"Look at him! Trying to be a hero? Tch." A condescending voice blared out towards Izuku. He was fighting a mock villain and said villain's words hit too close to home for comfort.

Izuku involuntarily flinched, expecting to be hit but at the same time he pulled the mock hostage behind him. He signaled with his hands for the kid to run while he dealt with the exercise.

The mock villain's mask broke for a split second, showing concern before going back to an evil grin.

It would always feel bad to be on the receiving end of one of those glares. Afterall he wasn't as strong as Kacchan. And he didn't have an amazing quirk like Todoroki. Not to mention the precise-ness of Iida. The drive to Uraraka. And the energy Mina brought.

He was nothing in comparison to those people.

But at least he knew when he should stop playing hero. And this was not that time.

He isn't done yet and by golly he wants to get his hero license and hang it up in his hero agency along with all the other workers that will be there spending their lives saving innocents.

But in order to do that he has to finish this exercise. So he began to fight the villain and later detain him.

Aizawa saw the small moment of hesitation from Midoriya and squinted his eyes. Something was there, holding his student back from engaging. But since Aizawa was in the observation room along with everyone else, no one could hear the conversation below.

Aizawa made a note on his clipboard next to Midoriya's name.

"Ask mock villan what he said," was written in red ink off to the side.

As a pro hero he realized he could never assume without pointing fingers and possibly making problems worse. But if push comes to shove then he would guess Midoriya had some unresolved trauma.

"What kind of hero do you all want to be? Kero." Asked the groggy voice of Tsuyu at the dorm's breakfast table.

It was six in the morning and gosh darn was it already time to call it quits for the day.

"One that can be like my brother and help others who are in need of assistance!" Chirped Iida. He was one of those people who are such a morning person that it gets annoying after three days of seeing them up at five AM starting an animated conversation about the homework assigned the previous night.

He was also the reason Aizawa went to Nezu in an attempt to switch out of the 1-A dorms and into the 2-A one.

Long story short Nezu refused and Aizawa was sent on an all-paid vacation to a mattress and sleeping bag store. Nezu even bought him a new one as a condolence after watching the security videos of Aizawa's class.

But some things are better left unknown to the boisterous morning person, Iida.

The table nodded at his words. Some admired those words of excitement towards his brother and others looked on with annoyance.

That is what almost got you, Midoriya and I killed. Thought an annoyed Todoroki, sipping his soba.

"I want to be able to help people out of dangerous situations and get them to safety! Be a rescue hero like Thirteen!" Cheered Uraraka, jumping up from her seat and raising her fist to the air.

Midoriya flinched and jumped back by her sudden movement but it went unnoticed.

"They are very admirable, aren't they." Stated Tsuyu thoughtfully.

"Mhm!"

"Yo guys, I just want to use my quirk to help out, yaknow?" Inserted Sero. His eyes were red--a side effect from being bloodshot.

"That's super manly, bro! I just wanna be able to shield people from harm's way! Together we could be like a duo!" Kirishima added on.

"Sure dude." Sero agreed, sticking his hand in the cabinet to grab some cereal.

There was a long silence before Todoroki looked at a small Midoriya. He noticed the slightly pale features and decided to ask if Midoriya was sleeping well later. He seemed different somehow.

"What about you, Deku?" Asked Uraraka, leaning forward over the table. Her arms were crossed and lifting her torso up while her legs were wrapped around the legs of her chair.

Midoriya took a moment to think before swallowing. "I just want to save someone." He whispered.

Todoroki nodded.

Iida cheered him on.

Tsuyu squinted.

And Uraraka thought to herself, "singular? Only one person?" But she nodded it off anyway and sat back down in her seat.

"Yo Bakugo, have you seen Midoriya?" Yelled a voice.

"HAH?!"

"Midoriya? He's been gone for a few hours. None of us have seen him, have you?" Refrased Kaminski.

"Nerd's probably out training." Said Bakugou, turning back to his work on the stove.

After all, none of these other idiots could cook anyways. Besides the one mysterious person that cooked decent food and left it out at meal times. It was always warm and Bakugo's food was always extra spicy. No one would own up to cooking the meals and eventually everyone just started thanking Sato. He had refused the idea of having ever made any of the food, but the evidence was decidedly not in his favor and everyone concluded that if he could bake desserts then he could also cook meals.

Hence Sato was always thanked for the meal.

But sometimes Kaminari would make an offhanded joke about it being a UA ghost.

Bakugo liked the spicy food though, so he was sometimes pissed when the mystery person didn't make meals for a few days. But overall he understood the stress of cooking for twenty people plus sometimes teachers.

However when Bakugo cooked only a handful of people could eat it. He tended to accidentally make meals too spicy. And only Kirishima, Uraraka, Jiro and Midoriya could handle the spices. Kirishima because his aunt loved making bets on who could eat the spiciest foods, causing him to build a tolerance for ultimate manliness. Uraraka because her family bought the cheapest things and sometimes that included extremely spicy foods that no one else wanted. Jiro because she was used to putting a concerning amount of peppers on her food. And Midoriya because he grew up with the Bakugo family.

