Tomura signaled to Kurogiri, who formed a portal that opened up right behind the girl; they had no idea how her quirk worked, but it didn't stop her, then their hopes of winning today were gone. Master would want this girl and the news of the number one hero's death, if they played their cards right, both could still be achieved.

Naoko was giving everything she had to protect Aizawa, which meant that she had no idea that a hand was reaching out of the portal towards her. One touch would be all it took to break Naoko's concentration, after that, well... The villains would have a much better chance of winning

The hand was a hairbreadth away from connecting with the girl when, without warning, a wall of ice interrupted the hand. The ice crumbled as it made contact with Tomura's hand, absorbing the deadly quirk that Tomura was ready to use on Naoko. To the side, a boy with red and white hair stood, his eyes flashing dangerously as he took in the situation.

His eyes filled with concerned at the sight of Naoko, covered in an odd dark liquid and oozing blood from every available opening on her face He had no idea what the liquid was, but the amount of blood that was pooling under Naoko was beginning to be worrisome.

The nomu was still regenerating as fast as ever, and Naoko wasn't sure if she could keep this up any longer, her body had basically given up supporting itself, so she lay sprawled out on the concrete, her eyes were going in and out of focus as she tried to keep her quirk extended, though it was easy to tell that she was losing steam when the nomu completely regenerated an arm before she was able to liquefy it once more. Just as she was giving up hope, Aizawa was pulled out of the creature's grip by a fuzzy green haired boy. The smallest of smiles lifted Naoko's lips, she did it, she lasted long enough for help to arrive.

Perhaps it wasn't the professional heroes, but as she was being lifted from the ground by Todoroki, she saw Bakahoe blasting onto the scene, taking on the nomu; they weren't pro's but Naoko had enough experiences with these particular classmates to know that they would be able to handle the situation until All Might or someone got here.

Finally, her quirk snapped back to Naoko, which was enough to send her over the edge, Todoroki may have been shaking her shoulders, but Naoko was already gone.

***

Police and pro hero's roamed around the complex, arresting the villains and gathering all the information they would need to fill out the paperwork that an attack like this generated. It was a huge undertaking, but it had been made easier by the fact that only a small handful of people died, all of whom had been villains. The students did a good job of protecting themselves, so it would be an understatement to say that the authorities were impressed; especially when the fact that the only injuries sustained on their side were by two students and the teacher who had been fighting the main body of villains.

As this was happening, the students were being herded out to the bus, they had already given their statements, so they were free to go home for now. Perhaps that move was a tad bit overconfident on the higher-ups part, but it made some amount of sense that the villains wouldn't attack again so soon (though there was a case for the other view, so take that with a grain of salt).

Once again, two students were lost in thought throughout this, doing as they were told almost robotically; both Todoroki and Bakugou were thinking about what they had just seen. As two of only three students who had really gotten a good view of the fight that Naoko, Aizawa, and All Might were involved in, it made sense that they had some processing to do. And also once again, the two students were viewing the same situation through completely different lenses.

Bakugou couldn't help but see Naoko as she held off a villain that gave All Might trouble. People could say what they liked about Bakugou, he didn't give a shit, but he was an intelligent kid. He knew that the nomu had some serious power, so for Naoko to hold it off like that meant that her ability level had to be high... Perhaps even higher than his was (Gosh darn it Bakahoe, that's what you got from this! Are you kidding me?!), when that little twerp got back to school, he would have to challenge her to a match and make sure she didn't hold back.

Thankfully, Todoroki happened to have a few more brain cells in his head, meaning that instead of petty thoughts of revenge, Todoroki was dwelling on the look that had been on both Aizawa's and Naoko's face when he cut in. Yes, it was obvious that the two had been in incredible amounts of pain, but there had been something else there, something he had only seen once before in those levels; regret and sadness. It was the exact same look that had been on his mother's face after she burned him.
What happened before he got there?

When he stopped the villain from touching Naoko, it was fairly apparent that the guy wasn't planning on killing her, so what happened? Todoroki was getting tired of being left in the dark; first this girl acts as though she knows him, then there was that display of rage during the battle training, and now she screams during the attack as though she had just murdered someone, and when he finds her, she is single-handedly holding off a creature that stood its ground against All Might.

It appeared that he would have to have a serious discussion with her when she came back from the hospital.

(Just so you know, class A-1 did recognize that it was Naoko who screamed, but it'll be mostly brushed off, seeing as how they were literally in the middle of a battlefield when the girl screamed...)

