Our chaos crew prepares for the cavalry battle!

Notes:

My update schedule has updated with the new year! Each fic will update every eight days and I will be posting every other day. The order is Mastermind, Viridian, Deku, and Cheat Code!

Art!

The Pancake Dream

I'm totally a bee

Kitty

Dabi Best Bro

Mufuku

Memes!

X

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Izuku didn't stop running when he reached the finish line. His lungs were burning, but he could hear the sound of incoming explosions behind him and knew better to assume that they were all from the remnants of the mindfield. His mind switched rapidly between berating himself for being an idiot and accidently winning the first round and trying to come up with any semblance of a plan that could keep him alive until the next round. He scanned the field, mentally screaming in relief when he realized that there was a news camera on the field.

He made a beeline toward it and hoped that his plan would actually work. Bullying a quirkless kid in the relative privacy of a prejudiced middle school was one thing, but beating up a kid between rounds live on national television? Even if Katsuki didn't get kicked out of the hero course, there would be consequences for something like that, so all Izuku had to do was make sure that Katsuki remembered he was being recorded.

Izuku put the biggest smile he could manage and ran straight up to the camera, waving as hard as he could, "Hi Mom!"

He was a bit out of breath and knew that Shinso would probably never let him live that down, but the look of frustration on Katsuki's face as he realized there was nothing he could do made it worth it. The other competitors were starting to trickle in now and Izuku should probably go find Mei and Shinso in the chaos and make sure they made it through, but instead, he had another terrible idea that almost put his impulsive victory to shame.

He noticed Kirishima going up to congratulate Katsuki, which gave him the courage to actually go through with it. Well, that and he'd already gotten himself on Katsuki's kill list, so he had nothing left to lose, right?

"Oh, and hi Auntie!" Izuku beamed into the camera again. "Can you believe I beat Kacchan?!"

Yep, he was gonna die.

If Katsuki's quirk affected his eyes instead of his hands, Izuku would have already been dead by the time he hurried over to Mei, who was making a few adjustments on her equipment. Thankfully, though, Izuku had been right in predicting that Kirishima would be able to hold Katsuki back for now. He'd almost definitely be gunning for him next round, but he'd also be gunning for the win, which Izuku could use to his advantage.

Mei glanced up at him as he approached and immediately started cackling, "Izuk-kun! Why didn't you tell me you were planning on adopting Nedzu's babies?!"

Izuku grinned, pushing the whole Katsuki issue onto the back burner for the moment, "I wasn't planning on it, but I couldn't just leave you and Shinso alone in the next round, could I?"

"Extra-Credit-Kun!" Mei yelled. "Where is he? I need to check that his baby is still in optimal condition."

"It's still working fine, Mei."

Both Izuku and Mei jumped a foot in the air as a tired voice suddenly spoke up behind them and Shinso smirked at them momentarily until he was hit full force with one of Mei's capture nets. His eyes widened as he was wrapped up and he tried too late to dodge and ended up falling to the floor instead, "Ow…"

"Oh, Extra-Credit-Kun! I'm so sorry!" Mei fiddled with some of the controls and the net released, falling into a tangled mess of string and magnets on the ground. "We didn't even see you!"

Shinso grimaced as he sat up and rubbed at his wrists where the net had wrapped around him, "That was kinda the point, Mei. Eraserhead may have mentioned that stealth was a big part of being an underground hero, so I've been practicing." He glared at them. "I think I need to practice dodging too though if you two are gonna keep trying to attack me."

"That's such an awesome idea, Shinso!" Izuku gushed. "The stealth, not the dodging, well, the dodging too, but um…"

Izuku's rambling was cut off both by Shinso and Mei's amused looks and by Midnight, who snapped her whip and called their attention back to the stage, "Hello Children! Congratulations to the 42 of you who were strong and fast enough to move onto the next round!"

Izuku shuffled awkwardly. Yeah, he won but he wasn't really strong or fast. Mostly he'd just relied on the technology that was already there, but...his hacking counted as a strength, right? Maybe he could just pretend that's what Midnight meant and ignore the fact that she was probably talking about strong muscles and quirks and people like Katsuki and Todoroki.

"Everyone gird your loins and prepare for your next test!" Midnight snapped her whip as the slot machine-like graphic on the screen behind her finally slowed to a stop. "A cavalry battle! Those of you at the top will suffer the most, but then you'll find that's the norm here at UA."

Izuku breathed a small sigh of relief. He had never been at the top of anything in his life! He was just a support student, or like Mic said, an underdog, here, so obviously a quirkless kid like him wasn't a frontrunner. The top hero students like Katsuki and Todoroki would probably have a pretty hard time in the next round, though.

"Izuku Midoriya won the qualifier!" Midnight snapped her whip at him and Izuku froze. "So he'll be worth 10 million points in the upcoming round!"

Izuku only paid half attention as Midnight explained the rest of the point values. He was at the top?! He supposed it made sense, what with him winning the obstacle course and everything, but...but he was just a quirkless support student? How…?! He was going to die, wasn't he? And it wasn't even going to be all Katsuki's fault!

He could feel the bloodlust radiating off the other competitors and it felt like he was on the floor in middle school again, curled up on a ball to protect his stomach and other organs from the beatings. He didn't even see UA students in front of him, just his old classmates jeering about the quirkless deku, the absolute loser, he'll never be a hero…

Someone grabbing his hand steaded him and Izuku looked over to see Mei giving him a confident smile as she squeezed his hand reassuringly. He forced himself to take a shaky deep breath and smile back. He could do this. He wasn't alone anymore. He had Mei. He had Shinso. He had his analysis. He could show them all that he wasn't just going to sit down and take it anymore!

