"Now, I'll summarize your statements on today's events." Shota Aizawa said in his characteristic monotone as Present Mic handed him some notes. "After getting acquainted with the boat, you three followed the other teams onto the open water. After an estimated fifteen minutes of uneventful sailing, you noticed Blue Team had stopped responding on the radio. Correct?"

Denki Kaminari and Shoto Todoroki gave a simple grunt and nod while Tenya Iida gave a firm "Yes!" All three boys were taped up to varying degrees and, with the exception of Iida, were a bit more crestfallen than usual.

"Right." Aizawa continued. "Now, after making visual contact with Blue Team's boat and seeing nothing was wrong, you contacted Red Team on the radio and they volunteered to check on them. After around five minutes of radio silence, Kyoka Jirou contacted you. She told you that Red Team had been affected by a villain's quirk and were pursuing Blue Team. She suggested they were not chasing them with lethal intent, but their pursuit required your intervention regardless. Still sound right?"

Again, all three boys answered in the affirmative, though only one articulated it.

"After a few minutes of travel, Todoroki engaged Red Team with his quirk and combat ensued. After another few minutes of combat, during which Red Team showed unnaturally high speed, strength, and quirk-aptitude, they successfully incapacitated you and propelled your boat, with the three of you on it, into the coast, where you were found and assisted by some fishermen. Does that about sum it up?"

Yet again, three nods, one yes.

"Good." Aizawa handed the notes back to the unusually stoic Present Mic before folding his hands together and looking at the boys across the pushed-together tables. "Now, in case nobody else told you, none of you are in trouble for the damage to the boats, nor for failing to stop Red Team from reaching Blue Team in their influenced state. Also, due to the unorthodox nature of this event, your grades for this exercise will count for a much lower portion of your overall grade. Finally, because no definitive crime was committed by any known party, this incident will be investigated by the school and not the authorities. Any questions?"

"Will Red Team be punished for their actions?" Iida asked with a raised hand and a tone implying concern for the mentioned girls.

"Nah," Present Mic jumped in, "Midoriya made a good argument about that weird villain, plus this sort of thing is way out of character for those girls, so we're treating them as victims, too."

"And you really have no leads as to who did this?" Todoroki asked.

"Not yet." Aizawa clarified. "It's only been a few hours and there's a lot of ground to cover, so this isn't a cold case yet." After a moment of silence to let the boys ask any questions they might have, Aizawa continued. "Now I know today wasn't easy, but now that they've hit U.A., whoever's behind this will have a much tougher job hiding."

"You boys are free to go, but give us a yell if you have anything new to report, y'hear?" Present Mic was met with another trio of nods before the boys got up from their seats and left the room.

"Damn!" Kaminari lamented as soon as he was confident they were out of earshot. "I figured they would've caught this creep already, but now we have to watch out for this crap?"

"I agree." Iida concurred. "I had hoped the League of Villains would be the only ones complicating our school lives, but it seems I was mistaken."

"Do you think this could be the League, too?" Kaminari pondered aloud. "Like some plot to undermine our teamwork or something?"

"What do you mean?" Todoroki asked.

"Well, what if they were trying to cause drama to try and… I dunno, knock us off our game?"

"I see, but why go after those six? They seem like a random group to do something like this to." Todoroki's statement caused the other boys to stop walking and look at him in confusion. "What?"

"Seriously man?" Kaminari said, too shocked to yell. "You haven't seen the signs?"

"What signs?"

"What signs? Like when Kirishima-kun called a pink rose a 'Mina flower' because he couldn't remember what it was actually called?"

"We all have brain farts from time-to-time."

"Surely you've seen how Midoriya-kun has over twice as many pages dedicated to Uraraka-kun in his notebooks than anyone else in class?"

"Well, they're close friends and gravity is a complex topic."

"What about that one time Jirou accidentally called Yaomomo 'mommy' when she wore her hair differently?"

"Well Yaoyorozu does have plenty of motherly qualities."

"There was the incident where Ashido-kun failed an exercise for her team because she was staring at Kirishima-kun's abdominal muscles."

"Anybody can appreciate a well-defined six-pack."

"How about the time Yaomomo gave Jirou a fancy new guitar on Valentine's Day?"

"Jirou loves music and there are only so many occasions that are appropriate to give your friends gifts."

"I'm fairly certain Uraraka-kun looks at Midoriya-kun whenever he enters the room!"

"With how often he gets hurt, I'm surprised everyone isn't doing that."

The following silence was deafening as Iida and Kaminari said a silent prayer for everybody who ever had or ever would flirt with the impenetrable Shoto Todoroki.

