15

Chapter 15: Aftershocks: Heals Pt 2

Aftershocks: Heals Pt. 2

Never allow pride nor shame to halt your sharpening. No technique is too low, no method is too stupid. If it works and you refuse to use it out of some sense of 'honor' or 'decency,' you are the stupid one. A knife that refuses the whetstone is a dull blade, and we are not in the business of forging dull weapons, no sir. A dull knife cuts only butter and that does not butter my bread.

Perspective is a funny thing. Take the most objective person there is, put them into a simple situation, and they will still not know the objective truth of the matter. There is their perspective, your perspective, and the truth. Always take the time to learn and understand outside observations, for the slightest tweaks that would allow more power, more efficiency, better abilities can't always be seen by the one wielding it.

Different strokes for different folks, and you always want to vary your strokes.

Plus if it's really cool you can post it on the internet.

- Serration, Chapter 13: 'Don't be a Dumbass, dumbass.'

1-A was doing the typical student thing of sitting around and chatting as they waited for Aizawa to arrive, but their hearts just weren't in it. The memories of the USJ Incident were too fresh: seeing the cloud of smoke carrying a legion of sneering villains into what was supposed to be a safe place, fighting for their lives against said legion, seeing one of their own nearly killed, finding Aizawa lying in a pool of his own blood, watching helplessly as All Might battled an inhuman monster who had stomped their friend to death, seeing their friend come back, only to drill said monster into the ground so hard he had reduced it and almost himself into paste…then watching as two veteran Heroes and a student where wheeled into ambulances, looking terribly still and small.

The empty desk at the back where Izuku usually sat felt like a hole in more than the attendance list, his absence like a missing lightbulb and a broken air conditioner. Without him, the classroom seemed too large, too stuffy and too dark. Although, his absence wasn't the only thing missing…

Just then, the over-large door slammed open as Himiko rushed through, breathing hard. "Toga-kun, you are almost late!" Iida announced, hand chopping sharply, "Furthermore, you were not in the dorm when morning roll call was performed! Would you care to explain yourself?"

She gave him an amused look, as if she was humoring his attempt at authority. And she wondered why some people compared her to a cat. "I went to go see Izuku," Himiko replied with a shrug, "I needed some snuggle time and he needed a notebook and his phone, he'd go crazy without something to do while he's lying in bed." Plus, I got some excellent pictures. I can't wait to see those two go at it…maybe I could convince him to try the twin thing now? He does owe me…

"Ain't that right," Kyouka muttered, her jacks rubbing together as she recalled Izuku's 'episode' the day before.

As Iida went off on a lecture, the door opened again and an empty yet shapely uniform slipped through, though only a few noticed as Toru sat at her desk, tucking an autographed picture of Mt. Lady into her jacket for safekeeping.

Bakugou sat with her feet up on her desk, wearing a scowl with her arms crossed as usual, though if one were to peer closer, they'd see that her eyes were darting about rapidly as she thought, her frown deepening every so often. It was a common sight in the classroom.

Truly, the only one who seemed entirely unaffected by the events of the previous days was Keqing, lavender hair in her signature cat-ear buns, sitting straight in her chair as she wrote in a notebook.

When the door opened the third time in as many minutes, it was to admit Aizawa. After seeing the bloody mess he had been, one arm with the skin around his elbow gone, exposing the muscle underneath, one eye caked shut by blood and arms hanging limply at his sides, they expected he would have to wheeled into the classroom in a wheelchair or possibly a hospital bed. But to their surprise, Eraserhead walked in as calm and uninjured as you please, the only evidence of his previous state being a red scar underneath one of his eyes. He also hadn't inched into the room zipped in his sleeping bag, so they settled into their desks quickly and quietly.

His bloodshot eyes swept over them slowly, something akin to pride glimmering in those dark orbs. "What happened at the USJ should never have happened," Aizawa announced bluntly, leaning on the lectern, "The situation you were all put in was a situation you never should've been put in, not here, not at Yuuei, not a place of learning. That being said, your conduct was noteworthy." His lips twitched into something that might be called a smile, if one tilted their head, squinted, and had never seen a smile before in their life.

Aizawa's gaze sharpened. "However, you should know that the results of the USJ are not common. Two veterans and a student seriously injured, with various minor injuries scattered throughout, was the best result you could've hoped for. As a consequence of what you experienced, you are all required to make appointments with Hound Dog for counseling, at least three visits lasting one hour each."

More than one student grumbled, but none louder than Bakugou. "Whaddya mean, counseling?" She barked, slamming her hands on her desk, "Who even needs that kiddy shit?! I kicked ass and took names, I don't need some shrink asking me about my relationship with my mom!"

Eraserhead gave her a flat stare. "You were attacked with the intent to kill," he said softly, his voice carrying through the room despite that, "You saw two teachers, people you are supposed to look to for safety, disabled and nearly killed. You saw a classmate apparently die. You did see a villain die. You are all going to counseling…" His lips twitched. "At least, you will if you want to participate in the Sports Festival next month."

There was a second of silence, followed by loud murmuring. "Wait, we're still gonna have the festival despite the break in?" Eiri asked loudly, standing up at her desk.

"Yes," Aizawa replied bluntly, eyes sweeping the classroom, "Can you guess why?"

Himiko, Momo, Keqing and Shimo raised their hands, and he gestured at the Chinese girl. "A show of strength," she answered, "The school is demonstrating that, although the break-in was unprecedented, it had no real effect and Yuuei is just as strong as before."

"Indeed," he muttered, withdrawing a jelly drink from his utility belt and beginning to drink, "Despite my complaints, I was overruled; therefore, instead of your normal classes, we will instead be going over your actions during the Incident." He held up a box of flash drives and rattled them quietly, "This is voluntary, however. If you do not wish for your classmates to view this footage, I will still require several pages worth of notes."

They all traded looks and nods, turning to face Aizawa.

He blinked blearily and nodded. "Very well. By class roster, then. First…Aoyama, Jiro and Yaoyozuru." He looked at the three of them. "Do you want to view the footage here and now?"

The three nodded, the blonde Frenchman looking a little pale as he did. Aizawa dimmed the lights and switched on the projector. It took only seconds for the screen to show a rocky mountain area, empty except for a few trees. Then the camera flickered, and a cloud of smoke swept over the plateau, the forms of several villains emerging from within. They were talking among themselves, jeering, laughing and joking, though one of them said something that had a feral-looking woman punch them in the face. "Tamahagane…" Momo breathed, her dark eyes fixed on the woman who'd partially collapsed her ribcage.

Then a cloud of smoke boiled in the air and Kyouka, Momo and Yuga stumbled out looking shocked, naturally. That was when the sound came on. "Baby Heroes, ripe for the killin'...I can already tell none of ya are gonna be a good fight, but whatever…" As the villain monologued, they could see a subtle flash of light as Momo created a metal staff and passed it off to Kyouka. "Sometimes laying into a punching bag is good enough! Although only the middle chick looks decent enough to beat on, that other one is all skin and bones! And this other guy, lookit him, thinks he can play the knight when he's prettier than the damsels! Ha! I'm gonna take my time peelin' you outta that tin can, pretty boy, 'bout all you'd be good for-"

During her speech, the punk-rock chick and the Frenchie had been standing defensively, looking pale, but Momo's eyes had been narrowed in thought. Then her shoulder began to sparkle brightly as she suddenly knelt, drawing a large, blocky device from her skin. A loud THOOM rang out and Tamahagane hunched over, clutching her crotch as a beanbag hit her.

"I would ask that you please retreat or surrender," the Creative girl announced politely, racking another beanbag into her weapon "It is only a matter of time before word gets to the faculty and when they arrive, All Might will be coming with them."

"-you little…bi-!" THOOM. The second beanbag slammed into the villain's face, bowling her over.

"I insist," Momo added, reloading once more.

There was a second of silence in the classroom and on the tape, then Himiko cackled. "Got her when she was monologuing, nice one!"

The villains attacked anyway, then the screen split up into three different angles. One showed Momo hitting the bulk of the villains with a smoke bomb before proceeding to nail several others with beanbags, steadily firing, reloading and aiming. The second showed Kyouka, wading into the chaos from the side, slapping fools upside the head or arm or leg with her staff, while the last showed Yuga.

