Chapter Text
Inko chewed on the end of her pen, her high school application form glaring up at her. Her entire life, whenever she pictured this moment, she always saw herself confidently writing ‘U.A’ in the top box, but now that she was here, she was starting to doubt herself.
Her whole life, she had dreamed of being a hero, of being someone who saved others. She didn’t care how popular a hero she would become, just that the people she saved knew her name and knew that she would always be there to help. When she announced this to her father with all the passion in her six-year-old heart, he had grinned, scooped her up, and told her to chase the stars, that she could do anything she put her mind to and that he’d always be there to support her, through hell or high water. Ever since that day, he had paid close attention to any heroes she liked, buying merch when he saw it, and on one memorable occasion, he had even spotted her favourite hero of all time and managed to get an autograph for an ecstatic Inko.
That autograph now hung, framed, over her desk.
Inko looked up at it. Her dad would be so disappointed if she didn’t apply for a hero course. He’d never say it out loud, he’d say that she could make any choice she wanted, but she knew he’d say it on the inside. God, she really needed some sense talked into her.
She quickly shot her hand out and floated her phone over to her, not pausing for too long as she scrolled through her contacts for the person she was looking for.
Mitsuki barely had time to say hello before Inko interjected. “Tell me to write U.A.”
There was a pause. “Bitch, what?”
“I’m filling out my choices for high school and I’m starting to doubt myself, so tell me to write U.A.”
Mitsuki took a breath. “Inko, sweetheart, light of my life, if you dare write anything other than U.A, I will come over there and wring your fucking neck. So what if you don’t think you can do it, wouldn’t you rather try and fail than not try at all?” She sighed. “Sorry to guilt trip, but you want to have a kid when you’re older, right? How are they gonna look at you if they find out you wanted to be a hero but chickened out and didn’t do anything to get there at the last second?”
Inko put her head on her desk. “You’re right. I know you are. But how am I supposed to use my quirk?”
“Are you finally getting over yourself and asking for my help?”
“I don’t want to bother you.”
“Bitch, please, I’ve already got in detail plans for what you could do, I’ve already been bothered and I’m gonna be even more bothered if you don’t accept my help and make sure this wasn’t a waste of my time.”
Inko was quiet for a while, then lifted her head slightly, only to slam her forehead into the desk. “Help me.” She whined.
“I’d be glad to, now write U.A and tell your old man that you’re coming to my house after school tomorrow. Get some sleep and stop stressing so much you idiot, you’re beautiful and talented and I love you.” Mitsuki said before hanging up.
Inko pulled herself up and stared at the blank screen of her phone. She’d known Mitsuki since the first year of middle school, but it honestly felt like longer. They’d first met during lunch on the first day when Inko had holed herself up in the bathroom since she hadn’t gotten up the courage to approach anyone yet. Mitsuki had banged on the stall door, demanding to know why she was eating her lunch in the bathroom like some kind of loser. She had then proceeded to drag her outside and talk her ear off, Inko eventually warming up laughing along. Ever since that day they’d been joined at the hip. Mitsuki easily took home silver for being Inko’s biggest supporter, second only to her dad.
Inko put her phone down with a sigh before reaching for her pen again.
~*~*~*~
Mitsuki had taken over the backyard and shed, shooing her parents away with a warning that they’d better stay inside unless they wanted to get hit by various flying projectiles.
“Um, Mitsuki?” Inko spoke up, inspecting the setup. “What’s all this for?”
Mitsuki picked up a bucket of tennis balls, then grabbed Inko by the shoulder and dragged her to stand a few feet away from the line-up of various stuffed animals, depositing the bucket at her friend’s feet. “You can control the speed objects come towards you, right? So, in theory, that should mean you can keep it floating in one spot, or even float it away from you.” She said, waving a hand around as she tossed a ball with the other. “But that’ll take some time, so I say we train your quirk at its base level before moving to more advanced stuff.” She caught the ball again and picked up the bucket with the others, walking away and setting it down a few feet in front of Inko. “So, what you’re gonna do is pull this towards you as fast as you can, letting go at the last minute, right before it gets to your hand, so it goes flying behind you and hits one of the targets.”
“Mr. Cuddles is not a target!” Inko huffed with a smile.
“Don’t worry, he’s getting paid. Now go!” Mitsuki yelled, throwing the ball in the air.
Inko activated her quirk, doing what Mitsuki said, but the only thing the ball managed to hit was her face.
Mitsuki frowned and furrowed her brow. “Maybe I shouldn’t have thrown it.” She picked up another ball, but just let this one rest on her palm. “You did good, that was probably just my fault. Sorry.”
