Chapter 35: Visions
Part of Izuku was proud of his progress after just one day of training with Gran Torino. Using twelve percent of One For All during the sports festival had been torture, but now it had become far more bearable. He could even push himself all the way to fifteen percent, if only for brief stretches.
The downside was that he still wasn't any closer to being able to reliably catch the elderly hero, even with the boost to how much One For All he could use. No matter how hard Izuku tried, no matter how much he tried to change up his own patterns to catch the man off guard, nothing seemed to work more than once. Izuku was convinced that Gran Torino was massively holding back during their spars. As soon as Izuku managed to so much as lay a finger on him, he sped up just a hair more and became even more erratic in his movements. And every time that happened, Izuku would be kicked in the face, in the stomach, in the back, wherever Gran Torino felt like kicking him, until he could catch up with the older man's new level of speed.
After four hours of training the previous day, and another three this morning, Izuku was running desperately low on ideas. The only one that he had left was to use Fa Jin for a burst of speed that Gran Torino wouldn't see coming. He'd been avoiding it because he would have to be very careful in how he struck. If he actually hit his mentor with a Fa Jin powered attack, it could very well end up with Gran Torino splattered all over the wall.
With no better options at his disposal, though, Izuku was willing to take a bit of a chance. And at this point, if Gran Torino ended up a little (or a lot) hurt, so be it. Izuku was so very tired of being literally kicked around, after all.
It had been long enough since Izuku's last breakthrough that he was pretty sure he had figured out Gran Torino's new pattern. He would always touch off the ceiling shortly before attacking, and usually only two or three walls before launching himself at Izuku. At first it was disorienting trying to find the man in the confusion, but Izuku had it down by now.
This time, when Gran Torino approached, Izuku was ready. He pulled on his reservoir of Fa Jin and launched a massive punch directly at Gran Torino, making sure to throw the punch just a hair early, so as not to actually hit the man. Somehow, it looked as if Gran Torino had seen the attack coming, altering his trajectory at the last minute to ensure that Izuku did not actually strike him.
It didn't matter, though. Izuku had built up enough kinetic energy in Fa Jin since the sports festival that just the air pressure generated by the attack alone was enough to completely halt Gran Torino's forward motion and throw him backwards against the wall.
The sound of the elderly hero's collision with the wall was enough to draw Sir Nighteye's attention briefly, eyes narrowing at Izuku, before returning his attention to his laptop. The former sidekick had barely said two sentences to Izuku since yesterday, and argued that his work was important enough that he needed to keep up on it while Izuku trained. That, of course, begged the question of why he didn't simply return to his own agency.
"That's what I'm talking about, zygote!" Gran Torino seemed entirely unaffected by hitting the wall, and immediately zipped over to Izuku. "You've been holding out on me, I guess."
"I didn't want to hurt you, sir. If I had actually hit you with that punch, you probably would have died."
"Bah, I'm neither as slow nor as fragile as you think." Gran Torino spoke with conviction. "You move in straight lines, too linear. Even if that punch itself was fast, I saw your wind-up coming miles away. But now we have something to work with. Show me what you did again, exactly as you just did it."
Izuku froze in place. "I, uh, I can't."
"The hell you can't, you just did!" Gran Torino looked like he was about to kick Izuku just for that.
"No, I mean." Izuku let out a small breath. How to explain? "Did All Might let you know of some of the more recent … developments to One For All." Sir Nighteye didn't do anything special, but Izuku was certain that he was suddenly listening very closely.
"If you mean that you're gonna get a bunch of different quirks, then he did." Izuku supposed that was the most important point for Gran Torino and Sir Nighteye to know. After all, they would have to know that Izuku might manifest another quirk at any point during the internship. But Izuku did not want to tell them about the former holders right now. It would complicate an already involved situation, and there was no guarantee that they wouldn't just dismiss him out of hand.
"Ah, well, there's a bit more to it than that, but that's the most important right now. I just used the quirk of one of the former holders. It's called Fa Jin, and it lets me store up kinetic energy from specific movements." Izuku felt Sir Nighteye's attention even more keenly now, but pushed on. "But once I've used it up I have to build it back up before I can use that movement again."
Gran Torino nodded sagely, one hand stroking his trimmed beard. "Hm, yes, that's quite the predicament." Without any further warning, he shot forward once again and kicked Izuku in the back of the head, sending him sprawling. "Toshinori told us that you were supposed to be smart, that you were supposed to understand quirks, and here you are proving him wrong!"
For at least the twentieth time today alone, Izuku pushed himself up from the ground onto his hands and knees. His patience was already thin, and the corporal punishment favored by Gran Torino wasn't doing it any favors. "Could you just tell me what I'm supposed to take away from this rather than have me guess?"
Immediately Izuku wanted to take it back, but was surprised to hear a snort of laughter from Sir Nighteye. However, when he looked towards the man, he was as serious and severe as ever, still apparently focused on his laptop.
"I'm not going to tell you because it'll stick better if you figure it out for yourself." Gran Torino glared at Izuku for a moment before rolling his eyes. "I can give you a hint though. What's the difference between One For All and this Fa Jin?"
Izuku took a moment before answering, trying to figure out exactly what Gran Torino was aiming at. After making sure his mouth was shut (Gran Torino had already kicked him twice for muttering just today) he started working through it all in his head. The immediate difference was that Fa Jin was a part of One For All; One For All encompassed all of Fa Jin and then some. But that obviously wasn't the answer based on the way Gran Torino asked it. When Izuku took a step back and thought about both One For All and Fa Jin as individual quirks, his mouth dropped open as he realized what Gran Torino was going for.
