Sorry for worrying some of you guys, but considering I'm going to give you nearly 3x the normal content in just ten chapters will more than make up for it.
warning that this and the next two chapters will be heavy with quirk science that I look forward to hearing your thoughts on my theories in the comments.
Setsuna tried her best not to be nervous.
She had heard about Deku-Sensei from her uncle before when Uncle O toko came over for family dinners, so she knew that Deku-Sensei wasn't going to be a dick about her quirk or her boundaries.
Hell the guy hadn't even outed her for being the reason for the star-bins in the dorms and even made it a point to not let anyone bother them with questions about the bins either.
But that didn't stop unease from crawling up her throat as she walked into the smaller room with Deku-Sensei.
Setsuna was proud of her quirk and the work she put into it, make no mistake about that, that did not mean that she felt one-hundred percent comfortable talking about the details of her quirk with a stranger though.
"Tokage, go ahead and take a seat." Deku-Sensei told her once the door closed.
"R-right." she muttered, moving to one of the two chairs set up in the middle of the room.
Setsuna wasn't sure what this room could be for originally, maybe a quarantine room if the cot off in the corner was anything to go by though she had no idea why a school would need a quarantine room of all things.
At least there was a window that let in some soft natural light to brighten up the place.
"Would you like anything to drink Tokage before we start?" Deku-Sensei asked, swinging one of his legs over the other, with his hands both resting in his lap.
"Nah, I-I'm good Deku-Sensei." Setsuna refused, waving her hand.
Only for said hand to disconnect and land on the floor with a little thump.
*Damnit.* Setsuna cursed in her head, she was about to will it back to her when Deku-Sensei moved to pick her fallen hand up, warm callused hands plucking her hand off the ground, turning it over before her hand was offered back to her.
"Thanks teach! Sorry for playing-" Setsuna tried to apologize as she attempted to reattach her hand, but Deku-Sensei cut her off.
"You don't need to apologize, I understand you're nervous Tokage and these things happen." Deku-Sensei calmly said as he sat back down.
"Pff, nervous? Me? Nah." Setsuna lied but even she could tell how empty her words were, and she let her shoulders hunch up too, almost coming up to her neck and hiding either side of her neck "Kind of... " she confessed.
"That's okay, a lot of the people I've counseled before were nervous actually talking about their quirk with me, it's a totally normal and understandable feeling Tokage." Deku-Sensei assured her.
"Can I ask which part of talking with me makes you nervous, or is it a general anxiety?" Deku-Sensei inquired.
"Um, both I think? I've talked with uncle and dad about my quirk before but you're," Setsuna answered avoiding looking at Deku-Sensei directly as she trailed off.
"I don't have a similar quirk and might not understand?" Deku-Sensei guessed.
"Yeah." Setsuna admitted kicking a non-existent pebble with her foot.
"Again that is a common feeling, it is a fear I've seen most commonly in people with predator-based quirks when talking about their need to consume living prey." Deku-Sensei explained.
"But I can assure you Tokage just as I assured them, that I shall do my best to understand your needs, regardless of what they are." Deku-Sensei told her.
Normally Setsuna liked to think she wouldn't be easily swayed, and maybe it was mostly her uncle's words about him or even his weird demeanor but the suffocating grip on her throat loosened up.
Just a little bit.
So, feeling less like she'd lose some part of herself by accident, Setsuna took a deep breath.
"Okay, what did you want to ask about my quirk?" Setsuna asked, not wanting to beat around the bush.
Deku-Sensei indulged her and pulled out a notebook.
"I'd like to confirm a few things first, to build a better understanding of your own, your quirk has traits from both of your parents with it leaning more towards your father's side correct?" Deku-sensei inquired.
"Yeah, mom could make her hair float, and dad has a lizard-based quirk, one of the ones that regrows their limbs, the Green anole to be specific." Setsuna confirmed a bit more comfortable talking about them instead.
Deku-Sensei nodded, writing something down.
"I see, that explains a few things since that breed of lizard can willfully detach their limbs rather than needing the part to be yanked off of them. And is it only her hair that your mom can make float?" Deku-Sensei asked.
"Um, I think so? She tried to float herself like I can when my body's detached but she never could make her body float, just her hair." Setsuna answered.
"I see, and how about your body temperature? Have you had problems keeping yourself warm?" Deku-Sensei questioned.
Setsuna rubbed her neck "Yes, I'm cold-blooded like my dad is." she admitted.
"I'll make a note of that for the heroics teacher and Recovery Girl since your previous counselor did not." Deku-Sensei told her.
"Now, I'm aware that after about ten minutes a part of your body can no longer be re-attached to you from these notes, do you know why that is or have any ideas why that might be?" Deku-Sensei inquired.
Setsuna rubbed her neck.
"Um, not really? I just sort of stop feeling anything from that part of my body until I can't feel that part of me anymore." Setsuna explained.
Deku-Sensei hummed, tilting his head and tapping his chin with his pen.
"Is it a painful sensation losing a part of you? Or is the loss of feeling more a numbing of sorts?" Deku-Sensei asked to clarify.
She paused trying to think about it.
"The second usually, my chest feels tight and a little like it's burning when I don't re-attach my head to it." Setsuna eventually replied.
"Then the issue might be the lack of oxygen, we can clear that up with a few simple tests along with an examination of your blood cells." Deku-sensei guessed making a note of that.
"Wait really?" Setsuna asked.
"Yes, I'm sure you know about organ transplants, yes?" Deku-Sensei brought up.
Setsuna nodded.
She had given a lot of thought to donating parts of her organs given the regeneration aspect of her quirk, but was ultimately turned down as a candidate for medical donation because she fell under star-fish laws.
"Well, there is a certain amount of time where the organ is considered still good after being removed from the body, the same principle can be applied to when you separate yourself and the biggest contributor to keeping your body parts 'active' is the blood still within those parts." Deku-Sensei detailed for her.
"Blood is how our bodies bring the important nutrients to the rest of the body along with our oxygen, but when you separate a hand per say, it will only have the blood inside of it to keep it alive for a while before re-attachment and that blood will only have so much to give, afterwards true cell death will occur." Deku-Sensei further elaborated.
"At which point your mind or perhaps your subconsciousness registers that your hand is in fact dead tissue and 'cuts' it off in order to prevent re-attaching to necrotic tissue which could kill you." Deku-Sensei mused.
"Oh, wow." Setsuna said blinking.
If that was the case, it was a shame she was cold-blooded otherwise she could use the cold to maybe get a few more minutes out of her separate parts.
She knew that ice was one of the major ways to preserve organs being transported and kept blood good in blood banks.
"The fact your separated body parts don't start bleeding until after you lose them also points to the conclusion being closer to the truth, as your body might have a specialized circulation system that can redirect your blood and preserve the tissue as long as there is enough oxygenated blood." Deku-Sensei pointed out.
"Geeze, can a few tests really prove all that?" Setsuna questioned.
Deku-Sensei nodded.
"A blood sample will let us see if your blood cells are different from the average person's and we can check the oxygen levels of your arm after being separated from you at different times to further confirm that is what is keeping your arm alive when detached." Deku-Sensei explained for her.
"Dang, can you tell me where the floating part comes from? I mean I know I got it from my mom but I never really knew why I could float all of my body and she couldn't." Setsuna asked slightly awed.
