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Chapter 2: To be more
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U.A. is a university, apparently. One with on campus dormitories, which students are expected to reside in. I figure that must be what changed with Universal Calibration perk. That didn't matter much to me. The perk itself said that it wouldn't mess with the canon timeline, so I didn't have to worry about the end of times happening before I got any hero training from the school. It wasn't a big thing, but it did give me more time to train.
Which is what I was doing now, actually... against my mother.
Monoma Jeanne came to Japan twenty years ago from Europe (not France, despite the name), and must have had some kind of training, given how badly she was beating me.
I dropped down on crouched legs as her kick soared over my head, laying a hand on the ground so I could send my own kick at her ankle. I had to abort that move when her foot started coming down on my head, forcing me to roll to the side to dodge. I kept rolling as I pushed myself to my feet, taking a breath to observe my opponent again.
Something I've noticed about how this would registers the WC perks is that it prefers giving them a reason. My mother was the source of my blonde hair and blue eyes, as well as my height and natural fitness that the Body Tune-Up gave me, where dad was shorter than both of us, even though I was only in my first year of high school. I'd actually taken to using her hair style, tying up my long hair to keep it out of my face. But while my hair was naturally kept clean and styled by Time Savers, my mother's hair was fine since I hadn't landed a hit on her. Her training outfit was pristine, irking me slightly as mine was ruffled and dirty.
Because of that quirk of hers. Even after years of asking, she'd never explained the specifics of her ability, and she'd refused to let me copy it before I got her permission. I knew it was some kind of forcefield, something that seemed to increase her physical strength as well, but I have yet to find the limits of it yet.
"Have you given up yet?" she called out, bouncing on the balls of her feet. I scowled, unzipping the pocket where I kept my advantage. "I guess not."
"Of course not," I answered, a little tired of the little exchange. It happens almost every time we spar. I don't know what happened to my mother, but she really doesn't want me to have anything to do with the official hero business. I've heard her tell Dad that she'd rather I go vigilante than risk the Pro Hero system. "I still say that U.A. will be the best place to help me get stronger."
I felt powers, two of them, appear at the edge of my perception. Two little stars that held the two quirks that I had been able to gain access to at all times. I placed my hand against the concrete and felt the cool material extend up my arm and across the rest of my body. My Dad seemed to understand my mother's reluctance to let me be a Hero, but he was willing to help me prepare, rather than try to stop me. He gave me a lock of his hair to copy his quirk from about a year ago.
"I'm not having this argument with you again," my mother stated, readying her self as her forcefield pulsed with visible light.
She charged me, crossing the distance between us almost faster than I used to be able to register, the concrete exploding under where she stood. Fortunately, the Martial and Athletic talents have been pulling their weight against her, letting me keep up far better than I used to be able to.
As her fist came around to strike at my stomach, my knee came to meet it, resulting in the loud noise of concrete cracking under the force of her blow. I stamped my foot on the ground and raised my other one to take its place, kneeing my mother in the solar plexus, only to be blocked by the white flash of her quirk.
When she bounced back a step, I braced myself to do something about her upcoming kick. For all that my mother is strong, she tends to be a bit predictable in a fight, so when her leg rose I had enough forewarning to catch the leg against my chest, feeling another crack form in my Dad's quirk, and pick my mother up off the ground.
The surprise on her face was visible when she went airborne. I pulled her up by her leg and slammed her down on my other side, creating a crater in the floor from the impact.
"Kuro, Section-F!" I called, feeling my quirk shift from Absorption to Dark Shadow. From the darkness under my clothes, a shadow extended up my arm as I pulled it back for an attack, covering the fingers of my hand. I tensed those fingers as I drove my hand down, slipping between my mother's guard that she rose when I spoke.
