A line drawn in the sand

by Master of thr forgotten

U.a has a twist this year

1. 1-5

AN: this is straight copy and paste i also did ask the author of this fan fic AWeeBitRustyEh if I could bring it to ffn

A Line Drawn in the Sand

AWeeBitRustyEh

Summary:

This year, UA is experimenting with a new Young Villain and Criminal Reformation Program. Instead of twenty hero students, the first year hero class will be a combination of both hero and villain students...The hero students will have one year to find the villains in their midst in order to escape Eraserhead's expulsion. For the villains, this is their last shot— it's blending in or it's prison.

Midoriya Izuku wants nothing more than to be the first quirkless hero. After failing the practical hero exam, he's shocked when he receives a letter telling him that he has been offered a tentative position in the illustrious Class 1-A.

There's just one problem: Midoriya has been accepted to Class 1-A as a villain, and he has absolutely no idea why.

(This fic has a Discord.)

Notes:

(See the end of the work for other works inspired by this one.)

Chapter 1: Introductions

Notes:

I had this idea one night in a dream and it's haunted me ever since... I have too many other WIPs (which you can check out on my profile, cough cough). Check back every Saturday in October for the first chapter of each new WIP to be posted. I don't think there's any warning or anything necessary for this chapter, but let me know in the comments if I need any. Also, this is unbeta'd, so any mistakes are my own.

Comments and kudos give me life! Please feed the poor, starving, sleep-deprived author who should really be doing her coursework, but has murder-villain schools on the brain instead...

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

Chapter Text

A Line Drawn in the Sand cover from my tumblr

Midoriya craned his neck to look up at the towering twin buildings looming above him. UA was just as fascinating from an architectural standpoint as from an academic or heroic standpoint. This school produced some of the world's finest heroes, like All Might and Best Jeanist.

And here Midoriya was as the school's first quirkless student.

The likelihood of his acceptance was unlikely at best. Extraordinarily improbable described the sheer incredulity that a quirkless Deku could be on the same campus as his lifelong idols.

He gripped the letter tightly in his left hand while his right hand clutched his neon-yellow backpack strap to hopefully hide the shaking. The letter that had changed everything. Last time he had been here on this campus was when he failed the hero practical for the entrance exam, probably after failing the written exam too. All of his studying had been for naught between the giant robots and his horrible test anxiety.

At least that's what he had thought until his mother retrieved the mail one day and out popped a letter with the official UA seal. Midoriya had grimaced at the sight, already well aware that he'd walked out of the exam with exactly zero points. The worst part had been that he knew how to find the robots weak points. But every time he tried to make his move, the points were stolen by some other aspiring student with a flashy quirk and far more potential as a hero than Midoriya could ever have. The final buzzer had sounded and the exam period was over, along with any hopes of attending UA the next school year.

His hopes had been suitably mollified when he opened the letter privately in his room. Between the two of them, if one of them started crying then the other would follow shortly thereafter. The Universal Constant of the Midoriya genetics.

Instead of just a letter, a small black disc fell out of the envelope as well, flickering to life a moment later. It projected an image of a small, white animal with beady black eyes and wearing sharp business attire. Midoriya recognized him as Nezu, Principal of UA High.

He blinked at the principal's voice filtered through the speakers. "Am I dog? Am I a rat? Am I a bear? Who knows, but most importantly, I am the principal! Hello, Midoriya Izuku! I would like to congratulate you on scoring one of the highest scores on our written entrance exam to date. The panel grading your essays was suitably impressed by your critical thinking and logical analysis of the heroics industry from a moral and ethical standpoint. I enjoyed your responses immensely. Very well done! Unfortunately, you did not pass the physical portion of the heroics exam. Normally this would result in you being placed in the General Education program, with the opportunity to rise up to the hero class after significant improvements and under certain conditions. However, the first year heroics class at UA this year will be quite different. More details will be provided on the first day of class, but for the moment, I would like to provisionally welcome you, Midoriya Izuku, to Class 1-A. Welcome to your hero academia."

"Inside the attached letter will be instructions forms ordering uniforms, emergency forms, and other necessary documents required for your enrollment. There is also a list of a few caveats due to your acceptance as a provisional student. You will be placed in remedial classes instructed by myself, though I promise they will be remedial only in name. I see quite a bit of potential in you, Midoriya. I look forward to seeing you this semester. Plus Ultra!"

Now, staring up at the grandiose high school, he more than ever before felt like he had reached a turning point in his life. The point of no return.

Principal Nezu liked mysteries. Mysteries, conundrums, enigmas. In fact, his signature introduction perfectly encapsulated his love of intrigue. Was he a mouse? A dog? A bear? He was actually a stoat with unusual coloring and size, Mustela erminea, but he best keep that secret. Nobody had figured it out yet!

As he waited patiently in the vents, perched above the single grate that accessed the staff meeting room, Nezu reviewed his proposal. None of the staff gathered below, including their newest addition of the number one hero, would have the necessary ammunition to halt his plans. The only ones with that capability would surely be on his side, or very easily swayed.

Speaking of the devil himself, the last and most important member of the meeting finally entered the room. Nezu popped out of the vent just as the underground hero plopped into the remaining seat by the head of the table. He only sighed in resignation as the other heroes screeched and hollered.

"Greetings! I'm sure you all think you know what this meeting is about," Nezu started before grinning his wicked grin. He saw the gathered staff members shiver. Excellent.

Nezu let the anticipation settle for a moment before easing their fears. "And you would be correct!" he said, handing a stack of folders to Aizawa to distribute. He tossed them to Vlad King to his right with an irritated grunt. The Blood Hero passed out the thick folders without complaint.

"For those of you returning to the staff, you know your duties. The applicants have been scored based on their performance in the practical and I have assigned them to their tentative classes; however, if there are any problems or accommodations required, please make a note." The staff members nodded, some already thumbing through their student profiles. They would ensure that there were no conflicts between future classmates and begin learning about their future pupils.

"Right! Before you get started though," Nezu said, "please flip to page 7 of your packets." Most of the teachers were eager to finish their several hour shift of sitting in the staff room in dead silence while they tediously learned about their students for the principal's required quiz. Nezu usually enjoyed the stench of white-knuckled boredom and despair when the teachers were unable to exit the room without suitably knowing thier students' profiles, but today they had more exciting business to attend to. One of the grandest mysteries he would have the pleasure of executing.

The staff members thumbed to the correct page and some began noticing the bolded headline sitting at the top of the proposal. There were quiet murmurs as they began to process the meaning and Nezu could feel one particular pair of eyes studying him.

"As you can see, this years' hero course will be significantly different from previous years. The Hero Public Safety Commission has provided UA with the funds necessary to begin the Young Villain and Criminal Reformation Program. Suitable candidates have already been selected and are awaiting approval of their future teacher in order for their entry to be fully processed."

"Wait, wait, wait," Yamada said, holding up his hands. He must have noticed that his file was conspicuously thin. The future hero student profiles were barren, with only names, quirks, and basic identifying information located on the sheets. None of the family information or background knowledge scoured for by Nezu would be provided this year. "You're telling me that we're enrolling villains in the hero course?"

"Yes!" Nezu rubbed his paws excitedly. "Former villains and criminals who are young and willing enough to be rehabilitated, provided that they meet our graduating conditions of course."

Aizawa, as if sensing his oncoming migraine, pinched the bridge of his nose. "However, due to the experimental nature of such a program, only one of the hero courses will be deviating from the usual standard. Class 1-A under Eraserhead will feature the first batch of YVCR students."

"Why my class?" the underground hero ground out, looking as if he wanted to punt the principal across the room. No different than his usual appearance after their individual meetings. His cooperation was already in the bag.

"You're in the unique position of having both a suitable quirk and required disposition necessary to deal with the potentially dangerous members of the YVCR." Plus, Nezu knew his former pupil also enjoyed a good mystery. Although he preferred the term logical ruse.

The principal waited for any more questions, but there were none. Some of the staff were flipping through the next few pages explaining briefly the parameters of the program and the amended guide for graduation, both for the hero students and the villain students.

Snipe was the one who spoke up first. "What's this saying here about a trial system?"

Nezu grinned, his tail swishing excitedly in anticipation of all the fun he would having this year. "The trial system will be part of a broader system implemented for the Class 1-A students. If you will turn to page 9, there is a brief outline of the way in which this program will function to the potential benefit of both the hero and villain students."

One of the features designed to allow the program a smooth function is the Anonymity Clause, which states that only the student's homeroom teacher and I, the principal, may know a student's status and whether or not they are enrolled in the program."

"Wait. So we won't even know which one of the kids are going to be criminals? How are we expected to keep an eye on them?" Kayama protested with her usual dramatique.

"You're not! This program will not only benefit the YVCR students but the hero students as well, in that they will gain first-hand experience in uncovering their friends from their foes. As you can see in the modified graduation structure section on page 10, there are two separate sets of requirements for the students to graduate. The hero students, who have taken our practical and written exams, will be graded on their ability to cooperate and work out who are the villain students within their class. They will have six trials throughout the year, one during midterms and finals of each semester, and will be required to flush out the villain students by the end of the year."

"Or else?"

"Or else they do not graduate. For the villain students, however, their goal will be to survive the semester without acting suspicious. The goal of this type of program integration is to prove that they understand the error of their previous ways and that they can reintegrate back into society successfully and with minimal problems. By remaining hidden among the hero students without arousing suspicion, they will have proven their reformation is complete and will be granted entry into the heroics program next year. Are there any other questions?" the principal asked. He was well-aware that the flood of information had gone right over everybody's heads.

Everybody except for one. Eraserhead scowled at the program description, locking eyes with the principal as the two studied one another, former teacher and pupil. "Will the villain students know each other's designations?"

"Excellent question, Aizawa! No they will not. They will be given access to a special chat and it will be up to them to supply their own identifying information or to remain anonymous to one another. A united front or a divided sleeper cell. Oh, this will be quite fun indeed." His tail brushed against his suit in its excitement.

"And the tracking bracelets," Aizawa stated bluntly.

"Yes. All students in Class 1-A will be required to wear the tracking bracelet at all times, due to the YCVR students who will require constant attention. I am sure the importance of their cooperation will be impressed upon them suitably. All of the candidates selected are those I believe to be truly capable of this reform."

"Now then," the principal continued, "it is time to read the student profiles. Please do so while I speak to Aizawa in private about his students' profiles." He saw the glint of excitement as they realized they might escape his hellish pop quizzes. "And do be sure to wait for my return. This year's quizzes are going to be extra special!"

Nezu hopped down from his seat and escorted Aizawa to his office through a secret door just outside the meeting room. The underground hero was the only one beside himself that knew of the tunnels' presence in the building. He graciously ignored the hero's mutter of "sadistic" and instead began brewing his special blend of tea while the man settled into his chair.

The two cups of tea sat steaming on the desk between them as Nezu pulled out a specially marked file that would never leave his office and be hidden under his highest protections.

"Well then, Aizawa-kun, shall we get started?"

Walking into Class 1-A with its massively oversized door, Midoriya noticed the two people he least wanted to see.

The robotic boy from the practical exam, who must have been related to Ingenium with his engine legs and squarish face, was waving his hands and shouting at the second offender in the classroom who had his feet kicked back on his desk.

"Take your feet off that desk, now!" the robotic boy shouted, waving his arms up and down.

Kacchan smirked like the devil himself. "Huh?"

Midoriya could tell when the robotic boy realized that Kacchan respected authority the same way he respected Midoriya— he didn't.

Most of the students who were already in the class were preoccupied by the increasing volume of the two's argument as the robotic boy began to preach about respecting the school. Midoriya, ever the opportunist, used this distraction to peek at the seating chart at the front of the classroom and stilled at the sight.

Of course his seat was right behind Kacchan's.

Better behind that in front, Midoriya thought as he made his way towards the back of the room. If he could loop behind Kacchan and linger out of his periphery until the teacher arrived, then he could hopefully escape his former best friend's notice. Unfortunately, it seemed as if the universe had other plans because he had barely started his journey when a familiar voice shouted at him and began introducing himself.

The robotic boy appeared in front of him so quickly that Midoriya would have assumed he'd used his quirk if not for the boy's uptight stickler for the rules attitude. He held one hand over his heart while the other was extended toward a startled Midoriya.

"I'm from Somei Private Academy—"

Midoriya eeped. "I-I heard you before! Ah, I'm Izuku Midoriya… Pleased to meet you, Iida."

Iida locked onto him with robotic (what else could they be, the boy acted more machine than man) eyes. "Midoriya. You perceived the true nature of that practical exam. While I did not. I misjudged you! I hate to admit it, but you were the superior candidate."

Midoriya rubbed the back of his neck, aware of the amount of attention on him from the other students in the room. Iida spoke extremely loud. It was so similar but different from Kacchan, who spoke an angry loud while Iida spoke a very stern loud. That made sense, right?

"I didn't perceive anything!" he protested.

Kacchan finally noticed him, growling out a "Deku."

Before Kacchan could annihilate him in a salvo of explosions, a bubbly voice called out behind him. "Ah! Your curly hair is adorable."

Midoriya turned around to see a short, brown-haired girl with rosy cheeks and a cheery disposition. There were little pads (toe-beans, a traitorous part of his mind whispered) on each of her fingers. She must have a touch-activation quirk. Was that him or was her backpack not sagging as heavily as it should?

A yellow caterpillar crawled across the ground behind the bubbly girl. He locked eyes with the dull black eyes of black haired caterpillar man. Nobody else noticed the man until he spoke. "If you're here to socialize, then get out."

Bubbly girl turned around first, followed by Iida and then the other people close to the door, and then the rest of the class. Everybody was silent as the caterpillar man drank from a small juice packet and said, "This is the hero course."

He stood up, shedding his cocoon through the help of a zipper rather than bursting through a chrysalis with the help of a release chemical. The man stepped out with a baggy black jumpsuit and a white scarf wrapped around his neck. Midoriya recognized him instantly, though he doubted anybody else would.

Eraserhead was their teacher.

"It took eight seconds for your to quiet down," the man continued, uncaring about Midoriya's internal crisis. "Time is a precious resource. You lot aren't very logical, are you?"

Eraserhead walked over to the front table and stood behind the lectern, dragging his yellow sleeping bag cocoon behind him.

"I'm your homeroom teacher, Aizawa Shouta. Pleased to meet you," the man said in clipped words. Midoriya and the others immediately raced to their assigned seats as the hero shuffled through some papers.

Aizawa-sensei looked up from his papers with the barest glint of something in his eyes. Midoriya struggled to put a name on it. But regardless, the twenty students— who had only been in the class for less than a single period— were hit with the overwhelming sense of danger which had been lurking on the fringes of their perception. Midoriya studied the underground hero and found an assured confidence. Every word he was saying he believed to be true. Every action was one he knew he could fulfill. He really was a hero.

Eraserhead glared the already-silent class into submission before addressing them. "Good morning. Normally, we would already be taking our first test by now but the rat wants me to explain first."

"UA has done its best to keep its student's private lives private. As such, you will not have heard of the new changes to the Class 1-A heroics program for this year. Principal Nezu has worked with the Hero Public Safety Commission—" Midoriya snorted softly. No way that the principal would do that. Their rivalry with the Commission preceded him. "— to establish a trial program known as the Young Villain and Criminal Reformation Program. This is designed both to benefit the incoming hero students as well as the program's members. It will provide a pathway for young high school age villains and criminals who have been established as having high potential for reformation and reintegration into society."

The man began walking around the classroom, handing out manilla envelopes with their last names printed on the front in neat kanji. "Inside your envelope you will find your student ID and your H-watch. Both will be required at all times on campus, while only your H-watch will be mandatory on your person when you are not on campus."

Midoriya followed alongside the nineteen other students as they dug through their envelope to find the items mentioned. The underside of his watch, which looked like a typical smartwatch, had the number 18 engraved. There were several programs already installed on the device but Eraserhead began talking before Midoriya could fiddle around.

Eraserhead held up his own version of the ID card, which displayed his hero name and clearance level for school access. He showed them how to click the button on the side to turn it on. Midoriya clicked his and it displayed his name, quirk status, class number, and a dozen other pieces of personal information. In the top right corner was a small emblem made up of two English characters… no wait. It had four English characters, but two overlapped with the others if Midoriya read it right.

And then he did a double take when he read the line holding his status.

Villain (Reason for Enrollment: ————)

How… why was he a villain? He was just a quirkless kid with a dream, a futile one at that. This had to be a mistake or something. Maybe there was another Midoriya Izuku who had applied that was also quirkless… no, he wasn't delusional. It was him.

"Some of you may already be aware of your circumstances for entering this program while others may not. Regardless, what I am about to say is very important, so listen closely, hellions."

"Do not share this status or your enrollment in the program with anybody, either inside this classroom or in the general public. Nobody outside of myself and Nezu are aware of your identities. As heroes, confidentiality is one of the most important lessons you must remember. If you can't figure out why you shouldn't tell the public, then you're not smart enough to be in my classroom."

"Your peers are another matter. Principal Nezu and I have decided that in order to maximize the effectiveness of the program for both the enrolled students and the hero students, the second semester confidentiality and second year investigation lessons have been rearranged to your first year."

Iida waved his hand in the air, robotic as ever. "Sensei, I do not understand the purpose of rearranging—"

"If you'd wait for me to finish," the hero grouched, "I will explain. From now on, hold questions until I call on you."

He didn't wait for a response before continuing. Midoriya couldn't help the small snort at the chastised look on the blue haired boy's face. "There are two objectives. In order to graduate from the first year hero program, the hero students within the class who are not enrolled in the program must figure out who the villains and criminals students are through mock trials that will occur during midterms and finals of each term. Hence why we are learning about investigation and confidentiality."

"The villain students will have a different objective. Their objective is to make it through the semester without being caught by the hero students. Or sold out by the other criminals. Your individual consequences should be obvious to each criminal student. But in order to graduate at the end of the year, you must prove that you are ready for reintegration and can successfully become a hero like the rest of your classmates."

Aizawa-sensei waited for several moments, then opened up questions. Immediately, several hands shot into the air, including Iida and Kaminari. The underground hero selected Kaminari.

