4

Chapter 4: Arrival

Summary:

Izuku begins the entrance exam for the support course.

Notes:

We got a TV Tropes Page!

Chapter Text

Izuku actually ended up getting to UA a few minutes early, early enough that he didn't even see Kacchan, who should be taking the hero course exam today, on his way in. He looked up at the building, not even bothering to conceal his awe considering that he was far from the only applicant gaping at the fact that they were actually at UA! After a long moment, he shook himself and hurried into the building, taking everything in as he followed the signs to the support course exam orientation. 

He ended up in a large room lined with desks that were almost completely empty except for a few other early arrivals like himself. Izuku swallowed nervously as they all looked up at his arrival, his anxiety already getting the better of him as he ran to one of the seats in the back corner. He really wasn't ready to meet his future tormentors quite yet. 

After a few minutes of sitting in the oppressively silent room, Izuku decided that he needed to find something to distract himself. The longer he just sat there, the more he worried that he was somehow making a terrible mistake, or that he would fail the exam, or that the proctors would come up to him and tell him that UA had actually decided to not accept quirkless applicants this year. He could always analyze his fellow examinees and see if he could guess their quirks, but he knew that as soon as he started analyzing, he would also start mumbling, which would sound even louder in the quiet room, and then any hope he had of fading into the background would go out the window. 

Izuku thought for a moment before getting out his laptop. From what he'd read, UA had impressive cyber security, so it wouldn't hurt to take a look at their firewalls, right? He looked at the clock, he still had another twenty minutes until the exam started and if he didn't do anything, he was going to go insane, so this would be a good way to keep himself busy and satisfy his curiosity at the same time. 

The rumors really hadn't exaggerated UA's security. Anywhere that Izuku would normally look for holes or backdoors were patched up and defended, and he grinned as he had to get more and more creative the more he poked around. Most villains would probably just take one look at the programs and decide to go hack somewhere less secure. Maybe if he were to…

"What are you doing?"

Izuku yelped and slammed his laptop shut, leaning back as far as he could to get away from the girl who was suddenly way too close to his face. He glanced around the room to find that most of the seats were filled. How long had he been trying to get past UA's firewalls? And more importantly, how long had this girl been there and how hadn't he noticed when she got in his personal space. 

Also, she was a girl!

"Uh, I, um…" He swallowed nervously, but the girl didn't seem to be backing off anytime soon. "Nothing?"

The girl grinned savagely, her pupils narrowing slightly, something that was made more obvious by the crosshairs in them, "If it was nothing, you wouldn't have been doing it!"

Were the crosshairs a result of her quirk? If so, then what was it? It was obviously something to do with her vision, and she seemed to be able to change her pupil size at will, so maybe it was like a telescope? That would be really cool! What were the limitations and...oh, she was still staring at him.

"Do you have a telescope quirk?" Izuku blurted out the question before his self control caught up to his curiosity, then promptly turned bright red and started freaking out. Of course, the first time a girl ever willingly talks to him and he has to make a fool of himself by asking about her quirk like some kind of creepy idiot. 

The girl didn't seem put off by it though, in fact, her grin just got bigger, "I'll tell you about my quirk if you tell me what you were doing on your computer!"

Izuku thought for a moment. He really wanted to know more about her quirk, but...would she think he was weird? What was he thinking? She already thought he was weird! And he didn't know why, maybe it was because she had gotten so close to him despite never meeting him before, but she didn't really seem like the type to stop talking to people just because they were weird. Or maybe that was wishful thinking. 

"I, uh," he smiled sheepishly, "I was trying to get past UA's firewalls?"

The girl blinked at him for a moment, then laughed loudly, "That's awesome! Hacking UA before the exam even starts, what a way to make a first impression!"

Izuku's eyes widened and his stomach dropped, "Oh no! What was I thinking? I just wanted something to do and I've probably ruined my chances! They're gonna think I'm some kind of villain and…"

He was startled from his mumbling by the girl flicking him on the forehead, "Did you have any luck?"

He tilted his head, "What?"

"Did you have any luck hacking UA?"

"Uh, no?" Izuku didn't know why she didn't seem freaked out at all, in fact, she was acting like him hacking UA was a good thing. 

"Too bad." The girl shrugged. "That probably would have been a great way to get your foot in the door."

Izuku thought about that for a moment, but it made his brain spin, so he just shook his head, "Well, I told you what I was doing. What about you? What's your quirk?"

"Zoom!" The girl was grinning again and Izuku would probably have been intimidated if her energy wasn't so contagious. "You weren't that far off with your telescope idea, I can see things as far away as five kilometers, but I mostly use it to zoom in on tiny things while I make my babies!"

Izuku's face went red again and he sputtered, "B-babies?"

She nodded, "Yep! I make all sorts of cool babies for heroes to use! My favorite baby is the jetpack I designed!" 

She dug in her bag for a moment before slamming a grease-smeared folder in front of him. Izuku hesitated for a moment, but she looked like she was expecting him to do something, so he opened the folder and looked at the detailed blueprints inside, "These are really cool! Is this your portfolio?"

She nodded, "Where's yours?"

Izuku put his laptop back in his bag and handed her his own portfolio before going back to looking through her blueprints. A lot of it was technical jargon that he didn't understand, but after a minute, he thought he had a good idea of how the jetpack was supposed to work, "Is this based on Air Jet's backpack?"

"Yep! It's a super-cool flying baby!" The girl looked to be about halfway through his portfolio. "And these are really cool notes, Hacker-kun, but weren't you supposed to bring blueprints for your babies?"

Izuku rubbed the back of his neck, "Well, um, actually, that's only for the invention track. I'm applying for intelligence and analytics, so, yeah…"

"Hmm," the girl looked back and forth between Izuku and his portfolio, then grinned, "that means that we'll have to work together so I can make super awesome babies based off your notes!" She stuck her hand out for him to shake, "I'm Mei Hatsumei, future CEO of Hatsume Industries! What's your name, Hacker-kun?"

Izuku grinned and took her hand, "Izuku Midoriya. Pleasure to meet you, Hatsume!"

"Oh just call me Mei, Izu-kun.." Hatsume said dismissively, ignoring the way Izuku's face turned red again at the nickname. "We'll be working together a lot once school starts, so there's no point in pretending to be formal, don't ya think?"

Izuku wasn't really sure, but he wasn't about to say otherwise and risk ruining whatever this was, "S-sure thing, M-mei-chan."

Mei nodded and handed his portfolio back, seemingly satisfied with the nickname, and Izuku breathed a sigh of relief as he returned her portfolio. Wait, were they friends now? The only person he ever had a nickname for before was Kacchan, and they'd been friends once, so did that mean that Mei was his friend? Or were they just future business partners? What were people supposed to do with their friends? Izuku suddenly felt more nervous about his new friendship with Mei than he did about the exam, which he supposed was a good thing, since distracting himself from his exam anxiety was what he'd set out to do in the first place. 

The background chatter in the room died down and Izuku and Mei looked toward the front of the room to see Powerloader standing on the stage holding a mic. 

"Oh my goodness, it's the support hero Powerloader!" Izuku couldn't help muttering, but Mei actually didn't seem to mind, something he'd have to unpack later, "He's one of only a handful of heroes in Japan that has both a hero license and a support license, which means he can make his own support items, but he normally focuses on making them for…"

"Welcome, everyone, to the entrance exam." Powerloader cut off Izuku's muttering and Izuku slammed his mouth shut so he wouldn't start muttering again as the hero continued, "I'm Powerloader, the head of the support course here at UA, which should be the department you applied to. If you didn't apply to the support course, you're in the wrong place, so just leave and there's staff members at the front office who can help you find where you're supposed to be."

There was an awkward shuffling for a moment as everyone looked around, but no one got up to leave, so Izuku assumed they were all in the right place. 

"Alright, first off is going to be the written exam, which will be taken here. Staff members will be handing out the exam as I explain a few things, so just ignore them and don't break the seal on your exam until I say you can begin. The exam is identical for all four courses at UA, but yours has an additional section with questions on support specifically. You'll have three hours. Next, you'll take the practical exam, which will be divided based on your emphasis. You'll have four hours to create a functional support item, for the invention track, or a finished costume prototype, for the design track, based on the prompts given. You'll turn in your portfolio when you start your practical exam."

And now Izuku's anxiety was back. What was his practical exam going to be? He'd gathered that there wouldn't be many other applicants for the intelligence and analytics track, but Powerloader should have said something about it, right? Had he filled out his application incorrectly? He'd thought he checked it five times, but what if something went wrong? Or maybe they'd wanted him to use his intelligence gathering skills to figure out the exam before he'd arrived? 

A vacuum wrapped packet was placed in front of him and Izuku forced himself to take a deep breath. It was too late to do anything about it now, and he couldn't afford to be worried about his practical exam when he hadn't even started the written one yet. It'd be fine. He could do this. 

"Alright, does everyone have your tests?" Powerloader asked. "Begin."