67

Hitoshi was ready to punch something, but he was pretty sure that was a normal reaction to three solid days of brutal academic testing that was probably the main reason why the physical exams were on the very last day to let them let off some steam before heading off to summer break. The fact that they were punching the teachers though was an interesting twist. He almost felt bad for Ochako having to fight All Might, but it only made sense for the two One for All holders to be paired up, since that was the only way the students would even stand a chance, but it would be interesting to see how Mina would hold up during the fight.

He glanced over toward Kaminari, who had seemed almost relieved when it was announced that they'd been paired up together, which was weird. Because it had also been announced that they were fighting Nedzu and Kaminari was always going on about how intelligence wasn't his strong suit. The only reason Hitoshi could think of for his reaction was that he had someone in the class that he was trying to avoid or really didn't want to get paired with for whatever reason. But that also didn't make any sense because Kaminari was the definition of a social butterfly. There wasn't anybody he didn't like! Maybe he could brainwash him and get the tea, but that was a boundary he really shouldn't cross anyway. He could always just ask him and see if he'd answer voluntarily, but that was awkward and Hitoshi would rather die of curiosity than awkwardness, thanks. 

"I honestly thought they'd pit you against Aizawa." Kaminari laughed awkwardly, shooting a nervous glance up toward the front of the bus where Nedzu was sitting. "You've got, like, those similar scarf things and eyebags and stuff."

"They probably just want to avoid any nepotism charges." Hitoshi grumbled.

Kaminari's eyes widened, "What?!"

"Don't worry about it." Hitoshi said quickly. "Now do you have any strategies in mind for how to fight a rat smarter than most humans?"

Kaminari went pale, "Um...mostly just don't die?"

Hitoshi rolled his eyes, "Nice start, but I think we're gonna need something with a little bit more oomph."

"Well, mon ami, I hope you're as fast as you look." Aoyama said, his smile somehow sparkling as he spoke. "I would imagine it takes quite a bit of speed to outrun a black hole."

"I'm not going to outrun Thirteen's quirk." Tenya said tensely. "That would require going faster than the speed of light. I will only be outrunning their reaction time."

"Light will be absorbed as well?!" Aoyama looked nauseous. "Oh my…"

"You didn't…" Tenya scowled. "How were you planning on fighting them?!"

"My navel laser is simply too marvelous!" Aoyama said. "It doesn't usually require any planning!"

"Everything requires planning!" Tenya said incredulously. "You can't just wing it! "

They both tensed as an automated recording of Nedzu's voice played out over the testing area, "All combatants are in position for the final exam. Begin!"

Tenya fell into fighting stance and stared straight ahead, "When Thirteen comes, we need to be ready to…"

His eyes widened as he felt himself be pulled backwards. He looked over toward Aoyama in a panic and saw that he had already grabbed onto the nearest railing to prevent himself from being sucked in by Thirteen's quirk. Tenya quickly dug his heels in and followed suit, yelling at Thirteen over his shoulder, "Coming at us from behind?! That is disgraceful! You're a hero!"

"Villains aren't going to fight fair kids." Thirteen sounded almost amused. "So what are you going to do about it?"

"We need to come up with a plan of attack." Shouto began. "Aizawa has practically maxed out his stealth stats, so he'll most likely open with a sneak attack."

Yaoyorozu blinked in confusion for a moment before nodding, "So what's the plan?"

"Not sure." Shouto frowned. "My first instinct is to run, but it'll be a lot easier to win if the whole party is on the same page, so how about you tell me what you think we should do and then we can go from there, sound like a plan?"

"Um...sure?" Yaoyorozu looked surprised. "I actually did come up with a strategy that might work, if you think we could maybe…"

"Let's hear it." Shouto nodded decisively. "We've got a boss to beat."

"So, like, you can teleport us to All Might and we can attack him before he has a chance to fight back, right?" Mina asked. "Or does your quirk not really work like that?"

"I mean, it does, technically." Ochako said. "But I'd really rather leave that as a last resort."

"Why?" Mina pouted. "Wouldn't it give us an advantage? I want to teleport!"

Ochako growned, "My quirk isn't like Kurogiri's, Mina! I'm used to the G-forces it takes to teleport and everything, but anyone that tags along isn't and there isn't anything my quirk can do to protect you from them. When Hitoshi and I tried it the other day, just one jump wiped him out for a full five minutes and then it was a couple hours before he was up to 100% again. So, yeah, no. It's not really the best option if you want to, you know, fight. "

"Oh…" Mina slowly got a mischievous look on her face as an idea occurred to her. "We could...I mean, we probably shouldn't, but we could…"

"What?" Ochako demanded. "Come on Mina! Spit it out!"