My concrete hand and Kuro's shadow acted like a knife's blade, stabbing through my mother's forcefield with some difficulty, only for the Dark Shadow quirk to lose a lot of power as the forcefield emitted a bright light in response. A dull pain shot through my hand, like something strong was gripping it and trying to force me away, but I pushed further, very briefly making contact with her before I was almost blinded by the light and blasted backwards, getting launched a good five meters.
Neither of us moved. Though out reasons for such were different, they both came from the same source. In her training outfit, my mother's stomach was exposed, so when my attack made contact for the first time in our months of spars, my quirk activated, and I could copy hers. I had done so out of reflex just before I got launched away, listening to some feeling in me that said I had to.
I recognised that feeling after landing, as the last part of the WC build activated. A Template Stacking of Velvet Scarlatina, as well as the Template Stacking II to boost what I had access to. She was a side character in the early volumes of RWBY who was able to replicate any mundane moves she saw performed, allowing her to fight with other peoples' fighting styles. Couple that with her weapon, which the template would either soon give me or allow me to make, and she could copy weapons to fight with as well.
It was an interesting combination, with my Copy quirk. I could mimic their fighting and movement styles as well, using their quirks with the fighting styles that they practiced rather than trying to incorporate those quirks into my own fighting style.
Even ignoring that, Velvet was a faunus, a bunny girl, resulting in heightened hearing and night vision. Add that all to Aura, RWBY's power system, giving me a forcefield like my mother's that increases physical strength and a healing factor, and Velvet's Photographic Memory Semblance almost becomes secondary.
My benefactor seemed to have the template reformat itself into something fitting for this world. Aura, which would normally not fit within this world, seemed to have been treated as a side effect of my mother's quirk. For me, it was a kind of inherited aspect of my quirk, like the ice and fire quirk I remember from the anime. For my mother, it acted as fuel for her quirk.
"You copied it, didn't you?" I was pulled out of my thoughts when my mother spoke up, having approached while I thought about Velvet's template. "My quirk."
I turned my inner eye to the quirk that I had indeed just copied, scowling again as I looked over it and felt what it could do. Then I had to hold back a scowl, more than a little pissed off at what I found.
"Quirk amplification..." I declared, making my mother flinch a bit at the calmness of my tone. It was deceptively calm, and she knew it. I sat up, looking her in the eye. "Not even that. Temporary quirk amplification dependent on contact and with a slowly self generating fuel source. That's what you've spent years hiding? All those years..." I felt my jaw clench. "... Pushing me away. Keeping me at arms' length, like the kids in school that didn't want their quirks copied." I saw her open her mouth to deny it, but I cut her off by reminding her of something. "Since I was five, I've hugged a forcefield."
She practically jolted in place. I noticed her hands shaking and she refused to meet my eyes as I stood up. I had half a mind to just walk away and crash at Fumikage's place for the next day or so. After so long without any contact with my own mother in this life (literally, since she kept her forcefield up to stop me from sneakily copying her quirk), I expected more. She can't awaken Aura, as one of my theories suspected. She can't permanently boost quirk outputs, or even boost them for a certain amount of time.
My mother was essentially a female version of Jaune Arc, also from RWBY. Along with the forcefield and physical boosts, which are this world's version of Aura, she can boost the power of emitter and transformation type quirks, increasing their effects while in contact with the user. It was this world's version of Jaune's Semblance, Aura Amp. Her version would deactivate her forcefield to use, and the energy used for it would be used to boost the targeted quirk instead. If she used it on herself, she'd lose power twice as fast as either effect (forcefield or amplification), but keep the forcefield and make it stronger.
"Why?"
There was silence after I finally asked the question. I could understand keeping it a secret, but for me, her quirk was a blank. It required her version of Aura, which required time to generate. In my ten minute time limit for copied quirks, I'd barely get a second for amplification or forcefield, which is certainly not enough for... any of what she did. While I may have the memories of an adult, I, Neito Monoma, am still a teenager whose mother always kept herself a literal inch out of reach since I was a child.
