Did I manage to get this chapter out on the 20th anniversary of Ben 10 as a franchise? Yup, I believe I did!
Also, RIP Jim Ward, original voice of Diamondhead, Wildvine, XLR8 and more.
The person who usually works with me on my other fic (Of Alliances & Assimilation, if anyone here is into High School DxD) is currently out of commission right now, so you're getting two chapters of this in a row! Will probably balance that out with 2 chapters of that fic in a row (if necessary) once she's ready to help me with that one, so don't be surprised if the next chapter of this fic takes a bit longer than normal to come out.
The chapterly transformation counter, as of the end of Chapter 8:
Jetray: 3
Four Arms: 2
Humungousaur, Spider-Monkey, Diamondhead, Upgrade, Swampfire, Grey Matter, Big Chill: 1
Anyway, once you're done with this chapter, which I seriously hope you enjoy, hope you've got it in you to keep leaving your thoughts via review, or if you want to chat with me (about the fic, Ben 10 or MHA in general, or something else entirely, drop me a PM or look me up on Discord (name for it is on my profile), or better yet join my server (link also in profile, just take out the spaces). Any of those methods works out just fine for me, and I hope to chat with you soon!
IT'S CHAPTER TIME!
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"Not bad, Mr. Tennyson. You clearly have some idea of how to wrap up wounds already-"
"Dude, just call me Ben."
"But it's in danger of coming loose up at the top, here."
"Damn. Uh, I thought we had tape around here? Uh, Grandpa usually did-"
"And that's a good idea, but if you don't, it's a good idea to use…"
Running a hand over the bandages he'd wrapped around the arm of the practice dummy that he, the expressionless Kodai, the beastly-looking but deceptively polite Shishida, and Tokage, were all knelt around, Ben took half a second to get to his feet, stretching his knees a little bit before sitting back down on the floor of Gym Alpha, paying attention as Shishida carefully redid the bandage-wrapping, showing him- and by extension the two girls they were working with- a good way to tie up bandages without the need for tape, and without restricting circulation…
Or at the very least, the practice dummy's simulated circulation. And Shishida was right, Ben DID have some idea of how to bandage wounds. Even if he hadn't specifically been the one doing the bandaging, and contrary to what both his Grandpa Max and Gwen had probably thought at the time, he had been paying attention whenever they had to treat him, after one battle or another.
Near the dummy's head, Tokage was guiding Kodai, gently pulling the dummy's chin downwards away from the rest of its face, her fingers holding its tongue away from the back of its throat, and her head… detached from the rest of her body, and situated right next to the dummy's mouth.
"No need to stick your mouth on theirs… not yet, at least." She remarked, moving her head back to her neck and reattaching it. "Just look for any signs of their chest rising and falling, or feel for their breath on your cheek-"
"Or try to listen for breath as well, Tokage! That's important too!"
"…Yeah, what the totally-appropriately-dressed teacher said." Tokage jerked her head in Midnight's (who was passing) direction, before offering Kodai a sheepish grin.
"I heard that!"
"Here, you try." The greenette continued to Kodai, shifting away from the dummy and getting to her feet.
"Mm." Kodai hummed, as she took Tokage's place.
"…I'm gonna take that as an 'okay' and head to the toilet now."
Tokage got up and removed herself from the group, leaving them down to three. Ben watched her- skintight suit and all- moving over to where Recovery Girl was stood, bending down to probably let her know that she was heading out for a minute, before doing exactly that. As she did so, while Shishida moved over to the dummy's head to watch Kodai's work on it, he frowned.
It wasn't anything obvious. No alarms, no villains crashing through the ceiling, no teachers tensing up. Nothing but a feeling that something… wasn't as right as everyone else in the room seemed to think it was.
His mind couldn't help but jump back to lunchtime, where the press had somehow gotten onto U.A.'s campus, and how he, Gwen and seemingly, no-one else had suspected that something else was even slightly up with that. Class 1-B were in groups of four (well- two of the groups were in threes at this very second, as Tokage and Tsunotori had broken off from their respective groups to use the little girls' room), working through the first-aid drills that Recovery Girl had briefed them on. The elderly-looking nurse was slowly pacing around the room, occasionally stopping to correct people whenever she saw them doing anything wrong. Midnight lounged nearby, occasionally making her own rounds to offer her own input on how the students were getting on… or crack the occasional comment that flustered one half of the class, with the other half of the class trying REALLY hard to ignore them.
Everything looked so… normal. Which was precisely the problem when some primal instinct of Ben's- honed by as many battles for his life that he'd been through- was silently shouting at him that something about this whole situation was not normal in the slightest.
The door to the gym ground against the ground slightly as it was pushed open. A couple of students looked up from their exercises, but went back to their work when they saw it was just Tsunotori- blonde hair, horns and all- stepping back in after she'd returned from the bathroom. She looked around for a second before spotting the rest of her own group- Komori, Shiozaki and Honenuki- though rather than move over to them, she made a beeline for Ben.
"Ah- uh- Tennyson? Sorry, Ben?" she spoke, once she was close enough. "Excuse me… may I, uh, ask you a question?"
Ben blinked.
"Sure." He got to his feet, stretching his arms a little bit as he looked his fellow transfer student. "What's up?"
"I was, uh…" Tsunotori paused for a moment, her face screwed up in concentration for a second before she looked back over to her own group. Honenuki, who had been chatting with Shiozaki at that moment, looked up in turn.
"Curious!" he called out, across the room. "That's the word, Tsunotori!"
"Ah, thank you!" Tsunotori called back, inclining her head to Honenuki before turning back to Ben. "I was curious, Ben… you are from America, yes?" she gestured to herself as she spoke. "A transfer student, like me?"
Ben rubbed the back of his neck, outwardly allowing himself an awkward chuckle.