"Well I was just thinking, if whoever you teleport is gonna be practically useless," Mina defended, "then what if you don't teleport me? "

"Oh." Ochako's eyes widened and she couldn't hold back a smile. " Oh… this is gonna be interesting."

"Ok, this is pointless." Hitoshi huffed. "Nedzu's turned this place into a maze and is only making it worse by knocking down walls left and right. If we keep going like we have been, we're never gonna find a way out before time's up." 

"Well then what are we supposed to do? Head straight for Nedzu?" Kaminari asked. "We don't even know where he is!"  

"Hmm…" Hitoshi thought for a minute. "Well, right now, we're at a disadvantage. He can see us but we can't see him…." Hitoshi grabbed his capture scarf and used it to yank down the nearest camera. "Let's change that."

"Got it!" Kaminari grinned and started sparking as he grabbed the wires where the camera had been, "One blackout, coming right up!"

Tenya grit his teeth, "We're not getting anywhere."

"I can try…this!" Aoyama shot his navel laser at Thirteen and, predictably, it disappeared into their quirk in under a second. "Well, that did not work."

"I told you it wouldn't." Tenya growled. "Black holes are strong enough to absorb light!"

They couldn't run, they couldn't fight, they couldn't even let go of these stupid railings! What was he supposed to do when nothing worked right and all the rules he thought were supposed to apply here were thrown out the window?!

Get creative.

Tenya gasped softly as it clicked. This was what Tensei and Artiste had been trying so hard to hammer through his head. When everything went wrong, he had to go with the flow and think outside the box, otherwise he'd be paralyzed! Direct attacks on Thirteen were useless, they'd simply turn everything to dust, but if they didn't limit themself to the rigid rules of a riar one-one-one fight…

"Aoyama, quickly!" Tenya yelled. "Aim for the ceiling! Let's bring the roof down on top of them!"

Aoyama's eyes brightened with excitement, "Oui, Monsieur!"

Tenya watched Thirteen with rapt attention as Aoyama adjusted his aim and fired. He just needed to wait until just the right moment…

"That's not going to work, kids!" Thirteen called out, using their other hand to suck up the debris from the roof and keeping one hand pointed toward the kids. "You're going to have to do a lot better that that!"

Tenya almost smiled as he let go of the railing. He knew they'd take care of the debris, but they also made the mistake of looking up. As soon as Thirteen saw him flying toward them, they deactivated their quirk, but with all their focus on the falling roof, there wasn't any time to stop him and Tenya used the full momentum of Back Hole to help him as he prepared a devestating kick that knocked Thirteen halfway across the room. Tenya crouched to lower his center of gravity, but he didn't stop moving. Instead, he let his rollerblades do all the work and used the speed he already had to curve around and grab Aoyama, flinging him onto his back as they rocketed toward the exit. 

It didn't take long for Aoyama to recover from the surprise, "Ah, so we're making a run for it after all?"

"I guess so." Tenya panted. 

Aoyama started squirming, "Let me face backward and I shall use my sparkle to dazzle all those who would try to follow!"

Tenya nodded and focused on staying steady as Aoyama held on tight and maneuvered himself so that they were back to back with their elbows linked. It was like they'd become their own battleship and Aoyama was the artillery as he shot his laser in short bursts behind them. There were crashes as anything that was hit with the laser fell to the floor and created obstacles for Thirteen, but the unexpected result was that every time Aoyama shot his laser, it gave Tenya a boost of speed as if the two of them were a literal rocket. The rollerblades get rid of any friction, so all the energy of Aoyama's laser was converted almost directly into pure speed and the two of them practically flew down the halls and through the exit gate. It took a full thirty seconds for so for them to actually slow down enough to stop and they were still speeding away when they heard the recording, "Tenya Iida and Yugi Aoyama have passed the final exam!"

"Ok, so I'm gonna take the high ground and try to figure out where Nedzu is while you sneak up on him through the tunnels, right?" 

"Hitoshi nodded, "They didn't give us comms, but uh...dang it, what can we use to communicate?"

"Well, uh..I have this?" Denki pulled a laser pointer out of his pocket. 

Hitoshi blinked, "Do I even want to know?"

Denki shrugged sheepishly, "It was on Present Mic's desk one time and I thought it was cool, so I was playing with it, but then he came back in the room and I didn't want to get in trouble, so I shoved it in my pocket and I meant to return it after class, but then I forgot that I had it and now it's been too long to return it."

Hitoshi just stared at him. Mic never really used laser pointers while he was teaching, so he'd probably bought it for the cats and then assumed he lost it. 

