After I was in position in the independents area, I wasn’t surprised to see there were only ten of us. I nodded to a few and said hello to a few that said it first. Most of them had heard I had Endeavor’s recommendation to take the exam and were both respectful and distant. I couldn’t blame them for that, either. It wasn’t often they interacted with someone with that kind of connection to someone famous.
It wasn’t long before the remains of Class 1-A entered their designated area as a solid group. It showed solidarity and implied they were someone to not be messed with. That was unfortunate, because it painted a target on their backs and everyone else wanted to prove themselves against them.
Of course, Bakugo couldn’t resist his usual urge to spout nonsense, curses, and threats. It wasn’t even at me, either. All of the others around him, even some of his own classmates, received a similar attitude. Who in their right minds would threaten their friends to not get in their way?
I almost snorted a laugh at that thought. Did Bakugo even have any friends? For as long as I could remember, all he had were sycophants and minions following him, because he had such a strong quirk. He was praised by everyone, including his teachers, when he was bullying and using his quirk against others. That was why Izuku and I had worked so hard to frustrate him and curbed his antics when we could.
My thoughts came to a stop when I locked eyes with Momo Yaoyorozo and saw the disgust she had on her face. It was directed at me, so my immediate thought was that her and Mei Hatsume were good friends. That meant Mei had been filling her head with a bunch of stuff to turn her against me, probably making me out to be the villain.
“I don’t think we can be friends anymore if you’re so closed-minded to believe the lies you’ve been told about me without any corroborating evidence, Momo.” I said pointedly, reminding her of everything I had done to visit her in the hospital after the USJ incident.
Momo looked shocked for a moment, then her face went red with embarrassment and she turned away from me to hide it.
“Hey, you can’t talk to her like that!” A pink skinned girl with horns wearing a skintight purple unitard shouted.
“Well, considering I used to be able to count the number of close friends I had on one hand, has now left me with four fingers left over, I’m pretty sure I can save her the trouble of telling me we’re no longer friends.”
“That’s mean.” The girl with earphone jacks for earlobes stated. She didn’t look angry, though.
“If she can’t bother making any effort to talk to me, or even text after important events I should have been involved in, she hasn’t considered me a friend in a very long time.” I told her.
She looked like she didn’t believe me, so I took out my phone. I flipped through the sent texts I had sent occasionally, usually during the times I wasn’t busy. None of them had been responded to, not that I expected her to. Mei was quite angry at me for denying her fantasy.
“I sent them at random, just to see if she would respond. I didn’t dare try to call her directly, since she was ignoring me and that would make her hate me even more for bothering her.” I added and earphone jack girl nodded in understanding.
Momo looked even more embarrassed somehow.
I realized then that she might have put that cell phone away and bought another one as a replacement. That way, no one would ever be the wiser if she received texts or calls from me. “You bought a new cell phone after the internships and changed your number, didn’t you?”
“Y-yes.” Momo said softly and her voice was barely above a whisper.
I nodded at guessing right and tucked my cell phone away. “Then I’m sorry you never gave me the chance to explain my side of things.”
“M-me, t-too.” Momo stuttered.
“Is everyone in their places?” The head guy asked over the loudspeakers from the announcer’s booth.
I glanced over to the booth and saw he had several heroes and academy principals gathered around him. The little-mouse-like creature named Nezu was there, as was the principal from Shiketsu Academy. The man’s face looked full of pride until his eyes caught sight of me in the independent section. All color drained from his face and he stumbled back. The prideful look was gone and resignation replaced it.
The other heroes noticed, especially Eraser, and they all asked him what was wrong. The man only shook his head and didn’t say anything. Nezu, the smug little creature, told them it was because I had attended the provisional license exam without my school’s recommendation and his little paw pointed right at me.
Of course, I waved and smiled. I didn’t want the judges to think I was antisocial or held any of the people in that booth in contempt, which I did. No matter my own personal belief, a hero’s career was defined by their public persona and I would never give them the satisfaction of seeing me unhappy.
“Well played, Mister Kent. Well played.” Nezu whispered.
I nodded slightly at him, which made the little creature chuckle. He now knew I could easily hear them all and they were in a secured sound dampening booth on the other side of the arena. His efforts to stop my school from recommending me hadn’t worked because I had better connections.
“Then begin!” The head guy said and a bullhorn blew.
Bakugo didn’t waste any time and instantly lunged towards me with his hand on the release for the grenade gauntlet he wore on his right arm. “Great Explosion Murder God Dynamight orders you to DIE!”
Being the kind soul I was, I stayed still and let him pull the trigger when he was practically in my face with it.