"Well, this is all conjecture anyway." Iida admitted. "I just hope Midoriya-kun isn't so shaken he will lose his analytical edge. I'm sure he'll be essential for any future investigation."

"...and once Red Team finished with their… objective, you three have no memory of events between then and being awoken on the docks, correct?" All-Might looked up from the notes Cementoss had handed to him to look at the still-bleary-eyed trio across the table. None of them raised their gazes from the table as they nodded. "Right… Well, uh… Thanks to the evidence Midoriya-shonen provided, we have decided that all nine of you involved with this incident are blameless, and aside from the obvious investigation and security adjustments that will be carried out, we will be proceeding business-as-usual for the time being. Unless you three have any objections, that is."

When silence answered him, All-Might dismissed the trio with as much cheer as he thought was appropriate. It was a little much, but nobody was going to tell him that. The trio that would be known as Blue Team for longer than any of them would have preferred walked across U.A.'s campus in silence for the entirety of their journey back to the dorms. They were silent as they walked outside in the early night, they were silent as they power-walked across the dorm's common room, and they were silent as they gathered in Kirishima's room. Only five more agonizing minutes were spent in silence before it was mercifully broken.

"Well it's good that nobody got hurt… That bad…" Kirishima offered optimistically.

"I can never talk to her again." Jirou told the floor with a haunted look in her eyes.

"What am I supposed to say to her?" Midoriya asked the ceiling, panic settling into his voice. "What am I supposed to say to anyone? I have no frame of reference for how to behave in this situation."

"Uh…"

"Whatever the next thing she says to me is the worst possible thing. She knows I squeak now. How is she supposed to look me in the eye knowing how to make me squeak?"

"That was my first kiss. My first sixty-four kisses. Oh god, it's weird that I remember how many times she kissed me on the lips, isn't it? It has to be."

"Guys…?"

"She picked me up, too. Like I was a goddamn teddy bear. I'm never not going to think about how easily she can scoop me. SCOOP me."

"I've been trying to make eye contact when I talk to people more, but I'm afraid I'll just be staring at her lips from now on."

"Oh god, you're right." Jirou looked up from the ground to Midoriya, his epiphany hitting her as well. "She's gonna know. I thought getting caught staring at her chest was bad, but that would be…"

"What are we gonna do?" Midoriya looked down from the ceiling to match the frenzied look in her eyes. They both whipped around to look at Kirishima with those eyes that glowed with mania. "What are we gonna do?!"

Kirishima looked between them in silence, searching for the right thing to say. He tried to convince himself he didn't sympathize with most, if not all, of their sentiments. In the end, he landed on; "We're so unbelievably doomed, aren't we?"

They all groaned and flopped back on whatever they had been seated on, be it a bed or the floor. The rest of the evening was spent staring at the ceiling or floor in despair, trying in vain to strategize how to keep the next class from being excruciatingly awkward, and general lamentation.

"...and when you woke up on the pier, you were back to your usual selves and were able to remember what happened when you were afflicted. Is that the story?" Midnight asked the three girls sitting across from her, wearing Momo-provided oversized hoodies and with their faces planted on the tabletop. They raised their thumbs as they didn't have the will to speak since they finished telling their side of the humiliating story. "Well girls," she continued, putting down the notes she had taken while Ectoplasm checked a phone notification beside her, "I sincerely hope the other briefings turn up something to explain your behavior today, because as much as I'd like to believe you, this was a-"

"Speaking of," Ectoplasm interrupted, offering her his phone, "look at this, Midnight." She accepted it and spent a few silent moments reading its contents and occasionally tapping something.

"I see." She mused, breaking the tense silence before handing the phone back to Ectoplasm. "Well girls, I have good news." She was really hoping that would get them to look up. "It seems Midoriya-kun has provided some information that has effectively exonerated you." She smiled when she finally got to see Red Team raise their heads, a sparkle of hope in their eyes. "Midoriya-kun has informed us of a recent string of incidents matching today's events far too well to be considered coincidence. We already talked to the various police departments that investigated these events and have decided you are completely innocent."

"R-Really?!" Uraraka asked, her voice a little raspy from being on the verge of tears for an extended period of time.

"Yes. The only reasonable conclusion to come to is that you girls were under the influence of an unidentified villain's quirk." The girls let out a synchronized sigh of relief at the news.

"Oh thank goodness." Momo said with a hand to her chest.

"Let's go Midoriya! Coming in clutch!" Mina cheered.

"I'm so happy, I could just ki-!" Uraraka stopped short, punching herself in the face to resolve the sudden rush of self-loathing. "That's really good news!"