"What about regular classwork? Does this mean we have no tests?" Kaminari asked excitedly. The pink-skinned girl also looked excited, though significantly less than the electric boy. Midoriya wondered if the bolt streak in his hair was natural or dyed in.

Aizawa-sensei grunted. "No. This will be supplemental, not subtractional. Your exams will be worth the same weighting as seen in the syllabus. Don't read them now, it will waste time."

Another girl with a long, brown ponytail raised her hand. "How will the mock trials be conducted and will any preparation be necessary?"

"The trials will be explained at a later date. For now, expect a similar trial to our actual legal system. To prepare for this, you will need to be aware of your classmates, their activities, and make your own judgments ahead of time about whether they are a hero or villain student. Do not," he flashed his quirk in emphasis. "Do not leave this for the last moment. This is supposed to be a year long exercise. You will not have good results if you do so. And you will be penalized if you don't contribute to your team's score, then you will not pass this semester either. Be prepared to write an analysis of why you believe each classmate is or is not a villain. Is that understood?"

There were mutters of agreement throughout the class. Midoriya was too afraid of their teacher to bother scribbling the information in his notebook. He had already committed it to memory out of pure fear. The reality of his situation hadn't hit him yet, but now he understood why his acceptance was provisional. And why he needed to meet with the principal himself.

"Good. Now, change into your gym clothes and head out to the ground." He glared with his quirk and the students shivered. "Don't be late."

The class sprinted for the locker rooms.

Midoriya, although he barely passed the test by the skin of his teeth, took the opportunity to observe his classmates. This had to be one of the strangest first days of school. Almost every single person in the class excluding himself had heroic quirks that would have been praised at Aldera. Even if some of them were villains. Including himself.

He wished he had his notebook on him to write down his questions and observations as each person stepped up to the Quirk Apprehension tests; he would have to make do with writing them down later. For now, he had to pass a test. Or he wouldn't get to see the end of his first day at UA. He already had a natural disadvantage. The only person scoring the same average score was the invisible girl, whose quirk just didn't make sense without having a failsafe deactivation. Quirk evolution favored beneficial quirks and he doubted that the quirk would have made it several generations before having such a disadvantageous mutation.

Of course, Bakugo glared daggers at him across the gymnasium as they rotated between stations. Midoriya did his best not to let it affect him. He had a decade of practice. The blonde boy held back for the moment. Midoriya thanked every deity above.

When the scores were revealed, Midoriya sighed in relief as he noticed that there was only one person below him on the list— and it wasn't the invisible girl. Mineta Minoru must have been the boy with the grape hair because he let out a gasp and immediately started protesting about how everybody must have cheated.

He singled out Midoriya. "And he didn't even use his quirk! Why don't you expel him for not using his quirk on a literal quirk test?"

Midoriya froze. Every single eye in the class was on him. Familiar, burning red eyes accompanied the crackling of explosions as Bakugo scoffed. "The useless deku can't use what he doesn't have."

The gymnasium was dead silent before erupting in a cacophony of whispers. He caught snippets of conversations and mutters about how he couldn't be a villain because he didn't even have a quirk. Or that they didn't know why he had been admitted to the hero course, much less as a hero than a villain. Weren't quirkless people fragile anyways?

Aizawa-sensei looked Midoriya in the eyes as his classmates gossiped. Midoriya remembered from his introduction speech earlier, that the teacher knew he was a villain. But did he know why Midoriya was in the program, when the boy in question had no idea what could have gotten him enrolled?

The underground hero flashed his quirk and the class quieted down. "You're learning. There's hope for you still. Nobody is being expelled today because it was a logical ruse. But I have my eye on the problem students of the class, including those who half-assed this test. Don't think I didn't notice. Next time it happens, I won't hesitate to expel you."

The class chorused in agreement. Though there were still furtive glances in his direction. Midoriya winced as Aizawa-sensei addressed the unwanted attention. "UA also has a very strict discrimination policy. Only villains discriminate against their peers for something out of their control." The teacher's eyes connected with the boy's own. "Remember that. Class dismissed. Rest up, because tomorrow's trials aren't going to be any easier."

Midoriya followed the crowd back toward the locker room. He was in a state of shock. Eraserhead, one of his favorite heroes, had defended him in front of his peers. Even knowing about his quirklessness. And the fact that apparently, he was a villain.

Changing out of his gym uniform and into his regular uniform was an exercise in speed. The locker rooms at Aldera were perfect for an ambush before or after gym, so the boy was used to quick changes. It made it easier to avoid the lingering stares, the whispers, and the boy with spiky hair who tried to approach him. He ran from the locker room before anybody could catch up.

Once he made it back to the main building, Midoriya pulled up his identification card. He had noticed a few tabs on the program. One of them was a map interface displaying his location on campus with little arrows pointing to a specific location. Midoriya selected the one for the principal's office and began following the display's guidance.

Along the way, he passed several groups of students and a few teachers. Nobody batted an eye at him. He knew it was irrational to think that news of his quirklessness had spread this far this quick, but years of paranoia made him, well, paranoid.

The guidance stopped when Midoriya stood outside a plain door, just like every other door in the hallway. There was nothing special about this room except for the fact that the door was slightly ajar. A high voice called his name from inside. "Ah, Midoriya-kun. Please come in."

His breath escaped as Midoriya slowly stepped into the principal's office. When doing his research on UA, he had invariably stumbled across information and speculation about Principal Nezu. Nobody knew what type of animal he was, or where exactly he came from, or just how smart he truly was. Midoriya only knew from some deep digging that the Hero Commission seemed to have a vendetta against the animal. And Principal Nezu held one in return.

Midoriya sat down on a cushioned chair directly in front of the principal's desk. It was a fairly standard looking office, with minimal accomodations for Nezu's size visible, though Midoriya knew better than to believe they weren't there. They must have been hidden.

"Indeed, they are, Midoriya-kun. I'm glad to see you already putting your mind to work, especially after Eraserhead's usual Apprehension Test." The principal pushed a steaming cup and saucer towards the flustered boy. "Would you care for some tea?"

Midoriya was too embarrassed to respond beyond ducking his head and nodding. Not only did he have to attend special remedial classes— probably because of his grades at Aldera, and his quirklessness— but now he had muttered about the principal in front of said principal!

The white creature rubbed his hands together. "Very good. I was very impressed with your ability to think outside of the box earlier. I know Eraserhead must have been too. Already, you are promising to be one of this year's most promising candidates."

Midoriya blinked. He swallowed his sip of jasmine tea before responding. "Principal Nezu, sir, I'm not entirely sure what you mean. I didn't think outside of the box on anything. I nearly got expelled from the class!"

"Perhaps," Principal Nezu said. His beady eyes studied Midoriya. "You are indeed correct in saying that your physical placement in the test did not reassure your teacher of your potential. However, I believe you are neglecting to mention something that both myself and your homeroom teacher would argue to be far more important that an arbitrary standardized physical. Would you care to guess what that is, Midoriya-kun?"

The principal smiled, and though he resembled a child's plushie, the smile on his face was that of a predator. "I'll give you a hint. It's why I requested for you to be my personal student."

"P-personal student?" Midoriya stuttered. His eyes bugged out of his skull.

"Yes. These one on one lessons will provide ample time to hone your natural skills and make you into one of our institution's finest graduates. As well as a very successful hero."

It took several moments for Midoriya to calm himself and slow his racing heart. If it beat any faster, Recovery Girl would probably need to come resuscitate him. Still, once he had reoriented himself and pushed the sheer absurdity of the day from his mind, he began thinking over the earlier test. What had he done differently from the other students besides not using a quirk? Was it…

"Was it my analysis, Nezu-sensei?" Midoriya asked meekly. He did not notice the creature's tail speed up at the use of the honorific.

"Correct! You not only analyzed your classmates and made impressive notes on their quirks, but you also managed to successfully divert any suspicion away from you within a single day. I am extremely invested in your enrollment in this program, Midoriya-kun."

"About that," Midoriya trailed off. Principal Nezu took a sip of his own tea, but kindly waited for the boy to gather his courage. "I don't understand why I was enrolled in this program. I'm not a villain."

The principal set down his tea, setting it aside as he rested his arms on the table. It looked all too similar to when the principal at Aldera would sit him down and scold him for starting fights with the quirked students. Even when Midoriya had the worst injuries, it was always blamed on the useless troublemaker.

"I believe that that question is better answered at a later time. Perhaps once you have settled in a bit more, then you will see." The principal clapped his hands together. It startled Midoriya and a bit of tea sloshed on the desk. He wiped it off sheepishly.

"Now then. Let's start our first lesson of the semester off simple. Tell me what you think about your classmates."

Midoriya spent the next hour describing each of his classmates' quirks, attitudes, personalities, and potential for villainy to a very, very excited principal who then requested to read his notebook. If the quirkless boy walked out of school with a smile for the first time in ten years, then there was nobody around to judge him.

After all, he was finally going to be a hero.

CLASS 1-A HERO AND VILLAIN ANALYSIS FOR THE FUTURE

ENTRY NO. 1 HAGAKURE TORU

Quirk: Invisibility* (see notes)

Hero Name: Stealth Hero: Invisible Girl

Student Number: 16

Height: 152 cm

Description: Invisible, supposedly short bob length blonde hair, fairly skinny, is willing to take off clothes so do not rely on clothes for spotting

Fighting Ability: Weak, needs improvement. Advantage in having invisible limbs to hit opponent

Weaknesses: Thermal imaging, lack of fighting experience, sound-based quirks, paintgun

Speculative Assignment: Villain

Reasoning: Most likely an informant or thief based on quirk/demeanor. No way she passed the entrance exam without a load of rescue points. Still feasible, but coupled with other evidence, I'm pretty confident in this conclusion.

Notes: How did she even get through the entrance exam? Also, she's lying about her quirk. Would Aizawa be able to erase her quirk and if so, would she reappear? Her quirk is more closely related to manipulating light (potentially energy) waves. If Aizawa's quirk is based on EM radiation/a signal produced through his eyes like I suspect, then would her quirk duplicate the waves through her with the same signature/effect, or would it simply be eliminated by her quirk?

I'm getting off topic. Yeah, there's no way she passed the entrance exam considering her weak physical performance on the apprehension exam. Those robots I saw in the servers were massive and the qualifying score is extremely high. She said she was at the exam but nobody saw her (duh, she's invisible). She's very good at dodging questions and her ability would make her a very good informant. She walks very quietly and has startled several of our classmates. She's crafty enough to use her quirk to cheat on the long jump and other tests during the apprehension exam. High villainous potential with a cutesy schoolgirl attitude to avoid suspicion. Will need further evaluation of whether can be reintegrated or was a villain unwillingly.

Notes:

That's the first chapter! I hope you all enjoy. I'm working on four main stories rn with drastically different plots and chapter lengths, so whichever has the most interaction/attention will definitely have MY attention in turn.

This fic should* update once a month (at least/depending on interaction) on the second or third Saturday of every month. Updates and schedule modifications will be posted on my tumblr (@aweebitrustyeh). Feel free (please) follow me over there and ask me anything about this work, updates, etc.

The next story to be published will be The Nine Mindgames of Aizawa Shouta a week from today, which is a mystery focused on the UA staff with some more mischievous Nezu wreaking havoc on Aizawa's sleep schedule...

Anyway, I hope to see ya'll next week! -Rusty

---

AN: this is straight copy and paste i also did ask the author of this fan fic AWeeBitRustyEh if I could bring it to ffn

a Line Drawn in the Sand

By: AWeeBitRustyEh

Chapter 2: Correspondence

Notes:

The reaction to this fic blew me away... I never expected more than like ten kudos and maybe a comment? But you all went wild and I have literally cried at how kind some of you were in the comments.

I won't delay any longer, I hope you all enjoy this chapter!

(Also, the chat names might be confusing at first, but don't fixate on them too much. They'll get better with time and this isn't a chat fic, so you don't need to worry about them just yet.)

EDIT: Only Midoriya can see the chat names toward the end. It's more to help on the reading end, bec even I (the author) got my numbers mixed up a few times!

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

Chapter Text

You have been added to a new chat room by Principal Nezu…

Accept Invitation?

Invitation accepted. Please read the moderator's rules before messages. Plus Ultra!

Chat Members: XXX1, XXX2, XXX3, XXX5, XXX6, XXX7, XXX11, XX12, XX19, XX20

XXX11 has joined the chat

Previous messages unavailable…

Midoriya played around with the settings of the server. He had never used this program before and judging by the coding he looked at, this seemed to be the brainchild of the principal himself.

They were allowed to change their classmates' names, but only for their display. Midoriya appreciated that feature since it would make keeping track of his classmates in the chat a lot easier. Still, the principal was a wily little rat and Midoriya checked the pathway himself. His information could be dangerous if somebody in the group decided to sell them out.

One by one, the other users in the chat began popping on, most likely as their watches began beeping for their attention. His mother had been at work when he'd gotten the notification. It probably woke at least a few people up as it was nearly midnight.

They had their second day of school in less than eight hours. Nezu had structured this chat's release purposefully, but Midoriya needed to fill a bit more of his sleep debt before he even began to decipher the principal's whims.

User XXX2 changed the chat room's name to 'Villains, Vigilantes, and Hazards, Oh My!'

Midoriya narrowed down their user to one of three classmates. He quickly grabbed his notebook, the new one he'd started after arriving home earlier that evening. There were few benefits to having his notebooks tampered with at Aldera, but one such benefit was the ability to remember information until he could safely write it down.

Each classmate had a page filled with information on their quirk, observations from the Quirk Apprehension test, and their potential as a villain. Midoriya found that he could come up with reasonable villainous scenarios for every member of his class. Well, except one.

Nezu still refused to tell Midoriya why his reason for enrollment had been left blank. Midoriya wasn't a villain.

Midoriya refocused on the chat room as more unknown numbers began chiming in.

User XX19 is typing…

Several users are typing…

User XX19: Hiya!

User XXX5: Sweet chatroom

User XXX2: ikr isn't this awesome??!!!

Several other users began typing as well, though Midoriya focused on the first three to speak. There were undoubtedly a few hints in their manners of speech, but for the moment, Midoriya focused on getting ready for bed.

He'd already spent several hours trolling hero forums. If he wanted to be mentally present in class tomorrow, instead of just a husk of a body sitting at a desk, then he needed his sleep.

More people were introducing themselves in the chat. Not everybody was responding Midoriya noted.

He resisted the temptation to start analyzing, his fingers twitching over his pen. Realistically, he would need more than a few introductory remarks to pinpoint any identities. Midoriya made a mental note to pay attention to his classmates' speech patterns starting tomorrow.

Midoriya climbed under his covers as more messages flooded his watch. He used the notes app on his phone to jot down the names of those who were responding. It wasn't much, but he doubted that most of the class would be up this late, especially after their hectic first day of high school. Kacchan certainly wouldn't be— he always went to sleep at nine on the dot.

User XX12: hey hey what's this?

User XX12: i've read about these special invite-only servers

User XXX2: yuck

Well, that one wasn't a surprise, Midoriya reflected. He jotted down a note on his phone. Fitting that the first person he had (mostly) confirmed as a villain would be the class pervert.

Midoriya remembered the feature from the coding he'd examined earlier, then quickly added Pervert to User XXX12's name.

User XX19: I'm going to go to bed now

User XX19: We can all chat in the morning

User XX19: But make sure not to mention it in front of the ~hero~ students!!

User XXX2: gnight!

The chat died down. Midoriya logged off, not bothering to reveal himself on the server just yet. There would be more opportunities to investigate the server tomorrow… or later, looking at the clock. He needed to be up for school in seven hours.

Midoriya plugged his phone onto the charger and then put his watch beside it. Despite the racing thoughts in his head, and the unexpected turns of the day, the moment his head hit his pillow, Midoriya was out like a light.

Midoriya woke up the next morning bright and early. His mother was out in the kitchen just beginning to make breakfast. He could smell the scent of something delicious cooking, but his brain was too sleep addled to properly name the smell.

It took him about five minutes to take care of his business in the bathroom.

He'd cut a whole ten minutes out of his morning routine years ago when he'd given up on ever taming his wild mass of hair. Broccoli hair seemed to be his ordained fate and so he let his mother fuss over him every morning instead of wasting valuable sleep, analysis, and preparation time.

"Morning, mom."

Inko finished making her coffee at the machine and greeted him. "Good morning, Izuku. How'd you sleep?"

"Like a baby," he lied. He'd tossed and turned all night, wondering about his conversation with the principal. About why the principal had been so excited to meet him, quirkless little Deku.

"I'd imagine, especially after such an exciting day yesterday. Have you made any friends yet?" Inko always wished that he had more friends, even when he had only told her the bare bones of what he experienced at school. He didn't want her to worry about him. He could handle everything the Aldera school system threw at him.

He smiled, thanking her for the plate of eggs she set down in front of him. "I've made a few. We have a group chat set up," by the principal, "and everything."

"Oh that's great!" She came up behind him and squeezed his cheeks before pulling him into a tight hug. "My little hero is all grown up."

Midoriya's smile lost a bit of its light. Right, her 'hero'…

Their first class of the day after homeroom with Aizawa-sensei was English. Midoriya flinched when a familiar loud voice called out for them to make some noise. Present Mic slid into the room with his signature finger guns and radio-ready smile.

"Can I get a 'Yeaaaahhhh'?!?!"

Midoriya wished he could say he was surprised by the awkward silence. But then again, he also remembered the hero's introduction at the entrance exam.

Present Mic laughed it off though, waving one of his hands at the students while he flopped into his chair. "You'll be responding to me soon enough." Somehow, he made it sound not like a threat.

It definitely was.

He then explained that he was aware of the class's program and that an unknown number of students in the class were in the Young Villain and Criminal Reformation Program.

"I don't know which one of you listeners are in the program though, and even if I did, you have my word that I'd treat you all the same no matter what. 'Kay?" Present Mic handed out their syllabuses and class proceeded as normal.

He asked them to complete a diagnostic assessment to figure out their level of English comprehension. They were given a ten minute period to talk to one another and work on their other homework from Aizawa, who had assigned a short essay that morning about ethics and morality.

