"The rush from the fall likely caused him to faint, thank you." Mandalay lay Kota down on the couch "Eraser warned me one of the boys was a little girl crazy, so I stationed Kota up there to keep watch. I suppose that's the danger of teaching kids your age."

"If only Mineta didn't survive." you muttered

Izuku elbowed you slightly "Well I'm just glad that both of you are okay."

"You must have moved pretty fast to catch the both of them Midoriya, and Y/n I'm glad you had the reflexes to protect him during the fall."

Izuku looked down at Kota "Um... he doesn't like heroes very much does he. I admit that's weird to me, almost everyone I know wants to be a hero, it's my dream. So it's just wild to think that a kid his age is against heroes, hates them even."

You remembered his comment on heroes and how distasteful he seemed towards your class, "Most kids his age were obsessed with heroes and All Might and the idea of fighting crime but Kota seems to be the opposite."

Mandalay leaned back in her chair "How observant of you two, of course he isn't alone, there are many in our society who don't approve of us. Maybe if he had a normal childhood he would have admired heroes like you did growing up."

"What happened?"

The door opened and Pixie-bob walked in "It was Mandalay's cousins, Kota's parents that is. They were heroes too... but they were murdered."

Your breathing hitched.

"It was a villain..." Mandalay started "Two years back, Kota was still so small... they were killed while protecting citizens, perhaps the most respectable way for any hero to die but..."

Kota's past sounded much too familiar.

"How do you even begin to explain to a child that his parents died honorable deaths? They were his entire world, everything. But to him, his parents had left him behind."

Your head started playing flashbacks of things you had tried to push down.

"And all the while, they were being praised because their sacrifice was such a noble one."

"He doesn't even like us that much, we're heroes just like they were."

"He feels like he's stuck here because he has nowhere else to go."

"Heroes just don't make sense to Kota, after all if his parents hadn't been heroes... they would still be here."

What do you do when you start to remember the things you've tried so hard to forget

How can you survive through the agony of reliving something that almost killed you

When you are suffocating in your own head how do you breathe

You do the only thing you know how to do

You bottle it up

Push it down

Smile through the pain

and let it slowly eat away at you until you die.

***

It's way too early for this

Aizawa stood in front of you looking as tired as ever "Good morning class, today we will begin a training camp that will increase your strength, our goal is to increase your skills exponentially so that each of you earns a provisional license. This will allow you to face the dangers that continue to fester in the darkness, proceed carefully."

He tossed a ball to Katsuki "Try throwing this for me."

"Yeah sure, like in the fitness test."

"Precisely, when you first started school your record was 705.2 meters, let's see if you've improved."

"Oh I get it! We're checking our progress!" Mina concluded

"A lot's happened to us the last three months so maybe he can throw it a whole mile now."

"Sero, Mina, it's 5:30 in the morning some of us aren't technically awake yet, shhhhhh."

"Oops sorry Y/n." Mina whisper yelled

Katsuki raised his arm, "Nobody blink..."

You immediately blinked out of reflex.

He pulled back his arm and absolutely YEETED the ball.

"GO TO HELL!!"

Well I'm awake now.

"That was 709.6 meters." your teacher stated blandly

Brooo that sucks.

"You've had a single semester at UA and due to your various experiences, all of you have definitely improved. But those improvements have mostly been limited to mental prowess and technical skill, with a light increase in stamina as well. Your quirks really haven't grown that much stronger."

Ahem, speak for yourself I've improved my quirk a lot.

"I know some of you might be thinking you have indeed improved, but again that is only in the technical elements of your quirk not it's strength."

I can't believe I'm being called out like this.

"That's why we're now going to focus on improving your power." Aizawa grinned evilly "This'll be so hard you'll feel like you're dying let's hope you all survive."

"Well this isn't going to be fun."

***

"Are you serious?"

"Do I look like I'm joking?"

"But I will actually die."

"That's not my problem."

"But Shottaaaa."

"Hurry up you're with Iida first."

You huffed and joined Tenya who was stretching before going on a long distance run.

"Okay Tenya I'm with you first."

"This is a good opportunity for the both of us Y/n, you can get used to my quirk and I can have an opponent to compete against."

Because of how versatile your quirk was, you had to do training with everyone, using their quirks so you would get used to different powers and get better at using multiple quirks in a short amount of time.

"I won't be much of a challenge to beat."

He laughed heartily "Of course you will, have some confidence. Ready... go!"

He blasted off before you even had a chance to take some of his quirk.

God damn he's fast.

After a solid hour of running with Iida you collapsed on the ground, your chest heaving.

"Well done Y/n! You managed to somewhat keep up!"

"Oh my god... that was so hard. I can't feel my legs."

"Not to worry! That feeling should go away soon, it's perfectly normal!"

NOrMaL?!

You debated staying on the ground forever, but you needed to work hard if you wanted to improve.

You stood up shakily "Okay, that was lovely but I've got to move on. Thanks for the pointers Tenya."

You gave him a weak tap on the shoulder as you walked past him and to your surprise he grabbed your wrist.

You looked up at him to see that he looked as shocked by his actions as you were.

"Well I um... good effort Y/n."

