If there was one thing that was scary about having a girlfriend or any kind of friend for that matter, it was taking them to meet your parents. At least Tami knew my mamá. I wasn't worried about that in the slightest being that she met her well before we were going out. While she was still embarrassing—as she'd constantly ask Tami to change into different things or ask countless questions about what life was like in America—Tami didn't mind.

There was just one person I knew would be bad for Tami to meet. I mean, most people who had heroes as their parents should have felt fine introducing their significant other to their parents; however, my dad was Herculean. While the guy barely made it in the top twenty on the Hero Billboard Chart this past year, that didn't mean he wasn't intimidating. Everything was about becoming the best with him. Striving to be mediocre or to just get by wasn't enough.

Honestly, that was the number one reason I was afraid of him meeting Tami. My dad knew I was dating someone from school, but I kept a low profile as to who she was. The less he knew the better. It wasn't that I was ashamed of Tami because I wasn't. If I was, we wouldn't have been dating as that'd be unfair on her part. I just didn't want my dad to try anything.

Following Hatsuko to the dining room, I glanced over at my girlfriend, who was anxiously looking down at her watch, fidgeting with it.

My hand reached into my pants pockets until I pulled out a worn-out stress ball from it. The old thing was barely holding together with all the holes Luz burned into it back when it was hers. It was kind of a secret rite of passage between all my siblings as we all got it the day we had got our results from whatever hero school we applied to.

Tami wasn't getting any results, but she was going to deal with my dad. Hopefully, he'd be in one of his better moods.

"Here," I said to Tami, holding out the old stress ball to her, "try this."

The blonde carefully took it out of my hands as if it was made of glass. To her credit, that thing could have fallen apart at any moment. I mean, it did go through nearly twenty years of my siblings and me squeezing the hell out of it. For my siblings like Luz, who's Quirk was lightning-related, it was burned while being squeezed, while for my siblings like Hatsuko and me, we used every bit of muscle we had to squeeze it.

"A stress ball?" Tami asked. "Why are you giving it to me?"

"Look, I've told you about my dad before, so whatever you do, don't look him in the eye, give short answers, and don't give him anything he can use on you later on," I warned. "That stress ball got all my siblings and me through his lectures, and in case that happens tonight, you'll need it."

"Of course that's if our dad is in a bad mood," Hatsuko explained, not looking over her shoulder to look us in the eyes. "Don't worry. Raiden and I will be there in case things get out of hand."

While I knew my older sister was trying to help, it only caused more stress on Tami. I looked back at her, seeing her clutching the stress ball to her chest as she started squeezing it with her left hand.

"If you need to excuse yourself to use the restroom at any point, do it," I told Tami. "That'll save you five minutes if need be."

Tami nodded her head. "Okay. I-I can do this. I mean, he's a Pro Hero, so he shouldn't be that mean, right?"

Whatever it was that Tami was expecting to come out of Hatsuko and my mouths, it didn't come. There was no point giving her false hope. I just wished I had more time to somewhat prepare her for what could happen.

Then again, there was no way to prepare anyone for meeting my dad.

We turned into the dining room, where I could see the man already sitting at the head of the long rectangular table. His head was down as he looked into the newspaper that was in his hands. Even without him staring down at us, my dad still held a presence that made me want to turn away. My sister felt the same way. She didn't have to say a word for me to know. Seeing her movements slow down a bit was enough.

Hatsuko looked back at Tami and me and pointed at the foot of the table. I nodded my head before I grabbed Tami's wrist and started to pull her in that direction.

Unfortunately, we were too slow.

"Why are you sitting down there?" my dad's voice questioned. I turned to look at him, but his head didn't even poke out from the newspaper. How he could do that was beyond me. "I've saved you two a seat right here."

His hand patted the spot next to him. Hearing that he wanted us to sit next to him wasn't good. My dad was never home much, and if he was and wanted a specific person to sit to his right—like he wanted right now with Tami and me—then it was never good. It wasn't that we were in trouble, but I knew whatever it was, it wasn't going to be good.

"You're squeezing me," Tami whispered.

I looked down, seeing her hand trying to escape my grasp. Seeing it, I let go, shoving my hands into the pockets of my sweats. There were times I didn't know my own strength, and not knowing when I was around someone like Tami wasn't good. There were red marks wrapping around her wrist.

I needed to be more careful.

