***

To say that everyone was amazed by the display they had seen would be an understatement. Everyone had been shocked by Midoriya's throw, especially since it was so much better than his first throw. The first throw he had done was what you would expect from someone who wasn't that athletic. The second throw, on the other hand, was entirely different which was what ended up shocking the class. The sheer difference between 46 meters and...

"He threw it over 700 meters!" The boy with the black streak stated.

That's right. Unlike the first time he had thrown the ball, the ball went much farther this time. 654 meters farther, to be precise. Hiromi found herself impressed by the scene, "That's a big difference from his first throw." Clearly, Midoriya had some kind of strength quirk. He used his quirk on the tip of his finger so the ball would be launched forward. Though, it looked like he had been pretty hurt by doing that.

With a big grin on her face, Uraraka hopped while giving a thumbs up to the green-haired boy, "Nice, he's finally showing us his true power!" She had told the others.

On the other hand, Iida seemed to be his usual self, not looking entirely impressed like everyone else. He had a hand close to his forehead to block the light that was shining in his eyes. He actually ended up voicing Hiromi's thoughts, "But his finger appears to be broken now," Iida brought a hand to his chin in thought. "Just like in the exam. This quirk is very odd."

"It seems to be pretty destructive to himself..." Hiromi trailed off. "Does he not know how to control it properly?" From what Bakugou had said earlier, Midoriya didn't used to have a quirk. It was possible that his "quirk" was an ability. If he hadn't had his quirk long then it would make sense that it had such a devastating drawback. If that was the case then Hiromi was shocked that he was able to pass the entrance exam.

Some people had entirely different thoughts, "It wasn't a very pretty throw." Hiromi didn't have to say who said that. She had a feeling that it was pretty obvious.

Feeling a murderous aura nearby, Hiromi turned her head in the direction of the dangerous feeling. It was coming from Bakugou. The blond boy stared at Midoriya with wide eyes, his mouth dropped open. He clearly hadn't been expecting what went down. Finally, he let out a growl as explosions came from his hands. Before anyone knew it, Bakugou was running straight at Midoriya," Midoriya gasped. "Deku, you bastard!" Oh... Was Midoriya's name actually Deku? "Tell me how you did that, or you're dead!" Midoriya, or Deku, let out a yell of fear, quickly bringing his arms up to protect himself. "What, are you an ability user or somethi-" Before Hiromi had time to beat the boy up, Aizawa grabbed him with his scarf. Bakugou grunted from the force and glanced back at the teacher. Aizawa had his quirk activated as well. "What? Why the hell is your damn scarf so strong?"

"He had it coming if you ask me," Hiromi whispered, crossing her arms. He deserved it both for the tone he used when saying ability user and also for trying to attack his classmate. I mean, seriously. If you're going to fight a classmate then do it when the teacher isn't there. Hiromi hadn't gone to school for as long as everyone else here and even she knew that. It was common sense.

"Because it's a capture weapon made out of carbon fiber and a special metal alloy," Aizawa responded to Bakugou's question. Hiromi found herself interested in his explanation. Why didn't the agency have anything like that? They usually only relied on their abilities, their wits, and whatever they had on hand. Maybe Hiromi could bring it up to the President... "Stand down," Deku gulped. "It'd be wise to avoid making me use my quirk so much. It gives me serious dry eye."

That's gotta suck. "Too bad," The students said at the same time Hiromi had thought that. "That power is amazing!" It was weird how everyone had managed to speak in unison like that. It was like they had practiced beforehand, but there was no way that any of them knew each other before today.

Still... "They're right," Hiromi spoke up. "That's gotta be a pain when he's dealing with villains." Even taking one second to blink to rehydrate his eyes would be a bad idea. It was most likely the reason why he was a stealth hero rather than a hero that primarily focused on fighting. He's worked around the weaknesses that he had and still found some way to do his work efficiently.

Aizawa let go of Bakugou, deactivating his quirk as well, "You're wasting my time now," he held up his left hand to signal for someone else to come over. "Whoever's next can step up."