'PLEASEWORKPLEASEWORKPLEASEWORK-' "Hey, you don't have to- uh, force yourself to speak Japanese for me." He replied. "We can talk in English if that's easier for you, it's fine either way."
Nobody reacted. Nobody looked up from what they were doing. Nobody immediately called Ben on something he'd feared would happen the second he learned Tsunotori was ALSO a transfer student from the United States- or this world's United States, at least. Evidently, everyone- including Tsunotori- was hearing him in English now.
"Oh…!" Tsunotori replied, letting out a slightly shaky breath. "Thanks! Talking in Japanese is still a challenge for me, but Honenuki's been really nice helping me out with it and everything!"
Ben made a mental note that- if he and Gwen ever made it home- he needed to thank Azmuth every day, for the rest of his life, for allowing the Omnitrix to detect what language he wanted to be heard speaking in at any given moment, and respond accordingly. Though knowing his luck, it was probably going to screw up on him next time he wanted to transform, to balance the metaphorical scales.
"Well, you're doing pretty good so far, I'd say." He replied. "And to answer, yeah, I'm a transfer student from the U.S. Like you, right?"
"Yeah." Tsunotori nodded. "I was just curious," she swallowed. "As to where in the States you and your… sister?"
"Cousin."
"Cousin, sorry." Tsunotori nodded. "Are from. I'm from Nevada, pretty small town called Lund. Everyone's still probably talking about how I made it here."
"Yeah, probably." Ben chuckled, scratching a random itch on the back of his head. "I'm pretty much the opposite. Whole-ass city called Bellwood, just north of NYC, that's where Gwen and I are from."
Of course, Gwen had made sure to check beforehand that their home city back in their world both existed in this one at all, and was in the same location as back home, before she'd given the goahead for Ben to say so when asked about it.
"That DOES sound like the opposite." Tsunotori replied, letting out a small giggle. "Hey, did you ever think about going through any Pro training courses back home, or…?"
Ben blinked, swallowed. Well, damn, time to improvise an explanation, because that was a pretty good question.
And back home… those two words weighed on him heavier than they had any right to, MUCH heavier than anyone in this room could even hope to know.
"…Yeah." He replied, after a minute. "Honestly, given my and Gwen's Quirks and training, we'd both have blitzed whatever courses Bellwood had for us and become Pros before we even got out of our teens, it would've been that easy. But…" he let out a breath. "Then we heard that the #1 Pro Hero in the world went here. And that U.A. was supposed to have the best Hero Course there was."
"Ahh, right." Tsunotori nodded, smiling. "Wanted to follow in All Might's footsteps, huh? Hey, did you know he actually started his career in the U.S. before moving back here?"
"I… did not." Ben replied, blinking. "But honestly? That does explain why he always yells out 'INSERT US STATE HERE, SMASH!' whenever he does anything."
Tsunotori let out a snort of laughter.
"You've got to admit though, something like Texas Smash does roll off the tongue better than, I dunno, Hokkaido Smash?"
"How the hell would a Hokkaido Smash even work?" Ben asked, chuckling a little bit himself. Tsunotori shrugged, before taking a couple of steps away as Shiozaki waved her back over.
"I don't know! Nice talking, Ben!"
Ben raised a hand as she left, calling back "Likewise!" as he returned to his own group, at the same time as Tokage as she returned from the bathroom. While he and Tsunotori had been talking, Shishida had procured some medical tape from Recovery Girl (who was making the rounds again) and wordlessly offered it to Ben so he could have a go with applying bandages to the dummy while using it.
As he knelt down and began doing just that, out of the corner of his eye, he heard a quiet saxophone solo coming from Midnight's direction, as she pulled out her phone from her utility belt. Frowning at the screen for a couple of seconds, she stepped a few paces away from the gathered groups in the middle of Gym Alpha and answered the call. Over the general din of all the groups talking to each other at once, Ben couldn't hear what she was saying, or what was being said on the other end. But he didn't need to, her posture and expression told him more than enough.
Her free hand curled into a fist. Her entire body stiffened. The easy-going- slightly sultry- expression she'd been carrying all afternoon vanished in an instant, replaced by something much more set and resolute.
She didn't take long to finish the call, before crossing the gym at a near-jog towards Recovery Girl, and bending down to whisper something urgent into the nurse's ear.
Whatever it was- again, Ben couldn't hear- made her eyes widen. She tapped her cane against the hard floor hard enough to get the entire class' attention.
"Everyone!" she barked. "Sorry to cut this class short, but something important's just come up, so that'll be all for today! You're all clear to head home after changing out of your costumes."
The class erupted into confused murmurs about what could possibly have come up, or if they'd done something wrong, but neither Recovery Girl or Midnight elaborated. The pair of them turned on their heels and took off from the gym, with some shouts of surprise joining the confused murmurs when everyone saw the elderly-looking nurse keeping pace with Midnight for the few seconds they were still in the gym.
A couple of seconds after Class 1-B had been left alone in the gym, some of them began to gather up the medical supplies that had been brought down to the gym earlier. Ben heard some short conversation being shared between Kendo, Shoda and a few others as they figured out where would be a good place to leave the stuff, while the rest of them began filing out of Gym Alpha. The murmurs and speculation about what could have come up continued among the students, though Ben remained silent.
He was already putting the pieces together: obviously, with Midnight and Recovery Girl being U.A. faculty, whatever they had just been called away on couldn't have had anything to do with anything going on outside U.A. High. There were almost definitely other Pros that could be called upon at a second's notice to handle whatever situation there was, so it had to be a U.A. matter that they were being called on.
As everyone made their way back into the main building, passing both some upperclassmen that were already making their way out, and spying Snipe and Vlad King rushing past everyone as best they could, Ben's mind settled on two possibilities of what the hell could be going on right now.