Shinso started sidling away from them, making Mei drop Izuku's hand and grab onto his arm, "Just where do you think you're going?"

"Um…" Shinso looked between them. "I was going to find a team?"

"It's ok." Izuku interrupted, "I have a huge target on my back from the 10 million points, so I totally understand if you don't want to work with us, but if you want to work together I think I can make it work…"

"It's not that." Shinso said bitterly. "I'm sure you already have a million ideas, it's just...I wasn't sure if you actually wanted to work with me, what with the sports festival being so public. With my quirk being what it is, going off alone is just a habit at this point. Nobody's ever wanted to be openly associated with the villain kid, you know?"

"Shinso." Izuku looked at him seriously. "You're an idiot."

"Gee, thanks." Shinso deadpanned.

Mei moved to hang off Shinso's arm so he couldn't run away, "We're not going to abandon you!" She said dramatically. "You're our baby!"

"Hatsume!" Izuku yelled. "Phrasing!"

Shinso wasn't phased, instead he just glared at her suspiciously, "I legitimately don't know if you mean that like I'm your child, the child that you kidnapped, by the way, or if you're referring to me as one of your inventions and I'm honestly not sure which is worse."

"We didn't kidnap you!" Izuku said indignantly.

The corner of Shinso's mouth quirked up, "You kinda did, actually."

"Doesn't matter!" Mei declared confidently. "It's the second one either way! We made you!"

Shinso raised an eyebrow skeptically and Izuku found himself bursting into laughter.

"She's right, isn't she?" Izuku gasped. "We did make you into who you are now by preparing you for today!"

"I hate both of you." Shinso said, unimpressed.

"Um…" A small voice spoke up and the three of them all turned to see Uraraka standing awkwardly behind them. "Am I interrupting something?"

"Oh, Uraraka!" Izuku grinned. "Shinso, Mei-chan, this is Uraraka! She has a really cool anti-gravity quirk that we used to float the robot I hacked and she's in 1A and…"

Izuku slammed his mouth closed as he realized that Uraraka was starting to blush and he needed to shut up before he revealed exactly how much he knew about her and her classmates. He didn't want to creep out his...potential friend? Maybe? But...

"Um," Izuku shrugged awkwardly, "shouldn't you be looking for a team right about now?"

"Actually, I was wondering if it'd be alright if I teamed up with you?" Uraraka awkwardly picked at the pads on her fingertips. "I mean, I'm friends with Iida, but he said he didn't want to work with friends this round because he wanted to prove himself, which I totally get, but then I thought back to the obstacle course and you're really smart, so…"

Izuku cut her off, "You do know I have 10 million points, right? Everyone will be trying to take me down."

Uraraka nodded as determination filled her eyes, "What better way to prove myself, right? Being a female hero, I'm already trying to beat impossible odds!"

"You're not the only one." Shinso drawled. "That's us, the team of underdogs and targets."

"Speaking of," Izuku turned to Mei, "are you sure you don't want to be on another team, Mei-chan? Ten million is a lot of points."

"Which just means all eyes will be on you!" Mei grinned. "So come on, 10 Million! What's the plan?"

Izuku looked at their team and analyzed the other teams forming around them, "Shinso will be the rider."

Shinso's eyebrows shot up, "You're joking, right? I'm the biggest one here."

"Which won't be a problem once we take Uraraka's antigravity into account." Izuku pointed out. "And the rest of us are all around the same height, so if we hold you, it'll be easy to come up with a balanced formation, but if you're on the bottom, whoever is the rider will be on two different levels. Plus, it just makes more sense from a publicity standpoint."

Uraraka frowned at that, "What does publicity have to do with anything?"

"Everything!" Mei piped up. "If Extra-Credit-Kun is the rider, his name will be the one on the screen and it'll be that much harder to deny that he deserves a place in the hero course when he wins! It'll also highlight my babies' ability to support a hero!"

"You're already in the hero course, Uraraka." Izuku explained. "So you don't need to be noticed by the teachers as much as Shinso does, and because we're support, that's where we'll be able to showcase our skills the most."

Uraraka nodded slowly, "Ok, that makes sense, but what are we going to do about your ten million points?"

Izuku grinned mischievously, "We're going to get rid of them."

Notes:

Do you guys like petty Izuku?

Cheat Code: Support Strategist

Clouds (myheadinthecoudsnotcomingdown)

Chapter 31: Memorable

Summary:

The cavalry battle begins!

Notes:

Art!

Kain wants Abeels blood

Panda's just here

Let bees hibernate

The pancake dream

Memes!

X X X

Chapter Text

Uraraka watched nervously as Hitoshi tied the headband across his forehead, "And you're sure that modifying the headband isn't going to get us disqualified?"

"Eighty-two percent sure, yeah." Mei responded, tightening the hoverboots onto Uraraka's feet

"Nowhere in the rules does it say we're not allowed to mess with the headbands." Izuku said confidently. "And honestly, considering the set-up of the sports festival, we're actively encouraged to use quirks and support items on them, so as long as we keep it visible in accordance with what Midnight said, we should be fine!"

Hitoshi put a sympathetic hand on Uraraka's shoulder. It was going to take some time for her to get used to the way his kidnappers did things, but she was doing remarkably well so far, considering the circumstances.

"Just go along with it." He shrugged. "My kidnappers are hardly ever wrong, and if something happens, well...Midoriya is Nedzu's favorite, so he'll let him get away with anything."

"That's not…" Midoriya blushed bright red and tried to hide his face. "He doesn't like me that much! And he's the principal, so he has to be unbiased. And for the last time, we didn't kidnap you Shinso!"

