Chapter 73: Chapter #72 | Liminal
Notes:
Hoo Boy. Sorry for the delay folks. Next weeks chapter is a doozy. We couldn't seem to get it right. Several rewrites later and we have something we're happy with. That being said, next chapter is the LAST, finally, chapter of wrestling. That does also mean that it will be the last we'll be seeing of these guys as we move on to bigger and better events.
Last chapter we had:
-Kirishima
Enjoy Everyone!
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
Kirishima winced as Recovery Girl brought her cane down on the top of his head, her accuracy and strength surprisingly impeccable for someone of her age, though he would never dare to tell her so. When Midoriya had told them all to avoid pissing off the medics, he hadn't entirely understood, clearly. It had made sense at the time, good sense, but now, as Recovery Girl alternated between Matsumura and himself, deftly poking at their various sore spots with her cane, he started to understand the statement just a little better.
"... And you," Shuzenji turned fully to Matsumura on the seat beside him. "Do you have any idea the kind of damage that you can cause with ice burns?" Kirishima let himself retreat from the situation, his attention instead straying to the screen at the side of the medical tent. They were lucky to have it, and Recovery Girl, on standby. It let them do, as she'd put it, "stupid shit without risk of putting themselves out of the sports festival."
A grimace came across Kirishima's face as he recognized the man on screen. It looked like Bakugo was wrestling in the general event. A sensational throw aided by explosions flashed across the screen, and the crowd reacted predictably. Kirishima was already learning to hate the audience. Unfair to them, he knew, but so far, he could do without them.
"Friend of yours?" Kirishima jerked his head slightly before turning fully to look at Matsumura beside him.
"Mmm. Might have been, if he hadn't dropped a building on my classmate and nearly killed them in an exercise. Got removed from the hero course after that." Kirishima focused back on the screen as he observed Bakugo's demeanor. The same self-importance, same anger, but undercutting it was something Kirishima felt uncomfortable looking at. Desperation?
The screen flickered in the middle of the match, a standard broadcasting transition, before showing the green blur of what Kirishima recognized to be Setsuna's raptor blitzing across the finish line for the triathlon. The crowd at the end of the course cheered as the raptor danced around, tail feathers wiggling.
"Aaaaaand there we have it, folks! Our resident ravenous raptor, Arytiss, has charged ahead of her competition, earning herself first place in the first official event of twenty-three twelve's sports festival!" Kirishima couldn't help but shake his head at his professor's antics. Even still, grinning like an idiot, Kirishima shot a fist in the air.
"Woo! Go Setsuna!" Recovery Girl's cane smacked him in the shin with a crack and earned a wince from the large man.
"Cheer more quietly. We have people trying to rest in here." Some more commentary and the screen flickered again. Evidently, it was the main channel, not one of the sub-channels exclusively covering individual events and games. Vaguely, Kirishima registered Shoji stepping up onto the platform to fight with his opponent. Across from him was one Kawata Moriko.
The smile on Kirishima's face turned wry as he adjusted himself towards Matsumura. He had things to talk about with the young woman, after all. She blinked at him slowly as Recovery Girl gave a light tug on his singlet. "You don't want to watch your classmate's match?"
Kirishima shook his head. "No need. His opponent? Kawata? Doesn't stand a chance."
Matsumura winged an eyebrow up at him, crossing her arms. "Just because they aren't from U.A.-" Kirishima's hands shot up. Or, one shot up, as Shuzenji quietly and firmly gripped the other, preventing it from rising as she kept the warm washcloths tight against the ice burns on his skin.
"Whoa whoa whoa, I never said that. I'm sure Kawata has worked just as hard to be on this stage as anyone else, but it just isn't a good match-up for him. We regularly work on group fighting. Kraken's one of our best at it. Nothing against Kawata."
The woman in front of him seemed to deflate at the statement. "Oh. Sorry for assuming. Why are you guys using your hero names, by the way?"
Kirishima grinned, shaking his head. "It's fine. A whole bunch of reasons for that…" Kirishima chatted with the woman in front of him amicably while their doctor watched on with calm, impassive eyes. Oh, to be young again. She shook her head, checking her watch. She'd have another patient here soon by her estimations.
The tent flap opened, and the old woman sighed. No rest for the weary.
…
Shoji examined his opponent as he stepped forward into the ring. Coiling in tendrils around his hands and wreathing his feet was a white fog that spilled forward from the edge of the platform where his opponent stood, something that would have caught him off guard had he not watched Sato's first match or if he didn't have the information that Midoriya had given him when he'd asked. Spirit Animal. Quirk user can convert their own vitality into any form of animal, which will then be under their control.
The quirk itself would have caught him off guard altogether if he hadn't known about it beforehand. The fog was misleading. Though, Shoji presumed, that could be precisely what his opponent was going for. Possibly a technical foul, given how he was flooding the area with fog before their fight even began. But Shoji wasn't about to call him on it, no need.
The whistle blew, and the match started hard and fast. Shoji drove his feet into the ground, propelling himself toward his opponent while the man in question took several steps back, raising his hands quickly from his side, palms flat to the ground. Figures took shape and rose from the fog. Ethereally, the fog wisped in the shape of twin wolves. One jumped forward at Shoji, while the other bolted to his side.
Shoji slid to his knees. Letting one wolf sail harmlessly past him, he twisted as the second dove at his side. Keeping his senses, he rolled to the side, cleanly placing himself between his opponent and the wolves. The two circled him as the commentary ran and the dull roar of the crowd anticipated the next attack. It wouldn't go how they expected.
The wolves lunged at Shoji again, Moriko a step behind them to capitalize on the opportunity the wolves would open. Shoji charged the wolves, allowing them to latch onto him. Their gossamer teeth sank deep into one of Shoji's fake arms as their claws raked down his front, tearing strips from the singlet and letting blood well up from long scratches. A grunt was all he let escape as he gripped the wolves by their scruffs and ripped them from his skin.