“It’s ok,” Inko said, waving her off. She removed her hand from where it was cradling her forehead and readied herself. “So I just let go and move my hand back?” At Mitsuki’s nod, she took a breath and tried again. Fortunately, the ball didn’t hit her in the face again. Unfortunately, she didn’t draw her hand back quick enough, the ball hitting her fingertips, sending it flying off course and straight into a flowerpot.
“Mitsuki!” Came a shout from inside, Mitsuki’s father poking his head out the door a few seconds later.
Mitsuki was hardly phased. “Don’t get like that, you knew what you were getting into when you let me have the yard.”
Inko bit her lip as she looked at the broken flowerpot. “I am so sorry Mr. Bakugo, I didn’t mean to.”
The man’s face softened as he looked at Inko. “Don’t be, it was an accident, just try and be more careful, ok girls?” He said, going back inside.
“Damn, I can’t believe you’re my dad’s favourite child,” Mitsuki muttered. She clapped her hands. “Well, that was a disaster, and my mother is going to kill me.” She bit her thumb in concentration. “Maybe you should stand sideways? It would probably help with drawing your hand back.”
Inko nodded determinedly, adjusting her stance.
They continued training for a few more hours, gradually getting an idea of where Inko’s limits were, and Mitsuki occasionally jotting down notes, before Mitsuki’s mum called them in for dinner with the promise to chew her daughter out about the broken pot later, after which the girls got straight back to work until Inko’s dad came to pick her up.
As Inko was about to leave, Mitsuki stopped her and handed her a notebook. “I’ve got a few notes in here for how you can increase the size of the objects you can lift, so keep doing that while you’re gone so you can improve as much as possible before the entrance exam.”
Inko took the book and flung her arms around her friend’s neck. “Thank you so much.” She sniffed.
Mitsuki patted her back. “Yeah, yeah. If you’re crying, I will kill you.”
Inko quickly pulled back and started frantically rubbing her eyes. “Not crying!”
Mitsuki snorted. “You’re a disaster. See you tomorrow!”
Inko smiled and waved before getting into the car, where her hair was promptly ruffled.
“Have a good day, Hun?” Her dad asked with a grin, starting the car. “Heard you broke a pot.”
Inko winced. “That was an accident. But other than that, I think everything went pretty well.”
“That’s good.” He was silent for a while. “But seriously Inko, a pot?”
Inko groaned loudly as her dad cackled.
~*~*~*~
“Hey, Mitsuki?” Inko asked around her ice lolly as she and Mitsuki lay in Mitsuki’s backyard, having taken a break from training.
The girl in question hummed, not looking up from her sketchbook.
“You’re really good at helping me with my quirk, and you always have loads of ideas for other things. You’re really smart and creative.” She rolled over so she was also lying on her stomach. “I mean, just the other day you were talking about all sorts of items pros could use to help them, and,” She pointed to the page Mitsuki was working on. “‘Ideas for Inko’s hero costume’. You’re taking this really seriously.”
Mitsuki folded her arms and stared her friend down. “And? I just don’t want you running around looking tacky. Is that such a crime?”
“I’m saying.” Inko paused to suck at her lolly smacking her lips theatrically. “That you’d be good in a support course.” She finished, pointing her lolly at the blonde, but pouting when part of it fell into the grass.
Mitsuki furrowed her brow, considering her friend’s words. “You think?”
“I know!” Inko exclaimed, depositing the rest of her lolly in her mouth and waving the stick around. “You’re top of the class in technology, you’re really good at science and you’re an amazing artist! You always have so many cool ideas and the skills to make them happen.”
Mitsuki stared for a while. “I guess. I mean I never really thought about it before.” She smiled. “You know what? I’ll think about it.”
Inko grinned brightly, then stood up. “Ok, I’m ready to keep going.”
Mitsuki rolled her eyes and stood up as well. “We were barely down for five minutes.” She moaned. She quickly shook herself out and clapped loudly. “Alright, let’s bully some stuffed animals!”
~*~*~*~
Inko scuffed her trainers along the ground as she stared up at the gates looming over her. She had finished the written part of the U.A entrance exam and was fairly confident she’d get a good mark, so now she, along with the rest of the group she’d been sorted into, were standing outside of one of U. A’s famous training grounds.
To say she was nervous about the practical would be an understatement. Both her dad and Mitsuki had sent her into the exam with the order to not allow herself to get too stressed, Mitsuki telling her to try and figure out the quirks of the people with her, to at least give her mind something to do.
So that’s what she did.
