Chapter 24: Across the Aisle
The school's decision to proceed with the sports festival as planned received a mixed reception from my classmates. Most were either excited or cautiously optimistic, but a handful expressed their doubts.
Then there's Mineta. I thought irritably as the boy in question continued to whimper behind me.
Fed up with his prattling about how he was going to die, I made my way to the front of the class, where Aizawa was leaning on a cane to slowly lower himself into his chair. While my interference had spared his eyes, the damage to the rest of his body had been just as severe, if not moreso, than it had been canonically.
"How bad is it?" I asked sympathetically as Aizawa settled into his seat with a grimace.
He exhaled heavily before casting me an irritated look and ignoring my question entirely. "You're lucky I didn't have you expelled."
"Yeah, yeah, I know, but I stand by what I said at the USJ. I couldn't just leave you to die." I replied earnestly.
Aizawa grumbled something about me being a problem child, but didn't continue his chastisement. "Four broken vertebrae, one disintegrated elbow replaced by a steel plate, a cracked skull, three broken ribs, and a serious concussion. And that's just the big stuff." He said in answer to my original question.
I winced at the list of injuries my teacher had sustained. Still, it's better than what could have happened if All Might hadn't arrived when he did.
"Well, I'm glad you're alive. When Nomu threw you, my heart practically stopped." I admitted.
Aizawa studied me for a moment before beginning to shuffle some papers atop his desk. "How are you doing?" He asked seriously.
"Me?" I repeated bemusedly. "I'm fine. You saw Nomu send me flying, but that was the only real hit I took." I answered.
Lifting his head to look at me once more, Aizawa sighed before putting his papers back down on the desk. "That's not what I mean, Midoriya." He said in exasperation.
Looking past me to ensure the rest of the class was still preoccupied discussing the festival, he continued. "You were in the courtyard. You saw the bodies. I want to make sure you're okay." He finished sincerely.
"Oh." I responded dumbly.
This is awkward. How do I answer that without coming across as a total sociopath?
"Um, yeah, I'm okay. I mean, don't get me wrong, it was jarring to see, but…" I began, fumbling for the right words. "It's just that I've watched a lot of hero videos over the years. When you get to be as obsessed as I am, you start looking on sites other than YouTube."
What I said was technically the truth. Izuku had seen his first dead body when he was nine years old. Granted, he had cried for a week and never looked at that particular site again, but it was true that he had accidentally found himself on a few Liveleak equivalents over the years.
At Aizawa's doubtful expression, I sighed and shrugged my shoulders. "Yeah, it was pretty fucked up. I've had more than a few nightmares the last couple nights. Seeing corpses online doesn't really prepare you for the real deal, especially the smell." I steeled myself as I met Aizawa's coal black eyes. "But you did the right thing. Those villains were there to try and kill All Might, and they had no qualms murdering anyone else who got in their way. While I'm relieved that I didn't have to kill anyone, I wouldn't have hesitated to do so if it meant saving you, my classmates, or myself."
It was Aizawa's turn to sigh heavily before grimacing as the action apparently agitated one of his various injuries.
"What about you? It's only been two days since the attack. Shouldn't you at least take the rest of the week?" I suggested.
Scoffing at my suggestion, Aizawa hobbled to his feet as the lunch bell rang. "Don't worry about me. I slept for almost thirty-six hours straight, after Recovery Girl finished her surgeries and quirk treatments. I only woke up in the infirmary fifteen minutes before class started. You're welcome for sparing you Present Mic's morning greeting, by the way."
I laughed at the man's tenacity, my smile widening when the corner of his mouth creeped upwards for a fraction of a second. "You should go to lunch. I'm letting you know now though that you'll need to have a session with Hound Dog this week. It doesn't need to be a regular thing and you aren't the only one going. Kirishima, Todoroki, and Bakugou will be scheduled for an appointment as well."
"Don't worry about me." I dismissed with a wave. "I have no problem going to therapy. It's Todoroki and Katsuki that you'll have trouble with."
Nodding as he watched the two boys in question make their way out of the class for lunch, Aizawa voiced his agreement. "I've wanted to get those two in with Hound Dog, anyway. The circumstances may be less than ideal, but I may as well make the most of it."
Giving him a conceding shrug, I bid Aizawa farewell, but just before I crossed the threshold of the classroom, he called out to me. "Oh, and Midoriya?"