"Sounds fake, but ok." Hitshosi smirked and elbowed Uraraka until she started giggling.

"Well," Uraraka shook her head in disbelief, "even if this goes horribly wrong, it'll definitely be interesting!"

"That's the spirit, Floaty Girl!" Mei grinned and stood. "The true goal of the sports festival is marketing, so even more than winning, our goal is to be memorable!"

"Oh, they're definitely going to remember us." Hitoshi said dryly. "It's just a question of whether or not that's a good thing."

Uraraka was about to say something else, but they were interrupted by Midnight taking the stage again, "Riders! Mount your Horses!"

Hitoshi watched as Mei's crazed smile got slightly more wild and both Midoirya and Uraraka got scarily determined looks on their faces. He still wasn't quite sure how he'd ended up with friends like these, but he couldn't help but be grateful he was on their side. As much as Midoriya might try to deny it, they really were impossible to stop once they set their minds on something.

It was weird being the rider as the tallest member of the group. He understood where Midoriya was coming from with the more consistent heights being better for the horses, and Uraraka's quirk made it so that his weight wasn't an issue, but still...Hitoshi carefully put on a bored expression and leaned back slightly so that it looked like he was a king lunging on his throne. He could feel Midoriya chuckling beneath him and couldn't resist smirking.

This was gonna be fun.

"Is everybody ready?!" Mic yelled.

The crowd screamed in response and Hitoshi felt his team shift underneath him as the other teams prepared to charge them.

Midnight cracked her whip and everyone lept into action, "Begin!"

Hitoshi's team immediately lunged forward, which caused a few teams to stumble back in shock, considering that, if one didn't have Midoriya as a strategist on their team, the most logical move would usually be to run away. Instead, Hitoshi's team ran straight for Bakugo's.

In one fluid movement, Hitoshi whipped the headband off his head and threw it at Bakugo, whose eyes widened as the fabric started floating up and away without any gravity to hold it, "Have fun, Kacchan!"

"Is…" Mic's confused voice echoed through the stadium. "Is that allowed?"

"Technically." Eraserhead sounded almost amused, which Hitoshi hadn't really thought was possible. "Though it remains to be seen whether it's an intelligent move. On the one hand, getting rid of the ten million points immediately means they are no longer the main target, but on the other hand, it means they now have zero points. Having Uraraka remove the headband's gravity was a nice touch though."

"It'll definitely add another dimension to this fight!" Mic yelled, hyping up the crowd. "Team Bakugo is gonna have their work cut out for them trying to keep those points from floating away!"

"Stupid purple bastard!" Bakugo looked practically ready to explode, even as that tape guy from 1A, Sero, used his quirk to grab the headband out of the air before another team could. "Deku!"

"Drop it, Bakugo." The rock dude, Kirishima yelled. "We got the points now, so like Mic-sensei said, we gotta focus on keeping them!"

Hitoshi almost thought Bakugo was going to go after them anyway, but he just tched and turned away to combat that ice and fire guy who was going after the ten million point headband, "Only Deku would be useless enough to throw away points like that."

"Why I outta…" Mei growled.

"Mei-chan, that's the plan, remember?" Midoriya interrupted. "We want Katsuki to underestimate us. We want everyone to underestimate us. Our job for the rest of the game is to disappear into the background!"

"Well, that and mess with everyone to get as many points as possible." Hitoshi added. "Speaking of which...Hey monkey boy! Do you even have any points?"

"Shinso!" Midoriya squealed. "Don't be rude!"

Hitoshi just shrugged as Ojiro, if he was remembering Midoriya's analyses correctly, turned toward him with a scowl, "More than you. Our team isn't stupid enough to just give up our points."

"We'll see about that."

Hitoshi couldn't hold back a smirk, but didn't take control of Ojiro just yet. Holding off on taking control was still difficult, but Midoirya had been right, it was getting much easier with practice. Plus, it was easier if he had fun with it. Hitoshi stared at Ojiro for a few seconds before raising his hands slowly, widening his smile slightly for maximum creep factor

The other team was starting to get visibly nervous. One of the other members, a short boy that Hitoshi thought was in 1B tugged on Ojrio's sleeve, "Come on, let's just go and get some other points, these guys don't have anything."

"Oh really?" Hitoshi shifted his foot to signal to the rest of his team to get ready to move, then suddenly closed his fists on thin air and yanked, using the jetpack that Mei had given him to close the distance between their teams as he finally let himself take full control of Ojiro, "Hand over your points."

The rest of the team was still off balance from the little show he'd put on, so no one was fast enough to stop a dead-eyed Ojiro from handing over his headband. Hitoshi released his control almost immediately and their team simply used their momentum to carry on down the field, leaving a very confused group of hero students to wonder how exactly they had just lost all their points.

"Shinso…" Midoriya said shakily, "Remind me never to come across you in a dark alley."

Hitoshi couldn't help laughing. From anyone else, a comment like that would rub him the wrong way. It was those kinds of comments he got all the time from his classmates or foster siblings, but from Izuku, it just didn't seem as mean-spirited. "You're one to talk. How are your murder notebooks coming along?"

"They're not murder notebooks!" Izuku squawked. "Uraraka, don't let Shinso scare you. My notebooks are just analyses of a couple people's quirks…"

"Along with their strengths, weaknesses, and what babies we could use to destroy them!" Mei finished gleefully. "They're amazing!"

Uraraka's eyes were wide and she looked slightly overwhelmed, which Hitoshi found extremely amusing. He almost felt bad, but then he remembered his first day of being kidnapped by the chaos duo and figured he'd earned the right to laugh, "Alright, enough scaring the one hero course student willing to team up with us. Who are we going after next?"