Once he finished grading, he kept their tests up front and started teaching the first lesson of the course.

Midoriya realized fairly quickly that his own self-study throughout his copious free-time at Aldera meant that he could understand nearly every word the hero said with ease. He skimmed the syllabus to find that he had covered most of the topics already too.

"Oh, that's all the time we have for today, listeners. No homework for tonight, so study extra hard for next week. Ya dig?" The students nodded, already packing their supplies back into their bags.

"Midoriya, can I talk to you for a moment?" Mic called.

Midoriya ignored the eyes on his back as he walked up to the front of the classroom. Each step lead towards the gallows, though he did his best to steady his racing heart.

He approached the desk from the side and spoke quietly. "Yes, Mic-sensei?"

"Hey, hey, relax, little listener. I can see you overthinking from here," the hero said. "It's nothing bad. I promise."

"O-okay," Midoriya replied. His brows furrowed when he noticed the hero's smirk.

"You sure know a lot of English. Did you understand everything I just said?" he asked.

Midoriya blinked. Had Present Mic been speaking in English? How long had he been doing so? Would he be mad at Midoriya for being too far ahead of the rest of the class? It would be incredibly inconvenient to have a student so far ahead. What if he thought he was cheating?

"You're mumbling, little listener." Midoriya's cheeks flushed crimson.

"Sorry."

"No worries! That's actually what I wanted to talk to you about. You did incredible on the written part of the exam. I wanted to see if your oral skills were the same. Who taught you so well?"

Midoriya rubbed the back of his neck. "I-uh, I taught myself outside of class. My father works in America."

He didn't mention that he hadn't talked to the man in over a decade and that his mother treated him as if he were dead. To this day, Midoriya hadn't actually gathered the courage to ask whether or not he truly was dead or just a deadbeat.

It didn't matter in the grand scheme of things. The two Midoriyas got by just fine on their own.

"Wow! That's great. Since you already know the course material though, I don't want you to be bored. In the past, Nezu let students who were already fluent either enroll in another elective or act as a teacher's assistant. I'd love to have you help around! It would still count as English and I'd occasionally give you some more advanced assignments. But it would essentially be an extra study hall!"

Midoriya smiled hesitantly. He glanced over his shoulder at the rest of the class, most of whom had returned to their own work. A peppermint haired boy returned his stare, but didn't react otherwise. Midoriya wondered if he understood them.

"I'd love to, Present Mic-sensei! Thank you for this opportunity." He bowed. "It will be very helpful in completing my extra assignments from Nezu-sensei."

The voice hero's smile faltered. "Nezu…sensei?"

Midoriya nodded. "Yes. He gave me a few assignments to work on yesterday to test my knowledge of coding and analysis. It was very fun!"

"I can imagine," the blonde smiled. It didn't reach his eyes. And, for some reason, looked vaguely… haunted? "Well then, I'll take care of the paperwork with Nezu and get everything set up!"

Present Mic practically ran from the room afterwards, shouting at them that their next teacher would be in shortly. Midoriya returned to his seat and started picking away at the Ethic's essay.

The rest of the day passed in a similar fashion. Ectoplasm-sensei taught their next class: Mathematics. Not exactly Midoriya's strong suit, but he once again realized that he already knew a fair amount of the course material.

Ectoplasm seemed surprised by his confident response when he called on him. Afterwards, he let Midoriya fade into the background once more.

Afterwards, they had lunch break before they had hero lessons. Every other day, their morning classes would switch to Literature with Cementoss and Art History with Midnight. Mineta and Kaminari in particular seemed excited for the next day after that realization.

Once they finished their lunches came the lesson everybody had been anticipating. Their first practical hero lessons. No teacher had been listed on their class schedules, which made everybody drum their fingers in anticipation.

There had been mad speculation at lunch about which hero would teach them. Some thought that UA might have had one of their alumni come in to teach them, like Best Jeanist or maybe another top ten hero.

Nobody, not even Midoriya, could've expected who walked in the door.

"I am… coming through the door like a normal person!" A large, blonde figure exclaimed as they did just that.

Midoriya's jaw dropped to the floor. The other students reacted similarly.

"It's All Might!"

"All Might is gonna teach us!!"

"T-that's his silver age costume," Midoriya mumbled, already aching for his notebook. He remembered the video he begged his mother to replay over and over again. He remembered seeing the man when he saved Bakugo from the slime monster.

He remembered him crushing his dreams on top of a rooftop.

Not that Midoriya held it against the man. He was just a weak, quirkless Deku. People who had stronger quirks were better in the eyes of society. Midoriya should have never been able to get into UA's hero course under normal circumstances.

It was still incredible to realize that he was being taught by his childhood icon. Even if there was only one page Midoriya had ripped out of his notebook to put in the Box. Even if…

"Hero Basic Training!" the hero called out, much to delight of nineteen students.

"This is the class that'll put you through special training to mold you into heroes! There's no time to dally. Today's activity is… battle training! And for that, you'll need these!"

The wall at the back of the classroom slid open to reveal several racks filled with labelled briefcases. All Might was saying something about quirk registries and special request forms, but Midoriya had other things on his mind— namely the design he'd been required to fill out with his provisional acceptance forms.

"Costumes! Yeah!"

All Might clapped his hands to draw their attention as most of the class rushed toward their cases. "After you change, come out in number order to Ground Beta."

"Looking good is very important. Look alive now, because you may not be heroes just yet, but you're on your way to becoming somebody. Whether that somebody is great or terrible is up to you." His smile gleamed. "UA can only teach you what you're willing to learn."

Midoriya thought about All Might's speech as he rushed toward the locker rooms. Most of the class arrived before him, though Midoriya didn't mind. It would make changing a bit less awkward.

He unpacked his costume, which consisted of a dark grey-green hoodie and a pair of matching cargo pants. With his costume, he'd specifically asked for a small utility belt, durable shin guards, combat boots with red laces, and best of all… his mask.

Midoriya slipped on the half face mask, covering the bridge of his nose down to his neck. The mask almost looked like a muzzle except that the front panel had no straps; instead, it was covered with an array of LED lights.

He found the switch exactly where he asked for it to be and he picked up the small note from inside the case.

It was from one of the older support course students who'd created the costume, basically explaining the functions, the durability, and some slight modifications they'd made to his specifications. Plus a question about if he'd gotten help with his specs because they were basically flawless for a hero course student. Nope, just a decade long obsession with everything and anything 'hero'.

After reading the note, he checked the arm guard on his right arm and noticed that the student had been able to make his last minute costume addition work. He had only thought of the days before the exam and couldn't manage to make the specs work. That's what the support course was for.

The small computer would allow him to access police databases, connect to external devices, and perform a variety of other functions in case he were in need. There was also a note about how Power Loader was working on a software patch for some minor bugs. It would be coming soon.

Midoriya joined his classmates outside. Some of them gave him weird looks at the dark, muted colors of his outfit. Most of the others had vibrant colors and suit design elements that looked extremely impractical.

Did Kacchan have giant grenades on both his wrists? Who approved that? And what about Uraraka and Yaoyorozu? The heels and the revealing outfit were both highly impractical for a combat situation. Or a rescue situation, in Uraraka's case.

"Let's begin!" All Might exclaimed as the last students trickled into the gymnasium.

"Today, we'll be covering Indoor Anti-Personnel Battle Training! Villains are most commonly seen outdoors, but are most likely to appear indoors. You'll now be split into villain teams and hero teams and face-off in two-on-two indoor battles!"

Midoriya jolted. Shouldn't they have some form of training first? A safety training or something to not damage the structure of the building.

There was an immediate uproar of questions asking about the terms of winning (Yaoyorozu), threats of expulsion (Uraraka), dividing up teams (Iida), and about a fabulous cape? (Aoyama, a literal knight in shining armour).

All Might tried his best to calm them down and began randomly drawing their team assignments. Midoriya breathed a sigh of relief when he was that his partner was Uraraka, who flashed him a brilliant smile across the crowd.

And then he immediately lost a year off his life when he saw the two team assignments in All Might's hand.

"The heroes will be Team A and the villains will be Team B!"

Fuck.

Uraraka made her way toward Midoriya as some of their classmates backed away. He could hear mumbling about how it wasn't fair to put the weakest kid in the class against the strongest rage machine. Some said that it was a shame that Uraraka had such a low chance of winning against Bakugo without a good teammate.

Midoriya let the words flow off his skin. It didn't matter what they thought. He could beat Kacchan if he thought this through and made a plan.

Uraraka popped up next to him with her usual bubbly cheer. "Oh, this is going to be so exciting! All Might handed me the blueprints so we have five minutes to look them over. Explosion boy and you were best friends, right Deku? Do you have any secret best friend insights."

"Er…" Midoriya rubbed the back of his neck. "We… we're not really best friends anymore. B-but I think I might have some ideas about what he'll do. He's going to come after me first, no doubt."

Uraraka nodded, allowing Midoriya to keep talking. He blinked when he realized that she was actually waiting for him to speak and not just cutting him off once she realized how annoying he was.

They spent the remaining minutes coming up with a brief game plan. Uraraka would float him to the second floor window while she entered through the first floor. From there, Midoriya would make his own way to the higher floors in order to search from the top down.

Midoriya fidgeted with his wrist computer. Something wasn't right with the exercise code. There were so many extra pathways…

"That way, we can cover more ground quicker. Iida is smart and he'll want the most maneuverability with his quirk. That means they're probably on the third or fifth floors with the large common areas seen here." He pointed at the map.

"Got it, Deku! Let's kick some butt!"

All Might called for the end of prep time and the timer began ticking. Midoriya synced his wrist computer with the countdown timer. He didn't know if All Might would announce warnings about the encroaching limit or not. Better to be safe than sorry.

Uraraka held out her right hand in the air and it took an embarrassingly long second for Midoriya to realize she wanted a high-five. He felt a tingle as their fingers connected and gravity lost its hold on him.

Midoriya grabbed onto the side ledges of the building to begin pulling himself up. He didn't have to worry about releasing her quirk, since the earpieces made it simple to communicate.

Without having to worry about pesky things like gravity, Midoriya made it to the top of the building in under half a minute. He alighted on a sixth story ledge before tapping his earpiece twice. Gravity took hold once more as Uraraka released her quirk's hold. Midoriya scrambled to jimmy open the window and slip through.

He stepped out into a long, grey hallway. There were an array of doors on each side without doorframes, which would make it easier to quickly search the rooms. Midoriya started creeping down the hallway listening for any sounds the others would make. Kacchan had the quirk and personality of a bomb which meant that unless he suddenly developed some alternate personality, Midoriya would be able to hear him coming from a mile away.

None of the rooms on the sixth floor had signs of life (or the bomb). Midoriya whispered the message to Uraraka, who confirmed it was the same on her end. One third of the building eliminated. Four floors to go.

Midoriya paused when he heard a creaking sound from the floor below him.

He ducked into an empty room, looking up into the ceiling corner and finding what he was looking for. This was his backup plan, one he hadn't told Uraraka about since he'd focused on their main plan. But with Kacchan and Iida as unknown variables, Midoriya decided to take the few minutes to establish a direct connection with the system.

Power Loader and the Support Course student who'd designed his wrist computed had been very thoughtful. Extra cords for external connections were tucked away in the safety of his utility belt. He selected the right cord and tapped away at his wrist computer.

Nezu mustn't have coded this exercise, because Midoriya actually stood a chance at getting past the firewalls and into the main controls. Hopefully All Might wouldn't stop the exercise when the system was yanked out of his control. It's okay though because Midoriya only needed to borrow his eyes and ears for a second, to locate Kaachan.

It was only the matter of a few seconds before his wrist computer beeped and allowed Midoriya access. If he'd known it would be this easy, he would've done this way sooner.

Midoriya quickly skimmed the camera feeds to look for the villain team. So far there was nothing except… there, on the fifth floor. Right below him actually.

Iida stood there in front of the large, paper-mache bomb. He had cleared out the entire room to prevent Uraraka from using her quirk. Midoriya had to admit that it was clever. It wasn't something he would've expected from Iida.

Legacy heroics had to be good for something, he guessed. Ingenium had to pay particularly good attention to his environment in order to manuever with his quirk. So it should've been no surprise that Iida would've learned environmental awareness from his older brother.

Midoriya couldn't see part of the room with the current camera angle though. It was when he went to adjust the camera angle settings when he noticed something interesting.

"Oh."

User XX19: So did anybody expect to have freaking ALL MIGHT as our PE teacher

User XX19: Or am I just the only one shitting bricks????

User XXX7: just you

User XXX5: Only you lol

User XX19: :'(

User XX20: I believe we should resume the conversation from last night, about the purpose of this chat room

User XXX1: Excellent idea!!!

User XX20: Right. Considering that the principal didn't put our names down, I would presume that he would like us to decide for ourselves whether or not to reveal our identities.

User XX20: I personally am against revealing ourselves to one another.

User XXX2: :( why not?

User XXX7: because then we have a security risk. If one of us gets caught and everybody we hang out with is a villain, then we're all goners

User XXX2: … I guess

User XXX2: though that might be a problem whoops

User XXX3: Oh?

User XXX2: so somebody in the class already knows that I'm a villain

User XXX2: he went to the same middle school

User XXX2: I already talked to him after class though and he said he won't say anything

User XXX7: guess you got lucky

User XX20: Yes. There's no use dwelling on the past. We can only hope they say nothing about your identity

User XXX1: I do not mean to be rude, but are we sure that we are meant to be working as a team?

User XXX1: We are villains, are we not?

Ah, finally. Something Midoriya could talk about without having to deconstruct the entire, rapidly evolving, social situation.

User XX11: Actually, I believe that was the Principal's intention. Why else would he have given us a way to communicate in private? He most likely wanted us to connect because that would give us a better chance at graduating.

User XX11: Although I do believe 20 is right about Nezu allowing us to choose what we share

User XXX6: I also agree with 20! And 11's reasoning about seems logical. We are here to become productive members of society.

User XXX5: Productive, smuctive.

User XXX5: I'm here for the chaos~

User XX19: Lmao mood

User XX20: I think we should put it to a vote, whether or not we should reveal our identities

User XX20: If there is anybody in the chat who feels that we should reveal our identities to one another and would like to explain their reasoning to us, I belive it would be helpful to see both sides of the view

User XXX2: we can all hang out with one another outside of school!

User XXX1: And we can share tips and gossip from the class

User XX12: we can send each other personal pictures

User XXX2: can we kick him from the gc already?

User XXX3: Unfortunately, Nezu removed that option. For better or worse, we're all trapped here

User XXX7: for worse

User XX19: definitely for worse

User XX20: Any other pros for revealing ourselves to one another?

User XX12 (Pervert) is typing….

User XX12 (Pervert) has been muted for two minutes

User XX11: Can't ban him, but I figured out how to mute him

User XXX2: Praise be to our humble groupchat overlord

User XX19: (ﾉヮ)ﾉ:

User XX20: 11, Can you make a poll so we can make our decision?

Midoriya quickly scrolled through the settings and turned on the polling option.

User XX11 has created a new poll "Should we reveal our identities?" with two options: or

User XXX6: Everybody please vote!

Poll "Should we reveal our identities?" has closed with 10 votes. Results displayed below.

: 3

: 7

User XXX2 : darn I wanted to meet you all

User XX11 : I mean you technically have? You just haven't recognized us yet…

User XXX2 : our overlord is right I guess… o(T ヘ To)

User XX20: So we have agreed not to reveal our names to one another. I think we should extend that to any revealing information within the group chat.

User XX19: Does that include what we did to be here? Bec I reallllyyy wanna know what everybody else did to end up in the program

User XX20: I suppose that is alright as long as everybody is comfortable with it

User XXX2: ooh ooh I'll go first

User XXX2: I had a quirk accident

User XXX2: which is why my old classmate knew I had to be a villain :(

User XXX7: you're not a villain just bc of a quirk accident don't listen to what they say

User XXX2: 3

User XXX1: I have a similar story! I too had several unfortunate accidents, so my acceptance was labelled provisional. But I will become a hero soon enough!

User XXX5 That'd suck. But you will be great heroes I know it!

User XXX5: I'm here because I got caught and it's either here of juvie

User XXX5: I always did want to be a hero though so I'll take it

User XXX7: same. except they never actually caught me

User XXX2: then why are you here???

User XXX7: suspected, but never actually proven

User XXX7: I'm here as a precaution apparently, which is bs

User XXX3: I was falsely accused by my former peers in middle school. I am glad that Principal Nezu created this program because I can prove that I am not the person they said I was

User XX20: I am sorry to hear that, 3. I hope you can appeal to the principal and see if he will reinvestigate the incident.

User XX11: That's terrible, 3.

User XXX3: Thanks everybody

User XXX2: so does anybody else wanna share with the class???

Midoriya held his breath. There were no messages for over half a minute before he slowly started to relax. He himself didn't even know why he was here, much less how to even begin explaining that to his fellow classmates.

User XXX6: I will pass at this opportunity. I do not feel comfortable sharing my past misdeeds.

User XX20: I as well. I do not mean to be rude, but I am embarrassed.

User XXX2: awww it's ok don't worry

Midoriya almost responded. But nobody called him out on his sudden silence and so he let the moment slip past. He quickly scrolled up in the chat though and screenshotted the previous conversation. Then, he began relabelling the contacts in his phone based on their reasons for enrollment.

User XXX6 has become Unknown 1

User XX20 has become Unknown 2 (Leader?)

User XXX3 has become Framed

User XX19 has become Unknown 3

User XXX5 has become Criminal 1 (Caught)

User XXX7 has become Criminal 2 (Alleged)

User XXX1 has become Protection 1

User XXX2 has become Protection 2 (Known)

User XX12 (Pervert) has become The Pervert (Grape)

He hesitated when he came to the last default name. What should he name himself? Just 'me'? Or 'Midoriya'? 'Unknown 4'?

Unknown 3: I'm ashamed of mine too. Not because of what I did but because of how my parents reacted

Unknown 3: I tried to keep them out of it as much as possible but they found out from the police

Unknown 3 has become Criminal 3 (Caught)

Criminal 3 (Caught): I still can't believe freaking All Might is teaching us

Criminal 3 (Caught): My villainous heart be still

Criminal 1 (Caught): I still can't believe that the quirkless kid managed to hack the building and destroy explodo-bitch and zoom-zoom with just a computer

Protection 2 (Known): are we sure that wasn't just his quirk?

