12 Gym Bros

"Man I can't believe Aizawa-sensei was bluffing that whole time," Kirishima said as we made our way back to classroom 1-A.

It had been about ten minutes after our homeroom teacher dismissed us once the Quirk Apprehension Test was over and since it was still only ten in the morning we had nearly a full day of school left. Which made sense as I always found it odd that the show had the class dismissed once it was over.

It felt extremely disrespectful to everyone's time to just end the day after the opening ceremony. Some people commuted hours to get to the school some kids' parents took time off from work to see their kids off to school for their first day, and some heroes even had to put ongoing investigations on pause to be here.

Yeah UA was not an academy that disrespected people like that, so the first day was still a full school day. Meaning that Aizawa's tests had made us miss the first few classes for the day, although I wasn't complaining, our first subject for the day was math and everyone knows math is evil.

"Yeah, Midorya must've been wetting himself the whole time." Mineta chuckled.

"Hey don't put him down like that, he tried his hardest." Ochaco defended.

"Yeah Mineta, you didn't do so hot yourself." The green-haired girl that I had learned to be named Tsuyu Asui spoke with a slight croak to her voice.

I looked over my shoulder at the classmates who were speaking behind me. "We should probably pick it up before our teacher gets to class before us."

"Ishii's right, come on dudes!" Kishirama shouted as he rushed forward.

"Yo wait up for me!" Kaminari followed close behind.

"Oi don't you forget about me!" Mina giggled as she too followed suit.

A chuckle escaped my lips as I watched the rest of the class running or fast walking forward in a hurried scramble with smiles on their faces and laughter filling the air.

As I walked onwards, a weight appeared on my left shoulder as hot breath purred into my ear. "Aw ain't they just the cutest?"

My heart fluttered at the sound of her voice, "you know we can always make some of our own if you want Aunty Nemuri."

The R-Rated Hero herself twisted around and struck a pose with her right hand on the back of her head and her left on her hip whilst she looked over her shoulder and winked at me. "Ah-ah-ah. That's Midnight-Sensei to you, my little pupil."

I was about to quip back after that little comment but I, fortunately, remembered my promise to Naomi. "I could say so much to you right now but mom ordered me to tone it down."

Nemuri sighed, "I know, she said the same to me. She's lucky she's hot or else I would've ignored her."

I had to bite my tongue to stop myself from making another comment, "I got to go before you tempt me further."

She giggled, "I'll walk slow so I can't punish you for being late, but don't make a habit of it or else I really would punish you."

"Love ya future baby m-" I stopped myself just in time, "fuck this is going to be harder than I thought."

Nemuri's laughter echoed behind me as I rushed forward toward class, the sooner I got away from this situation the better.

______________________________________

I walked into the classroom to find that I was the second to last to arrive, the only other person missing was Izuku, but since he broke his finger during the test his absence was excused.

My cursory glance over the room also revealed a new addition to the desks that were not there before. Folded papers with our names labeled on them hung off the backs of our desk chairs.

And from what I could tell, my curse of sitting at the front of the class nearest to the door had once again followed me to another school year. I don't know who is at fault here for this but I strongly suspect Nemuri as she is the only person here that knows of my former teacher's pet status and would occasionally tease me for it.

I held back an annoyed huff as I sat down at desk number one, once again consigning myself for yet another year of being expected to hand out packets and be the responsible one during drills. I pray that I'm not elected class representative, I do not want that much responsibility hanging over my head at the moment.

A minute after I sat down, Midnight came strutting into class as if she owned the place. "Hello, class, how is everyone doing today?"

I could hear the sharp intake of breath of my fellow males as the R-Rated Hero stood in front of the class and cocked her hip to the side whilst doing a little hair flip.

She briefly glance at me with a mischievous glint in her eyes, I knew from then on that she was going to ham this up just to get a rise out of me.

After a brief moment of silence where the males were left utterly speechless and the females were completely shocked. Nemuri spoke up once again, "oh how rude. Won't you be nice enough to greet your new History teacher?" She added a little pout to her lip as she batted her bright blue eyes.