The first was that Ben and Gwen's concern from earlier had been confirmed: that a villain had made their way onto campus and was stirring up trouble. He dismissed that possibility almost immediately, because the idea of letting everyone go home WITH the knowledge that someone hostile was on campus was, frankly, laughable. If that were the case, it'd make way more sense to lock everything down.
Which left the second possibility to jump into Ben's mind: that whatever was going on had something to do with the other Hero Course class going on right now… Class 1-A. Gwen's class.
Letting out a breath, Ben flicked up one of his sleeves to expose the Omnitrix as he stepped into the hallway that the changing room was on.
'Definitely Jetray." He thought to himself as he reached for the dial. 'Or XLR8. After I've caught up to them or get where they're going… I'll go from there.' As he reached for the dial and began twisting it, his stomach dropped as it… jammed.
No matter how hard he tried to twist it around so it would select the alien he wanted, it stayed stuck between Snare-Oh and Frankenstrike.
"No, no, no-!" Ben muttered angrily, under his breath as he slammed his palm down on the watch (which yielded no transformation), mentally taking back whatever thanks he had planned for Azmuth as nothing happened beyond an angry buzzing from his left wrist, the faceplate flashing once before going dark for a second. "You've gotta be kidding me, this has to happen now? Fu-"
"Uh… Ben?"
Ben looked up, frustration lining his face as he watched Kendo- still in her qipao costume- finish coming up the stairs onto the second floor, having just dropped off some of the bandages and practice dummies from the gym in Recovery Girl's office before coming up. Her brow was slightly furrowed as she stepped over towards him.
"You okay?"
"I'm fine." Ben replied, his hand still moving around the Omnitrix's dial as he attempted to adjust it. "Just- this damn thing's decided to screw up on me for whatever reason-"
"Oh, damn." Kendo's eyes flicked to the watch, then back to Ben's face, before she half-turned around. "Want to head over to the Support Course before we head out? Some of the guys in there might still be-"
"No, it's fine!" Ben quickly cut across her. "It does this sometimes, just needs to reset- I think-"
Kendo blinked a couple of times, before turning back around and taking half a step closer to Ben.
"You sure you're alright?" she asked. "You just look more tense than you usually are."
"I'm fine, I'm fine." Ben ran a hand through his hair, sighing. "I just- with how Recovery Girl and Midnight left just now, how all the other teachers are leaving this quickly… I think something's wrong. I've got a feeling that-" he swallowed "-that my cousin might be in danger."
"From Class 1-A?"
Ben nodded.
Kendo glanced over her shoulder, before looking out the window, where she could see Hound Dog and Cementoss (with Hound Dog literally running on all fours) taking off out the school's main gate. She then looked back at Ben, who was still violently twisting the Omnitrix's dial and attempting to slam down on the dial with his hand every few seconds.
"You're planning on going after them." She said, flatly.
Ben didn't answer verbally, simply spending the next few seconds trying to get the Omnitrix to actually work properly. Which, ironically, was all the answer Kendo needed.
"Okay, no." she said, taking another step closer to Ben, taking a hold of his right wrist and physically guiding his hand away from the Omnitrix, with the gesture being enough to shock Ben into actually stopping what he was doing. "I can name a good few reasons that that'd be a bad idea. First being that we were told- literally just now- to change back into our uniforms, and head home. That's what the teachers told us to do, I think they've got good reason to tell us."
Ben opened his mouth-
"Second," Kendo continued, cutting him off before he could even start. "Midnight, Recovery Girl and all the other faculty here, they're not just teachers with fancy costumes, they're licensed and reasonably seasoned Pros. If all of them- including freaking All Might, Ben- are being called away for whatever might be going down with Class 1-A right now, then I've got a feeling too," she fixed him with a very… Gwen-like, look as she repeated his own words back to him "that it's serious. Much too serious for a student- yes, I know you're strong but we're still only fifteen- to get involved with without potentially making things worse."
Ben pulled his arm out of Kendo's grip, and returned to twisting the dial and smacking it against his hand- the nearby wall- anything, as if sheer willpower might force it to respond.
"Thirdly," Kendo- who looked tempted to try and grab his wrist again, but decided against it after a second. "Do you even know which way they're going? And if you did, do you even have a way of following them that doesn't rely on that support item on your wrist co-operating with you within the next… I'm gonna say minute?"
Seemingly in response to Kendo's words, the Omnitrix gave an irritated-sounding buzz, that both she and Ben ignored.
"And fourthly," Kendo continued, her tone softening a little. She raised a hand to grab Ben's wrist again, hesitated, and laid it down on his shoulder. "You can't know for sure if your cousin is actually in any danger. I think I remember her, we met briefly during the practical exam… she got third, didn't she? Most points out of anyone outside of Bakugo from 1-A-"
"And me!"
"And you." Kendo added, patiently. "Point is, if that points-total is anything to go by, she's pretty strong in her own right."
Ben had to resist the strong urge to reply with something to the effect of "If only you knew…"
"If she IS in a bind with the rest of her class," Kendo finished, out loud. "I'm sure she can hold out until the Pros arrive. Have a little faith in her, yeah?"
Ben gave the Omnitrix's dial one last whack against the nearest wall, and when it still refused to budge, his hand fell to his side. Running his other hand through his hair, he took half a step away from Kendo, turning back towards the male changing rooms.
"Fine." He replied, with a tired exhale as he began moving again. "You'd better be right."
"Don't worry, I usually am." Kendo remarked, resisting the urge to giggle at her own remark as she caught up to Ben, passed him and entered the female changing rooms. "See you tomorrow."
Ben didn't reply. He moved on autopilot more than anything else- changing out of his hero costume, back into his U.A. uniform, slung his bag on his shoulder, trying whenever his right hand was free to work the Omnitrix, but to no avail.
