Rain.
Mina wasn't the sort of person to be particularly bothered when it came to the weather, regardless of what it was, rain, shine, snow, or even a tornado. She'd always know a way or two to make the most of a bad situation, and enjoy what was there while it was there. But she had a mild dislike of the rain, really just for a couple of reasons. Well, mostly just one.
The only really practical issue she ever had with the thousands of collective droplets of water falling from the sky was how it messed with her Quirk. Water washing away any Acid she made weakened, or in some cases totally negating the effects of her powers, which didn't exactly do much for her endearment towards the rain. As one might imagine, for someone training to be a Hero, that was a fairly large deal.
To combat such a disadvantage, Mina took an extra precaution when faced with the issue of precipitation. In addition to her raincoat, characteristically colourful and bright, filled with the primary colours of red and yellow on a sea of black behind it, and a few pins and buttons, to match her colourful personality, she wore a poncho, which in keeping with her own colour scheme, was bright pink. She thought that she might as well get some fun out of the plastic device, and see if she could confuse passer-by's and see if they thought a poncho had somehow developed legs and began to run off on its own.
Unlikely, considering the following - The only issue that she ever had with either of these were her horns - Since they jutted out of her skull a bit further up her head, they prevented her from always pulling her hood up fully, so whatever precautions she took, short of carrying an umbrella everywhere, like she was forced to right now, this object not at all colourful, but instead a shade of coal black, she'd always end up with rain hitting her in the face.
'I should put in a special request at a clothes store or something...' She found herself thinking of a hoodie with specially designed holes in the hood that she could slot her horns though a few times, but she'd usually forget about it by the time she was someplace warm and dry. She tugged the poncho hood as far as she could pull it over her horns, praying that it wouldn't snap. She was already in the middle of the rain right now, she didn't want to be dealing with her poncho misbehaving now! "C'mon, you plastic piece-a junk..."
As she did so, she began to wonder if she should make some modifications to her Hero costume, since it'd be pretty hard to be the Hero Tokyo both deserved and needed if she could be countered by someone throwing tap water at her.
Ashido Mina - Defeated by the hated Villain, Tapman, the Quirkless Villain who threw bottles of lukewarm tap water at everyone he saw. God, she could practically see the headlines now.
The thought of the fictional Quirkless Villain brought her thoughts right back around to the very real, very much Heroic classmate, and her friend, Midori.
Both of them had shared a conversation of text messages throughout the entirety of Sunday. They hadn't discussed anything in particular, just what came into their heads, from school, to Heroes, to games, their classmates, and to family. No real structure, and occasionally, one of them would go missing for an hour here, or ten minutes there, but neither of them minded. It had been a conversation Mina had thoroughly enjoyed.
Last Saturday, she had learned so much about Midori, what made him tick, and how his brain worked. He'd told her something so incredible, so absolutely mind boggling, she couldn't believe she'd even heard it at times. To think, someone would actually attempt the Yuuei admission tests while believing themselves to be totally Quirkless... That in itself was something that deserved respect. She'd never even heard of that before. Sure, there weren't any restrictions on people without Quirks attempting to get into Yuuei, but any sane individual knew that the chances of that ever actually happening were basically non-existent.
But Midori had done it.
And passed.
But there was now so much more to her green haired classmate than she'd previously suspected. He made so much sense to her now, and she understood why he was like he was. A person who possessed such a useful and powerful Quirk, the incredible power that was his Strength Enhancing Quirk, that wound up being as meek and timid as Midori was... Came from his years of not knowing what his own Quirk was. Where his low opinion and confidence came from. It finally made sense to her. And she was the only one who knew! She'd guard that particular secret with her life. It was for Midori to disclose as he felt it was appropriate. Mina was a social creature - She wasn't a gossip.
Together, he and Bakugou were not only polar opposites, but they drew a direct comparison to one another. Bakugou knew his Quirk from youth, he'd had years to refine and practice it, to learn how it worked, and how to enhance it to the absolute limits. And he grew up to be... Well... His 'charming' self.
Normally, with a Quirk like his, one would suspect the same think to be true of Midori. For him to be exactly like Bakugou, right down to the sheer arrogance and bloodthirsty bravado. But no. He had lived close to fifteen years without even knowing his own power, and now that he had one, he had no idea what to do with it, but he was learning. Whatever strides he made, he always remained humble, and never took the credit he was due.
In a way, as selfish as it may sound, Mina was glad that it had wound up this way. That she had gotten to know the shy, awkward boy, was entirely because of the struggles he'd been through. They might not have met otherwise, or she could have been presented with something that was not at all the Midori she knew right now.