As if not knowing we were moving there, my dad laid down the newspaper, revealing his face to Tami for the first time. In the corner of my eye, I could tell she was scared and quickly scurried over to a seat. She almost made the mistake of sitting right next to him, but my dad stopped her as he snapped his head at Tami.

"If you don't mind, I want Raiden to sit next to me," he said in a chilling voice.

Tami turned her head at me, and I nodded my head. The last thing we needed was for this to go terribly wrong. I mean, Tami had too much on her mind already. Just being in my dad's presence was enough for anyone to feel afraid. It was hard to believe he was a Pro Hero, especially with the permanent scowl on his face. His dark eyes looked back at me. Without the bulging muscles that were far bigger than what Hatsuko and I had combined, he looked frightening.

Then again, it was no wonder why my classmates thought I looked frightening. While I took after my mamá with her darker skin, brown hair and eyes, I was built like him. That was because we shared the same Quirk.

At least he wasn't wearing his Hero Costume, I thought to myself as I slowly made my way to the seat between him and Tami. If she saw him in that, I knew she'd try to never come here again.

"So Raiden," Hatsuko said, trying to cut down any awkwardness between all of us, "final exams are coming up. How are you feeling about them?"

I shrugged. "Same as everything else."

"Good," my dad said as he folded up his newspaper and turned his gaze towards Tami. "And you? Are you feeling confident enough for your final exams?"

I turned my head to look at her, seeing the small blonde nodding her head. "Yes sir. I feel pretty good about them."

It took everything in me not to smile hearing her say that. Even as my eyes shifted to her hands that were hidden under the table, I could tell she was pretty relaxed for once. The stress ball was just being held between her fingers.

"Hmph," my dad grumbled a bit. "Well, I hope you don't get your hopes too high about them because my son will come out on top."

Tami glanced over at me after he said that, but I didn't say a word. No one must have told him about how Tami was the one who transferred from 1-A to 1-C our first year. I told him I was dating someone from school, but purposefully left out who she was in case he tried looking into her background or something. There were some things that were out of Tami's control, but I could see my dad thinking that she wasn't good enough.

One of those was something as small as transferring.

"So, Dad," Hatsuko interjected, "did anyone tell you that Tami has a really neat Quirk?"

Her Quirk. I let out a small breath of relief knowing that would buy us some more time. Sure, there were people out there that only saw people for their Quirks. Sadly, I was one of them for a while. While Tami's Quirk was admittedly impressive, it wasn't when I first saw it, so I made a few judgments about her.

To say I was disappointed with myself for how I treated her at first would be an understatement, but in my defense, my dad always had me around him before I made it into U.A. Dad made it his mission to make me look at things the same way he did, so I could be the best. Anything less wasn't good enough in his books, which was one of the many reasons why I was afraid of the moment when he met Tami. He'd just see her for her Quirk, for her status, for anything besides who she really was.

Luckily, while I quickly judged Tami for the wrong reasons when I first saw her Quirk, I knew my dad would do the opposite.

"What is it?" my dad asked.

I looked over towards Tami, who closed her eyes for a moment before taking a deep breath. She did this every time she explained to someone what her Quirk was and how it worked.

"BioChange," Tami explained. "I can turn into any animal or person as long as I can keep a good image of them in my head."

She opened her eyes, looking at me instead of my dad. I know I didn't smile, but I nodded my head to let her know she did a good job in that response. There was no way my dad could use her Quirk against her being how unique it was. Until Tami, a Quirk that allowed anyone to turn into someone or something else was basically unheard of. There was a small chance that someone else had a similar Quirk, but it wouldn't have been anything like hers.

Knowing that, I slowly turned my head to look back at my dad, who just kept looking at the two of us for some reason. His face was unreadable, but that was much better than seeing it with his usual look of disdain.

"Interesting," was the only word that came out of his mouth before he looked at me. "Raiden, Hatsuko, why don't the two of you go help your mother with dinner?

Dad never asked for us to help Má with dinner. Most of the time, Hatsuko and I would volunteer without saying a word to help her out. When my other older siblings still lived with us, they would do the same thing.

Despite that, I knew exactly what my dad was up to. If my sister and I walked out of here, that'd leave Tami alone with him. There was no way I was going to do that to her. Whatever he wanted to say to Tami, he could say it in front of me.

"I can do it," Hatsuko suggested. I turned my head to look as my older sister stood up from her chair and grabbed her long brown colored hair and pulled it back into a high ponytail. "Besides, if Raiden gets in the kitchen, he'll just make a mess."