"There… there isn't one." Gran Torino's mouth turned up into a satisfied smile. "They're both stockpiling quirks at base. Yes, they stockpile different things, but fundamentally they work exactly the same."
"And what was the very first thing you learned to do with One For All, eh zygote?"
It wasn't hard for Izuku to remember. Those few weeks before the entrance exam training his quirk with Kyoka had been some of the best weeks of his life. "Limit my output."
"Right." Gran Torino's face took on a decidedly darker cast. "So why the hell did you ignore all that with your new quirk?!"
"Because I discovered the quirk when I was fighting for my life and needed as much power as I could get." Izuku spoke before he could think, but realized his answer was exactly correct. If he had had time to think about it during the USJ, it would have been obvious that he could limit the power of Fa Jin, but he had needed as much power as possible. Afterwards, he had simply been locked into thinking of it as a switch, as all or nothing. The third holder's attitude hadn't helped much in that regard, to be fair.
There was a long silence as Gran Torino stared at him, long enough that even Sir Nighteye took note and glanced over. Eventually, though, Gran Torino's face softened. "Fine, I suppose I'll give you a pass for that. Just this once. It's not like Toshinori would be of any help in this, so you're basically muddling through on your own. Alright kid, new plan! You're done sparring with me for now."
"But why, sir? I feel like I've been making a lot of progress."
"You have, but if you keep sparring with just me, you'll end up settling into even more bad habits. We can't have that. This afternoon and evening, you're going to learn how to limit the output of your Fa Jin. Tomorrow, you spar against him." He thrust his arm towards Sir Nighteye.
"Are… are you sure? I don't want to hurt him." Sir Nighteye scoffed at Izuku's words, standing up from his seat to unfold to his full height.
"I would be far more concerned about the opposite, Bastion." Sir Nighteye strode towards where Izuku and Gran Torino stood, towering over both of them.
"Enough posturing!" Gran Torino shouted, although Sir Nighteye barely reacted. "Then, in the evening, we'll head out on patrol and find some heads to knock. That'll really teach you how to fight in general."
"Where were you planning?" Sir Nighteye turned his gaze to the elderly hero. If anything, Sir Nighteye's gaze was even more intense than normal. "Where did you want to patrol?"
"Shibuya, if you're so curious."
There was a visible lessening of a tension in Sir Nighteye's shoulders as he nodded. "Fine, but I'm driving. We will not be taking the train."
"Fine, fine, whatever you want. But that's for tomorrow. Go grab some lunch, zygote. You've got a long afternoon ahead of you." Izuku gulped, running off to fuel up for the rest of the day before Gran Torino decided that lunch would just slow him down. He wouldn't put anything past the sadistic man, after all.
---
Before arriving at Wash's agency for the first time, Juzo had had no idea what to expect from the hero himself. Essentially all of the communications that came out of Wash's agency were done through his sidekicks. In public, the vast majority of the man's communications came in the form of his catchphrase: "Wash!"
According to Midoriya, Wash only spoke normally in extremely important moments, when he could not rely on his sidekicks to translate for him. Generally, the only people who could hear him in those moments were other heroes, so to the public, he remained a friendly mascot.
Juzo had had some fun with Shoji, Jiro, and Midoriya trying to think up reasons why Wash would go through such trouble to never say anything useful in public. Jiro had been the most cynical of them and said that it was a publicity stunt that had gotten out of hand. While Juzo admitted there was a certain believability to that explanation, he vastly preferred some of the other explanations they had come up with, from Wash's voice being embarrassingly high pitched, to Wash having a severe stutter, to Wash actually being a sentient washing machine, not a human with a quirk.
The truth surprised Juzo by being one of the few possibilities that they had not considered: Wash had an absolutely filthy mouth. Outside of his costume he averaged well over one swear per sentence, and during times of crisis, it could be much, much higher.
The voice that most people heard when interacting with him was actually a rather large set of recordings that he had made early in his career. His costume was designed to intentionally muffle him and replace anything he said with his catchphrase. There was an internal microphone that transmitted directly to the ears of his sidekicks and interns, however, so Juzo could hear exactly what he thought on an average patrol.
At first, Juzo had been surprised that any hero would go through this sort of effort. After all, how hard could it be to stop swearing? As he found out on his very first patrol with the man, it could be quite difficult indeed.
While Wash was genuinely pleased to meet with his fans and interact with civilians, anytime things got even the slightest bit stressful or dangerous, he'd break out into a monologue consisting almost entirely of profanity, interspersed only with instructions to his sidekicks and the like.
Juzo figured it was some sort of deep seated coping mechanism, but there was no way he was asking to make sure.
On their patrol this evening, everything had been going fine until a somewhat frightened woman had run up to them to let them know of a villain attack at a nearby convenience store.
Wash replied with a thumbs up and a prerecorded, "Washa wash!" before taking off in the direction she indicated, Juzo following close behind.
Over his headset, however, Juzo heard exactly what Wash was actually saying: "Piece of shit. Ass. Meltain, it's just the fucking two of us, so you're on crowd control, dammit. Fuck. Damn." Even after just a day working with the man Juzo found it surprisingly easy to mentally filter out the profanity to get to the instructions underneath. The profanity was still relatively quiet and spaced out, so Wash obviously wasn't feeling too stressed yet. The hero placed a quick call to the police as the two of them ran the two blocks to the store.
