"Regular speech,"
"Flashback speech,"
'Inner dialogue,'
'Phone Text Chat'
"Are you sure you have to go," Ms. Midoriya asked as Himiko opened the apartment door.
"Sorry, I've got some important stuff I need to do, but I'll be back later when Izu comes home," she smiled.
"Bye, momma," Eri pouted forlorn at Himiko leaving.
Himiko crouched down and gave the girl a big hug. "I'll be back later with Papa, so don't be too upset!"
"O-Okay," the girl nodded, sniffling and wiping at her eyes.
Himiko softly smiled, rubbed the girl's head, and walked out of the apartment. She made her way to the other side of Musutafu.
Honestly, if she didn't need to do this, she wouldn't have left the apartment, but at this point, she had no other choice.
Most people didn't know it, and even some heroes weren't aware, but every city had its own center of activity for most of its criminals. She would be headed to the western edge of Musutafu today.
It was gradual, but anyone who could see the signs would know they had entered a seedier part of the city. Pristine and clean streets gave way to cracked roads and stained sidewalks that abounded with garbage.
Where you normally saw people walking about individually on the main streets, you would now commonly see people sticking in large groups. In a few cases, these were simply for protection, but most of them were, in actuality, independent gangs.
The only out-of-place sight to the residents of Western Musutafu was the smiling blonde girl skipping down the sidewalk, humming to herself.
"Hmm~ Hmm~ Hmm~" Himiko hummed, looking at the address on her phone again.
'It should be the next apartment building on the left,' Himiko skipped a few more feet, walking slowly along the apartment's walkway.
A group of men stood outside the building, all smoking and watching her approach.
"The fuck you want, kid?" One of the men with a beard barked at her," We ain't babysitters!"
"Nah, I think she's looking for a good time, Daisuke," the man said to the first one who had called out to her. The man approached Himiko, throwing his arm around her shoulder.
As the man's arm wrapped around her shoulder, his hand grabbed for her breast, and Himiko immediately pulled out her knife in a flourish, severing his index finger. The smile on her face grew wider as the man screamed. He tried to pull away, but Himiko grabbed his wrist and watched the blood spurt out.
"The fuck!? Hey, psycho bitch, let go of Souta," yelled Daisuke, pointing a gun at her; as he did, Himiko jerked Souta's wrist to bring his body to block the gun.
"If ya wanna shoot me, you're gonna have to shoot your friend~," Himiko laughed in a sing-song voice.
The seconds stretched on, and the gun didn't fire, so Himiko pushed Souta forward, keeping him between her and the gun. Once they were within a few feet, Himiko shoved the defingered thug at his friend, and she ran around to the side in a tight arch.
The gun fired, but that was just from the man bumping into his friend, who fell over with a gunshot wound to the stomach.
"Y-You bitch you made me shoot S—" Before he could finish yelling, Himiko had stabbed the man in the Achilles tendon of his right leg and then severed his left tendon as well.
Her last move was to press her knife to the man's throat. Her smile widened, showing the man her fangs, "which apartment are the rest of your buddies in?"
"T-Twenty-five."
"Any keys or passwords?"
"I-In my left pocket, I got the spare key."
"Good boy," Himiko smiled, took the knife away from his throat, and fished the keys out. She turned quickly, kicking the man so hard in the face that he tumbled down the steps, unconscious, along with his friend.
"Hmm~ Hmm~ Gonna make some money~," Himiko began humming again as she opened the entrance door to the apartment complex.
"I swear it's only been two days, and you've already been in my office both days," Recovery Girl grouched, waving her cane dangerously at the groggy Izuku.
"S-Sorry," Izuku yawned. "It wasn't exactly my fault I got this hurt; my opponent didn't really care too much about hurting me."
"Then I'll have to recommend that you not be paired with that student to your teachers. Now you should be all better. Just be careful of the stress put on your right leg; it was nearly fractured." Izuku nodded, standing up and putting his weight on the leg experimentally. It was a bit stiff, but he'd be able to walk it off, heading back to ground Beta.