Hearing Hatsuko say that, I wanted to scream that I never made a mess in the first place, but I quickly stopped myself. She was just doing this to give me an excuse to stay out here to protect Tami, but that didn't mean she had to have been condescending about it all.

Before I could say anything, she quickly rushed out of the room, leaving Tami and I alone with my dad. I slowly looked up at him, who just shook his head in disappointment. Seeing him like this, I carefully placed my hand over Tami's, giving it a gentle squeeze.

Everything was going to be alright. Just as long as I was here, then things won't get too out of hand.

"Fine," my dad said as he looked past me as if I wasn't even there. "Smith, I need you to answer a few of these questions, without any interruptions." When he said that last part, he shot me a look, warning me there would be very big consequences if I didn't listen to him. Hearing that, I could feel my muscles tensing up.

No, no matter what happened, I couldn't think of what he'd do to me. I had to think about Tami. She needed me right now more than anything.

I could do this.

When I turned my head to look back at my girlfriend, she just simply nodded her head. I didn't have to ask her about it to know she was terrified. Hatsuko and I warned her about this, but I really did hope that it wouldn't come down to this.

"You're that American girl that dropped out of 1-A the first couple of months of classes, aren't you?" my dad asked, causing my blood to run cold.

Shit.

Shit shit shit! How the fuck did he know that? I tore my gaze off of Tami as I looked at him. When I did, I realized that was exactly what he wanted. His lips curled up into a chilling smile, one that I really hated seeing.

"Y-yes, but I—" Tami started, only to be interrupted by my dad.

"And yet you still decided to attend U.A. after all that?" he questioned.

I was about ready to shout at my dad for being so rude, but Tami beat me to it.

"My friends go there," she answered quietly. "I-It was just easier to stay."

My dad nodded his head, but he clearly wasn't accepting everything. At least, he didn't look like he was.

"And why is it that out of all the people that go there, you decide to date my son rather than someone in your class? You do realize how dangerous it is to date someone who is a hero? That people like us throw ourselves in the line of danger every single day, meaning at any moment, you could be all alone and—"

I stood up from my chair when my dad said that, realizing what he was getting at. My hand quickly pulled away from Tami's as they balled into fists. A part of me hoped I was wrong, but knowing my dad, I wasn't.

Tami still answered, ignoring my actions. "Raiden's been teaching me self defense. I-I can handle myself. I have a few times because of him."

I looked back at Tami, noticing her eyes were glued onto her fingers as she squeezed the stress ball I gave her moments before. Her one thumb kept rubbing the other one, almost as if she was just trying to keep warm rather than calm down the anxiety inside of her. Seeing her like this, I wanted to pull her away, but she looked up, gluing her eyes on my dad for a moment.

"I know what you must think, that I—that I can't handle myself or that I'm pathetic. I am, but I can at least handle myself. I know Raiden can too. He—I've seen him do it before," Tami fought before she pulled her hands closer to her stomach and looked down at them again.

Hearing her words, I froze. Tami thought of herself as pathetic? No. No! She was far from that. This girl proved herself time and time again that she wasn't weak or pathetic. Every time she was faced with a stressful situation, she outsmarted it. Sometimes she needed a bit of help, sure, but that didn't mean she wasn't capable of anything.

My dad was just making her second guess herself. All he was doing was making her afraid of him, so he could manipulate her just like everyone else in our family. There was a reason all my older siblings left the moment they graduated and barely visited anymore. The only reason Hatusko stayed as long was because she worked for his Hero Agency. How she was able to work for him while living with him was beyond me. I even asked my other older siblings about it, and they were all clueless too.

There was an underlying message he was getting at, and that angered me more than anything. Knowing him, he was trying to accuse Tami of being weak and of being a gold digger. My hands clenched tighter into fists as I glared at my dad. It was luck that Tami didn't realize the latter part to his taunts, but that didn't mean I was going to let it slide. If I ever offered to get Tami or her family something, she always refused. She would rather work for something than have it handed to her.

Of course, my dad would have never realized that because he wasn't around to get to know her.

"Son, you better sit down. You know it's rude to get up without being excused," my dad warned. "I don't think I have to remind you of this."

"No," I argued. "You need to leave her alone! You don't know her, and yet—"

"That's why I'm getting to know her," my dad claimed as he narrowed his dark colored eyes on me. "Now sit. If I have to remind you again, I will send you to your room. As long as you live under my roof, you will live under my rules."

