Chapter 18: Expanding Networks
There were a number of real benefits to living in the dorms, Izuku had decided. One of the biggest ones was the ease of getting to class in the mornings. On their morning run today, he and Kyoka had seen a few members of the press hanging around the gates to U.A attempting to interview any students unlucky enough to wander close enough. Apparently the news about All Might assisting with teaching had been leaked, and that was enough for most studios and newspapers to send at least one reporter. By the time the school day was about to begin, there was a veritable mob standing just outside the gates.
A mob that class 1-A thankfully did not have to deal with. Instead, they had class president nominations to deal with. A remarkably refreshing ordeal after the quirk assessment and battle trials of the past two days. Aizawa had left them to their own devices for choosing a class president, something that did not surprise Izuku much at all. The man's teaching style could be called hands-off at best. If you asked Izuku, so far it seemed to border on negligent.
As such there were a number of arguments popping up among the class about the best way to determine a class president. Most of the class seemed on board with a democratic method of some sort, but there remained the issue that most of the class would inevitably vote for themselves. Eventually the class coalesced around Kendo's suggestion that any candidate must be first nominated and seconded by other students in the class to make sure that they had some support outside of just themselves. Once this method was decided upon, Kendo called for nominations. Surprising no one, she herself was the first nominated, being put forward by Pony and seconded by Tokoyami.
What surprised Izuku, at least, was that he was the second student nominated. Kyoka had looked eager to do so, and Uraraka had smirked at him as she seconded the nomination. Izuku was a lot of things, but he didn't believe that a leader was one of them. He was tempted to request Kendo to remove his name from the list, but something about Kyoka's eagerness to nominate him caused him to hesitate. So he did the next best thing.
He nominated Kyoka right back.
Izuku had been planning on it all along, but seeing her face morph to surprise alone would have made the nomination worthwhile. The fact that her mouth dropped as Yaoyorozu almost immediately seconded the nomination was just the cherry on top. Izuku wasn't exactly sure why she was surprised to be nominated. Kyoka had all the traits to be a fantastic class president, and her no nonsense attitude would make sure that everyone stayed in line.
Six students ended up on the final ballot: Izuku, Kyoka, Yaoyorozu, Kendo, Tokage, and Kaibara. The latter two had also been somewhat surprised to be nominated, but hid it significantly better than either Izuku or Kyoka. When it came time to vote, Izuku had quite a conundrum on his hands.
He could vote for himself to be the president, although he wasn't entirely sure he really wanted to be class president. Yes, it would be valuable experience for running a hero agency one day, but there were plenty of other venues where he could earn said experience. And he wasn't sure that he was really cut out to be class president, given his issues with social interactions. Or he could vote for Kyoka, who was tied with only Yaoyorozu in his mind for who would fit the role best, and who he was best friends with.
Which is all to say there wasn't really a choice at all. Izuku happily wrote down Kyoka's name and passed his slip in when asked. Yaoyorozu and Kendo had taken it upon themselves to collect and tally all of the votes. Perhaps they were hoping that simply taking some of the duties of a class rep upon themselves they might earn a few votes.
The results of the election truly stupefied Izuku. Somehow he had come in first with a grand total of six votes. Yaoyorozu and Kendo were tied for second with four votes apiece, while Tokage, Kaibara, and Kyoka all had two votes each.
This was absurd. He couldn't be class president. He could barely talk to anyone other than Kyoka without stuttering, and didn't have any experience with school government. No one was going to pay him any mind and the class would fall into chaos and it would all be his fault and everyone would blame him and he'd be kicked out of U.A.
Ok, perhaps he was catastrophizing a bit with that last thought, but he still didn't think he was suited for the role.
Of course, before he could voice any of his very reasonable objections, Aizawa had awoken (had he ever really been asleep?) and settled the matter in his typical manner. "Alright, Midoriya is class president, and either Yaoyorozu or Kendo as vice president. Since we're running low on time, Midoriya, it's your pick as to who is vice president."
What? That made a sort of sense, but it was a lot of pressure for his first official decision as class president. Both Yaoyorozu and Kendo looked at him expectantly, both obviously somewhat dejected by not being chosen as class president. Oddly, neither seemed upset with the idea that Izuku was the one to garner more votes than them.
"U-Um, w-would it be p-possible to have them b-both as co-vice presidents?" Aizawa raised an eyebrow, and Izuku hurried on. "T-The c-class obviously t-trusts both of them, and I d-don't see any r-real b-benefit to forcing one of t-them to s-sit by d-doing nothing."
Izuku steeled himself to meet Aizawa's eyes as the man considered his words. "Do whatever you want. We've wasted enough time on this already." Izuku released a breath he wasn't aware he had been holding. Speaking loudly now to the entire class, Aizawa continued. "Now that we're done with that, we can move onto more important matters." Izuku allowed himself to sink back into his seat. He could deal with the stress from being elected class president later. Right now he had classes to pay attention in. And he was nothing if not good at compartmentalizing.
---
Shota's homeroom class was full of students with potential, far more potential than any of his other classes had ever shown. Even better, most of them were even working to actually try to reach their potential. It was a sad fact that sometimes, the students with the most potential were also those that were most content to coast by on minimal effort. After the revelations related to Midoriya from the day before, there was only one student in the class that Shota believed was not working to fulfill their potential.
