Chapter 13 - Racing Heart

"Again," Aizawa called from the side of the mat. You were sweating and your fingers were raw, but you had managed to snatch Shinsou while he was in the air and drag him toward you with enough force for him to land splayed below your feet. You put a satisfied foot on his back.

"Can I get a minute?" Shinsou breathed up from the ground. Aizawa nodded and you helped the boy up. It seemed that last hit had knocked the wind out of him.

"Sorry." You gave a small smile as you handed him a water bottle.

"Well, you're definitely improving," he winced and took the container from you. You really had been getting better. In just the few brief sessions your technique had improved tenfold. You'd always been strong, but now you knew how to use not only your strength but also your momentum to reign in a captive.

You practiced the jumping capture a few more times before Aizawa stopped the lesson.

"Shinsou, you can go. I'm going to spend a little more time with [l/n]." You mouthed a quick 'thank you' to Shinsou. He took off his scarf and placed it back into his duffel before heading out of the gym.

"I want you to try something new," Aizawa finally said, coming to stand beside you once Shinsou was gone. "Take off your shoes." You suddenly felt uneasy and knit your brows in confusion. But you followed his instructions and soon found yourself standing on the mat with bare feet.

"Now, focus all your smoke to come out of your feet rather than your hands."

"I've never..."

"I know. That's why we're going to test this."

You squared your shoulders, took a deep breath and lowered your body into a slight crouch, not sure what would happen if the smoke did emanate from your soles. At first only a dark mist swirled around your ankles. "Let it out like your ropes," Aizawa pushed. You nodded, concentrating.

You were suddenly knocked backwards as streams of black shot from your feet. Aizawa smiled. A stunned expression crossed your face before you stood up to try again. The haze once again pooled at your feet until you pushed thicker jets, more delicately urging the tendrils this time. You raised up six inches from the ground before you cut the connection, falling the short distance back to the floor.

"I can float!" you marveled.

"I think you'll be able to do more than that. Go stand next to the wall for balance and let's see how high you can go."

***

The Sports Festival was the next day. You had been training harder than you'd ever trained in your life. Between sparring, conditioning, running and Aizawa's smoke practice your body was exhausted but your mind was on fire.

In your last session with Aizawa, you had managed to raise twenty feet off the floor, stabilizing yourself with not just smoke from your feet, but your hands as well. You had even taken a few hesitant steps from up high. It required a lot of smoke to hold yourself in the air but wasn't as taxing at you had first imagined.

Aizawa had instructed you to place a rush order for new shoes from the support class that could be approved before the Festival. By allowing enough small openings on the soles of a shoe, you'd be able to run, kick, and jump, but most importantly, fly. Being a serious contender in the Festival had never felt more real.

Bakugou had been a bit distant from you since that day in his room. He clearly didn't like to appear vulnerable. But as he had sat there on the brink of tears, head resting atop yours, he had never felt more-so. To hide that vulnerability, he focused all his attention on fighting harder, on running faster, and unfortunately for everyone around him, on screaming louder.

Being the day before the Festival, the explosive blond had locked himself into a quirk approved practice room in the morning and hadn't come out.

You decided to take this last day to rest. You would be no good to yourself in the Festival if your body was too tired to move. Your muscles were tight from all your workouts and so chose to reward yourself with a long hot soak. You grabbed your towel and a change of clothes and made your way down to the first floor, past the lounge and toward the baths.

You entered the corridor that split the boy's and girl's side of the baths. As you walked toward the women's entrance, a figure stepped out of the men's, sending a pillar of steam upward, fogging the glass of the entry door. It took your eyes a moment to adjust before you saw Todoroki walking toward you in only a towel.

His chest was exposed and glistened with the condensing steam. His hair hung in front of his eyes, still dripping from the shower, before he casually ran a hand through.  The movement revealed more of his handsome face while simultaneously led to a flexing of his bicep and lats. He was lean and strong, every muscle rigid. You gulped as you took in his abs and had to consciously keep your jaw from hanging open.

"[y/n]." He nodded as he passed you, a small smile on his face. He must have noticed your stare.

"Shouto," you managed to breathe back, a strong flush rushing up your neck. You clutched your towel to your chest and hurried into the baths. Perhaps you'd take a cold shower instead.

***

You could hardly sleep. The anxious feelings toward the Festival flowed through your veins. How could you not be nervous? Blackstone had been a well-known school, but they didn't televise their Festival to the entire country. It had been more of a school-wide training exercise rather than a stage spectacular. What if you failed? What if you won? All your sparring, your secret floating technique, the countless hours in the weight room, would they be enough? Could you beat your classmates in an all-out one-on-one? Izuku? Todoroki? Bakugou? Fuck.

You stared at the ceiling. You stared at the wall. You tried counting sheep. You tried doing jumping jacks to exhaust yourself. You failed. At 5 a.m. you gave up and decided to walk downstairs and at least make yourself a decent breakfast.

You weren't too surprised to see several people already in the common area. Ochako was levitating all the coasters on the coffee table. Izuku kept tapping his fingers, rolling a pen between his palms, picking at his nails, really anything to dispense some pent-up energy. Tokoyami seemed to be trying to meditate in the corner, while Jirou bopped along to music in her headphones - pump up? chill out? - you couldn't tell.

"Morning," you said quietly, heading toward the refrigerator.

"Good morning [y/n]!" Izuku perked up. "How did you sleep?"

"I didn't," you answered back dryly, your voice raspy from disuse. You pulled out the eggs. Coffee had already been made by one of the other early risers, so you helped yourself to a cup, adding a splash of milk and two teaspoons of sugar. You brought out a frying pan to make two eggs and then popped a piece of bread into the toaster.