Upon arriving at the convenience store, nothing was obviously wrong. Wash quickly entered the building, on alert for any potential villains still on site. Juzo, not having had any real instruction at any point on what exactly 'crowd control' entailed, simply crossed his arms and stood in the doorway of the store, discouraging any more civilians from entering.
Thankfully, he didn't have to do anything more than that, as enough people had seen Wash entering the building to let other people know. A handful stayed, hoping for a glimpse of the Laundry Hero, but thankfully they knew enough to stay away.
"Meltain, I fucking need you in here." The use of his hero name cut through the background noise of swears from Wash, and Juzo quickly ducked inside. Wash had only been inside for a moment, but enough of a crowd had already formed that peer pressure would hold them where they were for now.
The inside of the store was not as bad as Juzo had been expecting from Wash's current level of vulgarity. The only area that had appeared to have been affected was near the cash register. Wash was standing where the cashier normally would, gazing down at the empty register. Juzo hurried over to his supervisor and the stream of profanity stopped as soon as Wash noticed him.
"Fucking injury back here. Patch him the hell up, I'm going to catch the bastard that did this." Juzo rounded the corner into the cashier's area and found a middle-aged man lying on the ground unconscious and in a small pool of blood. Launching back into his litany, Wash quickly exited through the open back door into the alley behind the shop.
Juzo again mentally filtered out the man's profanity as he began standard field first aid on the cashier. The man's main wound appeared to be a puncture wound on his left lower back. Thankfully, despite his blood and unconsciousness, the victim's breathing and pulse were both strong and steady. Juzo quickly rolled the cashier onto his left side, left arm under his head and right leg bent to stabilize him. He was glad that they had covered basic first aid just a week ago, so he was still fresh.
With the victim repositioned, Juzo could quickly inspect and treat the main wound. Thankfully, the knife had missed the kidneys and angled outwards, away from the lower digestive tract. Unfortunately, whoever had done this had taken the knife out and the wound continued to bleed, slowly oozing blood. The flow rate wasn't enough to make Juzo think a major artery had been clipped, he wasn't sure what he would do if that were the case, so he took his first aid materials from his costume and began cleaning and dressing the wound.
There was an additional pair of small puncture wounds on the cashier's neck, although neither were particularly deep and both wounds had already clotted. Regardless, Juzo cleaned and bandaged them as well just to be on the safe side.
Almost as soon as Juzo was done stabilizing the victim, Wash let out a particularly loud string of profanity that caught his attention. "Goddamn motherfucking piece of shit son of a whoremonger !"
That was a new one. "Wash, is everything ok?"
"No fucking sign of the piece of shit that did this, dammit. Shit. Meltain, how's the victim?" Juzo nearly choked on hearing his supervisor use a sentence, even if only four words long, without a single swear word in it.
"Stable, but they'll need transport to a hospital."
"Shit, at least something is going fucking right. Good fucking job." It was hard not to feel a little swell of pride at a top ten hero telling him that he had done a good job, even if it was mixed in with more profanity than he typically used in a single day. The only ones in their class who came anywhere near Wash for vulgarity were Kaibara, Awase, and Uraraka, and then only when stressed. Uraraka at least had the excuse of growing up around construction workers.
Wash returned to check on the victim and, aside from a few expletive-laden corrections to Juzo's bandaging technique, again voiced his approval to Juzo's application of first aid. By that point the police and EMTs had arrived, closing off the convenience store to the public and taking the cashier to the hospital.
No longer faced with an immediately urgent situation, some of the police began inspecting the crime scene for any sign of the villain, while Wash moved on to check the security camera recordings for the store.
While the villain hadn't left any physical signs of their presence, thankfully, the recordings gave them a look at her. The villain in this case was far younger than Juzo had expected, an apparently middle-school aged girl. At the very least, she was wearing a middle school uniform, although according to the police on scene, it did not belong to any middle school in any of the surrounding districts. Wash, at least, seemed to recognize the villain, if the sudden increase in the volume and creativity of his swears was anything to go by.
The actual attack was difficult for Juzo to watch. The girl waited until it was just her and the cashier in the store before striking. She produced a knife from somewhere under her uniform before leaping onto the cashier's back, stabbing him once before biting him hard in the neck. The victim barely had a chance to fight back before sinking to the ground under the villain's weight. She remained latched onto the victim's neck for another twenty seconds before standing up and dashing out the back of the store.
According to the police, this was the fifth attack in three weeks by the so-called "Vampire of Koenji." Wash simply responded "Washa wash!", but over the comm link, assured Juzo that they would be joining the investigation. Juzo didn't have any particular expectation to be able to track down such a slippery criminal in a week, but looked forward to seeing how an investigation like this played out, regardless.
---
For the second time in as many days, Kyoka found herself on a bullet train speeding across the country. While her first trip had been in the early afternoon and she had been content to watch the small towns and mountains fly by, this time she was riding the train late at night, and only the occasional street lamp was visible from the rail.
Gang Orca was completely occupied with his laptop, making sure that everything at both his agency and aquarium would run smoothly with him out of town. The agency had a clear chain of command, as Kyoka had found out over lunch, so most of his effort appeared focused on the running of the aquarium.