"...I'm sorry," she eventually said, and I could feel Kuro shift from my emotions. "I left my home because some of my family wanted to try forcing a quirk marriage on me, looking for the amplification part of my quirk. I got some contacts of mine to wipe that part of it from digital records before I came here, but I still got several requests from the government both in Japan and back home to submit my quirk for testing. I didn't want any of that to touch you."
"So you didn't touch me," I finished. "For ten years, to stop me from copying your quirk even in private, where they couldn't have any idea that it happened." I looked at her, my mother that still hadn't looked at me, turned around, and walked away. "I'm crashing at the Tokoyamis' place." I called back to her, holding up a hand when I heard her step forwards. "It was a stupid ass idea, mother. I'll be back by the end of the week."
Three days. I'm emotionally aware enough to work things out in three days... I think.
[-]
I had lost her quirk by the time I reached Fumikage's house. Admittedly, I took the long route so I could cool off a little more, but I still hadn't developed my quirk enough to extend my time limit.
I could hold four quirks at a time, something that Fumikage's parents helped test, and I could keep a quirk for ten minutes before it slipped out of my grasp. While my classmates after moving here were far less wary of my quirk than the ones I had inn previous school, none of them had given permission for me to copy their quirks for training purposes. I once overheard some classmates of mine laughing, wondering why they'd give their quirks for someone else to be a hero. And because I was dedicated to my training, I must have asked everyone in school, causing rumours that I couldn't even try being a hero without other, actual heroes around.
Regardless, I managed to get a few uses out of my mother's quirk, though there were a few hiccups. The first was that, despite mimicking RWBY's Aura, my mother's version was purely quirk based. I copied that quirk, and the self generating fuel source that came with it, but those things were designed by nature to work together. I only had those ten minutes allowed by my quirk to build up that fuel, which was hardly anything worth noting.
Thirty seconds. When I first tried to use Quirk Amplification, I had given it five minutes to build up that fuel. With no other quirk to boost, I enhanced the forcefield aspect of itself, and I ran out of energy in only fifteen seconds. Calculating the fuel capacity available in my ten minutes, and then taking into account the doubled energy cost for self amplification, the ratio of power to amp time is 10:1. With the full ten minutes, I'd be able to boost someone's quirk for only one... almost. I'd need to use the quirk before I lost it after the tenth minute was up.
I scratched my head in frustration as I finally knocked on Fumikage's door. The more I figured out about mother's quirk, the more that her worries seemed like the paranoid obsessions of someone that's been burned by the system and never trusted again. I could understand hiding the true function of her quirk from that same system (using some less than legal 'contacts' that I'm curious about, if only because I've never heard anything about her life before I was born), but the whole thing about 'keeping it from touching me' was getting more and more ridiculous the longer I thought about it.
"My mother's an idiot and I'm more than a little mad at her. Can I stay here for a few days?" I asked as a greeting when Fumikage opened the door. The boy just blinked, nodding and stepping aside so I could come in. "Thanks."
"Don't mention it," he said, shaking his head. "I'll just ask you to cook as payment."
That had me huff out a laugh. "More than doable, though I already bring you snacks when we train. Make me cook for you any more and I'll just consider myself your chef as a side job."
Dark Shadow, who Fumikage tends to keep materialised when in private, came around the corner, carrying two glasses of water which were handed to each of us. "Oh, do that anyway! Fumikage loves your cooking."
I smiled as Fumikage tried to chastise his quirk in some vain effort to keep up his chuuni persona. He enjoys the whole 'darker than dark' thing, which isn't helped when Dark Shadow speaks bluntly about their feelings.
The rest of the afternoon was spent on various things. Some were kind of meaningless, like when I wondered where Fumikage's parents where, and some were kind of practical. We studied some, him doing homework while I looked up some new topics that are far above high school level (just because I already had a valid general education from Grail Knowledge didn't mean I wasted my time in school. I spent a lot of it researching more advanced topics).
I actually asked to borrow some paper to start writing out the principles and basic outline of Anesidora, Velvet's hard light projection weapon. It would need tweaking to fit this world and technology level, as well as refining if I wanted to make it a viable tool, but it was only the first draft.
Then dinner came, which I cooked, as promised.
"Oh, and I got a section to work earlier," I told Fumikage as we ate, Dark Shadow paying attention as well. "It was a bit weak, compared to what we theorised, but it worked."
"Truly?" Fumikage wondered, glancing at his companion. "Which one was it, and what did you pit it against?"
"I used Section-F in my spar against my mother, and it managed to pierce her forcefield before I was repelled by it." Both of them looked interested, having heard my complaints about my mother's quirk before. "Her quirk lets off light at times, so it faltered after getting through, but it managed."
"Our thoughts of Dark Shadow's dubious physical nature held some merit then," Fumikage smiled, turning to his partner. "Something for us to work on, I wonder?"
"The best defence is a good offence," Dark Shadow agreed. "Mum put the rocks back together before summer, so we have something to practice on."
I smiled, quite happy to help my friend and his quirk, who is also a friend. My quirk let me learn the ins and outs of Dark Shadow, Kuro, quite quickly and easily, so we've been working together for quirk training. "And the sections will be good practice for the 'Umbral Armament', as you called it."
Fumikage is in control of Dark Shadow for the most part, but should the quirk get too strong, the reverse can become true for a time. It's happened only once, as far as I'm aware, but the boy's idea for a super move that used Dark Shadow as armour and weapon at once was inspired by that lapse in control.
"Your mother assisted you with training again today?" Fumikage eventually asked, indirectly bringing up why- "Did something happen, more than her usual disparaging of your wish of heroism?" Never mind. That was rather direct.
I sighed, leaning back in my chair. "I... kind of. She finally told me the bare bones of why she didn't want me being a pro hero, and I've been poking holes in her reasoning since," I admitted. My gaze travelled to the ceiling, like it would provide some clarity on the topic. "I don't have the full picture-" like how bad it was that she felt she had to run from her birth country "-but it didn't feel worth it when compared to what she's done."
"To you," my friend clarified, making me pause before I nodded.
"To me," I accepted. But that brings me back to the 'paranoia' thought I had about my mother earlier.
"Then surely the first step would be acquiring that full picture, wouldn't it?"
My eye twitched at the simplicity of the advice, because it was right, but didn't feel right at the same time. I didn't know the severity, I knew that, but she had told me the reason after I copied her quirk. Keep her quirk away from me so that I couldn't tell anyone about it. Doing that would stop any government goons from knocking on our door, asking for me or my mother because of that quirk.
The government was really creepy about quirk manipulation, whether by other quirks, drugs, or otherwise. I remember reading about all the precautions that surrounded that drug, Trigger, when it got developed. It had a side effect of boosting quirk output (since it was prescribed for baldness and erectile dysfunction), and it had been investigated to hell and back before it was made legal for doctors to prescribe. I also remember that the big bad of this world was able to give and take quirks, which was honestly a miracle given how much I'd forgotten about the series my daughter and I watched together, and that the main character got given his quirk by All Might.
Hell, even my quirk got investigated. Not nearly as heavily as Trigger, of course, but the government 'requested' that I demonstrate my quirk back when I was six, just to make sure it was temporary copying and not anything else.
So I can understand not wanting the government to investigate a method of quirk amplification, but giving up any physical contact with your son for a decade over something that she hadn't confirmed was dumb. Hell, in any of the ten years since I got my quirk, she could have told me any of this and I'd be less mad, but she only said something when I copied her quirk.
I shook my head. "I'm not dealing with that right now," I decided. I'd given myself until the end of the week.
"Very well," Fumikage nodded. "I'd caution you, however, not to let anything negative fester by putting it off."
I waved his concern away. "I've given myself a deadline. This won't evolve into something too major."
He nodded again, changing the topic. "What was that blueprint you were working on?"
I smiled, explaining the basic principles behind Anesidora. He found the science and mechanics difficult to understand, but the projection capacity struck him as 'especially fitting'.
[-]
The elder two Tokoyamis would not be home for a week, apparently, so the two of us (plus Dark Shadow) had free reign of their property, so long as we didn't damage the house. Neither of us had much to do though, so when morning came we moved out to the backyard to train.
"You still specialising in kicks?" I asked as we faced each other.
"My hero costume will fall over most of my body. Even with holes available for my arms, my legs will be the most free."
I nodded. "Might want to rethink that when you practice the sections and Umbral Armament," I told him, getting into a ready stance. "Your upper body will be just as effective when Dark Shadow becomes your sole loadout."
"I will consider it," he replied, getting into a stance of his own. "Shall we begin?"
Rather than answer, I dashed forwards, suppressing the sensation trying to flicker to life in my chest as I did so. Fumikage's leg raised to the side, ready to strike. The limb lashed out quickly, far faster than it used to, and I raised my arm to defend. I tilted my own limb a bit so I could guide his leg upwards, throwing him off balance while I ducked under the attack.
Unlike the last time he tried that, he was ready for my response. As I kicked out to take his leg out from under him, he hopped and span, landing on the leg he just tried to kick me with and kicking me with the leg he was balancing on. It was impressive to watch and required that I take this kick head on, bracing both my arms and catching his leg as it came close.
I whirled around before he could rebalance himself, throwing him across the yard. I was certain that, should we be using quirks, I'd have gotten hit and been able to hit in equal measure as Kuro and Dark Shadow would fight for us, but since this was training for fighting styles, I let Fumikage land and flip himself onto his feet while I suppressed that feeling in my chest.
Fumikage approached me this time, using his arms and throwing a left hook, something I easily saw coming. What I didn't notice was that when I knocked his fist aside and prepared to grab his arm, he span with the deflection and slammed his right leg into my side. His shin hit my ribs, making me bend away from my attempted grapple and slam my left arm around his leg, trapping it there. For payback, I brought my right leg around and kicked the thigh of the leg he was standing on.
With some extra assistance on my part, exerted via the leg still in my grasp, that was enough to push him to the ground. I repositioned myself and put him in a leg lock, careful not to actually cause any damage as Fumikage grunted in pain.
After a few seconds, he sighed and relaxed. "I yield," he said, making me get off him and help him to his feet. He tapped the foot I had caught on the floor a few times to shake away the pain. "I'm reminded of the foolish words of the masses that say you can do nothing without another's quirk to copy."
With those words, we went back to starting positions and started again, and continued until lunch. About half way through, we included quirks into the mix, and I let that sensation that had been building in my chest free.
I clenched my fist, ignoring the sounds of Dark Shadow's exertion behind me, watching as a soft brown glow enveloped me. It was a weak, flickering thing, but it was there, separate from my own quirk, yet a part of it anyway. Like that boy in the hero course that had both ice and fire as a quirk, I now had Copy and Aura as a quirk. That's how the template was twisted to fit this universe; turning Aura into a forcefield/physical enhancement quirk.
Standing in front of a rock, I pulled my fist backwards and punched, feeling the impact be dulled in comparison to normal punches. The forcefield sputtered to life on contact with the rock, fading soon after defending me from breaking my hand. I punched again, putting my all into the strike, and the face of the rock cracked as my fist hit it, sending little stone fragments scattering through the air. Several of them actually hit me, only to be blocked by the forcefield before they touched me.
"Oh hey, that's a cool quirk!" I heard behind me, turning to see Dark Shadow looking at my hand over my shoulder. "Isn't that your mother's?"
"Kind of," I said, spotting Fumikage's attention on me as well. I shrugged. The boy was a friend, so I didn't mind telling him a bit. "When I copied her quirk, the forcefield was white, like hers. The brown one happened afterwards. It's self generating, so I think it just needed a jumpstart for me to use."
"Her forcefield?"
"And more," I answered Fumikage. I gestured to the rock with a hole in it. "It also gives me a physical boost and a healing factor, so long as I have the energy for it."
"And this energy is your own, or something separate?"
"Separate. Stamina doesn't factor into it, from what I know." I wasn't going to say anything about Quirk Amp or the potential for Photographic Memory. The former wasn't my secret, and I have no idea how the later will work yet. Also, Velvet had enhanced hearing from her bunny ears, and night vision from being a Faunus. I'm not sure how they'll develop either.
Fumikage nodded, before waving an arm over the open yard. "Want to try it out?"
I grinned.
[-]
Mother wasn't home when I finally decided to return. I'd sent a message to Dad to make sure of it, wanting a few extra minutes before I had to say anything to her. Apparently she'd gone out to get groceries, and if she wasn't trying to make my favourite meal to help in the apology, I'd be shocked.
"She's been driving herself mad, you know?" Dad said as we sat down in the living room. "She came running to me as soon as you left, trying to figure out how to explain everything and make things... better."
"...Thanks for dropping off some clothes for me," I said, rather than focus on his words. He huffed through his nose, a wry smile on his face. "Did you know?"
"About why she did it? Yeah." He looked older then. A bit more weary. "I used to run with the group that helped her get her quirk out of the system. I didn't know that she'd gone so far to stop you from copying it though. I would have said something, if I did." Then he looked straight at me, as serious as I've ever seen him. "It does make sense though. She's been straining her quirk, keeping her forcefield active for almost a decade straight. I've been noticing the results, but she'd never tell me what was going on."
That meant little to me, and I think he noticed. He sighed and glanced at the clock before closing his eyes. "She should be back any minute now. Hope you've got an idea of what to do. Because one way or another, I'm not letting this continue past today."
"I don't want it to," I shot back, frowning. "I didn't want any of this to happen in the first place. It's paranoia blown out of proportion, all for the sake of a blank quirk!" A little heat entered my voice, and I took the effort to stamp it down while my dad blinked.
Then he sighed again. "It's blank, huh?" He looked over my hands, which had been coated in Aura when I got emotional. "Even with your own energy store?"
"Essentially," I confirmed, tagging my Aura to the list of things to talk with him (possibly mother) about later. "That's my quirk, not hers. They'll probably end up stacking, but I can't use mine to fuel hers." I remembered how her quirk felt. It was specialised, and her version of Aura was tuned to work with her quirk. My version of Aura fuelling her Quirk Amp would be like a normal human trying to live off of sunlight, water, and nutrients in the soil.
Dad winced. "So, she was right about your quirk, but there was no point worrying about it in the first place," I heard him mutter to himself.
I was about to say something, but the front door opened before I could, making me tense slightly before I could stop myself. It seemed to be no time at all that mother had entered the room, dropping her shopping bag when she saw me. I stood up and looked at her, hiding any thoughts I may be having.
She looked bad. She had bags under her eyes and her hair, usually tied in a braid, was messy, by her standards at least. She looked paler than she was a few days ago, and it was clear to see that Dad was looking after her while she's been focused on... something else.
"Neito…"
I didn't say anything, simply stepping around the chair and walking up to her. I refused to slow down when I saw the edges of her Aura spark into existence, and felt somewhat lighter when I saw her consciously pull back her forcefield. A decade of rather frequent usage seems to have made it an automatic thing, and while it very much hurts to see it activate when I'm around, that seems to have changed.
She just stood there as I hugged her and rested my head on her shoulder. She was tense, something I could easily feel, but I was more focused on the fact that I could feel it. The quirk the bloomed in my perspective didn't matter. Dad sighing in relief behind me didn't matter. The stupid tears building up and making my vision go all blurry didn't matter.
For the first time in as long as I can remember, I hugged my mother.