Turning back to face him, I recoiled at the menacing gaze he pinned me with as One for All was snuffed out like a candle by Erasure. "Don't ever pull something like what you did at the USJ again, do you understand me?"
Regaining my composure, I smiled brightly and snapped a sharp salute. "Aye aye, captain!"
Aizawa dead panned at me for a moment before releasing his quirk and turning back to his desk, grumbling once again about problem children.
Stepping into the cafeteria, I quickly realized that in light of the recent attack, almost all of the student body had forgone their usual dispersed seating and had instead clustered at the various larger tables. While there appeared to be plenty of cross table discussion and even some merged classes amongst the second and third years, the first years were almost entirely segregated by class. I smiled when I noticed Cementoss reading a book at the end of Class 1-A's table, the large man acting as a deterrent to prevent them from being swarmed by the rest of the school for answers.
Well, here we go.
Striding forward, I received a few smiles and waves from my classmates, but these were swiftly replaced by looks of confusion as I made my way past the table Class 1-A had claimed for themselves and straight to the next.
Unceremoniously taking a seat as centrally as possible, I stifled a grin at the bewildered looks I was receiving from several members of Class 1-B.
"Good morning, neighbours. I assume you have more than a handful of questions. I am here to answer them as best I can." I proclaimed grandly while flashing a disarming smile.
I was met with silence for several seconds as they processed what it was I had said. Then, as if a dam had broken, I was assaulted by a torrent of questions from more than a dozen 1-B students.
Maybe I didn't think this through. Should I have them go alphabetically?
"Alright, that's enough. Quiet down!" Kendo ordered over the tumult, bringing the table's volume down but failing to completely reign in her classmates, many of whom were still attempting to speak over one another in their eagerness for information.
"I concur with our class representative. We shouldn't debase ourselves before this pompous 1-A-" Before Monoma could continue his insult, Kendo delivered a decisive chop to his neck, stunning the blonde boy as he flopped face first into his food.
The possibility of physical retaliation for their continued disobedience quickly brought the rest of Class 1-B in line, and following a few hushes, silence reigned over the table.
Nodding my head in appreciation, I looked over my shoulder to where my own class was observing the display in abject confusion. "Hey, Yaoyorozu, take notes! We should totally try that on Kacchan!"
"Try it and I'll kill you!" Bakugou replied angrily as he attempted to rise to his feet, only being kept in his seat by Kirishima's desperate intervention.
Chuckling at their display as well as Momo pinching the bridge of her nose in exasperation, I turned back to Class 1-B.
"Sorry about that. Anyway, where were we?" I asked no one in particular.
A few students hurriedly made to speak, but a swift glare from Kendo maintained the silence.
Whistling softly, I shook my head in disbelief. "It's been like a week since we chose class representatives. How do you already have this much authority?"
Kendo rubbed the back of her neck sheepishly, but Honenuki was the one to answer. "We didn't have an election. Vlad King chose Kendo as our class rep on the first day when she broke up a fight between Awase and Kaibara."
"And by 'broke up a fight', he means she smacked them both upside the head so hard they had to go see Recovery Girl." Tokage clarified with a sharp toothed grin towards the two troublemakers, both shrinking into their seats at the embarrassing memory.
Nodding in confirmation, Honenuki pointed a finger down the table towards a short, pudgy kid who smiled uncomfortably and gave an awkward wave. "Vlad King made Shoda vice rep because he was able to talk Kendo down after Fukidashi made a comment about her hands."
The physics defying student in question waved his hands wildly, the migraine-inducing speech bubble that somehow existed in lieu of his head morphing to display the words 'I'm innocent!'.
I blinked tightly to try and disperse the vertigo brought on by Fukidashi's appearance, earning a sympathetic smile from Rin, beside me. "You get used to it."
Not sure I want to. I've seen some weird looking people since arriving in this world, but this is the first one that actually hurts to look at.
"Well, it sounds like you had an exciting first day." I said in regards to our sister-class' apparently eventful introduction to UA.
"Where were you guys? You weren't in the auditorium during orientation, and when we asked Mr Kan he just grumbled something about an 'eraserhead'." Yanagi asked in her soft, almost ethereal voice.