***

Blurry white lines slowly came into focus as Naoko's eyes fluttered open. A headache pounded against her temples and she could already tell that her internal organs were messed up because of how sore her chest and stomach were, even though she was lying still.

It must have been early in the morning because the room was still slightly grey from the small amount of light filtering in from the shuttered windows... Which was nice, any more light and Naoko's headache would be exponentially worse.

As Naoko looked around, she saw a dark figure hunched over in a chair by the wall; which would have been alarming, except that she could see her aunt's favorite cat sweater glaring at her through the dimness. A tight smile spread across Naoko's face as her Aunt snorted slightly in her sleep, the position looked uncomfortable, but Hasame was making it work for her.

As loudly as her voice would let her, Naoko called out to her Aunt, though it came out sounding more like a squeak than anything, which didn't have the ability to wake up anything.

"Hasa-" She had to cut herself off in order to cough. One cough quickly led to a hacking fit, which certainly did the job of waking Hasame up.

The blurry form of Hasame jerked and sprang out of her seat when she saw Naoko was awake; Naoko could tell that she was saying something, mainly because the blob that served as Hasame's mouth was moving slightly and there were vibrations coming from her general area. It had been a long time since Naoko had felt this genuinely horrible; her head felt like it had been vivisected (basically an autopsy on a living creature), and the rest of Naoko's body had the distinct feeling of being torn in every possible way. Neither of those feelings were good.

She gingerly tried to shake her head, which would hopefully get her vision to clear but was immediately overcome with enough dizziness to send a violent shiver down her sore body... Now, this feeling was familiar, it was her whole life for about three months after she was rescued.

When she had first been pulled out of the wreckage, she was found with an odd substance running from her ears, which was later identified to be her inner ear and eardrum, which had been liquefied by her quirk in the panic. It was three months of nearly constant vertigo before the doctors figured out how to make a synthetic inner ear for her, which restored her balance and allowed her to act like a normal human being once again.

If this is what it felt like just to move her head, then Naoko didn't even want to think about trying to sit up; if she had liquified her inner ear once again, then she was better off just staying as still as possible and praying for death to come quickly (or another restorative surgery, whichever one came first.)

Naoko knew that even blinking quickly could cause her vertigo to act up, so she stayed as still as possible, trying to be patient as her eyesight slowly cleared.

"Is Eraserhead okay?" Her words were raspy and light. If Hasame hadn't been paying attention, she likely would have missed them all together.

Hasame shook her head with an exhausted chuckle before reaching out to gently turn Naoko's heard towards her, she knew just how hard this could be for the poor girl, "You would be the one to ask that... Idiot, try worrying about yourself for once."

Naoko's lips twitched upwards as she reached out a hand to cup Hasame's cheek, gently touching the edge of her eye, "You know? You telling me that is basically a pot calling a kettle black. Have you slept since I got in here?"

Hasame scowled slightly and looked away, "It's only been a day and a half since you came here, I'll be fine." She refocused her gaze on Naoko, "It's actually a good thing you woke up when you did, the doctors were reluctant to give you anesthetics while you were in a coma."

Anesthetics? Naoko's brow wrinkled as she looked up at her aunt, "Why would they need to put me under again so soon?"

"Because," Hasame smoothed the hair over Naoko's forehead and smiled gently, "Your new inner ears are ready. I doubt you would want to be awake while they are being put in."

The door slid open and both Hasame and Naoko looked over to see who was there; the movement was counterproductive for Naoko, who let out a slew of curses when the dizziness hit her again. While Naoko was adjusting, Rei walked into the room quietly and slid the door shut behind her.

"My goodness, it's only been two weeks since she's started U.A., and this is her second time in the hospital. This must be torture for you, Hasame." Her smile was gentle as she sat down on the other side of Naoko, but it was easy to see that the smile didn't touch her eyes.

Hasame simply groaned at that and dropped her head to the bed as she nodded, rather pathetically, "Thanks for coming Rei," She lifted her head wearily and looked at her friend, "I know it's a pain to get away from your room so often, but I need to get to work soon; they weren't exactly happy with me when I took off in the middle of my shift the other day..." She trailed off hesitantly and looked pleadingly at Rei, "I wanted to be here when the authorities came to question her, but it took longer than they thought it would for her to wake up. Would you please watch her while you can? My shift is a ten-hour one today, so I don't expect you to stay the whole time, but you know Naoko, she would appreciate someone here, even if talking will be hard for her until she can go into surgery."