She decided to start from the left and work her way to the other side. The first person she laid eyes on was definitely one of the easiest to spot. Despite only being fourteen like everyone else here, the boy was definitely nearing six feet. Combine that with the shock of crimson hair, the scowl that seemed to radiate anger, and the fact that he was stood on the outside of the group, actively distancing himself from everyone, and he was pretty hard to miss. He had no visible indicator as to what his quirk was that Inko could see. At least not one that was immediately visible since, upon closer inspection, Inko noticed that the air around him was warped in the same way it would be on a hot summer’s day. So his quirk probably had something to do with fire then.
Inko let her eyes continue their journey across the group, trying to figure out their quirks, eventually landing on another very noticeable person. Whereas the first boy was nearing six-foot, this boy easily cleared it. With his messy blond hair and bright blue eyes, he looked like he was simply born to be the centre of attention. Inko also thought he looked a little like a sunflower. With the way he was stretching his arms, and the sheer amount of muscle on him, his quirk probably had something to do with his strength.
Inko let her eyes continue to roam until they finally landed on a girl with short white hair, also standing at the edge of the group, although her body language made it seem like she was distancing herself more in an attempt to calm her nerves and less like she found the very concept of other human beings to be utterly disgusting. She had a fiercely determined look on her face, clearly extremely focused, but Inko couldn’t help but notice just how tired she looked. She was busy readjusting various heat packs lining the inside of her jumper, although it looked more to be done out of nerves than anything else. So it seemed likely that her quirk had something to do with ice.
Inko startled as a buzzer sounded and the gates opened. So they didn’t get any warning then, alright. She took off running with the rest of the group.
She ducked into one of the alleyways in the faux city and closed her eyes with a deep breath. Alright. Plan time. Her quirk was nowhere near developed enough to lift the robots, so there was nothing she could do right now without straining herself so badly she couldn’t continue. So the best course of action would be to let the others use their quirks to create debris she could use, then she could-
Fire flashed across her field of vision, melting a robot she hadn’t noticed sneak up on her. She whipped around to face her saviour to see the first boy she’d noticed when trying to gauge the competition. So he did have a fire quirk.
The boy huffed and lowered his hand. “Seventeen.” He grunted, turning to leave.
Inko blinked and pushed herself away from the wall, reaching out to him. “Oh, um, thank you!”
The boy turned to her, a hint of surprise in his eyes. Had he not noticed her? “I’m just getting points.” He said gruffly and ran off.
Oh.
Inko let her hand fall. She shook herself out and ran off too. If she was on the move, then that made it harder for any robots to get the drop on her again.
She soon came across the pile of what used to be a robot and laughed in relief when she realised the majority of the pieces were within her range. Oh, and lucky her, there’s a three-pointer. Inko quickly situated herself in front of it, falling into the stance she’d practiced for months, grabbed a piece of metal, and launched it behind herself, grinning victoriously when she heard it hit its mark. Three points. And there’s a two-pointer right there. Just rinse and repeat.
Everything was going relatively smoothly, which, in all honesty, was probably a sign that something was about to go horribly wrong. Inko had thought that the zero-pointer would be the same size as the other robots, maybe a little bigger, but only big enough to be a mild nuisance. In other words, she was absolutely not prepared for the bigger-than-the-buildings thing that came rolling down the street.
Once Inko had gotten over the initial shock of seeing that giant of a monster, she had every intention to turn tail and run like the rest of the group, but she just had to notice the person trying to yank their leg free from fallen rubble, no doubt caused by the appearance of their newest friend. Inko silently apologised to her dad, before doing the one thing he told her not to do. She ran headfirst into danger.
She kept her hand outstretched as she ran, reaching desperately with her quirk for whatever she could grab, yanking away anything she could get a hold of, and allowing herself an internal fist pump as she managed to hit one of the few robots left standing. Sure it was only a one-pointer, but a point was a point.
She dropped down beside the person, letting out a sigh of relief when they got their leg free to reveal that there was no noticeable severe damage. “Can you walk?”
The person opened their mouth to respond but was cut off by a loud whoosh as a roof of ice covered them both, followed by the sound of a lot of metal crumpling and hitting the ground.
“You two alright?” Came a voice, followed by the white-haired girl skidding into view. “Some guy just punched the hell out of that robot.” She dropped down beside Inko.
“Thanks.” The person muttered, trying to put pressure on their leg, but quickly stopping with a wince. “I don’t think I can walk.”
The girl nodded and turned to Inko. “You take one arm; I take the other.”
Inko nodded determinedly and they both reached out to grab an arm to sling over their shoulders and hauled the person to their feet.