"I'll show you dull, crude villains how to really Sparkle!" He shouted, unleashing a laser beam from his belt and sweeping it through the cloud, drawing cries of pain. A raptor-like screech rang through air as a lean form leaped from the smoke with the power of clawed, digitigrade legs, descending towards the sparkling blond at speed. He thrust his hips and fired again, but the villain dodged mid-air and landed, cracking the ground before lunging at him. Yuga yelped and clenched his stomach, firing small bursts of thin, focused lasers that the villain dipped, ducked, dove and dodged around before lashing out, their talons rending through his armor, though luckily missing his flesh.

Letting loose a panicked noise that definitely wasn't a shriek, Yuga released his laser, directing the energy up to the lenses on his pauldrons, jetting him backwards but also impacting the villain and sending them flying back; slamming into other enemies and driving them all into a nearby mountain face to leave them in a groaning pile.

"J-just as planned… mon dieu," Yuga whispered, gingerly touching his torn chest armor.

"What's the point of all that armor if it doesn't protect you?" Keqing asked, sounding genuinely befuddled.

Yuga chuckled nervously, a droplet of sparkling sweat sliding down his forehead. "Eh-heheh, you see, the magnifique lens system I wear is mostly glass and shining crystal, so it is…quite heavy. The armor itself is much lighter…but just as sparkly!"

They returned their attention to the screen, watching as Kyouka fought a crowd of villains. Her technique was quite simple, yet effective: transfer the vibrations of her heartbeats into the speakers mounted to her boots via her jacks, then stomp to shake the ground. And while the villains were off-balance and stumbling, she'd smack them with her staff. There were murmurs of appreciation as she let one villain reel her in with a vine to avoid another, proceeding to handily deal with the one before turning to face the others, only for one to catch a projectile to the face.

The focus rested on Momo once again, who had been hanging back, nailing villains with beanbags in the head, center mass and occasionally the crotch. As more and more fell, she had started walking forward to keep range, and that was when the class became aware of a weakness the trio shared: None of them had fought villains before, and supervised sparring was not the same as fighting for your life. Working together, they had done a lot of damage, taking down the majority of the villains in the process.

Down, but not out.

One recovered faster than the others and leapt at Momo's back with a shout, the Creative girl spinning around and clocking him with her shoulder cannon. She realized she was surrounded and while visibly worried, she didn't panic, instead slinging the cannon onto her back and drawing a boxy, plastic-looking pistol and shooting one in the chest. He went down in a juddering pile of limbs and Momo Created a second taser pistol, spinning in place as she dual-wielded guns to decent effect.

Mina whistled lowly. "So those are the gun-kata skills of a rich person…!"

"You make that look good, Momo-chan," Himiko murmured, baring a toothy smile as she watched the screen.

The Momo on screen realized that her plan was only delaying the villains, emptying the magazines of taser cartridges before Creating a staff with a faceted crystal ball on the top, calling out to Yuga and Kyouka. The sparkling Frenchie fired his navel laser into the crystal ball, which refracted the beam into several smaller ones that lanced out, finally taking the crowd of villains down for good. But, as the trio was securing the downed criminals, Tamahagane had silently risen to her feet.

She threw Yuga down and stomped on his stomach, ducking a wild swing from the punk rock chick before punching her in the stomach. The sparkling blonde and Kyouka both cringed a little, recalling the previous pain and the fact that they'd been taken out in one move each.

Momo shot another beanbag at Tamahagane who was prepared, catching and bursting it with a hand that looked covered in metal.

"Beanbagging me in the crotch, then in the face, while I was talking?" The villain growled, smile widening, "I approve, little hero! I thought I'd only get some fun outta stomping on you, but you've got some teeth, girlie! I gotta wonder, though," she stood tall, her veins bulging in her flesh as gray metal overtook her skin until it was a woman of metal standing there. She cracked her knuckles. "Can you really deal with me, without a sneak attack first?"

Momo shot at her again, to even less effect before the villain lunged at her, punching through the cannon and swiping at her, the Creative girl making a staff to defend herself. The fight that followed was rather hard to watch for the class, as it swiftly became obvious that Tamahagane was playing the Hero-in-training, taking pointless hits from the staff and inflicting minor injuries on Momo, wearing a smile the entire time. Then the villain broke her staff, and it went into nearly-uncontrolled flailing on her part, managing to get a lucky strike in on the villain's ear before throwing down a flash bomb followed by a smoke bomb.

"Hey, those are Izuku's bombs!" Toru pointed out, clapping as she bounced in her chair, "That was so cool, you were like a ninja Momo-chan!"

On screen, Momo had just donned a newly-Created glove and pulled a pair of familiar metal stars from her stomach when Tamahagane landed a kick to her chest, the stars falling to the ground next to the villain, who paid them no mind. The class made noises of sympathy as Momo landed on her book; that, and the heavy kick from a metal foot had made a rather visceral thunk audible through the cameras.

The camera split again as a large, armored form landed on a plateau above Momo and Tamahagane, crouched and ready to intervene.

"Sneaky little shit," Tamahagane muttered with an approving smirk, eyeing the girl as she writhed in pain, "Got any tricks now?"

Then the two Stun Shuriken Momo had created turned on, arcs of electricity dancing over the villain's metal skin as she screamed. As she collapsed, some in the class sighed in relief, someone even clapped lightly. Then they gasped, as the trio confirmed that they were injured but alive, Tamahagane had sat up, murder on her face as she made her skin metal before lunging at Momo's back.

Momo, in class, had her eyes on the screen showing Izuku. As her trap went off, he had risen from his crouch and nodded in approval, something that made her feel warm and just a little gooey on the inside. Then he had noticed the villain getting back up, and moved. His form blurred on the screen, crossing the distance in less than a second, and Momo wondered how armor that bulky let him move that fast.

"Izuku," she whispered in time with the recording, the warm and gooey part of her feeling just a bit more of both, seeing him protect her from that sneak attack.

"Your Quirk," he spoke to Tamahagane, the sound of his voice making the entire class jolt in their seats, even Aizawa. "You armor yourself using the iron in your blood, with a limited amount of control inside of your body, going by the metal over your teeth. Using the iron, you can also increase your rate of blood flow internally, letting you recover from injuries faster than usual."

The villain gaped at him, stunned. "Y-you… how?" she gasped, vainly trying to free herself from his grip.

"...Huh," Kaminari said, "He was watching for all of five seconds, how'd he figure her Quirk out so fast?"

"Well, her Quirk is pretty much his Quirk but with less steps," Himiko pointed out, "I mean, look at how she's dressed and unarmed, that pretty much screams 'armoring Quirk' to me."

"I guess…"

"I wonder, though…Can you still recover that quick…without any iron in your body?"

"…What?"

"Let's find out."

Most of the class flinched as Izuku decked the villain before headbutting her and pulling her into a bearhug, a few cringing as Tamahagane started screaming in pain as he visibly pulled the iron out of her body and into his armor. As her screeching trailed off into choked gurgles, Iida thrust his hand into the air. "Sensei!" he called, subconsciously rubbing the engine in one of his legs, "That villain…did she…survive?"

"Yes," Aizawa replied simply, "The last I checked, the villain was fine, just with a severe case of anemia."

Several students sighed in relief.

"Guess not," Izuku stated on screen, dumping the villain like a sack of wet cement, "Are you okay?"

Kyouka shivered, rubbing her arms at a sudden chill. "I know he just saved your bacon there, Yaoyozuru, but his voice…man, it sounds-"

"-Scary?" Toru offered.

"-Kinda sexy?" Mina added.

"Scarily sexy?" Himiko cut in with a grin.

"Protective?" Ochako mumbled.

"Intimidating?" Iida muttered.

"Deep as the Mariana Trench, ribbit?" Tsuyu commented, unperturbed.

"Not sparkling," Yuga murmured.

"...Like a dormant volcano demanding blood sacrifices," Kyouka finished.

Bakugou huffed under her breath, arms crossed tightly across her chest, her red eyes narrowing as, on-screen, Momo nearly collapsed only for Izuku to catch her, cradling her protectively in his arms. A few students shifted somewhat uncomfortably as Izuku laid his hand on Momo's sternum and did something that made her better, given the way she began to cough and the intense stare the two shared.

Yuga interrupted the moment, grabbing onto Izuku and babbling about his armor, which the Earthbender promptly fixed before something off-screen caught their attention.

"Find the others, make sure they're alright then get to Central Plaza," he ordered as he withdrew a pair of meal bars and tossed them to Momo. "Pick your targets, work together and don't strain yourselves!"

The video ended as Izuku leapt away. "Thoughts?" Aizawa asked, eyes sweeping the classroom…or at least, they assumed, as he hadn't turned the lights back and the windows were shuttered.