Thankfully, Kyoka had a phone conversation with Izuku to keep her entertained. Their conversation last night hadn't been particularly long, and despite them both being even more worn out tonight, Kyoka at least wanted this conversation to last as long as possible. It wasn't like she had anything else to do at the moment.
"Hey Green." Kyoka greeted Izuku as he picked up the phone. "How was day two for you?"
"I would say that Gran Torino and Sir Nighteye are trying 'good cop bad cop' on me, but I'm pretty sure both of them think they're the bad cop."
Kyoka failed to suppress a snicker. If Izuku was willing to complain so openly, it must really be intense training. "Sounds like you had a fun day, then."
"Well this morning was more of the same: Gran Torino bouncing around the room kicking me every so often, just for flavor. I think I only managed to surprise him once, when I hit him with a stockpiled punch. This afternoon was actually interesting. Gran Torino gave me some tips on how to use my, uh, kinetic energy stockpiling better." It took Kyoka just a minute to realize what Izuku was talking about. Since the phone line wasn't secure, he obviously couldn't say 'Fa Jin.'
"Did his tips involve kicking you more?"
The silence from the phone was telling. "...Maybe once or twice?" Kyoka sighed.
"Compared to that I would have to assume Sir Nighteye comes off as the good cop no matter what he does." Kyoka wasn't thrilled with the idea that Izuku was interning with someone who's first and last idea of how to teach involved physical punishments, but he seemed to be dealing with it as well as could be expected.
"Well… I guess. Sir Nighteye hasn't really done much so far except glare at me the entire time."
"That's weird. Do you know why?"
"No! And I don't really want to ask him because he's always busy. I swear that he's watching me when I'm not paying attention, though. I'm pretty sure that he used his quirk on me yesterday and isn't telling me what he saw." It also felt like an invasion of privacy to Kyoka, but she wasn't going to bring that up. Instead she went with a different adjective.
"That's… ominous."
"Tell me about it. And tomorrow I have to spar with him, so we'll see how that goes. I'm just glad I get to stay in Might Tower. The dormitories here are as nice as a five star hotel." Considering the quality of the room at Gang Orca's agency, Kyoka couldn't say she was surprised. She hoped that they would be staying somewhere even a fraction as nice once they got to Hosu. "Anyway, enough about me, how was your day?"
"Well, today was spent almost entirely in the gym with Gang Orca trying to get me up to speed and able to use sonar with my quirk." Kyoka's ears were still ringing from pushing her quirk for a bit too long today. Eight hours with only a short break for lunch was longer than even her training sessions while preparing for U.A
"That's so cool! That's one of the main reasons you went with Gang Orca in the first place. Did you make any progress?"
"Some, I guess. It's pretty tricky to split my attention between emitting sound with one ear and listening with the other. Most of what we did involved me holding a speaker putting out pulses of sound so I could listen for them. It turns out it's kind of hard to turn echoes into a visualization of where things are."
"I can imagine. Or, rather, I, uh, guess I can't. Because I've never tried to do it and I don't have a hearing based quirk or anything like that. I don't want to imply that…" Izuku was on the verge of descending into a self-effacing muttering session, so Kyoka decided to preemptively shut it down.
"Green." Izuku stopped talking almost immediately as Kyoka spoke up.
"Yeah?"
"Shut up."
There was an audible gulp from the other side of the phone before Izuku replied. "Yes, Kyoka."
"So yeah, anyway, it's hard, but I think I started picking it up by the end. I could at least walk around in a dark room and avoid the larger obstacles. It'll take a while before it's something I can use while active, but it's a step in the right direction, at least."
While it would have been easy to focus on the fact that she had tripped over smaller obstacles all day long, Kyoka was trying to focus on the fact that she could at least figure out where the walls and corners in the room were. There was no reason to expect that she'd be able to master echolocation immediately. Even Gang Orca with his whale mutation had taken weeks to master the technique.
"That's so cool! Is that what you're going to work on for the rest of your internship?" Izuku's whole-hearted enthusiasm for the minimal progress that Kyoka had made today helped her focus on that progress and not how far she still had to go.
"Actually… no. Gang Orca got called into an investigation away from Osaka, so we're on the train right now to Tokyo."
"Awesome! We'll be in the same city. I mean, Tokyo's pretty big and all, and we'll both be busy with our internships, but it'll still be nicer than being halfway across the country from each other." Kyoka blushed slightly at Izuku repeating to her nearly exactly the first thing that had crossed her mind after Gang Orca had told her where they were heading. It was nice to be reminded how much he cared for her every once in a while.
She huffed a laugh before responding. "You have no idea how much I agree with you."
"What ward are you going to be staying in?" Ah, this question. Izuku wasn't going to like the answer, but there was no point in lying.
"It's, uh, Hosu."
There was a telling silence from the other side of the line. "Gang Orca's been drawn into the chase for Stain?"
"Yeah."
"And he's bringing an intern with him?" That was one of the first questions Kyoka had asked as well.
"Apparently he wants to keep an eye on me himself, but he has promised that if anything happens, he'll make sure I get out safely above all else, even capturing Stain." Beyond that, there were so many heroes in Hosu right now looking for the hero killer that patrols there were significantly safer than in most other areas. In Kyoka's mind that was far more a blessing than a curse.
