Chapter Text
Chapter 17
“Oi! Dipshit!”
Izuku was suddenly broken out of his reverie and turned to look around. He found Izumi standing there with her left hand held up by her right, the index finger on her outstretched hand looking broken and bruised, a dark, ugly purple spreading over it. He was vaguely aware of the twinge of sympathetic pain in his own corresponding digit.
Izumi, looking annoyed and somewhat winded, growled in admonishment, “Don’t do that shit again! Don’t let them win; don’t let them ruin our dream! You’re better than all of that and when we ace this exam we’ll prove it to every one of those doubters. Don’t let go of your dream because they told you to!”
Izuku had still been in the throes of his own self-doubt, but suddenly he began to feel the emotions that had been dragging him down ebb away and his mind seem to clear. Taking a deep breath and looking around, he managed to take stock of the situation. Seeing as Izumi had used a flick to attack the robot, that meant one of their limited uses of their backup technique they’d discovered while training with All Might was already expended. He felt shame at having forced her to do that to herself, but as soon as she saw the thoughts creeping into his mind, she reassured him over their mental link, “ Relax, bro. It was gonna happen eventually. For now, let’s just focus on getting some more points. After all, that’s at least 1, right? ”
With his mind finally clear, he realized she was right. They were in this thing now, so they’d best keep their focus until it was over. As he thought all this, he noticed something moving out of the corner of his eye. When he looked, he thought it might be a person in some sort of white outfit with blond hair running away from the scene. He wasn’t sure, but he also thought he saw sparkles trailing behind them.
Taking a few deep breaths, Izuku steeled himself once more and walked toward the broken robot. He was careful not to cut himself on any of the broken edges of the wall Izumi’s attack had busted through as he climbed through and went to inspect the remains. He saw a few sparks fizzling off of exposed wires that protruded from what was now essentially a pile of scrap. Looking at all the pieces, he realized he had a plan that might work for them.
Izumi watched impatiently as he searched through the pile.. She knew better than to give him any shit for it because she could see his mind was running through so many thoughts that she couldn’t even follow them.
Finally, Izuku found what he apparently needed and lifted a rather large, thick piece of metal. He held it before him and it was almost comically large, nearly as big as himself. He managed to lift it easily enough thanks to all the training they had done at Dagobah, although due to its size it was awkward to move around with.
When he came back through the hole in the wall, he set the metal plate to his side and started looking around for something else. Finally, Izumi’s impatience got the better of her and she said, “Would you please just get this over with? We gotta get going before all those other dickheads get everything!”
Izuku said nothing for a moment as he leaned the piece of metal against a wall, then searched the ground nearby for a moment before letting out a cheer of excitement and bending down. When he stood up, he was holding a rather large length of metal and smiling. Turning to his sister, he held it out to her, and said, “”How would you like to be able to beat some asses with this?”
Izumi stared at it for a moment, then saw the thoughts in his head and grinned savagely before reaching out and grabbing the rod, testing how it felt in her hands. Looking to her brother, she thought, “ I think this could work. Not exactly my style, but for now it’ll have to do. After all, Nezu said it best: You have to use the environment to your advantage. I imagine this qualifies. ”
Smiling at her acceptance, he reached over and picked the metal plate up again, and held it out before him. “ So now you can stay behind me while I take the hits, and when an opening comes, you can jump out and attack,” he explained . “ Sound good? ”
Izumi rolled her eyes, but accepted the plan. “ Feels a little like a bitch move, but hey, at least I still get to wreck shit so it’s better than not hitting things. It’ll work for now. If we have to, we can still use more flicks. ”
Izuku sighed, and agreed. “ Yes, we can. Let’s hold off until we really need them though, ok?
Smirking, Izumi took a couple of test swings, feeling the aching throb of moving her broken finger around. It wasn’t ideal, and she hoped Recovery Girl wouldn’t get mad at her, but she wouldn’t let one angry old woman stop her from doing whatever was necessary.
