Haruto Namikaze. Height: 5'9". Blonde hair, blue eyes. Quirk: Teleport. He could teleport himself up to ten meters in any direction, more if he strained himself, and teleport small to medium-sized objects about the same distance.
Currently, he was washing the dishes.
Haruto's father had just sat down at the breakfast table, scrolling through some news article on his laptop and placing his coffee mug down with a clink.
"M-morning, Father." Quit with the stutter. Today is your day of confidence, remember?
"Hmph." That was all he got in response.
"Morning, Nii-san." His little sister Naruko emerged into the kitchen, yawning. "Morning, Dad."
"Good morning. What's my little girl doing up so early?"
"I've gotta see Haruto off before he goes and gets himself killed, hehe."
"Shut it, you. I'm not going to die."
"Hmm." Their father narrowed his eyes, and Haruto withered, letting a plate stay under the faucet a second too long before moving on. "So that's today, is it?"
"Yes. I mean, yes, Father."
His eyes fell back to the computer screen as he took another sip of his coffee. "Just finish the dishes first."
Haruto nodded and turned back to the sink, scrubbing furiously. At any moment he could change his mind. Can't ruin it now when I'm so close.
Convincing his parents to let him take the UA entrance exam had taken more confrontation than he'd ever had with them before—but luckily, he'd kept a lot of his true feelings under the lid.
"We've provided for your lazy ass for almost fifteen years, and now you ask for this?"
"I say let the boy give it a try if he wants to get himself good and killed. It's not like he'll succeed anyway."
"Then in that case, you may apply. But you'll be applying to at least two other high schools as well, of our choice. And you must get into both of them."
Of course his parents had picked two prestigious schools that required a truckload and a half of work to get into, but Haruto had done it. He'd worked so hard just to get to this point. Just for a chance to receive an education in heroism.
His mother had entered the room, and after ruffling Naruko's hair with a gentle smile, she gave him a raised eyebrow. "Up early, I see?"
"Y-yes, Mother."
"So you still plan on going through with this farce. Well, you filled all our requirements, so I guess I can't stop you now. Just remember how nice we've been to you for all these years, how generous we've been. We'll probably have to pay your hospital bill as well, when this is all said and done." She sat down with a grunt, squeaking the chair back a bit.
Naruko made eye contact with him. Her eyes and hair were blue and blonde like him. Haruto sighed and gave her a reassuring smile, although he still felt sad and scared on the inside.
She closed her fist on the table, and put steel into her gaze. Go get 'em, that face seemed to say.
He finished washing the dishes, and grabbed his backpack from the edge of the kitchen. "W-well, I'll be going now…"
His father gave another noncommittal grunt. His mother waved her hand dismissively. "Don't be put out when you fail. You've got those other high schools to lean back on, but I imagine your fool self is convinced that this suicide run is your only path. Well, so be it."
Naruko rushed forward and threw her arms around him, taking him aback. It took Haruto a moment to reciprocate. It has been a long time since she has dared to hug me in front of them. Indeed, his father was now glaring at him with reproach, as if he might taint her somehow through physical contact.
Haruto patted her head awkwardly. "You can do it," she whispered, and then stepped away.
He left the house.
On the way to the train station, a number of things were circulating through his brain.
"Lazy!"
"Good for NOTHING!"
"You think you can just use that flashy Quirk of yours to do anything? It takes WORK to get through in life! Hard. Work.
I bet you think you're real clever, huh? I bet you think you can cheat your way past anything. Well, news flash, buddy, you CAN'T!"
"Don't you DARE influence her with your tricks!"
"She's got a bright future ahead of her, and we can't have you knocking her off that path, you bum."
"But mom, dad," Naruko'd protested, while Haruto cowered and trembled, "he was only showing me how he can move stuff from one place to the other. It's not a trick. It's real."
"Yeah, it's real, and it renders him unable to do anything the NORMAL way. You don't have what he has; you can't be deluded by strangeness. Haruto uses his abilities to cheat and steal and be lazy, honey. Do you want to do those things?
N-no… "
"I don't do that," he'd mumbled. Not anymore. For speaking out of turn, he'd received a slap to the face.
Indeed, it had been a long time since he'd used his Quirk in a normal place at all. Since that conversation, he'd started going to pick things up like a normal person, taking runs and walks like a normal person, fetching the mail and doing chores like a normal person. The only place his Quirk saw use was in the underground training he'd sneakily signed up for. If they found out about THAT, I'd probably be confined to the house for the rest of my life.
But today was the day in which he could show off his ability with pride. An ability that could be of such use in disasters, lifting debris, getting to people in need of rescue. And in fights, as well, its potential was wide and varied. It was a hero's ability.
Namikaze Haruto wanted to become a hero.
His family had never much cared about heroism. The great fights between heroes and villains never showed on their television. There was no All Might merch in his or his sister's rooms. He didn't even care that much about All Might, or any of the other heroes, although he supposed he might start if he wanted to work with them.