Shoto Todoroki.
Interestingly, the boy seemed for all the world to be a model student, working as hard as he could to use his ice in creative, effective ways. Indeed, if you had told Shota that Todoroki's quirk was simply ice manipulation, he would have been quite happy with how the boy was behaving.
But his quirk wasn't ice manipulation. That was only half his quirk. There was something fundamental that was causing his student to refuse to use the fire side of his quirk. Something that Shota was determined to get to the bottom of. Fire generation and manipulation was a quirk with danger associated with it and with any other student, Shota would have assumed that the potential for hurting other students or even themselves would lead to an aversion to using that half of the quirk.
But Shoto Todoroki wasn't just any student. He was the son of Enji Todoroki, pro hero Endeavor, and was presumably well aware of the various uses that fire could have in heroics. Given the boy's overall physical fitness and aptitude with the ice half of his quirk, it seemed likely that Endeavor had given him some amount of training prior to U.A as well. If the man hadn't trained his son in the use of his fire, Shota would be shocked.
Shota's misjudgment of Midoriya (as well as Nezu's exceedingly detailed lecture the night before) had caused him to go back and reevaluate all of the hero students in his class, as well as the recommendation and scouted students in class 1-B. He found that his impressions of many of them were somewhat skewed due to his refusal to do any serious background reading on them. Both Honenuki and Awase already had some understanding of the heroism industry due to family connections to the support industry and the HPSC, respectively. In middle school, Ashido had been diagnosed with ADHD and Koda with selective mutism. Other students had smaller details that had escaped his notice that recontextualized them in his mind.
His greatest errors in understanding the hero students, however, came in class 1-B. He had allowed his friendship with Tensei to blind himself to the flaws in Tenya Iida's recommendation results. While the boy was surely faster than his brother had been at this age, his cornering and creativity both left much to be desired. On anything other than a straightaway, either physically or metaphorically, he would currently be at a disadvantage. On the other hand, he had ignored a potentially vital portion of Reiko Yanagi's file, stating that she had suffered from extreme quirk aversion until the past year when she had been scouted for U.A. According to her file, a strict regimen under Toshinori Yagi had helped her break through a mental barrier that had plagued her all her life.
This was now the second time that All Might had managed to unearth a candidate for heroism with outstanding potential by looking beyond their immediate situation to what lay underneath. Shota didn't know how to feel about this. It was clear that there was something lacking in his own teaching method, something that All Might had managed to grasp. It was galling to admit, but despite his lack of teaching accreditation, the number one hero had enough of a grasp of interpersonal relationships and heroism in general to have some worth as a teacher.
Regardless, the discovery of Yanagi having quirk aversion had started the gears of his mind working on Todoroki. Quirk aversion was not common among hero students, so he had never really considered it before. But the scar on Todoroki's face, along with his apparently steadfast refusal to use his fire, were making Shota worry.
Normally Shota would just expel the boy after he had ignored the warning in the quirk assessment test and be done with it, but the errors he had found in his judgments of so many other students made him second-guess his own instincts. Better perhaps for now to gather more information. "Todoroki, a word before you head off to lunch." A flash of emotion passed across the boy's face at this, but it returned to his usual blank expression before Shota could read it.
As the rest of the class filed out towards the cafeteria, Todoroki simply waited patiently for Shota to begin the conversation. This was not something he wanted to air in front of the other students, though. Once the room was empty, though, Shota found himself hesitating. He had never actually had one of these conversations with a student before. Expulsion was his go to method for dealing with difficult problems. Had been his go to method, he reminded himself.
"Todoroki, I hope you know what we need to speak about." Shota really did not want to have to explain the issue once again, and was relieved when the boy nodded. "Then you know that we need to speak about your quirk usage and your conversation with Honenuki in your battle trial."
A number of emotions flew across Todoroki's face: anger, anxiety, sadness, all in the short moment before he responded. "I did not know that you were listening to our conversations." After a brief silence, Shota realized that there was nothing more coming from the boy. Fine, they would do this the hard way.
"Part of what you were being graded on was your teamwork with your partner. It would be illogical to not listen to your planning and in-battle communication. As mentioned in your detailed review, your teamwork was severely lacking." Todoroki nodded a single time, remaining silent. "That is not why I wanted to speak with you though. You once again declined to use your fire despite rendering yourself nearly hypothermic and it being a strong counter to Tokoyami's quirk."
"If you listened to our conversation, then you know that I will not use Endeavor's fire." That was an odd phrasing and yet another red flag. Shota's eyes narrowed, taking in the boy's body language. Despite the blank look on Todoroki's face, his entire body had tensed, fight or flight instincts kicking in. Again Shota's attention was drawn to Todoroki's scar over his left eye. Shota's stomach sank.
There was almost certainly more going on here than he had initially thought, and likely more than he was qualified to deal with. While Shota had experience with trauma victims on a triage level, if any of his rising concerns about Todoroki were even remotely accurate, he would need more support than Shota could provide.
"And if you remembered what I said two days ago, then you will recall that I will not graduate any student who does not make use of all of their resources. It endangers themselves and it endangers civilians." Todoroki did not emote at this, but if anything his tension only increased.
