Chapter 93. Tests!
After we were all dressed, we went out to the bus department. Greeting us were all of the teachers. I grinned, as Deku looked at me with his scared expression. “This will be fun.” I said as the girls came outside with all of their costumes.
I was quickly surrounded by Momo, Kyoka, Ashido, and Hagakure. I greeted all of them with Deku right by me, silently freaking out from being this close to girls. Uraraka quickly put herself the closest to Deku. I smiled at her efforts, as did all of the other girls. She blushed up while looking away from all of our gazes. Deku was doing much of the same. I just patted him on the back as the teachers started talking.
Things played out for what the teachers talked about in the show, until they started discussing other teams that I forgot about. I already knew Momo would be paired with Todoroki, and Deku with Bakugo. What surprised me was my match up. Ashido and I vs the Principle. ‘Does he want to test my limits personally?’ I looked at him trying to figure him out, but he just returned with a cutesy smile. I wasn’t buying it though. He wants something from me, I know it.
After Kyoka’s match was also declared, I went up to both of the girls before they had to go. “Good luck, both of you.” gave both of their hands a gentle squeeze of affection. Momo just smiled slightly while nodding. Kyoka just stabbed me, with a reddened face. “We’ll be fine. Unlike you, we don’t push ourselves to the extreme.” I just smiled as she had me with that one. I started to walk away. I heard two quiet ‘Be safe’s coming from behind me. I stopped for a bit after hearing that. Then smiled and continued to my partner Ashido for this one.
“Well, we are up against the principal. How do you feel?” I asked Ashido as I came up to her. “Strangely ok. I totally don’t think that cute, little guy could really hurt us.” I laughed as we were walking. “That guy is the spokesperson of ‘Don’t judge a book by its cover’. He is super intelligent, and we had a small run-in after the U.S.J. attack. He always tries to control you with words, and put you into places he wants you to. He may not be strong, but he is super intelligent. He honestly scares me.”
I felt a chill up my spine as the principal looked back at us with that smile. Ashido after listening to me must have felt scared too, as she grabbed onto my coat. “So, principal. Where are we going?” I tried to get information about what we would be facing before the test began. “Oh, Kaminari. You know I can’t reveal that to you. That would detract from this learning experience. I know what you are trying.” I nodded knowing this was the answer he would probably give.
“You and I both know that more than half of the battle is fought before the first bullet is fired.” The principal just laughed at what I said. “Yes Kaminari I do, but I also want to win this battle. Why should I give any help to my enemy?” I was silent for a second thinking of the correct response. “You shouldn't, I was just trying to see what I might get without you noticing, I learned from the best on that front.”
The principal laughed again, while he was doing it Ashido just held onto my coat more tightly. “Very good Kaminari, always thinking outside the box, always trying to get the edge, never giving a hint of weakness. I must say, you make me think you somehow cheated your age. I can’t wait to see more of what you're capable of.” I frowned a little at the principal mentioning my most valued secret. ‘No way he figured it out. Quirks involving time are few. Almost non-existent if I think about it. I don't even know how I got here, no way he does. He must be saying any theory to see my reaction. Keep up my poker face.’
“Well, I will do my best to make you work for it. Any answer without effort will always be unsatisfactory.” I saw him look at me in surprise then he burst out laughing. We were told where to go, to wait for the test to begin between his chortles. Ashido and I walked to the prescribed point. Ashido was still grabbing at my coat. I let out a sigh after the principal was out of sight. “Don’t talk about anything, these walls have ears.” Ashido kept looking at me, while holding onto my coat. “Ashido, calm down. The principal won't kill us. At most he will give us harder and harder obstacles to go through to see more of what I can do. He probably wanted you with me as a contrast. Straight forward fighter, with the sneakiest assassin.”
I put my hand to my chin and continued my conjecture. “I think he wants to try and pull us apart. Then see what happens after that. Divide and conquer, I just don’t know what he’ll be using to divide us. He only has his wits, that means he can use tools with idea’s I could never think of. We may just have to play this by ear. Think about escaping as fast as possible, the less time he has to set up the more this just becomes a race. He knows that which means he might block off the exit first, but how. I keep going back to this question.” I was just leading myself in circles while Ashido was looking at me with a scared expression that was only growing.
“Ashido, you need to calm down. This is what the principal wants. For us to think irrationally and without thought. Just rush for the escape in slime girl mode. Burn anything in your path, I’ll be doing the same thing. Stay in seeing range, if anything happens yell it out. Clear?” Ashido just clenched her other hand on my coat as she stared into my eyes. “Ashido, what's wrong?” She didn’t say anything for a bit as she just stared at me. She finally started to talk in a shaky voice. “I don’t like that look in your eyes.” I immediately blocked my right eye, and turned away from her.
“I don’t mean your red eye, I don’t mind that. I mean the look in your eyes. I don’t know why, but it makes me sad, and scared.” I looked back at her and she jumped up a little bit as she saw my gaze. I felt a twinge of sadness when she did. I don’t know what look I had in my eyes, but someone as happy as her felt bad then it couldn’t have been good. I sighed as I put my goggles, and mask on.
