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Aizawa Shouta will probably never have another homeroom like the infamously famous Class A. With Problem Child sitting at the number one spot for going on four years, landing there at age twenty, along with Class A members who went the limelight hero route dominating the top twenty-five, Shouta doesn’t think that another homeroom could ever really live up to their potential.
While the idea of Problem Child’s Problem Child being in the class makes Shouta reach for antacids before going to teach, he, at least, knows he has one student this year willing to put in the work. Part of Shouta will always root for the underdogs, those society deems worthless or weak or labels as wrong. Being quirkless Watashi Kiyomi is at the bottom of the barrel to society. But Problem Child believes in her and so does Shouta, at the least he saw her training and her performance at the recommendation exams. Not to mention the rest of Class A in their rabid adoption of the girl.
Even though Shouta can no longer be classified as an underground hero due to his famous class and his own exploits with them, he strives to find his niche the way that Sir Nighteye (the first before Togata took the name and the agency and forged his own identity with it) did. Shouta feels like he’s rolled admirably with people knowing him when they come into his class, even if it annoyed him after his hellions graduated.
(Except for Eri, who while in a Class A homeroom, is not with Shouta. He had a third-year class he was seeing off in her first year. On top of that, she’s doing the mix of Heroics and Support so she can become a hero more in the vein of Recovery Girl. She’s currently in her second year and doing fantastic, very excited to be a “proper” senpai for Ki.
“Make sure she can have some friends in the class,” she teased, but her eyes were solemn. “It’ll be good for her.”)
So here Shouta is wrapped in his yellow sleeping bag (brand new and ready to break in), looking through the cracked door of his possible homeroom for the next three years. He sees Ki sitting in where Problem Child used to sit, dressed immaculately in the boy’s uniform, sporting a buzz cut. Her eyes meet his and she raises an eyebrow, a bemused smile playing on her lips.
Four seconds to spot him, not bad but it can be better.
The others, however, take ten to notice him. Clearly, Shouta has his work cut out for him.
Shouta probably should have switched up his usually first day test, especially since his hellions masquerading as responsible adults probably informed and prepared Ki for the Quirk Assessment Test. But he was feeling a bit nostalgic in his old age, so a Quirk Assessment test it is for the day.
(“You’re thirty-eighty, Sho. Not in the grave,” his husband’s voice whispered in his head)
So the class suits up in their respective locker rooms (he made sure to let Ito know there was a gender neutral one if they wanted it) and had them meet him on the field. Ki walks out first, arms crossed over her chest, and both of them playing like they didn’t already know each other.
Her eyes remain sharp though as she watches her classmates pour out onto the field, already talking and trying to make friends. Shouta has suspicions as to why she’s not attempting to make friends. A lot of it has to do with quirkless statistics gathered by Problem Child’s charity and more from Problem Child’s own mouth over the years.
Shouta’s kicked himself plenty of times over how Problem Child acted that first year before they got him into therapy. More importantly, he’s kicked himself over all the signs that Problem Child displayed and Shouta didn’t do anything about it. He’s apologized to him plenty of times over the years. So he plans on talking with Ki after class, figure out what she needs from him, what he can do to make her feel safe in UA.
“Watashi-san!” a voice calls out. It’s Ito, their long neon pink hair in a braid. “You left without waiting for me.”
Ah so Ki changed in the gender-neutral changing rooms. Possibly to avoid questions about the scars on her legs. The girl is not sensitive about many things, but she prefers boy's uniforms for a reason when at school.
Ki blinks at Ito slowly, “I wasn’t aware that you wanted me to wait, Ito-san.”
“Well I thought it was an unspoken rule,” Ito said simply before shrugging it off. “But maybe I’m wrong about that. It’s how it goes on TV though.”
(Ito Masumi, Shouta was ill the day of the entrance exam, but Hizashi and Nemuri told him all about how Ito broke into the control room and used their quirk to get a perfect score from the teachers. Nedzu kept the grade, impressed by their cleverness. Shouta was just angry that he had miss it.
But with a quirk like Cupid’s Arrow, which can instill people with love and trust for Ito, he has a feeling that their story was much like Shinsou’s. He was going to have to set up a chat with them later as well.)
Ki blinks at that, slowly. She looks over at Shouta for help, but all he does is raise an eyebrow and turns back to his tablet.
“Alright,” he hears Ki say slowly and uncertainly. “I’ll wait for you next time.”
Shouta buries his face in his capture weapon to hide his smile. He’s certain that Problem Child and the rest of the Class A are blowing out the group chat and their personal one on one messages with him to make sure Ki is alright. Mother hens all of them.
(“They learned it from you, Dad,” Hizashi teases in his head.)
Shouta is going to be expelling some kids off the bat. He can tell. He refuses to have another Mineta in the wings this time around. Even Bakugou in his early days probably should have been expelled if Shouta and Bakugou were both being one hundred percent honest.
But this doesn’t mean that they are all without potential. Ito uses their quirk to get students with better suited quirks to take the grip test and the ball throw for them. But they also put in the work themselves for the long jump and the sprints, where they excel. It proves a resourcefulness for their quirk and knowing their limits.
Others showcase their potential as well. Akiyama Sora, a cheerful punk with neon green hair styled in a spiked mohawk, has a quirk that allows him to generate soundwaves, uses them cleverly in the long jump, sprints and ball throw. Shouta makes a note to pass on their file to Hizashi, who will be thrilled to help them out.