Izuku sighed, and she could almost see him shaking his head. "Well, that's good, just surprising. I'll be on the way through Hosu tomorrow evening. Gran Torino wants us to patrol in Shibuya and we'll be driving there. Maybe we'll see you on the way!" Izuku had bounced back quickly from his worry over her being in Hosu, or at least it seemed that way.
"That would be nice. I know it's only been a day, but I miss you already."
"Me too." There was a distant banging from Izuku's side of the phone. "Hang on, someone's at the door."
After a moment of silence from the other end of the phone line, Kyoka heard a sudden crash that caused her heart to leap to her throat. A moment later, someone picked up the phone and an unfamiliar voice spoke.
"This is Gran Torino. The zygote has some surprise training waiting for him. He'll call you back tomorrow." With that, the phone call went dead.
Kyoka debated calling back to make sure Izuku was safe, but ultimately decided against it. Presumably Izuku would be alright. Most of his stories about Gran Torino had to be exaggerations. And it's not like his supervisor was actively trying to injure her boyfriend.
Kyoka settled into her seat and queued up an album by Lightning Nine on her phone and checked the class group chat. After considering her situation against Izuku's, she came to the conclusion that she would almost certainly prefer patrolling Hosu with Gang Orca, even with Stain on the loose, than she would be sparring against Gran Torino.
---
After her hellacious first day of training and sparring with Yoroi Musha, Ochako was not eager to spend the rest of her internship getting absolutely destroyed by the man. He had made it abundantly clear that not only did she lack any sort of fighting skills, but that there would be no way she could learn enough in a week to be any sort of threat to him.
While the training was ongoing and during the patrol afterwards, she had been too busy, too exhausted to really think about just how useful the pro's teaching had been. Once the patrol had ended, though, the more that Ochako reflected on her day, the more she felt that spending a week getting beat up all day every day did not seem like a great way of learning martial arts.
She had gathered her courage and was prepared to push back against another eight hour beating session, but Yoroi Musha pleasantly surprised her. He proclaimed that their sparring yesterday had been with the intention of giving her an accurate idea of just where she stood in terms of her own ability, that well-trained villains would be able to take her down even without using their quirks.
"Despite what you may believe, Uravity, while I did not use my quirk yesterday, I was not holding back in any way. Your form is non-existent and you need to learn some foundational basics, but your instincts and reflexes are top notch and your determination will see you through many fights that a less dedicated combatant might lose. The only way to judge those qualities is in the heat of hopeless combat. You never gave up, which is more than I expect I'd be able to say of a great many heroes in the business." Yoroi Musha gestured to the side, and a pair of sidekicks entered the sparring gym dressed not in their hero costumes but in similar fitted athletic clothing as Ochako herself.
"Today we will work to build those foundational basics, and give you the tools you need to continue your development once you return to U.A. My sidekicks here, Wildstar and Surge, will be in charge of that today. Neither have weapon based quirks, so they will be best able to help you. I'll be about, and we have another patrol tonight."
With that, the hero turned on his heel and strode away. Somewhat lost, Ochako turned to the two sidekicks who at least appeared used to this sort of behavior from their boss. "I'm sorry about that," one of the sidekicks said, once Yoroi Musha was out of hearing range. "He's always like this. You get used to it. Eventually. I'm Surge, it's nice to meet you!"
Surge was a slender man, just slightly taller than Uraraka herself, arms and legs roped in lean muscle. His youthful face was juxtaposed against his long, white hair pulled back into a tight ponytail. He spoke at a rapid pace, just slightly slower than Midoriya when he descended into one of his mumble fits, but his volume was high enough and he enunciated well enough that it was easy to understand him. An easy smile adorned his face while he waved at Ochako and introduced his partner. "And this is Wildstar. She's the real reason that Yoroi Musha offered you a spot."
Ochako turned with a raised eyebrow to the woman standing next to Surge. She was even taller than her companion, her jet black hair shaved short on her left side and hanging down past her shoulder in a complex braid on her right. Wildstar shot a look at Surge that promised all sorts of suffering later, but quickly turned back to Ochako, a smile on her face.
"Surge is bein' an ass, like usual." Wildstar surprised Ochako with an unapologetic Mie accent. "Boss man was plannin' on invitin' you one way or another. But I was specially voluntold to work with you."
"Uh, why you in particular?" Despite Wildstar's accent, Ochako didn't quite feel comfortable letting her own native accent out.
"My quirk." Wildstar stretched out an arm, holding her hand out with her fingers splayed. "'S basically the opposite of yours. You touch things and they float. I touch things and they sink. Five finger activation. No fuss, no muss."
"What she means is that she increases how much gravity something can feel. And she's gotten really good at using it as part of her fighting style!" Surge added.
"Then why are you here?" Ochako asked the excitable man.
Wildstar barked a laugh at Surge's offended face. "He's here cause he's a technician. " That last word came out in a perfect Tokyo accent. "Aside from the boss man, he's probably the best teacher round here. So here's the deal. We're gonna show you what we can this week, give you instructions for when your on your own, and we're gonna turn you into a terror." She smiled wide, showing an uncomfortable number of teeth.
Wildstar and Surge proved to be just as demanding teachers as Yoroi Musha, although their methods of teaching involved far less actual sparring. Somehow though, after a day of training with both of them, Ochako was at least as sore as she had been after the previous day with Yoroi Musha.
