Kirishima's POV

For most of the ride to Musutafu, we're silent. I just catch glimpses of Mina's beautiful hazel eyes, starkly contrasted by the black sclera. The bright lights from the city illuminate the tears on her dark eyelashes, making them sparkle as she blinks them off onto her cheeks. I want to reach over and wipe them away, but it's already taking so much of my brain power to just keep holding her hand as she tightly grips mine.

Our car stops in front of an unfamiliar building. The one story modern house is covered in large windows and the shrubbery is well trimmed. Warm lights stream from the inside.

As we walk up the driveway, a helicopter passes above us and lands further down the road, buffeting us with air. Mina and I cover our faces as dirt kicks up. A door opens and Shoji steps out, walking fast towards the house as the helicopter once again takes flight.

"You got to ride in a helicopter?" Mina exclaims when we can hear ourselves again, the spinning blades far enough away that they don't drown us out anymore.

"I live in Fukuoka, so it would've taken too long to drive," he explains, joining us as we walk to the door.

Before we can even knock, Aizawa walks out to usher us in. Inside, most of our classmates already sit. I take a seat next to Bakugo. It appears as though the only people not here yet are Denki and Yaoyorozu. Speaking of, just as I take a seat, the door opens again and in walks my blonde friend.

"Hey guys," he says, joining the rest of us in the large living room. He glances around and barely holds in a snort of laughter. "Were you asleep, Bakugo?" He asks incredulously.

We all turn to see my other blonde friend, dressed in pajamas pants and a tank top with very mussed hair, seething with anger as Midoriya makes slashing motions with his hands behind him.

"It's only 9:45, dude!"

"Fuck off," he growls.

"It's unkind to make fun of your classmate's sleeping habits!" Iida lectures. "I think it's admirable that he takes such good care of himself. A good night of sleep does a growing body good."

"Nobody asked you, Glasses," Bakugo snaps, leaning forward.

"Enough of this," Mr. Aizawa says with a bored tone. "Everybody's here, let's start."

"Wait," Hagakure interjects, "where's Momo?"

"Yaoyorozu is on vacation with her family in America at the moment," our teacher says. "She'll be joining us virtually."

He gestures to a laptop on the arm of the chair he's sitting in. He turns it around for us to see our classmate's face. It appears she's on a beach somewhere, wearing a strappy white swimsuit and large cateye sunglasses. The sound of the ocean is apparent, though I can't hear any other people, only seagulls squawking.

She must be on a private beach somewhere. Lucky.

"Like I said," our teacher sighs. "Everyone's here. Now let's get started. Hizashi?"

I, along with the rest of my class, turn to Present Mic as he stands from the sofa where he sat between Uraraka and Midnight. It occurs to me that I've never seen him as casual as he appears right now. Even in the hospital, he was still wearing his leather hero costume. But now, he sits in baggy jeans and a worn t-shirt, the print just barely visible from age. His hair is pulled back into a scraggly bun with a couple pieces falling loose. He wears square glasses instead of his usual triangle ones, these with clear lenses, letting all of us see how pink his puffy green eyes are. "Koto--" he begins and then breaks down into sobs.

Uraraka rubs his forearm gently as he wipes his eyes. I look around at my classmates. Their faces all show concern, even Bakugo's. The furrowing of his eyebrows is enough to tell me he's worried.

"Koto's my niece," Mic chokes out, then lets out a deep breath, like it took a large weight off of him, which it probably did. Many of my classmates gasp at the realization. "Her parents died when she was seven. She was living with her grandmother until she passed away a few years ago. She's been in my custody ever since. She blames herself for it and despite the therapy, I know it still tears her up inside. I've been worried about her for a while. I never expected her to do something like this, but then I found the note."

"What note?" Midoriya asks. "What information do we have? The sooner we compile it all, the sooner we can find where she is."

The voice hero wipes his eyes and nods. "You're right, you're right. Shota, can you read it?"

Our homeroom teacher sighs and takes the paper from the hero's hand. He reads,

"Mic,

"I'll be home before school starts. Don't worry about me.

"Koto"

"Well that was short," Denki says quietly.

"But where could she have gone?" Iida asks, getting everyone on track. "Is there a possibility the League of Villains is behind this and they planted the note to not stir up any worry?"

"No," Mic states firmly. "We have codewords to use if that happens. She knows to use the words."

We glance at each other, silently considering how much Present Mic has prepared for the possibility of his niece getting kidnapped. He certainly has a plan. He's more responsible than I thought he would be.

"Not to mention, she took her backpack," he continues. "She must've had time to pack whatever she brought with her."

"When did she leave?" Tokoyami inquires.

"I don't know," Mic cries. "I left mid-afternoon yesterday and came back late at night. I assumed she was still here, but I don't know. I only woke up around noon and I brought food into her room to check on her, but that's when I found the note!"