'Of course this thing throws a hissy-fit on me when I actually thank it for working well for a change!' Ben mentally hissed to himself as he, with his uniform back on, made his way out of the changing rooms, bag slung over his shoulder and hands slung in his pockets, right hand fingering with his keys. 'Just had to tempt fate, didn't-?!'
He heard a promising buzz coming from his left wrist. His eyes widening slightly, he pulled his hand out of his pocket and looked at the Omnitrix- lit up, buzzing lightly, dial raised and ready to be slammed down.
"Oh, NOW you decide to-!" Ben muttered to himself, pulling his other hand out of his pocket and raising it… before stopping himself and making a break back to the changing rooms, dodging around Tetsutetsu and Honenuki, who were chatting with each other as they came out of the door.
"Woah!" Tetsutetsu ducked as Ben dashed towards the male changing rooms' door. "Where's the fire, Tennyson?!"
"Forgot my keys!" Ben lied on the spot, bursting through the door into the empty changing room. As soon as the door shut, and he clocked that he was alone, he slammed his palm down on the Omnitrix's dial… and emerged from the green flash as something much… smaller, than he'd wanted. A yellow insect-like… thing, with black eyes and green pupils stared back at him from the nearest mirror, with four stick legs and a beak, along with a big antenna.
"What the… hell is this?!" Ben cried, to the room at large. "I- no- no, to whatever this is!"
Reaching out with one of his stick-legs, Ben tapped the dial again, and what looked like a normal-sized semi-armoured Velociraptor-looking alien emerged in place of… whatever he'd randomly transformed into earlier. Black wheel-like orbs for feet, black tail with five blue stripes, bulky claws, cone-like helmet with protective visor, THIS was exactly what he needed!
"Gotta go fast, XLR8!" Ben muttered to himself, making for the door in a streak of blue. The world slowed around him, such was the speed he was moving at now as he weaved around the few students that were still in the main building. "Excuse me- coming through- sorry Kendo-"
As he slipped through the doors of U.A.'s main building, Ben looked up through his visor towards the campus gate. As he dodged around a trio of older-looking students- a tall muscular blonde boy with beady blue eyes, a fair-skinned girl with long light-blue hair and a… VERY shapely figure, and a pale boy with messy dark-indigo hair- and flew through the gate, he glanced left- glanced right-
Nothing in either direction. No Midnight, no Recovery Girl, no teachers, no sirens, NOTHING that he could use to guess where the danger to Gwen was.
Meaning he was going to have to guess which way to turn: left or right.
"Eenie, meenie, miney…" Ben muttered to himself, glancing left, right, left… "This way!"
He turned right, vanishing faster than anyone could even see him, tearing down the road towards downtown Musutafu.
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Shoto Todoroki was used to seeing his own breath in front of him whenever he exhaled after using the icy side of his Quirk. Calmly stepping down from the Landslide Zone, his boots crunching softly over the frozen concrete and debris, he let a slow breath out as Aoyama caught up with him, delicately brushing chips of ice from his slightly-damp cape.
"Hero work is so cruel to beauty…" he muttered under his breath. "Mon dieu… this was bespoke fabric, and it's ruined!"
It didn't look all that ruined to Shoto, but that was hardly relevant to what was going on right now. His attention had already shifted to what was in front of him.
Almost directly across from where he and Aoyama had stepped down from, he could see three figures in the shallows at the edge of the Flood Zone. Midoriya- the boy who couldn't seem to stop breaking a part of himself whenever he did anything combat-related- Asui and Mineta.
Off to the side, but a little bit closer, he saw a few other people standing in the central plaza. The young man whom he assumed was the leader of the League of Villains (a title so cliché he'd resisted the urge to roll his eyes when they'd first proclaimed themselves as such), with the creepy embalmed hands gripping various parts of his body, and a hulking black-skinned monster with an exposed brain- the creature that the League of Villains had brought here to kill All Might: that had been the testimony of one of the villains he'd captured and interrogated back in the Landslide Zone- on its knees, its rear knee tendons blown out but steadily regenerating.
Eraser Head was stood several feet away from it, as was one of his own classmates, Gwen Tennyson. Given the stances they were currently taking, with their homeroom teacher standing on one side of the Nomu with his capture-scarf up and ready to go, and Tennyson on the other side while lowering an outstretched hand, Shoto assumed that they'd been fighting the… thing. He had to respect their balls for that one, considering how obviously strong it looked. One wrong move from either of them, and Class 1-A could very well be down a student… or a homeroom teacher.
There was a pause in the action, though, as the purple figure seemingly made of mist and shadow- the one that was responsible for warping the entire League into the USJ in the first place- appeared between the hands-villain and the brain-creature, addressing the former as "Tomura Shigaraki" before informing him that although Thirteen was 'out of commission' (hardly good news, but at least he… or it… didn't say she was DEAD), one of the students had managed to escape the USJ.
Shoto let out another breath. Finally, some good news: depending on who it was that managed to get out, help could very well be on the way soon, maybe EXTREMELY soon.
Shigaraki, however, didn't seem to take the news well, judging by how he began rapidly scratching at his twitching neck, his breath hitching and how he looked like he was angrily hissing/whispering in the purple shadow-person's direction… before he paused. Turned. To face Midoriya, Asui and Mineta.
"LET'S LEAVE A FEW DEAD KIDS, AT LEAST."
It happened in a couple of seconds.
Shoto blinked as Shigaraki closed the distance to the trio in the Flood Zone in an instant, his hand outstretched towards Asui's face. He slammed his right foot down to the ground, attempting to send out ice fast enough that he could maybe freeze Shigaraki in his tracks before he got to his classmate, but as much as he'd trained himself in the use of his right side… it wasn't nearly fast enough.