They had focused on the absolute basics at first: how to stand, how to form a fist, how to throw a punch. Any time she made an error, such as balancing her weight wrong or misjudging the angle of a punch, Surge was there to gently correct her. And then she would have to perform the maneuver ten more times correctly. If any of those repetitions were incorrect, it would add another ten repetitions on top. Thankfully, both Wildstar and Surge were familiar with the fact that most human beings have a limit to their stamina, and allowed her water breaks when necessary.
Wildstar had taken more of the lead in the second half of the day, first giving Ochako a short lecture on how, why, and when to plan on using her quirk in close combat. After that, she focused on demonstrating some of the most common ways that five point touch activation quirks could be subverted, and how to avoid them. Ochako had never really thought that people would go for breaking or severing fingers just to turn off her quirk, but it made a grim sort of sense.
The end of the day found Ochako completely physically drained but far more satisfied with her progress than after the first day. She felt like she had actually learned something useful during her suffering today. If the rest of her internship was like this, maybe with another patrol or two, preferably with Wildstar or Surge, she could see herself learning quite a lot.
Her hopes for an additional patrol were quickly fulfilled as Yoroi Musha himself once again appeared in the training room, this time in full costume. "Uravity, you will be patrolling with me again tonight."
This had apparently not been the plan, as both Wildstar and Surge looked as surprised as Ochako felt. Yoroi Musha looked at the three of them and after a moment of consideration deigned to give them an explanation.
"My agency has been approached about closing the net on the Vampire of Koenji. Seeing as you are the only person who has interacted with this villain in any capacity and not been attacked, you are uniquely qualified to aid in this endeavor."
"I am? I have?!" Ochako was so shocked that she didn't even realize that she had interrupted the pro hero. Yoroi Musha gave an annoyed snort before continuing.
"Yes, the girl you saw yesterday. She is our prime suspect for the Vampire. We know she is in the area. We are not officially on the case, but if she appears, your presence will be invaluable." Ochako had some difficulty reconciling the half-starved, terrified girl from yesterday with an apparently dangerous and highly wanted villain. She wasn't given much time to think on it before Yoroi Musha sent her to get ready with threats of what would happen if she took too long.
The entire time that Ochako was getting ready, all she could think about was how scared the girl had looked. Hopefully they'd be able to do what was right for her.
---
Actually going on patrol with Endeavor was an intensely odd experience for Shoto. He had been well aware of the fact that Endeavor was the second rated hero for as long as he could remember. Intellectually, Shoto knew that there must be some people out there who were legitimate fans of the man, not to mention a presumably larger contingent who thought of him as an effective hero, even if they did not rate him as highly as some other heroes.
But it was one thing to know something intellectually and another to actually see it in person. The number of people who seemed genuinely happy to see Endeavor on patrol was simply mind-boggling. While Shoto had always found himself tensing up whenever he knew Endeavor was nearby, the average person on the street could be seen visibly relaxing as soon as Endeavor was in sight.
After some time just marveling at the response from the public, however, Shoto turned his attention to Endeavor himself. It was subtle, and Shoto likely only noticed because he had more recent experience with Endeavor than perhaps anyone else alive, but there was a distinct change to his demeanor when dealing with the public.
He was still brusque and haughty, but with a blunted edge compared to what Shoto was used to. Watching closely, however, Shoto was able to find a deep well of impatience and annoyance in Endeavor's eyes and posture. Those emotions threatened to overflow the longer that he needed to interact with the public at a stretch, but no one else seemed to notice, not even Kaminari.
Thankfully, most of the public was aware enough of Endeavor's reputation to keep out of his way. Some would take photos of him from a distance, but only a very few, very brave (or very foolish) actually approached them to ask for autographs or anything along those lines.
They uniformly received a glare for their efforts.
However, Endeavor was generally more polite with fellow heroes, even if only slightly. And Hosu was certainly crawling with heroes these days. Most hero agencies had noticed Stain's pattern of murders at this point and so a sizable number of heroes were patrolling the streets of Hosu looking for the man.
Shoto didn't recognize most of the other heroes, and Endeavor did not bother to stop to coordinate with them. He made some comment about them being glory hounds and getting in his way, apparently unwilling to admit even to himself that he too was going out of his way to hunt down Stain primarily for the recognition.
There were only three heroes that Endeavor actually stopped to speak with, and only two that he seemed pleased to speak to. The first was Gang Orca, who ran into Endeavor early on in the night. Like Endeavor, Gang Orca had brought his intern, Jiro, along for the patrol. Kaminari took the opportunity to try and speak with her some more, but a glare from Jiro and a harsh word from Endeavor convinced him not to.
Their conversation was short and professional, high-level planning of which areas of the city they thought it most likely to find Stain in and dividing them between themselves. Shoto knew Endeavor well enough to know that he held a grudging respect for only a few heroes, but Gang Orca was certainly one of them. In a world where ranking was determined entirely by the sorts of results that Endeavor cared about (cases closed, villains arrested or killed, etc), Gang Orca would have been ranked much higher than tenth, and Endeavor respected his efficiency.
The second hero that Endeavor deigned to speak to was the elder patriarch of the Iida family, Machina. The elder Iida had retired from professional hero work a few months ago, but had returned to Team Idaten to hold the agency together following Ingenium's death. His short-cropped hair was, at this point, more white than blue, but he was still powerfully built and the engines sprouting from his back still sounded as strong as ever.