I glanced over at Ojiro who was to my immediate left, he glanced over back at me with wide eyes. I then glanced over at Kaminari who was sitting directly behind him and briefly gave me the same look, and then I glanced over at Kirishima who also had the same look as the other two.

We did not need words to already know what we were thinking, there was only one thing any red-blooded male could think once first encountering Nemuri Kayama.

"𝘋𝘢𝘺𝘶𝘮𝘮𝘮𝘮." They all thought as one. I didn't even need to look into their minds, they practically screamed their thoughts into the aether.

The exchange of glances happened in only a few short seconds, so lucky for Nemuri she was not left hanging for long once the class finally greeted her.

"Hello, Midnight-Sensei." It was a bit discordant as some were still finding their voices and others spoke a bit too fast but it was enough to please the teacher.

"That's more like it." She gave the class a wolfish grin as she turned around and strutted towards the desk with a sway to her hips where she sat down with her right leg crossed over her left and her arms crossed right below her breasts which caused them to be pushed up slightly.

"Now since your homeroom teacher decided to test you this morning we won't have much time to get to know each other today. But fear not, I'm sure we would all get many more opportunities to know each other…" Nemuri smirked and ever so briefly glanced toward me. "Very well though your three years here."

Must….not…banter….must resist the urge to make sex pun. Damn you Nemuri for conditioning me to quip back at you the second something even remotely dirty leaves your mouth.

"But regardless, everyone please take out your history textbook and open to page eight, we will be going over a light review of what you should already know for the rest of the class today and tomorrow. And please pay attention as we will have a review test on Wednesday." And just like that the teasing and sensual R-Rated hero was gone and in her place was the no-nonsense teacher known as Midnight-Sensei.

I was already grabbing my textbook and opening it to the page indicated while everyone else was left utterly whiplashed at our teacher's sudden change in attitude.

"Holy crap I don't think my heart can take three years of this," Ojiro muttered under his breath.

I stifled a chuckle at that, poor kids are going to have to get a crash course in dealing with the emotional hurricane that was Nemuri Kayama. May God have mercy on their souls, because Midnight sure as hell won't.

___________________________________________

After Midnight's History class, Present Mic arrived with his English language lessons.

Funny enough, even after The Great Collapse where the nuclear genocide of the world had all but destroyed civilization after the end of the third world war. English still ended up becoming the international trade language. Mostly due to the fact that once order was restored to the first-world countries. The United States went full mask off and became an empire not only in practice but finally in name and colonized a lot of the now depopulated areas of the world. The fact the U.S. was even capable of such a feat was more than likely due to the fact that they were blessed with the greatest number of metahumans being born within their borders at the time.

Of course, after the second and third American revolutions, the country is no longer the great power it once was but its influence was still formidable. Especially in Asia as most of southern China and Indochina have become Americanized thanks to the previous centuries' colonization efforts.

Hence why it is important for us to learn the English language, Japanese heroes are often sought after due to our quality over-quantity approach and it is not uncommon to find Japanese heroes often creating a life for themselves abroad. All Might is the most obvious example of this.

I did not particularly need these lessons at all, but in respect of Present Mic, I did at least pretend to pay attention.

A few of the other students in the class did have a few English lessons before coming to UA, like Jiro for example who actually spoke fairly well. However she still occasionally replaced her Ls with Rs as most Japanese tend to do thanks to the fact the L sound simply doesn't exist in the Japanese language, but it was still impressive nonetheless.

After fifty minutes of going over simple greeting phrases, Present Mic finally dismissed us.

"Alright boys and girls, you all did very well on your first day. Now go on and get some lunch!" The blonde teacher pumped his fist excitedly.

Many in the class cheered at that announcement and rushed out of the class.

Kirishima looked back at me with a toothy smile. "Yo Ishii come on, we'll sit together."

I had hoped to grab lunch and find a quiet place in the library or something, but I guess I could entertain the excitable kid for today.