"Those gadgets you used, Yaoyoruzu-san," Keqing spoke up, her amethyst eyes almost shining in the dim light, "What were they?"

"Well, Mei-san showed them to me in a magazine about less-lethal Law Enforcement equipment," the Creative girl replied, steepling her fingers, "The shoulder-mounted device is a portable Magnetic Accelerator Catapult, used, as you saw to deliver less-lethal payloads. I only used beanbag rounds, but it is capable of launching various things, such as smoke, flash, tear and sleep gas grenades. The pistols are simply that, pistols that use compressed gas to fire cartridges that are tasers."

Bakugou scoffed, all eyes turning to her. "You Extras are all swing, no follow through," she grumbled, feet up on her desk. "Jacks has obviously never hit anyone with anything, let alone a staff, and that stompy shit ain't gonna cut it for ranged attacks, while Shiny's armor ain't protecting shit and he doesn't have any dedicated close-range attacks. But Rich Girl is the worst about that; she bagged the same villain three times, once in the head, chest and crotch, and only actually knocked him out when she clocked him upside the head. Their tactics were all about taking those fuckers down, not out."

Kyouka turned to face her with a frown. "So what, we should've been cracking skulls and breaking bones, then?" She asked heatedly. "Permanently injuring people?"

Katsuki gave the punk rock chick a sneer, red eyes glinting in the low light. "They broke into our school to kill us, dumbass."

"Enough," Aizawa cut in, looking unamused, "She's out of line, but Bakugou is right. Lethal force is rarely authorized for Heroes, but you are all students and self-defense takes precedent. That being said," his eyes narrowed on the explosive blonde, "Cease swearing. Only warning."

"Don't worry about lacking 'killer instinct' as it were," Himiko added, smiling softly at the trio, "You'll learn how to moderate your Quirks. It's almost like we're at a school or something," she concluded with a waggle of her eyebrows.

"Anything else?" Eraserhead asked, and upon getting nothing further, he continued. "Then the next…Ashido, Sato, Shoji, Sero. View it now or later?"

There was no hesitation. "Now," they all said firmly.

With that, he switched the drives, and the screen changed to display a view from the camera above the front entrance, just as the Smoke Villain sent out a cloud of…himself? That swallowed almost the entire class, save for Thirteen and Iida along with Sato, who were immediately behind her. As the cloud approached, Shoji reached out to grab Mina and Sero under his arms and leapt high above the smoke.

Events played out. "As they said, while it is admirable to stay and fight, it is best to recognize when to retreat," Aizawa commented softly, pausing his quiet consumption of a jelly drink. "Don't let pride get in the way of doing what's right."

There was a chorus of sympathetic hisses as the Smoke Villain used his Quirk to make Thirteen use her own Quirk on herself. "How is Thirteen, sensei?" Ochako asked worriedly.

"She was out of the hospital before I was," he replied, "Thirteen may not have a lot of experience in combat, but she does have very fine control of her Quirk. The wound was large, but shallow; she won't even have a scar."

They watched as Iida attempted to evade the smoke from the villain, the other students doing their best to hold him back, before Mina got a skilled shot at the villain's metal brace/collar, Sero swiftly taping him up before Shoji and Sato worked together to toss him away.

"That was a nice shot, Mina-chan," Himiko praised with a toothy grin, "How'd you see the collar?"

"The light from the ceiling kept reflecting off of it," the acid-spewing girl replied with a shrug, "I figured it must've been important if it was the only other thing I could see besides his eyes, like a target on a boss!"

The screen displayed the four Heroes-in-training after Iida had escaped, showing them setting up barricades at the top of the steps by pulling trees, benches and signs out of the ground, lashing them together with Sero's tape then gluing them to the ground with Mina's acid, which had a thick, gloopy consistency.

Sato and Shoji would take turns standing between the barriers, battling the villains that would attempt to make the climb, usually ending with them thrown down the steps and taking out a few more on the way down. Then a pair of bent blades curved through the air, forcing the sugar berserker to duck as one swung through the air where his neck had been, embedding into one of the barriers with a shing.

Once they were no longer moving, the class could identify what had been thrown: large metal bananas. "Quit throwing bananas, asshole!" Mina yelled, reaching out to spray the stairs with slick acid.

"They are plantains, which are kin to the banana!" A strange man shouted back. He was tall, thin and wore what looked like brown bark on his torso, and around his wrists were green leaves and bunches of plantains. "Quit hiding and face me, younglings!"

"No, thank you," Sero replied, quickly pulling tape from his elbows as the other three quickly constructed something from it, "We're good up here."

The tip of one of Shoji's tentacles shifted into an eye that peeked over the barriers. "One of the villains has some kinda Quirk that spits hot liquid," he reported through a mouth in another tentacle, "He's using it to wash the acid off of the steps."

"Damn," the pink girl muttered, yellow eyes darting in thought, before she turned to the boys, "Any of you guys know how to use a bolas?"

Sero raised his hand and opened his mouth, ducking as another razor-sharp plantain buzzed overhead. "I know the basics," he answered, quickly pulling out a long strip of tape, twisting the majority into something like rope, leaving the ends like cups, which Mina filled with more gooey acid. Stepping back, he started twirling it over his head before standing up and hurling it.

It hit a villain that looked kind of like a pangolin, wrapping around him to trap his arms and sending him rolling back down the steps.

"That's it! I'm done waiting!" Plantain Man shouted.

"It's over, Banana-kin!" Mina called back, quickly loading a large ball of gooey acid into the largest section of the tape-construct, "I have the high ground!"

"You underestimate my Quirk's power!" The villain cried, crouching and pointing his bunches at the ground.

"Don't try it!" Sero warned as Mina pulled back, revealing the construct to be a makeshift sling.

The villain shot his metal plantains into the ground beneath him, launching himself into the air with a warcry. As he rose up, he saw between the barriers and the sling loaded and ready. He had enough time to have a look of shock come over his face before Mina released the sling, the payload slamming into his chest and launching him backwards.

"We warned you, banana-bitch! HA!"

With plantain man, the most visible threat dealt with, they settled back into their rhythm: Sero would construct bolases and the like from his tape, Mina would fill them, then they would throw them at the villains below, with the pink-skinned girl slicking the stairs every so often.

At one point, the villain with the boiling liquid Quirk attempted to use her power again, but mysteriously lost control and ended up dousing herself and several others instead. It was a nice break for the four of them, as it became obvious that they were getting more and more tired. The skin on Mina's hands began to look raw and red, Sero's tape had become more brittle and snapped easily, Sato had run out of sugar and was on the verge of crashing, while Shoji was visibly haggard.

"Guys, I'm gonna call for help," Mina muttered, reaching into her cleavage to withdraw an orb of what looked like glass, filled with magenta liquid. She squeezed it, the liquid beginning to glow before launching it into the air with the sling.

The camera split to show Izuku landing near the center of the USJ, equal distances away from a bloody pile of clothes that was Aizawa, the massive muscled form of the Nomu crouching above him, and the villains attempting to get the four at the top of the stairs. He visibly looked between the two before dropping down, ripping a chunk of concrete from the ground and chucking it at the villains, bowling several of them over.

And that was where the footage ended.

Without prompting, Momo's hand was in the air. "If I may offer criticism politely, I believe they were acting too defensively. Several times once a number of villains had been incapacitated simultaneously, they retreated behind their defenses instead of attacking, which led to the standing villains freeing the others."

Kaminari chipped in with, "They turtled."

"Acting defensively was the right thing to do, considering it was their first time fighting a number of villains," Keqing added, her soft voice carrying, "Was it the best thing, tactically speaking? Perhaps, perhaps not."

Aizawa looked over the class and saw no one else looking to comment. "Very well. Asui, Toga-"

"Yep!" Himiko interrupted, followed by, "Yes, ribbit." A second later.

The screen changed to display what looked like a regular, empty city street, except for the ceaseless downpour drenching everything. The unfortunately familiar clouds of smoke grew, depositing a crowd of villains lead by a rather cute girl, who defied such categorization by shrilly demanding the others to form up in such a way that she was the center, so that the soon-to-be arriving Heroes-in-training would see her first.

Himiko and Tsuyu were dropped into the Downpour Zone, their backs against a building while facing a ring of villains surrounding them, the center of which being the blue-haired villain. She was using her Quirk to shield herself from the rain, a translucent half-dome of water hovering over her head.

As she stepped forward with a superior smirk on her face, the two teens traded looks and grappled away, Himiko with her belt and Tsuyu with her tongue, launching themselves above the villains and away.