With their plan in place, the twins began to move further down the alleyway, Izuku slightly ahead and ready to jump in front if any of the robots popped up in front of them before Izumi could attack. As they moved down the alley, they came across a pair of robots: a 2-pointer and a 1-pointer. They were, thankfully, facing away from the twins. Izumi wanted to rush in, but Izuku had a plan instead.
“ Wait, let’s try this: you rush in and deal with the 1-pointer, and I’ll jump between you and the 2-pointer to shield you from its attacks while you do. Then when we get an opening you go around and take out the 2-pointer as well, alright? ”
Izumi thought about it for a moment, looked at the bots, then replied, “ I like it, but one modification: I’m going after the 2-pointer first. Ready? Break! ”
Izuku was momentarily stunned as his sister rushed forward at the bots but since he had no time to argue he ran to block the 1-pointer from attacking her while letting out an angry, frustrated growl at his sister’s impulsive and idiotic actions. As the 1-pointer turned to attack Izumi, Izuku slammed the shield down on the ground between them and put all his strength behind it just in time. The robot slammed its arm forward and Izuku grunted at the exertion of holding the bot back from breaking his defenses, but held strong, only getting pushed back a few inches. The pressure lessened, and he was about to look around the hunk of metal when he heard a loud, staccato series of thunks telling him the robot was unloading its payload of rubber bullets against the shield.
Izumi had known she was going to annoy her brother, but she really did have a plan this time. It was going to be easier for him to hold off the 1-pointer, and if she could get in a sneak attack against the larger, more powerful robot, their job would be significantly easier. So, with that thought in mind, she immediately rushed at the larger bot, trusting that Izuku would manage to protect her as she focused on her attack. As for how she was going to attack, she had taken a few moments to study the automaton, and she saw some gaps in the joints large enough for her to jam the rod into. She figured her best bet was to run up at the thing, slide underneath it, and jam the rod into one of those joints and break whatever she could. After doing just that, she jumped out from underneath as it fell and broke the big, red, glowing eye things to blind it. Finally, she just started whaling on its neck and head, figuring as long as it was nonfunctional, it’d count as defeating it.
Luckily for both of them, it seemed the strategy, bastardized as it was, worked just fine. When Izumi finally managed to beat the 2-pointer, the 1-pointer had just emptied it’s magazine, and was trying to reload. Izumi took that as her opportunity to jump out from behind Izuku’s shield and break it’s optical sensors, then jam her metal rod into the joint and break whatever she could before once more going to town on its head and neck until it ceased to be a threat.
The twins stopped for a moment, catching their breath as they wheezed from the effort and the adrenaline. Once he had enough air in his lungs to do so, Izuku turned to his sister and yelled, “What the hell is wrong with you?! Doing that could have gotten us hurt, not to mention causing us to fail!”
Izumi was too tired to do it physically, so she sent him a mental image of flipping him off, and replied over their mental link, “ I knew you’d bitch out if I told you what I was going to do because you overthink everything. Sometimes you just gotta go with your gut. Shut up and accept that it worked. ”
Izuku just gawped at her, wondering just how reckless she really planned to be through all this. Eventually, though, both siblings decided it wasn’t worth it to stand around and argue, so Izuku let it go for now, and they both mentally agreed to keep heading the way they’d been moving.
As they went, they ran into a few more bots, repeating the same strategy for the most part, racking up kills against three more 2-pointers, and five 1-pointers. By that point, they were down to four minutes, and they needed to move faster. Izumi was just complaining to Izuku as they came around a corner, when—
“ Look out! ”
Izumi managed to dodge out of the way as a pair of 3-point robots tried to crush her. Turning around, she saw the hulking behemoths looming over her, ready to strike at her once more. Just as they were about to attack, however…
“SMASH!”
Izumi was treated to much the same sight Izuku had seen earlier, as both bots were blown away and into the side of a nearby building. Looking over, she saw Izuku standing in the same pose she had been earlier when she saved him from the 1-pointer. A few seconds later, after he had taken a moment to breathe through the pain of his now-broken finger, he sighed, and moved over to her, and asked, “You alright?”