I burst into laughter at her description of Vlad King's answer as Tetsutetsu shouted across the table. "Damnit, Yanagi! Who cares about that? We have to ask questions about what happened at the USJ!"
Waving off Yanagi's quiet apology, I regarded Tetsutetsu. "Don't worry, you aren't limited to a certain number of questions or anything." Turning back to Yanagi, I answered her first. "Mr Aizawa thinks that orientation is a waste of time, so he had us do quirk assessments on our first day. He threatened to expel whoever came in last place. It was hilarious." I finished with a laugh, my mirth only increasing after I heard Mineta's squawk of outrage from behind me.
Most of Class 1-B looked horrified at the idea of a teacher threatening to expel someone on the first day, but when I prompted them for more questions, they were quick to refocus on the subject at hand.
Looking at their entire class beside the still incapacitated Monoma waiting with hands upraised, I felt a bead of sweat form on my brow.
I should have grabbed lunch first.
What followed was effectively a recounting of my experience during the USJ attack. Within minutes, the entire cafeteria had gone silent, and most of the student body had drifted as close as they could to 1-B's table before Cementoss ordered them to keep their distance. Even my own classmates listened intently to hear my perspective of the attack.
"That's when the villains beat a hasty retreat through their portal. After that, it was pretty much just the teachers cleaning up the rest of the small timers." I concluded, having glossed over many of the grittier details of what had occurred.
The cafeteria remained deathly quiet for a moment before Shoda hesitantly spoke up. "What the news said about a lot of the villains, um… You know? Is that true?"
The smile I had endeavored to maintain through my account faded somewhat at Shoda's implication. "Yeah, a lot of the villains were killed."
Murmurs broke out across the cafeteria and I turned to look at 1-A's table, where Cementoss was observing carefully, and Kirishima, Bakugou, and Todoroki all displayed varying degrees of discomfort at the memory of the corpse-strewn central plaza.
Shifting my attention back to Shoda, I raised my voice loud enough to be heard over the commotion. "It was the right thing to do." I began, earning more than a handful of gasps from the assembled. "Ask anyone in my class, gracefully if you would, it's a touchy subject. They will tell you the same. Those villains were there with the explicit intention to murder All Might. The petty thugs had been brought along to kill us and the other teachers. If we hadn't defended ourselves, I have no doubt in my mind that the entirety of Class 1-A would have been slaughtered."
Many of the upperclassmen, particularly those in the hero course, nodded in solemn agreement, but most of the other surrounding students merely considered my words in gloomy silence.
"We heard that All Might launched the weird bird villain through the roof of the USJ like a rocket ship! Is that true?" A bright and excited voice suddenly rang out through the cafeteria.
Turning to the source, I doubletaked at Nejire Hado, who had somehow slipped past Cementoss' watch to sit at the end of 1-B's table, where she was now propped up on her knees, arms crossed atop the head of an absolutely blindsided Pony Tsunotori.
"Hado, where did you… how did you even… forget it, go back to your table this instant!" An equally caught off guard Cementoss stammered out.
The blue haired girl pouted, but before she could return to her class' table, I decided to take advantage of the opportunity to shift the school's mood.
"He did." I answered happily with an easy smile, stopping Hado in her tracks as she plopped back down and resumed her place on the head of the still hopelessly confused Pony.
Making sure the entire cafeteria could hear me, I continued. "He was amazing. One moment I thought Mr Aizawa and I were doomed, the next, All Might was there atop the staircase. Even the insane hand guy and the practically animatronic bird villain froze at the sight of him. I can't even describe watching All Might and the bird guy fight. It was like watching two legends from mythology duke it out. All Might slammed the bird guy into the ground so hard he made a crater."
I didn't have to fake the awe in my voice as I recalled the event. "You guys should have seen him when he finally broke down the bird guy's regeneration." I said dreamily, the entire room hanging off my every word. "You may have heard this saying before, but I'll show you what it really means. Go beyond…'" I repeated All Might's words from the fight.
I shook my head slowly at the image seared into my mind's eye. The smile on my face hurt, it was so wide.
"I'll remember that 'Plus Ultra' until the day I die. I felt it in my soul." Turning back to Hado, who had finally removed herself from Pony and was now bouncing in her seat, I finished. "Like you said, it was like watching a spaceship launch."
As I had hoped, the more detailed recounting that focused on All Might lifted the spirits of the surrounding students as their minds raced trying to imagine what it must have been like to witness.