"Quirk aversion is nothing to be ashamed of, but it is something to be dealt with." This evoked only a raised eyebrow, but it did ratchet down the boy's tension somewhat. "I will not ask you to deal with it on your own, of course. If you do not show me progress over the next few weeks, then sessions with Hound Dog will be a requisite for staying in the hero program. If working with Hound Dog does not yield results, then we will have a more serious conversation. Am I clear?"
"Yes sir." Shota stared at the boy for another few seconds, looking for any signs that he was actually listening and understanding what he had said. Unfortunately, all of the cracks in Todoroki's stoic exterior had been smoothed over, and there was no real way to tell what he was thinking.
"Alright. Get to lunch, and remember, I'll be keeping an eye on you." As Todoroki left the room, Shota allowed himself a deep sigh. It was all so much easier when he could just expel problem children. But his experience with Midoriya had shown him that Yagi and Nezu had a point. Sometimes there was more going on than he could know.
---
Lunch was a relief after Ectoplasm's math class. Two days in and they were already leaps and bounds beyond what Kyoka had done in middle school. Part of her wanted to scream and let loose all manner of sound and fury to vent her frustration. Instead, after getting her lunch and sitting down across from Izuku, she just lay her head down on the table next to her tray.
"Uh, Kyoka, you ok there?" Izuku was looking at her with a raised eyebrow and genuine concern in his eyes.
"I am dead, slain by Oiler or whoever it was that Ectoplasm talked about today." So she was being a little dramatic, so sue her.
"...Do you mean Euler?" The way Izuku said it was slightly different, a hint of a German accent. That was probably the correct way of saying the name; Kyoka vaguely remembered Ectoplasm saying the man was German.
"Yeah, sure, him." Izuku merely chuckled at her dramatics. Seeing that she wasn't going to get any sympathy from him, she pushed herself up to sitting with a sigh. "It's just a lot all at once. Things have been running at full speed since we got here. I know it's only been two days so far, but we worked so hard for the last year that it all just kind of blurs together."
"Yeah, and the past couple of weeks with planning and then moving into the dorms, we haven't even had an opportunity to just unwind like we used to." Izuku looked a little wistful, and Kyoka could understand. Those jam sessions where she would teach him guitar and he would ramble about heroes and quirks were probably the only reason they made it through their training without going crazy. Well, crazier in Izuku's case.
"Well then, we'll just have to make an opportunity for ourselves." Kyoka spoke before really thinking through what she was saying, but didn't find her regretting her words one bit.
Izuku cocked his head to one side in confusion. "W-What d-do you mean?" Kyoka felt her cheeks burning somewhat as she realized exactly what she was proposing, but pushed on regardless.
"I mean we should make sure to save some time every week for a jam session to make sure we can unwind." Now it was Izuku's turn to blush. Once again the logical part of her brain was shouting at her that he must be interested in her, but she ruthlessly shoved it down. "I can keep teaching you guitar, and we can just hang out like we did while we were training."
"O-Oh." His blush got even deeper for some reason. "I-I k-kinda thought t-those w-were over since w-we got into U.A." Kyoka was about to cut in to further disabuse that notion when he broke out into a huge smile, despite the blush. "T-That sounds great, Kyoka! M-Maybe we c-could start t-tomorrow?" It was too much for her, and she felt her blush continue to grow. Maybe he did really have feelings for her.
"S-Sounds good, Green." She tried to smile back as wide as he was smiling at her, but wasn't sure she hit the mark.
"Sooooo… What's got you two all smiley?" Both Kyoka and Izuku shook in surprise as Yaoyorozu and Uraraka sat down to join them, Uraraka looking smug after asking her question. The look on her face was unbearable. She knew that Kyoka had a crush, and had to know what had been going on. Kyoka fixed her with her strongest glare before responding.
"I-I w-was just c-complaining about math class to G-Green. M-My brain is a little blown r-right now, right Green?" Not her best work on a lie on short notice, but it would have to do. Izuku was a terrible liar, so having something that had a basis in reality would help.
"H-Huh? O-Oh, y-y-yeah. K-K-Kyoka w-was complaining a-about Euler b-before you g-got here." All technically true, which was apparently the only way he could lie even somewhat convincingly. He had kind of retreated into himself a little bit, keeping his eyes focused on his meal with his face still fully flushed. While she had a chance, Kyoka gestured harshly to Uraraka and Yaoyorozu to let this issue drop. Uraraka rolled her eyes but seemed to fall into line.
"I just don't understand why we need to know so much math for hero work. I get it for paperwork and the like, but I'm not going to be plotting a parabola while I'm punching a villain." As Kyoka spoke she could feel her blush receding as she remembered her earlier complaints. She expected some sympathy, but got nothing of the sort.
"Well, those are kind of important for me, whenever I release gravity on something it moves in a parabola." Uraraka spoke up before digging into her food. Kyoka hadn't realized that parabolas were so important for using Uraraka's quirk, but supposed that it made sense.
"A-And t-talking about Euler is s-super important for your quirk, K-Kyoka." That was news to her, but she generally trusted Izuku when it came to things like this. Thankfully, he seemed like he was recovering a bit. "I-In addition to all the math he did, he did a lot of early work using mathematics to describe and understand music!" Honenuki and Shoji also joined the table, sitting down on the opposite side of Kyoka and Izuku.
