77

Izuku and Mei had ended up just stashing their bags in one of the many nest spots they'd made in the tunnels. Izuku threw his duffle bag down with a huff and turned to Mei, who was already dusting herself off to leave again, "I know you know we can find a more creative spot. We're not gonna win any extra points for this."

"Meh, that's what we have Extra-Credit-Kun for." Mei dismissed. "And this way we don't waste any more valuable lab time! I wanna see what fun toys Melissa-chan brought! Well, what are you waiting for?! Let's go!"

She grabbed Izuku's hand and started dragging him away, but both of them stopped short when they saw Melissa crawling toward them through the tunnels. She grinned and looked around as she dusted herself off, "This looks so cozy! I love what you've done with the place."

"Melissa?" Izuku gaped at her. "How did you get in here? It took us forever to figure out the entrances!"

Melissa giggled, "And it took me even longer. You forget that I've been visiting Uncle Might since I was a little girl. Nedzu usually invited Dad over for tea and I was free to explore. These tunnels are every nerdy kid's dream, seriously."

"Did you and your dad bring us any fun toys?!" Mei was bouncing up and down with excitement. "What did you bring me? Explosives? Trackers? Computer chips? I need toys for my babies!"

"Don't worry, I'm sure you'll be super happy with everything we brought you." Melissa said. "And we didn't forget about you Izuku. Turns out, the scientists Dad works with have been able to learn a lot about the theory of relativity from the data you collected when Uraraka was jumping around I-Island and they've figured out some tweaks you can make to help get some more exact readings! I brought their research for you to read over, it's just waiting back in Powerloader's classroom."

Izuku's eyes widened and he grabbed Mei's hand, "Well, what are you waiting for? We're wasting valuable lab time, let's go!"

Hitoshi was grateful that Mei had insisted on him getting some muscle building training because otherwise he would have been completely useless against these literally brainless dirt monsters. He decapitated another one with a fallen branch and ran forward again, eyes darting around as he watched Ochako zip around helping everyone. If only he could get to the lady who was actually controlling these things and brainwash her, but they'd left her back with Aizawa and there was no way that he'd be able to climb all the way up that cliff again…

Hitoshi facepalmed, leaving a trail of dirt across his forehead. He was an idiot. 

"Ochako!" He yelled. "I need you to get me to Dad!"

"What?" Ochako appeared right next to him. "Why?"

"I think one of those women he was with earlier is the one controlling the dirt." Hitoshi explained. "If she's still with him…"

"Then I can use Aizawa as an anchor and you can brainwash her." Ochako smiled brightly enough that Hitoshi's breath caught in his throat. "Shindig, that's brilliant! Are you ready?"

Hitoshi took a deep breath to steady himself, "As I'll ever be. Let's just get it over with."

The world's shortest and most intense roller coaster later, Hitoshi was kneeling outside a house he'd never seen before, Aizawa nowhere in sight. "Where are we? And more importantly, where are they?"

Ochako pointed at the building, "Up ahead, most likely just inside that building. I landed us a bit farther away just in case you needed a minute."

Hitoshi swallowed some bile and stood, "Good idea. They'll be expecting a teleportation attack, but this way, we can sneak up on them. You get Dad and make sure he can't cancel my quirk, I'll focus on the Pussycats."

Ochako nodded once and followed Hitoshi as he silently made his way toward the house. They were almost there, crouching behind a bush near the front entrance, when Ochako suddenly tugged on his sleeve, "What are you...oh."

A little kid, the same one that had been with the Pussycats at the drop off point, was staring straight at him, mouth open wide as he saw them trying to sneak in. Hitoshi shot a panicked glance at Ochko, but she obviously didn't know what to do either, so he did the only thing he could think of.

He raised a finger to his lips and whispered, "Shhh…"

Instantly, the kid's expression fell into a hateful glare, "Auntie! Some of those hero brats got here early!" 

"What would you do that for?" Ochako hissed. "You couldn't just…"

"You're just a bunch of stupid heroes." The kid spat. "Why would I ever help you?"

Hitoshi had been fiddling with his capture weapon, rearranging the parts that made it a voice changer and hoping he got this right because there was no way Aizawa was going to give him a second chance, "Auntie! Can't you make them leave?"

The kid's eyes widened and Hitoshi smirked behind his weapon as Ochako launched forward and shoved her hand over the kid's mouth. They froze as a pair of footsteps came running out of the front door, "No, I can't, don't be rude, Kouta."