"Still? Midoriya seems to train twenty-four seven nowadays."

Bakugo grunted in response to Mina's statement. There was a pregnant silence, where the only thing heard was a distant TV and the sizzling of meat being cooked.

"Sometimes Midoriya scares me." Sero speaks up.

"Dude?" Kaminari asks, appalled.

"That's not manly to say, bro."

"Wait wait wait. No! That's not what I mean!" He waves his hand around lazily, leaning on the counter.

Bakugo growled. "Explain."

"It's just that he seems to be so quiet and observant. But that's not the issue, he is probably just very analytical. Yet somehow it always seems like he is working for something...else." Sero trailed off.

"So you think he doesn't want to be a hero?" Asked Mina, tilting her head.

"No. That's not it..." Sero dwelled on her statement. "It's more like he is trying too hard to be a hero. As if he thinks he doesn't belong here and so he works extra hard."

"But Midobro is so manly! He definitely deserves to be here."

"He also has a super strong quirk!" Added Kaminari.

Mina hummed along to the conversation.

Bakugo scowled and gripped the pan, picking up a spatula to move the meat around. His knuckles were white.

"Uhm... Tokoyami what are we--why are we here? Uh...again?" Asked a slightly scared Midoriya. He was not used to being pulled randomly aside and pushed into Tokoyami's room along with Jiro, Shinso, Todoroki and, surprisingly, Monoma.

How Monoma was calm and in this room with four class 1-A kids was a mystery to Midoriya. Yet for everyone else it looked like a regular Tuesday.

"We have chosen you as our next study." Replied Todoroki, pulling out a cold soba from nowhere.

Midoriya looked frightened and began backing up. "S-study?"

He doesn't think he would look good being picked apart by curious scientists and hero students physically--much less mentally. He was a wreck.

No matter how many times Toga had told him how pretty he would look covered in blood, Midoriya never believed her. Such a shame too.

"Yeah, we are slowly working our way through the whole class. We just decided you should be next." Jiro waved off all other thoughts with her hand and turned back to look toward the center of the room, where a circle was drawn.

"Sit in the circle." Whispered a voice from behind Midoriya. Midoriya jumped quite a few feet in the air before flipping around and looking into the eyes of Tokoyami. He had forgotten the latter was behind him.

Midoriya edged toward the circle, slowly walking around everyone from a safe distance away and sat in the circle.

"You did that weird but okay." Monoma said, unnaturally calm. Was he drugged?

Midoriya thought he was drugged.

He sat down criss-cross applesauce in the circle. He hunched down and made sure he was as small as possible in this confusing scenario.

"Today I think we should try to assess the subject." Says Shinso, still slightly salty about the sports festival.

Monoma rolled his eyes. "You imbecile, we should try to rip him to shreds instead."

Midoriya snapped his head to Monoma, completely on edge after hearing his words. He almost flinched when he saw Monoma's grin so much like the Cheshire cat.

"Ignore them. It's what Jiro always does." Deadpans Todoroki.

"Shut it! You're not supposed to say that out loud. Read the room, will ya?" Said Jiro in much more of a whisper as she stabbed the duel quirk user in the ribs with her elbow.

"Your elbow is pointy." He said flatly before deciding to return to quietly finishing his soba.

Jiro huffed as Tokoyami announced that the whole situation reminded him of a saying. Said saying was:

"Revelry in the dark."

Monoma snickered at something Shinso whispered into his ear. Clearly there was a lot of teasing and mockery in the room.

Midoriya is uncomfortable with the events happening inside Tokoyami's dark room. He decides he wants out.

He begins to get up before Monoma pushes his shoulder down again, causing Midoriya to topple back down into the circle.

Midoriya decides to then play dead.

Running failed, maybe dying will work.

He makes sure to fall limp but ends up hitting his head on the ground and groans.

"That was comical!" Monoma starts screeching in laughter while Shinso chuckles. Todoroki asks if Midoriya is okay before they all turn to the edge-lord in the room. He had walked away to grab something and came back. It looked to be a notebook. Similar to Midoriya's Hero Analysis ones. This similarity caused Midoriya's interest to spike, and he sat up straighter. Not even the ominous random purple lighting could deter his newfound curiosity.

"We had these meet ups for fun and then something weird happened one day which lead to Tokoyami finding out Dark Shadow can kinda read auras." Jiro explained slowly, intensely looking at Midoriya. She had thought he was acting off for a while now. And the group had decided that now was a good chance to make sure their classmate was okay.

Midoriya gulped before turning to Tokoyami and smiling. "That is so cool, Tokoyami! You can read my aura whenever you like!"

Tokoyami nodded, feeling bad for lying.

Dark shadow could not read auras. He could, however, pick up on intense emotions and the mental state of people if he was focusing hard enough. That's why he took to certain people faster than others as well as why he tended to push Tokoyami away from overly suspicious people.