Protection 2 (Known): maybe bakugo was just lying or he just didn't know

Criminal 2 (Alleged): be careful about judging people. sometimes the strongest ones are the ones who look the weakest…

Protection 2 (Known): ominous

Unknown 2 (Leader?): It does not matter if Midoriya does have a quirk or not. What matters is that he is our classmate and we should treat him with respect.

Midoriya blushed. Unknown 2 was being very supportive, especially considering the general atmosphere of the class. It was refreshing.

Protection 2 (Known): I like it though...nobody knows his quirk or if he's actually quirkless. he's a wildcard!!!

Protection 1: ooh mysterious~

Framed: Does anybody have the reading assignment from Mic-sensei earlier? My brother spilled juice on my notebook and I can't read my notes

Criminal 3 (Caught): I've got you. I can PM you my notes if you want?

Framed: I would greatly appreciate that.

Unknown 2 (Leader): We can organize a study group over the group chat. It doesn't matter if we survive the trials if we fail out of the class

Unknown 1: Yes, education is extremely important! We must make sure to study hard, no matter our backgrounds.

The group chat devolved from there, with most people starting their homework or doing other family obligations. Midoriya scrolled back through the chat, taking notes on any speech patterns or information that may have been revealed. His eyes were drawn to one of the last messages by Protection 2, the one with the dangerous quirk and the hero classmate who knew.

They had been talking about him, which was extremely awkward, though they probably thought a quirkless weakling like him had no business being a villain. But Protection 2 had said that made him mysterious. A wildcard.

Midoriya made his decision.

User XX11 has become Wildcard

He smiled. Finally, he fit in with all the other villains.

CLASS 1-A HERO AND VILLAIN ANALYSIS FOR THE FUTURE

ENTRY NO. 2 MINETA MINORU

Quirk: Pop Off (*no notes because I don't wanna talk about this any longer than necessary, bleugh*)

Hero Name: Fresh-Picked Hero: Grape Juice

Student Number: 19

Height: 108 cm

Description: Short, Purple ball-shaped hair, puffy cheeks, large/round head

Fighting Ability: Weak, needs improvement. Small and nimble, but doesn't put it to good use. Little hand, if any, hand to hand experience

Weaknesses: Women, human decency, Acid could nullify quirk bond? (needs further testing), Close combat, Large opponents, Easily scared

Speculative Assignment: Villain

Reasoning: Perversion. Seriously, why hasn't he been reported for sexual harassment in the past? I think he must have some connections in high places to keep a clean record. But he might not be a villain; just a pervert. Which is as good as one. But if Endeavour, then I suppose perverts can too…

Notes: Based on his attitude, backpack, and stationary supplies, it wouldn't be too far of an assumption to assume that he comes from a wealthy or influential family. I found a few moderately suitable candidates for his family, but none of them have a child. Which is suspicious in itself. Maybe they're not wealthy but just act like it?

Back on track. I think he could've beaten the entrance exam robots with some creativity and the right motivation. His balls (ughhh) would've clogged up the robot's cannons, or he could've stuck the robots together/to the environment. He keeps mentioning the reason he wants to be a hero is for the girls, so I would imagine seeing the UA hero course girls would be sufficient enough information. Or maybe one of his family's contacts told him about the entrance exam so he could be prepared? Or he bought his way in

EDIT: Most of this was written before the creation of the group chat. I'm about 75% sure that he's User XX12 or The Pervert (Grape). Which just corroborates my theory that he's in here for sexual harassment of some kind. I'll need to see if he brings it up to the level of assault. But if he does… then it's grape stomping time.

Notes:

AO3 crashed and lost my first end note (and my chapter edits, oof), which is tragic bec I had a whole thing about how much you all literally made my week.

I'm working on the third chapter as part of Nanowrimo this month and it'll be out on Dec. 11. I'm going to prioritize this fic going into the new year, but between finals, grad school apps, and starting my thesis, I might be swamped with work. I'd rather give you all a quality chapter instead of a rushed one. You deserve the best!

Anyway, I need to stop rambling. Seriously, you all are the best and I hope you stick around because next ch is going to be... interesting. Follow me on tumblr at aweebitrustyeh (only fic related, I won't spam your dash, promise!). And let me know in the comments down below if there's any horrible mistakes in this chapter bec I edited in lab earlier and I'm sure I missed something...

-Rusty

Chapter 3: Representation

Notes:

Surprise update time! I'm moving this fic up in the schedule to be on the first day of the month, and I'm hoping to get another update in at the end of the month, so be on the lookout!

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

Chapter Text

"Ah! Midoriya-kun, please come in!" Nezu called.

Midoriya, still several meters away from the door, not even close to knocking, continued nonplussed as the principal welcomed him into the office. Classes had ended about half an hour ago, but between Recovery Girl's checkup and Present Mic tracking him down to hand him a paper, his departure had been delayed.

"Hello, Nezu-sensei," Midoriya greeted as he stepped into the familiar office. His lessons were scheduled for every other day, to reduce the impact on his academic workload.

"Hello," the principal returned. "How has your day been? Do anything interesting?"

Midoriya blushed. He knew the incident in question the principal was referring to. "N-not much, sensei. We had our first day of Hero Basic Training today."

Nezu smiled. "Ah, and how was our new teacher?"

"He was awesome!" Midoriya said. His smile didn't quite reach his eyes. "I can't believe we get to be taught by the number one hero."

"I've heard that you two have a bit of history," Nezu said as he pushed a cup of tea across his desk. Midoriya, who had been lingering by the doorway, took the invitation to sit.

He clasped the teacup in one hand and slowly sipped the steaming liquid. Despite the steam rising from its surface, it was the perfect temperature for consumption. And the taste…

"Where did you get this tea from?" Midoriya questioned before he could himself. He immediately backtracked. "I mean, I mean you don't have to tell me. Not if you don't want to. Sorry!"

"There's no need to apologize, Midoriya-kun! I make my own blend of tea." Nezu smiled kindly. There were a bit too many teeth, but it was the thought that counted.

"Oh," Midoriya said, unable to help his disappointment. He'd wanted to buy some for his mother. She would love this taste.

Nezu clicked a pen sitting on his desk closed before setting it to the side. "I'll trade you knowledge for tea. I wouldn't be a teacher if I didn't encourage my students."

"Uh, okay?"

"Excellent. Now, let's learn about the art of bartering. You want tea, and I want information about your earlier match against Iida and Bakugo."

Midoriya took a deep breath. "Hmm. Okay, what do you want to know specifically? I can't assign a value to the information unless I know what you're looking for."

"Very good, Midoriya-kun! I want to know about your strategy. During your planning period, your plan differed from the plan you eventually executed that resulted in your victory. I want to know the steps to get there."

Midoriya's mouth moved on its own. "Oh! You want to know how I hacked the robots and building defenses!"

"Precisely." The principal's tail swished in his seat. "Though perhaps do not give away that information so readily in future negotiations. Your information is your greatest asset!"

Midoriya sagged. "Oh, sorry Nezu-sensei. I'll do better in the future."

"Of course you will, Midoriya-kun. The best heroes learn from their mistakes and never stop changing for the better."

Midoriya nodded. "I understand. I'd like to add a term to my negotiation." He reached into his backpack, removing the paper Present Mic had handed him. "Mic-sensei asked if I would be his teacher's assistant in English and I need your permission."

Nezu's grin widened. His tail thumped on the arm of the chair before he reigned himself in. Midoriya blinked at the sudden… excitement.

"Very well! Now, let's continue on with our discussion…."

Coming to school the next day was a chore. There were swarms of reporters and media personnel camped outside the front entrance to the school. Even from down the street, Midoriya could see that they were harassing the students trying to enter.

Midoriya took one look at the entrance and at the flashing cameras and decided that he'd rather not.

There was a parking lot on the side of campus where teachers and authorized visitors could park. Midoriya walked down the street, away from the mob, and prayed that he wouldn't be late. As long as he could do what he thought he could, then it should all work out.

Midoriya made it to the parking lot, which was discreet and across the street from the high school proper. It had no parking signs that were reserved for a small restaurant down the street, but Midoriya knew that it was just a cover to avoid suspicion near their staff entrance.

He continued past the parking lot and into the restaurant itself, which had no patrons this early in the morning. There was a man with thin-rim glasses and a face mask covering the lower part of his face who stood behind the counter in a chef's apron.

It was a good disguise, Midoriya would admit, but not much escaped from his hero fanboy gaze. He couldn't wait to add this to his notebook once he made it to class.

"Um. H-hi, Ectoplasm-sensei," Midoriya rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly. "Could I use the staff entrance to the school? There's kind of a lot of people out front and I don't want to deal with them because I don't like loud noises—"

Ectoplasm gave him an indecipherable look. "How did you know this was here?"

"O-oh. R-ri-right. I, um, the teachers never enter through the front gate so there must be some sort of secretive entrance and I noticed that this restaurant was one of the only ones in the area that had a decent amount of parking for UA staff. So I thought about what Nezu-sensei would do and I found this place!

"N-now could I use the entrance, please? I really don't want to be late to Eraserhead-sensei's class."

Ectoplasm silently pointed at the door to the kitchen area and Midoriya thanked him as he quickly slipped by. He ended up finding the door labelled 'staff only' which opened to a long, dark tunnel. It almost looked like a sewer, but it didn't smell half as bad.

Midoriya walked for several minutes, passing under the vibrations of cars driving on the street above. He finally made it to a thick steel door with a number-pad on the front.

There wasn't enough time to even attempt hack it, Midoriya sighed.

Before he could panic too badly about being late on the third day of school, the door clicked open and the number pad flashed green. Midoriya decided not to look a gift horse in the mouth and continued toward the school.

There was a set of steep stairs in front of one last door. Midoriya, well aware that he had less than a minute to make it to class, pushed open the door and stepped out into the room.

Immediately, there were several sets of eyes on him, including a familiar lime green pair. Present Mic looked startled by his appearance in their staff lounge but he just smiled and waved. Midnight, meanwhile, had her jaw practically touching the desk as she stared at Midoriya. There was also a man in a red jumpsuit and yellow visor, who must have been Vlad King. He looked as if he was going to ask Midoriya questions that the boy had absolutely no time to answer right now.

"Hi senseis! Sorry to intrude! I need to get to homeroom, thank you, bye!" he called as he beelined toward the door. Nobody stopped him once he finally got into the hallway and booked it across the building at a dead sprint.

Midoriya yanked the door to Class 1-A open with a surprising amount of force, enough to startle even himself as he flopped into the room right when the bell rang.

Eraserhead sat up from behind the desk like a zombie, immediately glaring at the door. "Get in your seat, Midoriya."

Midoriya squeaked, but headed toward his seat. Kacchan glared at him as he passed.

Eraserhead called out attendance while Midoriya unpacked his notebooks and pencils for the day. As usual, the hero started off their homeroom with announcements… however, this time—

"Sorry for the sudden announcement… but today, you'll pick a class president."

Huh, that's such a normal school thing, Midoriya thought. I almost forgot that UA isn't just an academy but a high school too.

Immediately, there was a chorus of hands and shouting around the room. People were clamoring for attention as they reasoned why they should be class president.

Midoriya shrunk in his seat.

Iida, one of the many voices vying for attention, shouted, "Leading the many is a task of heavy responsibility! If this is to be a democracy, then I propose our leader be chosen by election!"

People immediately protested, saying that they all barely knew each other and how could they vote for somebody if they didn't even know they were a villain. When they addressed Aizawa-sensei, he just shrugged and shimmied into his weird yellow caterpillar bag.

Ashido, the pink-skinned girl, said that they should all introduce themselves and say why they should be representative. The class formed their desks up into a giant circle and Iida raised his hand in his choppy robot fashion once more.

"I will start the introductions! I am Iida Tenya and my quirk is Engine. I promise as classroom representative to promote our interests in furthering our education and—"

"Shut it, four eyes! Nobody wants to hear you talk about the shitty school for hours!" Kacchan growled. An explosion appeared in the palm of his hand, but it was quickly erased by a glaring Eraserhead. The boy scoffed and Midoriya winced at the anger he could feel radiating off his childhood friend.

Next up was Yaoyorozu, who promised to be a fair and just leader if she were elected. She would organize study sessions for the subjects people were struggling in and she would be an ambassador between them and the teachers.

"Yaoyorozu like the wealthy support company family?" Kaminari asked.

Midoriya winced at the sheepish look that passed over Yaoyorozu's face. "Yes, that is my family name."

"Oh wow, cool. You're like super rich!" Kaminari said, sticking his foot even further into his mouth.

Yaoyorozu quickly finished her introduction and sat down. Midoriya could hear some whispers across the circle about how much money she must have and apparently they could even buy their way into UA.

The girl with the headphone ears, Jirou, scoffed. She rolled her eyes when Midoriya looked her way and she looked startled to realize that his attention was on her.

Todoroki went next. He just said his name, his quirk, and then said not to vote for him.

Satou, Uraraka, and Hagakure all made their cases, promising that they would be really good at the job and that they would go plus ultra!

It was only during Shoji's turn that somebody finally asked the unspoken question. Unsurprisingly, it was a certain grape haired pervert.

"Well obviously he's a villain. Why would we vote him as our representative? There's no way girls are going to come near us with somebody like him around."

Immediately, the atmosphere in the room turned sour. "Hey! Don't you talk to him like that!" Uraraka cried.

"That's not right, kero," Asui croaked.

"Yeah! Don't just judge somebody like that based on their physical appearance, you stupid pervert!"

There was a shifting behind Eraserhead's desk. Midoriya looked over to see the hero wide awake and staring right back at the green-haired boy. None of the other students seemed to notice that their teacher was awake as they continued yelling at Mineta.

Eventually, Shoji got his turn and everybody around the circle introduce themselves. Midoriya flubbed his introduction, stuttering over his name and nearly choking up when he said he was quirkless.

At the pitying looks, Midoriya rushed through the rest of his introduction. He didn't even try to promote himself as a candidate; there was no way he would win.

He was proven right when the votes were cast and tallied up. Yaoyorozu had won with five votes while Iida got second place with three votes. They decided to be president and vice president respectively, which Midoriya could be happy with. He had voted for Yaoyorozu.

They settled into their roles well, beginning delegation as the homeroom period ended and the rest of the day began. Today's classes were Literature with Cementoss

First period with Midnight-sensei was… interesting. Midoriya didn't think there were supposed to be quite that many inappropriate images in an introductory high school class.

It took him some time to notice, but Midoriya realized that Midnight-sensei kept looking in his direction— specifically, at him. He had made quite the impression earlier and he knew there were rumors circulating around his supposed quirklessness.

She never called on him to answer a question, but that was fine. Midoriya usually got the answers correct when he answered them in his head. Her focus on Modern Hero Art overlapped with his general lifelong hero obsession. There were a lot of components that made up modern hero society and provided the pillar for which All Might stood.

Though he may not for much longer.

After Modern Hero Art was Literature with Cementoss, who immediately assigned them their reading for the semester, to the chagrin of much of the class. Midoriya recognized some of the names and had even read a few books, mostly the hero biographies or quirk related classics. Even one of the prequirk classics, from when he'd decided to be a hero in spite his quirklessness.

Literature was mostly covering the syllabus and Cementoss talking about the importance of literature in their society. Midoriya listened as he took notes, occasionally jotting down a piece of information in his class analysis notebook.

By the time it was lunch, Midoriya had finished creating his plan to knock out the all of Cementoss' reading over the first month of the term and he already had plans to start working on his term project for Modern Hero Art. The rough plans for his composition should be easy to start over lunch today.

He was about to go outside with his lunch tray when a hand tapped him on the shoulder. Midoriya turned around, having unpleasant memories of Aldera, when noticed Yaoyorozu standing behind him with a shy smile.

"Midoriya, I was wondering if you'd like to come eat lunch with Uraraka, Iida, Asui, and I. We really want to get to know you better."

For a brief moment, he contemplated saying no and just going to sit outside alone. It was a nice day after all.

But his desire to experience one normal thing about school, even in the constant abnormality of UA, won out in the end and Midoriya followed her back to their table.

Uraraka greeted him as he sat down. "Midoriya! I'm so glad Momo found you. I've been wanting to talk to you all day even though we had class. We totally kicked butt yesterday!"

Iida nodded. "Yes, you two did. I admit that I was too caught up in my villainous ruse to be prepared for your onslaught of weaponry. You adapted well to the situation regardless of your handicap just like a true hero— which is undoubtedly why you are in our class!"

Midoriya chuckled weakly.

"I have been wondering, Midoriya, how you were able to utilize the building's defenses in such a manner. I was under the impression that Nezu is one of the smartest beings out there and that he personally coded the school's security systems."

Uraraka nodded, chewing her food extremely enthusiastically. Lunch Rush's food was truly as amazing as people claimed. "Yeah. How did you do it?"

"Oh, uh." Midoriya rubbed the back of his neck. "I just connected to the system. The simulation exercises were actually coded by Power Loader or one of the support students, I couldn't tell, but I was able to exploit a weakness that basically allowed me to activate the building's defenses and place them in hostile enemy mode rather than defensive standby."

Midoriya realized that the other four students were staring at him. Asui in particular was staring at him like she was seeing him for the first time. Midoriya chuckled. "Uh, guys?"

Uraraka shook her head as if to clear it. "I think that's the most I've ever heard you speak, Mido. You're cute when you get excited!"

After a whole class with Midnight, Midoriya had to take a moment to parse the meaning of her comment. "Thanks?" he squeaked.

"Oh, Iida!" Uraraka pivoted her attention toward the boy in question. "The way you talk… are you a rich kid?"

Iida looked down at his tray. There was an indecipherable look in his eyes, nearly obscured by his glasses. "I don't like people to know, so I try to hide it. But my family is a hero family and I am the second son."