They managed to make it a few metres from the wreck before a buzzer sounded, signaling the end of the exam and a team of medical robots carrying stretchers flooded the area, one coming to the three of them.
After depositing the person on the stretcher, Inko stretched her back and turned to where the zero-pointer was, jaw-dropping when she saw just how wrecked it was. “You said one guy did that?”
The girl nodded from where she had dropped to the ground, curling in on herself and huffing on her hands to warm herself up. “Yeah, it was crazy. I saw him fighting a few times, as well, man’s a tank so if he doesn’t get in then there’s no hope for us.”
“Wow,” Inko mumbled, eyes still locked on the robot’s remains. She shook herself out and extended a hand towards the girl. “I’m Inko Midoriya.”
The girl pulled her sleeve over her hand before taking Inko’s, but she could still feel the icy cold of it. “Rei Himura.”
Inko sat down beside her, taking off her zip-up and wrapping it around Himura’s shoulders. “Here.”
Himura curled into the hoodie. “Thanks. I gotta say, I thought you were insane, running in like that.”
Inko huffed out a laugh. “So did I, honestly. All I was really focused on was saving that guy.”
Himura hummed. “I hope you pass, then.”
Inko felt her cheeks redden. “Thanks. You too.”
They sat in silence until a voice came over the speakers, telling everyone to leave the arena.
Himura moved to take the hoodie off, but Inko pressed it to her back. “Keep it, I’m warm anyway. Besides, if we both pass then you can just give it to me at school.”
Himura’s brow furrowed in concern. “Are you sure? What if one of us doesn’t get in?”
Inko shrugged. “Then I’m down a hoodie. Seriously, keep it, I never wear it anyway.” She then stood up, offering out her hand to help Himura up.
Himura smiled, sliding her arms through the sleeves and zipping it all the way up, burying her face in the collar. “Thanks.”
They walked together to the exit, waving goodbye with a "good luck" thrown at each other before going their separate ways.
~*~*~*~
Inko placed her hands on her desk, crouching down to be at eye level with the envelope as she glared at it. Her letter from U.A had arrived today, and she was excited to open it and finally find out whether or not she got in. Sure it had come twenty minutes ago, in which time she had just been staring at it, making no moves to open it, but she was still excited.
She was just also insanely nervous.
She jumped when the front door slammed open and heavy footsteps stormed down the hall, greeted by a cheery “Hello Mitsuki” before a fist pounded on her bedroom door. “Inko, I swear to all that is holy, if you don’t tell me what that letter says I will kick down the door and wring your damn neck!”
Inko sighed and pulled herself up, cracking the door open and smiling sheepishly at her friend. “I can’t open it.”
Mitsuki rolled her eyes and pushed her way into Inko’s room, beelining towards the envelope sat on the desk, which she promptly tore open and started to head. Quietly. To herself.
“Mitsuki! What does it-!”
“Shh!” Mitsuki hissed, continuing to read with a poker face.
Finally, finally, Mitsuki nodded and folded the letter again, putting it back in the envelope and setting it down gently, folding her hands and turning to face Inko again. “You passed.”
Maybe it was due to how casual they were said, but the words simply didn’t register. “What?”
Mitsuki nodded. “You got a seventy-nine on the written exam and place fourteenth in the practical with thirty-eight villain points and fourteen rescue points, bringing your total to fifty-two points. You are officially part of U.A’s Hero Course.” She said, trying to keep a straight face, but a smile still tugged at the corners of her lips.
“I’m going to U.A?” Inko asked breathlessly.
“That you are. And so am I.” Mitsuki said, holding up her own U.A letter. “Support course, like you said.”
Inko blinked. “Huh?”
Mitsuki barked out a laugh. “Inko, you passed! You’re gonna be a hero!”
A shout came from down the hall and Inko’s father quickly rounded the corner, face split in a blinding grin. “Inko did what?”
Mitsuki grinned back. “She passed!”
Inko’s father laughed in delight and spun her around to pick her up in a crushing hug. “My baby girl’s going to be a hero! Oh, Inko I’m so proud of you!”
Inko finally snapped out of her stupor. “I’m gonna be a hero.” She grinned widely, tears already escaping her eyes. “I’m gonna be a hero!”
“Hell yeah you are!” Mitsuki yelled, throwing herself at the two Midoriyas and wrapping her own arms around Inko.
Inko turned to face Mitsuki. “And you’re coming with me?”
“Like I’d be anywhere but right beside you.”
The tears finally broke free and Inko threw herself at her friend. “Sorry for crying on you.”
Mitsuki shook her head with a smile, patting her back. “You get a free pass today.”
Inko took that as her cue to cry harder.