Apparently, Kaminari took his silence as a sign to keep rambling, "I was thinking that even if Nedzu stopped knocking down buildings when I took the power out, there's still a lot of smoke and stuff in the air, so if I shine the laser where I see him, you'll be able to see where it's pointing. I'm sorry, that's probably really stupid."

"No." Hitoshi grinned. "It's just crazy enough that it might actually work."

Ochako huddled on a nearby rooftop and watched as Mina taunted All Might just like they'd agreed. She might be going up against the number one hero, but she looked like she was having the time of her life.

"Hey All Might!" Mina laughed and waved as she skated around on her acid. "Are you ready to go down?"

All Might gave a booming laugh, "Oh, young Ashido, did you come to fight me alone? Where's young Uraraka?"

"Oh, you know, here and there." Mina skated around him. "She tends to just pop up when we need her. Like now!"

Ochako took a deep breath and called on One for All, focusing on All Might as her anchor point. She just needed to focus on where he was and appear....right behind him! She smiled as the world spun and she landed less than a foot behind All Might. Bingo. 

She grabbed onto his cape and he immediately whirled around, but she hung tight even as she was whipped through the air. It took some concentration to focus on Mina's gravity, but just as All Might jumped to try and body slam her, she latched on and disappeared.  

When they reappeared, All Might immediately collapsed in a puff of steam and Ochako panicked when she realized that Mina was already running toward them and she didn't know about All Might's small form! Ochako cursed under her breath. Of course All Might's body wouldn't be able to handle the jump without reverting. Why hadn't she thought of that?! But if she could teleport close to All Might, then she could jump far from Mina, at least now that she wasn't focusing all her attention on hanging onto All Might's cape for dear life. 

In the blink of an eye, the two of them were two streets away and Ochako snapped the cuff around All Might's wrist as soon as she could so that the exam would officially end and the med bots could enter the city. She didn't even pay attention to the recording that announced their victory as she hurried to help All Might. He was already kneeling on the ground, so she just rubbed his back as he threw up, "I'm so sorry! Are you ok?"

"Umm….I'll get back to you on that." All Might wheezed. "But I'm proud. I...I did not expect you to beat me so easily."

Ochako chuckled awkwardly, "Uh, it was actually Mina's idea. Well, and I guess Shindig should get some credit too, since he was the one who discovered the, um…. unfortunate side effects of riding along with me. Sorry."

"It's…" All Might took a deep breath. "It's alright. Now go and...and celebrate your victory young lady. You deserve it."

Ochako hesitantly stood. She hated to leave him like this, but the med bots should be picking him up soon and she needed to intercept Mina before she saw All Might's small form. After a moment, she nodded and warped, falling into step with Mina as she skated down one of the fake streets. 

"Hey!" Mina skidded to a stop. "Why'd you disappear again? I was gonna help you cuff him!"

"He wasn't completely debilitated after one warp and I wanted to be completely sure." Ochako lied. "He's the number one hero! He's going to be strong!"

"I guess." Mina pouted. "But we won! We passed! Summer camp here we come!"

Ochako grinned, "Yep! What are you most excited for?"

"Hmm, probably swimming." Mina said. "What about you? Are you excited to see a certain purple haired boy in a swim suit?"

"W-what?!" Ochako blushed and covered her face with her hands. "Mina! Why would you say something like that?!"

"I knew it!" Mina grabbed her hands away triumphantly. "I knew that's why you got so flustered when he met your parents. You're crusing on him hardcore, aren't you?!"

"N-no!" Ochako stuttered. "Keep your voice down."

"Ah, come on, he's at his own exam, he's not gonna hear." Mina rolled her eyes. "Forget swimming, there's a more important goal this summer: get this ship to sail!"

"Mina!" Ochako whined as Mina started giggling. "Mina, no!"

Hitoshi followed the red line of light through the smoke until he finally found where Nedzu was hiding. He grinned and adjusted his support item so that he could mimic Kaminari's voice, "Whoa! Shinso! I found him! Think we can win?"

"Ah! Young Shinso! Brilliant use of teamwork and your support items!" Nedzu smiled and looked around the room. "But in case you've forgotten, I did read your file before you started hiding your activation requirements, so I'm afraid I won't be answering any questions from you or Kaminari today!"

Hitoshi sighed and stepped out of the shadows, "I guess we have to do this the hard way then."

Nedzu smiled, "I suppose so!"

Hitoshi lowered into a fighting stance and glanced out the window. The laser pointer was still shining, but the trajectory kept changing like Kaminari was moving toward them. Good, that meant that even if he couldn't beat Nedzu on his own, then he could stall until his partner arrived. He tore his eyes away from the window and focused all his attention on Nedzu, who was standing there smiling at him like he didn't have a care in the world. Hitoshi felt a shiver run down his spine. He didn't know a whole lot about Nedzu and his fighting style, but if his brain was anything like Izuku's, he was in for a rough fight. 