I took a step forward to say something when something brushed around my wrist. I snapped my head back to see Tami still sitting in her seat, shaking her head. Her dark brown eyes widened as she looked up at me, begging me to just listen. My shoulders dropped as I saw it. Even though I taught her self-defense and that she used to be in the Hero Department at one time, I knew Tami hated fighting. It was one of the many reasons why I didn't want her to meet him in the first place.

My dad always managed to make any situation tense. How he was about to become a Pro Hero because of it, I wasn't sure.

There was no arguing with Tami, so I just slipped back into my seat and looked down at the table in front of me. The last thing I wanted to do was make her even more uncomfortable than she already was. If she was okay with staying here for a bit longer, then I'd have to be too.

I just hope Hatsuko and Má would hurry it up.

"Interesting," Dad muttered under his breath. "You two have been dating for how long now?"

"A few months," I answered for Tami, not taking my gaze off the table. "We've been friends since our first year."

Those words slipped out of my mouth before I realized they did. It was the truth. Tami and I had been friends for a long time. It was just that I never liked to admit it. If there was one person I never wanted to admit it to, it was to my dad.

Unfortunately, he caught onto it.

"I see, well, that's quite a long time. Carmen and I got married after knowing each other for a month," my dad recalled.

"You two got married because of a Quirk Marriage," I spat. My arms crossed over my chest as I leaned back into my chair. I didn't care how disrespectful I was being. All I wanted was for him to be nice.

Of course, the day my dad was nice to anyone would be the day the world ended.

What I said wasn't a lie though. The only reason they got married was because of a Quirk Marriage. True, their Quirk Marriage was a bit more conventional than most, but it was still a Quirk Marriage. What that meant was that they'd keep having kids until they got a mutation of their Quirks that was seen as ideal. It was tricky, and it didn't always work. I, of all people, should know because I was the youngest, and I only had Dad's Quirk.

My mamá and Dad's marriage was a bit different. According to Má, they actually liked each other and knew each other before they decided to go through a Quirk Marriage. Dad always said they knew each other for a month, but Má always painted the story differently as he just deliberately left important information out. I didn't care what it was. I just thought the whole thing was wrong.

If it wasn't for that Quirk Marriage, Má could have still been a Pro Hero in Mexico. True, I might never have been born, but then Má wouldn't have lost her Quirk when she had me. She was sick when I was born, and that caused her to lose her Quirk, deeming her Quirkless. If only they didn't have a Quirk Marriage, none of it would have happened.

Like all of my older siblings, I never planned on having a Quirk Marriage, but my dad had other plans. If I would have known he was going to bring them up at that second, I would have never had Tami over.

"Quirk Marriages aren't bad," he defended. "It's for the good of humanity that we have Pro Heroes with good Quirks, otherwise, there will be villains who will have stronger Quirks and will easily take over the world."

My fingernails stabbed into the palms of my hands as I pressed my arms closer to my chest. I knew what was going to come out of his mouth next with that. A Quirk like mine, Ultra Strength, was hard to figure out what other Quirk could mutate well with it. BioChange was unheard of, so the chances of it mutating into something better wasn't good. Put those two together, and well, there was no telling what kind of mutation, if there could've been a mutation for that, to actually happen.

If this was Dad's way of forcing me to break up with her, he was doing a shitty job at it.

"What exactly are your plans after you graduate, Smith," my dad asked, changing the subject.

His question took me off guard that I relaxed and snapped my head back to Tami. Just moments ago, she was scared of letting me know about this. I wasn't sure how she'd react now that he was questioning her about it.

"I-I'm going back to America for a couple of years to study abroad," she explained. "I-I still have to think about what I want to do, but—"

"Why worry about that?" my dad questioned, making me realize I had it all wrong with what my dad was going to say. I quickly grabbed Tami's hand and was about ready to make a run for it, but he was quicker. "Your Quirk would be perfect material for a Quirk Marriage. All you have to do is marry my son after graduation."

It was then things went into utter chaos.

Author's Note:

So, fun fact: This chapter was supposed to have more to it before I realized it was getting too long, but I felt like it was needed to show how much of a—uh—how special of a person Tadashi Yamamoto (aka Herculean) is.

And seeing that Tami has a stress ball to help her out, I want to know for this chapter, what is one thing that helps you during stressful events?

Character Spotlight: Hatsuko Yamamoto
Quirk: Ultra Strength
Likes: Sweatshirts

Song: Bunseki Analysis from Boku No Hero Academia (wow, it seems like it's been a while since I've used a song from the anime).