Ratty, that was the only way Himiko could describe the inside of the apartment building. There were piled-up bags of trash under the stairs, litter all over the hallways, and junkies in the halls—each shooting up various drugs that made her crinkle her nose in disgust.
Apartment twenty-five was on the third floor, and it had the cleanest corridors by far. It looked like the entire floor was occupied by whoever was supplying the people downstairs with drugs.
Himiko cracked her neck and stretched a little bit; there wasn't any way she was going to be able to go through an entire floor of bad guys if she wasn't limber.
She readied herself and unlocked the door.
"Did I make you wait," Izuku frowned at Yaoyorozu worriedly, trying to figure out how to look at her without getting flashed and turning extremely red.
"Not at all," she answered back, observing the screen attentively, "we're watching the fight between teams H and J."
Izuku studied the screen for only a moment before he started feeling very bad for Kirishima and Sero. They had been put up against Tokoyami and Asui. The battle wasn't going too well, to say the least. While Sero had put up multiple lines of his tape to create traps all around the building, it didn't look like Tokoyami's quirk Dark Shadow cared as he tore them apart.
When the heroes finally found the villains and the bomb, the villains opened up strong with even more trap tape between them and the heroes. But of course, it hadn't gone well when Asui started shattering the lights and strengthening Dark Shadow.
Kirishima could take a lot of punishment, but that didn't mean anything when Dark Shadow just started pushing him away instead of trying to overwhelm him.
Sero did his best to repel Asui, but she just had too much maneuverability indoors as she sprang from wall to wall.
Eventually, Asui pushed Sero close enough to where Kirishima and Dark Shadow were fighting so that the shadow creature could grab and restrain the two villains while Asui touched the bomb.
Izuku nodded, writing entries on the four in his newest notebook he'd started so he could analyze his classmates, "so it looks like Asui's quirk is well suited to cramped spaces for maneuverability and would most likely be very compatible with aquatic hero work. While I imagine Sero's would be ideal for city traversal and villain capture. If Tokoyami's quirk is strengthened when it's darker, would that mean the opposite is true with more light? What is the upper damage limit of Kirishima's hardening quirk?"
A light tap on his shoulder snapped Izuku out of his wandering thoughts. Looking up, he saw that it was Yaoyorozu, "you were mumbling to yourself."
He blushed, putting his notebook away, "T-thank you for telling me."
Once All Might had finished giving his breakdown of the fight between the two teams, he asked if Izuku and Yaoyorozu were ready to begin.
"Yes, sir," they both answered.
"Good! Then here are your communicators, and as usual, you'll be given a head start on preparations," All Might said, giving them both a thumbs up.
"I believe our best course of action is telling one another the specifics of our quirks and their limitations. Does that sound agreeable," Yaoyorozu asked, giving Izuku a very serious stare.
"O-Of course, my quirk i-is superpower; it allows me to stockpile energy and convert i-it into strength. I can't use my full power, though. I have too much stockpiled, and if I did use full power, then it would backfire and break my body. Kind of like w-what happened when I threw the softball the other day, but imagine broken bones instead of a torn muscle. Oh, If I use the amount of power my body can handle, I can augment my overall physical ability with that."
Yaoyorozu nodded, taking in Izuku's explanation of his quirk. "If it comes down to it, you'll have to be the main frontline attacker. Is that alright with you?"
"That suits me just fine; I might need some insulation against Kaminari, though. Close quarters and electricity quirks don't exactly mix," Izuku said, tapping his chin in thought.
"Well, hopefully, it won't come to that, but if it does, I can make you a set of rubber-insulated gloves. My quirk is creation, and I can create anything I can think of, so long as I have enough lipids in my body and know the object's molecular makeup."
Izuku beamed at the girl, forgetting his bashfulness at her costume, "Really!? That's an amazing quirk; as you said, it might not even come to a fight if you create steel bars to seal each entrance. Kaminari, as I said, has an electrical quirk, and Jiro's quirk is just her headphone jacks, which I don't think can be used as a destructive force. But I don't like to just assume, so we should be ready just in case."