"Hm, you can only float your main body if they are detached further, like when your torso is in two pieces, or you have a limb or head separated already?" Deku-Sensei questioned, flipping back to a different page in his notebook.
"Yeah, tried to fly with just a hand detached but it didn't work." Setsuna answered with a nod.
She broke her nose that day when she tried it.
"Then my best guess would be that your mom, and you by extension, can only float 'dead' tissue that is a part of you still." Deku-Sensei responded using air quotes for the dead.
"Unlike yourself the only dead tissue your mom makes is her hair and maybe the end of her nails, so she can only float that, but since your separated body parts are in a nebulous position of being a part of you and maybe dead tissue you can float them until they become true dead tissue which is no longer a part of your body." he theorized for her.
"And in most cases losing a hand wouldn't kill the rest of your body, but if you lost your lower torso or even a full limb there is a higher chance of you dying from that, hence why you can float the rest of your body." Deku-Sensei further explained rubbing his chin.
"Oh." Setsuna muttered.
knowing that the reason she could float most of her body was because she was dancing along the edge of being dead, was quite a thing to realize.
Very morbid actually.
She probably wouldn't tell her mom that they could make the dead part of themselves float though, she didn't think that conversation would go well.
"Speaking of separating your body, have you ever detached your eyes and ears from your body specifically?" Deku-Sensei asked her.
"Uh, yeah, not all of them at once but I've removed an eye or ear before." Setsuna answered coming back to the conversation.
"Would you be interested in trying to remove all four?" Deku-Sensei inquired.
Setsuna winced and felt a touch tense at the suggestion.
"Why?" she timidly asked.
"I'd never push you to do anything you'd be uncomfortable with Tokage, merely wanted to suggest the idea since you could keep yourself less vulnerable to sight and hearing based attacks if your eyes and ears were not in fact attached to you." Deku-Sensei assured her while explaining his thoughts.
Setsuna blinked.
"What do you mean?" Setsuna pressed a touch uncertain.
Because she could see the advantage of sending off one of her eyes and even sending off one of her ears to join said eye.
But what advantage was there leaving her body completely blind and deaf?
"With the help of a visor and some gear that's normally used for ear protection, it wouldn't be hard to hide that your eyes or ears aren't attached to you at the moment, and you'd be able to watch over things from a third person prospective, think like most video games where you watch the character running around in the world." Deku-Sensei answered.
Setsuna's mouth fell open.
"I could do that!?" Setsuna exclaimed.
"Yes, we'd need to talk with the support course about making special gear to protect your eyes and ears with them separate from your body but it shouldn't be too hard to train yourself for such a thing." Deku-Sensei informed her.
"Please teach me how to do that, that sounds like it'd be so useful." Setsuna begged.
Deku-Sensei chuckled.
"I'll be happy to help you with that once classes start." Deku-Sensei promised.
Setsuna couldn't help bouncing in her seat thinking about how she'd be watching herself in costume later once she was a hero on patrol and in her costume looking like a video game character.
"But I do have some other questions to ask you, can you tell me more about your diet? Depending on your test results we might need to change some things to further help you with your quirk." Deku-Sensei requested.
"Oh, um sure, I try to get all of the food groups in and occasionally eat dead prey, um, mostly insects but I've eaten mice a couple times too." Setsuna answered, taking a moment to consider what she liked to eat.
"That was expected, green anoles are insectivores, and small rodents are a staple of most reptilian-quirk based diets. Your teeth also point to you having a carnivore-based diet so can I ask how much prey you eat per month?" Deku-Sensei said writing in his notebook.
Setsuna bit her lip.
"I don't know, maybe a couple times a week for the bugs, I don't eat mice much, too fleshy for my tastes to eat regularly, just every other month really." Setsuna replied.
"Thank you Tokage, this will be very helpful for us, I'll schedule with Recovery Girl in a couple days to get the tests done for your quirk, but I think that you've answered all the major questions I had for you." Deku-Sensei told her, putting away his notebook.
Then he stood up and offered her a hand.
"Thank you for your time." Deku-Sensei told her.
"Oh, no problem, is that really it?" Setsuna replied standing up, a touch surprised it was over this quickly.
"For now yes, I might have other questions after your results come up, or during future counseling sessions but we can address those later once they come up." Deku-Sensei assured her.
"Huh, okay." Setsuna muttered, then reached out and stopped Deku-Sensei from reaching for the door.
"Um, thank you for not telling everyone the star-bins were for me." Setsuna told him.
Past teachers had not been so kind about it, even though her kindergarten teacher had tried to warn the others off with good intentions, they hadn't gone about it the best way.
Her previous teacher was definitely the worst about it though.
Deku-Sensei blinked before realization crossed his face.
"Oh, oh... of course I wouldn't tell anyone you needed to use them, but the star-bins weren't brought in just for you Tokage." Deku-Sensei told her.
"Huh?" Setsuna dumbly replied.
"Those were something we added to the dorms as a default like the separate area for hazardous food, and I won't say specifics, but you aren't the only person in your class that will be using the star-bins either." Deku-Sensei informed her.
Setsuna's eyes nearly doubled.
"I- I'm not the only person in class affected by star-fish laws?" Setsuna said in disbelief.
"Again, I won't say specifics of who or how many, but yes you are not the only person in class affected by star-fish laws." Deku-Sensei confirmed.
"I- " Setsuna could help saying before bringing her hands up to cup her face, from her shock.
She couldn't believe it, she hadn't been in a class with someone else affected by star-fish laws before, and she definitely would have if there was another person in her previous schools was also affected.
It had to be one of the others that had raised their hand back when Deku-Sensei asked the class about star-fish laws.
Setsuna tried to remember what the others quirks were, but it was hard as the other thirty something students were blurring in her mind.
Maybe that Shoji guy? He was able to change his body mass wasn't he?
"Tokage, are you alright?" Deku-Sensei asked bring Setsuna out of her thoughts.
"Yeah, just a bit lost in thought Deku-Sensei." Setsuna hurriedly answered.
"Okay, would you mind stepping out, and sending Kaminari in after you? I'd like to speak with him next." Deku-Sensei requested.
Setsuna nodded and gave him a thumbs up.
"No problem Deku-Sensei." she told him before walking over to the door.
Feeling much better as she left the room than she ever expected she would, ready to send the next guy in and thinking about how she might go about asked Shoji if he was under star-fish laws too.
She really wanted to talk with someone outside of her family that was under those laws.
Denki supposed things could be worse for him than sitting in an extra-large nurses' office waiting to have his blood drawn or to talk with his teacher about his quirk.
His chances of getting into U.A, even with his aunt as one of its alumni, weren't the best.
He wasn't the smartest out there and half the times he used his quirk to the fullest he'd overload his brain and basically became a walking target.
U.A. could have failed him for that alone.
But instead, they allowed him a chance to prove himself, and all at the low price of working on his quirk, which was basically a win-win situation, how could Denki ever turn that down?
Maybe he should say something about wearing special gloves to Recovery Girl first though, he wouldn't want to shock her like he had the first time he volunteered to give blood.
The door to the small room Deku-Sensei and the greenette girl went into opened up.
Dang it, Denki was sure he remembered her name, she was super cute and had that little dino keychain on her backpack, He made sure to pay attention to her name when it was called earlier so why was he struggling to remember it?
To… Toka, something.
"Heya Kaminari," the cute dino girl said suddenly appearing right next to him.
Denki did not scream when she spoke.
…
Okay he fell out of his chair, but he didn't scream!