The son of the #2 hero had barely begun to process the fact that something AWFUL was probably about to happen to his classmate before he saw the flash of pink light emanating from Gwen's raising right hand, the mana-bolt whizzing through the air, striking Shigaraki's left hand dead-on and blowing it apart. Flesh, bone and blood blowing off of his hand in an instant, Aoyama's hands jumping to his mouth and a muffled shriek meeting his ears.
"S-SACRE BLEU-!"
Shoto stopped moving. He didn't blink. His eyes widened slightly as Shigaraki's fingers landed with light thuds on the ground beside him, as the blood that was sent off him landed on the ground, in the water, on Asui and especially on Mineta, who blinked once and keeled over forward, unconscious.
Shoto's eyes flicked from Aizawa- whose raised hair flopped back down the INSTANT Gwen's mana-bolt had hit Shigaraki's hand, to Gwen herself, her hand outstretched and pointed straight at Shigaraki.
'Reacting faster than Mr. Aizawa…' Shoto thought to himself. 'Striking at that angle to disable the villain without killing him, or bringing harm to anyone else, that's… impressive.'
Shoto was driven from his thoughts, though, when Shigaraki let out a raw, agonised scream, rolling around for a few seconds before sitting upright and screaming at the Nomu to "KILL HER!". And when he saw the monster charging, Aizawa darting across the zone to drag Midoriya, Asui and the unconscious Mineta away from the danger, the sight of Gwen rejecting his attempts to pull her away as well before pushing the four of them away with a barrier, and turning to face the Nomu herself… he blinked at that.
Ignoring Aoyama's whispers of "Si elle découvre moi… je suis mort!", Shoto moved forward, watching the Nomu bend downwards for a second before breaking into a sprint, rushing straight at Gwen. His own ice was just a bit faster, though, rushing at and enveloping one of the Nomu's feet just as it touched the ground a few paces away from Gwen, while rapidly spreading up its leg.
But that didn't stop the Nomu from continuing to rush forward, with such force that its own frozen leg was torn from its body, though it lurched to one side and went down the second it tried to plant a foot that wasn't there anymore. A sizzling mana-bolt, sent from Gwen's left hand and aimed at where the Nomu's head would have been, whizzed through the air and struck the dome that the entire class (minus one) had been trapped in since they arrived, blowing through it and allowing a small beam of sunlight inside.
As she saw the Nomu coming down in front of her, Gwen dodged away from it, her eyes shifting from it to its frozen leg, still planted in the ground where Shoto had frozen it, to Shoto himself. Looking the scarred dual-hair-coloured boy up and down, she let out a breath, her smirk fading.
"You should get out of here, with the others." Gwen spoke, flatly. "Let me buy them some time, before someone else gets here."
Shoto glanced from the Nomu, whose leg was rapidly reforming from where it had ripped it off a few seconds ago. Its head was twisted towards Gwen, its eyes narrowed and focused directly on her even though she hadn't been the one to most recently bring it down.
"Let me double that time." He replied, as the Nomu made its way back to its feet. Gwen glanced over at him, mana gathering in her hands again as the Nomu towered over both her and Shoto, before back to the Nomu itself.
"Fine." She replied. "Try not to get in my way, tho-"
"RAAAAH! EAT HARDENING, WHATEVER YOU ARE!"
From behind and above the Nomu, Kirishima joined the fray, hurling himself at the creature with a full-bodied leap, Hardening flaring across his arms. He drove his fist into the back of the Nomu's head, with force that would surely have shattered the back of any normal human's skull. However, the Nomu was hardly normal- maybe not even human- as it demonstrated once again when it barely flinched in response to Kirishima's punch- its flesh seemed to ripple around the area that it struck- reach around to grab him by the waist and fling him aside like a discarded toy.
Vaguely registering someone further away crying out "NO-!", Gwen flung out a mana-rope in Kirishima's direction, wrapping it around his waist and redirecting his momentum, setting him down far more gently than the force the Nomu threw him at, combined with gravity, would have naturally allowed him to.
As she set him down, though, she glanced back at the Nomu, watching the rippling of its flesh fade away. Thinking back, the Nomu didn't seem to be affected by the impacts of any blows it took, whether it was Kirishima's punch just now, or it going to ground via her yanking it down with a mana-rope or Todoroki freezing one of its legs off and causing it to fall over. How its flesh had rippled just now had caught her attention… was it absorbing the impact rather than taking it head-on?
Just as she redirected the mana-rope towards the Nomu…
"I'LL KILL YOU-!"
A swirl of purple mist opened on one side of Gwen, and Shigaraki- face still streaked with tears yet twisted in fury- lunged at her with his one good hand. On the other, the Nomu had closed the distance between itself and her, and was pulling back to throw a devastating punch at her.
Gwen darted backwards, out of Shigaraki's reaching range, raising sending several mana-spikes erupting from the ground and impaling the Nomu through the chest and back, slowing it down enough for Shoto to send another wave of ice into one of its side. One of its arms was frozen solid, yet torn off a few seconds later. She focused her attention on Shigaraki- who had almost fallen over given his clumsy lunge at her a couple of seconds ago, and raised her hand again. She narrowed her eyes slightly as she levelled it at his remaining hand, but- too late- before she could fire it off, he vanished into the same purple mist he'd come out of earlier.
"GWEN!" she heard Kirishima yelling from where she'd placed him down earlier. "BEHIND YOU!"
The quarter-Anodite didn't need his heads-up, as she heard Shigaraki's incoherent screaming before his first step out of a portal that swirled into existence directly behind her. She twisted to one side, around the side of the Nomu's regenerating arm, but felt resistance as Shigaraki's good hand closed around one of the ends of her cape.
