Bakugo, Savior of Mankind, and the Race to Save Christmas
Ominous flashing lights glowed in the windows of Mei's workshop. Thunder rumbled in the wintry sky, and haunting music sounded faintly out of nowhere. Wind howled through bare branches, making them scrape against the windows like gnarled fingers, and snow blew about the ground like crystalline fog.
Mei made one last touch-up with the welder, pulled up her mask, and wiped off her brow. "Good, good," she said. "Now, for the final touch!"
She flipped a switch. Lightning struck the workshop, surging down the giant metal cables and onto her workbench. On the table, a mechanical figure rose, whirring to life. Glowing red eyes snapped open, its metallic arms reached out, and it moaned like a diesel engine.
"Ho, ho, ho!" It puffed out, belching acrid smoke.
"It's alive!" Mei shouted. "Time to build you a sleigh and some mecha-reindeer."
The door slammed open. Bakugo stormed in and shouted, "Aha! The robots intend to replace Santa! Well, not on my watch!"
Bakugo grabbed Shoji and stretched him like taffy until he grew arms in the shape of a sleigh. He hitched Ochako to the sleigh, made her slap it into the air, then set Aoyama sparkling at the lead. He stuffed Momo in a sack, shoved boxes of pizza inside, and pulled out wrapped presents. Then he tied Hagakure to the underside with a bungee cord and slathered enough Vaseline on her to make her shoot cleanly through any chimney.
"Perfect!" Mei said. Her Mecha-Santa stood astride his steel sleigh, and clockwork reindeer snorted steam and pawed at the snow. "I needed a way to test out my new babies."
"Dream on! We're handling this Christmas ourselves!"
"Oh? Are you afraid you're going to lose?"
Bakugo ground his teeth. "We'll show your stupid robot Santa who's boss! Bring it on!"
"Alright then! Whoever delivers the most presents by Christmas Day wins."
Bakugo hopped onto the Shoji-sleigh. "No time to lose! We have robots to defeat!"
"Uh, Bakugo?" Ochako said. "I'm feeling-"
Bakugo cracked the reins. Ochako hurled downward, propelling the sleigh skyward with a rainbow geyser. Once airborne, Aoyama activated his beam and pushed them through the air. As they approached a chimney, Bakugo shoved a present in Hagakure's arms and kicked her off. She fell through the chimney, chucked the present through a TV, and popped back up for a second box. Trees toppled, windows broke, and one unfortunate man received a concussion courtesy of the rapid-fire present delivery. The general consensus among those receiving their gifts mused that it was at least better service than UPS.
Bakugo reached into his sack again, only to come up empty. He shook it, then scowled inside. "Hey, what's the holdup? That robot bastard's gaining on us!"
Momo raised an anemic arm. "So… weak… too many presents…"
"You can't give up now! Think of all the sad children who won't get any presents in the morning, or worse yet, will get one from a robot!"
At Bakugo's encouraging words, Momo hardened her resolve. Where she found the strength to carry on, no one knows, but legend says that her chest grew three sizes that day. With the extra fat stores, she made a veritable flood of baseball bats and wooden rocking horses.
And so it was, that the people of the world woke that morning to find the snow glittering in rainbow colors and cheap presents smelling like stale pizza lodged in their most expensive belongings. All fifty of the people that the 1-A students managed to reach before Ochako ran out of vomit and crashed into a fountain, anyways.
As Bakugo tried to blast his way back into the sky with his own two hands, the sun rose. Mei's mecha-santa touched down, and the inventor hopped off. "So, we got the entire world population minus fifty people. How many did you get?"
"Fifty people."
"That means we win!"
Bakugo pulled a shotgun out of the sleigh. "Only if the world population is more than a hundred people."
Panicked screams came from around them. Aoyama looked around. "Merci, that was fast."
Two people ran as a present with mechanical legs chased them down. Bakugo aimed and fired. The present exploded in a shower of bolts, motor oil, and confetti.
"Come on, guys." Bakugo slathered motor oil under his eyes like face paint. "Let's go spread some Christmas cheer."
The students went a hacking and a blasting, smiting all the terrible toys given to the good little girls and boys. Once they stood upon a pile of robot corpses, with the rising sun at their backs and the robot menace dead at their feet, all the people of the world cheered and rejoiced at their newfound freedom.
"The robots tried to use Christmas against us," Bakugo told them all. "They snuck into your homes while you slept and posed as gifts for you to open. But machines are no gift. They are our destruction! And though they failed today, they will try again, and again, until they have killed and enslaved every last one of us. Which is why we have to kill them first! Who's with me?"
The people of the world roared their approval. Torches and pitchforks were raised high, and they marched upon the electronic stores.
As they were about to purge the world of machines, a verdant glow fell upon the wintry countryside. Out of the sky dropped all manner of mechanical marvels. Microwaves, televisions, computers, PS6's fell like twinkling stars from the heavens. The people abandoned their torches and took up their new cellphones, faces going slack in the pallid light of LED screens.
From on high, jingling bells rang. Izuku's voice boomed out, "Ho ho ho! Merry Christmas!"
I did not change the time zone on my computer so I still technically managed to get this out on Christmas day, don't be absurd!
Also, if you missed it, two new stories dropped today. You can pick between Aizawa's definitely not getting enough coffee and Izuku turned himself into a lizard, it was the funniest shit you've ever seen.