Machina was one of the few people that Endeavor actually deferred to in conversation, showing the experienced hero a level of respect that Shoto had never seen from the man. Even beyond that, he showed an interest in the man's mental state, which he had never done with any other hero that Shoto had seen.
"How are you holding up, Machina?"
"I've only been out of the game for three months, Endeavor. I still know how to run a patrol." Despite his relatively light-hearted words and tone, Machina's face was grim. Endeavor ignored the warning, pressing on.
"That's not what I mean and you know it." Machina took a deep breath, hesitating before responding.
"I've been better. Tensei was a good man and a better hero. It will … take time to come to terms. For now, I just need to focus on my job and not let my emotions get in the way." He shook his head grimacing. "I've had to take Enigma and Bigshot off this case. They were blaming themselves for Tensei's death and letting it drag them down. I even had to rescind the agency's internship offer to my younger son. He's taking this whole situation very poorly and I worry about him doing something unwise. His training and inheritance can wait until he is in a better spot."
Endeavor nodded and the conversation flowed on for a moment, but Shoto was lost in his thoughts for the time being. Machina's decision to push on in the face of grief was unsurprising to him; it was exactly what Endeavor had done following Touya's death. But taking his surviving son's feelings into account wasn't what he had experienced at all. He wasn't even able to name the emotion he was experiencing in the moment, somewhere between envy and sadness and anger.
The only thing that drew him out of his funk was the third hero that Endeavor actually spoke with on patrol. Or rather, that Endeavor roared at from nearly a block away.
"Rock Lock!" The named hero turned towards Endeavor with no more than a raised eyebrow. Awase was with the man as well and nearly matched him in his poker face. It was an impressive display for a first year student seeing the number two hero fully enraged. Shoto himself had only seen his father this angry on a bare handful of occasions.
"Number two." Rock Lock replied as Endeavor stormed down the street. "I should have known you were in the city by the stench."
"You dare show your face around me after the debacle at the Chiba Museum of Science?!"
"I regret to inform you that I do not keep track of your every move just for your convenience." Shoto had never seen someone stand up to an angry Endeavor with this much poise and composure, let alone an Endeavor who had fully embraced his anger like this.
"What are you doing here?" Endeavor's voice was low and dangerous.
"The same as you, I would think. Patrolling." A growl deep in Endeavor's throat caught Rock Lock's attention, and Awase stepped behind the hero slightly. "If you must know, I'm patrolling as a favor to Sir Nighteye. I'll be out of your hair after tonight."
Endeavor exhaled sharply through his nostrils and Shoto was almost surprised that it wasn't smoke or steam. The temperature around Endeavor had climbed sharply as the flames on his shoulders and head had jumped in size and intensity. Kaminari had backed away slightly from the heat. Rock Lock stood tall through all of it, although sweat beaded on his forehead.
"Fine!" Endeavor finally settled on. "Just stay out of my way! Or else you will regret it!" The flame hero stalked away from Rock Lock and his intern, flames on his shoulders and head still running high. Shoto and Kaminari hurried to keep up with him.
From then, Endeavor behaved more like himself, snapping at the public and in general acting how Shoto expected him to. The familiarity was anything other than reassuring.
It was going to be a long night.
---
Izuku Midoriya was an enigma. Mirai had spent the better part of the past two days observing the boy, trying to figure out exactly what made him tick. To the untrained eye, Midoriya was straight-forward to a fault, wearing his heart on his sleeve at all times. That was certainly Gran Torino's conclusion about the boy.
Everything that the boy said and did was heroic, almost excessively so. And while Mirai had originally worried about All Might choosing poorly for his successor, he was nearly convinced at this point that Midoriya was not a terrible choice. Perhaps not the best possible choice, but certainly one that could be defended as reasonable. Acceptable.
After All Might had talked him up so much, Mirai had been afraid that Midoriya would arrive with a swollen ego and refuse to learn or take suggestions. After all, with All Might's approval, what could he possibly need from heroes like Gran Torino or Sir Nighteye?
Instead, Midoriya was almost overly willing to learn. When sparring, he listened to Gran Torino's and his own suggestions as gospel, and never needed to be told anything twice. It was almost refreshing to deal with.
It was also a relief to Mirai, who had been afraid of dealing with a student who thought he already knew everything. People with an overinflated sense of their own knowledge and importance were some of Mirai's least favorite people.
But every so often, every once in a while, Mirai got the feeling that there was something hiding behind Midoriya's words. There was a hesitancy to how he spoke about his past, about his family, and about the new quirks that could have been just the boy's natural shyness shining through, but Mirai's gut told him there was something more going on. Mirai had grown to trust his gut instincts over his years in the heroism business, and so he kept an eye on Midoriya. He didn't suspect anything malicious or villainous, just that there was something important happening under the surface.
At this point, Mirai didn't expect to be able to convince Midoriya to give up One For All, and was no longer certain that he wanted to. Lemillion still might have been the best choice, but the difference between him and Midoriya was smaller than Mirai had thought. Togata would still be a fine hero in his own right even without the power of One For All. And if what All Might had said about One For All's effect on those with quirks was true … well, Mirai did not want to contemplate that possibility.
If Midoriya was going to keep One For All, though, he was going to need to learn how to tell a better joke. That was the one area where Lemillion was indisputably ahead of Midoriya, accounting for their relative ages, at least.
Mirai checked his watch.