"Ingenium," Midoriya whispered under his breath. His hands were itching for a pen and paper. This was so going into Iida's file, which was pretty sparse at the moment. He had thought the quirk looked familiar but hadn't had time to check the registry yet…

Iida nodded. "Indeed. It's my admiration for my brother that's inspired me to become a hero!"

Uraraka gasped. "Oh, that's so noble! You're going to be a great hero, Iida. I know you can do it!"

Midoriya had just finally gotten the chance to take a bite of his meal when klaxons began blaring. He covered his ears as the noise in the cafeteria rose to a crescendo. Across the table, he could see Asui doing the same.

"What's going on?" Uraraka shouted over the sound of the alarms.

At the other tables around them, people were standing up and stampeding toward the exit. Iida blinked at the chaos before asking an upperclassmen what the alarms meant. He shouted that it meant somebody had infiltrated the building and they had to get out of there.

Midoriya took one glance at the chaos heading toward the door and realized that he would absolutely get injured if he stepped into that disaster zone.

Yaoyorozu looked torn between staying with Midoriya, and Asui, or following Iida and Uraraka into the crowd. She was saved from her indecision as Iida shot into the air.

He flung his arms around, trying to stabilize himself as he floated weightless above the student body. Midoriya could see him stare out the windows at something while Uraraka was dragged further away into the crowd. He hoped she was alright. The crowd seemed to be getting rougher by the second.

In a split second, there was fire spitting out of Iida's calves as he rocketed around in a circle. This immediately drew the attention of the crowd below, who finally stopped stampeding to listen to the blue-haired boy as he shouted.

"Everyone! Everything is fine! It's just the press! There's nothing to worry about, we're fine! This is U.A.! Behave in a way that is befitting of this great institution!" Iida cried.

The crowd finally settled down right as the Principal made an announcement over the intercom, telling the students to return to their lunch tables for the remainder of the lunch period.

Midoriya spent the rest of the period idly listening to the conversation and already making mental notes about the students surrounding him. He couldn't wait to get to class to write in his notebook. There was so much stuff to find out about his classmates…

The next day passed in a blur. Aizawa-sensei had informed them at the end of the previous day that they would be taking a field trip to another part of the campus— their parents had already signed the proper authorizations with their admission packet.

During his homeroom announcements, he mentioned that it would be a training focused on rescue heroics and that it would be proctored by him and two other teachers, including All Might. That got the excited whispers up and running again.

After lunch, the twenty hero students were directed to a bus which would ferry them the fifteen minutes to reach the new facility. It still amazed Midoriya how big UA truly was, especially considering its urban location.

Class 1-A stood around the bus in their hero costumes. Midoriya left his hood down and tucked his mask into his pocket while they waited for Iida to direct them.

"Line up according to your I.D. Numbers!" Iida called over the mass of students.

Yaoyorozu nodded. She greeted people as they stepped onto the bus, smiling at Midoriya when he gave her a shy wave.

Midoriya followed Uraraka. He sighed when he looked at the seat layout. "Uh oh," he muttered.

The students, having realized that this was a different type of bus, decided to sit in the closest seat rather than in any identifiable order. Iida protested and tried to find another method of organization, but Yaoyorozu put a hand on his shoulder and guided him to his seat as the last student stepped on.

Aizawa-sensei was missing his signature yellow sleeping bag, which made sense considering they were going to get very messy and physical that afternoon.

Asui sat on Midoriya's left. The general chatter of the bus filled the silence, but not for long before Asui turned to him

"I generally say what's on my mind, Midoriya."

Midoriya blinked. "Oh?"

Asui nodded. "Iida said yesterday that you took the entrance exam, and he saw you there."

Midoriya nodded. "Y-yeah. We met during Present Mic's orientation at the beginning."

He was suddenly aware of the whole bus listening to them. "Right!" Kirishima pitched in from the other side. "Those robots almost crushed me! If I didn't have my hardening quirk, I'd be toast!"

Asui nodded quickly. "Yes. Many of us had trouble with the robots. What I am trying to ask—"

Midoriya paled. Was she really going to ask him about being a villain in front of the whole class.

He could see Aizawa-sensei once again feigning sleep with his eyes cracked open. Midoriya locked eyes with him for a split second and knew the man was waiting to see how he'd dig his way out of this one.

"—is that how you knew to hack to the robots during the training exercise?" Asui finished.

Midoriya was already nodding before his brain could process anything more than the sweet relief of not being discovered. "Yes, exactly. I was able to recognize the coding and because I have a lot of experience from middle school— in classes of course!— I asked the support department to design a system that would allow me to interface with other systems."

At the back of the bus, Midoriya heard Bakugo scoff. "Fucking nerd."

"That's so manly!" Kirishima cried. "You do a lot of cool stuff with that!"

Kaminari leaned forward in his seat. "Yeah, can you play games on that? I want to ask for one so I can play Alien Shooters XII!"

Jirou whacked him with one of her earjacks. "You have a game system in your living room for that!"

"But you know that I can't play that unless my grades are good!"

"So do better," she scoffed as she plugged her earjacks back into her phone.

"You're so cool, Midoriya! You're going to be such a popular hero," Kirishima continued, drawing Midoriya back into the conversation he'd thought to have already ended. "Not like my hardening. I'm good in a fight, but it's real boring."

"I think your quirk is pretty neat though!" Midoriya cried. "Your quirk is more than enough if you want to go pro!"

"But don't forget that heroes also have to worry about popular appeal!" Ashido exclaimed.

Aoyama smiled, sparkles appearing on his face… somehow. "My naval laser is both strong and cool. It's perfect for a pro hero!"

"As long as you don't blow up your stomach!" Ashido laughed, remembering the boy's reaction during his battle trial yesterday. He had come out of the training building looking distinctly green and very pas pétillant as he would say.

"Yeah, but how are we going to be popular if people find out that some of our classmates are actual villains?" Sero asked.

Kirishima pointed across the bus. "People with strong quirks are always going to be cool to the public. That'd be heroes like Bakugo and Todoroki."

Asui croaked, shaking her head. "But Bakugo's so unhinged, he acts like a villain. He'd never be popular."

Kacchan burst from his seat with muted explosions. Midoriya couldn't help his flinch, remembering years of dodging explosions left and right while his classmates and teachers laughed.

"What the fuck did you say, frog-face?"

"See?" she said to Kirishima.

Kaminari laughed. "We've only barely started socializing and you've already made it abundantly clear how unpleasant a personality you have."

Kacchan growled. "Yeah, okay, Mr. Vocabulary. How about I fucking pound you?"

At the front of the bus, Yaoyorozu clapped her hands. "Please settle down, we're almost to our destination."

On cue, Aizawa-sensei rose from his 'sleep' just like a corpse. Maybe that was part of his quirk or something… he did have a lot of parallels with a zombie.

The bus pulled to a stop outside of a large, glass dome. It towered over the surrounding trees and it looked almost like a futuristic space ship had landed on the campus.

Aizawa-sensei made sure they all exited the bus before following them through the front doors of the domed building. Inside, was an amalgamation of different landscapes all surrounding a center fountain.

"Is this Universal Studios Japan?" one of the students cried.

"No!" a hero in a familiar space suit cried. "This is the Unforeseen Simulation Joint! I built this facility myself with a variety of zones to replicate every accident and disaster you can imagine!"

Beside Midoriya, there was another person even more excited about the new hero. "It's the Space Hero: Thirteen! They do their best work in rescue scenarios and I'm going to be a hero just like them!" Uraraka practically vibrated on the spot.

Aizawa-sensei stepped closer to Thirteen. "Where is he? I thought he was meeting us here."

Thirteen said something else that Midoriya couldn't hear over the din of the crowd, but he did see them hold up three gloved fingers. Huh…

Thirteen clapped their hands together and Aizawa backed away. "Before we get started, I have one or two points… or three… four… lots of point!"

"As I'm sure many of you are aware, my quirk is called Black Hole. It can suck in and tear anything apart."

"But you've used it to save people in all kinds of disasters!" Uraraka squealed. Was this what Midoriya usually looked like when he was fanboying at hero fights?

"Exactly. However, my power could easily kill. I've no doubt there are some among you with similar abilities. In our society, quirks are heavily regulated and monitored. It may seemed like this system is stable, but don't forget that it only takes one wrong move with an uncontrollable quirk for people to die."

"This class is to show you a new perspective on your quirks— to learn how to use them to save lives! I hope you leave here today understanding that you are meant to help people."

Midoriya smiled as the class applauded and Thirteen made their closing remarks.

Before Aizawa could talk and begin explaining their training, a growing purple orb over his shoulder caught Midoriya's attention. Aizawa-sensei noticed as Midoriya's eyes widened, the hero turning to look over his shoulder as a something emerged from the portal— a face covered with a detached hand.

Midoriya didn't think this was supposed to be part of rescue training.

There were villains at the USJ.

CLASS 1-A HERO AND VILLAIN ANALYSIS FOR THE FUTURE

ENTRY NO. 3 IIDA TENYA

Quirk: Engine* (see notes)

Hero Name: Turbo Hero: Ingenium

Student Number: 4

Height: 179 cm

Description: Tall, muscular, wide shoulders, short blue hair, square glasses, blue eyes (looks very similar to his brother, the original Turbo Hero: Ingenium)

Fighting Ability: Strong, has been training since childhood, focuses more on kicks and speed than punches

Weaknesses: Turning radius, thinking comprehension vs body speed, glasses/vision impairment, heavy costume armor, follows rules to the extreme, long range weaponry

Speculative Assignment: Hero

Reasoning: Comes from a very prominent hero family and constantly refers to the morality and duty of future heroes. He's very proud to attend U.A. and follow in his brother's footsteps. He is also very inflexible on rules and was willing to confront Kacchan on the first day of class for disrespecting the school property. His family runs an agency in Hosu that has been around for four generations, meaning he's probably recited the definition of heroics since the cradle.

Notes: Iida said that he took the recommendation exam alongside Yaoyorozu and Todoroki, but that he did not place in the top four. I saw him at the regular entrance exam (that was so embarrassing ugh) and with his quirk boosted speed/strength, combined with his harsh logic and childhood training, I can believe that he scored enough to place into the class by busting up robots.

His quirk is really interesting. I have watched some footage of Ingenium from before his extended hiatus starting last month. I can definitely see why he is a such a highly ranked hero! There are very few weaknesses to exploit in his form. Most of his previous injuries have come from long range weapons and quirks that fired faster than his reaction time; it can be assumed that this weakness carries over to Iida too.

From studying the Crawler and Ingenium chase footage against the second O'Clock six years ago, I think that there might be a problem with the physics of turning at such a high speed. Turning at such a sharp radius will place a lot of pressure on the body and either force them to take wider turns or to put more pressure on the inside joint. I wonder if their bodies have internal mutations to account for the g-forces and negative g's from deceleration? Maybe I can ask Iida about it in heroics tomorrow…

Notes:

I think we all know where this is going from here... I haven't started the next chapter because I was debating how to cover the USJ and I think I know how now, so hopefully I can start on it right after finals!

I just finished posting the last chapter of Nine Mindgames, my other Aizawa-centric mystery fic, so if anybody here reads that fic that missed the updates earlier, Chapters 8/9/Appendix are now up! Now that Nine Mindgames is finished though, I'll have some more time to write this one and I can hopefully move to two updates a month, real life allowing ofc.

I won't ramble any longer. I hope this set-up chapter conveys the calm-before-the-storm attitude, because it's gonna get real next chapter. How will the heroes and villains deal with real villains? Find out next update when the author finally finishes the outline past chapter four!!! (it's like one sentence descriptions and I found another timeline error, RIP me)

-Rusty

---

AN: this is straight copy and paste i also did ask the author of this fan fic AWeeBitRustyEh if I could bring it to ffn

A Line Drawn in the Sand

AWeeBitRustyEh

Chapter 4: Conflict

Notes:

Happy New Years everybody!

This chapter fought me like crazy, but next chapter should come along quick since it's one I'm very excited to write. I hope you all enjoy the USJ!

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

Chapter Text

"Hi, Midoriya. It's a pleasure to meet you."

"Y-you to-too," Midoriya stuttered out as the plain looking man entered the room. The quiet beeping of the hospital machines kept the room from growing too silent. Midoriya hated empty silence.

There was an uncomfortable-looking plastic chair at Midoriya's bedside that Recovery Girl must have brought over sometime after healing him. Midoriya scratched at the bandage wrapping around his arm as the man slid into the seat, his tan trench-coat pooled around him.

"How are you doing? Recovery Girl informed me that your injuries were minor, that you're mainly here as a precaution."

"R-right. S-sh-she just had t-to heal me, s-sir." Midoriya cursed his stutter. Why couldn't he just speak normally?

Still, the man nodded along as he scratched something down. He had a small memo pad, the kind Midoriya sometimes used when his notebooks were too far out of reach or needed to be air-dried after Kacchan and his cronies latest harassment attempts.

"I'm glad. From what your classmates have told me, you were very brave at the USJ. Without you, the situation would have been much worse."

Midoriya's breathing halted. A picture of Aizawa-sensei's disintegrated, decayed, arm sprung into mind. "Is Aizawa-sensei alright? What about Thirteen?"

The man smiled. "They're both fine, kid. Nothing that Recovery Girl and her team can't handle. They'll both make full recoveries."

Midoriya couldn't help his sigh as he relaxed further into the bed. Still, he couldn't untense, especially since the man hadn't introduced himself. Though judging by the notes and his trench-coat, Midoriya could make a fairly educated guess that this man was a detective.

"You're right. My apologies, I should have introduced myself sooner. I'm Detective Tsukauchi of the Musutafu Police Department. I'm here to take your statement about what occurred at the USJ yesterday afternoon and make sure that we have as much of the story as possible. It's important to catch the leaders of this operation as soon as possible."

Midoriya nodded along, though he hardly heard a word. His experiences with police in the past had been… less than optimal. At least this officer didn't have handcuffs this time.

"I'm… very sorry to hear that, Midoriya," the man said, his face a touch paler. "If you are up to it, perhaps you could elaborate on what happened."

Midoriya squeaked, trying to cover his mouth. Stupid muttering habit. "N-no, tha-that's alright, sir. Nothing h-happened"

Tsukauchi nodded as he scrawled something in his notebook. Midoriya noticed the man's eye twitch after his second sentence and Midoriya narrowed in like a hawk chasing a field mouse. That must have been his quirk. But why would he twitch? It had to have something to do with what he said, about nothing having happened. Could the man tell that it was a lie? That would be a really useful skill, especially for a police detective, because wow he could solve so many crimes with that and it would be really good for confirming alibis, but what about—

Midoriya was pulled out of his thoughts by the man growing even more pale. If his face lost any more blood, he would probably faint. The green haired boy swore he heard something mumbled about "Mic was right, it is a mini-Nezu." He wondered what that meant?

"You're right, Midoriya. My quirk is Truth Detection. I can tell if anything you say is a truth or a lie. It's a simple quirk, but yes, it has served me well. If you'd like, you can ask me more questions after we get your testimony, okay?"

Midoriya nodded as he started to speak. He started off with the mysterious portal and the face with the detached hand.

The students huddled together as their teacher told them not to move. Midoriya couldn't hear much over the rushing in his ears; somebody behind him screamed.

"Thirteen, protect the students!" Aizawa shouted. His quirk was activated, causing his hair to sway back and forth in an invisible wind. The green-haired boy itched for his notebook, instead settling on a mental picture to jot down the details of the underground hero's activated quirk. None of the videos on the forum could provide much description besides 'demonic red eyes.' Looking now, he imagined meeting his teacher in a dark alley would be absolutely terrifying.

There were more villains pouring out of the portal as Kirishima exclaimed, "What the heck are those? More battle robots, like during the Entrance Exam?"

Eraserhead shook his head. He lowered his goggles over his eyes and grunted. "Don't move. Those are villains."

One of the villains, who looked like a mass of floating purple mist, spoke in a deep voice. "Thirteen… and Eraserhead, is it? According to the class schedule I received the other day, All Might is supposed to be here."

Midoriya stared at the indistinct features of the villain. Why was he wearing a suit? And what about that neckplate? It had to mean something.

So caught up in his thoughts was he that he nearly missed his sensei mutter under his breath, cursing All Might. The fanboy in Midoriya wanted to protest, but things had changed since his pseudo-shrine bedroom days.

The first villain to come through the portal, the one that had the creepy detached hand obscuring his face, released an unhinged laugh. "Where is he? We've come all this way, with all these NPCs, and All Might isn't even here?"

The villain hummed before smiling. Midoriya could see the corners peeking out from behind the hand's wrist.

"I wonder if some dead kids will bring him here."

And then all hell broke loose.

Midoriya could hear Yaoyorozu asking Thirteen about the sensors. No, Midoriya thought, if they hadn't gone off already, then the villains must have been interfering somehow. What type of quirk would do that? It had to be a technopathy quirk, or maybe something with electricity similar to Kaminari…

Todoroki's musing broke him from his thoughts. "This place is far from the campus and they chose a time when nobody would be around. So maybe they're not as dumb as they seem. They must have an objective."

"To kill All Might," Midoriya mumbled.

Eraserhead's scarf whipped through the air as he pulled his goggles over his eyes. "Thirteen, evacuate the students. Get them away from here, now."

Midoriya immediately protested. "No!" His outburst surprised even himself. "You can't take them all on! Your quirk requires individual focus and your fighting style is more suited to quick ambushes with binding captures!"

A crooked grin spread over the hero's face. "No hero is a one-trick pony, kid," Eraserhead said as he leapt toward the nearest group of villains, his hair flaring above his head in an invisible wind.

The villains yelled as they launched into the fray with Eraserhead. Midoriya realized the problem almost immediately, before the villains even mentioned it.

All of the villains fighting Eraserhead had heteromorphic mutations. But how had they found out Eraserhead's weakness? It had taken Midoriya hours upon hours of trolling through forums to even begin putting the pieces together… though he had been pretty young at the time. He shouldn't be surprised that people had realized something so obvious that even a dumb deku had managed to figure it out.

Despite that, Eraserhead was still holding his own. The villains didn't stand a chance, at least not in small groups.

"We don't have time to linger!" Thirteen cried as they shielded the students. "Hurry up and evacuate!"