Next thing she realised, she was on the subway, speeding toward Yuuei, for another day of learning the ropes on how to be the very best Heroes they could be. And for some reason, her thoughts just would not fade away from Izuku.
And for some reason, it didn't bother her at all.
The excitement never ceased for the students of Yuuei, Mina found.
Before even arriving at the school grounds, she had been showered with praise and admiration and a thousand other admiration applicable components by the people she normally shared her train ride with, as well as a few she'd never seen before. Praises and pats on the back for her efforts and placing during the Sports Festival, which she'd happily and enthusiastically accepted. One child even asked her for a signature, apparently having come to the conclusion that she was some sort of celebrity because she was on the TV for a short time. Even so, Mina happily obliged, and it once again reminded her just how big of a deal getting into Yuuei really was. The students there were always the focus point when the topic of the next generation of Heroes came up. Being accepted in there really was one of her proudest achievements, if not the single one.
And in class, she found out that it hadn't just been her whom had experienced this shock and awe effect of their performances on the big screen. The classroom was essentially a frag grenade filled with activity and enthusiasm so thick Mina could practically taste it, and she freaking loved it! She basically breathed the stuff!
"I got so many people yelling my name in the streets!"
Her own social group had engaged in conversation regarding their experiences over the last few days, each of them having a different story to go with their own little escapades throughout their four day break. Some of them more exciting than others.
Her group consisted of herself, of course, alongside Kirishama, Hagakure, Sero, and Tsuyu, the frog girl seeming more on the edge of the conversation rather than directly involved in it, but that was just the way she was, and no one really seemed to mind too much.
"I got a ton of people who recognised me on my way here! A little kid asked me for an autograph!" She bragged, a grin firmly attached onto her face while everyone listened to her in a state of awe. Part of her was tempted to bring up Overgrow… But she decided against doing so. Since all it would take was one of them to make a careless comment in front of Aizawa-sensei for them to feel the full wrath of the stern Pro-Hero, a force Mina was in no rush to deal with.
"There were so many people staring at me so intently... I was so embarrassed!" Hagakure gushed on the spot, with Kirishama to her side, nodding alongside the invisible girl that he'd experienced similar. Mina couldn't help but smirk at that statement. It amused her that the girl who literally was invisible could be embarrassed at people staring at her. She stood out due to her innate invisibility, surely she'd be used to it by now?
"Speak for yourselves! I got freakin' elementary school kids trying to make me feel better by telling me 'Good try'!" Sero complained, a look that fell somewhere between irritated and amused covering his face, as he tried to decide if he should have been offended or not that he seemed to be the only one there that hadn't been admired.
"Good try!" Tsuyu croaked in the closest to a teasing manner she could manage. Her joke caused Sero to slam his head straight into his desk in frustration, which made Mina openly laugh at the Tape Quirk user's reaction.
As she and her group laughed and shared stories, Mina's mind ran back to the Saturday, where they had run into those two students from Midori's high school had shown up. She wondered what exactly had gone on between them and Midori, but judging from how jumpy he had been, it couldn't have been all that good. It was obvious they had been bullies to him as he had grown up, and while part of her was hungry for details… She wouldn't pry. She'd delved too deep into his private life already regarding his Quirk. She didn't want to make him uncomfortable. If he wanted to tell her, he would.
"Ah, Deku!" The pink girl tilted her head, to see Uraraka greeting Iida and Izuku, the two having just made their way into the classroom. For whatever reason, his hands were bandaged up again. Probably due to the run in with Overgrow, she thought to herself. Either way, she was happy to see him. "Did you get anyone calling you out in the streets? Everyone else seems to!"
Izuku seemed to hesitate before he answered, as if he wasn't sure if to answer or not. He seemed to shoot a glance towards Bakugou, who was nosily dropping his bags at the bottom of his desk and clattering into his seat before he finally answered, convinced that the irritable teenager couldn't hear him. "Y-Yeah... A few people on my train congratulated me... A-And I ran into some people I used to go to middle school with..."
Mina would have hopped out of her desk and gone over to join them had Aizawa-sensei not entered the room in that very second. Instantly, everyone found their seats, faced the front, and all noise abruptly stopped, like someone had cut the audio from a television set. Talking to Midori and everyone else would have to wait.
It was time for lessons to begin...
And what a lesson it had been!
Between learning about the votes that had come in for them from the Pro's, and learning that they would get to choose their work experience placements to go on in just a couple of days, things at the Hero Course were starting to heat up.
But that hadn't been the best part. Oh no, not even close!
Today, they'd finally gotten to choose their Hero names!