It was quiet as the tension was high from the interaction. Deku made his way around Bakugou, trying to head back to the others without pissing off Bakugou even more. Bakugou didn't move one inch. He only stared down at the ground, gritting his teeth in anger. His reaction made Hiromi wonder. Why was he so upset about Deku having some kind of power? What was so bad about that?

As soon as Deku made it back to the group, Uraraka was the first one to say something to him, "Ouch, is your finger okay?"

"Sure. Fine!" He replied.

Yeah, that was highly doubtful. Hiromi shot a weary glance at his injured finger, "Are you really sure? It doesn't look too good." It was bruised pretty badly and Hiromi could have sworn that she saw it pulsing. It was enough to send slight shivers down her spine. Hiromi had seen some of the most gruesome scenes that no child her age should see, and yet a broken finger was enough to make her blood freeze.

Once again, Deku reassured the girls that everything was okay. Uraraka continued to check on him as he blushed wildly. Hiromi could still see Bakugou glaring at Deku. He would probably get over it eventually. They had to worry about the other tests they had to do. The next few tests were actually pretty easy for Hiromi to do. One was situps, another was seated toe-touches, and the last one was a long-distance run.

The tests were finally finished. The students had gathered together in front of Aizawa, who only stared at them blankly. It was like he was purposely trying to intimidate them. "All right, time to give you your results," Aizawa stated. "I've ranked you all from best to worst. You should probably have a good idea of your standing already. I'll just pull up the whole list. It's not worth going over each individual's score," Aizawa got out his phone, pressed a button on it, and a projection came up in front of them. The projection was a leaderboard with all of their scores. Hiromi searched for her name and found herself being at number eleven. The tests definitely put some people at a disadvantage depending on what their quirk was. Some tests are perfectly tailored to an individual's quirk while others aren't which caused some people to struggle. One of them was Deku, who was in last place at number 21. Aizawa pressed another button and the projection disappeared, "And I was lying, no one's going home," The students stared at him with surprise as he grinned manically, "That was just a rational deception to make sure you gave it your all in the tests."

Loud screams of surprise came from some people. A girl with black hair pulled back in a ponytail placed a hand on her hip, "I'm surprised the rest of you didn't figure that out. I'm sorry. I guess I probably should have said something."

It took a lot for Hiromi not to laugh out loud while the students talked among themselves. The green-haired girl smirked to herself and whispered, "That wasn't a lie at all. He was actually going to do it." Hiromi was pretty good at reading people since it helped out with her job a lot. When Aizawa first said he would expel whoever was in last, there wasn't even one slight hint of him lying. He was completely telling the truth. He probably found something in Deku that he liked which made him change his mind about expelling the person in last place.

"That's it," Aizawa placed his phone back in his pocket, "We're done for the day," Without sparing a single glance, Aizawa walked away from the class, "Pick up a syllabus in the classroom. Read it over before tomorrow morning," Deku let out a sigh. "Midoriya," The boy looked up to see Aizawa holding a paper out to him. "Take this and go have the old lady fix you up," He took the paper from his teacher. "Things are gonna be tougher tomorrow when your actual training begins," Aizawa left the group with one final piece of advice, "Make sure you're prepared." With Hiromi's job, this will be a piece of cake.

***

The next few classes Hiromi had weren't eventful as Aizawa's class. It was mostly just introductions with the teachers and what kind of material they would be learning in class. Hiromi tried her best to pay attention but found that her attention span was much shorter than it usually was. Most likely because she wasn't used to sitting in a single room for so long. It felt like it took forever for the school day to end.

When it did end, Hiromi received a text message as she looked around for someone from the agency. It was a message from Kunikida that no one was available to pick her up so she had to find her way back by herself. Hiromi felt herself sigh, it was going to be interesting to find out whether or not she remembered what Atsushi taught her about using the train. After that, the man started lecturing her because she still hadn't finished all her paperwork and he told her to do it as soon as she got to the agency. It was at that point Hiromi stopped looking at her phone.