Hitoshi's first move was to attack with his capture weapon, but Nedzu dodged underneath it and rushed towards him before his attack even reached its target. Nedzu lept toward him and Hitoshi managed to force him back with a kick at the very last second, but by the time he regained his balance, Nedzu was already launching another attack. It seemed like everytime he blocked or dodged one attack, there was another just waiting. It was like a game of cat and mouse, but this time, the cat was literally a mouse. 

Hitoshi tried once or twice to switch to the offensive, but Nedzu forced him back onto defense every single time. Finally, though, Hitoshi felt a tingle of electricity in the air. Nedzu noticed it too and turned toward the doorway, giving Hitoshi the opening he needed to finally, finally , wrap his capture weapon around Nedzu's waist. He yanked the entire contraption off his neck and threw it toward the doorway right as Kaminari appeared, "Kaminari! Do your thing!"

"What?!"' Kaminari fumbled the capture scarf for a moment before finally grabbing it in a bear hug, "Oh, right! This thing has a bunch of metal in it!"

Nedzu was almost completely untangled by the time Kaminari was able to send an electric shock down the length of the scarf, but not quite. He went rigid as the scarf got turned into a taser and moments later, Hitoshi was running forward to slam cuffs around his wrist. 

"Kaminari Denki and Hitoshi Shinso have passed the final exam!"

"Shouto Todoroki and Momo Yaoyorozu have passed the final exam!" 

Shouta was honestly impressed. He'd expected Todoroki to steamroll Yaoyorozu and not listen to her input, but apparently he'd been working on his teamwork skills when no one was looking. The plan they'd put together used both their quirks well and played to their strengths, which showed a lot of potential. There was still room for improvement, obviously, but they were still teenagers. 

"We did it, Todoroki!" Yaoyorozu smiled. "We beat Aizawa!"

Todorki nodded, "Poggers."

Denki glanced over at Shinso as they picked their way out of the maze of destruction that Nedzu had created for them. At first, he'd just been grateful that he hadn't gotten paired with Todoroki because he really didn't think that he'd be able to keep his cool for the whole exercise and not let on that he knew about his classmate's super secret streaming hobby...or, more accurately, the murderous gaming partner that came with it.

He was still kinda panicking over who he was supposed to tell. Like, what if Todoroki actually was working with the villains and then the teachers found out and then somehow realized that Denki had known the whole time and thought he was helping them?! But what if Todoroki wasn't giving out any information and the teachers figured out that he was homeless and made him go back to his dad, who was obviously not the greatest if Todoroki would rather live on the streets than apologize to him. If that happened, Denki would feel terrible for ruining Todoroki's life, because he at least seemed to be fairly happy doing what he was doing. Which was streaming video games with a villain who had tried to kill them. Perfectly normal. 

Sometimes Denki just wished that Aizawa or somebody would find the stream on their own so that they could figure out what to do about it and Denki wouldn't have to worry about it anymore. It was kinda a stupid thing to hope for, because teachers were normally pretty lame, so what teacher was going to listen to stupid gaming streams in their free time? He'd pretty much written the whole thing off as a vain hope by the time he'd gotten paired up with Shinso and was pretty much ready to ignore it like he had been ever since he'd first figured it out. 

And then Shinso had made that nepotism comment. 

Denki wasn't 100% sure what nepotism was, but he was pretty certain it was similar to favoritism and meant that Shinso and Aizawa were related somehow. Even if they weren't, there was bound to be some kind of connection between the two and that meant that if Shinso somehow found the stream, then it was only a matter of time until Aizawa figured it out. That meant that all Denki really had to do was point Shinso in the right direction and he could wash his hands of the entire situation!

"So...uh….do you have any hobbies?" Denki started. "Like video games you play or anything?"

Shinso shrugged, "I wouldn't describe myself as a hardcore gamer or anything, but I play. You?"

"Yeah!" Denki latched onto the opening like a lifeline. "I like, um, listening to gaming streams and stuff when I study. I actually know one that you'd probably really like, um if you want."

"I dunno." Shinso hummed noncommittally. "I don't have a lot of spare time right now."

"One of the streamers has, like, this really deadpan sense of humor, kinda like you." Denki pushed. "They're just this streaming duo, you know, and they're pretty new on the scene, but they go by Dusty and Icy Cat if you want to look them up. I can send you a link too, just...I really think you should check them out."

Shinso looked at him suspiciously, "Ok…?"

Denki exhaled in relief and hurried ahead to where the med bots were waiting. He was so glad that was over, that had been awkward as hell.

Notes: