Chapter Eighty-Two
With Mandalay giving me the go-ahead, I looked around at the others, for ways to improve their Quirk training. The next person that probably should have their training tweaked, however, was standing right next to us. "Well, you're doing the same thing with Shoji that you were with Toru," I offered to the older woman, "training skill instead of use. Mind you, he could probably train at home-"
"Unlicensed Quirk use is illegal, unless you're on private property," the Pussycat reminded me. "And most people don't own their homes."
I gave the woman a flat look, "And I'm sure you never used your Quirk in your house, growing up, and certainly never used it outside of officially sanctioned circumstances. Dude grows arms, he's not Bakugo," I said, jerking a hand towards the teen in question, who, with a rage-filled yell, set off an explosion bigger than my parent's house.
"Just reminding you," the brunette informed me with a smug, cat-like expression.
". . . Right. So he could train that unsupervised at UA, but we're explicitly here to stress the limits of our Quirk's power, not our skill in using it," I redirected. "In that case, Shoji, you grow arms from your arms, but can you grow arms from your arms from your arms from your arms from your arms?"
The masked boy looked at me, then glanced at his arm, which grew a hand-tipped limb, which in turn grew another, the third extending slower, a look of concentration on his face as it finished and he tried for a fourth, which slowly started to emerge, his chained limb shaking with the effort, before it retracted back into the third, which itself pulled back into the second, though that one stayed out.
"I cannot," Shoji admitted, a note of frustration in his voice, muffled as it was by his mask.
"You cannot yet," I corrected, smiling encouragingly. "Other than that, maybe try to make bigger arms, or diversify the composition of those arms? For instance, do they need to be covered in skin, or could you use bone plates? It'd let you defend better, and handle things that normally only Kirishima could. In one respect, your power's only 'arms,' but there's still a lot of wiggle room there, if you'll pardon the pun," I joked, waggling my own arm. "Mandalay, any suggestions?"
The Pussycat gave the handsy boy a considering look. "Pull it back, and make the longest arm you can," she ordered, and the boy did so, the tentacle-esque limb extending, and extending, and extending, until it was damn near as long as he was tall, before it snapped back. Well, snapped back for Shoji, which was more of a fleshy retraction that, honestly, was a little gross, as opposed to my clean *snap*, but he didn't have any muscle spasms afterwards, so it was superior in that respect.
The Pro nodded, asking, "The way it felt, to stretch it that way. Was it different? Different from making multiple limbs?" she specified, and, after a moment's thought, he nodded. "Then make arms, until you can't. Then switch to making one long one, until you can't. And keep going back and forth. Until you can't."
Shoji gave her a serious nod, and sent an odd look my way, before he took a few steps back to start doing just that. Toru's voice made me jump a little, as she was right next to us apprently, when she asked, "And me?"
"Keep doing what Kaminari had you do," Mandalay ordered. "Try and grab as much light as you can, and push it together. Just, don't point it at anyone, 'kay?"
"O-of course!" the invisible girl replied, and the area around us started to darken again.
When the Pro turned an expectant look my way, I walked a bit back, giving the two space to practice, as I considered the others. Everyone with some variation of 'I blast shit' was pretty easy to train, it was just 'blast shit more'. Todoroki was the only one who couldn't do so, given his power had a built-in balancing mechanic, but his training, switching between the two as hard as he could, handled that as well. Similarly, all of the 'Enhanced Physiology' set, that being Sato, Kirishima, Asui, and Midoriya were similarly easy to work with, even if Midoriya's was being trained backwards, conditioning his body to handle his power instead of increasing his power by conditioning his body.
Those with built-in physical limits, like the strength of Mineta's scalp, or Momo's ability to process food into the reserves she used to create things, were a bit less straightforward, though still fairly obvious, and Tokoyami couldn't actually grow his power, or at least I didn't think he could, but it was his control that needed work, and in this case his losing control might mean a combative intervention, so working on it here made sense.
One of my classmates, though, her training didn't make sense, either in the 'increasing Quirk power' sense or in the 'why can't you just do this at home' way.
"Jiro," I said, turning to look at Mandalay. "She's not training her Quirk, only doing physical toughness conditioning. Mina's the same, in a respect, but she's upping her ability to create stronger acids at the same time, but Jiro's not."