While walking to the front gate, Hiromi saw Deku, Iida, and Uraraka in a group together. Hiromi didn't pay them any mind as she walked by them silently, starting to get lost in her thoughts. The others didn't disregard her like she had done to them though. Uraraka actually ended up calling out to the girl, "Hey, Hiromi!"

Freezing, Hiromi looked over at the group, "Hey. How's it going?"

"I was just introducing myself." Uraraka pointed to Iida and Deku. Ah, they probably didn't have a chance to introduce themselves properly this morning. Especially since Aizawa appeared out of nowhere while they were in the middle of talking.

The first person out of the two boys to speak to her was Iida. He held a hand out to Hiromi for her to take, "Hello, I'm Tenya Iida!" Hiromi reluctantly took her hand in his and shook it before pulling away. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Kawakami."

And there it was. A nervous laugh came from Hiromi, "Didn't I tell you that you can call me Hiromi?" Earlier this morning she had told him to just refer to her by her first name and yet he still called her by her last name. That was the last thing that Hiromi wanted to hear so she said to call her something else. Iida sure was the overly polite type.

"I-I'm Izuku Midoriya!" Deku stuttered.

This caused Hiromi to raise an eyebrow at him, "Oh, so your name's not Deku then?"

"'Deku?!'" He inquired, clearly shocked by her words.

It seemed like Hiromi wasn't the only one who thought that was his name. Uraraka had thought the same as well, "Uh, yeah, isn't that what Bakugou called you? During the fitness test, he said, 'Deku, you bastard!' Right?"

At the mention of the incident, Deku- Er, Midoriya had seemed to shrink in on himself as he fidgeted nervously. He started twiddling with his fingers and Hiromi could see the bandage that was placed on the finger that he had broken. "Uh, well," The boy became flustered, something he did a lot. "My name's actually Izuku. Deku's what Kacchan calls me to make fun of me."

Bringing a hand up to his chin in thought, Iida commented, "That's unsportsmanlike."

"Sorry about that then," Hiromi said. "I didn't know."

Unlike the reactions Midoriya had gotten from Iida and Hiromi, Uraraka had a different reaction to the news. "But, you know what?" She started. "I like 'Deku'," She clenched her left hand into a fist to show her own determination, "It could make a great hero name! Plus, I think it sounds kinda cute."

Without even a second thought, Midoriya shouted, "Deku it is!" The boy blushed furiously. It was obvious to Hiromi that he wasn't used to getting comments. Along with the fact that it was a girl that was commenting on him, it wasn't surprising that he got so flustered.

"Just like that?" Iida questioned. "Weren't you saying that it was an insult?"

Turning away with his hands covering his face, Midoriya exclaimed, "Paradigm shift! My whole world is upside down!"

"I don't think it's a bad idea," Hiromi shrugged. "This could be his way of making something bad into something good." A lot of people do it. Like when you make a bad memory somewhere and you try and do good things so you start associating that location with something good instead of something bad. Hiromi had tried the technique herself though it never really worked out for her. There were some things that you couldn't turn into a good memory.

A wide grin spread across Uraraka's face, "Yeah!" She exclaimed. Suddenly, the brunette froze and her smile turned into an expression of thought. The girl turned her attention to Hiromi, "Uh, by the way, Hiromi?" Hiromi hummed in question. She wondered what made the girl look so thoughtful. "Are you going back home by yourself this time? I don't see that guy you came in with earlier waiting for you."

This immediately caught the attention of Iida, "What do you mean, Uraraka?"

For a moment, Hiromi wasn't sure what she was talking about either. Then, it finally hit her. She had run into Uraraka this morning and she must have seen her come in with Atsushi. Hiromi nodded to herself and crossed her arms to protect herself from the cold breeze that blew by, "Ah, you're talking about Atsushi. No, he's at work right now. That's actually where I'm heading."