"She only took a backpack and some clothes," Mic continues. "Her laptop and phone were left on her desk, so we can't use those to track her. I checked her bank account and it says yesterday, she withdrew a large chunk of cash."

"She probably used it to buy tickets for some form of transportation," Yaoyorozu observes. "That could be by train or plane. If she goes by train, she could be anywhere in Japan, but if she went by plane, she could be anywhere. I propose we make a list of possible locations for both circumstances."

The girl pulls a notebook and pen out of her arm. "Present Mic and Ochaco probably have the best idea of where she would be, so feel free to start listing places off."

"She didn't come to my house," Uraraka says. "Or Reina's. The only other place in Japan I can think of is the agency she went to for her internship."

"Nyikang's?" Midoriya asks.

"But he said she took lots of money from her account," Ojiro points out. "Why would she take that much for a cheap train ride?"

"Has she talked about ever going anywhere else in Japan?" Sato asks.

"Not that I've heard," Uraraka says as Present Mic shakes his head.

"And where would she have gone in America?" Yaoyorozu asks, scribbling something down on her paper.

"Anywhere," Mic whines. "Her family went on trips everywhere."

"Do you have any specific locations?" The class rep asks as Yaoyorozu readies her pen.

Our teacher takes a deep breath. "I saved all the emails my brother sent me. He always wrote to me about where they were going, just in case. I can look through those."

"Please do!" She replies hastily. "Can I also get where she lived in America?"

"Yeah, she lived in Hawkins, Missouri with her parents and then Tyson, Missouri with her grandmother."

Yaoyorozu takes the information down and then says, "should I put stars next to these? Do we have reason to believe she would go to either of these?"

"She might," the hero says, rubbing his temples as he scrolls through his phone.

"Anybody else have any ideas?" Hanta asks.

"Has anybody checked her room for anything that might lead us to where she's going?" Hagakure asks, head resting in her hands.

"That was the first thing we did," Aizawa says exasperatedly.

"Did you check her trash?" Denki suggests. "She could've thrown something away that's important."

"It was just full of tissues," Mic says, still wiping his eyes.

Uraraka stops rubbing his back and looks up at him questioningly. "Can I see that note real quick?"

The girl takes the letter, turning it this way and that, holding it up to the light and everything.

"Do you see anything?" I ask.

"It looks like the same paper as her journal," she says, holding it up for me to see.

"Hold up," Denki says. "What does that have to do with anything?"

"She kept a journal," Uraraka starts.

"But instead of writing down what she did each day," I explain, "she wrote down songs that described how she was feeling or what she was thinking of. Do you think there's an imprint of the last things she wrote?"

"There definitely is," she says. "How do I do this? Does somebody have a pencil?"

"Let Midnight do that," Aizawa says, pointing to said teacher. "She's really good at it."

I wait with bated breath as my teacher carefully shades across the page, revealing the invisible text from the page before. When she's done, her eyebrows furrow and she holds it out for Mic to see. "What does this mean?"

"Song titles," Uraraka says from across both of them. "Like I said, she would write the names of songs down. I recognize these ones. "

"What songs are on there?" Yaoyorozu asks from the laptop.

"Looks like they're all in English," Uraraka says.

"So does that mean she went back to America?" Ojiro asks.

"Not necessarily," Present Mic sniffles, gesturing for Uraraka to hand the list to him. He looks it over briefly before saying, "I recognize most of these. And yeah, there's a lot of American artists, but that doesn't mean anything. These are a lot of sad songs or songs that make you think. But this one, Life Is A Highway, it's in Cars, her favorite movie."

"What happens in the movie?" Shoji asks. "Or what happens when the song is playing?"

"They're just driving across America," our English teacher says.

"So more reason to believe she went there," Tokoyami observes, tapping a finger on his beak.

"Wait a minute," Uraraka interjects. We all look over to her as she seems to rack her brain for something. "When I looked through the rest of her journal, she wrote this song down a lot, but it was always associated with a person. That's another thing she did, make playlists for certain people. I think...Kirishima?"

"Yeah?"

"I think it was your song," she mumbles almost to herself, then looks up to me. "Has she told you anything?"

I rack my brain to try and think of anything she might've told me about America. "She said... She likes looking at the stars, out in the country where you could see them better. And she also took a lot of vacations on the East Coast. She said some other things in sign language that I couldn't understand, though. I'm sorry."

"That's okay," she says, "it at least sorta narrows it down."

"Mr. Yamada?" Yaoyorozu asks, causing Mic to look up from the piece of paper.

"Oh right," he exclaims, "I was supposed to be looking up where they vacationed!! I'll send you the addresses. They're a little hard to spell."

He pulls out his phone and types for a little bit before looking back down to the paper. "I just don't recognize that one."