"H-hey… " Denki lamely replied quickly sitting up, trying to ignore the little snickers he heard coming from Sero.
Cute dino girl snorted so Denki was going to call that a win, an embarrassing win but a win for him, nonetheless.
"Deku-Sensei wants to talk to you next." She told him, jabbing her thumb back towards the door she came out of.
"Oh, cool! I really wanted to talk with him!" Denki said quickly getting up.
And he did.
Denki knew most of his previous counselors told him there wouldn't be anything he could do to stop himself from short-circuiting his brain, but hey U.A. hired the best of the best and maybe Deku-Sensei would be able to do something for him.
"That's the spirit." Cute dino girl told him with a sharp tooth grin, even going so far as to lightly punch his shoulder.
Which ouch, what was it with pretty girls and physical violence?
Or was that something that said more about him and his tastes…
Denki could think about that later, fixing his quirk came first.
Denki entered the room and saw Deku-Sensei was sitting down in one of two chairs and that there was a bed pushed off to the side against one of the walls.
"Hello Kaminari, come over and sit down, how are you feeling right now?" Deku-Sensei asked motioning over to the other chair.
"Great actually, I was really looking forward to meeting with you about my quirk." Denki told him happily, sitting himself down across from his teacher.
Then to Denki's surprise Deku-Sensei pulled out a fidget ball, his last teacher also gave him those but her one was the rubber kind with the little hair things that he kept pulling off by accident.
The one Deku-Sensei held looked more like a chew toy his aunt got for her dogs, with little bumps and even a bold swirl of red and yellow.
Denki immediately reached for it but managed to stop himself before he took it.
"Here, you can take it." Deku-Sensei told him, tossing the ball over and Denki eagerly began to rub his hands over the smooth not quite rubber material the ball was made of, one of the bumps going inside when he pressed down on it.
"Thanks Sensei, this is really cool!" Denki said pressing down on more of the bumps.
"It's no problem, your previous teacher made a note about you being able to pay better attention when you have something to run your hands over." Deku-Sensei informed him.
"Yeah, she's right about that, I think I do best with fluffy things though. Less distracting for my mind but I make too much static with the normal things." Denki replied, his hands still absently playing with the ball.
"I'm aware, I've asked around for something that might work but it'll be another week before it gets here." Deku-Sensei commented.
"Dude really? That's awesome, you're the best Sensei!" Denki gleefully told the guy, feeling even more excited at the idea of being able to pet fluffy things without worrying about shocking someone by accident.
Deku-Sensei chuckled.
"Thank you Kaminari, I want you to do your best and I know that will help you." Deku-Sensei replied.
"You can just call me Denki Sensei, I don't mind." Denki told him.
"Alright Denki, why don't we start talking about why you're here then, judging from what you said earlier I believe there is a problem you want to talk about first?" Deku-Sensei asked.
Denki nodded his head rapidly.
"Yeah, I want to know if there's a way for me to pump out more electricity without frying my brain, I can put out about two million volts but not without screwing my brain up in the process." Denki explained.
Deku-Sensei hummed.
"By pump out more, do you mean making more than two million volts or for you to make that much without losing consciousness?" Deku-Sensei questioned.
"Um… Both?" Denki answered a bit unsure.
"Well, then I'm afraid I have to disappoint on one of those two." Deku-Sensei told him apologetically.
Making Denki's shoulders slump.
"See, like most people with electricity producing quirks, your body has specialized 'nodes', yours are along your spinal column and that is where you make and store your electricity." Deku-Sensei described.
"Like Pikachu's cheeks?" Denki brought up.
"Yes, and those nodes will only be so big depending on your size, so there is little we can do about how much you can produce, we can maybe help your current nodes be more efficient but at best it would only double your current output." Deku-Sensei explained.
Well, that was a bummer, but four million volts was nothing to scoff at either.
"As for helping you keep consciousness, that is something we can work on together, one of the main issues I wanted to talk about you with in fact." Deku-Sensei informed him.
"Really? Cool, great minds think alike." Denki said his funk lifting.
"Indeed, now I'm sure you know your brain is wired different compared to others." Deku-Sensei started off with.
"Because of my ADHD right?" Denki guessed.
"Close, but not quite. Divergent brains are very common with electricity quirks as it is a natural failsafe to protect you from 'frying' your brain as you called it." Deku-Sensei explained.
"Wait, I have ADHD because of my quirk? I thought that was just something I was born with like my mom?" Denki questioned.
She didn't have an electricity quirk but did have mostly the same kind of ADHD he did, his dad who he did get his quirk from had something else, non-verbal autism if Denki was remembering right.
He loved his dad, but Denki was glad he hadn't been non-verbal like he was.
"And you were, the type of divergence can vary widely, and you could have been born with ADHD even if you didn't have an electrical quirk, you were just more likely to develop it than the average person." Deku-Sensei clarified.
"Oh." Denki replied.
"As for why you've been losing consciousness, there are a couple of reasons I can think of for why that happens despite your body's biological fail-safes." Deku-Sensei told him.
"The first reason I can think of is that you're putting out far too much at once, your brain is used to a much higher wattage to run on, and when you push out all but the bare minimum, your body goes straight to low-power mode." Deku-Sensei explained.
"Like when my phone's battery is low, and it makes the screen darker?" Denki said trying to better understand what he meant.
"Exactly like that." Deku-Sensei confirmed with a nod.
"Or, the way you're releasing the electricity isn't conductively sound and too much power is running through you instead of out of you, that again makes your body go into low-power mode for your own safety before much collateral damage is done." Deku-Sensei purposed next.
"Um, like a… uh," Denki struggled to think of something that would be comparable to what Deku-Sensei just told him.
"Like a fuse box kill switch, when too much is coming through the failsafe cuts out the power to protect something important or think of it like your body putting down sandbags down to prevent your body from flooding your brain with too much electricity at once." Deku-Sensei illustrated for him.
"Oh, yeah that makes sense." Denki replied as the concept clicked for him now.
He'd helped put down sandbags for hurricane flooding with his parents, and had seen how that worked before and could make sense of it.
"So um, how would we figure out which of those two it is?" Denki asked.
"We'll have you use your quirk while wearing a specially made vest and neck brace, which will help us see what is going on with your body when you release electricity, not a full charge that makes you go unconscious though." Deku-Sensei informed him.
"Depending on what is happening in your body, it could cause brain damage which could further impair you and how your brain works." Deku-Sensei explained further for him.
Denki felt his stomach flip.
"Uh, what kind of brain damage?" Denki questioned feeling nerves forming.
"A lot of things, such as your brain being unable to properly understand what your five senses are telling it, like being unable to feel cold, heat or pain. You could also start losing the ability to form or retain memories in the short or long term." Deku-Sensei listed off for him.
Denki's hands stilled and he looked at Deku-Sensei with a soft sort of horror.
"Would… would it be bad if I was already experiencing things like that?" Denki timidly asked, feeling his stomach being weighed down to the ground.
Because he noticed that the candy he normally ate for its sharp flavor didn't have its bold taste, among other foods he liked tasting off.
Small periods of time when his hands would get the pins and needles feeling or he'd pick up things without realizing they were too hot or cold.
His normal forgetfulness perhaps being more than his ADHD allowing his memory to slip through his fingers like water.
Deku-Sensei placed aside his notebook and gently took his hands in his, closing both of their hands around the fidget ball.