"Fine," She drew the word out for emphasis, "I'll give Euler a chance." Izuku brightened up at that statement. "But I'm blaming you for anything that goes wrong, Green."
"I can live with that, Kyoka." Izuku wore a confident smirk as he said this, only slightly offset by the remaining blush on his cheeks, and Kyoka felt her cheeks heat back up a tad. Why did he have to be so goddamn attractive?
"Oh, so we're back to Kyoka, are we?" Honenuki joined the conversation on the one topic that Kyoka really didn't want to talk about here at lunch. She sent him a glare as well but it didn't seem to work immediately. "If I remember from a couple of days ago…" Whatever he had been about to say was cut off by a yelp, before Honenuki glared across the table at Shoji. "What the hell did you kick me like that for?"
"Accident," Replied the taller boy in a flat voice. The look in his eyes, however, implied that it was anything but.
Kyoka's cheeks continued to heat up from Honenuki bringing up the sleep-deprived Izuku incident that had, so far, faded into the background. She had hoped that no one had heard what Izuku mumbled in his half-asleep haze, but apparently they had. At least Shoji understood that she didn't want to talk about it. Steeling herself, she snuck a glance at Izuku only to find him with his head cocked to the side, a combination of confusion and anxiety painted on his features as he looked between Honenuki and Shoji. Sometimes she was glad he was so dense.
Sometimes.
"Anyways," Uraraka interjected loudly, "I wanted to congratulate you two on being elected representatives!" She looked between Izuku and Yaoyorozu. "You guys are going to do great!"
While Yaoyorozu looked pleased at the praise, Izuku continued to look confused. "I'm still not sure who voted for me," He mumbled into his food.
"I did!" Uraraka immediately piped up.
"I nominated you, of course I voted for you, dude." Kyoka reminded him. Honenuki and Shoji also indicated that they had voted for Izuku, which threw him for much more of a loop than it should have.
"I'll admit that I voted for myself." Again, rather unsurprising from Yaoyorozu. "Pray tell, who did you vote for, Midoriya?"
He was blushing once again, avoiding eye contact with anyone at the table, and Kyoka had a sneaking suspicion that she knew why. "W-Well, I-I voted for K-Kyoka."
"B-But why?! I thought you nominated me as a joke!" There was no way she would be a good class representative. Izuku was usually much smarter than this.
"B-Because I-I think you'd b-be the b-best." Kyoka was about to respond when Izuku looked up, cheeks red but eyes determined. "You are a smart, determined, and thoughtful person and I bet you'd be really good at keeping the class in line." Once again Kyoka felt a blush grow on her cheeks. If she wasn't careful, they'd be red for the rest of the day. It did feel really nice to have Izuku say something like that about her. Again the logical side of her brain told her that he had to like her the way she wanted, and she was slower to shove it down than before.
"T-Thanks, Green." Was all she was able to get out, momentarily ignoring the smirks from Uraraka, Honenuki, and even Yaoyorozu. If she allowed herself to think about it, the only reason Shoji wasn't smirking at her would likely be because of his mask.
Eventually, the conversation picked back up on another topic and their friends left her and Izuku alone. Kyoka felt lighter than she had in days, though, and was fully looking forward to tomorrow. It wasn't quite a date with Izuku, but it was time alone with him, which she realized she had been sorely missing. Tomorrow would be a good day. Today was a good day.
And then the intruder alarm went off.
---
While the halls of U.A were home to a panicked rush of students away from the cafeteria, the area near the teacher's lounge was deserted. Deserted aside from a single student that made their way calmly, but quickly, towards the doors. On the off chance that anyone saw them, of course, they would only see an average U.A student, likely from the general education course but details varying from person to person, who had somehow remained blissfully unaware of the intruder alert currently going off. A useful aspect of their quirk for espionage, one that the Doctor had been eager to experiment with.
He had always hoped that his quirk would be useful for something, but certainly never expected it to be used like this. The Doctor had offered the world, saying that he could help his quirk evolve into something more powerful, to grant him more control over how he appeared to others. It had seemed too good to be true, but he had been so eager to believe. Because of his quirk, everyone had always seen in him what they had expected to see: an average student, someone who didn't want to make waves. It was frustrating to never be able to break out of the box everyone had for him. The Doctor hadn't even lied, and somehow that made it all the worse.
They slipped through the doors without making a sound, quickly looking around for any faculty that remained in the office. There weren't any teachers in sight, but they activated the x-ray vision aspect to their quirk to quickly glance through the various walls. No teachers in the entire office. The distraction at the gates must be working. They let a smile play across their lips at how easy this was. Shigaraki's distraction was more effective than even their master had expected.
She willingly went with the Doctor to try to find a way to turn off her quirk. Constant x-ray vision was infuriating. Sure, if you had never experienced it, it might seem like a quirk that was all upside, but there was so much she could never truly understand. Beauty in all sorts of forms: artwork, a sunset, the love in a mother's eyes. When all you could see of your fellow humans was their skeletons, it also led to a certain distance from society as a whole, never mind the host of things that she simply couldn't see. The Doctor's offer of a way back into that society that she so desired was simply too much to ignore.
