" "Ah, crap."

The familiar exclamation drew me back from the grey edge of consciousness, enough for me to open eyes that I hadn't realized that I'd closed and to look up from where I had fallen sideways on the floor. VREEE! VREEE! VREEE! Hazily, as if down a far-off tunnel, I saw a girl orange hair in a side-bow kneeling in front of me as a few other people rushed past her into the room, explosions and snowflakes following them in a kaleidoscopic display. They were all sideways and stuff, though, so that was a little weird. I smiled a little bit, because I couldn't laugh for some reason. "Hikki, you need to heal! Come on Hikki! I know you can do it, you did it when you saved my dog!"

Oh, right, I had a regeneration quirk. Haha, thanks Zaimokuza. Man, I should use that, huh? Somehow, despite my confusion, I switched to his quirk. It didn't really do much, but my chest started hurting more, so I started moving my arm, slapping at my chest. Huh, there was a knife there. When did that happen? VREEE! VREEE! VREEE! "You - you need it out before you can heal?" The girl asked. It sounded right, having a knife in me sounded bad, so with great effort I managed to make my head move.

VREEE! VREEE! VREEE!

"O-okay." She focused, and a huge knot of clothing migrated off her arm to pack itself around the knife. She took a deep breath, and VREEE! Pulled VREEE! The knife. VREEE! Out. The pain, bright and cruel and terrible, was enough for me to have a brief moment of regained clarity; before I could pass all the way out, I somehow managed to reach out to Stockpile.

"aaaakofff"VREEE"kofffkofff"VREEE"AAAAHHHH"VREEE"AAHHHH!"

If healing a broken bone had hurt, regenerating a punctured lung and a not insignificant quantity of blood was at least ten times worse. It was enough to make me want to vomit, but I was too busy coughing blood out of my lungs and fighting for air for my stomach to get involved. I suddenly noticed that I was freezing, that the floor that I was lying on was beginning to ice over, crystals forming in the giant puddle of blood underneath me. VREE-KaBOOM! The alarm sounded off again, but all of a sudden my hearing was stolen away by a burst of heat and noise as Bakugo set off one of his trademark explosions. In the flash, I could see that one of the sleeves of his uniform was a ruby red, as soaked with blood as my whole upper torso was.

As the smoke cleared, I saw a blonde girl, half-naked, scorched and seared from Bakugo's explosions, scraps of her Iwato disguise still hanging off of her and her phone still held to her ear. "Whew! These kids are pretty tough! Gen pop boy's got hero friends!" In her free hand, a second knife shone, red along one edge with blood. "Too bad for them they're just freshmen," She gloated, licking her lips with glee. Suddenly, she noticed me. "Ooooh! Kurogiri, he's got a regeneration quirk! Ohmigosh, I always wanted a boyfriend with a regeneration quirk! I could just cut, and cut, and cut, and cut, and cut! It would be so romantic!"

VREEE! VREEE! VREEE!

I had only just now managed to take a full breath, my mouth tasted like blood and bile, but the thought of dating a crazy bitch like that gave me a shudder of revulsion strong enough that I just had to say something. "Sorry," I coughed out, "I'm too busy to write letters to prison."

"Hikigaya!" "Hikki, you're alright!" "Get the fuck up, Hikigaya, you're making us look bad!" Yukinoshita, Yuigahama, and Bakugo all made sounds of relief or what passed for it coming from them as I actually made a sound that wasn't screaming.

"Don't get distracted!" I shouted back. "She's fast!" Sure enough, in the split second flicker where my classmates had looked back at me, the half-naked 'Iwato' girl had jumped forward, slashing at Yukinoshita's face. In an enclosed area like this one, Yukinoshita couldn't draw in heat indiscriminately without affecting the rest of us, so instead she relied on subtle movements, ducking and sliding backwards with her quirk like she was skating on ice in order to get out of 'Iwato's range. Bakugo similarly couldn't use his biggest explosions with us in the room, so he rushed forward as Yukinoshita rushed back, braving the knife at close distances in order to attempt to push the villain back.

Slowly, I pushed myself to my feet, and as the need to keep putting pressure on my wound disappeared, Yuigahama let herself stand up with me and got into a battle posture herself. "Oooh, it's four against one now," the villainess said, still holding the phone to her ear. "I might actually have to stop playing around!" All of a sudden, between the squawks of the intruder alarm, I heard a 'ding!' from the computer. "Okay, Kurogiri! Program's done, so come get me!" She said into the phone, grinning at us all.

All of a sudden, black mists enveloped a corner of the room, and she jumped back into them. Bakugo aimed an explosion at them, and Yukinoshita threw a chair at the retreating form of the blonde girl, but she was swiftly shrouded by the black mist and then disappeared; soon enough followed by the mist as well. Naturally, not fifteen seconds later was when the pros finally arrived, being led by a frantic-looking and panting Yaoyorozu.

After they finished asking us questions about the villains and the break in, to say that the pros chastised us would be an understatement. Apparently, when evacuation alarm sounded, students who weren't complete idiots were supposed to actually evacuate, not attempt to fight potentially armed and dangerous villains despite not having any real combat training. Of course, because heroes were screwed up in the head, they somehow also managed to simultaneously sound proud of us for 'heroically' rushing into danger and for acquiring more information about the villains who had caused the security breach, but it was very much a 'good job, now don't even think about doing it again until you have your provisional licenses.'

Personally, as I sat in the recovery ward hooked up to an I.V. to replace all the blood I'd lost, I was just thinking about never doing anything like that again at all.