"Only if we don't address it and get you treated for it, we can do brain scans to see if there is any damage currently." Deku-Sensei told him with a soft but unwavering certainty as he sat next to Denki.
The chairs were big enough that Denki didn't feel crowded or squeezed by Deku-Sensei being next to him.
"If there is any permanent damage, it is not at a level that would cripple you or prevent you from living a normal life since it has gone completely unnoticed before now." Deku-Sensei detailed for him.
Denki exhaled deeply hearing that and let his head rest on Deku-Sensei's shoulder.
People joked about him losing brain cells with how he used his quirk before, mainly an old crush and previous classmate Jiro liked to make fun of the way he used to get when he fell unconscious.
But those were just supposed to be jokes.
He had to force himself to laugh with everyone else when Jiro made any of those snide comments, because they were just jokes.
He wasn't supposed to actually be destroying his brain.
"I'll speak with Recovery Girl about setting those tests up as soon as possible, can I ask when you started noticing these changes?" Deku-Sensei said, shifting only to allow Denki a more comfortable way to rest his head.
Denki did his best to try and recall when this started, but it was difficult, he hadn't thought much of those things before Deku-Sensei said it could be signs of brain damage.
"I don't know… Maybe a few months ago?" Denki answered uncertain if they started even longer and he just couldn't remember it.
So many incidents rushing to the forefront of his mind.
Thoughts of when chocolate ice cream didn't feel as cold as it should have been in his bowl or his mouth and of wondering how he could have forgotten what he was just reading a moment ago.
Moments that he knew happened but couldn't place when they did.
Deku-Sensei's warm hands traveled up his arms and held his arms in a firm but grounding grip.
"Then I believe there is a good chance that we can reverse any damage your brain might have from quirk misuse, there might be difficult challenges ahead on your road to recovery from that damage, but I am very certain that you will be able to make that journey." Deku-Sensei told him in a firm, unshakable but warm tone.
"I went through this myself years ago when I was younger than you, and if you want, I will help you through every step of the way." Deku-Sensei offered.
Denki wrapped his arms around Deku-Sensei.
"Please." Denki pleaded.
He didn't want to go through this alone.
Deku-Sensei hugged him back tighter.
Manga wasn't sure how he was supposed to feel right now.
Drained felt pretty accurate in some ways.
Saying goodbye to Keiren had been hard, he knew that Kaoru's mother Ito-San would be able to take care of his brother, much better than dad could but...
Manga's knees felt like they were going to give out before Keiren hugged him and his body was being affected by his little brother's quirk.
Then there was meeting his future classmates whom he'd be sharing a dorm with, and there were already quite a few characters making a name for themselves.
Such as the near fight that could have broken out between two of the hot heads in class, Kamakiri and Testutetsu, or Monoma's 'main character' energy.
Kuroiro also looked to be trying to be an Edgar Allen Poe character, or at least the memeified version of it.
Honestly, if it wasn't for Kendo, Asui and Awase he'd be worried about living with all of them.
His teacher wasn't the most welcoming, coming in the room by crawling inside of a yellow sleeping bag of all things, which was super weird even to a regular comic and manga reader such as himself.
Then he scolded them for their lack of awareness before ordering them to get changed and down to the P.E. grounds.
The man left without another word to them about where they could change or even where the P.E. grounds were.
Awase had been the only one that seemed prepared for this, he along with some of the others knew the curriculum stated they would be going to a quirk assessment test instead of the orientation for the rest of the students.
But Awase had been the only one that moved with confidence back to the halls in search of the locker rooms.
Then there was the assessment test itself, because he knew that Midoriya- Or Deku-Sensei, as he told them to call him, was very serious about expelling someone.
Frankly he couldn't believe that no one else believed Deku-Sensei would expel them, the guy expelled three second year students on his first day and Kaoru-Kun had told him plenty of stories about how Deku-Sensei 'dealt' with problem people before.
Even if Deku-Sensei was pretty chill the few times he came to pick up Kaoru-Kun, Manga felt much better about not living under the same roof as the guy.
As for getting personal quirk counseling from him? Manga wasn't sure how to feel about it.
Kaoru-Kun praised Deku-Sensei a lot, and he knew the kid benefited from talking with Deku-Sensei, and the Tokage girl of 1-A seemed pretty happy after she came out of her talk with him.
But when Kaminari walked out of his turn he clearly had been crying... a lot.
Deku-Sensei led him back out and helped the boy sit back down before he went over to speak with Recovery Girl to speak with her about whatever went down, he guessed.
Tokage had come over to sit with Kaminari, probably concerned like most of them since Kaminari had been rather excited when he walked into the room.
"Fukidashi, I'd like to talk with you next." Deku-Sensei said once he was done speaking with Recovery Girl.
"R-right." he muttered, following Deku-Sensei into the room.
He could do this, Manga had talked with Deku-Sensei before now and he could talk with the guy again.
They just wouldn't have the buffer of Keiren and Kaoru-Kun around to talk about and would be talking about his quirk directly.
Which was fine, he could do that.
Deku-Sensei took a seat and Manga sat across from him.
"It is good to see you Fukidashi, how is Keiren-Kun doing?" Deku-Sensei asked with a soft casualty Manga hadn't expected.
"He's doing great, really excited for his extended sleepover with Kaoru-Kun." Manga answered.
Deku-Sensei chuckled.
"Yeah, Kaoru-Kun couldn't stop talking about it for the last month, I'm glad the boys are so close." Deku-Sensei commented.
Manga bobbed his bubble-head.
It really was a good thing, Keiren really deserved to have someone outside of the family by his side.
"So, um you had some concerns about my quirk?" Manga brought up, kind of wanting to get this over with.
"Yes, I did, there is also some questions that I'd like to ask you as well." Deku-Sensei confirmed, taking out one of his famous notebooks from somewhere and flipped to a different page.
"I'm already aware of how your parents' quirks came together to become your and Keiren-Kun's quirks, so I'll skip those questions," Deku-Sensei told him.
"But if you would feel comfortable doing so, I'd like to see your mouth." Deku-Sensei requested.
Well, he supposed he should have expected that.
A lot of people didn't put much thought into where his bubble came from, and thankfully just accepted quirks were weird.
It helped that he always wore high neck clothing that would hide the little neck he had.
Still though, the idea of having someone poke around in his mouth wasn't something he could fully get behind.
"... Just to look right?" Manga asked.
"Of course, if you don't want me to touch you or your mouth that is alright, I would like to use a small flashlight to get a better look inside but that will be the closest I get to you Fukidashi." Deku-Sensei assured.
"Alright." Manga agreed, reaching up to the neck of his P.E. uniform and carefully unbuttoned his top.
Carefully pulling the top open so that his neck and 'mouth' could be seen fully.
To call it a mouth, and not a gaping hole that it physically was, was being very generous.
He had about an inch of neck, and it probably wouldn't be all too different if someone had their head cut off if one was looking from an angle that didn't show the inside of his neck.
Deku-Sensei was about to get a closer look though.
Indeed, the guy used a flashlight and looked inside his neck.
Manga hadn't looked himself much, a few times with the help of a mirror or his phone's camera.
There was just a large hole, a ring of flesh forming the walls of his neck and then a large 'esophagus' which narrowed a few inches down after his collarbone, he was pretty sure led to his stomach.
His neck otherwise was bare and there were no teeth or tongue inside the hole, something that made him wonder how he could speak more than once when he was much younger.