"Thanks?" you eyed his hand gripping your wrist

"Oh yes." he retracted his arm "Sorry."

"Nah you're good... have fun."

What was that?

You talked to your teacher who told you that you were with Katsuki next to give your legs a break.

You groaned, knowing you'd just get more beat up, and walked over to where he was plunging his hands into boiling water to help make his explosions bigger.

"I have arrived." you stated dramatically.

"Finally, I was getting bored."

"Welp now I'm here to spice up your life, how do you do this?"

"It's not that hard to understand idiot, you stick your hands in the water and make the biggest explosion you can. Like this."

He demonstrated it for you punctuating the end with a yell.

"Looks easy enough."

You quickly took a portion of his quirk and stuck your hands in the water.

"Holly shit!" you pulled out your hands immediately "That's fucking hot!"

He smirked at you "What did you expect dumbass."

"Not for the water to be boiling!"

"Then be fast about it."

You glared at him for being so nonchalant about the fact he was basically cooking his hands.

"Fine but if my hands burn off it's your fault."

You tried again, this time ducking your hands in the water quickly and then producing an explosion.

"See it's not that fucking hard."

You stuck your tongue out at him and the both of you continued, alternating between hand cooking, and explosions.

Half way through, the 1-B students joined you.

"Hey Kat let's scare them." you gestured to the other class looking down at your class basically killing yourselves to train.

He grinned knowing your plan already. You both created an explosion at the same time, breaking the sound barrier by yelling Katsuki's signature phrase:

"DIE!"

You glanced over at the other class staring at you and Katsuki with simple and pure terror.

"Gottem." you gave Katsuki a quick high five before continuing with your torture.

"Okay, I've sufficiently roasted my hands, time to switch."

"Are you getting tired already? Loser."

You splashed Katsuki with the hot water "I know I'm amazing to be around and you must want me to stay forever, but sadly I must leave you." you teased him, your voice dripping with sarcasm.

He didn't say anything and turned around, you couldn't help but notice the tips of his ears were bright red.

"...okay?"

Your next training partner was Shoto who was standing in a barrel of water. He was supposed to regulate the heat of the water by using his fire and his ice.

"Shoto how are you not dead yet?"

"I don't know."

"That's reassuring."

You pulled off your PE shirt leaving you in your pants and a tank top and tied your hair up high, so it wouldn't get wet.

You noticed a slight problem and called to your teacher "Hey Aizawa! Won't we need another barrel?"

"We don't have anymore, you will both have to work to regulate the same water."

You made eye contact with Shoto, it was a very small space and you had to fit in it with him.

"Get going Y/n you're wasting time." Aizawa scolded you

"I'm going! I don't know why we can't just switch out!"

"There isn't time for that."

Isn't time my ass, he's just trying to make things difficult.

You climbed up onto the edge of it and dipped your legs in. Surprisingly the water was a nice temperature.

"Okay this is going to be tight, ready?"

"Yeah."

You hopped into the warm water, your back pressing tightly against Shoto's. Despite yourself, you made a muffled high pitched noise at the contact.

"Are you okay Y/n?"

"Oh yeah I'm fine, this is fine, let's get going."

The two of you started switching between fire and ice to keep the water at a good temperature. You could feel his breathing heavily behind you and you felt it every time one of his back muscles moved.

Holy shit holy shit holy shit

"The two of you need to cool down that water!" Madalay instructed

"You are both super red, it must be boiling!" One of the other Pussycats named Ragdoll commented.

The water was actually not hot at all.

"Alright Y/n you can get out now." Aizawa told you

"I've only been here for ten minutes though-"

"I said now."

"Okay!" you raised your hand defensively, "I'm going."

You hoisted yourself onto the edge on the barrel and suddenly felt something off.

"Oh god."

You hadn't warned Shoto that you were getting out so he could even out the weight. The barrel wobbled for a second and then toppled over with the both of you inside it.

You hit the ground hard and the water rushing out onto the ground soaking you completely.

You groaned.

Smart move Y/n, smart move.

You felt something on top of you so you opened your eyes to see Shoto right above you. He had stopped himself from crushing you by bracing his arms on either side of your head and straddling your waist.

His eyes were wide and so were yours, you were frozen in place not even able to say anything. All you could do was stare into his eyes while he stared back at you.

You could feel your heart almost beating out of your chest.

And then he started moving closer.

...

"Let's go, you two, get up." Shota roughly pulled Shoto off of you "Todoroki, refill the water and get back to it, Y/n come with me."

You were stunned for a second before you got up trying to brush off the whole experience before you started over thinking it. "But I was the one who knocked it over, I should fix it."

Your uncle gave you a hard glare "Todoroki can handle that himself."

You glanced back at Shoto who was looking just as shaken as you were but he nodded, confirming your uncle's statement.

"Okay, sorry Sho, see you later."

You followed your teacher as he led you to your next partner, you were soaking wet but when you asked to change he said you'd dry off fast enough.

Why is he being so weird, what's going on today? You know what, I'll ask.

"Shota I-"

"If you're going to ask about what just happened, don't. If you can't figure it out then you don't need to know."

"R u d e."