Making their way through the offices, they quickly found their way to Toshinori Yagi's office. While the students still only knew the man as All Might, their master had taught them the man's true identity from when they first became aware. None of the students in their class had yet figured out that All Might didn't even have an office in the lounge, let alone wondered why the head of a defunct scouting program would still need an office.
Inside was a vast array of teaching materials, notes, and preparations for classes throughout the entire term. Mixed in with all of these other pages was their goal: a detailed schedule of All Might's schedule with classes 1-A and 1-B. A glance was all that they needed: the eidetic memory portion of their quirk once again proved its worth. There were other important documents that they memorized as well, on the off chance it could be helpful, such as the layout of the USJ. Both classes were slated to spend time there in the next few days, after all.
If you asked him, he could recall every word, every gesture, every way that the Doctor had tried to convince him to allow his quirk to be studied. What he could not remember was why he had ultimately agreed, or how he ended up on the operating table with the Doctor hovering above him. He remembered everything that had ever happened to him after his quirk had come in. Even while sleeping, every noise he heard and every unconscious motion his body made were forever inscribed into his mind. The Doctor thought that the mental strain must be unbearable, and had offered to help, despite his insistence that everything was fine. And then there was a blank, a hole in his otherwise flawless memory. It was something far more terrifying to him than even his recollection of being pulled apart, piece by piece, until just his quirk remained.
The sudden silence as the alarm cut out was their cue to exit the teacher's lounge before they were found. There were still piles of documents that could have useful information within them, but even with the various aspects of their new fused quirk, it would be quite difficult indeed to deal with being caught where they were not supposed to be. Thankfully, the lounge remained empty until well after they had made their exit.
All that was left to do now was to return to the restroom where they had assumed their current form and drop their quirks. They had made sure to use the electronic interference side of their quirk in addition to the expected form aspect, to ensure that Nezu would not have any evidence tying this little excursion back to them. It wasn't until they made it back to their homeroom with the rest of class 1-B that they let themselves truly relax. Their master would be quite happy with the information that they had managed to acquire. These foolish hero wannabes would get their first taste of real terror in over five years.
She had always wanted to be a hero. No matter how many people told her that her quirk was too weak to be any good for hero work, that she was creepy or weird or off-putting, she still pushed herself to do better, to be better. She tried to be the person that anyone in her middle school could go to for help, and she would always do whatever she could to aid those who did. Now she found herself here, at U.A, her dream school for so long, under the worst circumstances she could imagine. The Doctor had offered her an opportunity to be a hero, just as long as she would agree to a few quirk-related tests. He had promised her the world, and she had foolishly believed him. She had always wanted to be a hero, but not like this.
---
After the "excitement" of the intruder alert over lunch, Izuku wasn't sure that he could deal with the first meeting with the student government. Unfortunately, it didn't seem like he had much of a choice in the matter. If nothing else, Izuku was happy that he had Yaoyorozu and Kendo alongside him. They were both far more competent in nearly every way than he was, so hopefully they would just carry him through and he wouldn't have to say or do much of anything.
As the three of them wandered the halls, trying to find the conference room where the meeting was to take place, they found themselves joined by another pair of students, presumably the representatives from another first year class, given by the vaguely lost expression that both of them wore.
One of the students, one with a bestial appearance, noticed them first, and pointed them out to his partner, a blue haired student. Almost immediately, the blue haired student whirled to face them and immediately attempted to get their attention with sharp, angular waves.
"Ah, Yaoyorozu, it is good to see you! Perhaps you could help us find conference room gamma."
"Hello Iida. That is where we are headed as well. This is Izuku Midoriya, the class 1-A president, and Itsuka Kendo, my co-vice president."
"Congratulations on your selection!" The boy bowed deep to Izuku and Kendo. "Forgive me for my impoliteness. My name is Tenya Iida and I am class president of 1-B, and this is Jurota Shishida, our vice president." He straightened, while the bestial boy gave a slight introductory bow. "Yaoyorozu and I met at the recommended student exam. Since we are all headed to the same place, perhaps we should walk together."
"It would be good to get to know our colleagues in 1-B." Kendo said. "It is very nice to meet the two of you." The five of them set out, hoping to make their way through the maze of hallways before the meeting began.
"W-Wasn't i-it a s-student from 1-B that h-helped calm e-everyone d-down earlier today?" Izuku asked, mostly to interrupt the stifling silence that they had been walking in.
"Indeed!" Iida continued to gesture with sharp motions, forcing Shishida to the side to not be struck. "It was a brilliant plan devised by our classmates Fukidashi and Kuroiro. I am still impressed at their ingenuity in combining their quirks to calm everyone so quickly." Izuku made a mental note to try to track those two down later on. He had so many questions he wanted to ask the both of them.
"If I may ask a question of you three," Shishida began, his voice far smoother and more cultured than his bestial appearance would have suggested, "Why do you have co-vice presidents? I was unaware that such a possibility existed as an option."
"W-We held a v-vote, and Yaoyorozu and Kendo t-tied for second place. Our homeroom teacher didn't mind if we had co-vice presidents." Shishida nodded in understanding, but Iida looked slightly dismayed at this comment.