Now though he preferred the lack of stuff in his neck.
"Do you have any trouble eating?" Deku-Sensei asked, clicking off the flashlight and sat down again.
"Not really," Manga replied fixing his shirt back up and covering his neck and mouth again "I can swallow most things just fine, but I've been careful not to 'eat' anything bigger than the size of my palm either." Manga told him.
Deku-Sensei nodded, writing that down.
"Thank you for showing me your mouth." Deku-Sensei told him.
"Can you tell me anything about how you see the world? You can see color and in depth yes?" Deku-Sensei inquired.
"Yeah, I can. Not sure of how though since I didn't have anything like an eye to see it all with." Manga confessed, motioning to his bubble.
"Hm, can you tell me more about how you see? Can you see what is in front of your body and behind yourself?" Deku-Sensei asked.
"Sort of, like I'm vaguely aware of what's behind me but my 'gaze' is usually focused on what's in front of me or if something is moving around me." Manga said trying his best to explain it.
Deku-Sensei pondered that bit of information for a moment.
"So, in practice while you can see all of the room we're currently in, your brain is focusing in on me and if there was a bird perched on the windowsill, you'd be focused on that as well?" Deku-Sensei mused, hoping for clarification.
"Basically, can be a bit of a headache when I'm in classes but I've gotten used to being around multiple moving things." Manga confirmed.
"Does sound play any role in your sight?" Deku-Sensei inquired next.
"Not from what I've noticed, loud kid in the back of the classroom catches just as much attention as the two kids signing in front of me." Manga told him.
"Well then, my best guess at the moment is that your bubble acts as an eyeball of sorts, absorbing light from all directions with it prioritizing movement, a common defensive evolution for eyesight." Deku-Sensei replied, writing down in his notebook.
"We can test for that another time," Deku-Sensei muttered.
"Can you please describe for me what happens when you use your quirk to, let's say... An explosion?" Deku-Sensei requested next.
"Um, like what I feel?" Manga asked back, Deku-Sensei nodded.
"Oh... " Manga lamely replied.
Using his quirk was... weird.
Depending on what he said and the thought behind it, the outcome was different.
For instance, he remembered one of the ways he trained his quirk when he was little was by saying 'lights out'.
When he did that the light switch in his room would flip itself and the lights in the room would be turned off.
He never felt much of anything then, but it had helped him from using his quirk by accident when he was just talking with someone.
But saying something like 'boom' with intention?
He could feel... something build up in his veins, could feel it move through his body until there was this crushing weight in his mouth before he even said the word.
Then once the action word was said all of that pressure was wiped away in an instant.
Leaving him feeling a touch... empty for a moment of something other than just his breath.
The same thing happened when Manga would say something like; Downpour, Gale force, or even something to make his punches hit with more power like, blam or ka-pow.
The bigger the action, the more severe the build up inside of himself, hence why he couldn't yell things like boom back-to-back, at least not yet.
There were exceptions though.
Like when his dad bought them all fireworks for a festival, he said a quiet ignite and the little fuses were lit and off in the sky in seconds.
Some action words fell from his mouth with ease when certain things were around.
How to go about explaining that though...
"Um, well it kind of depends on what's around me. If I were to do that here, there'd be this buildup of pressure before I say it in my body with it being released once the word is said, then a... Winded sort of feeling I guess." Manga answered trying to summarize it.
Deku-Sensei tilted his head to the side.
"Can you expand on what you mean by, if you did it here, and what role your surroundings play?" Deku-Sensei asked.
Manga rubbed his arm.
"Um, if I was next to a crate of TNT then I wouldn't feel that buildup, the crate would just explode." Manga elaborated, though he didn't know what would happen exactly since he's never tried that for obvious reasons.
Deku-Sensei hummed.
"Does the buildup of pressure change depending on the word you use? Or how loud you say the word?" Deku-Sensei questioned.
"No to the first one, whether it's blizzard or thunder the type of pressure in my body doesn't change. But for how loud I say it does affect how big of an impact the word, will have and smaller impacts build less pressure." Manga clarified, using his hands to show bigger and smaller.
Deku-Sensei sat for a moment, letting the information sink in, then wrote in his notebook clearly doing some kind of mental calculations.
Then he put his notebook down.
"I think I might have an idea about what is happening with your quirk to cause that buildup of pressure, but I don't think we will be able to test for it." Deku-Sensei told him.
Manga, if he had normal eyes would have blinked.
"Uh, can I ask what you mean?" Manga said a bit confused.
Deku-Sensei leaned back in his chair and looked up at the ceiling.
"Well, in layman's terms, I think that pressure buildup inside of your body is from essentially warping reality to cause the changes you have in mind when you used your quirk, and currently speaking we don't have the technology to tell if you're breaking reality." Deku-Sensei explained.
Manga stared at Deku-Sensei for a moment, stunned.
"I'm... What?" Manga asked.
"I understand your shock, frankly speaking Fukidashi, you are the first person I've personally met whose quirk actually appears to break the known laws of the universe." Deku-Sensei answered.
Keenly not clearing up any of Manga's confusion.
Toru rubbed her arm as she nervously looked over to the curtain.
She wasn't sure how they planned to draw blood from her, most of the time that sort of test was skipped over.
Most people hadn't wanted to risk missing the vein or jabbing something else by accident, insurance agreed it wasn't worth trying either when she couldn't be seen visibly even with cameras.
And getting vaccines was rather difficult too.
Toru winced thinking back to the many jabs she had to deal with before the technician would either give up, find the muscle, or worse a vein.
She really hoped that she wouldn't need to be sticked by a needle that many times.
It actually made her feel a bit faint to think about it.
The few people that had gotten their blood drawn being pale afterwards wasn't inspiring much confidence either.
Especially after one of the boys from 1-B had taken a long time to have his blood taken because of his thick skin.
Toru should stop thinking about that before she possibly made herself faint or maybe even nauseous.
She should think about something else, like…
What she could talk with Deku-Sensei about! Toru could think about that instead!
She couldn't be sure why Deku-Sensei wanted to talk with her about her quirk, she had been given the whole 'be very careful' speech a ton of times before from just about everyone.
Being completely invisible other than her clothes, she was warned strongly about the dangers of being very aware of her surroundings to prevent accidents.
She had learned rather young that a driver might not stop for her.
To their benefit, how was the driver supposed to know that the floating clothes in front of them were a person, or a mere prank?
It did not make almost being hit by a car any less scary when she was younger, but at the very least she could understand it now and learned her lesson very early on to make herself as visible as she could.
But beyond how to make sure she was 'seen' by others she couldn't really think of any other reason for why he'd want to talk with her about her quirk.
Toru wouldn't have the time to wonder though, as the door to the room Deku-Sensei was using opened once again.
The boy with the word bubble of a head walked out, the bubble was blank, and the lack of facial features made reading him harder than most people, but Toru didn't think that he looked broken like Kaminari.
He doesn't seem overly happy though either.
Distracted, would probably be the best Toru could guess of how Fukidashi held himself.
Which was probably why Deku-Sensei, again came out of the room to collect the next person to come with him.
Deku-Sensei's eyes looked around, until his eyes landed on her.
Not her clothes, she would have said that he met her eyes but she knew that would be impossible given the very nature of her quirk.
"Hagakure, I'd like to talk with you next." Deku-Sensei said.
