[Image: "The Unknown (Nani Chirin)" by RaaorQtpbpty]

"WHAT‽" demanded all the students in unison. They started complaining about how that was crazy, and terribly unfair. Hansho in particular looked very worried about his chances, but Katsumi didn't see this as a problem, she saw this as an out. If the school board hadn't filled Ayane's seat in the hero course, then chances were Katsumi's seat in the support course was still open as well, just waiting for her to get the chance to claim it. If she was expelled from the hero course, she could do just that. All she had to do was fail the quirk exam.

"A lot of things in life aren't fair," Aizawa explained, shutting them up. "Heroes are the ones who are supposed to even the playing field against things like natural disasters and rampaging villains that most people don't have a chance against. If you don't have a chance of doing that, then I see no reason to keep a student with no potential as a hero in the hero course.

"It's not going to be all fun and games if you want to be a hero. During these next few years, UA will run you through the wringer, and if you can't take it, then there's no point lingering. But if you think you've got what it takes, then give it all you've got and then some. That's Plus Ultra."

None of the students argued after that. Even if they still had complaints, they realized that it wasn't a debate. The entrance exam hadn't even been the qualifying round of this crazy, hardcore tournament they'd signed themselves up for, and if they wanted to win, if they wanted to survive, there was no room for complaining or slacking off. This was a war zone.

Katsumi was in the last group to run the fifty meter dash, so she got observe all her classmates quirks while she waited for her turn. Ayashimu was in the first pair, and showed off her telekinetic ability once more by levitating herself, and throwing herself through the air at high speed, and falling into an awkward somersault when she reached the end with a time of 2.71 seconds. Surprisingly, however, a blond boy named Hitoiki Ayumu was the first to finish, with a time of .29 seconds. Katsumi assumed he must have teleported.

The second group was Chirin and Hansho. Chirin also appeared to have a telekinetic ability at first, but then Katsumi noticed the footprints left behind as she completed the run in 5.97 seconds, and concluded that she had been carried the distance by a large, invisible, bipedal creature. She couldn't tell what Hansho's quirk was, based on this test, perhaps it wasn't well suited for running, but he still finished with a pretty impressive time of 5.21 seconds.

Zenchi Heihomame, a smallish boy with dark skin and an inexplicable silvery quality about him which couldn't be contributed solely to his silver hair, muttered the whole time he was walking to the start line, and when the buzzer indicated for the dash to start, his shoes sprouted wheels and rockets and propelled him to the finish in 3.92 seconds, at which point the wheels and rockets disappeared and he tumbled ungracefully onto his rear. He could have had an object transformation quirk, Katsumi reasoned. She didn't see the other boy, Hibiki Hiretsuna, at all when he was supposed to run, but his time was 6.97 seconds.

Neither Hexum nor Sora Keien, a thin, blond boy, less than a meter and a half tall, showed off their quirks either. Keien tried to do something with the dirt, but evidently it didn't have the desired affect, and his short legs obviously didn't do him any favors in the running department. They finished with 7.45 and 7.85 seconds, respectively.

Hatsuko Kisho, a girl with scales and fangs, obviously some kind of serpent mutation quirk, sprinted with the speed and ferocity of a striking viper, completing with a time of 7 seconds even. Nioubo jumped up and down at the starting line before the buzzer went off, and leaped forward like he was weightless, taking the whole distance in five, ten meter leaps, and 6.29 seconds.

When Kusabana started running, he simultaneously extended a long tendril vine towards the finish line that would cross long before the rest of his body reached it. His time was 3.37 seconds. Ika Sukippu, a girl with pitch black skin and fluorescent blue hair, evidently didn't have a quirk built for speed because she tripped once a little more than halfway through, and she wasn't going all that fast to begin with, ending with a time of 8.96 seconds.

Omisha ran barefoot, and used her quirk to meld together the loose dirt on the ground which increased her grip so she could move without danger of slipping, clever, but it didn't decrease her time by much, and she finished with 7.10 seconds. Her partner, Zei Oribunoki, a slight girl who'd pulled her brown hair up into a bun before the test began, just ran at full-tilt, evidently using a power type quirk which increased her speed, and finished in 3.06 seconds.

Okane used her long and powerful, animal-like hind legs to run the distance in 5.77 seconds, and Ivy Silva, a girl with long, black-green hair with bangs that hung into her eyes seemed to have a poorly suited quirk for a sprint, and ran a 7.51.

the last three students, Katsumi, and two other girls, Taeru Uchikatsu, who had a rosy complexion and boots that looked like they'd come out of a dumpster, and Emi Yukimura, who was obviously a rich girl, ran together. Uchikatsu finished first, running at top speed, unrelenting, and finishing with 4.99 seconds. Yukimura sprinted the distance with a dancer's grace in 6.98 seconds, and though Katsumi couldn't tell what her quirk was, she did notice that the girl didn't cast a shadow, which was, needless to say, highly unusual.