Their group looked around the field. Bakugo still had the ten million point headband, but Todoroki's team was giving him a run for his money, considering that a good half of the field was now covered in ice. Several teams had gotten caught up in the crossfire and were currently frozen to the ground, which Hitoshi planned on taking full advantage of.

Izuku's face lit up as he came to the same conclusion, "So Shinso...how do you feel about a captive audience?"

"I think I can give it a try…"Hitoshi smirked. "Our best best is to go after the lowest point values first, right? Quantity over quality?"

"Right!" Izuku smiled. "That way, we stay under the radar and don't risk catching the attention of the frontrunners."

"That seems kinda sneaky…" Uraraka said nervously.

"Oh, it is." Izuku agreed. "But heroes like Edgshot have gotten to the top of the ranks by being sneaky. Sometimes what decides a fight isn't someone's strength, but what weaknesses their opponent is willing to take advantage of."

"Hence why we're taking advantage of everyone's hyperfocus on the ten million points, especially during this first part of our plan." Hatsume said. "Ooh! Who's first?"

"What about that team from 1B?" Hitoshi suggested. "Midoriya, quirks?"

"Limb separation, glue, and quite literally speaking words into existence." Midoriya responded. "Good choice! Just make sure you don't only focus on the rider, because while she could steal the headband back by detaching a hand or something, in this case the horses are objectively the biggest threat to our mobility."

Hitoshi nodded and they made their way over to their next target, "Hey, uh, do you need help?"

"Uh…" The girl looked at her teammates hesitantly, probably nervous about their kindness being a trap. It was, of course, but she obviously didn't know that she'd already fallen into it.

"It's no big deal!" Hitoshi said kindly. "I mean, we're not hero students, so we aren't really planning on getting that far in the festival, you know?"

The kid in the front, the one with the glue quirk if Hitoshi was right, visibly relaxed, "Ok, cool. Yeah, we could really use the help if you're not gonna steal our headband or anything."

"Don't worry!" Mei piped up happily. "We're not gonna steal it!"

Uraraka elbowed her and shot her a warning look, but Hitoshi was already deciding what red herring to use this time. He leaned over and grabbed the other rider's shoulder, "Sorry, I just need to steady myself so I don't fall. Um, Mei's got this new flamethrower she wants to try out…" He turned to the last member of the other team, "You're not afraid of fire are you?"

"No," the guy didn't really have a head in the traditional sense, but he seemed like he was shaking the emoji currently floating above his shoulders, "just be careful!"

"Of course!" HItoshi grinned and leaned down to grab both of the horses shoulders. "Oh, and thanks by the way!"

He took control of all three of them, letting out a sigh of relief as the pressure in his skull decreased, "Give us your headband. Oh and Mei, can you melt them out. We did promise, after all!"

Mei laughed and used a surprisingly tame stream of fire to melt the ice around their feet as Hitoshi tied the headband around his head and turned back to the team, "You won't notice your headband is gone until at least one minute has passed."

He wasn't 100% sure that order would do anything, but if he could modify memories, then modifying attention should be theoretically possible as well, right? They'd have to see.

Once they were melted out, he let his quirk go and held his breath as they blinked back to life, looking slightly disoriented as the rider skimmed her eyes over Hitoshi's forehead, her own headband clearly visible on it. Hitoshi held his breath.

She smiled, "Thanks for the help!"

The corners of Hitoshi's mouth twitched, "No problem!"

He could feel his teammates shaking in silent laughter underneath them as they walked away and broke, "I cannot believe that actually worked!"

"I was thinking why is he releasing his control so quickly?!" Izuku gasped in laugher. "That was awesome!"

"I seriously thought we were dead!" Uraraka giggled. "Oh my goodness! That was a rush!"

"Next victim!" Mei yelled in excitement. "Onward!"

Izuku couldn't keep the smile off his face as they wandered around and started freeing teams that had been encased in Todoroki's ice. Shinso was doing really well at changing up the fake activation requirements for his quirk with every headband they took and beside him, Uraraka was gradually getting more and more confused. They had decided against telling her about the verbal response requirement both so that she wouldn't have an unfair advantage if she and Shinso fought in the next round and so that they would be able to tell if Shinso's redirection was actually working.

Judging by the almost constipated expression on her face as Shinso literally serenaded one of the teams, it was working exactly as well as they'd hoped.

"So," Izuku said happily. "Have you figured out how Shinso activates his quirk yet?"

"Uh…" Uraraka looked at the team that was currently handing over their headbands. "Maybe eye contact?"

"Hmm…I don't know..." Izuku grinned mischievously and turned to look at her, which is how he almost missed the dark figure lunging at them.

"Oh shit!" Shinso immediately activated the jet pack and Uraraka kicked on her hover boots so they could get out of range, but that didn't stop the shadow from ripping off two of their headbands.

The team they were currently facing had two 1B students and a 1A student, but all three of them had animal-type mutations, which is probably what formed the common ground for them to have the confidence to team up. There was a girl with a horse-like mutation and a guy with a mantis mutation, but their biggest problem currently was the 1A student with a bird mutation.

"Note to self." Izuku muttered. "Dark Shadow is apparently fully sentient."

"Yeah, Izu-kun, I think we figured that out." Mei griped.

"What did you do to Fumikage?!" Dark Shadow yelled and swiped at them again, forcing them to take to the air to dodge, not that that would work for long.