Suzuki Nakano, poised in a way that makes Aizawa think of Yaoyorozu, knows how to sharpen her words with her quirk: Silvertongue. The bladed weapons appear when she activates her quirk were great for taking down robots, not so much for the usual quirk assessment test. But he sees her trying and analyzing, attempting to be clever.
And so the list goes on. All in all, Shouta thinks his homeroom will probably be about ten to twelve students, depending on what happens next.
“Watashi,” he says with his eyes hooded and tone deceptively bored. “You’re up.”
Ki has done well in most of the events, which he’s unsurprised with. He’s known the girl for two years, knows how hard she trains and puts in the work, and knows how much potential she has. She won’t be at the top, but she’s definitely in the top ten. If only for sheer tenacity and thinking her way around some of the assessment to improve her own scores.
She may not have Problem Child’s sunny disposition or his early tendencies to break himself in pursuit of a goal, but she does have that sharp analytical mind. Power is power. In Shouta’s opinion, the real measure of a hero is their ability to think.
“She hasn’t used her quirk yet,” says one of the students loudly. One that Shouta has already marked as expulsion worthy. “I thought this was a quirk assessment test.”
He can see Ki stiffen for a split second before she relaxes. She tosses the ball up and down a couple times thoughtfully.
“Aizawa-sensei, can I bring something into the circle?”
“So long as you toss the ball, I don’t really care what you do.”
Ki hums for a moment before picking up one of Suzuki’s words, which last for five minutes after she summons them. She looks over at the other girl.
“Gonna use this. Hope you don’t mind.”
She doesn't wait for an answer as she wanders off. Ki twirls the word in her hand before stepping up to the plate, tossing the ball up into the air, and using the flat of the bladed word as a baseball bat hits the ball so it cracks into the sky which sails a good distance away.
Shouta marks the score down and gives Ki points for thinking creatively.
“She didn’t even use her quirk!” blusters the loud one from earlier. He has a Minotaur quirk and his bull head looks like it's about to steam from the ears.
“That’s because I don’t have one,” Ki says sharply with stiff posture and carefully blank eyes. “I’m quirkless.”
Shouta makes sure to observe all his students. Because the Quirk Assessment Test does, yes, test their strength. It also, however, tests their creativity and ingenuity. Ki’s confession, he thinks, will test the strength of their characters, or, perhaps, reveal themselves to him.
The half of the class that he pegged as reminding him of his hellions, the infamously famous Class A immediately erupt into “that’s amazing” and “you’re so cool Watashi-san”. The other half, led by the Minotaur quirk kid, frown. There’s something mean and sharp in their gazes. Something that Aizawa doesn’t like.
“Then why is she here?” He hears those kids murmur. “Did she cheat on the entrance exam?” “I can’t believe someone quirkless got into UA. Thought they had standards here.”
He sees Ki grip the sharpen weaponized word until it bites her skin. Shouta sees a thin trickle of blood appear. Anger flaring, he turns his gaze on the class and activates his quirk, more for intimidation than outright use.
“That,” he says in a very still and calm voice that doesn’t showcase his rage, “is enough.”
He points at the group, reads their names, and calmly tells them that they’re expelled. The Minotaur quirk user growls and charges at Shouta, who readies his capture weapon. When he sees Ki through the bloodied word in the ground like a javelin.
It lands, sticking itself upright into the ground, and the kid trips on it. Shouta uses his flailing to wrap him up in the capture weapon and turns his calmly furious gaze on his other expelled students.
“Would anyone else like to add attempted assault charges to their records?”
As it turns out, they do not.
It’s a good thing that hero course students don’t move into the dorms until after the first couple days of classes, Shouta reflects as he finishes the expulsion paperwork to hand into Nedzu. Otherwise things would have been very awkward for the next couple of days.
Right now though Shouta is going to have coordinate with Gang Orca, who is doing the UA All Might Teaching Fellowship this year for the heroics course, about the new reduced class size of Class A. Maybe he’ll also look into any Gen Ed student files to see if people could be bumped up.
Also he’s going to have to rearrange the classroom. Maybe a semi-circle? Shouta takes a moment to eye the desks. The sound of the door opening shocks him out of his reverie.
“You didn’t have to do that,” Ki says from the doorway. Her hand looks brand new courtesy of Recovery Girl, or Eri if she was working in the infirmary today.
“They lacked potential to be heroes,” Shouta responds. Ki eyes him for a long moment before giving a half smile.
“I’m glad that you’re different, Aizawa-sensei.”
He’s not. He thinks teachers like him should be the norm. But the world rarely works the way Shouta wants it to. He buries his face more into his capture weapon.
“Don’t you have to go see Problem Child?”
The half-smile cracks into that slight deranged grin.
“Yeah. I do. I’ll pass on your warmest regards.”
Shouta snorts.
“Tell him to stop overextending his left leg. I saw that fight with Sandslide on the news.”
Ki rolls her eyes, like that's all she's been hearing about for the past three days (and she probably has), before grabbing her bag. She pauses in front of the desk and raps her fingers on it for a second before taking out a jelly pouch and resting it in front of him with a wink.
“Happy first day of school, teach.”
“Goodbye, Problem Child the Second.”
Shouta watches Ki leave before looking at the jelly pouch.
It’s apple flavored. Cheeky little...she's been hanging around Hitoshi too much.
Shouta snorts and shakes his head before opening it to eat.