The Pro didn't say anything, but gestured for me to go over, so I jogged to the pair, Mina glancing over and smiling, before she noticed the Pussycat behind me. "Sparky, what'd'ya do?" she questioned fondly, if at a little exasperatedly.
"Decided I could figure out people's training better than they can," I offered, which got a smiling sigh from my girlfriend, "And Mandalay's letting me give it a shot."
"Spar-ky," Mina rebuked, but there wasn't any heat to it, her demeanor switching over to optimistically excited. "Okay, what should I be doin'? 'Cause this ain't fun, hun," she remarked, motioning towards the cliff-face, which she'd already eaten away in two handprint-shaped holes, the ones she'd made yesterday right beside them.
Wincing, I told her, "Uh, actually your training is pretty spot-on. Like, maybe work on controlling larger amounts of acid, but being able to make stronger acids is pretty important. Just also make sure to get your forearms, since that's where the canon on your armor sits," I told her, tapping the spot where it'd pull from, instead of her palms, which would've required a much more complicated tube assembly that'd get in the way of normal use.
"Ugh, fine," my girlfriend groaned. "But you're kissing them better, mister!"
"Will do," I smiled, turning to Jiro, who'd been listening in, but who was taken aback by my shift of focus. "I'm actually here for you."
"M-Me?" the rocker questioned, unsure. "This is fine," she said, half-heartedly plunging a jack into the stone, then wincing as it bled a little.
"You could do this on your own time with a square of rock, or iron," I disagreed, adding, "and using your physiological mutations for non-commercial uses isn't even considered 'Quirk Use'," before Mandalay could say a word. "So, Jiro, your Quirk lets you jack-in to things, letting you detect sonic vibrations, and create them in turn, right?" I checked.
"I, yeah," she nodded, giving me a skeptical look. "You got something for me to do, Kaminari?"
I shrugged, "Probably. We need to figure out your physical limits, and then go beyond them. 'Plus Ultra' and all that jazz," I offered with a smile. "Toughening your jacks is good, and maybe seeing if you can increase their physical strength would work too, but the sound part's probably what we should focus on."
"So, like, trying to hear quieter and quieter things?" she proposed.
"The opposite might be it," I disagreed. "Increasing your tolerance for loud sound might be useful, but you need an offensive boost. Do you know how those speakers of yours work? The Support items built into your costume?"
Jiro, unfortunately, shook her head no. "Sorry. Just that they do."
Frowning, I remarked, "I'll have to ask Power Loader for the schematics later, but if it's just an amplifying system disguised as speakers, it'd explain how they make weapons-grade sound without, well, all the negative effects of sonic weaponry, though perhaps. . ."
"Sparky, focus!" Mina urged, and I shook my head, dismissing possible schematics.
"Right, sorry," I apologized. "So I've seen you use it on physical objects, which means there's a certain amount of kinetic resonance transferal, which puts you into the 'blasting shit' category of powers, which actually makes this easier," I smiled. "If you could, plug in to the wall and use as much sound as you can, all at once, directing it that way," I ordered, waving away from us, where, even if there was some shrapnel, it wouldn't hit anyone.
Jiro hesitated, looking to Mandalay, who nodded, and she plugged once more into the rock-face. Gritting her teeth, there was a subtle ripple of force, before the wall practically exploded outwards starting a few inches from the jack and extended a good thirty feet away, solid stone fragmenting and coming apart, causing a mini rockslide as it fell to the ground. When the dust settled, I could see the spread pattern, ripples in the rock itself looking exactly like an extending wave, though one with a strict forty-five degree spread that wasn't natural in the slightest.
But, then again, it would fit a person's interpretation of how sound spread through a medium, like disturbances on the surface of a pond, even though actual sound should've shifted and bounced off the irregularities in the stone, since it wasn't made of a single, uniform material. Another point for Quirks being subconsciously controlled, I thought, having been trying to figure out how I could use enough electricity to kill someone without doing more than aggressively taze them, only even then without any possibility of inflicting cardiac damage.
Looking to the sonic blaster, she seemed a little woozy, but was quickly recovering. Before I could say anything, Mina jumped in, gasping and squeeing, "Oh my god, Kyoka! That was so flippin' cool!"