"Um, ok, weak to light!" Izuku's brain raced and he started mumbling as Mei whipped out her flamethrower to keep Dark Shadow at bay. "So, apparently he has his own consciousness? Or maybe his own area in Tokoyami's brain? That's probably most likely, but there's obviously some kind of separation between the two…"

"Don't care about the quirk theory right now, Izuku!" Shinso yelled. "Can I brainwash it? Because with the way it's thrashing, Tokoyami's gonna wake up any minute!"

Izuku jumped, "Yes! That's a great idea!"

Shinso shook his head and huffed in frustration, "Wonderful. Great help. Thanks. Hey bird brain! Your other half must be pretty weak if he fell to a wimp like me, huh?"

Dark Shadow almost doubled in size as he lunged at them, "Don't you talk about Fumikage that way!"

They all flinched as Dark Shadow swiped at them, only to stop short inches from Hitoshi's face, eyes wide as he fell fully under Hitoshi's control. They all exchanged glances and started giggling uncontrollably.

"Oh my gosh…" Uraraka gasped. "That was way too close…"

"Agreed." Mei laughed. "I almost thought he was gonna break my babies!"

"Ok…" Hitoshi shook his head. "Crisis averted...for now…Wow, that is some quirk, I almost wish we had it on our team…"

"I mean, you kinda do at this point right?" Uraraka asked. "Or does your quirk not work that long."

Izuku looked between Uraraka and Shinso, then smiled and shrugged, "I mean...why not?"

"That's rude, Midoriya." Shinso grumbled. "I'm not just gonna take control of a whole other team!"

"As long as we leave them enough points to pass, they'll be fine." Mei dismissed. "And you can give them back control for the last few minutes anyway!"

There was a moment of tense silence before Shinso sighed, "Get as many headbands as you can safely."

The mutant team rushed to obey Shinso's orders and he shook his head, "If this bites us in the ass, I'm blaming the hero."

Uraraka squaked indignantly, "Hey!"

"Go ahead." Izuku smiled. "You'd just be blaming yourself too, or are you forgetting that you're going to be a hero by the end of this?"

Shinso blushed slightly and looked out over the teams that still had points, "Um...What about that guy from 1A? The one with the arms? Wait...did somebody already take his headband? And is he allowed to be on his own team like that?"

"No." Izuku said firmly. "My guess is that there's at least one other student hiding inside that tent he's making with his arms and based on size and the assumption it's a 1A student, my best guess is Mineta."

To their surprise, that got a groan from Uraraka, "Do we have to? Mineta's such a pervert, I don't even want to go near him…"

"Oh come on, Uraraka, I'm sure he's not that bad…" Izuku said.

Uraraka huffed, "Whatever, let's just get this over with…"

They made their way toward the compact team and Izuku could vaguely see Mineta leaning to peak out between Shoji's arms, "Oh my goodness, Shoji, look! They've got two of the curviest girls in here! Who knew support babes had such bangin' bodies?!"

Izuku almost froze in shock. Sure, Mineta was theoretically whispering, but they could still hear him!

Uraraka groaned, "See why no girls wanted to team up with him?"

"Hey, Shoji, right?" Shinso called out. "You seem like a nice guy, why pair up with an incel like that?"

Shoji muttered something that Izuku couldn't hear, but it was obviously enough for Hitoshi if his slight smirk was any indication.

"Ooh, they've got headbands!" Mineta yelled. "Get 'em!"

Izuku's team shuffled backwards as a tongue emerged from the space inside Shoji's arms.

"Tsu?!" Uraraka sounded betrayed. "You're seriously teaming up with the grape?!"

"Shoji's got good defense." A voice croaked out.

Tsu sent out her tongue again and Izuku panicked for a moment as he realized they weren't going to be able to dodge again. To his surprise, however, Mei lunged forward and grabbed the tongue as it was reaching for their points, wrapping it around her arm like it was a stubborn piece of rope, "I got her! Hurry Shinso!"

"Whoa!" Mineta poked his head out and was practically salivating. "I'm not usually into muscular girls but damn! Do you think she could crush me between her thighs?"

Izuku's whole body tensed and he suddenly wanted nothing more than to steal this guy's points and make him regret ever looking at a woman. How dare he talk about Mei like that! She'd worked hard for those muscles! And besides, she was right there! It was like he didn't even care about the girls hearing him talking about them like that!

"You better be careful Mineta!" Uraraka's yell cut through the odd haze of rage and other unidentifiable emotions blurring Izuku's brain. "You don't know what Shinso's quirk is and for all you know, it activates by punching you in the face!"

Izuku and Hitoshi both froze and looked at each other, before Hitoshi got a wicked look on his face. As long as he was punched before Hitoshi officially took control, the pain theoretically shouldn't break their connection and if it did...well, at least they'd have punched a pervert in the face, right?

"Hey grape boy." Hitoshi called out. "Do you want me to give you her number? I heard she really likes making babies!"

"Extra-Credit-Kun!" Mei yelled.

"Yes!" Mineta almost unseated himself in his eagerness as their team hovered off the ground and flew at him with all the speed that Shinso's jetpack could manage. His eyes widened as he realized too late that he wasn't going to be getting Mei's number.

Hitoshi shook out his hand as he took control of both Mineta and Shoji, "That was weirdly satisfying, Now give us your points."

Tsu tried to prevent Mineta from handing them over, but Mei simply yanked on her tongue and threw her off balance for long enough for them to get the points and get away. They rushed to put some distance between them as Tsu got her tongue back and smacked Mineta, loosening Hitoshi's control. It probably wouldn't be too long until Shoji broke through as well, especially since Hitoshi was starting to get tired.

Izuku checked in with the other teams. Todoroki had at some point gotten the 10 million point headband from Bakugo's team, but the two were currently fighting to try and reverse that, not that it would matter much in a few minutes. Bakugo's original headband was gone and Izuku noticed that one of the 1B teams was pursuing a similar strategy and working on building up the small points. The mutant team that Hitoshi was controlling had gained a good number of headbands and was currently eyeing Todoroki's headband, which wouldn't be good since the resulting fight would knock them out of HItoshi's control.

He looked at the clock and grinned. Almost two minutes left, which meant it was time to move onto the next phase of their strategy. "Shinso, call back Dark Shadow's team."

Hitoshi nodded and yelled the order and the team he was controlling immediately turned around and made their way toward them, "Alright, how many points do we want to keep?"

"For this to work, I'd say we need half the points on the board, not counting the 10 million." Izuku said. "Which headbands do they have?"

Tokoyami robotically spread out the headbands they'd collected and Hitoshi did the same with his. Mei quickly grabbed the ones they needed and shoved them into Hitoshi's hands, letting Dark Shadow keep the rest.

"Alright, are we ready?" Mei asked.

"Ready as we'll ever be." Uraraka said. "I still think this strategy is insane."

"Oh, definitely." Izuku responded. "But remember, the goal isn't just to win…"

Hitoshi released his control on everyone he was still controlling and Mei laughed madly as she took out a small remote and detonated the tiny explosives they'd planted on the ten million point headband at the beginning of the game. The headband had been floating in the air halfway in between the two frontrunners, while both Yaoyorozu and sero tried to use a whip and tape, respectively, to grab it and keep it from floating away to the atmosphere. The instant Mei pressed the button, flames rushed over it, leaving nothing more than pieces of ash and fabric floating down as a loud silence filled the stadium.

Izuku smiled, "The goal is to be memorable."

Summary:

Fasten your seatbelts and enjoy the ride!

Notes:

Art!

Hatzui

KatChicken

Cryoud

Memes!

X

Ah, I love my meme gremlins...More memes at the end!

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

"And with that looks like the ten million point headband is out of the game! " Hizashi's voice echoed over the silent stadium, which immediately exploded into an uproar. "Again, are they even allowed to do that?!"

"Once again, there is no rule against it." Shouta sighed in exhaustion. "Though that will most likely change in future years after this little performance. I had wondered if there was something else fishy going on with that headband when Uraraka didn't deactivate her quirk after Team Shinso gave up the headband. Like most quirks that affect an object, Uraraka's quirk isn't indefinite, so there must have been some reason she chose to keep it active on that particular headband throughout the fight. In this case, the weightlessness of the headband prevented the other teams from realizing that it had been tampered with. In any normal situation, the other teams would have noticed the extra weight from the planted explosives, but apparently Team Shinso is anything but normal."

Midoriya, the problem child, looked up at the announcer booth and gave him a small thumbs up that made Shouta roll his eyes. Of course the kid had known exactly what he was doing by having Uraraka use her quirk on the headband. Shouta didn't even know why he was surprised, considering how often Powerloader complained about Hatsume's propensity for explosions, but for some reason Shouta had assumed that getting the target off their backs and going after the small point values had been the extent of those crazy kids' plan. Apparently he still needed to learn his lesson about not underestimating the support course.

Or maybe just not underestimating Nedzu's protege.

Hizashi grinned widely and shook his head in disbelief as both of them turned their attention to the teams still on the field. "For those of you still catching up, that insane powerplay has put team Shinso in the lead with almost half the remaining points. Teams Monoma and Tokoyami are next up, followed by team Todoroki. Everybody else has got practically zilch! So much for Team Shinso's plan to not be a target! With almost two minutes left on the clock, how are they going to survive!?"

They weren't.

Honestly, if Deku had to resort to dirty tricks like blowing up points to win, he at least should have been smart enough to do it at the last minute so no one had time to recover. But as it was, Deku was an idiot and had the most points on the board, which meant it was time for him to die.

"Come on, extras." Katsuki growled to his team, which immediately started charging toward Deku along with what looked like every other team on the field, not that that mattered. Deku was his. "I'm gonna kill you Deku!"

Except for the fact that Deku was gone.

"What's this?!" Mic's voice screamed above the noise of the crowd, who seemed to be eating up the last minute upset. "Team Shinso has taken to the air! Are they…"

"Yes, they are allowed to do that." Aizawa sighed. "Honestly, it's probably their only viable strategy, now that everyone is being forced to scramble for last minute points."

Viable strategy?! Yeah right, like he'd let a little thing like gravity keep him from beating Deku to the ground. Katsuki didn't hesitate for a second before blasting off and rocketing toward the damn nerd's team to teach him a lesson about daring to humiliate him!

"Hitoshi!" Deku smirked at him, smirked, as he yelled to that useless gen-ed extra on his team. "Now!"

Suddenly there was a snap and Bakugo was wrapped in metal-like ribbons or something and before he knew it, he was being flung back to earth.

"And that, folks, is why it pays to have a good relationship with the support course!" Mic yelled. "That's one rockin' support item! Kinda reminds me of yours, Eraser!"

"Bakubro!" Shitty Hair yelled, "Come on Sero! Catch him!"

He was wrapped up for the second time that minute, this time in tape, and pulled back to his team, "That's it. Deku definitely has to die."

"What's going on?" Pony screamed, her voice wavering in barely concealed panic.

Tokoyami shook his head and his eyes widened as he realized there were two different teams charging straight toward them, "What a mad banquet of darkness…"

"Being edgy isn't helping, dude!" Kamakiri shouted, blades already popping from his skin as he prepared to fight. "What the hell just happened?!"