Ah, she didn't think that she'd be called in so soon, but she didn't complain and stood up to go with Deku-Sensei to talk.
"Okay Deku-Sensei." She exclaimed careful not to accidentally run into or trip over Fukidashi since he was kind of out of it.
The room wasn't very big but she could at least appreciate the soft pastels of the room would be less overwhelming.
"Good afternoon Hagakure, I hope that you've been settling well, do you want anything to drink?" Deku-Sensei asked as he pulled out a bottle of water to drink.
"Oh no I'm good, and I think I've almost got everything how I want it in my room." Hagakure replied waving her arm, making sure to wave her arm enough to have her sleeve move too.
She probably should have asked the girls for a moment to go back and grab a pair of gloves at the very least.
"Alright, do you have any ideas what I'd like to speak about with you? Or any concerns you currently have over your quirk?" Deku-Sensei inquired, as he opened a note book.
"Um, no not really, and aside from how to be extra visible I can't really think of any other concern I could have about my quirk." Hagakure admitted rubbing the back of her neck.
Deku-Sensei merely nodded, tapping his pen on his book.
"Perfectly understandable, on the surface I can see why that might be the case," Deku-Sensei told her, and despite the pleasant tone he was using Toru couldn't help the sneaking suspicion that he was kind of annoyed.
"However, judging from your previous counselors' notes, I highly suspect there are many points that they have not talked about with you. Things that should have been addressed years ago." Deku-Sensei informed her.
"Oh, what kind of things?" Hagakure asked.
Even with Deku-Sensei saying that, Toru just couldn't put her finger on what they would need to talk about.
There couldn't be that much to her quirk since it just made her invisible.
"There are a few questions that I'll ask first before we really get into it, some confirmation on a couple things first, like the fact that you require glasses?" Deku-Sensei explained flipping to another page.
"Yep, I usually use contact lenses since the goggles I wear aren't very comfortable in prolonged use. It took a super long time to find the right strength since the doctors couldn't actually see my eyes. I got it from both my parents, one of them is legally blind actually." Toru told him, waving her arm off to the side.
Deku-Sensei noted that down.
"And is it correct that you can't see yourself when you wear your contacts?" Deku-Sensei brought up.
Toru rubbed her neck again.
"Sort of, I can't really see myself without them either. More like a blurry outline of my body, like you'd see in the movies when a character's supposed to be invisible, but we can still see them because of the warped outline." Toru corrected him.
"Hm, thank you for clarifying. Have you ever had your hair cut?" Deku-sensei asked next.
Toru blinked, taken slightly aback when that was asked of all things.
"I have, having long invisible hair would only be more dangerous you know. It doesn't become visible after it's cut though, so I don't know what that looks like either, I used to be a blonde though." Toru answered, her hand came up to play with her hair some.
Deku-Sensei hummed again, writing that down as well.
"Have you ever tried or used anti-quirk medication before?" Deku-Sensei inquired.
Toru rubbed her arm again, and looked away from him.
"Uh, once when I was two and my quirk first started to make me disappear. I'm allergic to an ingredient in most of the common brands and my parents couldn't afford to get me any of the fancier ones, even if I qualified for a medically necessary discount." Toru informed him.
Deku-Sensei, brows furrowed and he flipped through the pages of his book.
"I'll need to talk with someone about why that was not included in your paperwork." Deku-Sensei commented.
Toru wasn't sure what to say in response to that.
"Given your intolerance for common medications, we'll have to test you for possible allergies to other variants of them before having your try any." Deku-Sensei told her.
"Okay Sensei." Toru agreed, nodding her head even if she knew he wouldn't see it.
Deciding not to get to hyped over the idea given there was a strong chance she'd be allergic to them too.
"Now, given what you've told me, I have reason to believe that your parents quirk together might have spontaneously evolved from a pair of emitters to a mutation quirk, hence why your quirk continues to affect your hair even when cut." Deku-Sensei said next.
"Really? I don't have any scales or horns though." Toru asked, feeling her skin and even patting the top of her head.
"The addition of physical features is the most common sign of a mutation quirk, however just as blue hair isn't a sign of a water-based Emitter quirk, scales or any physical feature isn't necessarily a sign of a mutation quirk." Deku-Sensei answered.
"Passing mutations are a small sub-group and the exact numbers are uncertain given they are rarely discovered with how easily they pass for transformation or emitter quirks." Deku-Sensei further elaborated.
"Passing mutations? And I could have one?" Toru repeated.
She had never heard that term before, though she guessed it wouldn't be hard to see such a group existing.
There was that girl in her middle school who had four little horns on her forehead from her mother that didn't have anything to do with her bubble quirk, something about hold-over mutations if she recalled the technical term for it.
"Indeed, we'll be able to confirm it with the blood sample we'll take from you later, the three genome bases for mutation, transformation, and emitter quirks can be identified with a blood test. It's one of the reasons why there are only the three types of quirks despite how far spread the gene pool of quirks is." Deku-Sensei answered.
"Okay, what would that change though? Cause I don't see how me being having a mutant quirk or an emitter will really change things." Toru inquired.
"For one, it's even more important that we check that your diet is in order since mutation quirks often come with bigger dietary changes from 'normal' people." Deku-Sensei stated.
"Secondly, it will change how we go about seeing if we can help you become visible again." Deku-Sensei added next.
"Wait what? Make me visible? How? What?" Toru couldn't stop the questions spilling from her lips.
"Camouflage quirks are defensive quirks, even if being on is the default state for your quirk that doesn't mean that it cannot be turned off. Given you were born visible then that means your body's camouflaged mode isn't your body's only state of being, and therefore logically speaking, you can become visible again without the use of medication." Deku-Sensei explained to her.
Toru was sure her mouth was hanging open.
"I- How does that-" Toru sputtered.
"If you need an example, think of it as the difference between a sea-dragon which is born looking like a piece of kelp and a cuttlefish, which can change the color of its skin to match its surroundings." Deku-Sensei elaborated for her.
"And I'm a cuddle fish?" Toru asked pointing to herself.
"Yes, and with time and some additional tests we can figure out how exactly your quirk is camouflaging you. Once that is done, we can work on perhaps helping you turn off your quirk, if only temporarily, and see if there is anything else about your quirk that can be discovered about your abilities." Deku-Sensei confirmed.
Toru's eyes went even wider.
"You think I could do things other than be invisible?" Toru asked, in disbelief.
Deku-Sensei made a 'so-so' motion with his hand.
"Until we get confirmation on the way your quirk works, I can't say either way if you do, but if there is a chance you can do more depending on the nature of your quirk." Deku-Sensei answered.
"In what way? Like what do you think I could do?" Toru questioned.
Her mind was already racing over the fact she might be able to make herself visible under her own power, and now she might be able to do even more than that!?
Deku-Sensei hummed.
"The most likely ability you could do would be light manipulation; you could make massive flashes of light possibly." Deku-Sensei informed her.
"Or perhaps you might be able to further 'disappear' from human senses, such as making yourself completely silent in spite of wearing bells. If we really want to push the supposed bounds of your quirk to see if you're venomous as a secondary defense that hadn't been discovered before now." Deku-Sensei further pondered out loud, tapping his pen on his chin.
She stared at him.
Her mouth opened then closed, he was serious.
Deku-Sensei thought she could be able to do some of those things.
"Why, haven't I heard any of this before now?" Toru couldn't stop herself from asking.
Because how could no one ever mention this to her before right now.
