Hey hello I'm back! I apologize for up and leaving for like,,,, two years. I had gotten burnt out near the end and I wasn't in the proper headspace to write due to some life problems. Plus I wasn't liking any of my writing, and I knew if I kept going what I put out for you guys wouldn't be my best work. I appreciate those of you who stuck with me through my absence. I can't promise regular updates yet, but I'm working on prewriting chapters and getting back in the groove.

With that said, the first half of this chapter might be familiar, because I continued working on chapter 9 without realizing I had already updated it on here sO the first part will be familiar but I've added onto it and edited it to where I'm happy publishing it for you guys!

I really hope you enjoy, and once again, thank you for sticking with me :)

-Sin

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Kula was in the bar again- it seemed like she was spending more time here than anywhere else lately. Though Shigaraki wasn't there this time, instead it was just Kurogiri, who was cleaning a cup from behind the bar.

"What the hell do you want? It's not like you to call me without Handy Manny here." She said. This was the last place she wanted to be, especially with the head-splitting migraine that was already developing thanks to her parents coming home with a giant bag of thrift store jewelry just an hour ago.

"I brought you here for a simple talk." The villain said, turning the glass in his hand to make sure there wasn't any damage before putting it onto the shelf and directing his unsettling yellow eyes onto Kula, who just narrowed her eyes and remained silent, letting the warpgate continue, "You could always escape the situation you're in."

"What are you talking about."

"We aren't blind to your parent's actions, Kula."

Kula tensed up slightly and balled her fists at her side, "What are you suggesting, I leave and become a part of your stupid group?"

"That's exactly what I'm suggesting. You would be able to exact revenge."

"What, you mean to kill them?" She let out a dry laugh, but something in her head hung onto the idea... but no, she'd be an idiot if she actually joined up with a group of murders who've been threatening the life of one of the only people who's treated her like a decent human being. "I can exact revenge many different ways than murder."

Kurogiri was quiet, but it was clear that he knew that Kula wouldn't be swayed to join them, at least not yet. "Keep the offer in mind. This won't be the last time we have this talk."

And just like that, Kula was greeted with the familiar feeling of falling through cold mist.

***

Mika tapped her pencil on the table, trying to focus on Present Mic's lesson. But it was hard to listen to him when her mind kept wandering to one of her classmates.

She looked over at Kula, who was quietly taking notes- or wait- was she doodling? She was! How adorable! She sighed and stopped tapping her pencil as she looked up at the board, seeing a few sentences in English written up there, but Mika couldn't focus on them, not right now.

Ever since meeting the reserved girl Mika knew something was up. The way she walked into the auditorium during the entrance exams, how she sometimes shrunk in on herself when people got too close to her, the constant pulling at her gloves to make sure they're on and secure, and the not-so-subtle way she would direct quirk-related questions away from her direction. The biggest flag for her, though, was the clear disdain for her family name, as if she wanted nothing to do with them.

Most of what she had noticed were subtle, something other kids wouldn't have noticed, or they would have noticed but it would have been ridden off before anyone could consider anything more, but then again, most other kids haven't been jumping around the foster system for thirteen years. Mika rested her chin on the back of her hand. She knew she had been way too pushy with the girl at first, but it did help her to open up just a bit. They were definitely closer than they were at the beginning of the semester, but all Mika had really done was chip at the walls Kula had put up around her.

After the USJ incident, the two of them- and Kishi- had slowly gotten closer. And by closer Mika means Kula lets the two of them drag her along at lunch and sometimes makes her own inputs in their conversations. All that went to shambles a few days ago.

Kula had come into school that day with a sour expression, her eyes narrowed and looking at everything as if something was going to pop out and grab her, even the ground wasn't free from her gaze. It was obvious that there was something weighing heavily on her mind, and the fact that Mika didn't know how to help her made the blond frustrated.

The bell rang, breaking her out of her thoughts as she moved her gaze from Kula to Present Mic, who had stopped mid-sentence and sighed, "We'll continue this next class, enjoy your lunch listeners!" With that he waved and dipped out of the room and not even seconds later the entire classroom erupted in chatter. Before Mika and Kishi could even get to Kula she rushed out of the room with her bag.

Kishi stood beside Mika, his hands in his pockets as he looked out the door, a small frown on his face. "She needs someone to talk to." He said, glancing down at Mika. When the blond didn't move, he nudged her softly with his elbow with a quiet sigh, "Mika, go talk to her."