Walking up to the 1-B table, Cementoss gave me a small nod before addressing the students, who had finally been broken from their sulking and were now chattering amongst themselves excitedly. "Alright, head back to your tables. More information will be released by the school and the police in the coming days, but I can confirm that Midoriya's account is accurate."
The pro hero's corroboration led to an increase in the commotion as the various students began to make their way back to their tables. Slouching in my seat with a weary smile, I was drawn back to the present as my stomach growled loudly. Hesitantly, I looked at the large clock mounted above the cafeteria entrance.
Two minutes until the bell. I hate my life.
The remainder of the school week passed rather uneventfully. Our practical hero training had been postponed in order to give us time to physically and mentally recover from the attack, but the biggest change had been in how we moved around the school. Even after I had more or less explained what happened to everyone in the cafeteria, Class 1-A was still being constantly badgered by other students for more information. As a result, we never moved anywhere on school grounds without a teacher escorting us, something that was welcomed by some of my classmates and resented by others.
By the following Monday, the school appeared to have calmed down enough that the teachers deemed it acceptable for us to begin moving about on our own again. While this hadn't proven to be an issue during the lunch period when we were under the watchful eyes of teachers in the cafeteria, the final bell heralded something else entirely. Especially as Aizawa had left fifteen minutes prior to the final bell, most likely to take another nap.
"Why the heck are you all here?" Uraraka exclaimed in surprise as she opened the classroom's door, revealing the hallway beyond to be completely packed with first year students.
Iida politely enquired as to their business while Mineta immediately began protesting being held hostage. Watching Bakugou stalk towards the exit, I sighed heavily at what was to come.
"They're scouting out the competition, you idiots. We're the class that survived a real villain attack. Cementoss and the other teachers have kept them at a distance ever since the USJ. Now that the teachers have backed off, they want to see us up close with their own eyes." Bakugou stated dispassionately, a stark contrast to his usual boisterous demeanor.
Several of our classmates seemed to reach the same conclusion I had and began to panic as Katsuki came to a halt at the entrance, staring down the students before him, many of whom quailed at his dauntless approach. Kirishima hurried forward in an attempt to thwart the inevitable, but it was too late.
"At least now you know what a future pro looks like. Now move it, extras." Katsuki demanded.
The students, both in the classroom and in the hall, immediately descended into chaos. The collection of general, support, and business students immediately began shouting in outrage as several of my classmates chastised Katsuki for his rudeness.
"So this is Class 1-A?"
I wasn't sure how, but the dry, airy voice managed to pierce through the din, silencing the assembled students as a taller boy with purple hair made his way to the front of the mob.
"I heard you guys were impressive, but you just sound like an ass. Is everyone in the hero course delusional or just you?" Shinso asked sardonically.
"You and I are going to need to do some damage control next week. Go talk to the other first year classes at lunch or something." I suggested to Momo, who had a hand over her face in resignation.
As Shinso set down his declaration of war, I made my way past my mortified classmates to stand just behind Bakugou. It wasn't particularly necessary, but I figured it wouldn't hurt to try and alleviate some of the tension.
On cue, Tetsutetsu yelled out over the crowd from his position just outside 1-B's classroom. "Here I thought you guys were alright, but it turns out you're just a bunch of assholes that think you're better than us!"
Without so much as a click of his tongue, Katsuki turned and walked away, the other students quickly clearing out of his path. As Tetsutetsu began shouting after him, I made my way forward to the doorway.
"Hey, Tetsutetsu! Sorry about him." I apologized over the crowd.
"Oh, hey, Midoriya. That guy's a real asshole!" The silver haired boy said.
"Yeah, I know. He's a dick to us, too." I replied with a laugh.
I noticed Katsuki's shoulders tense, but before he could respond, Kirishima came up beside me.
"Dude, where are you going? You gotta say something! It's your fault they're all hating on us, Bakugou!" He demanded.
Katsuki halted and turned to look at us over his shoulder. "These people don't matter. The only thing that's important is that I beat them." He finished before stomping off, leaving most of the students in stunned silence.
The crowd dispersed in a storm of angry muttering as my classmates started bickering amongst themselves as to whether or not Bakugou was correct.
Well, so much for that. At least Tetsutetsu still likes me I guess…