"Are you ok, Iida?" Apparently Yaoyorozu noticed this as well. The boy sighed before responding.
"I tried to convince 1-B to hold a vote, but they were convinced everyone would simply vote for themselves."
"Ah, we got around that by requiring nominations." Kendo replied, with a hint of pride in her voice.
"An admirable solution! We could not agree on any such compromise, and so we used an… alternate method to determine our class representatives." The silence that followed was too much for Izuku to bear.
"So… how did you decide?" Iida remained quiet, a grimace stretched across his face. It was Shishida who ultimately stepped in to break the silence.
"Our classmates ultimately decided that Iida and I bore the most physical resemblance to a stereotypical class representative. I believe that their main criterion was that we both wear glasses, while no one else in the class does." The silence that followed spoke volumes.
"I'm sure you two will do great!" Kendo attempted to cheer the boy up.
"I know that U.A has a meaning behind everything they do, but I admit I am struggling to see how this could be a meaningful learning experience." Even when rather unhappy, Iida continued with his hand gestures, even if they were somewhat subdued.
"W-well, s-so much of the c-current hero system is based on p-popularity and i-image, your teacher may have thought that this was an early introduction to that sort of judgment." This didn't seem particularly likely to Izuku, but it was certainly a possibility. He thought that, like Aizawa, 1-B's homeroom teacher simply wanted the selection over and done with and was willing to accept any method of choosing representatives.
"Right you are, Midoriya! Your eye for detail far surpasses my own! I see why your class voted you president!" Izuku was saved from having to respond to such a patently absurd statement by their arrival at the conference room. They were not the last classes to arrive, but nearly so, and the school government meeting began shortly thereafter. The faculty advisor was Cementoss, which reassured Izuku somewhat. The man had seemed calm and reassuring in the few days of his Modern Literature.
As it was the first meeting of the year, the majority of the meeting was spent reviewing ground rules, introducing the first years and the like. Cementoss pointed out that none of the upper year hero courses were represented at the meeting, and that while the first year representatives would likely soon be busy enough that they too would no longer attend, he still thanked them for being there. Some of the older general education students did not look quite as happy, however.
There was one point to Cementoss's introductory remarks that stuck with Izuku, however, and it was one directed at the upper year students. Apparently the school was in the middle of discussions with the HPSC about the direction of their curriculum, and Cementoss made sure that the older students were aware that the curricula could change from previous years rather suddenly. In particular, he used the first year hero classes as an example, stating that the battle trials that 1-A had performed the previous day and 1-B had just finished up today were typically something that occurred closer to a month into the semester, rather than the beginning.
Even after the meeting had concluded, something about the HPSC pushing these changes on U.A rankled in the back of Izuku's mind. U.A had been the top hero school for years for a reason, presumably. Further, the HPSC had implicitly approved of U.A's methods by ranking so many of their alumni so highly. There must have been reasons both for their push and for U.A's resistance, but Izuku could not claim to know enough about hero education to say which reasons were the better ones.
His gut, however, told him that the HPSC was in the wrong, at least this time. Battle simulations with no foundational training was a recipe for disaster. His class had been lucky to make it out with only one injury. He made a note to himself to look into how the HPSC viewed hero education. That might give him some insight and settle this itch in his mind.
---
Kurogiri continued to wash and clean the glasses at his the bar while Shigaraki spoke to his captormaster and Doctor Garaki. There was something soothing about the repetitive motions of washing and drying, which made the meetings bearable. The meeting had been called at the last minute, and so he hadn't had time to clean up his the bar before it began. Yurei had provided detailed information as to All Might's upcoming schedule, and Shigaraki wanted to strike at U.A and All Might as soon as possible.
Shigaraki had been ecstatic that what seemed to be the best opportunity to strike at the man was tomorrow. Kurogiri chose to focus on other aspects of the plan: coordinating with their collection of hired muscle, familiarizing himself with the coordinates to the USJ and various locations within, considering whether attacking U.A and All Might was even a good plan to begin with , and determining which of their hired thugs would be sent to which region of the USJ. Obviously those with aquatic based mutations and quirks would be sent to the flood zone and those with ranged quirks would remain in the central plaza, but the other zones were not so straightforward.
Kurogiri was not entirely looking forward to being a part of the strike on U.A, although he was glad that the current plan called for an attack at the USJ. The thought of invading the main campus of U.A filled him with a sort of dread that he could not place, but it was somewhat lessened when thinking of the distant and recently constructed USJ.
Further, the plan as discussed had them deliberately targeting students, children, with the aim of both enraging All Might to the point of making a mistake, and to discredit the institution as a whole. Kurogiri even played a pivotal role in attacking the children, being tasked with scattering them across the complex, into the waiting hands of the criminals they had found for the plan. It was disappointing, if not surprising, how many of them were willing to kill literal children as long as they were studying to be heroes.
Kurogiri blinked at the monitors in front of him before subtly glancing at a clock to see how much time he had lost. Ten minutes this time. This was one of the worst incidents in weeks, but they had become more frequent over the last few days of planning this attack. He hoped that after the strike on U.A they would settle back down and he could go back to managing the bar.