She stared for a moment, then exhaled and nodded. “Yeah, I’m fine. Thanks for that. I coulda taken ‘em, but…”
Izuku nodded, then grinned and said, “Yeah, I know you could’ve, but it’s my job to protect you, you know. Just like you protected me.”
She smiled, glad to hear that he would protect her. Of course she knew as much, but hearing and seeing it was still reassuring. Looking back to the 3-pointers, she smirked and said, “And that’s six more points. At this rate, we might just make it. All we need is to hit a few more and we’ll be solid.”
Izuku frowned, worried she might be a little too optimistic, but he decided her optimism was better than his pessimism so he let the worry go for the moment and smiled. “Yeah, you’re right. Let’s go get our spot in Yuuei and prove we can do it!”
They rushed through the alleys, finding no more bots nearby, and finally decided to break out and head out to the open area in hopes of finding a few stray bots on the edge of the madness.
Out in the main street, the scene they came across was indeed one of madness. Examinees still spent nearly as much time arguing amongst one another over who got what kill, and who had the rights to an upcoming opportunity. When someone did attack a bot, they did so with reckless abandon, forgetting in their haste that there were others around, and some examinees would be hit with shrapnel, or even get caught up in an attack sometimes. The space was so heavily filled with debris and human bodies that it was actually hard to move at times.
They both glanced around and by sheer luck they came across a familiar face. They watched as Ochaco ran by several bots and touched them, floating them up into the air before moving out from beneath them and releasing her targets, crushing them under their own weight.
As she stopped to catch her breath, Izumi grinned and called out, “Woohoo! You go Ochaco!”
Ochaco, who had been focused on her task, looked over and saw the twins, then grinned and waved at them. “Hey, guys! Glad to see you’re still doing okay! You feeling confident?”
Izumi just laughed and said, “I always do! We got this. We’ll see you at the end!”
Ochaco, done with her recovery, gave them a thumbs up, then turned and raced down the road away from them, hoping to score a few more points.
Izumi looked over to Izuku and had a fire in her eyes as she said, “Alright, bro, let’s do this! We can NOT miss an opportunity to be in the same class as such a cute and beautiful girl!”
Izuku wanted to blush and reprimand her, but he was too tired and tense and just said, “We’re gonna do our best. Let’s focus.”
They began moving down the street and came across a pair of examinees arguing with one another over the remains of a 2-pointer. One seemed to sport a rather large construct covering their right arm which appeared to be as large as the wielder himself. The way it lay unmoving on the ground while the wielder gestured wildly at the other person seemed to indicate he couldn’t just throw it around wildly. The person he was arguing with was bundled up in a strange cloak of sorts.The only indication that they were human was their arms, which were also gesturing wildly at the other examinee.
Izumi just rolled her eyes and turned to find another enemy for them to take out. Izuku was just about to follow, when he noticed a 2-point robot coming from around the corner, heading for the examinees. He waited to see if they were going to take it out, too curious about how their quirks worked. The examinees, however, were too distracted to notice the robot approach, allowing it to close in on them. Instead of seeing a display of quirks, Izuku watched as the robot slammed into the one with the large arm, sending him flying into the other and knocking both to the ground. As they tumbled and finally stopped, the robot appeared to wait for a moment to give them a chance to get up and attack, but they were too dazed so the automaton advanced on them, intent on causing further damage.
Izuku, once again acting without thinking, rushed forward with his makeshift shield at the ready. As soon as he was close enough, he brought the shield in front of him and dropped it down hard on the ground, trying to dig it in if at all possible, and bracing for the impact as he interposed himself between the faux villain and its intended victims. Luckily he seemed to get there in time, and managed to catch the next attack that had been aimed at them. Izuku grunted with the effort of holding back the blow, sliding back a couple feet and dragging the shield along the ground, which left a gouge in the pavement.