*Hisss-WHAABOOOOM!*
A lot of the initial rush of everyone slowed down as they looked over at the massive explosion. The other independent heroes around me were thrown away because of the strength of the blast. Luckily, I moved at super speed and made sure they weren’t actually hurt by it, then I returned to stand in the same spot in a fraction of a second. The smoke and debris stayed covering me, thanks to a touch of telekinesis.
Bakugo looked immensely pleased with himself and laughed maniacally. “Hahahaha! I knew you weren’t so tough!” He said and did his hero pose, which looked stupid with everyone else around him just standing there and staring at him. “I took you down with one shot! It was a supercharged one, sure. I wasn’t taking a chance that a lesser shot couldn’t do it, so I went all out!”
“I can’t believe they let you stay in school after causing the deaths of three of your fellow students.” I said and used telekinesis to disperse the smoke around me, revealing I was completely unhurt and there was no charring, soot, or anything else on my pristine professional costume.
All of the people around us gasped at the accusation and most of his classmates looked both guilty and embarrassed.
“I’m too valuable to ditch for some useless extras!” Bakugo shouted and started flexing his hands.
“Did they tell you that, or did you assume that’s what they meant when they said they could redeem you from your many mistakes and your deplorable behavior?” I asked, curious if he would actually answer.
“Shut up! I’m going to be the number one hero! All Might retired and he was the only one that was in my way!” Bakugo shouted and took a fighting pose as his hands started sparking brightly.
“Thankfully, I do not share the opinion of your teachers.” I said and moved, making sure it was slow enough that everyone saw a blur, left the wind aspect to my movements, and used the ball in the right hand to touch the three targets on Bakugo in a second. I blurred back to where I stood before and smiled. “Oh, look. It seems you’re the first of three competitors I had to eliminate to advance.” I informed him.
Bakugo froze as he looked down to see the target on his lower stomach. His eyes grew in horror that it was lit up and his expression quickly changed to rage. “YOU CHEATED!”
“Using my powers is me cheating? Didn’t you just cheat by using all of your stored up nitroglycerine sweat from the workouts you’ve been doing the last few weeks and not what you’ve built up today?” I asked and he lost the anger. I motioned towards the doors with my hand absently. “Please make your way out of the arena before you can get hurt by the attacks of everyone else.”
That comment made Bakugo’s anger rush right back and he lifted his left arm and had his right hand on the trigger on the grenade gauntlet. I used a microscopic beam of heat vision to melt the connecting pin to disable the mechanism, to make sure he couldn’t fire it or catch anyone else in a second explosion.
“Katsuki Bakugo has been eliminated as a contestant.” The head guy’s voice said over the loudspeakers. “Anyone hurt by him or eliminated because of him, directly or indirectly, will be healed, have their targets reset, and can rejoin the battle.”
I couldn’t help but smile as Bakugo fumed at being called out specifically. “Good luck with the makeup exam in three months.” I said loud enough for others to hear it, then I whispered. “Assuming you can trick someone into sponsoring a pathetic loser.”
“SHUT UP!” Bakugo yelled and yanked on the trigger, only for it to easily pop off and nothing else happened. “WHAT THE HELL?!?”
I smirked at him and slowly rose up into the air, my cape fluttering out behind me. A chorus of gasps came from may people, most of them female, and I glanced down to see Momo’s bright red face and heard her panting breaths, as if she had run a long distance.
“Good luck, everyone.” I said and turned in the air to face towards where the Shiketsu Academy students had been told to gather for the exam. Using the same trick I used to go to full speed from a dead stop, thanks to my telekinesis, I made a sonic boom and flew across the entire arena in two seconds.
Lots of people trying out for their license were startled by the move, as were the teachers and academy principals in the booth. None of them had ever seen anyone perform something like that and the dramatic cape made me look awesome doing it, again thanks to telekinesis.
I landed beside Tornado guy and used my X-Ray vision on him, only to discover he was a real person. That told me that either the original hadn’t been as dead as I thought or Luthor had taken his quirk after he died and gave it to this imposter. I tapped each of his three targets with the ball I held in my right hand and he looked shocked, then he scowled at me and started to call upon his stolen power.
I tapped his forehead with my finger with enough force to knock him out and he dropped like a sack of potatoes. I glanced around and saw Camie, or the person impersonating her, scramble over a rocky outcrop to jump onto another competitor.
I couldn’t help myself as I felt anger when she cut the young man’s throat and then clamped her mouth over the wound. She seemed to suck and swallow several mouthfuls of blood in a second and then she spent a moment to become an exact copy of the guy.