"Is he your boyfriend?" Uraraka had a teasing look on her face.

A laugh came from Hiromi, "Absolutely not," Even the thought of them dating was humorous. Hiromi would never date Atsushi, she did not, and would never, see him in that kind of light. She had more of a familial relationship with him. Exactly like the connection she had with the rest of the agency. It felt like he was her older brother or something similar, "He's just my friend. He's also one of my partners at work."

"You go to school and you work?" Iida inquired. "That's very admirable of you, Kawakami!"

"Actually," The girl rubbed her collarbone, an act that she usually did whenever she was nervous or deep in thought. Hiromi had no idea why she did it, her thought was that it probably brought some kind of comfort for her. Like when a mother would rub their child's chest if they were experiencing chest pain, though Hiromi never really had that experience. "I only started going to school this year. The last time I went was when I was much younger. I've mostly been working."

There were a number of possibilities of how everyone would react to the information. One would be shock, another would be confusion, etc. As expected, Hiromi was met with a mixture of both shock and confusion from Iida, "Why'd you stop going to school?" He spoke very sternly toward her as if he were chastising her. "Getting an education is very important."

Well, there was the fact that she found out she was an ability user at school and then was kicked out. Her parents also hadn't been happy when they found out what she would and tried to keep her as far away from people as they could up until they finally gave her away. Hiromi didn't tell him that. The green-haired girl only shrugged, saying, "Personal problems I guess you could say."

It was a little quiet after that. It was obvious to Hiromi that they were wondering what kind of problems would keep a child from going to school. She could already imagine all of the outlandish things they were probably thinking happened. Thankfully, the silence was broken and the subject was changed by Midoriya, "What kind of job do you have, Hiromi?"

Great, she was moved from one uncomfortable situation to another. Hiromi was in no way ashamed of her job at the agency. She loved what she did, she loved the people there, she loved them all so much. But Hiromi had to worry about herself. "Uh... I work in Yokohama. I had to switch around my schedule since I've started attending school now." If she had outright told them where she worked then they would easily be able to put the pieces together of what she was... And who knows what kind of reactions they would have?

"Yokohama?" Uraraka questioned. "That's a long way away!" Hiromi only nodded in agreement. The conversation moved to lighter topics after that which Hiromi was grateful for. The four of them chit-chatted all the way on their walk to the station until they finally all went off on their separate ways. Hiromi couldn't wait to tell everyone at the agency about her first day back at school in years. She had a good feeling about school this time around.

***

Maybe Hiromi was wrong. School sucked. You must be thinking... What made her change her mind when it was only the second day? Well, the first day was the introductions and the only "hard" thing she had to do was the assessment with Aizawa. Now that they were on the second day, the teachers were actually getting started with the work. The work wasn't too hard, it was mostly just reviewing stuff that Hiromi had already learned. The people at the agency occasionally taught her themselves since they wanted her to get some kind of education.

The fact that the agency taught her meant that she excelled greatly in some areas and slightly lacked in others. In some of the classes they had started, she was ahead of most of the people in the class. But there were some classes where she was more behind than everyone else. It was a confusing feeling for sure, and also a little frustrating. That's the downside of not going to school in years, but it wasn't exactly her fault that she didn't go.

Finally, it was time for the class that most of the students had all been waiting for. The Hero Basic Training class. The class that All Might was supposed to be teaching. The pro hero hadn't been there on the first day of school because of the press, but they had managed to calm the situation down enough to where he could actually start teaching. All Might was one reason why everyone was on the edge of their seats, the other was that they were finally going to learn how to be heroes.

There was no doubt that Hiromi was going to do well in this class. Despite her... Sketchy past, she had learned quite a lot while working at the agency. There were heroes in their own right, though obviously not the same as the pros. Hiromi imagined that there were more restrictions on pro heroes which meant that whenever she became one then she probably wouldn't be able to get away with some of the methods that were used at the agency.