___________________________

Lunch Rush had prepared several dishes both western and Japanese cuisine, I, however, decided to have a lunch of spaghetti and meatballs with caesar salad that had tomatoes, onions, cheese, and an egg. If the meal tasted half as good as it smelt then coming to UA would be worth it just for the food alone.

My eyes roamed over the dozens of booths seating hundreds of students, from sight and sound alone it was apparent which student belong to what course.

The Department of Management or Business course students were the quietest of the bunch, many of them seated with a hunch and much more scrawny looking than their counterparts taking the hero courses.

The Support Department kids were probably the loudest as I could see a few of them shouting at each other over some engineering-related disagreement. I heard more than a few math phrases and other technobabble being shouted at one another that I could not understand so I chalked it up to nerd shit.

General Education was the most diverse and numerous out of all the courses, most of these students being people who did not quite make the cut for the hero course but were far too valuable to just let go. The biggest reason for the course to exist is mainly to pad UA's test numbers which would go on to help convince the government to keep funding the school as well as they do.

Finally, there were the cool kids, the Chads and Stacys of this school, the Hero Department. We were the equivalent of the school football team from my old life, meaning we were the whole reason this school exists.

I'm sure as upwards of seventy percent of the budget goes just to accommodate us, the giant robots, the mock city districts, even the amazing lunch, It is all for us. Is it unfair? Yes. Do I really care if it is unfair? No.

We're going to be putting our asses on the line every day until we either die in battle, or of a stressed-induced coronary. We NEED the school to focus its efforts on us, yes every student is important and can make a difference. But not every student needs to punch a robot to gain combat experience, not every student needs to know how to evacuate a panicking population. The students in the hero course however do so that's what we get.

"Yo Ishii over here!" Kirishima waved over.

Looks like he saved me a seat, that's nice of him. I approached the booth that was currently seating Kirishima, Kaminari, Sero, Shoji, and Ojiro. I slid into the outside of the booth and sat directly across from Sero whilst Kaminari was to my immediate left sandwiched between me and Shoji. Kirishima sat directly across from Kaminari and Ojiro was at the far end directly across from Shoji.

"We were just talking about our workout routines," Kirishima said once I got situated.

"Oh really?" I asked before taking a large bite of my bowl of spaghetti.

"How much you bench? I bet it's a lot since you got the second-highest score in the ball throw earlier." Sero wondered.

I shrugged, "my limit right now is three hundred pounds but I can only do twenty-five reps of that, I usually do about thirty reps of two hundred fifty pounds on my chest days."

Kirishima gave me a thumbs up. "Nice, I max out at three twenty."

"My max is five hundred eighty," Shoji informed.

"Woah, you're a tank, Shoji." Kaminari looked over at the taller boy with wide eyes.

Ojiro spoke up as well. "Well my max with my arms and chest is only two-thirty but my tail can lift up to four hundred."

Kirishima slapped his hand on the table. "Dude all of us totally have to hit the gym together."

"The map thing they gave us shows a workout gym on the bottom floor of the northeast tower, we could probably use it after school," Sero informed.

I nodded. "I could come but I can't stay long since I got to cook dinner."

Ojiro sighed, "I can only show up on Wednesdays and Fridays."

"Yeah, my train doesn't show up till a bit later so I could work out, except on Fridays cause I got family stuff." Said Kaminari.

"Well, I'm pretty good any day," Kirishima offered.

Shoji nodded as well. "I can show up almost every day but Wednesdays since those are the days my parents have a date night and I need to babysit my sisters."

Sero swallowed a mouthful of salad before he spoke, "I'm good any day like Kirishima."

"Well looks like we got a good plan for after-school workouts." Kaminari smiled.

Everyone at the table nodded in agreement before we fell into silence for a few minutes as we focused on eating.

I felt a bit less awkward than earlier in the day, these kids actually seemed more mature than I imagined they would. That was probably because the type of person UA accepts into the hero course tends to have a more mature and intelligent disposition than the average teen would.

I briefly set my fork down and spoke to the tallest among us. "You said you had sisters Shoji?"

The boy turned towards me with a nod, "I do, one is ten years old and the youngest is eight."