"R-Right," Midnight stuttered, not wanting to push any of these girls any more than necessary, "well since we're now working under the assumption that this incident was ultimately a villain's doing, I'd like to ask you girls some questions to try and find a lead to identifying our villain."

"Yes, ma'am!" Momo said as Uraraka and Mina saluted beside her.

"Great. Now, have any of you interacted with anyone odd and unfamiliar in the last week or so?"

"Well, I thought somebody was impersonating the owner of my favorite dessert shop," Uraraka offered, "but it turned out she just wasn't wearing makeup that day."

"I see. Have any of you felt inexplicable dizziness recently?"

"There was that one instance during the exercise the other day," Momo thought aloud, "but it was probably just because I didn't eat enough the night before and I overused my quirk."

"Hmm… That takes care of my question about quirk glitches…" Midnight took a moment longer than usual to write on her notepad. "Have any of you been thinking about 'Blue Team' more than you usually would recently?"

Whatever relief the girls had felt at hearing about their innocence was swept away by that question. Their faces reheated like leftover pizza as they took a moment to figure a way out of answering completely truthfully.

"Well Midnight-sensei," Momo began, avoiding eye contact with her teacher, "I think I speak for all of us when I say that today's events have made it difficult to think about them in any… other… way…"

From the way they avoided looking at them and how their faces reddened from that particular question, Midnight had the information she needed. "I understand." She said as she set her notepad on the table. "Well girls, I can tell today's events put a strain on you all, but rest assured we will do everything we can to make the one responsible answer for what they did. In the meantime, please don't hesitate to come to any of us with any questions, concerns or new information. Have a good night."

"You as well, sensei." The girls said before they shuffled out the door, their voices as sullen as when they'd arrived. Their trek from U.A.'s main building to Heights Alliance was largely similar to Blue Team's in terms of speed and shoe-gazing. As did their trek across the common room. As did their trek to Mina's room. Though the silence didn't last nearly as long, since Mina tossed both of her guests a pillow and the three had a long, hard scream into the appropriately pink and/or heart-shaped cushions.

"I can't believe something so ludicrous happened to me!" Momo wailed, being the first to articulate the internal agony they all shared.

"I swear, when I find out who did this, I'm gonna beat em to a pulp!" Uraraka growled with less ferocity than usual.

"Seriously!" Mina roared, flinging her pillow at the wall. "What the heck kind of villain does this?! Why couldn't they do normal villain things? Robbing banks, taking hostages, stealing cars! Normal villain things!"

"I'm not sure if that's preferable to…" Momo paused. "Ugh, I shouldn't have to think this hard about whether I'd rather go through this again or let a hostage situation happen…"

"Right, it's a hero's job to take one for the team…" Mina admitted reluctantly. "Well, to be fair, I guess Yellow Team really got the worst of it."

"Oh yeah, we really laid into them." Uraraka agreed with a bit of awe.

"I've been working with Sato-san to try and become a better fighter, but I don't remember him teaching me how to use a medieval flail."

"Is that what it's called?" Mina asked. "I thought it was a mace?"

"No, that's just a handle with some heavy blunt shape on the end, like a club."

"Oh, so like if there was no chain between the ball and the stick?"

"Exactly."

"I thought that was called a morning star?" Uraraka asked.

"Well, they're very similar, but a morning star has more pronounced spikes on the end to both bludgeon and pierce targets."

"Dang, gurl," Mina said warily, "I guess Todoroki really got off easy if you had all this medieval stuff in that big, wrinkly brain of yours."

"Oh god." Uraraka's haunted gasp drew her friends' attention. "What are we gonna do in class tomorrow?" Her revelation made the blood of her companions in humiliation run cold. "What am I going to say to Iida-kun?!"

"I have Todoroki-san right next to me, and the only thing separating me from Midoriya-san is Mineta-san." Momo said, piecing together what hell was going to look like. "And if I want to try and pay attention to the lesson, I'm going to have to look right over her head!"

"What am I gonna say to Kaminari?!" Mina despaired. "Oh no, and I've got Aoyama's smug, French face right in front of me! And Kirishima is RIGHT THERE!"

The pillows were not done absorbing screams that night.

"I must say," All-Might said, "in all my years I've never seen a case like this."

"I'd usually dismiss it as an elaborate prank or a diversion for something bigger." Aizawa added, looking over the same incident report as Nezu and most of 1-A's other teachers as they sat in the meeting room. "But the coastline and the campus were completely quiet, the incident didn't attract that much attention as it happened, and they targeted U.A. students. They hit a high-profile target with a pretty low-impact incident."

