52

By the time Ochako walked into the classroom again, the mood was a lot more somber. Aizawa just nodded to her as she found her seat and she nodded back, ignoring the curious stares of their classmates for the rest of class. As soon as the bell rang, Hitoshi made a beeline toward her and put his hand on her shoulder, "Hey, Ocha. Are you ok? Did you see him?"

Ochako shook her head, "He was in surgery, so I couldn't go in. But...Hitoshi, I can't feel him anymore."

Hitoshi furrowed his eyebrows, "What are you talking about."

"My quirk." Ochako had tears in her eyes as she looked at him. "They had to cut off his arm, Shindig. It threw off his gravity and I can't anchor to him anymore."

Hitoshi didn't say anything, just pulled her into a hug, "I'm so sorry, Ochako."

"I…" Ochako buried her face in his shoulder. "I could have helped him. If I just had better control over this quirk...I even thought about him and if I hadn't been so exhausted."

"Then you would have been exhausted when you got there and you would have been hurt too." Hitoshi reminded her firmly. "You just barely developed this ability, Ocha. Don't blame yourself for not being perfect. Remember what Mei says about failed experiments?"

Ochako sniffed, "They're what our successes are built on."

"Exactly." Hitoshi smiled. "Now, come on. Everyone is freaking out over you disappearing. I would probably just let them suffer, but you're too nice for that."

"Yeah, I should give them some sort of explanation, at least." Ochako said tiredly. "Wait, did we ever tell Mina how I got there?"

"Nope." Hitoshi smirked. "And I didn't explain anything this morning before you got there. Like I said, I personally would just let them suffer."

Ochako hit him in the arm, "Don't be mean, Shindig. They're our friends, and eventually, I'm hopefully going to learn how to use it in a fight, so they deserve to know. Not everyone can just get away with confusing people constantly like you can."

"Meh, not everyone has the support of vent gremlins." Hitoshi shrugged. 

He took a few steps before he noticed that Ochako wasn't beside him and he sighed, making sure she wasn't behind him before switching directions and heading toward the support classrooms. This was gonna take some adjustment.

Mei was pouting. At the beginning of class, Powerloader had gone over how their final exams were going to work, which was more of a final project, not that she'd expected anything different, but it was supposed to be something that was going to challenge them and even three different explosions hadn't been enough to get the creative juices flowing. 

She almost wanted to go pester Izu-kun about it, but he was so deep in his program that he hadn't even heard Powerloader telling him class was over, so she didn't want to bother him. If only she could count Gravity Girl's earrings as her final, they'd be perfect, but then she'd be bored for the rest of the semester. She just wanted a baby to work on!

Almost as if on cue, Gravity Girl herself slammed the door to the labs open, "Mei-chan! I need your help!"

"Oh, thank god." Mei swiveled around in her chair to face her. "Please tell me that you need a baby!"

"I don't." Ochako said, and Mei made to turn around in her seat, "but one of my classmates definitely does."

Mei immediately grabbed a pen and a sketchbook, "I could kiss you right now."

"Oh, you can save that for Midoriya." Ochako teased. "But seriously, it's about Iida."

"Iida...Iida...Iida…" Mei tapped her chin with the pencil. "Oh! Engine legs! He's like a living cyborg!"

"That's the one!" Ochako grinned, but her expression fell after a moment. "I was actually hoping there might be a way to make him more cyborg, if you think that's possible."

"Uraraka-kun, don't encourage her." Izu-kun walked out of his workroom, rubbing his eyes. "I already have to talk her out of making cyborgs every other week."

"But it's for a good cause this time!" Ochako insisted. "One of my classmates...he got injured during his internship."

"Oh no." Izu-kun looked like he was about to start sympathy crying. "I'm so sorry."

Ochako nodded grimly, "He was attacked by the hero killer and lost his arm. It's a career ending injury, unless…"

"Unless we make him a new one!" Mei immediately started scribbling down ideas as fast as she could. "I need everything. Measurements, quirk limitations, nickel allergies. Izu-kun! I get to make a cyborg!"

Izu-kun, the killjoy, just rolled his eyes and grabbed her hand, "Consent, Mei-chan. We need to talk to Iida and see if he's even interested in continuing hero work first before you make him our new pet project."

Mei pouted, "Ok, but if he says yes, then can I make him a cyborg?"

"Yes," Izuku gave her a sly smile, "Then you can make him a cyborg."

Mineta ignored the glares the girls were sending his way, not really caring if he came across as oblivious or just straight up rude. Either would make him underestimate him and think he was paying attention to their bodies instead of their words. 

"And then she disappeared just like this morning, and Shinso just hung up on me!" Mina cried. "The audacity! And now nobody will give me a single ounce of explanation!"

"Hmm." Tsu tapped her chin thoughtfully. "Maybe Midoriya and Hatsume would know what's going on?"

Jiro rolled her eyes, "Just because they act like cryptids doesn't mean they're all knowing. If it's a quirk thing, and let's be honest it probably is, then you'd have better luck asking Cheat Code."

Mineta perked up.

"Did you see Midoirya at the sports festival?" Hagakure asked incredulously. "He's almost as smart as Cheat Code is, and way easier to contact."

"He is Nedzu's personal student." Yaoyorozu mused. "So I doubt he has anything less than spectacular intelligence. But Cheat Code is a professional analyst and doesn't Midoriya focus on creating inventions with Hatsume? They both interned on I-Island, after all."

"They were the ones interning on I-Island?!" Mineta blurted out.

Jiro glared at him, "Don't act like you actually care. You're only interested because Hatsume has big boobs."

"And she refers to inventing as making babies!" Hagakure added helpfully. 

Mineta filed that information away for later to help him identify Hatsume just in case he couldn't swing an introduction. And if she and Midoriya were always talked about as a pair, that meant he was probably her boyfriend or something and if he found one, the other wouldn't be far behind. Sure, All for One had said Cheat Code was probably a second or third year, but they were looking for a student, so it was still worth investigating. Plus, Nedzu wouldn't dream of taking on a personal student unless they were almost smarter than he was, so even if this Midoriya guy wasn't Cheat Code, All for One would still want to know about him. Who knew? Maybe he'd find some other way to make use of him. 

"You!" Mina's shreik knocked him out of his thoughts and he saw Uraraka walking toward them with Shinso following a few seconds behind. Mina pointed her finger at them accusingly, "You have so much explaining to do, young lady!"

Uraraka giggled, "Yeah, I guess I do, don't I?"

Mineta inched a little closer, only to be stopped by Jiro's glare when he got a little too close to Yaoyorozu, "Buzz off, you little pervert."

Mineta gulped as Shinso turned to look at him, a bored expression on his face, "Is this guy bothering you?"

Yaoyorozu blushed, "N-no, well, I mean, but it's fine…"

"Yes." Jiro cut in.

Shinso hummed and stared at him far too intensely for a few seconds until Mineta was shuffling in place, "Well? What do you have to say for yourself?"

"Why would I ever explain myself to a villain like you?" Mineta whined. "You could have any girl you wanted with that quirk of yours, and you wouldn't even have the balls to tell them how it works…"

He trailed off as his brain clouded over and everyone's voices sounded suddenly far away. Shinso didn't stop staring at him, "Go away. Don't wake up until you're at least three halls away from here."

"Thanks a million Shinso!" MIna said as Mineta was forced to stop walking away. 

"Yeah." Uraraka added. "We owe you one."

"If only you could teleport other people with your quirk, Ocha." Shinso said. "But, whatever, my quirk's perfect for getting rid of creeps."

If Mineta had control over his facial expressions, he would have been grinning. A teleporter in class 1A? Now that was valuable information.