Midoriya's head snapped around as a wooshing noise drew his attention. In front of the Thirteen and the twenty first-years, there was a large, dark-purple spiral.

A figure in a grey suit with yellow eyes and a tall metal neckplate blocked their path. "Greetings. We are the League of Villains. Forgive our audacity, but we've come here to UA to end the life of the Symbol of Peace."

Two figures launched themselves at the purple man. Kacchan and Kirishima, Midoriya realized. Thirteen yelled for them to come back to the group.

The purple man said something. Midoriya couldn't hear it over the flowing information in his head. This was too much— there was too much going on. He couldn't pay attention to everything, from this new villain to the hand villain watching Aizawa-sensei's fight, to his classmates exclamations of fear, excitement, or some combination of both. No, no there was too much going on.

Until there wasn't. Midoriya realized what was happening a moment too late. He was too slow to dodge the lashing tendrils of purple that enveloped his whole class.

Midoriya landed with a splash. There was sapphire blue water surrounding him, marred by several dark blobs rapidly approaching him. A stream of bubbles escaped his mouth.

Something unexpectedly wrapped around his waist and Midoriya screamed as he was yanked from the water.

The detective's pen scratched at his notepad while Midoriya spoke. His hands were bloody raw by now, having been picked at for the duration of the story as Midoriya steadfastly tried to distance himself from… from the USJ.

A soft hand pried his fingers away from the meat of his right hand. Midoriya startled and looked up into the eyes of the kind detective.

"Kid? Are you back with me?" Detective Tsukauchi asked. Concern laced his tone.

Midoriya hummed, nodding. His eyes darted around the room and he winced as the pain from his hands filtered back into his perception.

He blinked when a glass of water was pushed into his hands. The detective sat back down in the seat. Midoriya smiled and drained the glass, mostly to buy more time to bring himself back to the present. He couldn't go away right now— the detective needed to know what happened at the USJ.

Midoriya placed the glass on the bedside table, ignoring the minute trembling in his hands. The same hands that earlier that day had… had…

"Midoriya. You're okay. I need you breathe with me, do you understand?"

He was so kind. What would he say when Midoriya finished his story? When he found out what Midoriya had done at the USJ? This rare kindness would disappear again and it would be back to the way his teachers used to treat him— if the detective didn't just arrest him outright.

"Whatever you did, it almost certainly qualifies as self-defense. There's no need to worry. You did what you had to do to survive. Several of your classmates have already expressed their gratitude for your actions. I have no reason to arrest you, Midoriya, nor would I want to."

"B-but… but you've… you've seen my file?" Midoriya stated. Or, well, questioned.

The detective nodded. "I have. It was only to confirm your presence and to contact your guardian."

Midoriya paled. Oh no, his mother probably cried her eyes out. It would be a miracle if their apartment didn't need new flooring after he returned home.

No, he was getting distracted. He couldn't go away yet, not until he figured out why the detective didn't seem to care, despite having read his file. Why wouldn't he care that—

"I'm quirkless," Midoriya blurted before his filter could catch up. He immediately slapped a hand over his own mouth, though the damage had already been done.

Instead of flinching away or sneering in disgust though, the detective simply nodded. "I'm aware. Quirks aren't everything in this world, despite how much people make them out to be. I have a friend who is," a small flinch," quirkless and I know that the world isn't easy for people society see as different. So just… keep on being you I guess. Uh, kid?"

Midoriya could hardly see through the tears blurring his eyes. "Y-you really t-thin-think s-so?" he croaked hoarsely.

"Of course," the detective said, scratching something down onto his notebook. Midoriya wished he could see clearly, to figure out what he was writing. "Have people in the past treated you differently because of your quirk status?"

Yes. "Sometimes," Midoriya muttered. They always blamed him for things, even if it wasn't his fault. It couldn't be one of the other good quirked kids; it must have been that quirkless devil child who's always causing problems. It was a miracle he hadn't been arrested for something one of his classmates at Aldera had done, though he had served a fair amount of suspensions for fights that weren't his fault. How were they his fault if he never even fought back, if he just sat down and took it because that's the way the world worked for useless dekus like him?

"Are you okay to finish the story, Midoriya, or would you like me to come back another time? Your story is important, but I can give you a few minutes to compose yourself."

Midoriya was already shaking his head. "No, no. I-I want to finish it. Now. Please."

The detective reclined in his seat as Midoriya started speaking again, picking up from the moment after he fell into the Flood Zone.

Asui tossed him onto the hard deck of the ship. Water splattered across the deck as Midoriya hacked his lungs out, spitting up half an ocean's worth of water. A gloved hand patted his back as his coughing finally began to subside. Midoriya used a shaky arm to lever himself upright and look at his two classmates.

"T-thanks, Asui," Midoriya coughed.

The girl nodded. "Call me Tsu."

"Oh, uh, you can call me Iz-Izuku. If you'd like, of course!"

Asu- Tsu nodded. She looked over the edge of the ship, reminding Midoriya of the figures he'd seen in the water. Of the villains who were attacking their class exercise.

Mineta was leaning against the edge of the ship, huddled up in a ball and shivering. Midoriya's mind was racing as he looked over the edge and started counting the villains. There must have been at least a dozen, all with mutation quirks that would give them the advantage in the water.

So the villains had known where everything was located in the USJ… and they had known Class 1-A's schedule, when All Might was supposed to be teaching them at the USJ. Which meant they had to have gotten a copy of the schedule somehow?

The press break-in. That must have been them. The man with the portals could have teleported a villain into the lounge if he wanted… but no. It was difficult to find any technical information on UA's security. Midoriya had only been able to get through a few layers of Nezu's security in that regard, and that was only because the principal had let him. But Midoriya remembered that the security system kept a record of every person on campus based on their student ID card, which was kept in their pockets at all times. Any person (as determined by thermal imaging) without a card would be flagged by the system. There was no way a couple dozen reporters had overwhelmed the system enough for a villain to slip in unnoticed.

Midoriya pushed that train of thought to the side. It didn't matter how they had the information. Right now, they were here and they had information on the class' schedule… though not on the student's quirks themselves. Otherwise they wouldn't have dropped Tsu into the Flood Zone.

"They can't kill All Might! He'll thrash them once he gets here," Mineta cried.

But how did they expect to kill the Number One hero? "They must have figured out a way," Tsu croaked. "Otherwise, why come here just to get beaten?"

"I don't know! But that hand guy promised to kill us too. I didn't come to UA to die— I just wanted the babes!" Tsu backpedaled as the purple-haired student launched himself toward her.

Midoriya snagged the back of his hero costume. Had the diaper design been intentional or—

"Hey! It's not a diaper. It's costume support!" Mineta wiggled in Midoriya's grip.

A gruff voice below them reminded them of the impending danger. Tsu croaked, locking eyes with Midoriya over the head of a whimpering Mineta.

"How are we going to get out of here, kero?"

Midoriya released Mineta. He rubbed the back of his neck. "Um, you could try to jump us— no, that's too far. Or we could use Mineta's, er, hair to stick them. But they'll catch on pretty quickly. What about—no, that won't work either. I guess—"

"Izuku, kero. You're mumbling again."

He slapped a hand over his mouth. "Oh, I'm so sorry. I'll try to be quiet—"

"No," Tsu shook her head. "I want to hear your ideas. I just couldn't hear what you were saying."

"O-oh. R-right. Well, I don't think you can jump far enough with us in your mouth. You jumped almost 60 meters in the long jump but with our added weight, I doubt you could land us on the shore. Mineta's quirk won't help us much in this scenario unless we can lure them in close to the boat or stick them to the bottom of the lake. But that's too risky. I guess I could check on my computer and—"

Midoriya face-palmed. His wrist computer! He doubted that the Support Department wouldn't water proof the computer, and his faith was rewarded with the screen flickering to life without issue.

Tsu asked what he was planning, but Midoriya had already started tapping away. It looked like the wireless network for the USJ controls had been knocked out by the same quirk that cut off the alarms and communications. He would need to directly hardwire into the system if he wanted to get into the controls. But for now…

"I have an idea," Midoriya said, locking eyes with both Mineta and Tsu. "I need you two to distract the villains for a few minutes. Get them to talk, but just keep them in the water and off the boat. I need to go below deck for a minute because I have an idea."

"What?! You're going to leave us to be eaten by the villains!" Mineta cried, latching onto Midoriya's leg. Despite the green haired boy's protests, Mineta wouldn't let go until Midoriya pried him off.

"I need you guys to trust me."

Tsu nodded. "We'll buy you time, Izuku."

Midoriya bolted toward the cabin door. The ship was large, but thankfully the bridge was easy to locate. He slid into the seat and started tapping away at the computer. A small slot opened and dispensed a cable, which he used to connect to the ship's control system.

Outside, he could hear Tsu and Mineta shouting, though he couldn't make out their words. Midoriya typed away on his computer as the systems finally connected. From there, it was the work of a few seconds to find the settings he was looking for.

"Yes!" he exclaimed as a series of command options appeared on screen. He scanned the text quickly and found the one matching the hatch he'd glimpsed during his brief dip.

Open main drainage hatch flashed green. Midoriya blinked once, twice, before a violent shaking began.

He could hear screams outside as the boat began to move, twisting around and around while Midoriya clung to the edge of the control console with all his might. It felt like an eternity even though it was less than half a minute. Still, as Midoriya tumbled to the ground when the ship finally ground to a halt, he let out a relieved groan.

Midoriya clawed his way out of the bridge, which was now askew at a forty-five degree angle. He stumbled onto the deck to see both Mineta and Tsu clinging to the deck with their hands and hair respectively.

Their heads both jerked toward him. Midoriya sheepishly waved. The two detached themselves and slid down the deck.

"Are you alright?" Midoriya questioned. "You didn't get hurt did you? I'm so sorry, I should've realized it would be that violent and I should've just clicked one of the other options or—"

"It was fine, kero," Tsu croaked. "The water is all gone. Some… some of the villains got sucked down as well."

Midoriya gulped. He had known it was a possibility when he selected that option.

"It doesn't matter right now. Mineta, can you stick down the remaining villains that are stunned? Then we should go. I think I know where the control room is located. From there I can try to contact the school… and maybe find our classmates."

And that was what they did. It was easy to stick down the villains, especially since most of them were dazed from the rapid spinning or collision with the ground caused by the water draining.

The scratching of the detective's pencil was becoming a familiar, soothing sound. Midoriya tapped his finger against his thigh as Detective Tsukauchi finished his last note.

"So that was how you three escaped the Flood Zone. That was very creative thinking, Midoriya. I do have one question, however. How were you able to access the commands so quickly?"

Midoriya rubbed the back of his neck. "I, uh, I have some experience with coding. Nezu-sensei is teaching me more formally since I started here."

The detective jotted down the information. "Right. Have you ever done anything illegal or immoral with your coding skills?"

"No," Midoriya answered a bit too quick. Detective Tsukauchi's right eye twitched.

Midoriya amended his statement. "I mean, who hasn't downloaded a couple songs illegally or watched a few dozen country-locked hero documentaries? Haha."

Detective Tsukauchi looked less than convinced, obviously noticing Midoriya's completely unsubtle avoidance of the question. Still, he let the green haired boy wriggle out of the question and onto the next topic.

"I'm guessing now you want me to explain how I got to the system controls?" Midoriya asked.

The detective nodded. "Yes. Your classmates have said you assisted them and provided information after you reached the control center."

Midoriya hesitated, wanting to argue how much of a help he truly was. It was just a few pieces of advice, a few warnings here and there. Nothing special. Nothing nobody else couldn't have done.

Still the detective's eyebrow crept higher and higher as Midoriya continued his story.

It took five minutes to get to the control booth— five minutes that involved running past trapped villains, through a small forest zone that had plenty of crevices for wayward villains to leap from, and then finding the electronic door to the control booth staircase which required Midoriya's wrist computer to unlock.

Midoriya, Tsu, and Mineta ducked into the staircase and the door slid shut behind them. There were several flights of stairs that led to a small control booth overseeing the entire USJ.

The room itself had several large screens flush against the console and another three hanging over the the viewing window. Midoriya connected his wrist computer with the same cord from the boat and entered the system even faster than his first attempt.

Tsu ribbited as the screens popped on one by one, each displaying an overhead view of one of the USJ's zones. Some of their classmates were visible on the overhead cameras while others were still missing.

Midoriya brought up a view of more cameras on the flat-desk monitors, using the touchscreen to zoom in further.

"There's Todoroki," Tsu said, pointing to the Landslide Zone. Sure enough, there was the half and half boy using his ice to trap the villains. Midoriya noticed some movement in the background. He fiddled with the controls for a few moments before locating the thermal sensors. It confirmed his suspicion.

Midoriya's eyes darted toward the control panel to the left of the screen, where there were several buttons with various numbers. Each of them represented a speaker and they were separated by zone.

He pressed down on the one furthest to the left for the Landslide Zone. There was a slight crackle before the audio came through.

Todoroki stood in front of the villain, who looked significantly less threatening whilst a human popsicle. The boy was currently threatening to leave the villain inside the ice until he froze to death, which was… a gruesome thought to say the least. He had no idea the son of the Number Two hero would be so cold and callous.

Well, it was now or never. "Can you hear me, Todoroki?"

Todoroki froze. For a moment, he appeared like a wild animal— startled but ready to attack at a moment's notice. His reactions must've been well-trained by his hero father.

His right hand tensed as ice coated his palm. "Who's there?"

"It's me. I mean, uh, it's Midoriya."

"'Midoriya' who?" Todoroki questioned. There were still speckles of ice forming in his hand.

Midoriya looked over to Tsu, who looked just as confused as Midoriya. Meanwhile, Mineta had recovered from his fear paralysis and was trying to use one of the other screens to zoom in on Yaoyorozu in the Mountain Zone.

"Um… Midoriya from class? I have green hair and I sit in front of Mineta and behind Bakugo."

Todoroki didn't look convinced, but he still lowered his hand. "I don't know who that is." Did Todoroki just, like, not learn their names? Not even after the Quirk Apprehension test?

"How are you speaking to me?" Todoroki asked. The villain was wisely keeping his mouth shut to avoid attracting the ire of the youngest Todoroki once more.

"I'm in the USJ control room with Mineta and Asui. I managed to get into the system and there's speakers and cameras covering every inch of the USJ." Midoriya remembered suddenly. "Oh, right. Be careful with your ice because Hagakure— er, the invisible girl?— is about ten yards away from you right now."

Todoroki whirled around, quirk flaring once more. Midoriya heard a faint squeak and realized that Hagakure had intentionally remained quiet.

"Uhhh, hey there Todo. Nice weather we're having?" Hagakure chuckled nervously.

"I don't understand how the weather is important during a villain attack," Todoroki deadpanned. Honestly, at this point, Midoriya wasn't sure if this was an act or if Todoroki just didn't understand human interaction.

Tsu pointed at one of the other screens, where Eraserhead was now fighting against the hand villain. Midoriya turned on the audio and heard the villain muttering. He was… counting?

No, Midoriya realized. He was timing the length of Aizawa-sensei's Erasure. Midoriya forgot the microphone was on until the hand man disintegrated part of Eraserhead's elbow and Midoriya gasped.

The hand villain paused. "Who's there?"

Midoriya's eyes were wide. Both Tsu and Mineta were staring at him frozen, not a single one of them making a noise. He was too afraid to turn off the microphone in case it made a noise. Whoever that villain was, if he could keep up with Eraserhead, one of the greatest underground heroes (in Midoriya's opinion) then Midoriya didn't want to catch his attention. Not anymore than he already had.

Eraserhead managed to pull away from the hand villain. His head tilted slightly to the right which told Midoriya that the hero was also confused. Though he must know about the intercom system as a veteran teacher.

"I said who's there?" the villain growled. "This dialogue option had better be good and not some useless NPC's interfering."

Midoriya finally muted the microphone, waiting to see how the villain would react. It seemed like there wasn't an obvious noise associated with closing the connection— that was a relief.

Aizawa took the distraction to catch his breath. Tsu pointed to one of the camera feeds, where Thirteen was fighting the purple mist man. Iida stood off to the side along with a few other classmates.

It looked as if Thirteen had the situation handled— then, it wasn't. Midoriya gasped as the mist ripped a hole in Thirteen's suit with their own quirk. Thirteen crumpled to the ground just in front of the exit.

Midoriya flicked on the microphone. "Iida," he said, ignoring the boy's startled leap. "It's Midoriya. Run for the exit and get the teachers. I'm trying to get a signal through, but it's taking too long."

The blue haired boy protested. "But— I won't leave my classmates behind! I'm Vice—"

"Just go, Iida! Be hero and run… please," Midoriya begged. "Get the heroes."

Iida looked torn, but the decision was made for him when the purple man attacked. Midoriya watched as Iida dodged several portals to make it out the exit. He disappeared from the cameras. Midoriya started a mental timer.

"Five minutes there, eight back with the teachers and mobilization response. Overall thirteen minute minimum response time. That's too long," Midoriya mumbled under his breath. He heard Mineta audibly gulp and Tsu release a small croak.

Midoriya realized he'd spoken aloud and quickly through on his signature smile. "The heroes will be here soon! All Might will be here to help fight—"

He quickly switched his attention back to Eraserhead. The hand villain was saying something now. Eraserhead's scarf whipped through the air around him as he stared down the hulking creature.

"This is the anti-All Might, specifically designed to kill your pillar. Your Symbol of Peace will crumple along with your stupid hero society. Noumu here has enough hit points to tank hits from the blonde buffoon and enough skills to beat him to smithereens. But I'd like to see a test run first…"

"Noumu, kill Eraserhead."

Midoriya watched as the monster moved with indescribable speed. It had to have been as fast as All Might, if not faster. The monster crushed Aizawa in one hand and smashed him into the ground, sending shards of concrete flying into the air.

Midoriya screamed.

The hand villain cackled. "Oh? Is the hacker back again? Just in time to watch your hero die a pathetic death."

His hand was still on the microphone button, but that didn't matter anymore. Not when Aizawa-sensei's head was mangled on the ground and their was a frighteningly large pool of blood beneath his still body.