"Th-bu-wh-tho-bi-the…THE AUDACITY!" The blue-haired villain shrieked, face twisting, "Get them!"

The camera followed the two Heroines as they swung through the mock city, twisting and leaping up until they landed on the roof of a building. "They can't keep up," Himiko laughed, turning to Tsuyu, "I got a plan, unless you've got one?"

"Let's hear it, ribbit," the froggy girl replied, appearing unconcerned for the pouring rain.

"It's called Plan BD-A2," the blonde bloodsucker started, "You're fast and this is the perfect environment, so you'll play rabbit, or frog, as it were. Get the villains to chase, do a figure-eight around the block to get 'em tired, then lead them back here, streetside. I'll drop on em-" her form was covered in grey goo for a second before it faded, revealing a blonde that was taller, older, and much more stacked, front and back, "-and we'll take them down." She finished with a grin.

Tsuyu tilted her head, expression unchanging. "...Who's that?"

"Mt. Lady."

"Ah," she nodded. "I'll go and come back, ribbit."

"Hold on a sec," Himiko muttered, shifting into Toru's form before shedding her costume, hitting a button that made it curl into a small ball, her gauntlet, mask, belt and pouches inside. "Hold that for me, her Giant form is too thick for my costume."

"Hey, I look pretty cute in your costume, Himi-chan!" Toru enthused, clapping happily in her seat.

As Tsuyu swung away, the invisible form, just barely visible in the pounding rain, shifted back to Mt. Lady, this time in her full costume, the screen splitting to show the froggy girl leading the villains on a merry chase while Himiko watched from atop the building.

The shapeshifter glanced around shiftily, then palmed her/Yu's breasts, squeezing experimentally. "Oh wow, these things are sensitive. Awesome."

Iida sputtered, rather appropriately, like a stalled car. "T-Toga-kun! That is…highly inappropriate!"

"Pfft," Himiko scoffed, unashamed, "As if you wouldn't have done it. And Yu couldn't care less."

"I do care!" The speedster retorted.

"No, I mean…whatever. Shush."

Tsuyu easily outpaced the villains, dodging the blades of water thrown at her by the blue haired villain by hopping from streetlight to streetlight, using her tongue to cross larger gaps. She stopped below the building Himiko was perched on, waiting calmly for the crowd to catch up.

"Finally realized…how useless running is?!" The apparent leader shouted, out of breath as the villains crowded under the traffic light the froggy heroine was sitting atop.

In response, Tsuyu simply pointed up just as Himiko threw herself off of the rooftop, Gigantifying on the way down. "WHAT'S UP, BITCHES?!" She cried happily as she descended towards them, their cries of surprise drowned out as her feet hit the road, the concrete buckling at the point of impact, sending the villains into the air. Himiko/Yu caught them in her massive hands, squeezing the crowd together. "I've got a lovely bunch of idiots," she sang as Tsuyu agiley hopped between her fingers, restraining the villains, "Here they are all sitting in my hands~! Gotta keep a good grip, or else they'll all slip, and that'll make-"

As soon as Tsuyu had restrained the last villain, the video had ended. "Aww, you didn't get to hear the whole thing…" Himiko mumbled, crossing her arms and pouting.

"Thoughts?" Aizawa asked, and most of the class shrugged and shook their heads.

"They escaped the ambush, had a plan and put it in motion quickly and successfully," Iida replied stiffly, adjusting his glasses, "Perhaps someone could've comported themselves a bit more responsibly."

"Tactical criticism only," Eraserhead commented, "The footage of Iida escaping has already been viewed so…Kaminari, Tokoyami. Viewed here?"

"Indeed," the bird-headed boy said as the blond nodded.

The camera began to show footage from a zone made up almost entirely of partially collapsed buildings, the streets buried in rubble and dust.

In the shadow of a building that had halfway fallen over, a group of villains emerged from the smoke, swiftly followed by the two teens. Immediately, Dark Shadow emerged with an echoing cry, battering the villains with shadowy wings.

What followed was simple, and effective. Dark Shadow would grow to a large size, grabbing the villains with both hands/wings, slap them together then slam them on the ground, where Kaminari would jump into the center and electrify the whole group…including himself. There was a smattering of giggles at his dazed 'Wahey!'

And that was it, the two teens defeated the group of villains using that tactic.

"So…" Sato coughed into his hand, "You always shock yourself with your Quirk, Denki-kun?"

Kaminari groaned, rubbing his temples. "...Yeah…"

"You should fix that," Keqing commented dryly.

"I'll introduce you to Mei-chan," Himiko added, "She'll build a gadget you can use to at least lessen the effects."

"…Thanks."

"Tactically speaking, their strategy was sound and simple," Shoji spoke through a mouth on the end of a tentacle, "I can't think of much in the way of criticism, besides the obvious."

"Anyone else?" At their head shakes (and Bakugou's muttered invective) Aizawa continued. "Next is-"

"Um, sensei," Ochako started, putting her hand in the air.

"-Kirishima and Bakugou," he finished, glancing at the two students, who nodded.

"Fu-finally, something worthwhile," the explosive blonde muttered, sitting up from her slump, the redhead leaning on her hands to stare narrowly at the screen.

The screen changed, the now-familiar environment of the Ruins Zone visible, though now the camera was inside of one of the buildings. Once more, the smoke deposited a group of villains, shortly followed by Bakugou and Kirishima. Before her feet had even hit the ground, the blonde exploded both her hands towards the floor, punching large holes through it before it collapsed, dumping the villains a floor below.

Bakugou and Kirishima were left on a chunk of floor standing above the group of groaning villains, and even from the cameras' position, they could see the wild grin on the blonde's face. "No holding back!" Katsuki cackled, cracking her knuckles before leaping down a floor with a cry of, "Time to DIE!"

"W-wait, we should-!" Kirishima tried to interject, sighing as her skin hardened and became rock-like. She jumped down too, and the fight was on.

The two weren't quite back-to-back, with the villains charging them gracelessly; perhaps they thought with only two, they could overwhelm them with wave tactics?

They were wrong.

"FUCK OFF!" Katsuki shouted, blasting a bulky villain away with a grin on her face as Eiri grappled another to throw out of a window, a jagged makeshift blade shattering on her forehead as she did. "You'd think, tryin' to invade fuckin' Yuuei of all places, these FUCKERS WOULD BRING THEIR A-GAME!" Small but intense explosions shot from her gloved hands as she jumped and spun, kicking a knife out of a villains' hand with one heel and kicking him in the face with the other, sending him cartwheeling into a wall. "But no! Extras! Extras, one and all!"

"...You really don't have any other insults, do you?" Himiko muttered, her chin propped up on her palm, her eyes alight with interest.

"Why make the effort?" Bakugou scoffed, grinning as her past self continued kicking ass. "Now shut up."

Eiri blocked the punches of a villain with spikes growing from her knuckles, grappling her arms to pull them in for a vicious headbutt, then flattened them with a hip toss that turned into an elbow drop that cracked the floor beneath them. She swept the leg of another villain, planting her hands and pushing off into a rising knee that sent the villain bouncing off of the ceiling. "This is what you get, Bastards!" She growled, boxing another villains' ears then grabbing them and rocketing her head forward once, twice, thrice, throwing the bleeding enemy to ground. "Imma break you all!"

"Go Eiri-chan!" Mina cheered, reaching over to shake the redhead's shoulder with a wide grin, "You were rockin' their worlds!"

Kirishima's face almost matched her hair, though she didn't reply.

"Maybe if you were faster!" Bakugou laughed, blasting a villain away casually, "WEAK!" She spun, kicking the legs out from another and launching a double blast into their chest, sending them flying, "USELESS!" She exploded, driving an elbow up into the gut of another, seizing them by the collar with her hand and pulling them over her shoulder, then blasting them out of a window, "FUCKING!" the topmost barrels on her gauntlets glowed before erupting in a mighty flash and thunder, sending many villains flying, "EXTRAS!"

"Note to self," Aizawa mumbled, a half-drunk jelly drink hanging from the corner of his mouth, "Emphasize collateral damage costs."

Unfortunately, Bakugou didn't manage to hear him, smirking to herself at the footage.

The muscular redhead cracked her knuckles, giving the many unconscious, mostly smoking villains a satisfied smirk. "Maybe next time, you'll think twice about taking on 1-A!" She crowed, turning to the other girl with a palm raised. "High-five!"

"We're not fuckin' done," the explosive blonde grunted, not sparing her a glance.