A sharp intake of breath left Gwen as she turned, saw the fabric around her neck beginning to blacken, noticed that it was happening at a much faster pace than it had through Aizawa's elbow earlier. She didn't hesitate, simply reaching up to undo the clasp around her neck, letting the cape slip free into Shigaraki's grasp. Twisting fully around to face him as he just began to realise that all he had of her in his hand was her cape, Gwen darted forward, grabbing the un-decayed end of his cape and quickly wrapping it around his good hand.
Ducking under the attempt at a punch he threw at her with the hand she'd blasted earlier, and resisting the urge to wince as some of his blood landed on the front of her shirt, it took her all of a couple of seconds to wrap up his hand and temporarily cut the villain's destructive potential down from half to zero.
"Kirishima!" Gwen shouted, pivoting around Shigaraki, grabbing him by the back of his shirt and sending him towards the redhead with a mae geri kick. "Keep him busy! Watch the hand!"
In the same breath, though, she heard a roar and turned, her eyes widening slightly as the Nomu bore down on her. Its destroyed arm was just finishing up its regeneration, with its good arm cocked back and ready to punch. She hadn't the time to try and dodge, just to snap a mana-shield into existence between herself and it. But she only had a fraction of a second to do it in, she knew it was going to be thin, rushed, she braced for impact-
The Nomu's fist shattered the barrier on contact, exploding into shards of pink light. Gwen was thrown back by the blowback of her barrier going down, letting out a grunt as she landed on the ground, momentum carrying her a few meters before she formed a pole of mana with one hand and drove it into the ground, coming to a stop and quickly pulling herself back to her feet. Though as the Nomu rushed her, as one of Kurogiri's portals opened to one side of her, heralding Shigaraki's arrival right next to her-
"MOVE IT, PINK LANTERN!"
Just as the one-and-a-half-handed villain came rushing out of the portal (as Kirishima shouted out "Sorry, Gwen!" from the other side of the central plaza), laser-focused on taking advantage of Gwen having temporarily gone down against the Nomu, Bakugo came flying from the Ruins Zone like a missile, smoke and fire ripping behind him as he blasted over to Kurogiri.
Unlike when he and Kirishima had tried to dive at him before, his aim was true this time. He reached for his centre, grabbed what looked like a piece of his armoured collar- probably the same armoured collar that Gwen had hit with her mana-bolt when she'd tried to strike him herself before- and drove the villain into the ground as the portal behind Shigaraki snapped shut.
"Got you this time, you creepy mist bastard!" he snarled, a manic grin on his face as he held Kurogiri down, mini-explosions going off in the hand that held him down. "Try anything funny, and they'll have to spend WEEKS piecing back whatever body you've got under here!"
His attention pulled away from attempting to decay Gwen, Shigaraki grabbed at his own hair with his half-hand, as Gwen's cape was still wrapped around his good hand.
"AAAAAAAGH, SHIT, SHIT, SHIT!" he screamed, in pure frustration. "THIS DAY CAN'T GET ANY FU-"
As if to spite him specifically, the doors to the USJ exploded inward with an almighty BOOM at that exact second.
The sound cut through the USJ like a thunderclap, attracting the attention of everyone in the central plaza, even the Nomu. The sound had barely faded before a blur crossed the distance between the entrance and the central plaza in less than a heartbeat, followed by the sound of another BOOM, this one sounding off much closer to everyone in the plaza.
All Might had shown up, out of pretty much NOWHERE, and hit the Nomu with enough force to send the monster flying. It was launched clear out of the plaza, into the deep end of the Flood Zone that Midoriya, Asui and Mineta had long since vacated along with Aizawa.
That got everyone's attention, just as much as Gwen blasting Shigaraki's hand had done earlier, if not more so. Not counting Todoroki, Kirishima, Bakugo and herself, Gwen counted six students standing at the edges of the zones that they'd been sent into earlier, all either wide-eyed, trembling or just staring like they couldn't quite believe what they were seeing.
Two seconds of stunned silence passed, as All Might- his trademark smile NOT on his face as another marker of how serious the situation was- straightened up from the uppercut he'd delivered the Nomu.
"Students, listen up!" his voice boomed across the facility. "The rest of U.A.'s faculty, the police, and emergency responders are on their way!"
His head turned slightly, as he looked over each of the students stood around and in the central plaza.
"The rest of your classmates have made their way outside, and your immediate priority is to get outside and join them, as quickly as possible! If you're with someone that can't move quickly, then help them as best you can! Is that understood?!"
Most of the students gathered around didn't need telling twice. Those gathered around the edge of the central plaza that hadn't dived into the fight with the Nomu after Gwen had squared up to it began moving: Jiro and Tokoyami broke into sprints as soon as All Might had finished talking, Aoyama had started moving before that point, and Yaoyorozu had enlisted Hagakure's help in dragging a brain-jammed Kaminari towards the exit.
Even Todoroki, Bakugo and Kirishima looked ready to go, even as ripples and a muffled sound of… something, beneath the waters of the Flood Zone began. Gwen took half a step forward, mana gathering around her hands as the ripples grew more pronounced by the second, as did the muffled sound of the Nomu getting closer and closer.
"You'll have a better chance of beating that thing with us here as backup, you know." she remarked. "It can regenerate, I think it can absorb the impact of physical blows, we can-"
All Might turned. Gwen ceased speaking, but her unflinching gaze- green eyes to blue- met his for a few seconds.
"Aizawa told me what was going on when I arrived, Young Tennyson." He replied. "And you've done brilliantly… but it's alright now."
The ripples in the water grew even more pronounced, and the muffled roars of the Nomu grew louder and louder. All Might squared his stance, turning away from Gwen as he visibly braced himself for the Nomu to burst out of the water at any moment.
"Because I AM HERE… and I've got this!"
Right at that second, the moment came: the Nomu burst from the Flood Zone, water dripping off its dark skin as its focus had seemingly switched from Gwen to All Might, and charged back into the plaza at full speed, fist cocked back for a devastating punch.
