Chapter Text
Date: March 6th, 11:32 A.M.
To: Kasumi Kushieda
Miss Kushieda,
We will be happy to accept your request to continue all forms of communication by email, until you are at a more permanent address. The semester will begin on Monday, April 15th and you will be receiving your class schedule and supply checklist a week prior. If you have any questions in the mean time, please feel free to contact me.
Best of luck.
Izumi Minamoto
U.A. Department of Human Resources
I can’t take my eyes off my phone’s screen. It worked. When I had the idea to ask to have all school information emailed to me, I was expecting to go through a lot more than simply asking over email, and getting an easy ‘yes’ back.
I flop back on my bed and let the stress I’ve kept pent up escape with a slow exhale. I’m accepted to U.A.. I don’t have to worry about any letter’s coming to my house to be intercepted by my dad. Or the mail man. Or, let’s be honest, the post office themselves. All I have to do is keep myself out of trouble for three weeks, and then I’m home free.
Three Weeks Later. . .
My first day of class is in two days. So far my dad doesn’t seem to expect anything out of the ordinary. I’ve kept to the image of ‘ideal daughter’. I’m present at the table at all meal times. I keep up with my chores. I don’t put up a fight when I’m escorted to and from my gymnastics lessons. I’ve lived complaint free as a prisoner in my own home. My only “alone time” is in the restroom and during sleeping hours. I’m a model daughter.
If only my dad knew what went on behind closed doors in the dead of night. I’ve continued to train with my quirk in the wee hours. After seeing the students at the entrance exams I could feel the differences in our training. I didn’t have aptitude tests to help me learn about my quirk. The only supervision or advice I’ve received were from training video’s I found on the internet. So I kept pushing through. Just because I was accepted to U.A., didn’t mean I was okay with falling behind.
The other activity haunting my nights was apartment hunting. I knew from the moment I confirmed my acceptance to U.A., I wasn’t going to be able to live at home. With my dad as a teacher at the Ishizawa High School, there could be no pulling the sheets over his head. No, if I’m going to attend U.A., I have to run away, disappear from Ishizawa, turn into just another picture in the missing persons section of the local newspaper.
I have a decent amount of money saved up, and on top of that I have the winnings from my gymnastics competitions resting in a bank account fully in my name. I checked with the school already to find that textbooks and uniforms are included with enrollment. But a whole apartment would still be too expensive. Rates for even the smallest, shoebox-sized apartments would still drain my accounts by the middle of my second year.
I could sneak into the vacant apartments at night to sleep. I shake my head at the thought. It would be hypocritical to go to a hero school while committing a crime everyday. This would be so much easier if U.A. just had housing.
But just as my stress and worry were about to pull me under, a new listing popped into my email. Except this time it wasn’t for a whole apartment. Just a bedroom someone was renting out. A bedroom that just so happened to work right into my budget. A grin spread out across my face. This is doable.
And now with my first day of class being two days away, it’s time for me to make a break for it. Looking at the clock on the nightstand, I decided I can’t really say my first day is two days away anymore as it’s already tomorrow. In about eight hours, I’ll be meeting the woman renting me the room. I zip my duffle bag shut. I can’t take very much with me, just what I can carry.
I’ve decided my school book bag and my gymnastics duffle will have to suffice. I roll and shove in as many things as I can into both bags. I give my bedroom one last once over. These four walls have been my sanctuary for so many years. The only place where every part of me could show. My vision gets blurry, and I look skyward, blinking to keep the tears from falling down my cheeks. I phase myself and the bags through the wall to the outside, dropping them on the ground before heading back in.
I have one more thing to do before I disappear. I move to my desk, spotting the target I’m after. An unsealed envelope. I grab it and head out into the kitchen. It’s funny how emotional you can get when it comes time to leave your home, even when it never really felt how I thought a home should. But it’s where I grew up. I know every scuff on the drywall, every creak in the floor, that you have over tighten the hot water valve on the sink otherwise it’ll keep dripping.
I glide my hand along the edge of the island marking the end of the living room and start of the kitchen. I hit my head right on the corner the first time I landed a roundoff . My hand instinctively goes to the scar hidden under my bangs. I had to get three stitches after that incident. Dad was so worried, I thought he would faint when they brought in the suture kit at the hospital. We went out for ice cream after that. He said it was because I was such a trooper and didn’t cry, but I think it was more to ease his nerves after.
I choose the island as my letter’s resting place. I’ve done my best to not think about my dad for the last few weeks. I’ve let my determination on getting to U.A. keep my mind distracted from the sadness and guilt looming like a hazy mist around his name. That is until I wrote this letter to him. I knew I would leave him one, knew I couldn’t leave without some sort of explanation, even if I’m too much of a coward to tell him directly.