"I don't think those kids would call it 'low-impact.'" Cementoss pointed out. "I can't say I know what they were thinking, but they were clearly shaken up."

"They've been through worse." Aizawa noted.

"I think there's a saying about this. Something about apples and oranges?" All-Might pondered aloud.

"We can only lend support to the students when they reach out to us." Nezu advised. "Our main focus should be finding the one behind this. Though aside from marginally increasing surveillance around the campus, we have no leads." The ascended rodent sighed. "I hope the last interview turned up-"

His wish was answered/cut off by the door slamming open, a cloudy-eyed Midnight entering the room, followed by Ectoplasm. The aura of internal conflict within her kept the room's occupants quiet while the pair found their seats, Midnight immediately burying her face in her hands.

"Something to say, Nemuri?" Aizawa asked with characteristic unwillingness to read a room. After a few more moments of silence, she spoke.

"This is the worst, cutest thing I've ever seen." She said through her well-manicured hands. The room turned to Ectoplasm for clarification, but he only shrugged his shoulders. "The villain tried to play matchmaker with our students." One could hear the confused blinking in the silence that followed.

"Matchmaker." Present Mic parrotted. "With our students? As in, like, trying to make couples?"

"Uh huh." She nodded limply.

"I'm going to regret this," Aizawa predicted, "but what makes you say that?"

"No other criminal activity coincided with this incident which means this was their objective," Midnight explained apathetically, "and they chose their moment and targets perfectly."

"What do you mean?" Cementoss prompted. "With the moment and targets, that is?"

"They struck when students who had crushes on each other were isolated, giving the ones she brainwashed the perfect opportunity to get some 'alone time' with their targets."

"Nemuri, please, try to be serious." Aizawa scolded. "A villain just attacked U.A. students without leaving a trace, this isn't some shoujo manga."

"Aizawa-kun," shot back, a troubling amount of annoyance in her voice, "have you ever considered that not being emotionally stunted might have its benefits?" Her peers' eyebrows shot up almost involuntarily. "Anyone with functioning eyes can see pubescent sparks flying between them."

"So what you're saying is," Aizawa sighed, "this villain has been targeting specific high school students with their quirk because they knew those students had a crush on another student. They do this to try and get the two target students in a relationship. Does that cover it?"

"Pretty much."

"Silly as it may be, Aizawa-kun," Nezu interjected, "her theory is remarkably void of logical fallacy. Plus it all lines up with what information we have on this villain's methods. However," he added before Midnight's smug grin could grow too wide, "this theory doesn't help us very much. We have an idea of what this villain's objective might be, but it doesn't help us at all when it comes to finding out how they were able to monitor class 1-A so thoroughly that they knew when and where we would hold our boat activity. And if Nemuri-kun's theory is correct, they may have also learned the personal feelings of certain students, which even we aren't truly tracking." His analysis did well enough to put a more appropriate tension in the room. "Though if there's any silver lining to be found it would be that this villain has yet to strike twice in the same place, or school in this case. With that in mind, we will allocate resources to improving the school's security, both online and on campus, and you are all to stay on the lookout for any negative aftereffects of this incident from any of 1-A, not just those directly involved. Any objections?" He was met with silence. "Very good. Now, I know it may feel like a lackadaisical decision, but given what we know about this villain, I think we should proceed under the assumption that they have moved on."

"Iida-kun, I'm begging you, please stop."

"I simply want to make it clear that I harbor no ill will for you because of the beating you gave me under the villain's influence, Uraraka-kun." He insisted, much to the chagrin of his friend who sat with her red face on the desk in front of her.

"Iida-chan," Asui advised, "I know you mean well, but I don't think this is helping." At the desk in front of her, 1-A's pinkest student wasn't faring much better.

"Aoyama, I swear to god, I can feel the smug grin on your face! Stop it!"

"Mademoiselle, I know that my dazzlingly handsome face can cause any who look upon it to become uncomfortable," he embellished as he kept his gaze forward, "which is why I have made an effort to not expose you to its further anxieties. I am nothing if not considerate.✩"

"Aoyama…" Mina growled, strangling the air right behind his neck.

"Dude, I'd just start wearing a mask or something." Kaminari advised the Frenchman. "You thought the sports festival was bad? That was her playing nice, trust me." He patted the still-taped spot on his ribs for effect.

"You're next if you don't watch it, Kaminari!" She pointed at him, turning back to Aoyama after catching a glimpse of some spiky red hair.