Ochako released Kouta with a yelp when he bit hard on her hand, "That wasn't me…"

Hitoshi didn't let him finish before taking control, "Call off the dirt monsters."

The woman didn't move and Hitoshi glanced at Ochako who disappeared, only to be back a second later shaking her head, "We must have gotten the wrong one."

"Let her go!!!" Kouta launched himself at Hitoshi and started kicking and punching him so much that it took all of his concentration and training to keep his control of whoever they had. He couldn't afford to let her go, though, not until they had the right one. "You let her go right now!"

A blond woman came rushing out of the house, "Kouta! What are you doing?!"

"He's got Autie!" Kouta had tears in her eyes and Hitoshi had to force down a twinge of guilt as Ochako cut in. 

"He's not even touching her!" Ochako lied. "How could he have her?"

"Uh…" Hitohsi gave his best innocently confused smile. "Can I have a little help here?"

"Of course." Pixiebob moved forward to help, only to stop short as Hitoshi took control.

He spat out a mouthful of dust, "You better be the one with the dirt monsters. Call them off."

Ochako disappeared and reappeared with a relieved smile, "It worked."

Kouta glared at both of them, "This is all about that stupid training exercise, isn't it?"

"Yes. it is." Dad's voice echoed behind them and both Ochako and HItoshi jumped to their feet. "I knew you'd figure out that this was the most logical course of action eventually, but I honestly thought the execution would be cleaner."

Hitoshi winced, "Sorry. We got the wrong pussycat first."

Dad raised one eyebrow, "Yeah. I saw that. Now let them go."

"But if we let them go, the blond one will just make more dirt monsters." Ochako argued. "That would defeat the whole purpose of it in the first place."

"The kid needs to know his aunts are ok." Dad said gently. "You won the spar and Pixiebob will honor that, now let her go."

"Ok." Hitoshi let them out and they immediately went to go comfort the kid. "I'm sorry, Dad."

Dad just rolled his eyes and ruffled Hitoshi's ahir, "It's ok kid. We all forget and go too far sometimes, the biggest thing is making sure you know your limits and the limits of people around you to make sure that doesn't happen. That's why intelligence gathering is so important."

Hioshi still kinda felt guilty about the whole thing, but was starting to feel a little better until the kid glared at him from underneath his aunt's arms, "You're nothing but a no good dirty rotten vilain!"

Mandalay gasped, "Kouta!"

Hitoshi shrunk in on himself. He could see Ochako starting forward, but before he could stop her, Aizawa put a hand on her shoulder. Hitoshi didn't think he'd seen him so pissed since he'd taken him away from his old foster parents, "Hitoshi, why don't you and Uraraka go help your classmates? I'm sure they need it."

Hitoshi took a deep breath. Distance and de-escalate, that was exactly what they needed. He grabbed Ochako by the arm, "Yeah, they're hopeless."

It was only when he saw Dad trying to hide a soft smile behind his capture weapon that he knew he hadn't done anything too wrong and everything was going to be ok. 

Ochako waited until they were out of earshot in the woods to go off, "That little jerk! How dare he call you a villain like that?! You're a hero through and through and that brat deserves…"

Hitoshi cut her off, "I mean, we kinda did kidnap his aunts. I wasn't even thinking beyond the objective to realize how hard that might be for him to watch."

"Still…" Ochako huffed and ran her fingers through her hair. "You didn't deserve that, especially not after you did so well capturing both of them."

"Yeah, Mei and Izuku would be proud." Hitoshi joked. "The kidnapee grew up to be a kidnapper."

"Ah they grow up so fast." Ochako wiped a fake tear from her eye. "What would Mina say if we told her our first date was kidnapping people?"

Hitoshi choked on his next breath, "Our what?" 

"I…" Ochako's eyes went wide, "Oh my god, I'm so sorry, I was thinking out of context and then thought it'd be funny, because Mina would freak, but like, obviously this is a training exercise and not a date, like that'd be ridiculous. Not that I'd be opposed to a date, but you already knew that because I also accidently told you I had a crush on you. I…"

Hitoshi caught a hint of light swirling around her as she gathered her quirk to leave and he moved before he could think, reaching out to take her hand and act as her anchor, "I...um…"

Ochako looked at him, "Y-yes?"

Hitoshi's mouth was dry, so he cursed internally as he found himself reverting back on his oldest coping mechanism and saying the snarkiest thing he could think of, "Do you really think I couldn't plan a better first date than fighting dirt monsters? I'd pull out the actual monsters at least."

There was a beat of silence before Ochako snorted, "oh yeah? What else?"