The last thing that he remembered clearly, they had been engaged in some sort of psychological warfare with Uraraka's team, but then everything went hazy. He had been vaguely aware of a sense of panic when he had lost control of an enraged Dark Shadow, and then seemed to remember going after other teams?

Pony haphazardly shot her horns at the approaching teams, forcing them to dodge and lose valuable time, "How many points do we have?"

"Uh…" Kamakiri glanced up at the board, "I think we're in third place right now? No wonder everyone's coming after us!"

"The purple one brainwashed us!" Dark Shadow yelled, swiping at some vines with his claws. "I'm sorry Fumikage! I tried to save you!"

"All is well, Dark Shadow. The agents of chaos have deigned to leave us enough points to stay in the running." Tokoyami stared down their new opponents. "Our challenge now is to keep them."

"Idiots, all of them." Monoma said haughtily. "We don't even need any more points at this point, unlike those 1A frontrunners."

"Well, yeah…" Tsuburaba said, slightly out of breath. "But now we're the prey, not the hunters."

Kuroiro nodded in agreement, "We can no longer stay in the shadows."

"Well, then…" Monoma smiled and reached out to copy a quirk from one of the 1A students trying to attack them . "I suppose we'll just have to shine, then."

Testsutestsu hardened his body again, his skin glinting in the sunlight as he looked down at him his team, "Everyone good on the plan?"

"God be willing, this will grant us success" Shiozaki nodded soberly.

"What she said." Awase agreed. "But if this doesn't work, we're screwed."

"Alright!" Tetstutetsu grinned. "Charge!"

They lunged forward and Shiozaki used all her vines to restrain Dark Shadow while Honenuki softened the ground underneath Team Tokoyami into a quicksand-like consistency. Their team quickly began sinking and Tetstutetsu did his best to block as many horns and blades as he could with his hardened skin so that Awase could get close enough to Pony to meld her horns to her head.

"No!" Pony yelled and tried to slap them away, but Tetsutetsu was already reaching toward Tokoyami's headbands.

"Don't you dare steal Fumikage's points!" Dark Shadow roared and broke through the layer of vines that had been holding him back.

Tetsutetsu's eyes widened and he was about to retreat and call the whole thing a loss when a laser suddenly shot past them, reflecting blindingly off his hardened skin. Dark Shadow whimpered, shrinking in on himself almost instinctively. It wasn't much of an opening, but that split second was enough for Tetsutetsu to grab some points and run away.

"Seriously, dude?" Tsuburaba sounded distinctly unimpressed. "You really need to work on your aim. That laser didn't even go near the teams we're actually fighting!"

Monoma cradled his stomach and swallowed a mouthful of bile, "Yeah, well, I'd like to see you try to aim a laser from your stomach when it feels like you're about to explode."

"Oui!" The stupid 1A french wannabee winked at them. "My quirk is tres difficult, non? That's why I need this stylish belt!"

"Not the time, Aoyama!" The monkey boy glared at Monoma and tried to grab at his points, but Monoma simply copied Tsuburaba's quirk and made himself a shield of solid air, trapping monkey boy's hand in it for long enough that they could retreat.

He glanced up at the board as the pain in his stomach finally started to subside. Still in the top three. Not bad for 1B.

Hitoshi panted as he had to use his weapon to rebuff Bakugo again, "Wow, this guy really doesn't know when to give up, does he?"

"That's Bakugo for you." Uraraka looked like she was starting to get nauseous, but she'd assured them at the beginning that while keeping them airborne for that long would be challenging, she'd be able to do it.

"Yeah, Katsuki's always been like that." Izuku rolled his eyes. "Even though it'd be smarter to go after some of the other teams, he sees my very existence as a personal challenge to his superiority."

"Well, you were making more direct challenges earlier." Mei pointed out. "So, I mean, you can't really say you're surprised."

"Heh…" Izuku chuckled, "I guess that's true, isn't it? Oh, looks like he's getting ready to try again"

"I, uh, I appreciate the whole teamwork aspect, Bakugo, but, uh…" Sero looked at him skeptically. "Are you really sure this is gonna work? Seems kinda crazy..."

"Come on!" Katsuki flexed his hands as Sero loaded the tape balls into them. "I'd like to see Deku resist boiling acid to the face! And with shark-face up there with me to take the brunt of eye-bag's weapon attack, there's nothing those extras will be able to do!"

"I dunno, man…" Kirishima said slowly. "Seems kinda violent."

"I think it's a great plan!" Mina cheered. "And we've got, like, less than a minute, so, uh...blast off you two!"

"I'm sorry, Fumikage." Dark Shadow purred contritely after he finally managed to pry their team from the mud. "We don't have enough points anymore…"

"It's not too late!" Kamakiri pointed out. "What about that one team from your class, the ice one? Think we can take them?"

"Uh…" Fumikage looked at Dark Shadow, who gave him a thumbs up. "They are as powerful as demons, but when one has nothing to lose, they must deal with devils."

Pony looked a little lost, "...is that a yes?"

"Looks like dear old Kacchan is switching things up and bringing a friend." Hitoshi said. "What's the other guy's quirk?"

"Rocks." Izuku answered. "I didn't expect Katsuki to actually work with his teammates, unless of course he just took off without warning and Kirishima just didn't have a chance to let go…"

"No time to second guess things, Izu-kun!" Mei grinned and adjusted her flamethrower. "We've got incoming!"

Hitoshi shot his capture weapon toward Bakugo, but at the last minute, Kirishima let go of Bakugo's ankles and latched onto the capture weapon. He hardened and swung on the ribbon like Tarzan and the sudden unexpected weight made their whole team suddenly lurch toward the ground. By the time that Hitoshi and Uraraka were able to get them back on balance, Katsuki was already in their faces, throwing balls of...was that Sero's tape?