If Rei had given her the opportunity, Hasame probably rambled on for several more hours like this, but thankfully Rei held up a hand to cut her friend off, "I'll watch her, you never needed to worry about that." It was such a simple statement, but that was all it took to put Hasame at ease.

She leaned back over Naoko, who was watching Hasame carefully, and the two exchanged a cautious hug, "Naoko, we'll talk later, but please stay out of trouble. My heart can't take much more of this." Naoko nodded weakly, ignoring the wave of dizziness that threatened to pull her back under, and squeezed her aunt tightly before letting go, allowing Hasame to leave.

Once Hasame was out of the room, Rei reached out and grabbed Naoko's hand, gently stroking it as she made eye contact with the girl, "I'll admit Naoko, I didn't expect to see you in this bed again so soon. This is becoming quite a habit for you."

Naoko groaned at that and gingerly raised a hand to her forehead, "It's only been twice, don't make this sound more dramatic than it is." The two looked at each other before erupting in giggles, nothing about this was truly funny, but at this point, it was just so much that there was a certain amount of dramatic irony to the whole situation.

Slowly, the chuckles stopped, and Naoko covered her eyes with her hand, blocking out the whole world for a moment, "Did you hear, Rei-sama?" She didn't uncover her eyes, but she could feel Rei stroking her hand gently, reassuring her without words, "I killed people yesterday. I lost control of my quirk during a panic attack and woke up to see bodies lying around me. What kind of hero does that? What kind of human does that?"

If Naoko had her way, she probably would have stayed in that position for the rest of the day and moped, but a firm hand pulled her hand away from her eyes. Green clashed strongly with grey as the two looked at each other; both eyes held sadness, but only the nearly vacant looking green ones held shame.

"You are a hero." Naoko almost missed Rei's words, but she managed to see her lips moving in time, "Are you going to let the fact that you lost control stop you from continuing to try? Will one failure really be game over?" Rei stood and leaned over Naoko, so she could clearly see what was being said, "After all the bad you've been forced through, is this really going to be where you stop? Naoko, you're so close! You can get so much better!"

Slowly, Naoko shook her head, careful to avoid activating her vertigo, "I don't want to hurt anyone else..." Shyly she cast her eyes away from Rei's intense gaze, "I'm not scared of my quirk... Not really. I just need to get better control if it before I can even think of using it around my classmates. I'm not giving up, I'm just a bit gun-shy right now."

A sharp knock caused Rei to break away from Naoko, she was glad that the girl wasn't afraid of her quirk, but there was a vulnerability in her eyes that worried Rei. She wasn't there during the attack on the USJ, in fact, from what Rei could tell, no one really knew what happened to her, but Rei could see that Naoko had been pushed back several spaces in her mental recovery. This made some amount of sense though, given what she had just heard.

If Naoko didn't show any signs of shock after killing people, then Rei would be more concerned. As it was, this would hurt Naoko, but Rei knew that she could get past it; even if she had to do it alone.

Rei slid the door open and blinked in shock at the odd pair before her. Two men, one was covered in bandages and wearing all black while the other was in a poorly fitting yellow suit. Both looked familiar, but Rei couldn't figure out where from.

"Excuse me," The scrawny blond man asked, stepping forward slightly, "Is Young Fujimura here? We were hoping to have a word with her."

A surge of protectiveness welled in Rei, were these the authorities that Hasame mentioned? Naoko was still fragile and didn't need to be attacked with questions right now.

"Who's asking?" Rei's voice was sharp, her eyes sharp as she stared at the man before her.

The bandaged man stepped forward slightly and bowed, "We apologize for dropping in without warning, but we need to speak with Miss Fujimura. We're her teachers from UA."

Rei had every intention of closing the door in these men's faces, Naoko needed rest right now, not whatever these two had planned right now; but she was stopped by a gentle voice behind her.

"Who's there, Rei-sama? Why do you look so mad?" Rei sighed and opened the door wider, she knew first hand how stubborn Naoko was, and now that she knew someone was at the door, she probably wouldn't stop bugging Rei with questions that she didn't have the answers to.

Gesturing for the uninvited guests to come in, Rei I made sure to stare them down sternly before they came in, "You can't stay for long, Naoko will be going back into surgery soon, and besides that, she just woke up, so she needs more rest."