Rather than dodge or block, All Might dashed forward and met the Nomu's punch head-on with one of his own. Their fists collided, the shockwave alone being enough to send Shigaraki- who had just gotten the last remains of Gwen's scarf off of his hand- hurtling across the ground before he could even think about trying to get a sneaky decay in on either All Might or Gwen. Bakugo was sent skidding backwards on his heels, Todoroki was forced to conjure up an ice-wall for himself to stop himself from being sent back too far, and even Gwen found herself stumbling a bit as the air ruptured around them. Kurogiri was sent flying- almost comically so- through the air after the second punch, with Bakugo not there to hold him down anymore.
It didn't take a genius to figure out that with how fast All Might was moving around the Nomu, and how hard the shockwaves of air sent out from every punch the pair of them threw at each other were being felt, powerful enough to unsettle anyone that stepped closer than fifty feet to the pair of hulking physical fighters… that any attempt to help All Might could well do more harm than good.
Gwen turned, running a hand through her hair
"You better have." She muttered to herself, before raising her voice to Kirisihima, Todoroki and Bakugo. "Come on!"
----- -----
It had been a while since Ben had gone this fast as XLR8 through a city. Hell, it had been a while since he'd used XLR8, period.
He'd almost forgotten how time around him slowed to a crawl when he put the metaphorical pedal to the metal and moved faster than people around him could even perceive. His wheel-like orbs barely grazed the pavement at times as he glided through downtown Musutafu, rushing down every street, glancing into every shop, taking every turn, rushing up to every rooftop and back down again, doubling back whenever he felt like he might have missed somewhere. And all of the time, his eyes scanned through the visor for a scan of an old nurse with a cane, a sexy woman in BDSM gear, an orange girl the same age as him in a cape, anything.
But… nothing. No Recovery Girl, no Midnight, no Gwen.
He felt like he'd been running for the better part of a day, though to everyone that wasn't him, it had probably been seconds, maybe a minute at the ABSOLUTE most, that he'd taken covering the better part of a city holding around a million people.
'Maybe I should try the other way.' Ben thought to himself, racing back the way he'd come towards U.A.'s campus and dashing right past it. Mentally apologizing to Kendo along the way as he dashed right past her again, he darted down the road, looking for any signs of anything that could spell danger.
And fractions of a second- to anyone that wasn't him, at least- later, he saw something.
A large dome-like facility loomed up ahead: outside the entrance, multiple black-and-white police cars and white-and-red ambulances were parked, with uniformed police officers and EMTs gathered outside.
Ben darted forward to investigate a bit more closely, doing his best to avoid running into anyone as he zipped between the cop-cars and ambulances. His eyes flicked to the entrance first, and just as he'd hoped, he spotted Midnight dashing through the large double-doors, along with the vast majority of U.A.'s teachers. Vlad King, Present Mic, Cementoss, Nezu (riding on Vlad's shoulder), Snipe, pretty much everyone… except Eraser Head and All Might.
The answer to where the former was was answered nigh-instantly. A glance into one of the open doors of the ambulance yielded Aizawa, with one of his arms outstretched and an EMT carefully wrapping bandages around his elbow, while he seemed in conversation with one of the others. And glances toward the others yielded the students of Class 1-A, who had split into groups of four or five and were all being individually checked out.
It didn't take Ben long after that to find his cousin, standing in line to be checked at the fourth ambulance he rushed past. She looked okay: the future-resembling hooded cape he'd remembered her ordering as part of her hero costume was gone, there were a few specks of dirt on her face and shirt, but apart from that, nothing really worth worrying about.
She was conscious, at the very least, unlike some kid with purple balls for hair that Ben had spotted in the second ambulance.
After rushing past the fifth ambulance with students inside, he turned toward the entrance and made a beeline for it, wondering what had been going on inside that had caused U.A.'s entire faculty to be called away from whatever they'd been doing minutes earlier. Within fractions of a fraction of a second, he had blazed past all the teachers… okay, maybe he'd slowed just a touch as he passed Midnight, seeing her running in that costume of hers sure was something, alright, but he was still going more than fast enough that being seen wouldn't be an issue.
Tearing his oval-shaped Kineceleran eyes away from U.A.'s sexiest teacher, Ben dashed into the USJ just in time to see All Might, in super-slow motion, punching a towering, grotesquely-shaped humanoid with an exposed brain, with a truly IMMENSE amount of visible force. Around the facility, as he dashed down the stairs towards the central plaza- from which the beast that All Might punched began to fly upwards in super-slow motion- he could see the various zones around the USJ, and if he squinted a bit, he could see villains- most down for the count in one form or another, some not even conscious, some restrained- in each and every one of them.
'Well, on one hand… or claw.' Ben thought to himself, watching the Nomu continue to slowly fly upwards towards the edge of the dome. 'All Might and the teachers have probably got this handled. But on the other claw… meh, I'm feeling helpful today.'
And he was off: dashing through buildings and streets within the Ruins Zone at nigh-incomprehensible speed, scooping up every villain in sight- two at a time, as his claws and their limited functionality compared to fingers didn't exactly lend themselves to carrying more than one thing at a time- and dumping them in a pile just outside.
As the villains in the Landslide Zone were all restrained together, shivering under a small dome of ice that Ben easily ran through, bringing them all to the edge of the zone and leaving them in a small, shivering pile was much quicker work from his quickest alien.
Only three villains were in the Mountain Zone- two groaning on the ground (a pair of quick taps at speed from him were enough to knock them out proper), a larger one completely out of it- were brought to the edge of the zone within two trips.
Heat shimmered across Ben's frame as he darted through the flame and smoke of the Conflagration Zone, whizzing through streets and over roofs as he tapped villains (all of whom he found seemed to be arguing with each other about… something or other) with enough speed and power to send them unconscious, and threw them all into a haphazard pile outside the dome-within-a-dome, before any of them could even register anything.