HItosh gulped, "Um...maybe a walk around the park? And some Mochi?"

His heart soared when Ochako smiled, "Ok then. It's a date!"

Mic was going to blow his eardrums out when he heard about this.

Dabi looked out the window at the darkening sky and downed the rest of his drink, "Alright, let's go."

The rest of the league, except for Shigaraki who was holed up who knew where, nodded and stood, the only complaint coming from Muscular, "I'd much rather get straight to killing people than waste a whole day scoping things out."

"Knowledge is power." Compress reminded him. "If we don't know the lay of the land, the heroes will strike back long before we even set eyes on our target."

"Not to mention that the extra day will lure the heroes into a false sense of security." Dabi added. "What with that and the mini attack on the mall the other day, they won't suspect an attack until their students are already injured. They won't stand a chance."

"Are you ready?" Kurogiri asked, already opening a portal.

Dabi nodded and stepped through, waiting for everyone to get to the other side before turning to address the group, "Alright. Number one rule of tonight, don't get seen. If you mess up, Trapper said they confiscated all the students cell phones, so make sure the kid doesn't have a chance to run back to to camp and we should be good. Sensei's using a quirk to track him, but his cover is still intact, so don't expect him to say hi or answer your calls if you see him. Be back here by three am or you're getting left behind."

Izuku had spent the whole day looking over the research Melissa had brought him and checking it against his program. Thankfully he didn't have to restructure his entire program, but the minor changes looked like they were going to make a big difference. He wished he could test it out by tracking Ochako, but he didn't finish making tweaks until after dinner, and by that point she was apparently staying put, so he'd have to wait until she was training tomorrow to see if it worked. He'd also widened his search net, since none of the students knew exactly where the training camp was, so he wouldn't even know where to look for her signature until he caught her teleporting. 

"Alright kids, you have ten more minutes, then we're kicking you out of the lab." Powerloader yelled. "Taking breaks is important. You don't have to sleep, but you do need to switch gears so you come back tomorrow with a fresh brain!"

Izuku smiled when he looked through the open door of his workroom and saw Mei doubling her pace, yelling orders at Melissa, who had been helping look over her project. She would have stayed in the lab all night if she could, but Izuku guessed that wasn't that odd, since Powerloader said they had a curfew at this camp every single year. Support students must get hyper focused more than the other courses did. 

He got a ping on his computer and frowned. Ochako should be resting too, not teleporting at this time of night. He opened the map and almost fell out of the chair. He knew what Ochako's gravity signature looked like and this wasn't it. No, even with the tweaks to his program, this signature was a little spread out. Not to the point where he couldn't figure out where it was, but to the point where it looked cloudy, for lack of a better word. And he'd seen this signature before.

Izuku hurried to open the program on his laptop, making sure to triple-check that the data was there and saved before running out of his room and dashing out into the hall toward Nedzu's office. The door opened just before he ran into it and Nedzu smiled at him, two cups already set out and ready. 

"Hello Midoriya!" Nedzu chirped happily. "I apologize, the tea is still steeping. You ran here faster than expected, that training with Shinso must be paying off!"

"I have a location for Kurogiri." Izuku blurted. 

Immediately, Nedzu's mood changed. He was still smiling, but it was more intense and the teacups got pushed to the side as he reached for Izuku's laptop, "Are you certain?"

"Not completely." Izuku admitted. "But the gravity signature I'm picking up matches what I've theorized about the way his quirk works. My only question is what they're doing in the middle of nowhere. I would have thought their hideout would be in a city, close to the action where they could easily get info and not have to rely too much on warping to get everywhere, but they're nowhere near anything."

"Hmm...interesting." Nedzu glanced down at the map and froze, his hair standing slightly on end. "Midoriya, you're absolutely certain this isn't Urarka's warping, correct?"

"Yeah, hers doesn't look like that." Izuku nodded. "It's more like a lightning strike, not a cloud."

"Very well, then." nedzu nodded. "Do you mind if I hold onto this until tomorrow? I do believe that your class's current assignment is to take a mental break."

"Um, sure." Izuku narrowed his eyes. "Is something wrong?"

"That remains to be seen." Nedzu said. "But if so, we have a team of heroes ready to help and you're right here in case we need your expertise. Don't you worry, I know what I'm doing, young Midoriya."

"O-ok." Izuku frowned. "I'll try."

Nedzu smiled softly, "That's all I ask. Sleep well and thank you for bringing this to our attention. Have a great night, Midoriya."

Izuku nodded and walked away. It was going to be a weird night.