Katsumi walked the whole length at a leisurely pace, ending quite some time after the other two with a time of 51.84 seconds.

"What the hell was that?" Aizawa demanded. Katsumi shrugged. "I watched the video of your entrance exam. You used your quirk to fly, latch onto the back of a zero point robot, heal gaping wounds in your knees, and protect dozens of other examinees, but you didn't lift a finger to earn points, and now this? I've expelled scores of students who didn't have potential but you have nothing but potential, and you're squandering it. Why?"

"Trust me, you don't realize it yet, but you don't want me here any more than I do," Katsumi said, meeting Aizawa's angry gaze. "It's better for everyone if you kick me out of the hero program and let me enroll in the support course like I wanted to all along."

"If you can't even run fifty meters, quirk or no quirk, then you're not wanted here."

"To be clear, I can, but I'm intentionally not, because I want to get the boot."

"And I'm sure it's got nothing at all to do with the fact that you're afraid you can't cut it with the real heroes," Aizawa sneered. "You're just running scared."

"I'm not afraid."

"You're weak. And if you chicken out during a physical exam then no hero could ever want you as a sidekick, let alone a partner."

"Geez, Mr. Aizawa, don't you think that's a little harsh?" Oribunoki said.

"Nobody will trust someone who can't even be bothered to try with anything important, someone who will let others die because they're a brat who cares only about themselves. How can even your family trust you when you act like this?"

Suddenly Katsumi was gone, in her place was a pile of gym clothes, and some kind of bird rocketing up into the sky.

How dare he suggest that she could betray her family? How dare he accuse her of something so against her morals? But was he wrong? The whole reason she was there in the first place was because her father asked her to, and she was being selfish. Her father wanted this for her, wanted her to be a hero, and she was flaking, wasn't she? God damn it!

Aizawa set the buzzer and the bird dove, plummeting to the ground faster than they could see before veering upwards just before hitting the ground. 1.29 seconds. It circled back around before finally landing on top of Katsumi's clothes, snatching them up, and taking them behind a tree. A few moments later, Katsumi returned, back in human form, to make her final argument.

"The peregrine falcon is the words fastest bird, with diving speeds of up to 250 miles per hour. Combine that with a smaller size with less air resistance, and a mass that steadily increases during the dive, and I could reach almost 350 before I had to pull up," Katsumi expounded. "And even though making those changes as fast as I did hurt like a bitch, I bit through it, just to prove your self-righteous ass wrong. You don't know shit about me, Eraserhead, so why don't you butt out?"

Aizawa grinned. "All you've done is prove my point, underachiever. You're selfish and unreliable. You don't belong in the hero program."

"But can you, in good conscience, expel a student with so much potential?" Katsumi said. "Let's see you get rid of me." His mouth was covered by his scarf, so she couldn't see if he was smirking, but his eyes were smug. 

"Onto the next challenge, then."

Name: Daremo Ayashimu; Quirk: Telekinesis—She can move anything with her mind, including herself

In the second event, though it was a bit tricky to position the device with pincers, with the proportional strength of a coconut crab, even in only one arm, she owned the grip strength test with the highest score in the class, 1,089 kg, followed by the girl with the power type quirk, Oribunoki, with a grip strength of 954.

Third event, the long jump, wasn't as easy, because most animals with great jumping power have very large legs, and she didn't want to take off her pants, or rip them. Rather than fully transform she morphed the powerful tail of a kangaroo to give her an extra boost, and added muscle mass in her calves and thighs as she prepared to jump, 511 cm. Nioubo beat her score easily with the same method he used during the sprint, but Ayamishu got the highest score in the end. It was no wonder she scored highest on the physical exam with a quirk like hers. She had probably just levitated every faux villain in the battleground at once, rendering them useless. Truly, it was a frightening ability.

Katsumi couldn't think of anything off the top of her head for the sidestep, but by increasing her muscle mass again she managed to get a few more steps in than in middle school. Chirin had the best score for that event, using the invisible creatures to push her back and forth very quickly.

The ball throw was nothing if not entertaining. Kusabana used his plant limb like a whip to throw the ball, Oribunoki got it over 700 meters with brute force alone, Nioubo shook the ball, and it started to glow faintly, though it was hard to tell in daylight, when he threw it, he shouted "YEET!" and unfortunately it reached almost 1100 meters. Katsumi's 496 meters was nothing to sneeze at, but it seemed this particular group was really good at throwing things.

Oribunoki's strength quirk put her first in the upper body strength test, despite Katumi's best efforts, Kusabana's flexible, apparently boneless, plant body just barely managed to edge her out of first for the seated toe touch, and as it turned out, Uchikatsu's quirk was literally 'Endurance' so obviously she took home the endurance run easily, but all in all, Katsumi was proud of her scores. 

[So who will be expelled??? Care to take a guess? It's a mystery, especially since y'all barely know any of the characters at this point. Find out in two weeks! Love y'all. 

<3 Raaor!]