Chapter 7: Sparring and Dating
Josuke woke up on Saturday and had a smile on his face. He was going on a date. Not to brag, but Josuke was a bit of a ladies' man; he'd already had a dozen girlfriends throughout middle school. It helped that he was good looking, athletic, and was the child of two popular Heroes. The last part didn't matter much in UA because a lot of his fellow Hero Course students were also legacies, but the point still stood, he had the special something that made him popular with the opposite sex. All this went through his head as he got into his workout clothes and started stretching, he had to get in better shape now that he was in UA. He hated to admit it, but he was facing some serious competition, and the way his Lycanthrope Quirk worked was that it multiplied his base levels of strength. The stronger he was in his base form, the stronger his Werewolf Form. He also thought he had to try to go further as well.
After stretching, Josuke headed for the gymnasium in the 1-B dorms. Inside the gym he spotted Hana, already sweating and beating up a heavy punching bag that was being held by Hirose Rei. The large and muscular teenager grunted after Hana landed a hard spinning kick to the bag and said, "Damn, you got some strong legs for someone so slender." Hana smirked as she landed another kick, "My Mom taught me to focus on power, not size." Josuke left them alone and focused on his own workout, heading for the weights. He picked up a 10kg kettle ball and decided that was the perfect weight for him. He turned on his cell phone to a full body kettle ball workout he had seen last night and started following along to it.
After fifteen minutes, Josuke was sweating like a pig, but at least it was over. After taking five minutes to stretch, Josuke saw that Hana and Rei were sparring with each other now. He had to admit, for a large, muscular guy, Hirose Rei was also fast. Hana's kicks and strikes were nimbly dodged and blocked by the more muscular teen, but Hana was easily able to block and counter any strikes Rei tried. Josuke watched his sister and classmate spar and saw that Rei used some variant of Tiger Style kung fu and mixed with karate; almost every strike he tried to land with his hands he made a claw and moved as if he was trying to cut Hana. Josuke saw similar fighting like this with his Mom and Mysa, and himself. It was a natural consequence of fighting with claws, it became instinctual even in their normal forms.
But Hana was used to that kind of fighting and was quickly starting to wear down Rei, his large movements were costing him more energy than Hana's own straightforward kicks and punches. After six minutes of fierce back and forth exchanges, Hana finally landed a hard jab to Rei's solar plexus. He grunted and raised his hands, "You win. For someone with an Electric Quirk I though you'd be easier in hand-to-hand combat." Hana took a second to catch her breath and said, "You're a lot faster than you look, Rei-san. Problem is, I'm used to fighting people with claws. Plus, my Mom taught the whole family how to fight, she said you never know when you might have to fight someone immune to electricity, but almost no one is immune to a good punch or kick."
Rei smiled at that and Josuke thought he was smelling some strong hormones coming off of his sister. He decided then to say, "How about you try me, Rei-san?" Rei looked at Josuke and nodded, "Alright. Just don't complain if I win." Josuke cracked his neck as he walked over and took his fighting stance, "Take a minute to catch your breath, I don't want you to have any excuses for losing." Hana rolled her eyes at the macho banter but got her water bottle and stepped aside to watch, along with a few of their classmates coming into the gym as well. Most people focused on their own workouts, but a fair number stood around to watch Josuke and Rei. Hana announced, "Ready? Go!" As soon as she said 'Go', Rei shot forward with a lightning-fast kick. Josuke barely dodged it or the follow up strike Rei unleashed. Holy SHIT! Josuke thought as he barely blocked another strike and tried a kick to Rei's chest, only for him to jump back to dodge it. Josuke went on the offensive then and threw wild strikes at Rei, only for Rei to block every strike.
Their fighting styles were just too similar, and soon it became a test of endurance as Josuke struggled to keep up with Rei, realizing the blue-haired teen had way better technique than him. It was the most intense three minutes of Josuke's life, but in the end, Rei landed a roundhouse kick to his head that knocked him down and Josuke caught his breath. "You win man," Josuke said between breaths. "You're pretty good, but not as good as your sister," Rei told him as he helped him up. Josuke nodded, "I know, I know. She's the second best among the four of us, only Kaoru is better than her."
"Doesn't really matter," Hana said as she took another sip of water. "And why's that?" Rei asked as he got his own water bottle. "My Quirk has a longer range than yours. You need to get up close to attack me, but, I can send my electricity a little over three meters out and hit anything I need to," Hana explained, then made a handgun motion with her left forefinger and sent a small jolt of electricity straight at Rei. "Gah," he exclaimed, only to say, "That wasn't much." Hana smirked, "Just a little static shock to prove a point. Dad taught me a lot about control, and I think I remember reading that children that inherit Quirks from their parents often have even better control than them." Hana headed out and as she left, Josuke smelled some powerful hormones coming off Rei.
The larger teenager said, "Damn, now that's a girl I could go for." Josuke rolled his eyes and headed to his room to take a shower and get changed. Him and Samerya Hisa had decided to hang out at the school's pool, it was prefect for her because unlike public pools it was saltwater, just fine for aquatic Quirks like hers. Josuke focused on that as he cleaned himself off and pulled on his green swim trunks. He grabbed a towel and headed straight for the pool, a lot of girls and he noticed a few guys were watching him head out, some with lusty hormones coming off them. The effect made him feel extra confident.