Izuku was preparing for another attack when he felt the comforting presence of Izumi rushing toward him and immediately heard a massive boom, then the sound of shattering and crashing as she launched yet another flick attack at the tank-like enemy. As soon as he was sure the robot had been taken care of, he relaxed and turned to the two he had rushed to protect. “Hey, you guys okay?”
He was expecting some groans of pain, or maybe a thanks, or even a disappointed sigh at the missed opportunity, but he didn’t expect what he got instead.
“Hey, asshole! That was my kill!”
“No, it was mine!”
Izuku watched in shock as the two of them berated him and each other, mad that they had missed the points. They continued to yell until Izumi approached and glared at them, breathing through her teeth. She managed to grind out, “Get the fuck outta here before I beat you to death, idiots.” She glared at them and they just stared back at her until she lost her temper and slammed the metal rod into the ground and roared, “NOW!”
With that, the pair stood and began to move away, looking for more enemies to take out. As they walked away, Izumi glared after them for a few moments, until she sighed and relaxed, letting herself slump down a little after tensing her body so tightly while confronting the two examinees. “This shit isn’t what I expected to deal with today.”
Izuku stared blankly for a few moments in the direction the other two examinees had been heading, then sighed sadly and turned away, thinking about what they should do next.
“ Guess we should try to find a few mo- ”
At that moment, Izuku and Izumi were interrupted by a rather loud sound coming from behind them. As they turned around, the ground shook and the noise only grew louder, eventually filling the entire city around them with the sounds of buildings being destroyed and people screaming. Looking in the direction it originated, the first thing they saw was a massive cloud of dust, which rose above the level of the buildings, indicating something of impressive size and power. Very soon after that, however, they saw the head of an immense robot rising above the level of the buildings and the dust cloud.
Seeing that, Izuku screamed over their mental link, “ What the fuck is wrong with Nezu?! ”
Izumi was actually stunned into silence, but could only nod in agreement. She knew he was a sadistic prick, but this was just…
Very soon after it appeared, it began to make its way toward them and it had already been rather close to begin with so it quickly came much closer than either twin was particularly comfortable with. Almost immediately, they were nearly trampled by a herd of stampeding examinees running for their lives away from it. A few of them slammed into the twins in their rush to escape from the massive death machine rolling its way toward them.
Izumi wanted to yell at them, but they ran so fast it was amazing they didn’t leave behind dust clouds. Looking up at the giant robot, she shuddered at the thought of trying to face it.
“ I am so damn glad that thing isn’t worth any points. We’d be fucked if we were supposed to fight that. Alright, bro, I think we should- ”
“Ow!”
They were both about to turn and run with the other examinees when Izumi heard the exclamation of pain. It seemed familiar and she was sure they knew the owner of that voice, but it was too hectic at the moment to be sure. Looking over at Izuku, she asked, “ Did you hear that too? ”
“ Yeah. You think they’re okay? ”
Izumi was about to answer when the dust seemed to be blown away, revealing a large pile of rubble in the road in front of the 0-pointer. Looking closely, they saw someone was lying at the base of that pile, and Izuku wasn’t sure if they were okay or not, and was about to yell and ask, when he recognized the person.
It was Uraraka.
Izuku felt a range of emotions and thoughts run through his mind in that moment. He thought back to all the years of teasing he had endured.
“Loser!”
“Weakling!”
“Useless!”
“You’re nothing but a quirkless nerd!”
He thought back to what people had told him all these years about his dream.
“I’m so sorry, Izuku!”
“No, I don’t think you can be a hero without a quirk.”
“Don’t you dare apply to Yuuei, nerd.”
“You should have more realistic expectations, young man.”
He thought about the insane training he’d gone through to get here, remembering all the times he’d ended up on his knees puking out his guts after a particularly hard day of training in the beginning, or how he’d had days where he had a hard time even standing up out of bed the next day. Worse than that were the lessons with Nezu, and his system of abusing his students to ‘encourage’ them.
He thought about the times they’d hung out with Ochaco since meeting.
“Oh, that’s so cool! You guys both want to be heroes?”
“Yeah, you too! I hope we all get into Yuuei together!”