"At least you had a halfway decent time out there, right Kiri-?" Kaminari stopped short when he looked to the seat behind him and found Kirishima deep in conversation with Koda. What one could consider a deep conversation with the near-mute Koji Koda anyway. It was really more like Kirishima asked him what the difference was between a wolverine and a badger and was playing charades with Koda's gestures and mumbles.

With a chuckle, Kaminari turned to Jirou on his left. Seating-wise, she was the luckiest of Blue Team; close to the front of the room and none of the other involved students to look past, just Mezo Shouji's remarkably broad back to stare into and pretend she didn't exist. Oddly, both Shouji and Sero seemed to be sitting as stock-still and blank-faced as the girl that sat between them. "Uh, you guys good?" Kaminari asked the boys. "You know she's not one of the ones who-"

"You're gonna wanna shut the hell up, dunce-face. Ears is on the warpath today." Bakugo warned before pointing to the desk ahead of his. "Nobody here went looking for gossip and got the electric chair for her trouble." Sure enough, Hagakure appeared to be slumped over in her desk, a small pool of drool where one would assume her mouth was.

Being a frequent target of Jirou's jacks, Kaminari quickly assumed the same position as his desk-neighbors.

"I swear to god, I thought the shitty nerd turning into a space heater was bad, but listening to you dipshits whine is making me- GH!" Bakugo choked as Jirou's unusually strong heartbeat shook his system through a jack to the neck. While he hadn't exactly rubbed salt onto her wounds, the class had realized as the school year went on that Bakugo was more of a manic sociopath than the ok guy with a funny temper that they thought he was at first, so humbling him when he became belligerent had become almost routine for the class. It had also been a great mental help for Izuku, since seeing his longtime bully and source of most of his traumas and anxieties be so frequently silenced by a large group of kids around their age was a great ease on his soul.

Unfortunately, the previous day had introduced him to a whole new set of anxieties, which caused him to become a 'space heater' as Bakugo put it. A set of anxieties that was, incidentally, the talk of the class. Although he was being left relatively alone, the same could not be said for his classmate two seats behind him.

"All I'm saying is, the flail seems to be your weapon." Todoroki pointed out to a steaming-red Momo seated to his left. "Maybe you should retire the metal pole as the default weapon you make."

"Todoroki-san, I'm begging you, please stop." She implored, face in her hands.

"I'm sorry, but you really made an impression yesterday. And not just with blunt force trauma."

"Todoroki!" Mineta admonished the scarred boy. "Can't you see she's uncomfortable?"

"Hm? Oh." Todoroki noticed as though he had just developed an additional level of social competence. "I see. Sorry, Yaoyorozu. You always were able to tell when other people were uncomfortable, Mineta." Before he could see anyone sitting around him, Mineta included, giving him an absolutely bamboozled look, Aizawa opened the classroom door.

"Alright, settle down." He said, causing the class to snap to seated attention even those whose faces were glowing pink. Bakugo and Hagakure were still face down on their desks, but he paid them no mind, he figured someone would push too hard. "Alright, let's get this out of the way first. I expect you all know the main notes of what happened yesterday, but let me set the record straight. Red Team was put under the influence of a villain's quirk and targeted Blue Team. Yellow Team tried to neutralize the situation, but got repelled. Aside from Yellow Team, there were no injuries and from what we know about the villain, they will not be targeting this school again." His typical monotone lowered slightly to his 'no nonsense' monotone. "Anything beyond that is not important. Got it?" The class responded with a firm "Yes sir!" aside from the still smoldering members of Red and Blue Teams who were a bit more meek than usual.

"Good." Aizawa returned to his normal apathetic timbre. "Now with that being said, we're taking a bit of precaution with our next exercise. The exercise at Ground Beta we had scheduled for this week is being moved to next week." He took a moment to look across the class, noting the students that were unconscious and those who wished they were unconscious. "Before we begin, let me just say that you all should take yesterday's events as a lesson in humility." There were more than a few faces that gained a curious glint in their eyes. "No matter how skilled or experienced you become, you will fail once in a while. You're going to get knocked on your ass and made to look like a fool. Yesterday was fortunate in that there were no cameras around to record things, but that won't always be the case. You won't get a warning when you're going to get knocked down a peg in front of a few people or the nation, so you'd better start thinking about how you're going to deal with that humiliation now so you're ready for when, not if, it happens."

The class was more or less used to Aizawa dropping the occasional stern wisdom bomb, but it always managed to hit them deep. This particular piece of advice would help many of them later in their careers.

But over the next few weeks, it wouldn't be too helpful to the six students who had already learned it the hard way.