"Man I'm jealous, I'm an only child." Said Kirishima.

Shoji's mask moved a bit, indicating that he was smiling. "They can be a handful at times, they asked me a hundred times to get All Might's autograph for them once they heard he will be our heroics teacher."

"Oh yeah All Might's going to be teaching us, I'm so hyped for that!" Sero exclaimed excitedly.

"Yeah dude, who better to be teaching us how to be a hero than the number one himself?!" Kaminari pumped his fist up in the air.

Ojiro leaned forward "speaking of teachers…" He looked around quickly to see if none was listening in before continuing. "Midnight…like bro."

"I know right, like…holy shit dude." Said Sero.

"I wonder what her three sizes are?" Kirishima asked.

Nemuri's three sizes were Twenty, Fifty, and Thirty-six, in inches of course. But I was not about to say that out loud. The only reason why I even knew that was because of the number of clothing stores she's dragged me to either during one of our playdates or when she and Naomi would go out and needed someone to act as a pack mule for their shopping sprees. Something that has become much more common now that Naomi could actually afford it once she got back to being a pro hero.

Irregardless, I did not feel comfortable with people drooling over Nemuri in front of me. It's one thing to intellectually know she's a part of every guy's spank bank, but another thing to see people actively fantasizing about someone you love right in front of you.

"Where are you guys from?" I changed the subject.

My question seemed to have the preferred effect as the table was torn away from their fantasies of our History teacher.

"Fukuoka," Answered Shoji.

Ojrio whistled lowly. "Damn that's pretty far south, I'm from Tokyo myself."

Kirishima raised his water glass "Chiba gang!"

From a table to my immediate right, came the sound of Mina shouting over the crowd and raising her own glass of water. "Gang, gang!" She smiled widely at Kirishima before giggling and picking up the conversation she was having with Momo and Tsuyu.

"I'm from Saitama," Answered Kaminari.

"What about you Ishii?" Ojiro asked.

"I'm from Kakegawa so not too far away from Musutafu."

"Kakegawa, didn't you guys have a giant robot go crazy last year?" Kaminari questioned.

I nodded, "yeah, shit was wild."

"Where you there?" Kirishima asked as he leaned over the table.

"Yep, saw Star Platinum beat the ever-loving shit out of Mechagodzilla right in front of me. Was the scariest moment of my life if I'm being honest." I still sometimes had nightmares about it, the screams, the smell of ozone as the laser charged, the fear that Naomi was rushing to her death.

"Holy crap dude that's awesome." Sero gushed.

I took a shaky breath, "yeah…could do without the five hundred people dying part but otherwise, it was a fun night." I chuckled.

"Oh…uh yeah…that's not so awesome." Sero looked down awkwardly.

The table fell into silence for a long moment, I felt a bit bad because I didn't mean to bring the mood down. But then again I sometimes forget that the Japanese don't really appreciate dark humor as well as other cultures do. If this was a table of Brits or Americans then they would be losing their shit right now.

Damn, I miss Monty Python, note to self, download the entire series to watch later and show Naomi the Quest for the Holy Grail this weekend for movie night.

We continued to eat in awkward silence for several minutes until Kaminari finally spoke up. "So what do you think will be our first lesson will be in Hero studies?"

"Man I hope it's something to do with our quirks," Kirishima answered with an excited grin.

Ojiro nodded in agreement. "I'm itching to spar with one of you guys."

"They probably won't do anything too crazy today but guaranteed we will do something awesome by the end of the week," I answered.

"They might teach us some basic skills first like self-defense things everyone should know." Shoji reasoned.

Sero shook his head. "I'm pretty sure most of us already know how to throw a punch, otherwise we wouldn't have made it past the entrance exam."

"I think Shoji means stuff like situational awareness, learning about transitional spaces, and knowing the body language of suspicious individuals," I spoke after swallowing a mouthful of salad.

"You talk like you've already had some self-defense training." Ojiro pointed out.

"My mom works security and taught me a few things."

"Really like what?" Kaminari questioned.