The Sports Festival didn't start until 8 a.m. so you still had to kill three hours of nervous jitters and crippling self-doubt. You ate your breakfast slowly, hoping by some miracle at least an hour had passed. Nope, only ten minutes. You cleaned up your dishes and headed back to your room. You watched videos on your laptop to pass the time. You checked emails, read the news, searched for recipes, anything that would take your mind off the twisting sensation in your gut.

Finally, at 7:40 you put on your PE uniform, complete with new shoes and headed to the stadium.

***

The roar was deafening. You walked between Bakugou and Kirishima as Snipe, the sharpshooting professional hero and teacher, announced your class.

SNIPE—QUIRK: HOMING. HOMING ALLOWS SNIPE TO CONTROL THE TRAJECTORY OF HIS PROJECTILES WITH PERFECT PRECISION.

You could see Todoroki over your shoulder as you scanned the space. He was in his own world, staring into the crowd.

"Please welcome Hero Class 2-A!" Snipe's slow drawl overemphasized the word 'hero'.

Though smiling, Kirishima definitely appeared to be nervous. His steps weren't even, and he kept jerking his head from side to side, looking at you, looking at the rest of the class, looking at the arena full of people. You grabbed his hand and gave him a weak smile and a nod. He squeezed back, seemingly grateful for the easy contact.

Bakugou on the other hand was a rock, an unsmiling, stoic, glaring straight ahead, and fuck you if you got in his way, boulder.

"Good luck today Bakugou." You started to reach up to pat him on the shoulder, but he took a step too far, isolating himself from everyone. From you. "Or not. Break your leg and die then I guess."

Before you knew it, all the second years in the school were on the arena floor. "And now, please welcome to the podium, last year's winner, from Hero Class 2-A, Bakugou Katsuki..." A boom of applause filled the stadium.

"You think he's gonna do it again?" You heard Kaminari whisper to Kirishima.

"Definitely," Kirishima breathed back.

"Do what?" you chimed in.

"Just watch," the redhead replied, nodding toward the podium.

Snipe's voice echoed out once more, "... who will lead us in the athlete's oath."

"I'm gonna win... again," Bakugou spoke calmly and clearly into the microphone in front of him.

"Did he really just...?" you gasped.

"Yup. Just like last year. That's our Bakugou." Kaminari put his hands behind his head, resting into his arms as if this were just par for the course.

A wail of protests rang out from the assembled crowd of 'bad form!' and 'what a giant ego!', but Bakugou simply walked back toward the students, landing in front of you and Kirishima as if he hadn't just pissed off the whole second year class and much of the crowd.

Snipe tried to calm the stadium by diving into the next round of announcements.

"This year's qualifying round'll be-" The large screen behind him showed a spinning roulette wheel with various tasks listed instead of numbers. The wheel went around and around for what seemed like an eternity before finally landing on- "Capture the Flag!"

The surrounding students all began to mumble.

"Let's explain the rules," Snipe continued. "There are an unknown number of flags hidin' 'round USJ, in all environments, in all kinds of places." He held up a neon yellow flag the size of a playing card. "Your task is to retrieve one of these flags and bring it back to the entrance before they're all accounted for. You'll be timed." You took in a deep breath. You could find a flag. That shouldn't be too hard. "But this wouldn't be UA if there weren't some booby traps and snags along the way. So, watch where you step, swing, swim and fly. Now students, mosey on down to USJ and we'll get ya'll going in twenty minutes."

You followed the hoard of teenagers as they exited the main stage. A caravan of buses had assembled, one for each class to take all the second years to USJ for the first task. You walked onto the 2-A bus and took a seat at the very back. Not caring who sat next to you, you stared down at your hands trying to develop a strategy, to psych yourself up.

There were 6 zones in USJ, the Unforeseen Simulation Joint, UA's rescue training facility. The Ruins Zone depicted a destroyed urban environment with buildings found in precarious conditions. The Landslide Zone simulated sloped terrain with building remains. The Mountain Zone contained a rocky, mountainous area filled with cliffs. The Conflagration Zone showed an urban environment that was constantly on fire. The Flood Zone simulated a maritime environment, containing a ship as well as a water slide. And the Downpour Zone which portrayed an urban landscape continuously hit by heavy rainfall and strong winds.

It would have to be the Conflagration Zone. That's where your smoke could be used to its fullest. You knew it would be to the southwest of the entrance from your various trainings in the building.

"You better get a flag. You promised you'd be on my team." Todoroki sat down beside you, pulling you from your planning. You looked up at him. His eyes were clear and calm.

How is he calm?

"You nervous?" he asked. Your face must have looked far removed from placid.

"If terrified can be classified as nervous, then yes I'm nervous," the words tumbled from your mouth. He pulled one of your hands into his open left. You felt his ever-present warmth flow into your palm. You looked up at him slightly startled at the intimate contact.

"You said this helps soothe you right?" he asked genuinely. You let out a single breathy chuckle, not sure how to reply but didn't pull away.

"Do you have a plan?" he asked in a soft, easy tone. The last of your class filed onto the bus. Bakugou didn't even look back toward your seat, instead sitting upfront, that unwavering, hard look on his face.

"Yeah." The engine roared to life, vibrating underfoot.

"Then that's all you need. Don't worry about the rankings. Don't worry about the other students. Just execute your plan." His words were reassuring. You squeezed his hand lightly before trying to untangle your fingers, but Todoroki didn't release. Instead, he held onto you the whole ride to USJ, easing your racing heart.