Jiro shook her head to clear it, then looked at the destruction she'd wrought with wide eyes, whispering to herself, "holy shit."
"Never gone all out, have ya?" Mandalay questioned, giving me another appraising look out of the corner of her eye, though most of her attention was on the rocker.
And if she never had, it wouldn't be a 'strength' for Ragdoll to pick up on, I completed internally.
"I, no. I've rattled a few robots, but not, well, that," the rocker muttered, smiling to herself. "Just, damn."
"I know, right!?" Mina grinned. "That's some Bakugo-level damage right there!"
Kyoka blinked, then stared at what she'd done with new eyes, stuttering out, "R-really?" She glanced over, and I realized that the boy in question had paused his repeated explosions to look at what we were doing, along with half the class. The detonating teen surveyed the effects, and gave Jiro a nod of respect, before going back sticking his hand into near-boiling water and setting off another enormous explosion, which shocked the others into going back to their training.
"Anyways, that seemed to tire you out, right Jiro?" I questioned, the girl blinking, a bit flushed, before she nodded.
"I, yeah. It's just. . . a lot," jacked girl slowly articulated, clearly trying to put words to feelings she didn't quite understand.
"Cool, now keep doing it," I ordered. "With time you'll get even stronger, and when we're all back at UA you can work on shaping it."
My girlfriend looked at me, confused, echoing, "Shaping?" I glanced at the pattern, and she followed my gaze, understanding dawning in an instant. "Oh! It's like me and my acid! Only all at once!" Glancing to Kyoka, she added in an oddly teasing tone, "Like an explosion!"
The rocker reddened again at the repeated comparisons to the temperamental blonde, maybe she didn't like it? He was kind of an asshole, though he was getting better. Either way, Mandalay gave the sonic blaster orders to train up the strength of her shockwaves, shepherding me away to look at the training of the others.
For Class 1-A, those three were really the only obvious improvement I could see to make, and for 1-B, I really didn't know their Quirks that well, requiring quick explanations before I could even try and make any suggestions.
The guy who could make his exhalations solid was doing breathing exercises to take in and expel air quickly, already breathing out more than probably should be physically possible. Mushroom girl was making mushrooms, size-changing girl was rapidly cycling a number of items back and forth, the glue guy was making a small mountain of the stuff, onomatopoeia guy was shouting out a ton of solid words, the mantis guy who could project blades was projecting as many as he could, as big as he could, and as rapidly as he could while Ibara was making all the vines. Shadow guy was trying to make a black mannequin move, struggling to make it more than twitch, Tokage was trying to work on separating out into as many pieces as possible while keeping them out as far as possible, and scale guy was trying to cover as much of himself with scales as possible, then firing them off and trying to regrow them faster.
The guy who could soften things, was; beast guy had become huge while visibly struggling to keep a hold of himself; and the telekinetic girl was surrounded by a small storm of items that she was constantly dropping and trying to re-acquire, obviously working at the edge of some kind of limitation. Spin-to-Win and Kendo were doing strength training with Midoriya, while TetsuTetsu was beating on, and being beaten on by, Kirishima. The last four, though, caught my attention.
The guy who could fuse things was putting together a shattered ceramic tablet depicting UA, then shattering it again, and re-fusing the now differently broken pieces. Pony was maneuvering her horns back and forth, while the double-impact guy was just using his Quirk over and over, almost seeming bored. Lastly, Monoma was dashing back and forth between his classmates, copying half a dozen people's powers, but, like the others, he didn't seem to be straining. Just moving.
The problem, as far as I could tell, was that these were all skill based uses, and Monoma's wasn't even that.
Talking to them individually, though with Monoma I finally had to have Mandalay tell the boy to answer my friggin' questions, I was able to get to the heart of the issue, in that while this was training, this wasn't the extreme level of training the others were going through, and all of them, like my own classmates, just accepted what the Pussycats had asked them to do without really thinking about it.
Something that Pros wouldn't do when they came here to train and let loose, but students, especially those that'd been trained by the Japanese school system, or at least this weird future version of it we all went through, wouldn't realize there was anything that they might need to push back against. The difference between training confident adults and unsure teenagers, I told myself, though I barely qualified, original me being in my mid-twenties instead of older like these Pros, only my foreknowledge of just how fallible these people were, along with my status as an outsider, giving me the perspective needed to question this as deeply as I was.