Mina had literally jumped straight out of her seat when that particular bombshell was announced, and she hadn't been alone. Virtually everyone had shared that level of pure unrestricted enthusiasm and energy when they'd learned that that was what today would be focused on!
Of course, Aoyama leading everything off, it had gotten very weird, very quickly.
'Can't stop Twinkling' was his Hero name... Mina didn't even have the words to express how exasperating that particular choice had been. Even Midnight, the person who was supposed to be here to make sure their names weren't too ridiculous, started helping him revise it to make it sound clearer! There was definitely a sense of frustration from everyone in the class, everyone wanting to beg him to please pick a language, either English, French, or Japanese. At this point, none of them even cared which one it was, as long as he became freaking consistent with it!
But then it had been her turn, and she had been so incredibly excited to share her name with her class. She'd skipped right up there, whiteboard in hand, and held her Hero name up with pride and a smile!
Alien Queen!
...And it got shot down before her dreams of glory ever began. Midnight had drawn a comparison to the creatures from Alien, which she would admit, had played a part in her inspiration for the name, but come on! If Aoyama got freaking 'Can't stop Twinkling', what was stopping her from becoming Alien Queen?
Who was in charge of that?! What logic was being used there?!
Probably on reflection, the same logic that let Shouji pick the name 'Tentacle' despite his Quirk being Dupli-Hands, not tentacles, and the same one that let Mr. Twinkle-Man get his! It was a combination of frustrating, infuriating, embarrassing, and incredibly disheartening to Mina that her name got scrapped like that. She'd thought she'd come up with a cool name, but apparently tentacles and a guy who was shiny were more impressive.
"This sucks." She'd muttered quietly to herself, as she'd brainstormed for what other options she had.
Eventually, she'd just decided on the first thing that came to her head, since she'd not been given much time to come up with a revised name. And what had that been?
Pinky.
It was the best she could come up with in such a short amount of time. The best she could come up with in that time was the thing her brother called her to annoy her.
Pinky. The Acid Hero.
Yay.
'Oh, Micha is just going to love this, isn't he?' She couldn't help think to herself bitterly. The sheer number of Pacman jokes was going to be un-freaking-bearable. The number of jokes about her skin pigments was gonna go through the roof. In her head, she was already thinking of the perfect counters to use against the sarcastic little bastard. Well, older bastard. Skinny... Whatever, it wasn't important!
The rest of the Hero names went by fairly uneventfully, everyone picking the names that they'd be known by for years to come, in a lot of cases. Everyone knew that a Hero name was one of the most defining things about a Hero, so everyone had at least put some thought into it growing up. Tsuyu had her name planned since elementary school, whereas Bakugou... Evidently put more focus in just breaking things. Constantly. At all times.
Todoroki and Iida ended up just going with their names. Mina couldn't personally understand the appeal of that. That wasn't any fun, but it was their choice, and she'd respect it.
The last person to present their Hero name, excluding the Explosion maniac's revision of his, was Izuku. Mina assumed he'd come up with hundred, thousands of names throughout his childhood. Rough ideas, sketches, probably even costumes that he wanted to have replace his current one once he grew out of it. He probably had the perfect Hero name for himself.
Although, when she saw it, she couldn't help herself. "Wha - Are you sure about that?!"
She wasn't alone in her sentiment. There wasn't a single person who wasn't at least surprised by Izuku's choice. Even more surprising was the unwavering conviction he held himself in. He wasn't shaking, he refused to back down from this. This was the name he wanted to carry into battle. He'd decided.
"I'm sure." He nodded, very deliberately. "Until recently... I hated this name... I hated everything about it. It basically was a shackle I'd have preferred to forget about. But... With help from certain people, it's become something I want to be known by." His fingers gripped tighter around his whiteboard. Any tighter, and he was going to shatter it. "This will be my Hero name."
The whiteboard was blank except for some large writing in the centre. No justification like some of the others had on theirs, no bubble writing, and no style to it.
It was just there. His Hero name.
Deku.
The derogatory nickname that Bakugou had used to shame him, to humiliate him, that Uraraka had picked up and given a new meaning…
She knew for a fact it wasn't directed at her, his reasons for liking the name Deku. That had to go to Uraraka, Iida, or maybe even those guys from Saturday. The only person who really knew the answer to that was Midori over there... But Mina couldn't help but smile all the same.
Once everyone had selected their chosen Hero names, each student was handed out a list of workplaces that they could apply for field experience with. Students who had received nominations from Heroes who watched their performances were given a personalised list of those who voted for them, for them to select a place from. This led to a situation where someone like Todoroki was given well over two thousand options to choose from, whereas someone like Sero had maybe twelve options to consider. As if the gap between them wasn't wide enough. Since she hadn't received any, Mina was just given a standard workplace sheet.