Mika looked at Kishi for a second before she took a deep breath and nodded. She didn't need some kind of intensive plan that required multiple moving parts, she just needed to go in and be there for Kula. Though bringing some food with her might help.

After a quick stop at the cafeteria, Mika walked through the school with two bags in her hands. Thankfully since the school was so big and a lot of the students opt out of eating in the cafeteria Lunch Rush prepares to-go meals for students. It took a while for Mika to find her friend, but she eventually found her sitting in one of the bridges between the General studies and Business course buildings, she was sitting against the windows sketching in what Mika could only assume was her idea book going by the coffee stains and scuff marks on the cover.

"I brought some food." Mika said, lifting the bags up into view.

"Thanks, I'm not hungry." Kula said shortly, only sparing a slight gaze upwards.

"Aw, come on, he had your favorite today! Miso-zuke Salmon and rice~" She waved the bag in front of Kula, who hesitated for a second before sighing and shifting a bit, a sign that she was allowing Mika to sit next to her.

The blond didn't hesitate to sit down, and she placed the bags down before grabbing her own box of food and started eating. Kula doing the same beside her. There was a soft 'snap' when the both of them snapped their chopsticks before digging into their food but afterwards they fell into a soft silence. It was nice.

Of course, nice things didn't last forever. They were interrupted by the sound of footsteps and a loud gasp.

"No way, Kula?! Is that really you?!" A voice shouted out and Kula flinched, almost choking on the bite of food she had taken as the two girls looked up to see a girl walking up to them. Something about the pitch of her voice and the way she looked at Kula rubbed Mika the wrong way.

"Oh. Heikin." Kula said, a certain venom in her voice.

"You sneak in or something? There's no way a quirkless looser like you'd actually get into this school." The girl snickered.

Mika glanced from the newcomer to Kula, who's expression turned sour. "Looks like your insults haven't improved. Didn't think U.A would accept someone as dull as you."

The girl, Heikin tensed up, "I got in on my own merit and intelligence."

Mika sighed and leaned back on the window, getting the attention on her, "I've known you for what, five, maybe ten seconds and even I can tell you're as smart as a marble."

Heikin gritted her teeth, "How dare you! Do you know who I am?!" As she was ranting, Mika stood up and stretched her hand out towards the ranting girl and a second later she was quiet- well at least neither of them could hear her despite her still running her mouth. With a sigh Mika sad back down and grabbed her chopsticks.

"What did you do?" Kula asked.

"Just nullified the sound coming from her. It's my quirk."

Interest gleamed in Kula's eyes, and it was obvious that she wanted to ask questions but was holding herself back. Mika just smiled, "We haven't really talked about our quirks, well aside from Kishi, so it makes sense you didn't know. It's called Nullify, though it's not actually as cool as it sounds," she lifted her finger and twirled it in the air, "I can nullify either outgoing or incoming sound from a certain area or attach it to someone and make them effectively mute, or deaf until I turn it off or it wears off, which usually takes a few hours to do."

"So, she's stuck like that for a while?" Kula asked, looking at the now frustrated and seemingly screaming Heikin.

"Yep! Because there's no way in hell I'll willingly release my quirk on her!" Mika laughed and tossed an apple slice in her mouth as she watched the girl in front of her huffed, stomped her foot, and stormed away.

"...Thanks..." Kula said, her voice just barely above a whisper.

Mika looked at her and smiled, "It's not a problem, I'd do anything for you."

Kula paused, something going through her head before a golden glow rose to her cheeks, she turned her head and suddenly the salmon in front of her was extremely interesting. "Yeah, right, and I'd do the same. After all we're..." She paused, and Mika could see the expression on her face change. "We're friends right?"

It took all of her self control to keep calm after Kula said that, but Mika couldn't hide the grin that had spread to her face, "Of course we are! Starting today we're officially friends!"

***

Friend. Kula had friends. Kishi and Mika were her friends. On her walk home after school Kula had to keep repeating that phrase to herself. Sure she'd had friends before but they were always almost only her friends because of her quirk. Mika and Kishi... the two of them didn't even know her quirk and yet the two of them wanted to be friends with her. It was unreal.

The only thing that made the day better was that she wasn't even headed home, she was instead headed to the workshop to work with Ms. Tatara. So she didn't even have to go home and see her pathetic excuses for parents.

She entered the shop and the familiar chime of the bell announced her entrance. When she stepped inside, she almost froze in her spot. Why? Well standing right in front of her at the counter was none other than Eraser Head.