The men nodded, but Rei wasn't done yet, "This girl has been through too much because of your school's incompetence, so if I detect that she doesn't want you here, or even if you are getting on my nerves, I reserve the right to kick you out."

Both men nodded and entered with a bow, though the bandaged one turned before he got too far into the room, "It's good to see that you care so fiercely about our student, though you shouldn't worry too much. We actually came here to thank Miss Fujimura for her actions the other day. Without her efforts the other day, many people would be dead, myself included."

A small gasp escaped Rei and she stepped back, looking at the man with wide eyes. This was the first she had heard of Naoko saving lives... Just what had happened during the attack?

***

Naoko watched the two men carefully, trying to figure out who they were. The black haired one... He wasn't wearing his black hero outfit, but it was relatively obvious that it was Eraserhead; having a face full of bandages may hide his face, but Naoko could somehow still see the ever-present half-dead look he had on his face.

The other one... Naoko knew she had seen him before, the little hair strands that framed his face were too familiar for anything else, but where had she seen him before?!?

He seemed to be saying something, but Naoko was too focused on figuring out this mystery to pay attention. Let's see... Black eyes with an electric blue pupil, the gaunt frame that looked like he had missed one too many meals. Those were kind of familiar, but maybe... If those tufts of hair stood up straight...

All Might! That's right, he showed her his small form a while ago, gosh, she had completely forgotten about that with everything else that had happened.

She felt a hand slip into hers and looked down to see Rei on the other side of the bed, looking at her with concern.

"Oh!" It took a second for Naoko to realize she had completely missed the everything that might have been said in the last minute or two, "Sorry about that, I'm still kinda out of it. Please sit!"

They did as she said, and for a minute, awkwardness filled the air until Naoko cleared her throat, "So... Are you here because of what happened?"

They nodded, and Naoko saw Aizawa's facial bandages move slightly, "Mr. Aizawa?" She cut over what he was saying, "I can't see anything you're saying, I'm sorry, but you'll need All-" A sharp look from All Might cut her off... Oh, that's right, All Might didn't want anyone to know about this form... Oops.

Naoko coughed to sloppily cover her slip, this inadvertently led to her vertigo acting up and Naoko groaned as she pushed her head further into her pillow, "I.. mean... Sorry, give me... A sec."When Naoko's vision cleared, she gestured to All Might, choosing to simply ignore her slip, rather than continuing to dig herself into a hole.

"Well, we mainly came to see how you are doing, all we were able to get out of the doctors was that you only just woke up from a coma. Anything we want to talk about can wait until you're feeling better." All Might shifted forward in his chair uncomfortably, which gave Naoko a brief flashback of the huge wound on his side. Perhaps he could understand how she felt.

A weary smile stretched half-heartedly across her face before she answered, "Well, honestly, the only thing I can say for sure is that I've melted my eardrums again. Hopefully, they'll be able to replace those again so I can get rid of this dang vertigo; but other than that, your guess is as good as mine. I just know that I feel like crap."

Aizawa's facial bandages moved slightly, and All Might nodded, looking perturbed, "Do you feel well enough to answer some questions about what happened?"

Rei's hand tightened around Naoko's, causing Naoko to look at Rei in shock. For the first time since she had known Rei, the older lady looked genuinely mad. Not just irritated, but like she was about ready to slap someone. "What did I tell you?" If there ever were words that looked like they were being hissed, these would certainly be them. Naoko's eyes widened and she pulled Rei's hand, trying to get her attention, but it didn't work.

"Get out. Now." Naoko continued pulling on Rei's hand, more than a little confused.

"Rei-sama, please, if they have questions, then let them ask me. I would rather get this over now then wait a few more days, please?"

Honestly, Naoko was concerned that a full out fight was going to break out because of the looks being exchanged between Rei and Aizawa... Well, Naoko couldn't actually see the look that Aizawa was giving Rei, but it didn't take a genius to read body language, and Aizawa just seemed hostile.

Thankfully, before anything happened, everyone looked to the door, which caused Naoko to look there as well. A nurse stood in the door with several items that all looked rather sinister. "Excuse me, but now that Miss Fujimura is awake, we would like to bring her into surgery as soon as possible. I have to ask you all to leave so we can prep her."

Naoko sighed in relief at this, it was a little too convenient, but she would take any distraction she could get at this point. Thank heavens for the exemplary timing of nurses!