Fuse boy was limited by surface area, so I had Momo 3-D print off a ream of poster-sized papers, and tasked him to fuse the individual sheets together in one go, something he couldn't manage, and something that pushed himself to even try, which made it the exact kind of practice that the rest of us were doing.
Pony's training was similarly easy to figure out, the girl able to hold two of her horns in the air and maneuver them, but she grew another pair on her head nigh-instantly, so she could theoretically use more. In actuality, though, when she fired another pair, she lost control of the original two, and trying to take control of them back meant she dropped the second two. Noting it as a skill training for later, something the girl admitted she already was working on, I shifted gears to see just how many horns she could create and fire at once, essentially replicating what Mineta was currently doing.
While the girl didn't have his unfortunate physical limitations, not bleeding from over-use, the creation of her horns ex nihilo did impose some kind of minor energy cost, as, while she could get a good stream of them going for a few seconds, it started to slack off after that, the teen breathing hard as if she were sprinting.
~Oh, this goddamn sucks!~ Pony groaned in southern-accented English, as the flow slowed to a trickle.
~Welcome to camp,~ I snarked right back. ~You think me giving myself muscle spasms from overdoing my transformations is fun?~
The girl froze, turning a delighted look my way. ~Oh darn, You speak English? Like, actual English!~
~Almost like I was a native,~ I quipped, ~but we can do that later. This'll suck donkey balls in the short-term, but it's needed training for some of the shit we're likely to find ourselves in down the line. Trust me.~
The girl grinned, giving me a salute, and went back to firing while Mandalay and I moved to the last two.
~I canna speaka English too,~ the Pro pointed out, with a very thick accent.
~Was I wrong?~ I shot back, the woman not answering, which was answer enough.
Dealing with the last two, coming up with something was a bit harder, Shoda's 'Twin Impact' Quirk's only limitation being how much force he himself could physically exert, with a cap on how many 'charges' he could hold at once, but that was something he'd admitted that he'd been training for a while, and could do on his own. Monoma, meanwhile, didn't seem to be actually getting anything from using the powers he copied, and if there was any kind of advantage to doing so, it wouldn't be anything we could easily improve on in a few days of intense training, even Mandalay noting that Ragdoll had been at a bit of a loss as to what to do for him.
"Okay, I've got a suggestion, but first," I said, waving over to where Midoriya, Kendo, and the others were being put through their paces, "Is 'work out, but really hard' actually a good use of their time, or yours?"
The Pro was silent for a moment, as if unsure of what I was really asking, but there was no subtext there, something she got after a few seconds, then smirked about, shaking her head. "Pushing yourself that hard, Kaminari, there's a chance of injury. Tiger's an expert at that kind of thing, and a trained medical professional. So am I, for that matter."
"Oh," I replied, "So while I can practically regenerate, they can't." Thinking about it, I sighed, "And I've probably already screwed myself up, with my own training, but with my healing I thought I just pulled something, only, with how I am now, pulling something shouldn't've taken that long to come back from."
"Put those two with Tiger, to make them stronger?" the brunette proposed, guessing my suggestion before I even made it. Before I could respond, she nodded in agreement to her own statement. "Okay, I can see that. Short kid's obvious, and the blond brat will always have his strength, no matter what powers he copies." Mandalay shot a teasing glance my way, "The other blond brat."
"Hey, we also have Bakugo, so there's at least three of us," I riposted, the insult sliding off me with surprising ease. It only took a moment of thought to realize the reason why: She took me seriously, at least a little. I was eighty percent sure that the terrakinetic looked down on all of us, and Ragdall absolutely did. Tiger I hadn't dealt with, but Mandalay seemed like the most, well. . . adult of the four, or at least mature, and I appreciated the fact that she'd actually listened.
Sighing, I shook my head, turning back to my station. "Now, if you'll excuse me, there's an iron bar and battery with my name on them."
"Not gonna change that, like you did the others?" the Pro questioned.
Looking over my shoulder, I shrugged. "Why should I? They're solid training methods."