All Haruto cared about was putting his Quirk to use where it mattered. Not for his own lazy personal benefit, but for others. Apparently warping-type quirks were incredibly rare. If that was the case, then the world needed him. How could he end up in some dead-end salaryman's office when he had this power brewing in his insides? That wouldn't be responsible at all.
In any case, he'd only recently decided this, and was incredibly late to the hero game. What little he knew about fighting was what he'd learned in the underground training, but other than that, he was completely clueless on the inner workings of hero schools, hero agencies, the press, and any of the currently active villains.
He boarded the train that went to the city where UA was, and found a seat near the doors. He leaned back and shut his eyes for a moment, sighing. This was earlier than he was used to waking up, and he would need all his energy for whatever was to come. A normal test, I know that much. With all the schoolwork I've been cramming to get into those other schools, that will surely be a breeze. And then… whatever comes next after that.
"Namikaze-kun?"
Haruto opened one blue eye to see who'd just sat down next to him. A floating set of clothes.
He started.
"Ah! Hagakure-san! What brings you here, I mean, why are you on this train, at such an early hour? Yes. Question. I asked it." The truth was that Haruto's Quirk wasn't truly Teleport; rather, it was a yellow energy that stewed inside him that allowed him to teleport things and himself. Another side effect of that yellow energy, which was connected to adrenaline and hyper-activity, was that Haruto talked very quickly and in a scatterbrained manner, even if his inner monologue wasn't reflecting such a mood at any given moment. It was like he opened his mouth and all the thoughts came spewing out at once. He usually held it under control around his parents and sister, but people from his middle school, like one Toru Hagakure, often got full blast of it.
She giggled. "You never change, huh Namikaze-kun? It should be obvious. I'm going to the UA entrance exams, like you!"
"Huh? How'd you know I was going to… oh, I suppose you just reached it via conjecture, huh. You're smart, Hagakure-san, real smart."
"Aww, you flatter me, but I'm as dumb as they come, really. I'm more worried about the normal test than whatever practical thing they throw at us."
"Yes, well, let's hope it's a situation where your invisibility comes in handy. You gonna strip down or something?" Why would I say that oh my god.
"Namikaze-kun!" She punched him lightly, but she was giggling. "Speaking of which, I don't actually know what your Quirk is, even though we were in the same class." She was tilting her head; he could tell from how her shirt had shifted.
"Ah. Right. Well, I suppose you wouldn't know, would you." Unlike the mutant types, his Quirk was not inherently obvious, even though his looks were faintly exotic. And he never made a point to show it off at school or his parents would hear of it. A few of his closer guy friends in that class had known, but Hagakure was only a friendly acquaintance at the edge of his social circle, nothing more. "My Quirk is Teleport. I can teleport myself ten meters in any direction, and can teleport objects the same distance or so, up to the weight of like, a desktop printer. But those limitations are loose-ish, I guess. I can go past that in distance and weight, but it'll exhaust me pretty quick."
Hagakure appeared to suck in breath in an awed kind of way. "I had no idea. But hey, maybe you shouldn't have told me all that, huh? We're about to be competing, after all." Her tone was playful, but Haruto frowned.
What does she mean, competing? Is that what hero school is like? Will the students be set against each other?
"Hey…" she seemed to notice his drop in attitude. "No worries, man. Your Quirk sounds way better than mine. I'm sure you've got a better chance of getting in."
"Huh? No way, Jose. Don't speak down about yourself like that for my sake, Hagakure. You wouldn't be doing this if you weren't confident. We're BOTH gonna get in, okay? For all the people back at middle school. We'll show 'em who's boss!" I'd like to work together with the other students as much as possible. We'll all be heroes in the future, right? That means we have to collaborate, like in rescue operations and stuff.
Hagakure let out a squeak. "Ah… yes, of course," she mumbled. He couldn't see her face, but she seemed embarrassed. Fuck. "Uhh, yikes, that was kind of awkward, wasn't it? I mean, shit, I'm not supposed to call attention to how awkward it was… uh… sorry for embarrassing you, and erm… man I wish I could shut up…"
"It's okay," she interrupted, chuckling quietly. "That means a lot, actually. And you're right. Let's both do our best!"
"Aye aye captain." He gave her a ridiculous salute without a second thought. Where does my brain get these smackhead-ass ideas?
Hagakure kept laughing. "I never realised how funny you were, Namikaze-kun. You must be in a good mood!"
"You mispronounced 'silly'. Also, I don't know if you can necessarily call my mood 'good' at this point. There are butterflies flapping around in my stomach. I feel like I'm going to puke."
"If you puke on my clothes, I'll kill you in your sleep. No one in your house will see me coming."
Ha, as if they'd protect me anyway… he actually managed to avoid saying that out loud.