"Alright, then, we'll begin by sealing every door with a steel bar," Yaoyorozu nodded at Izuku, seeming to ready herself to begin creating; she turned slightly and unceremoniously opened her already-revealing top. Steel bars fell from her chest, but Izuku was entirely too busy panicking. "Hmm? What's wrong, Midoriya?"
"N-Nothing j-j-just keep doing w-what you're d-doing," he stuttered, looking away.
She shrugged and pilled up as many bars as possible, nodding when she was finally happy with the amount. "Here, you take half, and I'll take the other half. You cover one side, and I'll cover the other. If we seal every door, we can waste their time, and while I'm going, I can set up boobytraps to hinder them further."
"G-Good idea, I'll get s-started."
"Where the fuck is she!" Yelled a very frantic man as another person next to him went down, a warm liquid spraying him in the face.
"I can't see a fucking thing; the little bitch broke all the lights," Himiko threw a knife from the apartment's kitchen, embedding itself in the shouter's shoulder, making him fall. A quick, precise kick to the head sent him into unconsciousness.
A quirk flared up for a moment, the user's fists igniting, but that only served to turn him into a target that Himiko could launch another knife into the backs of his knees. He screamed in pain as Himiko ran past him, yanking the blades out.
In the seconds after the fire quirk was used, another thug caught sight of her and sent a hail of needle-like quills at her. The only thing that managed to do was help her incapacitate another thug, whom she used as cover from the needles.
She quickly launched two more knives at the shooter, the first one missing and only cutting his arm and the other embedding in his arm's joint, causing it to fall limply to his side.
He was quickly pounced upon, her knife cut into the other joint, and she viciously slammed his head onto the ground.
For a moment, the entire apartment complex was silent, save for the very injured people, and then a frantic screaming came from downstairs.
"Ooooh, all the little mice downstairs are scattering~," Himiko sang, causing the few people in the apartment, not unconscious but severely wounded, to shiver.
She approached the fire quirk user, who was still awake, and held her knife to his throat, "Now, I'm sure you keep your money and other valuables, you bad guys, get somewhere in here. So if ya don't want to get cut, tell me where."
"Fuck you," he spat.
"Mmm, no thanks. I've got a boyfriend, and I bet he's ten times better than you," she smiled, jamming her knife into his shoulder and twisting it, "so if you don't want the other arm stabbed, I'd start talking."
He hissed through his teeth, "I'm gonna fucking kill your little pussy boyfriend."
Himiko's faux smile dropped as she yanked her knife out and held it down to his crotch, "then how about I stab here?"
That got the man to blanch and start sweating in earnest, "I-It's in the bedroom, i-in the mattress!"
Himiko's predatory scowl made him tremble. She lifted her knife and brought it down savagely into the man's leg, barely missing his tender privates. Her cheerful smile returned as she left the man to bleed in pain and relief at not having his junk stabbed.
"Too small of a target anyway," Himiko shot back as she entered the bedroom and cut into the mattress.
She rummaged around in the thing for a moment before realizing it contained no individual packages but was just full of money.
"Ugh, dumb gangsters can't even put their money away neatly." She pulled out a handful and was at least a little pleased to see it was held together with money clips.
She got up and went back to the area she had incapacitated all of the men in and looked around for a bag. Thankfully, she found a large duffel bag, and she disgustedly emptied it of all the drugs it held inside before returning to the bedroom and stealing all of their money.
"Ah, I love what I do," she sighed, taking the now full-to-bursting bag and exiting the apartment.
"Well, that was easier than I expected," Izuku sighed as they unbarred their door and made their way down to the first floor.
Kaminari and Jiro looked very annoyed at the two of them as they had just now burst through one of the doors to get inside.
"Guys, what the hell," Kaminari complained, "we didn't even get into the building, let alone fight!"