Deku-Sensei sighed.
"I can't speak for your past counselors, however the fact these things were never brought up or even looked into was exactly why I asked you to come today. It would not surprise me that this lack of study might have already led to problems for you physically." Deku-Sensei replied.
Toru felt her heart squeeze.
"What kind of problems, Deku-Sensei?" She pressed.
"The blood test will confirm if there is a problem, but malnutrition can cause severe problems, especially mineral or vitamin deficiencies. With your quirk's nature any visible signs would be completely impossible to find without through testing, but your inability to become visible might also be a sign of there being a problem." Deku-Sensei answered.
Toru felt like she could scream after hearing that.
Her hands gripped her hair instead and she buried her face into her lap.
She could have lost her ability to be visible?
After all of these years spent listening to people just telling her that she needed to just make herself more 'visible' by being more outgoing and memorable, constantly being told to be oh so very careful by just about everyone like she was some toddler.
How was she supposed to handle learning something like that?
"Here," Deku-Sensei said suddenly, and Toru looked up to see that her Sensei was offering her the pillow that had been on the bed off in the corner.
"The walls are completely soundproof and I'm under patient confidentiality so nothing will leave this room if you want to let some frustration out." Deku-Sensei assured her.
Toru hesitated but eventually broke and took the pillow, and screamed into it.
Having blood drawn wasn't as bad Momo remembered it being, her hand traced the edge of the bandage holding the cotton ball in place.
It had been a couple years though she supposed as she walked back around the curtain.
Her eyes went over to where Suna was sitting with Kaminari, the latter looking better than when she'd been called on by Recovery Girl.
Suna was still rubbing Kaminari's back, but he wasn't hiding his face anymore and his hands were still squeezing the ball he presumably got from Deku-Sensei.
Momo hesitated for a moment, unsure if she should join the two of them.
She could just go wait with Jurota again.
Kaminari had been rather excited to speak with Deku-Sensei, so she wasn't sure what the two of them talked about would get such a strong reaction from her classmate.
Her indecisiveness was brushed aside quickly though, and she sat down on Kaminari's other side.
She had already distanced herself earlier and it wouldn't be right of her to avoid Kaminari and Suna simply because she wasn't comfortable or familiar with how to handle someone being so visually upset.
"Hey Yao, finished with the stick test already?" Suna asked, in a voice that would have been teasing, the attempt though was half-hearted.
"Yes, is everything okay though Kaminari? I understand if you don't want to talk about it-" she answered, regretting being so forward almost immediately after she asked and held up her hands as she rushed to assure him, he didn't need to respond.
"N-no it'd be better to tell others about this too, and you can just call me Denki," Kaminari told her, sniffing as he rubbed the palm of his hand against his cheek, wiping away tears that weren't there anymore.
Momo, flushed a bit.
Was being on first name bases normal for classmates? She could have sworn that it was supposed take more than a day to be that close though…
"Deku-Sensei thinks that the way I've been using my quirk might have caused me brain damage," Kaminari- Denki told her.
"I need to be tested to know the full extent of the damage and if it can be fixed, but I think I've been having memory problems." He further explained hugging himself.
Momo couldn't stop herself from a soft gasp, her hand coming up to cover her mouth.
That would certainly explain his reaction earlier, and she could understand why he been so emotional as well.
She couldn't imagine being told something like that.
Momo remembered how badly losing his memory affected her grandfather, the fights her parents had with her grandfather trying to get him to accept he needed help.
And to have your own quirk actively contributing to that? It sounded purely nightmarish.
"I've already asked Suna, but would you mind keeping an eye out for if I forget anything big? I might forget because of ADHD but if I'm also losing my memory too, I just-" Denki's voice became shaky.
Momo placed her hands on his trembling hands.
"Of course. I'll be sure to check in with you if you'd like? Reminding you of any assignments every few days if you'd like Denki." Momo offered.
"Hey, why don't we just have a study group instead? I don't know about you guys but I know that I'll have trouble with some subjects later on." Suna suggested instead.
"If it wouldn't be too much trouble, I'd really appreciate something like that." Denki told them.
Suna huffed.
"You are not trouble, even if you do end up having permanent brain damage Denki!" She scolded him.
"Suna is right, having people to learn with will be no trouble." Momo further assured softly placing a hand on Denki's shoulder.
"And if anyone tries to tell you otherwise you better tell us, or Deku-Sensei." Suna said, frowning at the thought.
Before Denki could say anything to that the door to the room Deku-Sensei opened and Hagakure walked out.
While Momo couldn't see most of the girl, she could tell from the way she left the room that she was also upset.
"Yao, Deku-Sensei wants to talk with you next." Hagakure told her, and her tone of voice further pointed to Hagakure being upset.
"Hagakure are you alright?" Momo asked.
"Ugh! I'm okay, just upset that I'm only learning now that my quirk could possibly turn off and that I could be suffering from a deficiency of some kind!" Hagakure answered, crossing her arms, or at least she thought that Hagakure crossed her arms.
"Jesus, you too? What the hell?" Suna replied "Do you think Fukidashi's also bummed because of something being up with his quirk?" Suna put out there, looking back to the bubble-headed guy, now sitting in the corner.
"If there is we shouldn't pester him about it, we can't know how private he might be." Momo pointed out.
"Yeah, you're right Yao, now go get your butt in there with Deku-Sensei. And please, don't come out telling us your quirk is more screwed up than you ever thought it was." Suna pleaded, one of her hands leaving her body to rest on Momo's shoulder.
Momo smiled and patted her friend's hand.
"I'm sure I won't." Momo told her in turn, letting Hagakure take her seat next to Denki.
Her parents hadn't spared any expense when her quirk first developed, and she started producing simple items from her body.
So, she strongly doubted she learn anything new about her quirk.
Momo walked over to the room, entering with a knock on the door before she walked inside.
The room was small, maybe the size of one of the closets back at home but the room was styled with furniture sized for it.
"Good afternoon, Deku-Sensei." Momo greeted with a bow.
Still a bit abashed when she said something of that nature to a teacher, and she certainly wouldn't have said it if Deku-Sensei didn't tell them to do exactly that.
"Good afternoon, Yaoyorozu. Come, take a seat please." Deku-Sensei said back, motioning to the seat across from him.
Momo did as she was bid and sat across from Deku-Sensei.
"Your previous counselors kept good records of your sessions with them, including the medical testing you've had before." Deku-Sensei commented flipping through a notebook.
"Yes, my parents wished for me to have a truly deep understanding of my quirk." Momo replied, nodding her head.
"Understandable given your quirk's possibilities." Deku-Sensei conceded.
"And there is a lot of good work done by your previous counselors, however there are some things that I think that they have overlooked when it comes to your quirk." Deku-Sensei informed her.
Momo hummed, tapping a finger on her thigh.
"What do you think they could have overlooked?" Momo asked, certain she could asway whatever concerns her teacher had.
"You're familiar with the Pro-Hero Fatgum, yes?" Deku-Sensei brought up.
"Yes, our quirks are rather similar, so I've been compared to him before and I'm familiar with his work." Momo answered.
"According to your past counselors, yes your quirks are similar." Deku-Sensei responded "However, there is a problem with that thought, mainly from the x-rays you had done about five years ago." Deku-Sensei informed her, pulling out some of copies of her x-rays in fact putting them on the table.
"Yaoyorozu, can you tell me the difference in the x-ray on the left, and the one on the right?" Deku-Sensei asked.