But, moving on... A loud and booming voice sounded from the doorway, "I am here!" Hiromi jumped in her seat, startled by the sudden shout. She could hear someone, probably Midoriya, let out an astonished gasp at whoever had yelled. Hiromi looked over to see the number one hero himself holding both sides of the doorway as his upper body leaned inside the classroom. He stood on his tiptoes as well. "Coming through the door like a hero!"

Now, Hiromi had never seen All Might in real life. She had only seen him through TV or newspapers. One thing she knew for sure was that has was big... She was not expecting what she was seeing at the moment. The green-haired girl stared at the hero with wide eyes, "He's fucking huge," Everyone let out gasps of their own. Immediately, they were all fangirling over the man, talking about how cool he was and what type of hero suit he was wearing, things like that. "Why does it seem more like everyone's favorite singer decided to pay a visit instead of a hero?"

The pro hero made his way into the room while everyone stared at him with awe. He stopped when he made it behind the podium and placed his hands on his hips, "Welcome to the most important class at UA High. Think of it as 'Hero-ing 101.' Here, you will learn the basics of being a pro. And what it means to fight in the name of good!" Turning away, All Might started to pose and flex. Hiromi raised an eyebrow at this. Who did he think he was? A model? "Let's get into it," When he turned back to them, he had a card. The card had the word, "BATTLE," on it in red. "Today's lesson will pull no punches!"

One person in particular seemed to be very ecstatic about this, "Fight training." If you guessed it was Bakugou then you are correct. He practically had stars in his eyes at the thought of getting to fight his classmates.

Hiromi narrowed her eyes at the boy, "He seems a bit too happy about this."

"Real combat?" Midoriya looked a little worried.

"But one of the keys of being a hero is..." He trailed off to add suspense. Finally, All Might pointed at the wall that have compartments that come out of them. Inside of each of the compartments, there are suitcases with numbers on them. "Looking good!"

This was something that Hiromi found herself questioning, "I... I really don't think it is." What you wear has no meaning when it comes to being a hero. The ADA literally wear whatever the hell they want when they go on cases. As long as they can fight in them then it's fine. Hiromi wasn't sure of what to think about the number one hero. She didn't question that he took pride in being able to save lives, but everything he's done since being here reminded her of a glorified museum piece or even a fame-obsessed star. Maybe Hiromi was being a little harsh on him, who knows.

Not hearing what Hiromi said, All Might continued to explain the suitcases, "These were designed for you based on your quirk registration forms and the requests you sent in before school started."

That was all he had to say to let everyone know what was inside of the suitcases. The students all gasped and cheered. Hiromi could hear Midoriya say, "Costumes!" with pure delight in his voice. It was a little heartwarming to be honest. One thing that she was able to observe about Midoriya is how much being a hero was important to him. It was definitely admirable.

"Get yourselves suited up, and then meet me at Training Ground Beta!" All Might ordered.

"Yes, sir!"

And so all of the students went to get dressed into their hero costumes. The boys went into their lockerroom while the girls went into their own. The girls were pretty comfortable when it came to change in front of each other, the only one who wasn't was Hiromi. She had made sure to actively avoid them while she was putting on her costume. If she had changed in front of them then there was no doubt going to be questions about the scars that littered her back and other places.

A sigh escaped Hiromi after she was finally able to get on the hero costume. It was skintight which she really didn't like. She had asked them to make it a little loose fitting, but whoever worked on her costume clearly ignored that request. Besides that, Hiromi was actually pretty happy with what she saw. She had gotten Yosano and Naomi's help when it came to designing the costume and they were amazing with their ideas. The costume was completely black with gold accents. It showed off a little of her collarbones which was Naomi's idea. It also came with a cape that was black with gold trim.

Once everyone was dressed up, they all headed over to the meeting place that All Might specified. The teacher was already waiting there for them, doing his usual pose with a big grin on his face, "They say that clothes make the pros, young ladies and gentlemen, and behold, you are the proof! Take this to heart. From now on you are all... Heroes in training! This is getting me all revved up. You look so cool! Now. Shall we get started, you buncha newbies?"