"Well, to be fair," Jiro sighed, "it's not like we had any way to get in; I mean, my amps in my shoes can rupture eardrums, but they aren't powerful enough to destroy thick metal doors like this. The point was for them to protect the bomb, and they did."
"I know," Kaminari whined, "but I wanted to fight."
"Did you really," Jiro asked, looking at Izuku, "cause you saw the fight he had with Bakugou. Did you really wanna have to fight this guy?"
"W-Well, not really; I don't wanna get kicked in the head like Bakugou did," Kaminari shuddered.
"S-Sorry guys, Yaoyorozu seems to have an excellent utility quirk, and she's really smart, so we kinda had a huge advantage," Izuku laughed, scratching the back of his head.
All Might met all of them at the exit, praising the winners and encouraging the losers that they gave it their all and that it had just been a bad matchup.
They all returned to the control room to discuss their successes and faults in their actions, but there wasn't much to say since neither team had seen the other.
The final team battle was a bit more interesting than Izuku's and Yaoyarozu's had been. Both teams started fairly evenly, but it slowly grew one-sided.
It was Ashido and Aoyama against Koda and Sato. The fight had been relatively even, but Ashido's acid eventually wore down Sato's durability, and Koda didn't have too many animals in this scenario to command.
What was interesting was the way Ashido used her acid. Not only could she use it to melt, but she could also control its acidity to turn it into a jelly that she used to skate.
Izuku quickly filled out as many pages as possible for each classmate and sketched a rough outline of them and their costumes.
"That's rather good," Yaoyarozu complimented him.
"T-Thanks, it's kind of a hobby," he said, finishing the pattern on Ashido's costume.
"If it wouldn't be too much trouble when you finish your notes about my quirk, could you let me read through them? I've put a lot of thought into how I use my quirk, but you can grow nearsighted if you think all of your own answers are correct too often."
"S-Sure, if they'll help you, then no problem," Izuku nodded as he continued to write.
Thankfully, Heroic Basic Training was their last class for the day because Izuku was completely wiped out. He had just finished pulling off his now-tattered costume. It had taken quite a beating because of Kacchan, and now he would need to send it in for the support course to repair.
His slow trudge back to the classroom had made him lag behind a good majority of the class, who had already finished changing and run back to 1-A.
When Izuku opened the large door to the classroom, a flood of loud, excited voices made him flinch.
"Dude! That first throw and kick you gave Bakugou was awesome," Ashido said excitedly as she got very close to him.
"Uh, t-thanks," Izuku said, looking anywhere but at the girl.
"That was really manly how you stood your ground," Kirishima grinned, his sharp teeth gleaming.
"Do you dance any in your spare time," Ashido asked," cause you've got some crazy footwork!"
"U-Uh, no, but I went through a lot of training with Himiko to learn how to fight with my legs," Izuku answered, fidgeting under her stare.
"Oh, and who's Himiko? A girlfriend, maybe," she teased, not realizing she'd hit the nail on the head until Izuku turned bright red. "Whoa! Really? You have a girlfriend, Midoriya?!"
A few people in the class came over to join Ashido and asked about his girlfriend.
"Dude, seriously, how the heck do you have a girlfriend? No offense, but you're pretty plain," Kaminari said incredulously.
"W-Well, I knew Himiko when we were really little, and I helped her out cause her quirk is really inconvenient for her. And like ten months before the U.A. entrance exam, I met her again, and we started hanging out," Izuku explained, looking at Kaminari and Ashido, who were very interested in the topic
"You got a picture of her? I wanna see this girlfriend," Ashido grinned, testing to see if Izuku was lying.
"S-Sure," Izuku pulled his phone out and scrolled through a few pictures he and Himiko had taken together.
A few were ones she'd taken when watching him train, and she'd sent to him saying he looked funny in them. A few others were pictures of Eri doing various things he'd found cute, like the one of her drawing Himiko as a vampire. He finally found the perfect one, a picture he'd taken where Eri and Himiko had fallen asleep on him while sitting on the couch.
"Here you go," Izuku absently said, passing his phone to Ashido.