Leaping away, sailing through the air with OfA assisted strength, I made it back to my station, took a bracing breath, and went back to pushing my limits.
MHA
It was time, the fun part of the summer-camp over, and the part where we'd have to fight for our lives just beginning. My own stamina meant the time cooking dinner had popped me back up to full, my regen only having basic wear and tear to heal me from, while Mina had, at my request a week ago, taken it a little bit easy at the end today, so she was ready to throw down if need be as well. We'd both made sure that Momo had gotten enough to eat, even if that'd gotten us an odd look from our friend, but the Creationist had humored us.
And that was all I could do, without attracting more attention, and without revealing my status as a precog-by-proxy.
"Perfect!" Pixie-bob announced. "We've filled our bellies and cleaned the dishes! It's time for. . ."
"A Test of Courage!" half the class cheered in response.
Aizawa, behind us, chimed in, "Not so fast. It pains me to say it," he said in tones that indicated it absolutely didn't, "but the remedial class will be having lessons with me tonight instead."
"Come on, Eraserhead!" Bakugo scoffed. "We got the message already."
With a flick of his wrist, the Pro sent out his capture scarf, which somehow split into five, wrapping around Sato, Kirishima, Cero, Midoriya, and Bakugo. "I'll be the judge of that," he remarked. "And I'll be using as much time as is needed until I'm sure you have."
As the others moaned, being dragged away, Aizawa stopped, and headed over to me, still trailing the five students. "Kaminari," he stated, saying nothing else.
"Aizawa," I replied, even as Midoriya looked at me curiously, as did several of the other students. "You think I need remedial training as well?"
However, he shook his head, and held out his free hand. "Your necklace. Give it to me."
I felt myself still. "Gonna have to say no on that one," I informed him slowly, my classmates looking on in confusion, and in surprise at my response.
"I wasn't asking," the Pro stated, still deadpan.
"That's nice," I told him, matching his tone.
"Sparky!" Mina hissed at my side, but I ignored her.
Glancing at my gauntlets still tucked into his belt, I stated, "You've already disarmed me enough."
Behind him, I could see Midoriya gasp in understanding, but my focus was on Eraserhead, who said nothing for a moment, then sighed. "You're going into an environment where you're supposed to be surprised. Supposed to be scared. How long would it take you to rip off and fire one? Three seconds? Two?"
"Less," I admitted, and while I didn't like it, I could see where he was going with this. "You're worried about friendly fire."
"There won't be anything friendly about it," he agreed, glancing at the Pussycats. "I suggested we not do this at all, but Principal Nezu was clear they have the final say in things. This is my compromise. And don't have Yaoyorozu make you another. I'll give it back tomorrow morning."
Which would be too late, I thought, but. . . he wasn't wrong, even if he didn't know enough to understand that it was worth the risk. The fact that I knew an attack was coming would put me on high alert, and 1-B's powers were just unknown enough to me that I might misinterpret something in the moment, where fractions of a second could mean the difference between death or merely injury.
"Sparky, please," my girlfriend whispered. "You don't need them."
Which. . . was actually a good point. I'd need a solid thirty seconds of concentration, but my own creational reserve was more than up to re-making my necklace twice over. Using Creation to construct discrete items, like my coins held onto the chain by thin, breakable loops, was beyond my current capabilities, but making them all individually was doable, and I had my Electrobody to handle the initial burst of combat.
When I looked back to Aizawa, he was staring at Mina, brow slightly furrowed, having heard her, and clearly picking up on the fact that there was a meaning beyond the obvious 'you won't need them' the situation would heavily imply.
Sighing, I reached back and unhooked the thin chain, removing it, and snapping it back together. I hesitated for a moment before dropping it into the man's waiting palm. "If anything happens, that will be on you, and the others," I told him.
He accepted the jewelry, nodding, "Already was," before turning and dragging the remedial students back towards the main building.
"Uh, Yeah!" Pixie-bob cheered, a little confused at what had just happened, but pressing on regardless, and I felt the stares of the other students on me. "As I was saying, Test of Courage!"
I nodded, Mina taking my hand and whispering into my ear, "It's gonna be fine, Sparky! Trust me!"
AN: Next Four Chapters are up on , as usual!