"Well one of the most useful sayings she's taught me is this. The eyes might be the windows to the soul but the hands are the windows to the intent. Meaning you should always watch someone's hands, especially if they're in pockets or otherwise hidden from sight then be ready for them to pull out a weapon."

"Huh, I never thought of that," Kirishima said with a contemplative look.

"Your mom sounds cool dude," Ojiro said.

I couldn't help but smile at that, "yeah, she's the best."

___________________________

The rest of the day went on as any other normal school day would, after lunch was our science class. This class was taught by a man named Asuma Orito, he was an older man with greying hair and a chin-strapped beard, and coal-black eyes.

He was a fairly laidback person and taught his class from the comfort of the desk chair rather than standing and walking around the class as Midnight or Present Mic had done.

After science was the real deal, the thing we had all been waiting for. Heroic studies.

The class was abuzz with excitement as we all waited in anticipation for the man, the myth, the legend. All Might.

The door opened with a loud squeak Izuku practically vibrated in his seat as he held himself back from jumping in place. Kaminari was standing and leaning over his desk while Kirishima mirrored him.

Mina had her fists in front of her lips as she held in a squeal.

Walking inside the classroom was a seven-foot behemoth of a man wearing a dark yellow pinstriped suit that matched his blond hair that had two long bangs pulled upwards that appeared almost like bunny ears.

"Hello, students." All Might greeted with a wide smile.

At his entrance, several students began to whisper amongst themselves

"No way,"

"He's so manly."

"He cleans up nice."

"He's actually here, this is awesome."

All Might chuckled, "Now, now calm down my pupils. Or else I will not be able to give you today's lesson."

That got everyone to shut right up, no one would even dare speak over the number one.

"Thank you," All Might cleared his throat, "now, as today is only the first day, we won't be going into anything deep. But you will be shown today an informative video that has helped me throughout my career. Yes, it is very old but it is nonetheless important, so I want all of you to take notes as there will be a quiz at the end of the video!"

The energy in the class deflated like a hot air balloon as students slumped in their seats and others muttered disappointment under their breaths.

"Young Ishii, may you please hit the lights?" All Might asked.

Without even thinking I willed the light switch to flip downwards and turn off the classroom lights.

The students around me turned to me in confusion, "dude how did you do that?" Ojiro asked me.

"Bro, you have an electricity quirk or something?" Kaminari asked me in a stage whisper.

I blinked once, then twice, then it hit me. I've become so used to using my quirk that I totally forgot that my casual use of telekinesis would seem strange to some.

Thankfully before I had to explain myself, the projector screen lowered itself and the title of the video made itself known.

'Surviving Edged Weapons'

Holy shit, the legendary police training video from the eighties. This class was officially the best class I've ever had. Friendship with Mythology 101 is over, now Hero Studies is my new best friend!

_________________________________________

The school day was finally over and I was spotting Sero in the school gym.

"Come on dude one more!" I encouraged.

"Fuuuuuuu," Sero grunted through gritted teeth.

The kid had been doing well for someone that hardly ever benched. One hundred and twenty-five pounds was his current max, I was making him do twelve reps, something that he had already accomplished but the real gains were in the burn so I had him push himself.

"Fifteen come on you can do one more! Don't be a pussy!" I shouted.

"Gaaaaah." Sero's arms were shaking, sweat had fallen into his eyes and blinded him.

"Come one push it, you got this! Your ancestors used to eat American POWs for fun, you got this!" He was so close, just one more inch.

"Sixteen take a rest." I grabbed the bar and set it down on the rack.

"Holy….ahhh." Sero's arms fell like limp noodles.

"Nice job Sero!" Kirishima called from across the gym on the lower back extension machine.

"Yo Ishii let's spar in the ring!" Ojiro called from his position in the boxing arena at the far side of the gym.

"Sure, just let me ge-" A sudden ringing from my phone sounded from my bag that was propped up against one of the large windows that made up most of the exterior walls.

Color then drained from my face, "guy what time is it?"