"Ah, Kula dear, I'm glad you're here." Ms Tatara said from behind the counter, causing Eraser Head to turn and look at the student. Though he expression was almost entirely unchanging, Kula could see a glimpse of recognition. Excitement at facing one of her favorite heroes once again rose.

"You're the support student that got mixed up with the USJ incident, aren't you?" He asked.

"Uh, yes sir, I am. Kontorōru Kula."

"Ah, so it looks like you've met! Oh good! Eraser Head was just asking for a small repair. According to him the U.A repairs aren't to be trusted, and I was just telling him about your project."

"My... project?" Kula asked before she suddenly remembered her attempt to make her own version of Eraser Head's scarf. Oh god, he knew about that now? Where's the closest hole she can go crawl into and die of embarrassment? "Ah, okay. Cool, cool, cool cool- Speaking of that I'm going to go back and work on that." She gave the two of them finger guns before ducking her head and running to the back room. God that was mortifying. Finger guns? Finger guns?! When in her life had she ever done finger guns to anyone?! And what was worse it was to her favorite hero! Mika was for sure rubbing off on her.

Shaking her head, she headed to the workbench she normally worked at, hanging her bookbag up on a hook nearby and sitting down on the stool. She needed a distraction before she regressed into nothingness because of embarrassment. She took her notebook out of her bag and flipped it open to the page she was working on during lunch earlier and delved herself into working on her project. Though she couldn't help but listen to the voices that were drifting in through the archway connecting the front and back rooms.

"I'll look into it. Thanks for the heads up." Eraser Head's voice came. The two of them were probably talking support gear, after all, what else would they be talking about?

"Please do, and they're sneaky people. It's scary how much they can sneak around the law." Or maybe they weren't. Did Tatara know something about some villain group and was passing the information along to Aizawa? That was probably the case going off of how they were talking.

Well, whatever it was, it was something Kula didn't bother to listen more on and proceeded to dive head on into the project on the table in front of her.

***

The Sports Festival. Power Loader had explained the event to them a few days prior, but it wasn't like any of the support course students were interested- well except for Mei, she was practically vibrating at the idea where she'd be able to show off her 'babies'. Everyone else in the classroom couldn't be any less excited, and they were making their thoughts very clear during the workshop that day.

"Jeez, why do we have to take time out of the day to compete in something that will just make the hero course students look good?" Someone asked. "Sure we can show our inventions to investors but other than that we're just going to get beat up."

"Speak for yourself! You just need better showmanship!" Mei exclaimed from where she was sitting, a pair of large and highly technical boots sitting on the desk in front of her. "My babies are going to steal the show!"

"Only you can think that way."

Kula just sat quietly at her desk, screwing something into a small disk.

"How many times do I have to tell you, no, adding a self-destruct switch does not make it a good invention!" Mika said from beside Kula.

"Okay but if that's true than Dr. Doof lied to me all my childhood and I can't deal with another betrayal right now." Kishi responded.

"Why do you want to be like him?!"

"He gets to fight an intelligent blue platypus who doesn't want to be like him!"

"Anyone!"

"Listen I think your judgment of my guy Doof is unjustified. He deserves better. He just wanted to be better than his brother."

"He does." Kula piped up.

Mika looked from Kishi to Kula, a look of utter betrayal on her face, "Not you too." she groaned.

Kula just shrugged, "Mika, he was raised by garden gnomes, and his mother wasn't even there for his own birth; he's had a hard life."

"I trusted you, K. I trusted you."

Kula looked at Mika dead in the eye, a completely neutral expression on her face "That is a mistake."

Mika put her head in her face and groaned, "I... I'll be right back." She said stepping out of the classroom.

And for the next few days word of a ghost haunting the building with screams of agony started to rise up.

__
Since I deleted the previous chapter 9 Here's the fanart showcase from that chapter :)

Now that that's out of the way, fanart time most of these are from the old book so they include stuff from that!!

This was drawn by @Hamilham_lover! It's of Kula's vigilante mask and costume from the old book and I love how you drew the mask ;; The grin on the copper side and the eyes are just *chefs kiss*!

This was sent to me by @_Crazy_Stone! Another drawing of Kula's vigilante costume! Plus some of the gear she's used in the old book!! I absolutely love the detail in the boots and that you added the gloves (something that I sometimes forget to add myself lol) and I love the medal in the side inventory area!

Along with those I ave a handful of things I've drawn!

First Mika and Kula that I drew for pride month

Little Kishi addition :)

Anyways, thanks again for sticking with me throughout this unexpected hiatus, and hopefully updates will slowly start being released :)