At a glance it was obvious that Tomura and All For One had not noticed his lapse, as his master was currently instructing the youth on how weak All Might should be and how to best kill the man. Kurogiri made sure to school his thoughts as he heard All For One describe how best to use his own quirk to cut the man in half and was thankful that he did not lose any more time.
Doctor Garaki, on the other hand, may have noticed his lapse, as he appeared to be looking at him oddly. It was, of course, impossible to tell exactly where Garaki was looking from the other side of his monitor, but the camera placement on top of the monitor made it somewhat possible. Kurogiri had had torture sessions check-ups with the good Doctor for missing time in the past, and was terrified aboutresigned to them happening again. He didn't remember much of the check-ups, and wasn't sure how to feel about that.
"Doctor," Thankfully, All For One changed the topic to involve the Doctor before he could say anything about Kurogiri. "What nomu do you have available immediately?"
"I have four nomu that could be used. The prime unit, which you are already familiar with, Shigaraki, as well as three others." Shigaraki nodded impatiently. "Of these three, one is simply a weaker version of the prime unit, without the shock absorption or as powerful a regeneration quirk. Good for brute force and not much else. One is winged, so it may be of less utility in the indoor USJ. The last has a variety of useful skills: energy absorption and release, a webbed tongue, and hypnotic eyes. All three have at least one super strength and super speed quirk." Apparently as an aside, he added, "This last was the closest to quirk fusion. If I had known about that frog quirk at U.A earlier, I think I would have been able to tie them together."
"Hm, an off tank, a flier, and a debuffer to go with the tank and spike dps prime unit." Tomura hummed to himself, thinking about what he heard. "I like it. We should take them all. Those three will be useful in making sure at least some hero brats end up dead." Kurogiri felt a distant discomfort at that statement, but made sure not to dwell on it so as to not lose more time.
"And Kurogiri, you know your role in this plan, correct?" All For One turned his attention for the first time to Kurogiri, and he was fairly sure he could feel a distant amusement filter through their link.
"Indeed. I only need to determine where to send each of the students. Has Yurei provided us with any information on class 1-A? Their quirks or appearances?"
"Why do you care? Just send them wherever!" Tomura snapped. Kurogiri would have to once again remind the boy about manners and politeness.
"It would be preferable to send students to zones where their quirk cannot help them. Sending a student with an aquatic quirk to the flood zone could work against us. Sending them to the conflagration zone instead would be far superior."
Tomura was about to speak back once again, but All For One interrupted. "Kurogiri has a point, young Tomura. Unfortunately, Yurei was not able to find any information on class 1-A, and we will not attack class 1-B." A strategic disappointment, but Kurogiri couldn't ignore the swirl of relief deep inside of him.
"Very well, then I am prepared as well." It was barely even a lie.
---
The setting sun cast Tokyo in a soft orange light as Hawks returned to the Aerie. He always tried to take the time to appreciate the beauty of the sunset at the end of his daytime shifts, especially from the top floor of his agency. The Aerie was the fourth tallest building in Tokyo, behind only Might Tower, the Tokyo Skytree, and the Tokyo Tower, and had a spectacular view on clear days like today.
Unfortunately, today was not one of the days where he could take the time to enjoy the scenery. On return from his patrol, he had been notified that he had received a message on the internal HPSC messaging system. Very few people had access to said system, and most of them weren't heroes. There were only three people remaining in the HPSC who should have known how to reach him using that method, and he didn't particularly want to hear from any of them.
However, just because he didn't want to hear from them didn't mean he could afford to ignore them either. In fact, the inverse was perhaps more true: the less he wanted to hear from them, the faster he felt he should respond. The commission always lauded timeliness from their underlings. Even if he wasn't technically directly employed by the commission anymore, they had provided enough of the funding for his agency's startup and continued operation that he knew he had to stay on their good side.
His office was small for a top heroes office, and lightly decorated, focusing instead on the floor-to-ceiling windows that bore an southward view of the city and, eventually, Tokyo Bay. Hawks did not bother to turn on any lights, opting instead to let the sunset light his office so he could enjoy at least some of the beautiful evening.
The console at his desk was rarely used but always on. Now that he was the number three hero, he had more assistants and clerks than he really needed. It did mean that he never really had to deal with paperwork any more, though. As such, this office, the view, the console on a secure network, it was all essentially a formality. The only time it got used was for impressing various politicians or other self-described VIPs. Or, far more rarely, for dealing with internal HPSC communications.
Most communications between his agency and the HPSC were done on standard networks because there was nothing note-worthy about them. Standard paperwork filings, patrol scheduling and sidekick hiring notifications and the like. Anything that came in on the secure network was something that the HPSC would rather the public never know about.
Much like his childhood.
The console booted up quickly, showing Hawks who exactly had thought to message him: Katashi Oh. Of the three possibilities, this was both the least expected, and the least desired. Hawks had thought himself free of his former teacher when he had been promoted to Director of Education and Training. But as he knew all too well, the past never dies. It can always find a way back to you.
The email was brief. Terse and harsh in the way that Katashi had always been with him.
Hawks,
I have come into intelligence as to a potential threat to hero society. Attached, find a change to your patrol route for tomorrow. Musutafu, and U.A in particular, is the possible site of a large-scale strike. Identify and eliminate any villainous activity that you observe. If asked, you were there as a coincidence.