It’s an apology letter. An apology for not being the daughter he wanted. As I wrote, I hoped my words could make him see why I have to leave. That I have to follow my dreams. That this doesn’t mean that I don’t love him. That I wish we could see eye to eye when it came to quirks and heroes. But most importantly, it is a goodbye. I can’t be the daughter he wants just as much as he can’t be the father I wish I had.
I lay the letter down with shaking hands and deposit my cell phone next to it. I don’t mention anything about U.A. in the letter—though it wouldn’t be hard for him to guess that’s where I am—, or where I’m going, so my cell phone will only serve as a tracking device. I’ve already made the plan to pick up a track phone after I meet with my landlady tomorrow. And with my lighted load, body and spirit, I leave this anti-quirk town and head for my future.
The first day of school arrives and the route I had preplanned to get from my new “home” to U.A. took less time than expected, so I wind up being one of the first students in the classroom. I was sent my orientation pamphlet over email about a week ago. Turns out the hero course has been broken up into two classes of twenty students. I’d estimate far more than twenty just in my battle center alone at the entrance exam. They weren’t kidding when they say admission into U.A. was selective.
I’m in Class 1-A. As soon as I find the room with that title I head in to find the seating roster on the front desk.
I find my name listed above Seat No. 9. I scan through the remaining names on the list, but after ultimately finding none of them familiar I take my seat. A sigh of relief escapes me. My seat is second from the back in the second row. I’ve never been much of a “front row” kid, choosing more to disappear into the background. The less noticeable you are, the less of a target is on your back. And with my target already being bright red with big light up arrows pointing at it, I didn’t need the attention of a front row student too.
No sooner than my butt hitting the chair did another student come into the class room. His height was noticeable even as he leaned over the teacher’s desk to find his name on the seating chart. He begins to move toward the seats, heading to the row to my right. He passes the first two desks and doesn’t stop at the third.
I panic.
I’m not prepared to converse with anyone yet. After arriving early, I was hoping to have a few minutes to develop a strategy for my first impression. But I have no time to come up with anything because the boy places his bag on the floor by the desk that’s right next to mine, and turns toward me.
“Hello!” He starts out, “I am Tenya Iida. It is a pleasure to meet you.” He holds out a hand. I reach out and take it, hoping the slight quiver of the my own went unnoticed.
“Kasumi Kushieda,” I say with a nod and smile.
I hoped that was the end of our interaction, but he goes on, his hands moving in time with his words. “I assumed that I would be the first to arrive, but I’m glad to see that another student shares my sense of preparation. I remember you from the mock battle.”
Oh crap. I scan through my memories of the mock battle, but besides a few exceptionally cool quirks, the only people I can even remember paying attention to were invisible girl, the girl with the bob who floated things, and the kid to one-shotted the zero pointer and himself. I can already feel my fingers getting ready to phase. I hide them in my lap.
“If I do recall, you were moving straight through the battle bots. That’s an impressive quirk. I am looking forward to being your peer, Kushieda. I believe we will have much to learn from each other.”
He didn’t ask if I remembered him. My shoulders relax. “Yeah, I can’t wait.” More students fill into the room, halting any further conversing as Iida excuses himself from me to introduce himself to the other students. I happily remain behind in the back of the classroom.
The room fills in leaving only a few open seats left. Iida has managed to introduce himself to each and every student who walked through the door. I haven’t moved from my seat, I offere nods and mumbled “hello’s” when students passing by do the same. I spot the invisible girl, who does come over to introduce herself as Toru Hagakure. I find out that we’re on opposite ends of the room from each other, with her being in the first seat of the starting row two lines to my left.
Disappointing.
A student with a feathered head and bird beak takes the desk to my left, and I have to try my hardest not to stare. I recognize the boy with the naval laser. A boy and girl walk in together, the first with crimson hair styled spiked to the sky, he takes the seat in front of me. The second is pink from hair to toe with all black eyes and horns coming out of the curly pink hair.
And her and bird boy aren’t even the flashiest ones. The next student who files in has six arms! A set of three upper extremities on each side, each connected by fleshy webbing like some kind of human-bat hybrid. It’s crazy.
I check my watch. 7:53 and the empty desk sitting at the head of the room makes me wonder if punctuality is an important virtue for heroes. I drum my fingers on the desk, stewing in my impatience when a disgruntled “You’re in my way,” catches my notice. I look up and find the boy who ran into me on the morning of the exam, telling immediately from his spiky light hair and irritated hunched-over-hands-in-his-pockets-look.