A sly grin fell from her face when she saw the picture, "dude! Your girlfriend is super cute! But who's the little girl with her?"
"Oh, that's Eri. It's a little complicated. All M- I mean, a hero, helped me save her from some people, and she's been living with us."
"Aw, you look like a family," Ashido cooed, not realizing how close she'd come to hitting the nail right on the head because of Himiko's hijinks.
"Dude, that is so unfair," Kaminari groaned.
Izuku laughed, continuing to talk with his classmates. It was weird that he could talk with other students like it was normal, while Bakugou had been the one to leave after class and go home.
Izuku had thought about following after him and talking. Still, he knew the boy would rather be taken hostage by another sludge villain than talk to Izuku after he had technically lost to him.
The urge to talk to him wasn't in any sense about Izuku feeling bad, but that he didn't want to be as uncaring as Kacchan himself had been about Izuku's emotions. He'd never forgive Kacchan for how he'd treated him, that was certain, but he was also a different person from Kacchan and couldn't ignore someone if they were clearly upset.
But then again, when was Kacchan not upset? He almost always yelled like he was annoyed; when he wasn't yelling out of annoyance, it was to threaten someone.
'He can take care of himself,' Izuku thought, watching Kacchan stomp through the U.A. gates with hunched shoulders. 'I'm going to go home to see Eri and Himiko.'
"And we just sat in the building until the time ran out," Izuku laughed to Himiko and his mom as he told them about the basic training he'd gone through today.
His mom had been distraught when she heard he had to fight Kacchan, but it went away when she heard how it had gone. He'd been hurt, but at least it wasn't too bad, and he had even won.
On the other hand, Himiko was very angry, "Let me beat him up, Izu! Just a little bit, I'll only break like one of his arms!"
"I don't think that's a good idea," Izuku laughed nervously, "you'd probably get arrested."
She mumbled at that but continued to eat while holding Izuku's hand. It had been frustrating not being able to spend time with Himiko because of school. He still enjoyed going to U.A., but he liked spending time with his girlfriend a bit more.
"Hey, Izu! Do you wanna come over to my apartment this weekend," she asked, surprising him.
"R-Really? Is that fine? Your parents won't mind?"
"I don't live with my parents, silly," she laughed.
Izuku had to register that for a moment, his face slowly growing redder by the second, "Y-you m-mean i-it would j-just be you a-and me?"
"Yep! We can stay here and keep Eri company until about the evening; then, we can go out and have some fun. And end the night at my place with some movies!"
That… sounded pretty innocent to Izuku. He was sure his girlfriend had some… other activities in mind for the day, but they hadn't done anything like that since the day they had saved Eri. And if he was being honest, Izuku could rarely get what had happened in the movie theatre out of his head when his mind wandered.
He thought about her giving him complete control over their kiss, the soft gasps as he bit into her shoulder, and the way she had shuddered against him as she climaxed.
"Izuku? Honey, are you okay?" his mom asked very worriedly. "You've got a funny grin on your face."
"Ah, yeah, I'm fine," Izuku panicked, fanning his face with his hands. "I-Is it alright with you if I spend time with H-Himiko, Mom?"
"You're a high schooler now, honey; I trust you'll be safe, but just in case, you should buy protection. You're getting to that age, and Himiko is a very pretty girl. We might have Eri, but I don't want any proper grandchildren until you're both old enough," his mom smiled at them both evilly and sweetly.
Both Himiko and Izuku's faces were bright red.
"R-Right," Izuku nodded, turning his gaze to his plate.
"We'll be careful," Himiko mumbled, pushing her food around.
Eri looked between the pair, confused at their bashfulness.
A/N: Okay, so I don't do too many author notes on this website; most of those are on my uploads for Archive of Our Own. But I felt like I should do one for here. If you've noticed, the quality of the last two chapters is a little weak. It's because I don't particularly like the Team Battle arc in My Hero Academia, so it was really tedious to write through. But now that it's over, the next chapter will hopefully be a lot better for everyone, including me! I hope you enjoy!!!!!!