Kaminari who was being spotted by Shoji nearby spoke up, "like six-thirty I think."

"Fuck, fuck, fuck, I should've been home by now!" I rushed over to my backpack and fumbled with the zipper in my panic for a few seconds before bringing out my phone.

It was Naomi, to my horror.

With a nervous gulp, I answered the phone, "h-hey mom."

-𝘞𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘢𝘳𝘦 𝘺𝘰𝘶?-

"I'm still at school, they have a gym and some of the guys in my class wanted to work out together."

A relieved sigh came from over the phone. -𝘖𝘩 𝘨𝘰𝘰𝘥. 𝘐 𝘸𝘢𝘴 𝘸𝘰𝘳𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘥 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘢 𝘴𝘦𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘥.-

"Sorry I know I should've left early, I wanted to make dinner before you got home."

-𝘐𝘵'𝘴 𝘢𝘭𝘳𝘪𝘨𝘩𝘵, 𝘫𝘶𝘴𝘵 𝘵𝘦𝘹𝘵 𝘮𝘦 𝘪𝘧 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘱𝘭𝘢𝘯 𝘰𝘯 𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘺𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘭𝘢𝘵𝘦 𝘯𝘦𝘹𝘵 𝘵𝘪𝘮𝘦.-

There was something in her voice that didn't sound right, "are you okay?"

-𝘐'𝘮 𝘧𝘪𝘯𝘦…𝘫𝘶𝘴𝘵…𝘭𝘰𝘯𝘨 𝘥𝘢𝘺.- She sighed this time in weariness.

I frowned "Alright, I'll see you soon."

-𝘓𝘰𝘷𝘦 𝘺𝘰𝘶.-

"Love you too."

I heard her choke back a sob before ending the call

Something was definitely wrong.

"You okay man?" Kirishima asked as he approached me.

"I don't know," I sighed with a shake of my head before shouting towards the tailed boy across the gym. "Sorry, Ojiro but my mom needs me home, I'll have to beat you up tomorrow!"

"Bet!" The boy shouted back.

"Damn that sucks, see ya tomorrow then." Kirishima extended his hand toward me.

I shook it with a nod of my head, "this was fun, see ya in class tomorrow."

After one final farewell to my other classmates, I ran out of the school with a telekinetic push. If I rushed I could catch the train in time and be home soon.

_______________________

With a flick of my wrist, I unlocked the door and rushed inside. I immediately knew something was wrong, the lights were not on, and Naomi's armor was strewn about on the living room floor as if she took it off in a hurry.

The apartment was quiet, much too quiet. I felt the hair on my arms stand on end and a nervous pins and needles began to spread over my skin as my ears began to sound a faint ring.

I sent my psychic awareness through the area, it was only me and Naomi in the apartment. But It did not make me feel any better, the feelings coming from her almost staggered me as I felt an overwhelming feeling of guilt and self-hatred coming from her.

I sprinted towards her room, the only light in there was coming from the partially ajar bathroom. I could hear the water running from inside and Naomi sniffling.

I opened the door.

She was standing in only a blood-stained white shirt and ripped pants. The strongest woman I've ever known was crying as she viscously rubbed her hands in the sink, there was nothing on them, she was rubbing her hands raw.

I took a tentative step forward and gently placed my hand on her forearm.

Naomi jerked at my touch, wide watery purple eyes looking down at me. Her lip quivered as she swallowed spit in her dry throat.

"I-" She tried to speak.

"Shh," I stepped forward and wrapped my arms around her, "I'm here." I squeezed with all my might.

I don't know what's wrong but I did know she needed me right now. Naomi was strong, a pillar of strength that I could always look up to, seeing her like this…it wasn't right.

She collapsed to her knees and I followed her. She held me close and cried into my shoulder.

My heart broke as she whispered.

"It's not fair…she was only eight….why….why…it's not fair, it's not fair."

Her voice was rough with evidence of her grief.

I felt my own eyes mist with unshed tears. "I'm here, I'm here."

I felt so fucking useless right now, all I could do was hold her while she wept.

"I'll always be here."

______________________