Hagakure seems to be on the receiving end of his snarky command today, given the way he shoved passed her floating-clothed body leaning against her desk. He flops down in his seat and eyes the rest of the class, like he’s sizing us up. I fight the urge to shy away from his glare as his eyes find mine. I think his face would be pretty cute if it wasn’t set in such an unflattering scowl.
My jaw clenches and I find myself sticking my nose slightly up into the air, as if to say “I see what you’re doing. I won’t be some weakling waiting to be shoved out of the way,” It may not be the nicest of ways to portray myself on the first day, but I’ve had my fill of bullying, and if being the girl with the bad attitude who glares at strangers prevents that, then so be it.
I could see the muscles in the boy’s jaw clench from across the room. But before he can voice his distaste of my unwillingness to submit, Iida moves into the picture, introducing himself accompanied by a plethora of hand motions.
I can’t fully hear their conversation, but blonde boy brushes off Iida’s introduction and leans back in his chair to relax his feet up on his desk. I smirk, turning my gaze back down to the green notebook I have readied on my desk. If there’s one thing I’ve learned about any student in class this morning, it’s that Tenya Iida is a model student, sculpted to follow rules and wired with a politeness that any parent would be proud of.
And he wasn’t about to tolerate the filth of the outside pavement tainting the sacredness of a U.A. High desk top.
“So you must think you’re better than me, huh?” The increase in volume of the unheard conversation brings my eye back to the pair in the front left of the classroom. “I’m going to have fun tearing you a new one.”
Iida seemed shocked by the threat, and based on the quieted voice of the red head in front of me saying “Man, that guy needs to chill. It’s the first day.” I’m not the only one who’s noticed that rudeness isn’t the problem with the blonde boy, it’s that he’s just an asshole.
“Yeah, way to label yourself jerk of the group on day one.” I mutter to myself in answer.
“Do we get our labels on the first day? Seems a little ‘judging a book by the cover’ don’t you think?”
I start. The red head in front of me is eyeing me with a mischievous smirk. I didn’t expect him to have heard my mumbled response. My body is jittery with nerves, like I had caffeine injected straight into my veins. I need to cool it. It’s just a conversation with a boy. . . well, a rather cute boy.
Polite conversation I can manage. Snarky remarks to asshole comments? Top of my class. Having easy, playful conversations with attractive people? I wasn’t present for that class.
Guess I’ll fake it until I make it.
“But don’t we all actually judge books by their covers?” I gesture with my head to the arguing pair in the front corner of the classroom. “His book could go way further into why his attitude sucks, but most of us won’t bother reading it if the cover is that distasteful.” I finish with an impish curl to my lips.
My response was a bit much, but it seemed to hit the way I wanted because red-haired boy shakes his head with a breathy chuckle.
“So is your cover ‘mysterious girl who analyzes everyone from the back of the class’?”
“Maybe. Is yours ‘cute guy who actually bothers to talk to mysterious girls sitting in the back of the classroom’?” It’s a bold move to include the fact that I think he’s cute, but their’s something about being here, surrounded by people like me, talking to someone without a fire of hatred in their eye, that’s giving me the confidence to try my hand at flirting.
His cheeks pinken and his lips fail to hold back a smile. He puts his hand out to me. “Eijiro Kirishima,”
I take it. “Kasumi Kushieda.” His smile widens showing off a set of shark like teeth with prominent incisors. What kind of quirk causes that?
“Huh? It’s him.”
Iida catches the attention of everyone in the classroom, directing it to a freckled boy standing in the doorway. It’s the boy who one-shotted the giant robot. I didn’t think he’d made it through the exam. But then again, in my acceptance video All Might mentioned rescue points. Could that boy really have earned enough points just from rescuing someone. Did he know rescues counted? The look I remember seeing on his face while he frantically tried to drag his lifeless body along to get at least one point, tells me otherwise.
“If you’re just here to make friends, then you can pack up your stuff now.” A tired tenor voice says. “Welcome to U.A.’s Hero Course. It took eight seconds before you all shut up. That's not gonna work. Time is precious. You lot aren’t very rational.” I couldn’t see who was talking at first but a man with unruly shoulder length black hair takes up the doorway.
He moves into the room, his posture looking as exhausted as his voice sounded. He’s in baggy all black clothes with his neck wrapped up in a thick gray scarf, like he could nestle down into it at any moment.
“Hello, I’m Shota Aizawa. Your homeroom teacher. Pleased to meet you”
I blink, unbelieving. He hardly looks the role of a teacher. With a school as highly ranked, I figured every teacher would be required to wear at least business casual.