"Who— who are y-you?" Midoriya's voice trembled. He tried to stay calm. He needed to stall. To keep the Noumu and the hand villain away from Aizawa-sensei.

Information, he needed information. He could get information too. Yeah, distraction and information. He could do this. Don't think about Aizawa-sensei. Don't think about it, it doesn't matter, just focus on the stupid hand villain—

Midoriya took a steadying breath. "You said you were the League of Villains. I've never heard of you before."

"That's because this is our debut. Our goal is to kill All Might, and with Noumu here to do it once he arrives, hero society will crumble." The hand villain laughed once more. It sent shivers down Midoriya's spine.

"How will it crumble? Your plan sounds pretty stupid to me," Midoriya said. Tsu was staring at him like he'd grown a second head. "I mean, there's plenty of other heroes out there."

The hand villain scoffed. "You stupid sheeple follow him like he's your god. It's all All Might this, All Might that. None of those stupid other wannabes could ever replace All Might. When their strongest hero is beaten bloody and strung up on the stairs of this stupid hero school, then the whole world will know that the League of Villains is the most powerful force."

"Hmmm. Sounds pretty convoluted to me. Also, how are you going to take credit. I don't even know your name," Midoriya said. Something caught his eye on one of the other screens. It was angry, blonde, and heading right toward the plaza with the monster. "We can't 'spread your message' or whatever if we don't even know your leader's name."

Midoriya waited until the villain started talking to shut off the microphone, hoping that the sound of his own voice would distract from the clicking noise. He found another student on the cameras and flagged their attention.

"Kirishima! Kacchan is heading toward the plaza and you have to stop him. He's going to die if you don't. I've gotta go, sorry!" he squeaked, before cutting off the microphone. The red haired boy didn't even have a chance to speak.

He reopened the connection to the plaza right as the hand villain finished monologuing. Something about how he wasn't the real boss, but his name would live on in infamy anway, yada yada. Shigaraki was his name, though, even though that sounded really fake. His name literally had death in it.

"But if we're doing introductions, little NPC, then what's yours? You have to be one of the stupid hero brats, though I don't remember any of you having a technology quirk."

Oh? That… they had access to their records? No, their quirk records were only kept on paper. They could have stolen the hard copies, but the teachers would've been much more wary if those were missing.

There was another way they could have found out though. As much as it hurt his heart, they had been classmates for only a matter of days. He didn't actually know them, even if they were some of the nicest classmates he'd ever had; they treated him a little weird for being quirkless, and it definitely cast suspicion on him being in the class without a powerful quirk. But they were his classmates.

He didn't want one of them to be a traitor.

Midoriya realized he hadn't answered the villain's question. Telling his real name was out of the question. But what else could he say?

"I'm… I'm Deku." His mouth just moved on its own. Curse his stupid non-functional filter. It wasn't the worst name to give. It was true, he really was Deku. The name Kacchan had given him all those years ago had been the only thing he'd been called in years, to the point that he sometimes forgot he had an actual name. Really, it was only his mother who called him Izuku anyway.

Yeah, he was Deku. And right now, Deku needed to be a hero.

"Deku? Like the little wooden doll?" Shigaraki laughed. "It's like a Zelda game or something."

The misty villain appeared next to Shigaraki, standing between him and the Noumu. "Shigaraki. One of the students escaped."

Shigaraki immediately whirled on the purple man. "Are you kidding me, Kurogiri? You had one job, you idiot! Is Thirteen at least taken care of?"

The purple man, Kurogiri, nodded. "Yes. They have been incapacitated. Their injuries are severe enough that they will succumb shortly."

"At least you can do one thing right," Shigaraki grumbled. "Now that we've got a time limit, let's kill some of these hero brats. There's one named Deku that's really been getting on my nerves."

The grin sent a bolt of fear through Midoriya. Before he could say anything though, there was a loud noise over the speakers. He winced as the feedback echoed.

Standing up from where he'd landed— after punching a hole through the roof of the dome— was All Might.

He wasn't smiling as he said his signature phrase.

"I am here…"

CLASS 1-A HERO AND VILLAIN ANALYSIS FOR THE FUTURE

ENTRY NO. 4 ASUI TSUYU

Quirk: Frog* (see notes)

Hero Name: Rainy Season Hero: Froppy

Student Number: 3

Height: 150 cm

Description: Short, slender build with dark green waist-length hair, dark green eyes, long tongue and other physical attributes from her frog quirk

Fighting Ability: Long distance fighting, not a lot of formal training but she has great reflexes

Weaknesses: Cold, acid (I guess that's most people though?), Camouflauge negated by thermal imaging, weak against larger opponents and opponents with more fighting experience

Speculative Assignment: Hero

Reasoning: Tsu has been very kind to me in my time here. She genuinely wants to help people and she has confessed to me that she wants to become a hero so her brothers can see somebody like them on television. Her favorite hero growing up was Gang Orca since he was another hero with a prominent mutation quirk. She treats everybody in the class with kindness and appears genuinely interested in learning the class material, unlike some of our classmates who seem bored with the material. I can't wait to see her as a hero! I'm going to buy all of her merch!

Notes: Her quirk is surprisingly versatile and well-suited to heroics. Frog grants Tsu the physical attributes and abilities of a frog. For example, in the long jump during the Quirk Apprehension test, she managed to jump around 60 meters which is 36 times her body length. Some species of frogs can jump 50 times their body length! She also confided in me that she can secrete mucuses which is so incredible. I might have geeked out about it too much because she changed the subject quickly after that. I gave her my cookie at lunch to make up for it because I felt bad for being so invasive.

I know from the Battle Trials that she is indeed weak to cold and will go into hibernation, just like an actual frog. But I wonder what species of frog her quirk represents? That also seems like an incredibly invasive question so I'll never ever ask her that. But maybe I can bring up the idea of seeing one of UA's quirk counsellors (or Nezu-sensei since he's been so helpful during my own quirk analysis lessons) to see if she can find any more frog abilities that can help her. Some species of frogs can absorb water through their skin. Or maybe she can secrete a poison like a poison dart frog?

I think Tsu is set on limelight heroics to show the world that mutation quirk heroes exist— but she would be so great for underground hero work. She should ask Aizawa-sensei to teach her the principles of his capture weapon, since her tongue could work much in the same way. Oh my, what if she did limelight and underground heroics? Just with two separate identities. She could be bright and colorful during the day like a poison dart frog (as Froppy) and then could do more underground patrol work at night like Eraserhead, just under an alternate identity or costume design (*see next three pages of suit designs, hypothetical frog aspects, and contributions from Nezu on Midoriya's first analysis pages)

Notes:

And then the rest of the USJ happens as usual! The end, because this chapter was already getting way too long (my longest for the fic!) and I cut a lot of stuff. Midoriya was supposed to help a lot more people. It really kicked my butt, but thankfully next chapter gets to the really fun part!

Some things that you might be curious about, but idk if they'll be mentioned explicitly in the fic: 1) the tracking bracelets were affected by the technology quirk so Nezu was already sending people to investigate which is why All Might arrives slightly earlier, 2) Izuku fractured his arm while thrown around in the ship and Recovery Girl healed it somewhat but he didn't have enough stamina from the fear/exhaustion of the day. If there's anything else you wanna know or that isn't mentioned in this mess of a chapter, leave a comment!

My goal for this New Year is to do 2 chapters a month. I'll be finishing up my longer ongoing fic at the end of the month, so afterward this will have my complete attention. Life is crazy, so I might be a bit late; don't worry, this fic won't be abandoned!

Thanks for reading and for being patient as life kicks my ass! Happy New Years everybody, let's make it a good one!

-Rusty

---

Chapter 5: Tasks

Notes:

I'm pretty sure I missed 500 kudos last chapter because I forgot to check (whoops), so consider this the celebratory chapter! Thank you all so much for the support, the comments, and the speculation. I don't have words to describe how awesome you are, seriously.

This chapter has like barely been edited because I finished it last night in a covid haze and then passed out for thirteen hours. I might come do edits later when I'm not suffering tm

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

Chapter Text

Midoriya woke up in his own bedroom. He vaguely remembered his mother coming to pick him up from Recovery Girl's office. It had taken her a while to check her phone, since the hospital was always a madhouse. She arrived about an hour after the detective finished with him and she immediately took him home.

Her fretting in the car ceased once she looked into his eyes. Whatever she saw was enough for her to back off, turning up the radio and keeping her worry to side-eye glances. Midoriya barely noticed as he stared out the window and the passing cityscape.

He blinked just before stepping into the shower and then next he knew, he woke from sleep. It must have been a good one too judging by the crust lining his eyelids.

Midoriya remained under the warmth of his covers. The cold outside had yet to filter into his blankets and he wanted to savour the warmth before the cold reality of the previous day's events hit him once more.

His watch had several dozen messages from the villain class group chat. As much as he didn't want to think about UA and the USJ, his curiosity won over and he opened the chat.

Criminal 3 (Caught): Hi everybody! I know this afternoon was crazy, but I just wanted to make sure everybody was alright. I didn't get to see any of you before they made us leave. Is everybody doing okay?

Criminal 1 (Caught): I'm fine, just a little scratch that Recovery Girl took care of

Criminal 1 (Caught): But I'm curious if you all got that same weird question from the detextive that I did

Criminal 1 (Caught): Like idk if it was bec he knew about my past (he might've worked my case before this, small world) but he asked if I knew any of the villains

Criminal 1 (Caught): I said no and he believed me but like that hurts that they think I would do that

Criminal 2 (Alleged): We are villains. It makes sense they'd treat us like that

Criminal 3 (Caught): I know but it's still sad :(

Unknown 1: I am fine as well! I received confirmation from the teachers that the only student hospitalized was Midoriya, while Eraserhead and Thirteen are still in critical condition.

Framed: I hope sensei feels better soon

Framed: He fought very hard for us at the USJ. I saw him—

There was a gap in the texts for several minutes as they waited for them to finish their sentence. But a follow-up message never came, and so the conversation continued on.

Criminal 3 (Caught): I know. I was thinking about making him a get better soon card! School is cancelled for the next few days, but maybe Present Mic would pass it on for me!

Criminal 1 (Caught): That's a good idea!

Unknown 2 (Leader?): I agree. Unfortunately, I do not see how we could collaborate on a card without risking our identities, but individual cards should convey the same sentiments!

Framed: I'm going to make him one too. He treats us all like regular students. Not like a villain or a future criminal or a freak

Framed: He is a very good teacher.

Most of the chat after that devolved into card ideas and praising Aizawa-sensei's teaching style. Midoriya agreed; it was refreshing to have a teacher treat him like a regular student instead of a quirkless freak. Even though he was technically a villain, for reasons unknown. Perhaps he should ask Aizawa about that… but Nezu-sensei wanted him to solve that himself.

His mother was sitting out in the living room when Midoriya finally left his bedroom. By that point, it was well after noon and his empty stomach rumbled. His mother gasped when she saw him, immediately ushering him back to bed while she promised to make anything he wanted.

Midoriya complied. He spent the rest of the day in bed scrolling through various hero forums and ignoring anything referencing UA or the USJ. He could hear the group chat buzzing a few times throughout the day but again, he didn't want to think about it.

He pulled out his analysis notebook after a few hours on his phone and began analyzing some of the quirks he had seen at the USJ. After that became repetitive (since he had only gotten glimpses, and speculation could only take him so far), he started brushing up on his English skills. Hopefully Mic-sensei would still let him be the English assistant, even after his lackluster performance at the USJ…

When he ate dinner with his mother that night, she asked the question Midoriya had been dreading all day. He knew his mother could be overprotective; it was hard living in a world where everybody was special except for him, a fragile deku who could be hurt by the slightest breeze. He had been the only student needing to be hospitalized after the USJ for a reason.

Midoriya managed to persuade her to let him stay. It was difficult work fraught with tears for both of them. But for the first time in years, Midoriya actually wanted to go to school.

Even though he was a villain, Midoriya could still be a hero.

Midoriya slept fitfully that night, haunted by images of the previous day. What if he hadn't hit that button in the control room? If they had left quicker, could they have stopped Aizawa-sensei from being so injured?

The what-ifs continued until sunrise as Midoriya got ready for the new day of class. The group chat was abuzz with activity speculating about how the school would address the events. One particularly grim comment brought up the possibility of increased security measures for the villain students.

Midoriya was reminded of the thought he'd had while fighting in the USJ. The villains had known their schedule, had worked in tandem with the press break-in to get information about their schedule… but not their quirks.

Their quirk information was either inaccurate and/or incomplete, which most likely didn't come from a file if it was that incomplete. The possibility of a traitor among them— somebody in the group chat who wasn't here for rehabilitation, but for something more sinister— haunted Midoriya as he took his seat in Class 1-A

A few of his classmates asked how he was doing, now that the bandages had been removed on Recovery Girl's orders. He played up his innocent smile and reassured them that he was doing great.

The room quieted when Aizawa-sensei entered, covered from head to toe in bandages. Midoriya wanted to protest… until he saw a suspicious flash of fur from behind the hero. Then, he was content to wait.

And sure enough, the principal jumped out to greet the class. Some of his classmates made some interesting remarks that he was sure didn't go unnoticed by the nation's most intelligent being. Midoriya caught Nezu-sensei's eyes as the principal climbed onto the underground hero's shoulder. Even through the bandages, Midoriya could sense Aizawa-sensei's resignation at being used as a glorified climbing structure.

"Greetings, Class 1-A! Am I a dog? A mouse? A bear? I am the Principal of UA, and you hero students have been through quite the ordeal."

Midoriya could hear Kacchan scoff in front of him. He gulped, hoping not to draw the explosive boy's ire. If Aizawa-sensei had that many bandages, then he probably wasn't allowed to use his quirk, which meant that Midoriya would be at the mercy of his blasts once more and that wouldn't be fun, especially in a hero school where—

"I'm very grateful for your cooperation with the Musutafu Police Department and our own staff members in the investigation at to the League of Villains' attack at the USJ two days ago. If there is any more information you would like to report or any concerns about your safety, feel free to approach any of your teachers. We are here to guide you, after all."

Principal Nezu smiled, not unkindly but with a bit too much teeth for comfort. "Now, in light of the attack, I have decided to kickstart your education even further. I hope you have been paying attention to your classmates in the past days, because the next phase of your requirements for continued enrollment in the Young Villain and Criminal Reformation Program will be commencing shortly!"

"Only villains will be receiving these tasks! As heroes, your continued goal is to find the villain students among your ranks and find ample evidence to convince your classmates at the class trial during midterm examinations."

"As villains, you must complete this goal by the end of the term or risk being revealed to the class. If any of you fail, I will reveal a key identifying detail to your classmates before the beginning of the final examination trial!"

Nezu smiled as all of their watches buzzed. Midoriya scrolled through his updated card profile to see a goal highlighted at the bottom of the page, alongside a progress bar that sat at 0% completion.

"Please check your assignments and start your preparations as soon as possible. It is very important for your rehabilitation to prove that you are capable of completing these tasks. I wish you the best, my dear class! I cannot wait to see your potential!" Nezu's tail wagged as Aizawa lowered him to the ground by the end of his capture weapon. The principal trotted from the room care-free of the destruction he had left in his wake.

Aizawa-sensei groaned, pinching his nose through the loose-bandages wrapping his arms. The injuries couldn't be too severe if the wraps weren't plaster; Recovery Girl must have healed the worst of it, minus the face. Hopefully it wouldn't scar or affect his quirk too badly.

Their teacher groaned as he lowered himself into the seat behind his desk. Midoriya watched with rapt eyes as the man surveyed the room. Brown eyes locked onto green for the briefest moment before continuing through the class. Midoriya gulped, tried not to dwell on it, and instead looked at his goal on the watch.

Midoriya Izuku, your goal is to analyze every villain team member by the end of the semester. The first five members will be due before the midterm trial in order to avoid being Revealed; the second five members will be due before the final trial. Any incorrect answers will result in a Reveal, with the severity of the information Revealed depending on the number of incorrect analyses. Please format your analyses in the standard format taught to you by Principal Nezu, with an extra reasoning section to justify your logic for each choice. Plus Ultra!*

"Alright, hellspawn. Now that the rat has given you your new assignments, it's time for your fight to continue… The Sports Festival is coming up. There will be an increased security presence due to the USJ attack."

Midoriya gulped as Aizawa-sensei continued talking about the importance of the Sports Festival. This was one of the countries biggest events; it would be televised across the country. Midoriya had watched it with his mother every year to scout out the future heroes. It was a great way to gain analysis when there were high definition cameras focusing on their every move.

But it was also a dangerous event, especially considering the villainous status of half of his classmates. The public at large was not aware of the Reformation program, but Midoriya doubled it would remain that way for long. The truth always got out somehow…

A few of his classmates looked green at the gills, though that was presumably at the thought of fighting for sport on live national television. Still, he jotted down their names on a new page in his quirk analysis notebook.

Aizawa-sensei had only briefly touched on internships. They were going to be slightly different this year, with restrictions on villain students who were more of a flight risk.

Midoriya wondered who would take on the quirkless student as an intern. Maybe if he got the opportunity to show off enough of his quick thinking and technical skills during the Sports Festival, he could nab an internship with an underground hero.

With just a few weeks before the Sports Festival, Midoriya needed to start formulating a plan of attack ASAP. Now that he had personal lessons with Nezu and understood the principal a bit more (that was an overstatement), plus his previous analyses of the patterns of the Sports Festival, Midoriya could have a pretty good idea of the events that would show up.

One individual bottle-neck event, then a group event to demonstrate teamwork and cooperation, then an individual or paired fighting event to showcase combat and quirk skills.

There were two potential approaches for him: he could either try to aim for the top and take the spotlight (chances were minimal of him making the podium) or he could try to showcase his skills in the first two events and have a gracious bow-out before the fighting event to preserve some anonymity. If he were to aim for an underground internship, the second option might be best.

Hmm. He would focus on his game-plan later. For right now though, he had to survive Literature and Mathematics. At least they were taught by heroes.

Lunch was an interesting affair.

Although half of the class had discussed the USJ in the Villains group chat, Midoriya supposed it made sense that the entire class would be interested in each other's sides of the stories.