"Boo! Don't leave buddies hangin' like that! Boo!" The pink girl called.

Katsuki growled, much like the pomeranian her hair made her resemble, "One, none of you are my 'buddies' and two, Shut Up!" She grunted as Aizawa shushed her, his eyes flashing red in the dim light of the classroom.

It was a man, black hair pulled up into a topknot, dressed in the traditional samurai getup, jacket, hakama and geta, all colored blood red and trimmed with black, a katana tucked into an obi, topped off with a straw hat (also black.) "If they couldn't satisfy you, perhaps I can be of assistance?" He offered in a smoky voice, thumbing the tsuba of his katana to show the gleaming blade, "You'll see that I'm a cut above the rest."

"...Pfffffffft," Himiko snorted a laugh, "What a lame-ass. He obviously thinks he's the main character."

Bakugou glanced at the sensei with a scowl. "Oi, she cursed! Why aren't you saying anything about that?!"

Aizawa looked at his explosive student blandly. "Because," he replied flatly.

Katsuki stared at him, an incredulous eyebrow creeping up her forehead before her cheeks bulged and raucous laughter escaped from her mouth. "L-look at this edgy motherfucker!" She chortled, slapping a knee, "Where the fuck do you think you are, Bushido-con!?"

"Yo, is that a thing?" someone asked.

"Oh yeah, I think so. I heard about it once, no idea where or when it is. Seems like it'd be a nice change of pace from all the Hero Cons…"

The villain's eye twitched dangerously. "You-!"

"And the colors! Holy shit , I think that color palette is called 'It's Not A Phase, Mom!'" Bakugou added, nearly bent over from laughing so hard, "Lemme guess, you call yourself 'Ronin!' No, wait, 'Ronin of the Underworld!' No, that's not edgy enough, how about 'Shadow Ronin of the Underworld!" She saw his face curl into a scowl and laughed harder, "Oh god , I bet your first villain name was 'Original Character, Do Not Steal!' Ha!"

Himiko cackled, as did several other students. "I gotta admit, that's good," she said through laughter.

"Yeah, who knew she could be funny?" Kyouka added with a subtle smile.

"THAT'S IT!" The very edgy villain howled, gripping his katana so hard his fingers were white, "DIE!" And then he blurred forward, drawing his sword and swinging down with all his might.

"Look out!" Eiri shouted, throwing herself in front of Katsuki, arms raised, skin hard as rock. The blade sliced down, meeting her skin and beginning to cut through it. The redhead gasped in pain, before her eyes hardened and she clenched her fists, growling with effort. Her skin became even more jagged and rock-like, stopping the katana cold.

"Did she just level up?" Denki asked, "That's pretty cool!"

Eiri smiled, but once again said nothing.

With the villain's momentum meeting her immoving form by way of his sword, the blade shattered into silver shards. Then Eiri heard an explosion and glanced over at the blonde.

"That's my line."

Katsuki, powered by a blast, uncorked a spinning uppercut into the villain's chin, sending him into the air. She landed and took aim, catching him right in his floating center of mass and launching him out of the other side of the building. Sniffing, she stood and wiped her cheek where a shard of sword had cut into her flesh, giving the redhead an unimpressed look. "Yeah, I had that handled, dipshit," she said casually, cracking her knuckles, "If you hadn't jumped in front of me I would've cleaned his goddamn clock before he could bring his sword down."

Eiri blinked at her, feeling a little flatfooted. "Uh…you're welcome…?" Shaking her head, she squinted in thought with a small frown, "Wait, how, exactly?"

Bakugou scoffed. "An edgy bitch like that? Press their unimaginative inadequacy buttons a bunch and they'll default to the most basic strikes out of anger; which, for a katana, is an overhead slice. I was already crouched over 'n ready to explode and counter his ass."

"Oh hey look at that, a lack of communication caused easily-avoidable damage," the blood sucker intoned, smirking as Katsuki stiffened and shot her a glare, "Who-ever could've seen that coming?"

The redhead rubbed her chin, coughing and refocusing on more important things. "Now that we've handled these goons, we should find everyone else and help 'em out."

"Fuck that, if they can't handle these goddamn extras," she kicked a groaning villain in the side, "Then they shouldn't even be in our damn class. The smoky son of a bitch, he's got a teleporting Quirk; as long as he's on the field, these fucks have an out. Taking him down, that's the winning play." A villain, having recovered from getting beat down, charged at Katsuki's back with a yell. She stepped to the side and held her arm out, letting him clothesline himself on her bulky gauntlet. Not even acknowledging it, she jumped out of the building and blasted away.

Aizawa sniffed, rubbing his nose. "Mm?"

Iida's hand shot into the air with a sound like a piston. "Bakugou-san was severely lacking in decorum, though not skill in combat!" he declared, before pointing a finger at the blonde, "She is also very fortunate the battle was taking place in a training ground, otherwise the collateral damage she would've caused would have been severe!"

Bakugou muttered something under her breath, the only actually audible words including, '...collateral you…'

Momo raised her hand. "While Kirishima-kun was correct in saying they should find their classmates and group up, Bakugou-kun was also correct in saying that cutting off the villains' retreat would be tactically sound…it could've been worded more nicely, I suppose?"

"Her Quirk is strong, she herself is skilled in using it, but the hostility she shows to her comrades will not make her considered popular," Keqing summarized, idly spinning one of her large needles in her delicate fingers.

Eraserhead finished making a note before turning back to the class. "Anything else?"

Mina thrust her hand into the air. "Sensei, that edgy samurai guy-what's his villain name?"

Aizawa checked through a sheaf of papers, dragging a finger down to a picture of said villain. "..The Shadow Blade of the Underworld," he announced flatly.

"…Wow," Katsuki muttered, "I shoulda punched that guy harder."

"Next then, are-"

"Sensei, um-"

"-Koda and Keqing," he finished, ignoring Ochako's raised hand to look at the two students. The horned boy and the Chinese transfer both nodded in acquiescence, shooting looks at the frustrated pout on the gravity girl's face.

The projected view changed to what could politely be called 'a burning hellscape of twisted wreckage and flaming buildings' but was also known as The Conflagration Zone. There were areas that weren't on fire, streets and parks that weren't choked with smoke despite the thick clouds of the stuff billowing into the air. They could barely see the cloud of smoke that deposited the villains followed by the Heroes-in-training, at least until several figures rose from it.

Before Koda and Keqing had begun to drop, they suddenly flickered away in a bolt of purple lightning, leaving the villains to begin searching. The camera switched to a different angle, showing the two students crouched together on top of a smoldering building. "Koda, your Quirk lets you control small animals, yes?" She asked, voice muffled by her helmet.

The horned boy began to sign something to her, then paused and tilted his hand back and forth.

"I doubt there are any such animals in a place such as this," Keqing replied, peeking over the edge of the roof to see a group of five villains prowling down the street, "Then here is what we will do. I will neutralize our enemies, and you will secure them, yes?"

Koda nodded vigorously. Keqing stood from her crouch and flicked a trio of needles at the group below, stabbing into three of them. She disappeared in a bolt of lightning, reappearing between two villains as she split-kicked them both in the head before bolting to the third, sweeping their legs before bringing her heel down on their skull, spinning as the fourth attacked her from behind, two more needles held between her knuckles like claws that she stabbed into the villain. Energy crackled as the villain shook, lightning dancing over their frame before they collapsed in a twitching heap.

The last villain, a man with no hair who was sweating profusely, turned on his heel and ran with a scream. Keqing idly retrieved her needles and bound the villains with zip ties, making sure Koda had them corralled before taking off after the other villain at a jog.

"Where the hell are these brats?!" A villain with what looked like smokestacks growing out of his head shouted over the crackling of flames, receiving no answers from the other villains waiting in hiding. "Dammit!"

The sweaty villain came sprinting around the corner, eyes wide with fear. "R-run!" he shouted, waving his arms frantically.

Smokestack scowled, smoke angrily billowing from his stacks. "Where are the others?!"

"Run!" Sweaty repeated in panic, only to squeal in pain as Keqing nailed him between the shoulders with a needle. Purple flashed behind him and he went rocketing forward, skidding over the ground on his face with the girl standing on his back.

Even through her faceless helmet, they could feel the glare Keqing was shooting at the villains, flinching as she stomped on the groaning villain under her boot and plucked the uncomfortably long needle from his back. Then she flicked it and Smokestack dodged, the long metal implement sinking into the charred brick next to his head. "You miss-!" Lightning crackled and she was there, driving a fist into his stomach before seizing his face and slamming the back of his head into the brick with a crunch.

Keqing snatched her needle back and threw, zipping towards another villain, her boot meeting their stomach, pushing off to snap-kick their head and send them spinning, sending her needle into the air. She bolted upwards, creating one needle and grabbing the other, hurling both downwards then zipping to one with a leg extended. Surprisingly, her attack was dodged as the villain, a woman with unbound black hair, gracefully spun away and scraped the ground with what looked like bare, metal feet. A wave of sparks shot up at the contact then exploded into billowing flames.

The class watched as Keqing fought the two villains, bolting back and forth so quickly there seemed to be two of her. Then something changed as she appeared in front of a male villain in a tattered fireman's jacket with a crack of thunder, yanking her needles out then speedily and repeatedly stabbing them into his chest, making him flinch and jerk with every shock. Kicking his foot, the villain fell to one knee and she ran up his torso, landing a flipping kick to his chin that sent him flying into the air.

The other villain, a rather pretty woman with metal feet, had begun to spin gracefully, almost like a figure skater, her heel dragging on the concrete to create a barrier of sparks around her body. The dancing villain had a mere second to see a lightning-sheathed needle pass her body by a few inches before the other punched through her wall of sparks and sank into her sternum. Wreathed in lightning, Keqing bolted to her needle, palming the villain by the chest and carrying her onwards under the overhang of a burning building, slamming the villain into the wall. As the villain doubled over, she threw another needle above and zipped up, driving the woman into the overhang before letting go. Plucking her needle, she flicked it down past the falling villain and bolted down with a leg extended, stomping the woman into the ground with a crunch.

She did not get up again.

The whole fight had taken maybe thirty seconds. "...Wow," Denki muttered, nervous sweat beading on his forehead, "I got lucky in Battle Training…"

Keqing threw her needle up and zipped to it, seeing the remaining villains gathered around each other, doing their best to keep her in their sights. Summoning all five of her needles to her hands, she threw them in a circle around the group, her body briefly glowing like a purple star before vanishing in a glint of light.

A second later and she reappeared outside of the circle sliding to a stop, smoke curling from her suit as what looked like a five-point star of purple energy shone, then erupted. A thunderous crack rang out as the air displaced from her speed realized it had somewhere else to be, hurling the villains every which way, each unconscious and sparking.

A few students gaped, and Kaminari audibly gulped. "...Really…really lucky…"

"Oh wow!" Mina enthused as the footage ended with Koda joining the transfer student and together they restrained the villains, the pink girl clapping her hands excitedly, "You know, if you had a katana, you could be just like that guy from that one show, the devil with the silver hair after some apocalypse, Blade of the South Star or something, the one where he swings his sword a bunch of times when he's fighting guys, starts sheathing it and then goes," she deepened her voice, "'You are already sushi.' then *click* and psssshhh they get cut into pieces and explode!"

Seeing the looks she was getting, Mina cleared her throat, trying to ignore the blood rushing to her cheeks. "…Without the killing, obviously."

"An interesting idea, Mina," Keqing nodded seriously, making a note in her book.

"I think it should go without saying," Himiko started, subtly shooting a glance at the purple-haired girl and licking her lips, "That Keqing-chan absolutely carried them. Her actions were swift, efficient, and just the right amount of brutal to put the villains down. Koda-kun, however," she turned to the boy with the rock-like face, "I know you couldn't use your Quirk, but you're a bulky guy, y'know? Throwing some punches or tossing fools around should at least be an option."

Koda nodded, face red as he tapped his fingers together.

"Gadgets and such would also help when it comes to combat without your Quirk," Momo offered, giving him a gentle smile.

Seeing as no one else was going to comment, Aizawa continued. "And finally-"

Face red from both embarrassment and frustration, Ochako punched her hand in the air. "Sensei!" She called, cutting him off, "What about me and Deki-kun?"

He sighed, idly rubbing his nose. "Midoriya isn't here to consent to having the footage shown, therefore we cannot show it. Now, Todoroki and Hagakure."

The half-hot-half-cold girl nodded, arms crossed, while Toru chimed in with, "Yep! There's not much to see, though!"

The view changed to a pool as wide and deep as a lake, a large tube feeding water into it with a large boat in the center. Shadows of villains already present darted under the vessel as a cloud of smoke appeared up in the air, dropping Shimo from about thirty feet in the air. She threw out a hand, a beam of ice leaving her hand that turned into snow as it impacted the deck, puffing up into the air as she landed on the cold powder, shortly followed by a pair of boots and gloves.

She looked around, noting her placement even as the villains began to close in on the two of them. "You have all made a terrible mistake," she said aloud before stomping her foot.

The camera shook as an enormous section of the pool became a glacier, trapping the villains within an icy prison while also nearly snapping the boat in half. As the heterochromic girl began walking across a newly-formed ice bridge, the camera stayed on the boat as Toru, partially covered in snow, got back to her feet. Before she could follow, though, there was a crack as a villain who looked somewhat like a humanoid shark with a sawtooth nose punched his way out of his icy prison.

As he stalked towards Shimo's back, he completely missed Toru until she launched herself at his back, her gloved hands crossing over his throat as she caught the shark man in sleeper hold. He gagged loudly, waving his arms as he tried to throw the invisible girl off of him, but she held on gamely, even when he swung back and audibly struck her with his elbow. Slowly, he collapsed to his knees and then on his face, falling limp.

Toru rolled off of him, her back imprinting in the snow underneath her, a hand coming up to run her chest. "Owwie," she muttered, "He hit me in the boob…"

And that was where the footage ended.

"Nice choke, Toru-chan, but your arm wasn't angled properly," Himiko commented.

"I know! Izukun said he'd help me with that!" Toru replied, gently bouncing in her seat, "What about Shimo-chan, eh? That ice everywhere-brrr!"

"..." The class turned to look at Shimo as she made a quiet noise of distress. "…I didn't know she was there," she admitted.

"Rude," Mina tutted.

Aizawa sighed. "Addendum: strongly emphasize collateral damage costs."

Momo coughed into her hand politely. "I believe that, perhaps Todoroki-kun should work on controlling her power a bit more finely. As it is, twice she has used her power to great effect, although equally damaging to the environment around her."

There were quiet noises of agreement from most of the class except for Bakugou, who scoffed audibly.

Eraserhead closed his notes with a snap. "With that done, you will discuss new strategies with what you have learned today, and I will be leaving a schedule for you to mark down when you will visit Hound-"

"Sensei, we wanna see what Izuku and Ochako did!" Mina protested, sticking her hand in the air, followed by basically everyone else.

Aizawa grunted and scowled. "I already said why-"

"Yeah, but I went to give Izuku his phone and notebook," Himiko interrupted, holding up her cell, "It's why I was almost late. I can literally just call him up and ask."

The Underground Hero pursed his lips in thought, unconsciously rubbing his eye. "…Fine," he allowed, a swift glare silencing any attempt at a victory cry.

The blonde bloodsucker hit speed dial followed by a brief tone and a click. "Himi-chan, it's the middle of class, you should be focusing," Izuku's voice echoed from the speaker, a note of reproach in his tone. Iida nodded in agreement.

"I've got permission to call, don't worry," she answered, "Anyways, Sensei is showing footage from the USJ, and he needs your permission to show the one involving you."

"Okay, he has my permission to show it," Izuku replied, "Just make sure to take notes…you have been taking notes, right?"

Himiko looked down at her bare desk, as did several others. "...Does mentally count?" She asked sheepishly.

Izuku sighed, the speaker fuzzing slightly. "Not really, no. At least take notes for mine, please."

"Alright, I will," She promised, idly twirling a loose strand of hair with her finger, "I'll see you at lunch time, okay?"

"See you then, miss you in the meantime-ow!" A scuffle and rustle of fabric came over the line, "Hey, don't just yank on it like that, I'm still tender!" His voice was faint.

Another voice, just as quiet but female replied, "Sorry, I couldn't help myself, it's just so thick!"

There was a click as Izuku hung up, leaving a rather stunned silence behind.

"…Moving on," Aizawa coughed into his hand, pressing a button on the remote, bringing the projector back up to show a large, rocky hill, though with closer inspection, it was revealed to be the aftermath of a landslide. Several buildings were half-buried and partially-collapsed in rock, earth and sand.

"Oh boy," Himiko laughed, slapping her desk lightly, "They did not do their research."