“Right, let’s get into it,” He reaches into— wait, either my eyesight has gone bad or the front of the room is a lot further away than I thought—a puffy yellow sleeping bag, pulling out a blue and white track suit. “Change into your gym clothes and head outside.”
“How unflattering,” Hagakure moans pulling at the tracksuit in the mirror of the girls locker room.
“They’re meant to be practical, not fashionable,” A tall girl with a responsible demeanor and wild black ponytail says, closing her locker.
“But they would be so much cuter, if they were shorts. Then you could at least accessorize with cute socks—oh, or maybe an anklet!”
“And the blue totally washes out my face,” The pink haired girl —who I overheard introduce herself as Mina Ashido.
I’ve stayed quiet during the whole “gym uniform” debacle, though I can agree with Hagakure about preferring shorts. Not for the accessory factor, though. After training and workouts spent in leotards, leggings or shorts, the long baggier pants feel restricting. I finish with my shoelaces and stand giving myself a once over in the mirror. The top fits. . . Okay. I move my arms up and down, the half sleeves of the uniform not restricting the movement, but certainly not going unnoticed. And the white lined bottoms looks like they swallowed my legs whole. I kick a foot out and the bottom of the pants fall over my shoes covering everything but the toe.
That won’t do.
We file out onto the training field from the locker rooms, meeting with the boys. We look like a sports team in our matching outfits, though their are some variants. Like Shoji— guy with many arms— has a uniform without sleeves for understandable reasons. Iida and I both have our bottoms rolled to the knee. Me, because they were too long and it’s the closest I can get to leg freedom, Iida, it seems, for the fact that his calves are huge. Like, he certainly didn’t skip leg day, like, ever.
“You all are slower than I’d thought you’d be,” Mr. Aizawa’s monotone voice catches the attention before we even see him. He moves through the group like a ghost, with no noise to his step, slinking his way further out into the training field.
“Despite seeing your performances in the Entrance Exams, I don’t have good grasp on what each of your quirks can do. I have the basics of what you filled out on your applications, so today we’re going to evaluate your quirk’s potentials with a Quirk Assessment Test.”
Mr. Aizawa’s last words are repeated back to him as if he were speaking to a bunch of befuddled parrots. Floaty girl— whose name is Uraraka— chimes in, questioning our supposed attendance at orientation.
Our teacher’s face doesn’t break from it’s exhausted look. “No time to waste on stuff like that if you want to make the big leagues. U.A. Has a more ‘freestyle’ approach to the education system. So, I can run my class however I see fit.”
The gasps sounding through the class are overkill in my opinion. As much as I was looking forward to orientation, my body is eager to let off some nervous energy. Plus—my eyes scan over my classmates— I’m dying to see what everyone has hidden up their sleeves.
“Bakugo,” Mr Aizawa calls out after finishing his speech on the idiocy of equality in school systems. I wish my dad could’ve been here for that, just to see his face. “You received the most points in the entrance exam. What was the farthest distance you could throw a softball in Middle school?”
Bakugo, I learn, is the rude boy with spiked hair. He answers, but I can only gawk at the fact that he, the kid that bumped into me on the way into the exams, was able to score the most points in said exam! What the heck kind of super powered quirk does he have?
Bakugo moves in to chalked circle on the field, with the instructions to power up his throw with his quirk. The rest of us move as one to get a closer look, but out teach holds out his arm. “You’ll want to keep a distance.” He says, years of experience weighing heavy in his bloodshot eyes.
Bakugo winds up his arm, and just before the ball flies from his fingers, his palms ignites in a deafening explosion. My hands come up, shielding my ears. I couldn’t even see the ball leave his hand, blocked by the still lingering cloud of black smoke. With a quirk like that I can see how he got the most points. There couldn’t possibly be anyone here with a more powerful quirk. Right?
A meter-reader beeps in Mr. Aizawa’s hand. “It’s important for you to know your limits,” He turns the reader’s screen to the rest of us. “That’s the first step in figuring out what kind of heroes you’ll be.”
705.2 meters.
“Whoa so cool!”
“I want to go next!”
“So we get to really use our quirks? The hero course is so awesome!”
My classmates voice their amazement, each sentence toppling over another, but I can’t focus on any of it. My gazes falls to my own shaking hand. I can see the blue gym clothes of the student in front of me through my translucent fingertips. My quirk doesn’t have that kind of power.
“So, you think this will be fun, huh?” The cacophony halts at our teachers remark. You’re hoping to become heroes after three years here and you’ll think it’s all going to be games and playtime?”
His hair has fallen further into his face, casting the pale skin in an almost sinister shadow. “Right. Today you’ll compete in eight physical tests. Whoever comes in last across all eight will be judged hopeless and be expelled immediately.”