The emo boy walked over towards the smiling greenette, crisp notebook in hand.

"Fair warning, I don't know how this affects certain people but I know that there aren't major side effects, the most anyone has gotten was drowsiness. And the quirk counselor that Nezu sent me to recommend that the worst that could happen is someone falling asleep during it." He tried to explain that there was nothing to worry about but he had a nagging feeling that something wasn't right.

Midoriya shook his head up and down in excitement, the boy was like a little kid who was told they could pick out any candy they wanted from a store. "Okay! I'm ready." Midoriya turned around in the circle so he was sitting with his back to Todoroki and Monoma. Jiro and Shinso were to his side and Tokoyami in front of him.

Tokoyami nodded and began to open the book, sitting down. He allowed Dark Shadow out and turned the purple lighting to a deep navy. Probably using a remote from his pocket. He looked into Dark Shadow who nodded and turned to an awestruck Midoriya.

It doesn't matter how many times the greenette has seen a quirk, he will always find every single one freaking fascinating.

"Close your eyes, Midoriya." Jiro said bluntly. Shinso snickered from the sides and Monoma had to have a hand firmly pressed to his mouth to stop a stray comment directed towards the excited teen.

Midoriya did as told though and closed his eyes, though he slightly tensed, as if expecting the worse.

Todoroki, who had finished his soba by now, was observing quietly and picking apart the boy known as Izuku Midoriya.

Dark Shadow began looking closer to the small boy inside the circle. Time seemed to pause.

Suddenly the lights begin to flicker from off and then to red lighting. Dark shadow was screaming, throwing Tokoyami into a frenzy of worry and he began screaming for people to leave before he accidentally hurt them. Monoma was latched onto someone and wouldn't let go. Everyone could hear the bowl (presumably Todoroki's soba) falling over and breaking into a million pieces. Jiro could be heard screaming for everyone to shut up.

A loud noise sounded from the center of the room before the lighting turned back to red. Dark Shadow was gone--having re-entered a disheveled Tokoyami. The notebook was now on the floor, flipped upside down with a couple pages notably bent.

A slap was heard before everyone turned their attention to Monoma. The same guy who hated class 1-A was practically sitting on Todoroki's lap.

"Don't any of you ever speak of this again." Monoma threatened, obviously still shaken from the experience.

Jiro was backed up in the corner, in an early attempt to get her sensitive ears away from the screaming of Dark Shadow. Poor girl.

Shinso had somehow located the light switch and was sitting under it, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed and a bored expression. However slight fear was shown as he looked to the center. Overall he wasn't affected by the screaming and flashing lights, rather he was troubled over the limp body on the floor.

Did they kill him?

I mean if the hand crusher was involved...

And the resident sassy commenter...

As well as the bourgeoisie spy...

Not to mention the person most likely to become a class 1-A serial killer...

And lastly a coffee addict who played off being able to not create a cohesive thought without snarkiness...

Shinso sure thought he was dead.

Todoroki looked down at his hand in sadness before jolting forward to feel his deflated friend's wrist.

He didn't know what he was looking for but he saw it on the news when a medical team rescued someone from a collapsing building. He nodded his head along, acting as if something good was happening before pulling away. He then just sat back with worry.

What if he did it wrong?

He did. But he didn't know that.

"Is he oka--is Midoriya alive?" Asked a fidgeting Jiro. Killing a classmate in her first year was not on her bucket list. At least not this specific student. She picked at her fingernails.

Todoroki nods, eyebrows furrowed.

Shinso decides to take this moment and put matters into his own hands. It's not that he didn't trust Todoroki...

But he never had a reason to trust Todoroki.

Better safe than sorry.

There was a slight pause before:

"You are the dumbest smart person I've met. Get him to Recovery Girl, his pulse is a lot slower than it should theoretically be." Shinso said, lifting himself up.

Jiro and Todoroki got to work, lifting up their test subject and friend, then deciding to follow Shinso, who had at least opened the door for them. Unlike Monoma who did nothing.

"And why aren't you carrying him?" Asked an annoyed Jiro. Her shoulder was already hurting and they barely made it out the door.

"Not a hero." Shinso replied curtly before walking off.

"And what's your excuse?" She turned to Monoma.

"I--" A short intermission between thoughts. "1-A is stupid." He concluded his invisible speech and walked ahead of the two and in the direction of class 1-B dorms.

As everyone walked out of Tokoyami's room, the owner of the room was still in mild shock.

He...hurt Midoriya. He had told the boy that the "aura" reading wasn't going to hurt.

But that same boy was now passed out and being carried to the infirmary room.

Did Dark Shadow write anything at all?

With a shaking hand he picked up the flipped notebook and looked at the blue lines.

Well...something was scribbled on the paper.

In runny red ink was the word:

UndETErMinED.

He blinked before feeling around for any indication of Dark Shadow's presence. What does an undetermined mental state mean? But Dark Shadow was nowhere to be found...for once since he was four years old, Tokoyami felt the somber feeling of being completely alone.