“HARLEY QUINN!” I yelled, gaining everyone’s attention, especially hers. They all saw her standing over her victim and she sighed.
“Fuck.” The guy said and ran and the guy’s legs stretched out to impossible lengths. Apparently, she could use his quirk and that made everyone scared and they fled from her.
I kicked off from the ground to fly after her and she turned to bring up a weird device to hold out in front of her chest in an attempt to intercept me. Since I was moving at my slowest super speed, I easily dodged it and tossed the ball in my right hand up in the air before I used my open hand to bitch-slap her face.
It was meant to incapacitate and not cripple, so she flipped around in a circle several times before she fell to the ground unconscious. I caught my ball and took the opportunity to tag her three targets with it, knowing they might not count, and stood above her as she morphed briefly back into her Camie disguise, then she morphed from that and revealed her base form as Harley Quinn in her jester outfit.
“A contestant posing as another contestant, does not count as a valid target.” The head guy announced from the broadcast booth. “Emergency Services have already checked the victim and he will make a full recovery.”
“I’m happy to hear that. I figured tagging her wouldn’t count. I just didn’t want the opportunity to go to waste in case it did.” I said and picked her up. I flew over to the exit where the eliminated ones were leaving through and dropped her at the feet of the security guard there. “You should cuff her, even if she’s unconscious. She can morph into different people, so no matter who she becomes after she wakes up, do not let her go.”
“You got it, Supreme.” The guard said and bent down to cuff her and drew his stun baton to hold it at the ready.
I clapped him on the shoulder. “Good man.” I said and turned around to look for another target. I didn’t really have a preference on who to take out, now that I had taken care of the actual dangerous threats.
Now that I wasn’t in a rush, I saw the class of UA being ganged up on by everyone else. What was funny was that it was only the first years, which meant no one from Class 1-B or Class 2-B had been picked to participate.
Stupid elitist propaganda. I thought and saw six balls fly towards me from six different directions. I didn’t even have to move as all six of them had been aimed at the bottom target on my chest and bounced off of each other and went past me without me having to do anything.
The guard laughed and I gave him a smirk and flew up into the air. I surveyed the battlefield and saw one guy bent over with his hands against the stone floor and causing large spikes of rock to shoot up out of the arena floor and wrecking the place. That was reckless to do in any area, especially with allies around him. I flew down and stopped to hover right in front of his face.
“Eep!” The guy squeaked and tried to stand up and jump back at the same time, which caused him to stumble, then he stabilized himself and turned to run.
While he was turning, I easily tagged his three targets and didn’t even have to use super speed. He cursed at being eliminated and only briefly glared at me, then he laughed and waved as he walked over towards the exit.
“Supreme has advanced to the second round.” The head guy announced.
“There’s a second round?” I asked and flew up out of the danger area and saw the head guy point to the other side of the arena and the exit there.
“All will be explained when the remaining 99 hopefuls have been chosen.” The head guy answered.
I waved to him in thanks and flew over to the right spot, landed, and entered the large room. It had refreshments, several large televisions screens, and a counter. I really had been the first and I went to the table loaded with desserts. I ate a couple at super speed and then moved off to the side with a plate of danishes and slowly snacked on them.
I was tempted to call Lois, only I knew it was frowned upon to do so. Would they consider it cheating or something? Maybe getting advice from someone outside of the testing facility was a bad thing when being sequestered inside? I mentally shrugged, because I wasn’t going to take the chance. Lois was depending on me and I wasn’t going to disappoint her.
I stood there munching for several minutes until I heard someone else be announced. It wasn’t a surprise to see Shoto Todoroki enter the room. His two tone colored hair wasn’t messy and his outfit was only a little dusty.
“Hey, Todoroki! It’s nice to see you here.” I said and waved with a danish.
He walked right over to me and gave me a pointed look, then he nodded and picked up his own plate and grabbed several of the choice desserts. It was a nice spread of food, so we weren’t lacking in choices to try.
Neither of us felt like filling the silence with idle chatter, so we stood there beside the dessert table and quietly ate. By the slight smile on Todoroki’s face, I knew he appreciated it. I held in my laugh, because the last time I had been near him and eating a meal, it was in the cafeteria of Endeavor’s Hero Agency and I had told him to get over himself and to stop holding back.
Apparently, my advice had worked and he looked beefier and more sure of himself, without being too arrogant about it. That was the main difference between him and Bakugo, actually. Todoroki never boasted about being better than anyone or rubbed it in their faces. His attitude was going to take him very far in the hero business as much as his fire and ice powers would.