He spotted his Grandma waiting for him in the common room, wearing a black one-piece, sunglasses and sandals. "Follow me kiddo," the retired Midnight said as she led him to the pool. They made it and saw Hisa was already there, swimming laps. She was like a blur in the water, a dark mass moving faster than any normal human could outswim. It was like watching a missile coming towards you as she rose high enough to see Josuke, and then swam straight at him before exploding out of the water and then landing right in front of him. "Holy shit that was awesome!" Josuke said out loud, and then thought to himself, Holy shit! She is SWOL! Hisa's swimsuit was a skimpy one piece that exposed her stomach and back, she had shredded eight-pack abs and the muscles in her thighs and shoulders were especially well developed, and he noticed she also had a shark fin on her back that he guessed could fold so she could wear normal, unaltered shirts. Her underside was also stark white, like the underbelly of a Great White Shark.
"Something wrong, Josuke-kun?" Hisa said as she started acting shy. "No…" Josuke managed to say, "I've just, you're even hotter than I thought." The shark girl blushed at this, and Midnight laughed at her grandson's boldness, and Josuke realized what he just said in front of his Grandma and felt self-conscious himself. "Th-thanks," Hisa said as she smiled a little, "Most guys get intimidated when they see a girl with muscles." Josuke walked closer as they walked over to a diving board, "Well, my Mom's really buff, plus she hangs out with some pretty huge superheroines. I'm used to seeing well-built ladies, but I gotta say, you're definitely the one of the most muscular girl's I've met in person." Hisa went on the diving board first and said, "Well, when you got a Shark Quirk, you got a strong compulsion to swim in the ocean, and that really works out all your muscles." She then dove into the pool with all the grace of a mermaid returning home. Josuke watched and then quickly dove in after her.
For an hour the two teens just spent time swimming together, doing laps, splashing each other, and even seeing who could hold their breath longest. In all these things except splashing, Hisa overwhelmed Josuke, even when he transformed into his werewolf form, he just wasn't in his natural element, and she was. Even with superhuman strength from his werewolf form, his body just wasn't designed for the water like hers. But despite all these things, he still had fun, just pushing himself to keep up and watch her. Watching Hisa in the water was like watching a ballerina onstage, a master martial artist in a fight, or an acrobat on the mat.
Josuke had to get out of the pool to relax and Hisa joined him and laid down beside him as they dipped their feet in the pool. "So, what's it like, being a legacy?" Hisa asked him as they rested. Josuke shrugged, "Well, Mom wasn't working as a Hero for a while, until me and my siblings, Kaoru, Hana, and Mysa went to school. Before that, we were kind of old fashioned, Mom stayed at home and took care of us and the house, while Dad worked all day. Sure, Dad was cool, people always said hi or wanted him to sign things when we went out, but I thought that was because he was a musician. He had released a few albums and stuff in Japanese and English. It wasn't until I was five that I even knew my parents were Heroes.
"Then things got different when we started school and Mom started being a Hero again. Suddenly both my parents were popular, Mom was usually asleep when we got home from school because she worked nights while Dad worked days. She used to exercise with us too, like bench pressing us, carrying all four of us around, even doing pushups with us sitting on her, until we got too big, and we couldn't all fit on her back anymore. She still does that with us occasionally, and even sits on Kaoru to help him workout, or she did before we came here."
"Wow, sounds like she had a lot of high expectations for you," Hisa said. Josuke nodded, "Only because we all said we wanted to be Heroes. Before that she even told us that we could do anything we wanted. When we told her we wanted to be Heroes like her and Dad, Mom told us the whole story about how she came to U.A. It was…dark. I'd rather not talk about it; it might ruin the mood." Hisa nodded, "I kind of know already about your Grandfather, Joseph Freeman, the first Wolfheart. I looked it up when I heard you were a legacy, and your parent's story is all over social media because of that movie about them. Anyway, we can talk about something else."
"What about you," Josuke said, "We've been talking about me and stuff, but what about you, what's your family like?" Hisa smiled and said, "I'm actually the oldest of three, all girls. My little sisters are 12 and 8. My Mom and Dad both are undersea divers with fishy Quirks, my Dad is like a Merman, and Mom is sort of like me, but instead of a shark she's got a Manta Ray like Quirk. My little sisters got their Quirks, one's a Mermaid and the other is Manta Ray like Mom. I was a surprise. But, when I figured out how to use my Quirk to fight, I thought I could be a Hero. My parents encouraged me and even got me to start taking martial arts lessons." Josuke was interested then and asked, "What kind of martial arts?" Hisa smiled as she stood up and jumped up, spinning around and twirling her tail around before landing and performing three hard punches finished with a kick, "Tailman Style Karate! A new style developed by the Hero Tailman, designed especially for those with tails like him! My whole body is a weapon." "Sweet," Josuke said, "We should spar sometime, test it out."
The two teens kept on talking for another hour before they decided to part, it was about lunchtime and Hisa was starving. They agreed to meet up again the next week, and with that Midnight and Josuke headed back to his dorm. "I must admit, you were cuter together than I expected," the retired Eighteen Plus Only Heroine said as they walked. "Well yeah, she is pretty cute. And pretty hot too. I wanna see how this goes," Josuke said. "Just go slowly, alright," Midnight told him, "I'm not eager to be a Great-Grandma quite yet." Josuke almost tripped in shock and said, "Ah Geeze!" and ran back to his room, hearing her laughing behind him.