They had been given just two days to decide where it was that they wanted to go. Then, at the beginning of next week, they would be sent off to attend those workplaces every day for the next week. It would be their first glimpse - Real glimpse, not the kind of glimpse where a bunch of Villains and murderers were trying to kill them - Into the everyday life of Pro-Heroes.
The next day, Mina still couldn't decide on a place to go to. Her list wasn't exactly huge, and not a lot of the options appealed to her, and the few that did seemed like her Quirk wouldn't be worth a damn with. A few of her classmates had already decided and handed their forms into Aizawa-sensei, who had reminded them many times, that they needed to be absolutely certain, since they may come to regret it in their third years. That seemed like so long away to Mina, but she got the message clearly.
She had to choose the best possible place. Make the most out of the next week, because it could wind up being the biggest factor in determining what the next three years were dedicated towards, be it civil service, fighting Villains, or rescue operations, and everything between them.
Mina allowed her head to slump into her arms on the desk, covering up her face. What she wouldn't give to have one of those personalised lists... Then the Pro's would have done half the work for her. They could've decided if her Quirk was best suited for their regular workloads.
She sighed into the warm, dark den that was her arms right now, feeling her horns press against her forearms in doing so. What the heck could she pick?...
"Hey, Ashido-san?"
Hearing that voice, that almost unsure, nervous, but clearly concerned tone, Mina knew exactly who it was before he'd even said her name. She pulled her head up, feeling cool air hitting her skin, and sure enough, found Izuku stood near to her desk, with an expression that looked like he'd worked up a lot of nerve to just walk to her side of the classroom.
For someone like Midori though, Mina wasn't surprised. They stood on the exact opposite ends of the room, so there was no way that he could walk over to her desk without people noticing him being out of place. Even if it was nearing the end of the day, he tended to stick to the left hand side of the room, near the windows, with Iida and Uraraka. Apparently he'd just decided that seeing the pink girl looking like she'd passed out at her desk was worth the attention he'd get.
Though that didn't mean she wasn't gonna enjoy messing with him just a little bit.
She smiled at him warmly, but also with a craftiness to it, as she rested her head in her left hand and looked up towards him. "Thought I told you to call me Mina, Midori?"
Izuku blushed. "Y-You were serious? A-Are you sure?" He was a polite person, always preferring to use family names with the appropriate honorific out of nothing else but respect for the individual in front of him. Even if he felt comfortable enough to forgo the honorifics, he still usually called people by their family name. That was just how he was. Even Tsuyu had given him permission to use her given name, and he still slipped up on that from time to time. The one and only exception seemed to be Bakugou, or Kacchan as Izuku called him.
He somehow struggled at being casual. Just another one of his many, many amusing traits.
"Yep! I was! Try it!" Mina grinned, watching the boy flounder around the place. They'd got the attention of a couple of onlookers, but it wasn't like that was to be unexpected. They weren't really know for being friendly with one another, so seeing them engage in this sort of conversation was an unusual occurrence. She didn't mind who took notes though. It wasn't like she had anything to hide.
"A-A-Alright... M-Mina-san." Izuku managed to force out, not being able to do so without showing his normal level of proper respect. His face had gone beet red, apparently flustered by just saying her name.
"Not quite, but that'll do." She teased him, before sitting up straight in her seat. She'd had her fill. Mina-san was a step up from Ashido-san at least. He'd get better as time went on. "Whats up?"
The bumbling young student managed to calm himself down enough to be able to form a coherent sentence at last, remembering what it was that brought him over here in the first place. "O-Oh... I-I was just wondering... Y-You looked like you were stressed?..."
The grin on her face fell, as she answered. "I am!" Mina groaned, pushing her work placement sheet in front of her so the freckled boy could see. "I've been struggling to come up with where I wanna go for the weeks work experience. Aizawa-sensei keeps saying we need to choose the right spot, but I can't think of any..." She paused. "What about you? You got one of these forms, right? Where're you going?"
"I uh, All Might told me I got a late nomination yesterday, so I'm going there." Izuku revealed. He gave her the rundown of the information that he knew, but in truth, the only thing that he knew was that he'd be taking nearly an hour's ride on the Shinkansen line to his location.
"Luckyyyyyy..." Mina sighed again, kicking her legs underneath her desk lightly. "Wish I'd gotten some votes..." She'd put on a half decent show, hadn't she? How hadn't she at least gotten one vote?... Probably because of Bakugou and Todoroki. That gap was just getting more and more noticeable.