“I don’t wanna go here and not have my two new friends with me.”
As he realized that the first friend they had made in the last decade was in danger, his body immediately moved without another thought. He was already in the air heading for the 0-pointer’s head and charging up One for All into his right arm as he flew before any thoughts at all went through his mind. He wasn’t consciously thinking about what he was doing, rather acting on pure instinct, his only aim to stop the threat to his friend.
As Izuku was flying through the air, Izumi could already feel the twinge in her own legs and arm, their empathic link activating to tell her he was in pain. However as she felt his thoughts, she also knew he wasn’t feeling any of that yet. She knew he wasn’t thinking about what he was doing, just like he hadn’t been thinking when he’d gone to save Bakugo from the Sludge Villain.
‘ That fucking idiot and his overly-heroic streak’s gonna get us killed, someday. ’
Sighing in annoyance, she looked back to Uraraka and realized she was still in pain, whether she was still in danger or not after what her idiot brother was about to do. For now, she knew she needed to deal with Uraraka so that her brother’s efforts weren’t in vain. With that in mind, she jogged over, ready to figure out some way to remove the rubble from Ochaco’s ankle.
Up in the air, Izuku had reached the 0-pointer’s head, and had called on his full power with One for All. ‘ I don’t know what I’m going to tell Recovery Girl this time. I guess I’ll just have to hope she’s in a forgiving mood. ’
When he reached the head of the robot, he put everything he had into his right arm, threw his fist forward at the mech’s head, and yelled out as loud as he could, “SSMMMMMMMAAAAAAAAAAAASSSSSHHHHH!!”
With that bellowed warcry, Izuku’s fist made contact with the 0-pointer, immediately sending it toppling backward. As it tilted further and further backward, explosions began to rip forth from beneath the armor, traveling down the behemoth until they reached the core, then the robot began to explode in earnest, large pieces of its armor flying off of from the force of the explosions and the entire structure beginning to falter as it was destroyed.
Izuku watched for a few moments, making sure it wasn’t going to suddenly start moving again, then when he saw it beginning to fall apart, he cheered. “YES! I DID IT! I actually managed to—”
“ Great job, dumbass, now how ya gonna get down? ”
Izuku was confused for a moment, then remembered where he was and what he’d done and immediately began to panic.
“ Relax, we got ya. Moron. ”
Izuku was even more confused at that, wondering who ‘we’ was, until he looked down and saw Izumi and Uraraka flying at him together while riding a large chunk of rubble. He wasn’t sure how to respond but she sent him a quick image of them catching him and Uraraka using her quirk to remove his weight so they could come down to the ground lightly. That was enough for him, and he adjusted his body as best he could with two broken legs and a broken arm so that they could catch him without problems.
“ We’re gonna have to fix this idiotic habit of yours of just rushing in without thinking about your safety. If nothing else, it hurts like a bitch. ”
Izuku didn’t understand what she meant, until he remembered they felt one another’s pain and began to freak out yet again.
“ Oh my god, I’m so sorry Izumi! I didn’t even think about you and just rushed off to save Uraraka, and then— ”
“ Shut up, I know, just relax and worry about it later. At least you saved Ochaco, so that’s good enough for now. ”
Finally, the females reached Izuku and Uraraka had her hand held out to touch him, immediately removing his gravity as soon as she did. While she did that, Izumi reached out and grabbed him, pulling her brother against her and bringing him onto their makeshift platform. Once she had him secured against her, she looked at the brunette and gave her a thumbs up. Uraraka returned it, then said loudly, “Brace yourselves! Release!”
Suddenly they felt themselves falling again, and Izuku was worried they were going to crash into the ground, but Izumi just held onto Ochaco, who was holding onto the piece of rubble, and when they got close, she must have activated her quirk once more because they quickly stopped falling, that feeling of complete weightlessness returning.
“And release!”
This time they did hit the ground, but only lightly as they’d been just above it. When Izuku felt the sensation of being back on solid ground, he sighed in relief. It had been nice to be weightless like that, but it had felt very unnatural as well, and with his already severe injuries he wasn’t keen to add any other odd sensations to that.