"What one?" Midnight asks, looking over his shoulder.

"The last one," he says, pointing to the bottom of the list. "Bust A Move."

"Why don't you play it and see if someone recognizes it?" Midoriya suggests.

He types a bit more on his phone before music starts playing. The song has more of a hip hop beat with repeating guitar riffs and a strong beat. It confuses me even more when the rapping starts. I've heard a lot of her music, but nothing like this.

I look around to see Uraraka and Present Mic just as confused as I am. I'm sure they've heard more of her music than I have, but they don't seem to understand the importance of this song either. After a while, a woman begins singing.

"Oh," Todoroki says nonchalantly.

"You recognize it?!?" Uraraka shrieks.

"Don't you?" The boy asks, brow furrowed.

"C'mon man," I say, my knee bouncing in anticipation. "Don't drag it out, just tell us what it means."

"It was in that movie we watched," he replies blandly.

"Which one?" She asks impatiently.

"The football one that we watched after the sports festival."

Uraraka's face shows understanding as she whispers out, "the one we fell asleep during..."

What in the world are they talking about?

"They were listening to it before they got into the car crash."

"What?!?" Mic and Uraraka gasp at the same time.

Todoroki looks back and forth between the two for a moment before continuing, "the big guy and the kid. They were in a car, listening to the song which distracted them and then they crashed, but he blocked the airbag so it wouldn't kill the kid."

I glance around at my other classmates, wondering if anybody sees the connection, but nobody seems to understand.

At least I'm not the only one.

On the other hand, Present Mic and Uraraka share an intense look before whispering to each other. Even Aizawa looks confused as to what's transpiring.

"Koto's parents were killed in a car crash," Mic says after a moment, putting his head in his hands. "Her mother protected her, sacrificing herself."

"Pretty much exactly like Todoroki said," Uraraka says quietly.

"Oh, quelle pauvre fille," Aoyama laments, shaking his head.

Why didn't she tell me any of this? Is it because she was scared of me? But still...why? What did I do?

"Oi, fucker," Bakugo growls as the rest of my classmates talk amongst themselves. "Get out of your thick head and pay attention."

"You think she might go back to her hometown?" Yaoyorozu asks.

Clearly I missed something.

"Even after everything that happened there?" Hagakure adds.

"Because of everything that happened there," Mic says matter-of-factly. "She never really got a chance to face what happened, ya know? She was just picked up and dropped somewhere else without any real time to deal with all of it."

"It must've been hard on her," Hanta says quietly.

"I just wish I knew what she was going through," our teacher cries, wiping his cheek with the back of his hand.

"I'm sure a lot of us feel the same way," Uraraka comments, making eye contact with me for the briefest second.

"So if we think we've narrowed down where she may be, ribbit, what do we do from here?" Tsu asks.

Aizawa opens his mouth to speak, but our other teacher beats him to it. "I wanna go get her, but it'd take too much time on my own. I'm going to assemble a team to go find her."

"I'll join!" Uraraka and I say immediately.

"Me too!" Midoriya exclaims.

"And me," Denki adds.

"Sign me up!" Mina demands.

"I wouldn't mind going," Todoroki says.

"I could be useful in tracking her down," Shoji suggests.

"I would be able to join as well," Yaoyorozu adds from the laptop screen. "I'm already in America, so it'd be a quick flight. And I can set up a place for us to stay."

I nod along with my other classmates that volunteered, already seeing a plan coming together.

"Hizashi..." our homeroom teacher says in a warning tone.

"I know you don't approve, but she's my niece and these are the people that know her best. They may think of something we won't. We can't pass that up," Mic says firmly.

"You know how much trouble this got them into last time."

"Because we told them to stay out of it."

"They were safer that way."

"The only reason All For One is in jail right now is because they provided an escape route for me," Bakugo snaps from beside me. Everybody looks at him in shock. "Did any of you heroes actually have a plan to get me out of there when All Might started battling him or were you just going to watch like everyone else? We're training to be heroes, goddammit. We're the ones who acted. And there's no way I'm letting Deku and Half n' Half get more field experience than me. I'm coming with."

We all pause to take in our classmate's declaration.

Did he just admit we saved him?

"Bakugo," I start, but he cuts me off.

"And I know you'll all be running around like chickens with your heads cut off without me," he growls.

"Well it looks like we have our team," Present Mic states proudly, standing from the couch.

Aizawa sighs and looks at his colleague with trepidation. "You better know what you're doing," he says after a moment.

"Don't worry about us," he replies with the ghost of his usual smile. "WE'RE HEROES, RIGHT?!?"

He extends a hand out to Bakugo to high five, but my friend just clicks his tongue, mumbling, "whatever."

The pro hero slaps his own hand. "We'll get that energy up! Now let's make a plan!"