Izuku just looked at the sheet, and then back towards Mina, before running through some ideas in his head. Pointing to the option on her sheet he asked, "What about Urban Dealings? If I had a Quirk like yours, that'd be where I went."
"Hrmm? Whys that?"
"Your Quirks useful in that sort of environment. A lot of Heroes who do a lot of work in the Urban Dealings sector of the department tend to have Strength Enhancing or violent Quirks that can cause major damage to public property, but your Quirk is a lot of use to them because you can minimise the total damage done since you can choose a target or an object you want to dissolve, and the worse you'll create are some droplets in the side of a building while the main concentration of your Acid is on your target." Izuku listed off the reasons, before giving a TL;DR. "You can do the same thing that the Heroes there would have to do, but cause less overall damage in the meantime. You could probably even fix some of the damage they cause by using your Acid like a welder." He pointed out the name of a Hero on the list. "The Quick-Hit Hero Frenzai. He does Urban stuff."
It never ceased to amazed Mina just how much Izuku knew about the different areas of Heroics, including the ones that he himself didn't even have any outstanding interest in. He was like an encyclopaedia for the world of Pro-Heroes.
"That... Actually sounds like it might be a good place then..." She pondered, looking over the list a second time. She hadn't thought about her Quirks use in that sort of way. Where she had thought about applying for the most obvious and logical reasons, Izuku seemed to also consider the fringe options, the ones that most others wouldn't expect.
"I could text you some details on each of the placements later, if you want." The freckled boy offered, taking note of the current time. "I could help you choose a place, I-if you like."
For whatever reason, Mina felt her heart flutter at the offer. It was yet another display of kindness, of him getting involved in something he didn't need to be, all because he thought that the person he'd seen from afar needed the help.
It was a quality she'd admired about him for a long time. There were very few people who didn't respect that about Izuku, his willingness to just help out.
"That'd... That'd be nice, Midori. Thanks." She smiled again, far warmer this time. No jokes, and no ironic tones. Just genuine, deep seated gratitude towards her friend.
That night, Izuku had followed through with the promise that he'd made, and sent her a long winded list that went over what each Hero placement did, based on what he knew about each individual Hero. His knowledge was simply staggering, but Mina was gonna be damned if she didn't take the full advantage of it.
'So this guy, he works in the city?'
'Yeah. Sendai, I think. He's got a really good reputation there, people love him.'
Thanks to help from Izuku, and her now firm understanding of what each place did, Mina finally decided on a work placement after just a few minutes of the information being sent to her. Everything said and done, she knew that the best option for her, the best placement, and the choice that she honestly liked the look of was up further north in Japan.
Specifically, the Hero office that she had decided to go and visit the neighbouring Tohoku region, with a Hero who went by the name of Heator, who apparently had a Quirk that let his hands reach lava-levels of heat. A very dangerous, but useful Quirk if handled correctly - Just like hers.
She'd made her choice, and was now able to just relax. Into her comfortable pyjamas she had changed, and now, she laid on her back in bed, and just allowed the mattress to return her heat back to her, warming up the girl's body within a matter of minutes. She let out a sigh, this time of relief and of relaxation, that the stress was finished and done with, that she didn't have to worry about that anymore. She closed her eyes for just a few moments, before opening them again, turning down the brightness on her phone so it didn't literally sting to look at, and typed up a reply to Izuku.
'Thanks, Midori. You're the best.' She meant it too. In the short time she'd known him, really gotten to know him, Izuku had proven to be the sort of person that you knew you could rely on. The kind of person who you could go to with your problems, and he'd help you out, no strings attached. She'd only gotten to know him a short time, but she already felt like they'd been friends for years. Maybe that was just in part to how warm a person he was, how he was kind to anyone he met, and the way he was. A big part of her regretted not speaking to him sooner... Better late than never though, right?
'I-It's not a big deal at all! I'm just glad I could help.' Mina chuckled. How could someone be so humble, so altruistic, so naturally?
So what if he'd only just begun to discover his Quirk? So what if he was sort of a wimp when it came down to it? So what if he had a tendency to be nervous and to mutter out loud? She couldn't think of anyone who better embodied the term 'Hero' more.
She got another message from Izuku, which she read.
'By the way, Ashido-san...'
"It's Mina, but okay." She said out loud, not really thinking about it. She continued to read the message, holding the screen at arm's length.
'...Your first name. Alien Queen... I liked it... I thought it was cool.'
Once again, she smiled. At least someone liked it.
'Thanks, Midori.'