Once they were securely on the ground, Izuku turned his head to thank Uraraka only to find her cheeks and eyes bulging, clearly about to vomit. she immediately turned away and began to empty the contents of her stomach over the edge of the rubble they had ridden. Izuku and Izumi turned away to give her some sense of privacy, but they were pretty sure they saw a light shining from her direction.
Eventually, Izumi and Izuku relaxed and started communicating again.
“ Holy shit, that was crazy. ”
Izuku nodded in agreement. “ Yeah, it really was. I’m really sorry about that, Izumi, I didn’t mean to- ”
She just waved him off and thought reassuringly, “ It’s fine. It’s done, we’re alive, Ochaco’s safe, that’s all the stuff that matters. We’ll work on your stupid streak later, but at least you did something completely badass. ”
Izuku wasn’t sure he agreed, but he was happy Uraraka was safe so that was good. Realizing they were still taking the exam, he started to say, “Oh crap! We’ve still gotta-”
“And that’s time.”
Present Mic’s voice signaled the end of the exam, followed by a very loud honk that made certain everyone was made aware. Izuku was completely shocked, then realized they probably didn’t have enough points and felt his world shatter.
“Oh crap! We didn’t get enough points! I wasted the little time we had left, and now we’re not… I’m so sorry, Izumi. I didn’t mean to make you fail, too. I should have been more focused and…”
Izumi, who was feeling a twinge of regret, still sent him a reassuring feeling, and said, “It’s okay, Izuku. I know you meant well, and we did keep Ochaco safe, so I’m not mad. After all, isn’t it more important to save someone than it is to kick ass?”
Izuku was stunned into silence for a moment, then blinked and said with surprise, “I think I hit my head, because I just heard you say that something was more important than fighting.”
She growled and went to slap his arm, but then she remembered that he was injured and just ground her teeth before sticking her tongue out at him and turning away with a pout.
Off to the side, Uraraka finally stopped vomiting and managed to turn back to the twins and give a shaky smile before saying tieredly, “Well, I guess we can finally relax, at least. We should probably-”
“What did you two idiots do this time?!”
Hearing the familiar voice coming from nearby, the twins both cringed and shrank into themselves, now actually afraid for the first time today. They were not ready for yet another lecture from the elderly healer, nor were they ready for the inevitable walloping from her staff. Trying to stave off the inevitable, the pair of them tried to hide behind the edges of the debris they were sitting on so Recovery Girl couldn’t see them, though it was harder for Izuku with his inability to move very much without causing tremendous pain.
“Oh no you don’t! Get your butts down here and let me heal you so I can beat some sense into you!”
Uraraka looked at the twins, then at the elderly woman down below, wondering just who she was and how the twins knew her.
“We’re sorry, ma’am, we just-”
“ You just! I didn’t do shit, and you jumped off to do this stupid thing all on your own! If you’re gonna hit someone, hit him!”
Izuku cried out in betrayal, staring at his sister in disbelief. “ Traitor! ”
“ I’m not going down for you on this one! This is your mess, you get to suffer for it. ”
Izuku just whimpered as he crawled his way to the edge of the debris and looked down at the healing heroine and gave her the most piteous look he could, hoping to engender at least a little sympathy. “I swear I was only trying to help! Uraraka was in danger and I just moved without thinking!”
The old woman gave him a withering glare that made him shrink back behind the edge a little bit more once again, then said angrily, “You should know better than to think we’d actually endanger the lives of you children. Of course she was safe the entire time!”
Hearing that left Izuku completely empty, and suddenly he felt the world begin to fall away as he realized all his efforts were wasted and he’d only ended up wasting their precious time. As he fell into unconsciousness, he actually heard Izumi snort and begin to laugh as Uraraka called his name with worry. Finally he was allowed a blissful rest after the crazy day they’d just had as he passed out. His last thought was that he just hoped All Might wasn’t too ashamed.