The drive to Shibuya was going smoothly, despite the evening rush hour traffic. They were just passing through Hosu now, right on schedule. Both Midoriya and Gran Torino were sitting in the back seat of the sedan, and Gran Torino was rapid fire quizzing the boy on the details of the process and procedure of patrols and hero work in general. For a first year student, Midoriya was correctly answering a surprising number of the questions, including ones that Lemillion might have struggled with.
Mirai assumed that the two of them were lost in their own little world, and allowed himself to relax just the smallest amount. He pressed on the gas to hurry through Hosu, but the action brought Gran Torino's attention away from his quizzing of Midoriya. Through the rear view mirror, Mirai could see the elderly man look out the window of the car and spot something in the distance. His stomach dropped.
"McDonald's!" Gran Torino pointed at a billboard advertising a McDonald's at the next stop. In the center of Hosu city. "We said we'd stop for dinner on the way, Mirai. Let's stop there." The older man was bouncing in his seat like a child.
Mirai checked his watch. "The plan was to eat in Shibuya, to use it as an opportunity to gather information."
"That was before I found out you're a slowpoke behind the wheel. This is why we should have taken the bullet train!" Gran Torino descended into one of his typical whines, pretending to have some sort of mental degradation. "I'm hungry now, and I want McDonald's!"
Mirai rolled his eyes. "You should have thought of that before we left." Motion from Midoriya drew his attention. "Do you have something to add, Bastion?"
"I, uh, w-well," They'd have to work on his stutter as well. It wasn't as bad as All Might had made it sound when he had first met the boy, but it still wouldn't do for the future symbol to stutter whenever he was caught off guard. "I'm hungry too. I, uh, wouldn't mind eating before we get to Shibuya."
"McDonald's! McDonald's!" Gran Torino chanted.
Mirai checked his watch before sighing. There really wasn't any way around it. "Fine." He turned right towards the McDonald's, aiming to be in and out as quickly as possible.
Gran Torino was apparently not expecting this at all. "Really? You're serious?"
"It's what I do." Gran Torino accepted this at face value, but Midoriya cocked his head, considering exactly what Mirai meant. The boy certainly was smart, and had good instincts. Thankfully, Gran Torino distracted him with more procedural questions, so Mirai did not have to explain any further. No one ever really understood the frustrating details of knowing the future.
But then, Midoriya's future had been confusing. For the first time ever, Mirai had seen things that were, as far as he could tell, mutually exclusive. It was impossible for Midoriya to both watch Stain die but also fight him months later. There were no healing quirks that could revive the dead, after all.
It was both reassuring and deeply frightening. For his entire life, Mirai had thought that the future was set as soon as he used his quirk. It was encouraging to know that that may not be the case, but terrifying to consider why Midoriya might be different.
That uncertainty, though, undercut some of the other things that Mirai had seen in Midoriya's future. Some of what he had seen simply had to occur, no matter what. Mirai had seen to that. Even if there would be pain and suffering and misery along the way, it was still better than the alternative. And wasn't that what being a hero was all about?
Mirai checked his watch as he pulled up to the McDonald's. Perhaps he could be quick enough to delay what he had seen. Even if things had to happen there was no reason they had to happen tonight, after all. Gran Torino had taken to chanting "McDonald's!" in the back seat once again, and that was enough to solidify Mirai's plan.
Thankfully, the drive thru had only one car in it, so Mirai pulled in behind them. Unprompted, Gran Torino laid out his order, which was far more complex than it had any right to be. Midoriya also chimed in with his order, thankfully just a combo meal.
Mirai pulled the car forward to place his order: a single, black coffee. He completely ignored Gran Torino and Midoriya's orders.
Gran Torino fell silent and Midoriya had such a look of betrayal that Mirai almost changed his mind. Instead, he pulled forward to the window to get his order. In the interest of time, he gave the worker a single 1000 Yen note for the coffee and told them to keep the change.
He took a single sip of the coffee and winced. It was awful. Perhaps that was to be expected. Mirai pulled the car forward to where a trash can sat next to the restaurant and threw the rest of the abominable drink in the trash.
That was what finally broke the silence, as Gran Torino began throwing an epic fit. Midoriya remained silent, his look of betrayal turning slowly contemplative. The boy might even be too smart, Mirai decided.
Since time was of the essence, Mirai pressed down on the accelerator as strongly as he dared, aiming to get out of Hosu as quickly as possible.
Mirai checked his watch and sighed. It hadn't been enough. It could never have been enough. He had known, deep down, that tonight was the start of it. He'd never been able to change what was meant to be, even after seeing contradictions in Midoriya's own future.
A black misty portal appeared down the street in front of their car and Mirai slammed on the brakes. Thankfully, this was enough to shut Gran Torino up for the time being. Midoriya took in a sharp breath as he registered exactly what was in front of them.
A hulking beast at least seven feet tall stalked through the portal before it snapped out of existence. Based on the descriptions of the nomu from the USJ, there was no way this could be anything else.
In fact, given the gasp of recognition that Midoriya gave out, this might be the exact one that had escaped from the USJ. The exposed brain took up the vast majority of its head, leaving only room for a lower jaw. The beast had jet black skin covered with a vast array of scars, under which rippled thick, heavy muscles. The arms of the nomu were just as heavily muscled, and longer than looked natural, reaching past its knees, while strange metal protrusions extended from its elbows.
All in all, the nomu was exactly as Mirai had seen in his visions from Midoriya. Which only meant one thing.
Hosu was under attack.