"Mei! Flamethrower!"

"Let us charge into battle!" Fumikage cried.

The team didn't move, "Um…"

"Go!" Dark Shadow shouted.

They rushed toward Todoroki's team, who had been using a combination of ice and Iida's engine quirk to stay out of range and keep the points they had collected. Dark Shadow stretched behind them and started wrapping around to force Todoroki's team into a close range battle and keep them from running away.

"Kaminari!" Todoroki ordered cooly, pulling some sort of sheet over himself. "Attack!"

Sero wrapped a length of tape around Kirishima's waist and pulled him back to the team, "Good work dude."

"Thanks." Kirishima gave a sharp toothed grin. "How's plan B going?"

Mina held out a couple of headbands, "It won't be enough, but I managed to burn a bunch of those crazy vines and Sero used his tape to grab some of the headbands from that metal guy's team while you were gone. Do you think Bakugo'll actually be able to pull this plan off?"

Kirishima shrugged and turned back toward the aerial battle, "Well, I wouldn't underestimate either of them."

Mei blasted the flamethrower at the tape balls right as Katsuki set off an explosion. Some of them vaporized entirely, while the rest splashed a suspicious pink liquid over everyone.

"Owww!" Uraraka rubbed at her arms frantically. "You filled Sero's tape with Ashido's acid? Really Bakugo?!"

"Fuck that hurts…" Hitoshi grimaced and was busy wiping acid from his face when a hand suddenly emerged from the smoke and snatched away most of their headbands. "Hey! Izuku! Bakugo got our points!"

"Shit!" Izuku rushed to tally the points in his head. "How many did he get?"

"More than half!" Hitoshi answered. "Hey Blasty! What do you think you're doing!"

"No time!" Mei messed with something on her tool belt and launched it at Bakugo. "Take this!"

Bakugo's eyes widened as he was tangled in one of Mei's capture nets and started to fall. A line of tape reached to grab him and Izuku tugged at Uraraka's sleeve, "We need to remove his gravity! If he gets back to his team with all our points, we won't move on!"

"Extra-Credit-Kun!" Mei yelled. "Full blast on the jetpack! Everyone hold on tight!"

"Ugh!" Hitoshi groaned but had a smile on his face as he adjusted the jetpack controls. "I hate this family!"

"Kamakiri!" Tokoyami cried. "The time is now!"

Kamakiri grinned as he threw a chain of his blades at Kaminari. He wouldn't have normally thought of using his uniform shirt to tie them together, but when Tokoyami said they would need a way to counteract Kaminari's electricity, his first instinct was to create a lightning rod with his blades. Thankfully his aim was true enough that he managed to stab Kaminari in the arm seconds into his attack and the otherwise disabling attack was channelled into his blades and flowed harmlessly into the ground as their team kept advancing.

"Onward!" Pony yelled. "For loss!"

Dark Shadow reached for the headbands on Todoroki's neck, flinching back slightly when there was a brief splutter of fire, but pushing forward when it died after only half a second, "I think you mean for victory!"

"Oh, right. For victory!"

Uraraka swallowed down the vomit that was threatening to come up as she pushed herself and her quirk to the limit. She grimaced as she grabbed onto the capture net with all five fingers. It would have been better to make Bakugo weightless, but with seconds left on the clock, she'd take what she could get. Bakugo tried to force her way with explosions and she could feel the net jerking away from her as Sero pulled at his tape, but with the angle he was trapped at Bakugo couldn't use his quirk to propel himself, which put their team at an advantage.

"Thanks, Kacchan." Midoriya reached past her and yanked away as many headbands as he could. "Have a nice fall!"

Hizashi waited with baited breath as the last few seconds ticked away, "And that's time! Wowza! In all my years I really don't think I've seen a more intense final few minutes, have you Eraser? I thought the free for all was normally at the beginning of the match!"

"Well normally, more than half the points aren't obliterated with two minutes to go." Shouta said dryly.

He looked out over the stadium. The crowds were eating up the twists and turns to the battle, which had to be good for their ratings and, by extension, good for UA's publicity. Sero had just barely managed to reel Bakugo in without him touching the ground, and Shinso's team was shielding Uraraka from the cameras as she finally released her quirk and the contents of her stomach. Tokoyami was doing well at interclass bonding, it seemed, as he and his teammates patted each other on the back and counted up the points they'd stolen at the last minute and the team from 1B looked smug that they were the only team that had actually managed to keep all the points they'd stolen by the time the 10 million point headband was taken out of play.

"What's this?!" Hizashi yelled, hyping up the crowd as the scoreboard readjusted itself to reflect the final totals. "It looks like a good mix of students will be moving on! In first place, we have team Monoma from class 1B! Then Team Shinso with students from support, gen-ed, and class 1A. Next place is team Bakugo from class 1A, with their impressive teamwork! Finally, in fourth Place is...Team Tokoyami with some points stolen at the very end! Oh, and because Team Tokoyami only has three members, one person from Team Tetsutetsu will be moving on as well! I guess you could say that this year is the year of the underdogs!"

Shouta looked down at the field again. The teams that had moved on were laughing, crying, and celebrating, but he was paying more attention to Todoroki, who was looking down at his hands and appeared to be in shock. Shouta knew he was imagining it, but he could almost feel the heat from Endeavor in the stands as he realized that his son wouldn't be moving onto the final found. To Shouta's memory it wasn't the first time that the strongest student had failed to make it to the one-on-one battles, but it was rare enough to be notable and he couldn't help but feel that his husband's observation, however dramatic, was correct.

This was the year of the underdogs.