Izuku and Ochako emerged from a portal nearly forty feet above the top of the hill. As they fell, he grappled over to her, wrapping Ochako up in his arms and steadying their fall. Armor formed around his legs, pockets swelling on the surface as they gathered air. Right before they hit the ground, Ochako pressed her pads on herself and Izuku, removing their gravity but not their momentum, the pockets opening to release small jets of compressed air, slowing them to a near stop.

And at the bottom of the hill stood a group of villains, smiling with vicious intent as they saw the Heroes in training arrive. "Finally, the entertainment has arrived!" One shouted with glee, the metal spines on his arms and back rattling, "Hey, try not to die too quick, yeah?! I've been looking forward to this all week!"

"I get 'em first!" A bulky man with no shirt, black hair in a topknot and a beard declared, stomping to the head of the group and flexing his oiled muscles, "You better put up a good fight, brats! You're supposed to be the best Hero school in Japan! You better damn well show it!"

"We don't have to fight them on our own, Deki-kun," Ochako whispered, gulping at the catcalls and jeers floating up from below, "They'd have to climb the hill to catch us, and we can link up with others before they do!"

"How did the cameras hear that?" The gravity girl wondered aloud.

"It was taken from the recordings on your radio headset," Aizawa answered, his eyes locked on the screen.

"That's just sending the problem further down the line, Ochako-chan," the earthbender said calmly, "They came here to kill us, and in numbers. Leading this group to another means they'll just outnumber us even more. No. We need to make our stand, here and now, and crush them without mercy." He gazed deeply into her eyes. "I'll hit them hard. Pick your moments and then slam them when you can, okay?"

In the back of the room, Keqing smiled slightly to herself and made a note in Chinese. Katsuki grinned, eyes locked on the screen as her hands slowly flexed.

Ochako looked up at him and nodded slowly. "…Alright, Deki-kun. Let's do this!"

"Enough talking!" The man screamed, veins bulging in his neck, "If you brats won't come to me, then I will come to the brats!"

Izuku squeezed her hand gently, then stepped away as his fingers curled into fists, his goggles deploying from his mask.

"It's time for you Baby Heroes to get buried-!" The bulky man shouted, stamping on the ground, loose rocks swirling together around his form until he was covered in stone armor and nearly twelve feet tall and half as wide. "-in a Rockalanche!"

Izuku threw himself down the rocky hill in a slide, rock bleeding into liquid to crawl up his body, wrapping himself in the dense stone of his Full Armor and speeding over the rock like it was greased. Rockalanche, if that was what he called himself, brought his bulky, rock covered fists over his head, but was too slow.

Izuku planted his feet and launched himself like a bullet, spear-tackling the villain out of his rock armor and carrying him into the air, leaving a dust trail like rocket smoke. Then he began to spin and together they crashed into the ground before the crowd of Villains. Barely stopping, Izuku leapt to his feet, leaving the villain buried head-first in the ground, only his legs sticking up.

"Oooh, got him with the Tombstone!" Himiko cheered like she was at a wrestling match

His Full Armored form stood before the Villains, eyeless helmet boring into them. "Listen well," his voice rumbled like the warning earthquake before the shifting of tectonic plates, "Leave. Now. " His fists crashed together, clapping like thunder before he held up a finger. "This is your only warning. Run as fast and as far from here as you can…" The cracking of his knuckles rang like the retort of cannon fire, and he jacked a thumb at the legs next to him, "Or I'll Bury You."

Several of the students shivered, though for what reason exactly was unknown…except for Himiko, who licked her lips, the darkening of her cheeks hidden by the dim light.

The Villains traded looks then a weasel-y looking woman stepped forward with a sneer. "Nice try, Baby Hero! Try the threats when your balls have dropped!" Her words were followed by jeers and threats.

Izuku sighed, lowering himself into a fighting stance, subtle sparks of green lightning dancing along his armor.

"What was that?" Tokoyami muttered, narrowing his eyes.

"…So be it."

Then he reached back and grabbed the villain by the legs, whipping him into the front line of villains before leaping into the air, the ground cracking in his wake. He threw his legs out, locked his fists together with his elbow pointing out, and descended.

"…Wait, where's that music coming from?" Kyouka asked, brows furrowed as electric guitars started blaring faintly. She looked around and received only confused shrugs, even from Ochako.

The impact cratered the ground, knocking several villains into the air. Slapping his palm on the ground, Izuku lashed out and spun, his armored heel sinking into a stomach and continuing, bludgeoning the floating enemies out of the air. Pushing himself up his shin crashed against a face and sent the owner flipping before landing on his feet and lunging at the nearest villain with a roar. The crunch of bone meeting rock and failing rang through the speakers, then again as he turned the punch into a backhand to slap the weasel-y woman away, catching the clawed foot of a villain before driving his elbow into the knee with a crunch, palming a screaming mouth to slam the villain into another, silencing both with a kick.

As Izuku fought, a few of the villains not directly in his warpath circled around the melee, waiting for a chance to jump in and attack him while he was distracted. A rock dropped from overhead, shattering against the skull of a skulking villain and sending her to the ground. Up on the hill, Ochako removed the gravity from a good-sized rock and gently pushed it into the air, watching closely as it floated over another villain, tapping her fingers to re-allow gravity and dropping the rock on their head. "Bullseye," she muttered, searching for another.

An angry shout sounded behind Izuku as another bulky man, this one with oversized arms, lunged at him with a fist pulled back; Izuku dashed forward to meet him striking forward at the same time, their fists meeting with a thunderclap. The villain's hand crumpled and his arm distended as the bones were knocked free, a squeal torn from his mouth before Izuku silenced him with an elbow to the temple, turning his momentum into a kick that sent a villain screaming back, only for his grapple to race out and latch onto their chest.

The earthbender planted himself and spun, using his grapple and the villain attached as a flail, bones crunching under the impact as he swept many of them off of their feet. Releasing and hurling the villain into another, he spun at a primal scream and nimbly ducked under a roundhouse kick, sweeping the leg of a gi-clad villain to slam their skull against his knee, rising to dodge the frenzied slashes of a clawed enemy, catching her hands in his grasp and driving his knee into her stomach. As she bent double, someone screamed "DIIIIEEEE!" and he turned, soaking up a rain of metal quills from the porcupine-looking villain with his back.

"...Stole my thing," Katsuki growled to herself, knuckles popping as she gripped the edges of her desk.

The woman he'd protected looked up at Izuku in surprise. "You saved me-!" His helmeted head crashed into hers and she fell back, insensate. He turned to the porcupine villain and stalked forward, his armor writhing with his field as it ate up every metal quill, only adding to his strength. The villain gaped at him, hands forward to launch his quills, and Izuku seized him by the arms, knee meeting groin, fingers digging and pulling until his shoulders left their sockets, then turning and slamming him into the ground.

Meanwhile, Ochako's efforts to thin out the villains had borne fruit; at least five had been knocked out from rocks dropped on their heads, though one had taken notice of her efforts. The villain, who had arms that looked like they were made of sand, had dived into the ground like it was water and started tunneling towards her, displacing the ground above. Licking her lips, the gravity girl reached down to gather a dirt clod, watching as the trail headed towards her. Crouching down, she removed the gravity from herself and jumped just as the villain popped out of the ground where she once stood.

"Gotcha, you-" She whipped her arm forward, nailing him in the eyes with the clod, tapping her fingers to drop to the ground and roll, scooping up a rock as she went, "-Argh, you bitch-!" He howled, clutching his eyes before Ochako popped up behind him and shattered a sizable rock over his head.

"That's no way to talk to a lady!" She proclaimed, brushing her hands off with a scoff before bending over, breathing hard.

"You tell him, Chako-chan!" Mina cheered.

"Good use of your environment," Momo added with a smile, "But perhaps you should look into a weapon of some sort?"

There were no more villains standing, all of them lying in groaning, sometimes silent heaps on the ground. "Good work, Ochako-chan," Izuku rumbled, retrieving his zip ties and getting to work securing their enemies.

She jumped slightly at the sound of his voice, but graced him with a bright smile even through the dirt on her cheeks and visor, a few small cuts evident in her suit. "Thanks, Deki-kun! Not all'a 'em were distracted, so I made a bunch of dirt clumps to hit them in the face with and then threw rocks. Worked pretty well until this guy-" she nodded at the unconscious man at her feet, yanking his arms behind his back aggressively, "-Got the jump on me, so I threw some dirt in his face and hit him with a rock."