After that note, All Might started to set something up which meant that the class could hang out until he was done. Everyone had taken this chance to try and get to know each other a little better, breaking off into their own little groups. The first person that actually approached Hiromi had been Uraraka, "Your costume looks cool, Hiromi!" The girl stated. "It's pretty simple, too."

"Thanks!" Hiromi smiled. "I don't really need support items. My power does most of the work and there aren't any modifications that need to be done to my costume either."

As if some higher power out there hated her (which she swears that one does), the dreaded question finally came up, "I've actually been meaning to ask you about that," Uraraka started. Hiromi tilted her head slightly in question, waiting for her to ask the question. "What is your quirk? Is it some kind of wind quirk?"

Blank. There was not a single thought inside Hiromi's head. It was finally time that someone had asked her that. Hiromi had no quirk which meant that she should definitely correct her and tell her that she actually had an ability instead. Nothing came out though. Hiromi was scared. She thought back to when she had activated her ability on the school playground. How the teacher yelled at her, how everyone stared at her with fear when they found out what she was. What if the same thing happened now? Hiromi was not ashamed of what she was. She would gladly tell anyone that she met. But those people were people she would meet once and never see again.

The girl was spared of the difficult question. She had glanced to the corner of her eyes to see Midoriya. He ran out of the tunnel in his own costume... Which was not the best-looking costume mind you. Hiromi immediately pointed him out, "Hey, look! It's Midoriya."

"Ah! Hey, Deku!" Uraraka called out.

"Uraraka! Hiromi!" The boy said. A blush could still be seen on his face even though his costume covered his face.

There was no doubt that it got worse when Uraraka started making her way toward him and said, "Love your costume! Not too flashy, ya know?" Muffled sounds came from Midoriya as he covered it, still flustered and the costume making him even more so.

Wanting to be nice, Hiromi tried to bring herself to compliment his costume, "She's right. It looks... Good!" The green-haired girl was completely lying. It looked like something that she would have seen in her nightmares... And she had some pretty scary nightmates.

Uraraka rubbed the back of her head, "I should've been more specific about what I wanted. This bodysuit is skintight. Not really my style."

A scoff came from Hiromi, "They probably still would've. I asked for them to not make mine skintight and they did anyway," Hiromi sighed and placed her hand on her hips, turning her gaze to the sky in thought, "A lot of female heroes seem to have skintight suits from what I've seen." It was no doubt because of the fact that they were women too. There was this stupid perceived notion that women heroes had to make themselves look appealing to be able to be considered a good hero while the male heroes were praised by their skills alone. It was stupid.

Speaking of stupid, a small boy wearing purple gave a thumbs-up as he stared at the girls in skintight suits, "I love this school." All of a sudden, the boy felt a murderous glare on him. He let out a yelp and quickly backed away when he saw the look Hiromi had on her face. The sight of his terror made Hiromi smirk. You had to put boys like that in their place.

~~~

If anyone wants to know what Hiromi's hero costume looks like, here is a pic of it:

CREDITS TO THE ORIGINAL ARTIST. I COULD NOT MAKE A MASTERPIECE LIKE THIS EVER. IF THE ARTIST WOULD LIKE ME TO TAKE THE PIC DOWN THEN I WILL 100%.

Obviously, that character in the picture is Storm from X-Men. I actually based Hiromi's powers on her's. I couldn't think of an original hero costume since I have no talent in the drawing department so I was looking around and Storm's costume felt right.

What do you guys think about Hiromi's feelings about All Might? 👀 Hiromi is the type of person who will pick apart pro heroes so expect a lot of that in this story. She started saving people only because she didn't want people to turn out like her so she definitely doesn't like it when people want to becomes pros for the fame and the money which is why she was so critical of All Might. She recognizes his desire to help people and gives him props for it, but feels like he's doing it for his own ego as well.

Anyway, I hope you guys liked the chapter!