Director Oh
Hawks had the email read within seconds, and memorized shortly thereafter. Regardless, he left the console open, staring at the words, trying to decipher the deeper meanings and unwritten messages behind it.
First, and most obviously, Oh had retained some of his connections from the Department of Intelligence and Surveillance. This wasn't a surprise; Hawks had always assumed the man knew more than he let on, even after his promotion. If the HPSC had come by this intelligence through one of its standard routes, it would not have been Oh to reach out to him. Presumably having personal informants would be politically damaging to the public-facing head of Education and Training.
Because of this, and the order to report his presence as a coincidence, it was certain that only Hawks had been contacted for this operation. How he was meant to deal with a "large-scale strike" was not entirely clear, but Oh always expected the best out of him. It did, however, mean that backup was unlikely.
Unless the target was, in fact, U.A. In that case he could count on the teachers.
The real question that Hawks turned over in his mind was why Director Oh would not at least allow this information to disseminate down to the staff at U.A. They had their own methods of security, far superior and more comprehensive than anything Hawks could do on his own. The obvious answer was a rift between the HPSC and the top hero school. The fact that it referred to this threat as one to "hero society" only reinforced this conclusion.
Hawks tried to keep his beak out of politics but, like the past, it always seemed to find its way back to him. He copied the text of the email onto a secure drive before responding in the affirmative to Director Oh. He had never liked to be kept waiting.
The winged hero continued to ponder the implications of the email long into the night, long past when he sent his reply. Eventually the office was lit only by the light of his console and the city lights outside.
---
"And All Might is the teacher for our heroism classes! Well, the assistant teacher to Mr. Aizawa, I guess. But All Might does all the teaching and he's actually really good at it! Which you wouldn't necessarily expect because there's not a lot of overlap between heroism and teaching but he's starting off really well!" Izuku continued to rapidly praise his idol and now apparently heroism teacher, but Inko tuned out somewhat. He had already covered this ground more or less twice already, but that was nothing new for Izuku. At least not when talking about All Might.
Finally hearing from her son was heartening, even if he had only just moved out three days ago. She had been worried when she tried to get in touch with him the day after he moved out only to get his voicemail and no response all night. It took everything in her power to not go right down to U.A and find out what had happened to him that night.
Izuku had explained that he had gotten too caught up in getting to know his classmates and pre-school activities that he had simply fallen asleep early that night and not woken up when she had called. She almost believed him. The real problem was that he didn't give too much detail about what exactly he had been doing. Something about a quirk assessment test was the most she had gotten out of him on the topic of pre-school activities.
Thankfully, he had been more open about the friends he was making, and it was so gratifying to hear him talk about having friends once again, and more friends than just Jiro. One of Inko's biggest fears about Izuku going off to U.A was that he would end up isolated like he had been at Aldera. She knew that it wasn't as likely, given that his quirk had awakened and he would be attending with a friend in Jiro, but it still worried her.
"Yesterday was our first class with All Might and it was battle trials, which sounded really intimidating but ended up being exhilarating. All of my classmates have such cool quirks!"
"Battle training, Izuku?" Inko wasn't sure how she felt about jumping right into that on day one. "Are you alright? You're not hurt, are you?"
"I'm fine, mom. E-Even if anyone got hurt, U.A has Recovery Girl on stand-by so injuries are dealt with right away." The little hitch in Izuku's voice when speaking about students getting injured did not go unnoticed by Inko. There was something there that he wasn't telling her, but that wasn't new. He didn't stutter when saying that he was fine, so it probably wasn't him that got hurt in the battle training.
"Still, it makes me worry. What is U.A thinking throwing first years into that sort of training?" Inko knew that hero schools were potentially dangerous, but it was disconcerting having it start so soon.
"Actually, that training usually is a month into the year."
"How do you know that?" Izuku hadn't mentioned speaking with any of his senior students or anything of the sort.
"Oh, you remember I told you I was elected class president?" Inko made an affirmative noise, and Izuku continued. "Well we had our first school council meeting today. I'm not going to go to a lot of those, probably, but I'm glad I went to this one. Cementoss was the faculty advisor, which is so cool, but he said that the HPSC has been coming down on U.A to change their curriculum. He used our early battle training as an example of that happening recently."
Inko didn't know how to feel or what to believe on hearing that. Her contacts at the HPSC had said they were trying to get U.A to improve their educational experience. She thought it had been implied that they would try to make it safer.
The rest of the call with Izuku rushed by as it devolved into a normal conversation between the two of them. She was somewhat lonely in the apartment all by herself, but talking with him helped bring her out of it somewhat. Hearing that he had friends and was already trusted enough by his classmates to be the class president was heartening.
Once the call ended, however, she decided that she wanted to try to speak with some of the other parents, perhaps the Urarakas or the Kirishimas again. Both of their children were in Izuku's class and it would be helpful to hear another perspective on what had happened in the first few days. And then she would need to get back in touch with the HPSC and make sure that they were actually trying to make things safer.
She was distracted from all of this by a knock at the door. Unsure who would be visiting so late at night, Inko looked through the peephole only to find Hisashi standing on her front step.