"I saw," the earthbender nodded, not flinching as a villain who had faked being unconscious leapt at him. The way it echoed when his slap had met the villain's face, it must've felt like the sky had fallen. "Good use of your environment. Though we should probably find a weapon for you, Ochako-chan."

"...Ah," the creative girl hummed as the footage ended, "Great minds, I suppose."

Aizawa swept his eyes over the class, noting the expressions on their faces. Most were a combination of shocked, awed and slightly disturbed, which was to be expected when a fellow classmate, a peer, had swept through a crowd of nearly thirty villains with the sort of ease, grace and sheer efficient brutality of an experienced Pro Hero.

There were a few exceptions; Himiko was looking down at her notebook, her cheeks dark as she bit her lip, and it almost seemed like she was squirming in her seat-Aizawa cut that train of thought off there and then. The Chinese transfer was studiously taking notes, appearing unaffected by the violence she'd just seen except for a faint smile. But Bakugou, on the other hand…her red eyes were narrowed and gleaming as they darted back and forth as she thought furiously, and silently.

Iida slowly lifted a hand in the air. "Sensei…" he started, "...How many of the villains died from their injuries?"

Eraserhead arched an eyebrow. "None," he said flatly, getting several surprised looks. Apparently the speedster had been the only one with the stones to ask what many were thinking. Those who cared, anyway. "There were several broken bones, cracked skulls and dislocated joints, and more than a few of the villains will be eating through a straw or hobbled for a time, but there were no fatalities."

Clearing her throat, Kyouka held a hand up. "I think Ochako-chan did just fine, letting Izuku hold the attention while she picked off the others, she just needs a weapon or some gadgets to round her out," she said, getting agreeable nods from the class. "…Also seriously, where did the music come from?"

Eraserhead cracked his neck with a sigh, tapping the remote once more. "This is the last of the footage; as the subject isn't here, it is required that you take notes and present them to the source later in the day," he explained, patting his belt and finding that he was out of drinks.

The screen showed Izuku swinging through the air by shooting his grapple, latching it to the highest feature nearby as he fell, curling himself up and kicking himself back into the air, until-

-a great force suddenly slammed him from the side, sending him through a building and into the street, bouncing off of a few cars for good measure and finally landing against a totaled sedan.

Several of the students flinched at the initial impact, and then the ones following that with sympathetic hisses.

"Lookit that, I totally swatted him outta the air like a fly!" A nasally voice crowed as Izuku groaned, pushing himself up using the car as support with a hand on his head. "And here I thought we might not see any action! Stomp his Baby Hero ass, boys!"

The camera shook as a crowd of hooting and shouting of villains who thought they'd gotten an easy mark thundered underneath. They were nearly on Izuku when he grabbed the car with both hands and turned on his heel, sending it spinning into the villains with a roar and dashed after it. The spinning frame flattened the frontrunners and scattered some more, leaving them wide open for Izuku to slam into them, his punches and kicks shaking the road, rattling the cars and broken windows, each strike sending two or more villains flying at a time. The largest, a villain with fur like a tiger, lashed out at him with razor-sharp claws; Izuku dodged his first strike, then the second and as the third came his way, he shot forward with low straight punch to the villain's gut, sending him flying back to be imbedded in a truck.

"Oho, he got the tiger guy with the Tiger Drop, yes!" Himiko cheered.

That left only one, a lean man wearing what looked like round, opaque spectacles, with a crown of small crystal horns growing out of his skull. Izuku hurled a stone knife at the villain, a solid barrier of what looked like crystal springing out of thin air to deflect it. "Come a little closer, Baby Hero!" The villain with the nasally voice crowed with a smirk, "Fight me like a man!"

Izuku picked up a nearby SUV and chucked it at the villain, who squawked, two barriers appearing to catch it. The heroes in training noticed that two of the villain's horns were glowing as he did so.

"Quit throwin' shit!" The villain shouted, throwing the car right back.

His field rippled and the car crumpled in half around him, falling into two pieces on either side, more metal added to his armor.

"…Damn dude, that was metal," Denki muttered, his voice carrying through the classroom.

Eyes fixed on the villain, he stepped forward a bit, then stopped as a barrier slammed down just in front of him. Tapping the construct with a finger Izuku looked around, obviously deducing the function of the villain's Quirk. Drawing a fist back, he punched the barrier and watched it crack, but not shatter.

The villain flinched as one of his horns cracked, the tip falling to the ground. "Hey, knock it off!" He shouted, a note of panic in his voice.

Izuku scanned the area around them, idly flexing his fingers. "I don't have time for this," he said after a moment, reaching to his belt and withdrawing a flash and a smoke bomb. He flicked the first above the villain then nailed it with the second at the apex.

Said villain, who had been watching him do so, grabbed his eyes in pain at the flash. "AH! You rat bastard! Leave me alone, dammit!" Then Izuku loosened his field and sent a cloud of sand towards the villain. "Oh, great! First you blind me and now you're throwing sand! What are you, a fucking child?!"

"Never underestimate the power of Pocket Sand!" Toru chirped as Kyouka nodded.

Under the sound of complaints, Izuku leapt over the dome and landed next to a mostly crumbled building, with the exception of the facade. One punch tore a chunk out of the remaining wall, the second deepened it, and the third sent a crack through the foundation. He grasped the wall and heaved, grunting as he pulled until he felt it give and begin to pitch over.

The villain had just cleared his vision after rubbing his glasses. "Alright you little bastard, I'm gonna squash you-!" He looked up as the sky darkened and saw the facade of the building behind him tumbling straight down on him.

A shrill scream split the air before it was sharply cut off by a boom and slight shake of the ground. Picking through the rubble, Izuku found the villain still alive, but all of his horns were broken, his glasses cracked, with a puddle forming around his crotch as he lay on the ground, unconscious. Restraining the villain, Izuku sprinted off as the footage ended.

The shocked silence that followed was broken by a slightly hysterical giggle. They turned to see Mina, nearly bent double with her forehead on her desk as she clutched her stomach. "Did you-did you hear that scream?" She laughed, her eyes watering, "He-he sounded like one of those goats! AhHhHhH!"

Chuckles broke out at her imitation, though they fell silent as what they'd seen began to sink in. That Izuku had defeated nearly thirty villains with some backup, then almost the same amount by himself, and then fought and killed that enormous villain…how strong was he?

I can't wait to find out, Bakugou thought, grinning with anticipation.

The bell chimed, shaking the class out of their contemplative mood. "This class was an exception due to the extreme circumstances surrounding the USJ Incident," Aizawa uttered, "Class will resume as normal following lunch. You are dismissed."

"Sensei, what about-"

"No," he interrupted Sato's question without looking up from his desk, "You were all there, you experienced what happened first hand. There is no need to reiterate an event such as that. You are dismissed." With that said, Aizawa zipped himself into his sleeping bag and collapsed on the floor under the desk, immediately beginning to snore.

As the class began to make their way to the cafeteria, Himiko tapped her fingers against the cover of her notebook. Hopefully Izuku's gonna be out soon, she thought, not having him in class sucked. I wonder what he's been doing? I can't imagine it was anything fun.

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A/N: Been a while, eh? Sorry about that, I've been working on a lot of other stories recently. But hey, new chapter…although, frankly speaking, I'm not a huge fan of it, mostly because of the 'react' parts of it which, good news, means I'm not going to write one of those stories any time soon. And it's also a recap of things that happened two chapters ago, but giving the character more information from an event like the USJ feels like something that should've been done, plus more character interactions.

Good news, by the way, I decided some time ago to shorten chapters to 5-6k words, except for the big ones, which will help me be more constrained and concise, especially when it comes to character interaction which, going by how the first arc of this story lasted over a 100,000 words…well, it's needed. Plus, keeping myself restrained means I'm always itching to write the next chapter even while I'm writing something else.

So, in this chapter, 1-A got some outside perspective of their actions and others' in the USJ and now most of them have a good idea of how to make themselves better. The Sports Festival is gonna be fun, I tell you what.

Next chapter: We find out what Izuku was doing and see how he's healing.

Big thanks as always to NSG for being a beta, sounding board and all that good stuff. One of his stories, Songs Across Time and Space has just been updated, too! Give it a look-see and say hello from me!

I also recently updated my Star Wars story, STAR WARS: The Old Empire (SWTOE) which I'm telling you about because FF still isn't fixed, the fuckers.

All of my stories, and a few upcoming exclusives can be read first on my P atreon, and then on my Discord! All support is appreciated!

And thank you as always for being here, reading, liking and reviewing! Thanks for sticking around, and there's more to come soon!