The wolves let out a startled yelp as they were pulled from where they'd latched. Blood dripped now from the arm punctures, onto the ground as Shoji spun in place, tossing the wolves at their summoner. Moriko yelped, slamming his hands together, his eyes so focused on the wolves and the subsequent cloud of fog they exploded into, that he missed Shoji running behind them. His arm was wrenched up to the side as an impact against his right shin launched his leg out from underneath him.
The thick fog dissipated in seconds, revealing Moriko on the ground as the large 1-A student towered over him. Shoji held Moriko's wrist in his hands while his foot rested squarely in the man's armpit. Threat, both implicit and intended. The whistle blew for reset.
…
Midoriya grimaced as he watched Shoji reset. It was a good thing that they had spare singlets. Phoenix?
Yes, Father?
Remind me after this to check with Mei regarding the viability of making singlets for future sports festivals out of some kind of better fabric. Hell, we can use some kind of UHMWPE cloth if we have to, but this is ridiculous.
A soft chirp was all that Midoriya received in response as he scanned the crowd, a scowl on his face. He hated being even tangentially near crowds of this size. It made his skin crawl. Whether that was a decade of quirkless trauma rearing its head finally or just regular trauma combined with training, he wasn't sure. Phoenix?
Yes, Father?
Remind me to also finally schedule that first session with Hounddog.
Oh? Did we finally have a breakthrough?
Yes, yes, snark all you'd like. Just remind me.
Another soft chirp and Midoriya sighed. That would have to be after everything else but before the I-Island expo and internships. Midoriya rubbed at his temples. Right then, there's also sorting through the internship offers that everyone will undoubtedly be receiving. Because, fuck me, no way Aizawa will voluntarily take on that task. Speaking of which. Phoenix.
Yes, Father?
Set yet another reminder for after the wrestling event to go kick Aizawa awake, wherever he is. A long moment of silence almost had him verbally confirming with his artificial intelligence, whether he looked crazy or not, be damned.
Apologies. It took me a moment to locate your professor. Aizawa is currently in supply closet one-six-seven… The way Phoenix trailed off had Midoriya's eye nearly twitching.
Day drinking. He's nursing his flask again, isn't he?
There are no cameras in supply closet one-six-seven… Phoenix trailed off again for a long moment. But yes, I calculate that the probability is high, considering his behavior these last weeks.
Midoriya looked up at the sky, took a deep breath, and let it out as a long, suffering sigh. He could understand it, he really could. If he had been recently turned into a near-meaty smear defending first-year students, then he'd probably be nursing a drink, too. Though he wished that it was the only reason Aizawa was drinking. Of course, all that would require alcohol to actually affect him. God, he wished alcohol still affected him. Midoriya blinked, noting the digression and the need to come back to it.
He'd spent days cataloging his issues, and every time he thought that he had cataloged them all, he discovered a new issue. That is to say, issues by others' standards and not his own. Though, when everyone around you says that something is a problem, perhaps you should listen. The feeling of pressing his gun barrel into Mei's throat still haunted him.
How long until you doze in the lounge? Until one of the students grabs your shoulder? Cooks the wrong thing? Are you going to have to kill someone before you deal with your problems?
Midoriya clicked his tongue as he let the incessant voice in the back of his head shove itself back into the box that it had popped out of. He was handling this just fine. Midoriya clenched and unclenched his fist as he took another deep breath and focused back on Shoji's match. On the blood trickling down his chest from claw marks. Just fine.
…
Mirio grinned as he watched the event unfold on the big floating screen above the food stalls. He and a number of the other students in his year were currently wandering around the festival proper outside the stadium. Nejire was currently bouncing up and down in line at what appeared to be a family-run okonomiyaki stand. Amajiki, unfortunately, couldn't be convinced to brave the crowd. No surprise there, really, but they had gotten the man to agree to meet them on the way back, under the condition that they bring him festival food.
Silently from the bench, Mirio found himself grinning when Haya nearly barreled into Nejire in an attempt to bring her some of the Takoyaki from several stalls over. Mirio was quietly worried that they wouldn't make it out of the food stalls by the end of the day. An unfortunate downside of Nejire's quirk was that she had to get her energy from somewhere, and it was either this or the calorie bars that she despised.
This was… nice. It was nice, Mirio decided, to have days off from the constant street patrols. Did Mirio count patrolling the festival as a patrol? No, but then again, for him, it was hardly work to enjoy activities, eat festival food, and direct the occasional civilian to a classroom or adjunct facility. His phone buzzed, and his eyebrows went up. He had set it to silent when they'd left the changing rooms in their costumes. His phone would only buzz from a few select people in this mode, or for a few select alerts.
Mirio couldn't help the grin that broke out on his face when he saw who it was from. Evidently, Sir was on campus! Mirio, I need to speak with you. There will be time at the end of today's events. When the last event ends… Mirio's smile stayed on his face as he read the rest of the message.
"What's up?" Mirio looked up from his phone and gladly took the food offered by Nejire and Haya.
"Nothing, Sir is on campus today and wants to talk to me later." Nejire blinked before shrugging, her smile light.
"Who knows, but if it's coming from Nighteye, I'm sure it's important!"
Notes:
Time for a check in guys! Like I said, we'll be leaving this event behind for the next after the next chapter. How is everyone feeling? Anything you'd like to see that hasn't hit yet? Etc.etc.etc. We're dealing with real uncharted waters here so I'll probably be asking for a check in after each game!
If anyone would like to support my writing, remember you can find out how Here! I'm infinitely grateful for anyone who can and does!