The table he sat at was a hodge-podge of various friend groups from the Class 1-A. Uraraka and Yaoyorozu were talking on one side of him while Tokoyami and Shouji were discussing something in much quieter tones. Iida was chastising Kaminari for joking about cheating on his homework while Jirou and Hagakure made a game of sticking pieces of rice in the blonde's hair.

Huh. Almost the entirety of Class 1-A was at the table, minus Kacchan, Kirishima, and Sero— the latter two were pestering the blonde about something. They should be careful because he would start exploding soon.

A tap on his shoulder brought him back to the conversation.

"Izuku, kero. Lunch is almost over and you haven't eaten," Tsu pointed out.

Midoriya startled. "Oh!" He quickly worked to rectify the situation, stuffing as much of his bento into his mouth as he could without choking. He would need his energy for hero training that afternoon.

He was so busy digging into his lunch that at first he brushed off the knock to his head. It only drew his attention when the rest of the table quieted down to look at the person behind him that Midoriya realized the actuality of the situation.

"Greetings, 1-A. It is I, Monoma Neito, an ambassador from the superior hero class of 1-B. I couldn't help but overhear your discussions about your rescue training. I've also heard some interesting rumors about your class."

The blonde's smarmy smile immediately drew Midoriya's disdain. Monoma spoke with the same air of arrogance as Kacchan but with five times more charm. Except for the slimy note in his voice, the boy's words were silken.

"What kind of rumors?" Jirou asked, staring down the table at the boy with utter disdain.

Monoma waved his hand. "That not only were you heroes unable to defend yourselves at the attack, but that there are villains among you that are unworthy to be heroes! It's disgraceful that UA would let people like you walk in its halls."

Uraraka scoffed. "What do you mean by that?" she cried.

"Villainous scum doesn't deserve a place in this school, much less in the prestigous 1-A! And that reminds me," Midoriya gulped as the blonde's razor eyes focued in on him. "I heard that one of you villains is supposedly quirkless."

Midoriya stared down at his lunch tray. Ignore the eyes, ignore the eyes.

"Yeah? And what of it?" Shouji said, shifting in his seat. His limbs were scattered but tense. Was he really preparing to fight Monoma… for Midoriya?

Monoma laughed. "Well obviously, that's preposterous. A quirkless person could hardly walk down the street alone, much less make it into UA."

Well then you're about to be sorely disappointed. Don't believe me, then just try it out for yourself, copycat.

Midoriya tapped his finger against the table once, twice, before realizing that the cute giggle he had heard was from Uraraka. Why would she be laughing at him, unless—

"Oh no, I said that out loud, didn't I?" Midoriya mumbled. His eyes widened as he slapped his left hand over his mouth.

Most of the class were suppressing their laughter or covering their mouths. Even Yaoyorozu was giggling a few seats down. Monoma looked so offended by the mere prospect of being quirkless that Midoriya himself couldn't help but smile.

Asui croaked. "It's not right to judge somebody by their quirk, kero. Just like you shouldn't judge people for having mutant or non-human features, you shouldn't judge people for not having a quirk. Even though he doesn't have a quirk, that doesn't make him worthless."

Midoriya almost cried at her kind words. Scratch that, there was definitely some moisture in his eyes.

"Yeah, Monoma. You're the one from 1-B with the copy quirk right? See for yourself that Midoriya is quirkless and still kicked ass at the USJ," Kaminari cried.

The rest of the tabled jeered as Monoma took a step backward. Midoriya turned around in his seat and held his hand out for a handshake.

"I-if you really wa-want to tr-try it, then-then go ah-ah-ahead," Midoriya said, hopefully sounding far braver than he felt.

Monoma eyed the hand like a dirty sock. "Ugh. Obviously you're lying. Let's see what quirk you're actually hiding under this dorky exterior…" he trailed off as their skin connected. Midoriya expected to feel something, like a spark, but there was no indication that his quirk had been copied except for Monoma's face.

The blonde's expression was frozen in face in a twisted scowl. Their hands were still connected, though not for long as the copycat yanked his hand away as if it'd been burned.

"I-It's so empty. How do you live like this? It's so hollow and miserable. I can't even feel my own quirk because of the emptiness." Midoriya winced, swearing he heard somebody mutter something about being harsh.

Before Monoma could say anything else, a large hand chopped him across the neck and sent him tumbling to the floor. A girl with bright orange hair raced over frantically apologizing.

"I'm so sorry. I went to the bathroom for five minutes and Monoma decides to come antagonize you all. I'm really sorry. We're not all like this in 1-B, I promise!" the girl bowed.

"O-oh, uh, it's no problem?" Midoriya said as the girl dragged her classmate away.

The din of the cafeteria finally returned to a normal volume as people tuned back into their own conversations. Still, try as his classmates might to distract him, Midoriya swore he could hear the whispers floating around. About the villain class, about the quirkless kid, and about the USJ attack being an inside job.

When the bell finally rang, Midoriya had eaten only a quarter of his lunch. But that was fine; he wasn't hungry anyway….

"So what'd you think of those tasks?" Kaminari asked as the group of seven did planks. Aizawa-sensei was laying on the bleachers a meter away from them, staring up at the ceiling with his arms pointed toward the heavens in their casts.

Midoriya groaned, shifting his arms to clear the sweat from underneath. They had been at this for fifteen minutes now while the second group worked with All Might. The third group was running laps around the track.

One look at the groups told Midoriya that he was in for a world of hurt. His group— consisting of himself, Kaminari, Sero, Mineta, Jirou, Aoyama, and Koda— had one commonality: they were all not in the best physical shape or had quirks to emphasize it.

Midoriya knew he should've trained harder before high school applications. He'd studied for the UA written exam and then prioritized his computer skills and analysis.

In hindsight, maybe a few pushups wouldn't have hurt. Then he could've actually taken out a robot.

"30 more seconds," Aizawa called, not looking away from the ceiling. A couple of the others groaned as their arms trembled like there was an earthquake.

"Shut up, Kaminari," Jirou said. One of her earjacks poked the blonde boy who yelped. He nearly lost his balance.

"I'm just saying," Kaminari said as he recovered. "I wonder what type of tasks they're going to be."

"Just check your card then," Jirou retorted.

Kaminari sputtered. "Wh-well I already did! And there's nothing there because I'm. Not. A. Villain."

Jirou snorted. "Damn, my plan is foiled once again."

"If you have the strength to talk, maybe I should add another minute onto the planks," Aizawa said. There were immediate protests, but the group collapsed to the hardwood once the timer beeped.

Their teacher wouldn't let them bask in the relief though, instead telling them to head over to the outside lane of the track; they would be doing time trial sprints and whoever lost would have to do ten burpees.

Needless to say, there wasn't much talking after that.

Midoriya could hear the sounds of Bakugo's explosions as him and Todoroki raced around the track. Satou was also running around the track, though he had slowed down considerably since he'd started. His quirk required sugar, but there must be a limit when he hit a maximum sugar high or he had burnt out his quirk and was feeling quirk withdrawal, which probably didn't feel good at all—

The bonk to his head startled him out of his thoughts. Aizawa-sensei stood there, one cast rested on top of Midoriya's head and one eyebrow reaching escape velocity on his forehead.

"Interesting thoughts there, Midoriya. But focus on your own race right now. You can take over the world with Nezu after school."

Midoriya's cheeks burned. "Yes, Aizawa-sensei."

He ended up losing his race against Kaminari. The boy claimed he wasn't using his quirk, but Midoriya wondered if there wasn't something there with the boy using his friction to generate more static electricity. Perhaps he was drawing the static electricity away from his feet to decrease his friction? If he was telling the truth, then maybe it was subconscious. Or Midoriya was just really out of shape.

In between their races though, after switching opponents and catching their breaths, they were able to exchange a few theories. Sero made a joke about his task being to figure out how to swing like Spider-man while Kaminari said he was going to embrace his full-Pikachu mode as his goal.

Kaminari and Sero were still talking as Midoriya tried to catch his breath."I had this cute Pikachu charm on my backpack, but it fell off somewhere and I can't find it. My little sister gave it to me for getting into UA."

"That sucks. I lose stuff all the time. My mother said if I lose another house key that I'm going to have to wait for my brother to come home from school every day. And he gets home so late."

"Oof. Rip my dude."

"Kaminari, Jirou. You two are up next," Aizawa called as the two got into ready positions.

The races also had the goal of getting them used to movement in their hero outfits, though Midoriya knew there were a few spots that would chafe—at least until he wore the fabric down a little more. But so far, his costume was lightweight and flexible so that he didn't need to worry about his movements being hampered. That didn't stop him from losing almost every race until Sero tripped off the starting line. It was a hollow victory.

They were finally released from their time trials as the period drew to a close. Kaminari made another dumb joke about rooting out the traitors, 'the imposters are among us', for which Jirou slapped him upside the head. But now that hero training was finally over, they could go home and relax before completing their homework. Ectoplasm had given them several problems to solve that night and Midoriya knew he wasn't the only one dreading it.

Now that his notebook was his task— his requirement to continue his UA enrollment— it suddenly made his observations all that more important. Not only did he have to figure out who the villains were, but he also had to turn in an accurate and useful analysis of them as well.

And he still had to worry about the Sports Festival too, then the internships, and then the impending class trial. Suddenly, the afternoon didn't seem quite so relaxing.

He quickly made his way to the locker room. Midoriya had just finished changing out of his hero outfit and exiting the locker room when a loud voice called his name.

He jumped, whirling toward the gymnasium entrance where Present Mic leaned against the doorframe. The rest of the his classmates stared as their English teacher gave the green-haired boy an exuberant wave.

"Hey, listener! Got a moment to talk to your favorite radio host?" Present Mic winked underneath his green glasses.

Midoriya smiled weakly and waved goodbye to his classmates. Had he done something wrong in English? They hadn't had English that morning, but maybe it was something from before the USJ. Had they had any assignments though?

"Come on, Midoriya! Let's go sort everything out in the Staff Lounge and get everything set up for your first period of tutoring tomorrow!"

Oh, yeah. He'd forgotten that Nezu-sensei approved the forms.

Midoriya followed behind the teacher as they crossed the building toward the Staff Lounge. Along the way, they passed a few stragglers from various classes. But none of them seemed to find it unusual that he was following so closely behind a teacher. At Aldera, you were only singled out by the teacher after school if you were being punished.

Mic-sensei gestured for Midoriya to enter the lounge and guided him to the back, where two desks were pushed up against each other. One of the desks was covered in various music-related trinkets and the other only had a single coffee mug beside the computer. The blonde dug through his desk, throwing several items onto the already cluttered desktop, before 'aha-ing' as he pulled out a sheaf of papers.

"Gotcha! Pull up Shou's chair, listener, and I'll show you my lesson plans for tomorrow. That way you know what we're doing in case you need to brush up on anything last minute, ya dig?"

Midoriya nodded slowly. He dragged the rolling chair around the desk to sit just behind Mic-sensei. The man smiled as the boy scooted the tiniest bit closer.

There was something different about this smile, Midoriya thought, looking at the papers now scattered across the desk. It wasn't as wide as it had been back in the gymnasium, nor as it always was in the man's press release pictures. But it felt more genuine than his other smile.

"Can you see everything alright?" Mic-sensei asked. Midoriya nodded and the man continued. "Excellent. I'm just going to explain the lesson and show you how everything is laid out, in case I have to miss a day for hero work. And if there's anything that doesn't look familiar, just let me know and I can give you a quick crash course. Okay?"

He guessed that made sense. Mic smiled when he nodded, before he started to run through the first three days of lesson plans. For now, they would be learning introductory phrases and key words before moving on to basic structural elements the next week.

"Now obviously we won't be getting too far down that rabbit hole for the moment," Mic said in English, "but I think it will help to understand the differences in stringing together the sentence now instead of confusing grammar later."

Midoriya nodded. "So what will I be doing during these lessons?"

"Right! You'll mostly use it as a free study period for your work with… Nezu." Why did Mic-sensei says the principal's name like that? And why did he shiver, was he cold? It wasn't that cold in the lounge and he was wearing his leather jacket which had to be somewhat warm.

"I'll occasionally call on you for help and when your classmates are working on class activities, you'll need to be on stand-by. Oh! And I almost forgot, Shou mentioned that you soak up information like a sponge. Since there won't be a lot for you to do during this first week, I have some old JSL textbooks that you can check out. It's a valuable skill for a hero to have!"

Oh, that sounded interesting! Midoriya had tried learning some JSL in the past, but he didn't know much more than some basic signs and fingerspelling.

Yes. I w-o-u-l-d love to l-e-a-r-n, Midoriya signed. He fingerspelled the words he didn't know.

Mic-sensei spoke as he signed. "Awesome! I'll get you set up tomorrow then. And while your classmates work, I'll show you a few signs to practice!"

"Thank you! I wanted to learn back in middle school but I had nobody to practice with."

"Aw, I'm sorry, li-Midoriya. Do any of your friends know JSL?"

"I think my one… friend… does, but he doesn't speak to me much anyway. So I learned what I could from hero video analysis." Midoriya smiled. "But that's okay, because I think Shouji and Koda know JSL, so they can give me a few pointers!"

Mic-sensei's smile changed again, back into that radio show smile that didn't quite reach his eyes. Did Midoriya say something wrong? "That's great! But just so you know, Midoriya, if anybody treats you different just because you're quirkless, you can come talk to me or Aizawa? You know that, right?"

Well, yes, theoretically he could. But he also didn't want to complain about them treating him differently, especially when it wasn't even that bad. It wasn't nearly as bad as Aldera and he didn't want to get on his teacher's nerves too early in the semester. Besides, he could handle it.

"Of course, Mic-sensei," Midoriya lied. Mic-sensei didn't look like he believed him, but he let it slide.

Midoriya left the staff lounge with the link to a JSL youtube channel and a list of English topics to brush up on. There was also a sticker that must have been from Mic-sensei's radio show because it said that he was a "rockin' listener!" with the man doing his signature finger guns.

And if he ended up sticking it on the outside cover of his English notebook, then it was worth it for the happiness on the hero's face the next morning.

CLASS 1-A HERO AND VILLAIN ANALYSIS FOR THE FUTURE

ENTRY NO. 5 SHOUJI MEZOU

Quirk: Dupli-Arms* (see notes)

Hero Name: Tentacle Hero: Tentacole

Student Number: 11

Height: 187 cm

Description: Tall, very muscular, grey hair covering most of his face (and his right eye), six arms/limbs(?), always wears a blue mask

Fighting Ability: Very strong and fast, overwhelming at close quarters due to multiple limbs, also a very good spy if has sensory organs on limbs, great reflexes too!

Weaknesses: Loud sounds (if ears on limbs), removing mask?, blinding his eyes, removing/disabling his limbs, *add more to this section later

Speculative Assignment: Villain Hero

Reasoning: I'm not completely sure. I originally wrote down villain, but I feel like I was being prejudiced because of how intimidating he is. I kept brainstorming uses for his quirk as a villain, even though there's just as many (if not more!) uses as a hero. He would be very intimidating as a villain, but that doesn't matter (think of Kacchan). He's nice enough and he even defended me at the lunch table when Monoma was bothering me. Obviously that's not enough to prove that he's a hero or villain, but I want him to be a hero.

Even if he is a villain, we need more heroes like him. People who are willing to stand up for anybody, no matter what they look like. Even if they're useless quirkless like me.

Notes: What an amazing quirk for heroics! Although he specializes in close-range attacks, I wonder if he could use a multi-barreled weapon with his limbs to hit separate individual targets? I'll have to draw up some designs and think about it further…

I do wonder what other potential there is for his limbs though. I doubt that there's any organs/limbs that he can generate that he hasn't already figured out. But what about a support item that would help his mobility (which is his biggest weakness at the moment— quick, vertical movements)? I was thinking maybe a thin but durable cloth attatchment that could be put between his limbs and used to glide, possibly with a lightweight propulsion system to at least get him farther away in case of a potential disaster. Or what about a harness to help with carrying more civillians out of rescue areas. Right now, unless they're small children, it is hard to carry people without using multiple arms. Ooh, combined with Uraraka's quirk this could be really interesting!

One thing to note is that he's probably going to struggle a lot with public image. For his internship, I think he should go with a hero with a more public facing personality that also has mutative features— maybe somebody like Gang Orca or Miruko who are known for raising awareness of mutant discrimination. Definitely somebody with some prescence with children, because unfortunately he is quite scary (but that's no excuse for judgement— I'm working on it)

Notes:

Fun fact: Several of the villains already started on their tasks in this chapter. Some of them are briefly referenced; can you figure out which? ;D

This chapter is brought to you by my life going to absolute shit and (the cherry on top) I have covid and my throat burns like a mf and my head is pounding. I wrote 2k in quarantine yesterday though so maybe this'll kick me out of my writers block for villain!mic fic.

Next chapter should cover the Sports Festival, which is another event I'm dreading. If there's any suggestions or things you want to see, let me know! That also goes for other events or interactions you'd want to see! I'm hoping to keep up bi-weekly updates on this fic, but that might depend on the month. Follow me on tumblr for updates or to ask about them (I don't mind asking about updates, as long as you're polite!) at aweebitrustyeh

That's all for the notes for this fic, but if you follow any of my other fics I'll have some quick announcements below. Thanks for reading!

-Rusty

—

1. "Lights, Camera, Action." (Villain!Mic) Chapter 3 is being delayed to Feb. 14. Like I said earlier, Covid and other life related stuff has severely derailed my schedule and I won't be able to make the orig. Jan 29 date. The USJ is also kicking my butt there, just like it did for this fic, because there's a lot of canon divergence. But don't worry, I plan to have it out by mid-Feb at latest, earlier if I can manage with school/my thesis/research starting back up!

2. "The Nine Mindgames of Aizawa Shouta " sequel will (probably) start being released in early March. I just finished planning it out in quarantine and there are way too many characters to keep track of (150). It's a nightmare, but it's going to be really fun! More info to come, but subscribe to that series to get the notification when it goes up. It'll be the second work, under the title "The Ten Day Siege of UA High" with 10 chapters at 5k apiece.

AN here more link from the creator of the /users/AWeeBitRustyEh/pseuds/AWeeBitRustyEh