Momo, looked down at both of them.
A picture of what she believed an ankle joint from a side view, one of which was noticeably thicker in the part of the bones where the joints were connected, the bones on the right were thicker overall but it was most easily seen where the bones were 'connected'.
"The one on the right is thicker." Momo said pointing to the copy.
"That x-ray is a girl with a fat-burning quirk like you supposedly have, the thickness of the bones here in her joints is a natural mutation which is meant to help her skeleton safely hold the larger weight her form is supposed to have naturally." Deku-Sensei explained.
Momo frowned.
She hadn't heard of anything like that before, it made sense she supposed, there were often adaptations for quirks, like Ashido's pink skin was no doubt.
"But why would that be needed? Being overweight isn't the default state for our bodies." Momo questioned.
"For most humans it isn't, people with fat-burning quirks have very different metabolisms and health needs though in order to better use their quirks." Deku-Sensei answered, waving a hand.
"A fat-based quirk wouldn't work well if there was no fat in the body, so having a heavier weight is the default and the body has differences to keep that type of body since is needed for their quirk to work." Deku-Sensei explained further.
That… made sense.
Just like whales needed to be able to have blubber to survive in their migration through the coldest parts of the ocean.
But then why would she struggle to put on weight? She had to use a very loaded diet just to keep herself at the appropriate weight for someone her size, and that was before accounting for her quirk use.
She couldn't ever recall being considered overweight for her height before now.
"Fat-reliant quirks also come with other features in the body to keep the user from suffering any ill effects from their heavier weight, such as being able to make cholesterol even more effectively and having stronger muscles in their hearts compared to others. Putting them at less risk of heart-attacks." Deku-Sensei told her.
"Including having a stomach which is twice as large, if not three times bigger than the 'average' person since their diets need more food consumption as well." Deku-Sensei further pointed out.
"But, I don't have any of that." Momo informed him.
Perhaps she could have been unaware of some of her body's differences, but she would have to heard about one of those things at some point in her life.
And Momo couldn't recall at any point hearing about having a heart with stronger muscles, or of her skeleton having reinforced joints.
"Which is why I wanted you to come in for testing. Your body's makeup doesn't align with what is currently known about fat quirks, so that means either you don't have a fat quirk or need extensive medical tests to determine why your body hasn't developed these same defenses." Deku-Sensei replied.
Momo, couldn't be sure which of those two things would be preferable.
She had always known her quirk as one that burned the fat of her body, and to learn it wasn't doing that would be… very life changing and leave her with so many questions.
But on the other hand, if she did still have a fat-based quirk then why would her body not have any of the traits that her teacher said it would need or develop?
"If I do not have a fat-burning quirk, then what is my body doing when I make the items I create?" Momo questioned.
Deku-Sensei hummed.
"Given you do have a change of weight and suffer from malnutrition if you over-use your quirk, then it does relate to your eating habits in some way." Deku-Sensei stated.
"I do think however, that your quirk instead makes your body a chemically based elemental forge." Deku-Sensei suggested.
Momo's brow furrowed.
"How, would that be different to the fat-based quirk we thought I had?" Momo asked.
"A fat-burning quirk would only reconstruct things with the existing fat tissue in your body, the elemental forge on the other hand would draw energy and material from the chemical reactions your body is constantly going through to fuel what your mind is constructing." Deku-Sensei clarified.
"Such a quirk would also explain how you would be able to make a functioning cannon, something which typically weighs a minimum of two tons along with many more things in addition to that cannon, when you yourself weigh less than ninety kilograms." Deku-Sensei pointed out.
Momo's mouth opened, then closed.
She was aware how much a cannon weighed, she had to know everything about something to create it herself.
The fact she was making something that had much more mass than her body could possibly hold had… somehow not fully occurred to her.
Even if her body had some formula to convert a small amount of mass into something bigger, there would be no way for her to have one so efficient that she wouldn't lose a visible amount of her body mass for something so large.
Frankly in hindsight, it would have been more believable that she was using up fat to summon the items from a different plain of existence than making them outright.
It seemed she would owe Suna an apology, already one question in exposed something glaringly obvious about her quirk that she hadn't paid proper attention to.
"How likely would it be that I have an 'element forge' quirk instead of a fat burning quirk?" Momo inquired.
"Considering the complete lack of traits needed for a fat-burning quirk, I would say highly likely unless you have a myriad of previously unknown health conditions that stopped you from developing those traits as you should have." Deku-Sensei answered honestly.
"I see. That would be highly doubtful." Momo replied looking away from him and down at her folded hands in her lap.
Her health had been checked many times before and any form of medical condition should have been caught by now even if she looked healthy for the average person.
"Given my quirk most likely isn't what I believed it to be, I must ask, would my previous diet be harmful to my health?" Momo questioned, one of her hands coming up to her forehead.
Deku-Sensei flipped through some pages.
Looking it over for a few moments until he answered.
"In the short-term, it certainly has but I can't see any long-term effects from it that will affect you ten years from now. You've kept your diet diverse enough aside for it to work without stripping your body when you used your quirk, but we'll need to definitely have you tested to see what actually happens in your body when you use your quirk, and adjust your diet from there."
Momo let out a breath of relief and allowed her head to come down to rest on her hands.
Knowing that she had not accidentally hurt herself listening to her previous counselors and that it would not lead her to needing medical intervention was a great relief.
"Are there any other problems you wished to speak to me about Deku-Sensei?" Momo asked, lifting her head again.
"Well, I would also like to have you come in for a brain scan, since there is a chance your quirk could affect your brain, since that is the place in the body where a majority of our chemical reactions occur. I don't think that your brain is at any risk, mainly I want to see how your brain reacts when you construct something since that data could also help us." Deku-Sensei told her.
"Ah," She responded before her mind went back to how upset Denki had been and what he told her before Hagakure came to get her.
"Would you mind scheduling me for the same day as Denki? He told myself and Suna- Tokage-San about your concerns, and I think going together would possibly help him." Momo requested.
Deku-Sensei blinked, then smiled.
"That would be more than doable, and I'm sure that Denki will greatly appreciate the company in such a trying time." Deku-Sensei said.
"Thank you Deku-Sensei." Momo told him "Will that be all then?" She asked.
Deku-Sensei nodded.
"For now, I'll probably have more questions for you once we do your testing but we've covered everything that needed discussed for the moment." Deku-Sensei assured her.
"Then thank you for your time Deku-Sensei." Momo told him bowing where she sat then stood up.
"Would you like me to ask the next person to come in for you?" Momo inquired since that seemed to be the theme of those that were capable of it when they came out.
"If you wouldn't mind, Monoma of 1-B is next on my list to speak with." Deku-Sensei informed her.
Momo nodded her head then moved towards the door.
Various results post sessions.
Setsuna: So your saying I could be game character?
Deku-Sensei: Yes
Setsuna: Nice :)
Denki: Things are going so great for me :)
Deku-Sensei: I, have some bad news for you Pichu
Denki: Don't you mean Pikachu?
Deku-Sensei: Unfortunately, no
Denki: D:
Manga: I break the universe?
Deku-Sensei: Yep, very short list of people and congradulations on joining the void quirk classification
Hagakure: I possess the rage of a thousand suns
Deku-Sensei: I mean, technically you could one day?
Momo: I shall not have an interal crisis for a third time today
Deku-Sensei: Oh honey...