“Sorry, I just look like this sometimes. Best I can do is hide it from you during the test, now we need to focus. We need to make a break for the exit. We can make it to the tops of the buildings and find it easily. Run for it as fast as we can, and beat the principal at his own game.” She just looked at me almost horrified. But slowly nodded all the same.
As soon as the start was announced I grabbed Ashido under her arms. “Hold on to me.” She was shocked but did as I asked. I threw a cable to the top of the building, and almost made it to the top. Before the whole building started to shake and crumble. I then released my cable from that building and picked another close by. As I was heading up to that one, the first building that I was grappling, started to fall into this one. “So that’s his plan.” I whispered under my breath.
I dropped down to the ground as fast as I could. “Ashido, we have to separate and try to find the exit alone. Us being together is making it easier for him to stop us.” She just kept looking at me unhappily. I sighed. “Ashido, please… we have to work together by trusting each other. Trust me, that I will bring the majority of his attention. I’m counting on you to end this.” I then put my hand on her cotton candy hair. “Good luck Ashido” And with that I was off. “2nd Gear!”
I took to the walls to gain some altitude. I learned I could run fast enough to wall run for a small period of time before needing to push off the wall or hold my weight with my wires. Every time I tried to get to a building, it would begin to collapse. “Ok, let's try to get on top of the rubble. Can’t break what's already broken.” I thought out loud as I ran to already mostly demolished buildings. Climbing to the top was a pain in and of itself. Everything I tried to step on was loose and crumbled under the slightest pressure.
But after a while I was able to get to the top. I could see past all of the other destroyed buildings, but the ones that were ok were just too tall for me to see over. ‘I’m gonna have to be faster to catch the principal off-guard to see over everything.’ I got ready and yelled. “2nd Gear ‘Overdrive’!!” With that I put myself on a timer. But I had a chance to make it to the roof. I wasn’t putting as much power into the overdrive as I could, but it was enough for me to run up the walls with the assistance of my wires.
I turned on my ‘bullet-time’ as soon as I got to the top, and looked around. I saw the exit far off in the distance. I quickly turned off my ‘bullet-time’ and ran towards the exit on ‘Overdrive’. Running across the roof-tops I almost made it until I heard Ashido screaming from behind me. “Ashido!!” I screamed out for her. She responded back to me with her voice muffled. I was down to 50%, but I ran for her.
I jumped down off the building while making a mental note of the direction I needed to go. I found Ashido with a twisted ankle. It looked almost broken, no way she could walk on that. She looked up at me with tears in her eyes. I turned off ‘2nd gear’ and grabbed her. She yelped as I placed her on my back. “Hold on tight, and don’t let go for anything.” She held on for dear life as I shouted. “3rd Gear ‘Overclocking’!!!” This was the strongest that I had. Combining ‘Overdrive’, with ‘Bullet Time’. It ate up power like nobody's business, even with the batteries that I had, I would only last for 10 seconds before the 30% threshold.
My body was heating up, steam was coming out of me. My hair was sparking, and arcing to Ashido. She had already covered most of herself with goo to stop me from shocking her. Yes my coat could take care of most of it, but it was nice to have extra protection. I began to run, but this time I felt normal. My mind was able to process the movements of the ‘overdrive’ like speed. I ran as fast as I could toward the exit running off of walls to get over obstacles, like pipes, and fences. Ashido was still holding on with all she had, but I could feel her slipping. I quickly cupped my hands under her thighs to keep her on my back. Her goo stopped the electricity going to her, but the heat was real, especially on my left hand. The goo helped insulate that a little, but as I tested earlier; electricity or heat was possible to prevent, but not both
I ran past my threshold of 30%, but I had to keep going. “Push through!!” I yelled to myself as I rounded the last corner to the exit. 25% 20% I could feel my power trickling down. My batteries on my costume were sucked dry, I was running low on energy, but I needed to make it out. I was almost there, but I saw a building starting to fall to block my path. I got a bit of inspiration, and threw my wire at the exit door itself. I then had it pull as hard as it could while I ran at full speed.
Ashido and I made it past the building with some time to spare, and made it out the door. As soon as we did I turned off my ‘3rd Gear’ but I was still overheating. I continued to walk with her on my back. My breathing was unstable and heavy. My legs were shaking. I felt absurdly dizzy. But I continued on to the hospital tent. “Kaminari, let me down, you can’t keep up like this.” I just gripped onto her thighs tighter as I was still going to the tent. Ashido yelped in surprise. I laughed weakly. “Not gonna happen on that leg, I will take care of you until we can get you the treatment you need.”
Ashido was silent for a second before she leaned into my back deeper. “Jiro told me a little bit about you, and what I should know. She did tell me about how you change when fighting somebody, but I had a hard time believing her. I saw it happen today, and I hated every second of it. The way you looked at me, like I wasn’t somebody you cared about. Almost like you didn’t see me like a person. All that mattered was winning.”