All the villains in the Flood Zone were floating together, held together by what looked like sticky purple balls…? Questions aside, it made for a very easy trip, as Ben simply dashed across the water, grabbed one of the villains by his soaking shirt, dragged them- and by extension, the entire group- out of the zone, tossed them on the ground, and was gone the next instant.
He had a little bit of fun dashing between raindrops as he scooped up the final round of villains in the Downpour Zone, most of whom looked like they were knocked out from blows to the head or back, and dumped them just outside the zone.
His work done, XLR8 sprinted for the exit, and was gone from the USJ facility as quickly as he'd entered. And in his wake, villains lay together in heaps brought about by speed, gravity and extremely bad luck.
As the Nomu continued to fly through the air, blasting through the USJ dome and keeping going out into the sky, All Might turned, steam bleeding off of his frame, ready to try and intimidate Shigaraki and Kurogiri into giving up next, though what he saw…
"…Hm?"
Made him pause for a second.
He'd clocked the presence of thugs throughout each of the various zones in the USJ immediately upon entering, even though his immediate priority had been the biggest and baddest one of the lot, the one that Tennyson and Todoroki had been fighting. He did NOT, however, remember them all dumped in piles outside the zones that they'd been entrenched in before he'd rushed down to face the Nomu.
He didn't not appreciate the villains being delivered like this, it would definitely make things easier for the rest of U.A.'s faculty plus the police to arrest them all, but… he couldn't lie, he was rather confused.
As were the only two villains that… whatever it was that had been through here and rounded up all the villains like this had seemingly not gotten to. As the constant blowback from All Might's beatdown on the Nomu faded, and both of them were able to stand upright, Shigaraki span around as he took in the sight of all the thugs he'd brought to the USJ lying in piles around him, before turning to Kurogiri.
"What- I- what the hell just happened?!" he hissed, seemingly too shocked by the situation to continue the screaming fit that had started after losing half of one of his hands.
Kurogiri straightened up, purple mist coalescing around himself as he looked around himself.
"I… don't know, Tomura." He replied, slowly. "It would appear that our comrades were… relocated."
One of Shigaraki's eyes twitched as he glanced around, looking for any sign of… whatever it was that had done this. Because as much as he'd heard and seen All Might's spectacular heroics, as much his master had drilled it into his head that All Might was something to be loathed above all others… he'd been watching All Might taking on his precious Nomu, and he HADN'T ever heard of All Might literally being in seven different places at once.
But before he could say anything else, the sound of footsteps echoed from the entrance. Shigaraki, Kurogiri and All Might all turned, to see U.A.'s faculty pouring into the main facility. Judging by the looks on their faces, none of them seemed to notice anything amiss about the situation they'd ran into.
As the teachers- at speed- came down towards the central plaza, Shigaraki was the first to react.
"Kurogiri!" he screamed, spinning on him. "It's time to go! Get me out of here, now!"
The teachers were nearly at the bottom of the stairs, now. All Might could see Present Mic taking in a breath in preparation for a Quirk-enhanced scream, Ectoplasm opening his mouth to create clones of himself, Vlad King activating his gloves to release blood from his body, which began swirling around him as he stepped down, Midnight preparing to tear some of her skin-coloured costume and release some of her sleeping gas.
All Might himself clenched a fist, shakily raised it, not sure of exactly how much energy he had left to spare in his muscled form but sure he could at least throw a powerful enough punch that the air pressure could halt 'Kurogiri''s mist from getting them both out of here.
Kurogiri himself hesitated for a fraction of a second, though his purple mist began to ripple and swirl around Shigaraki.
"The others-"
"I DON'T CARE!" Shigaraki returned to screaming, his voice cracking with rage. "GET. ME. OUT OF HERE!"
As the teachers reached the bottom of the steps, and began spreading out towards the edges of the various zones where the villains had been deposited, Kurogiri's mist began to swirl faster, enveloping Shigaraki.
All Might, clenching his teeth, took half a step forward, raising his fist and preparing to throw the punch, but as he did so, Shigaraki turned from the teachers to him, his tears-streaked face contorted in fury, hatred and something resembling… humiliation?
"THIS ISN'T OVER, SYMBOL OF PEACE!" he yelled, as Kurogiri's mist began to envelop him. "YOU HEAR ME?! YOUR DAYS ARE NUMBERED! I'LL KILL YOU- AND THAT GIRL- ONE DAY! I SWEAR IT-"
And he was gone, along with Kurogiri, with the last thing he saw before he faded away from the USJ entirely was All Might, his raised fist and that goddamn smile.
As the purple mist faded, and the teachers moved to properly apprehend the villains with capture-weapons and Quirks alike, All Might remained standing, his eyes flicking from the spot where Shigaraki and Kurogiri had faded away, to one of the embalmed hands on the ground, and back again.
'That girl…' he thought to himself, Shigaraki's words from seconds ago ringing in his ears. 'Did he mean Young Tennyson?'
----- -----
"You feeling dizzy or nauseous, Ms. Tennyson?"
Gwen shook her head, blinking a couple of times at the penlight that flashed briefly in her eyes.
"No. My back's just twinging a bit. This side…"
"I see. Well, if I can just lift up the back of your costume, then-"
Gwen shifted herself around a bit, allowed the EMT that had been looking her over for the past couple of moments to lift up the back of her shirt. A few seconds of inspection later, the shirt was lowered again.
"Yeah, there's a decent bruise on the left side of your back." The EMT remarked, coming back around to her front, looking outside to the entrance of the USJ before refocusing her attention on Gwen. "You take a fall in there?"
"A couple." Gwen replied, as the EMT approached her left arm, gently rolled up her sleeve and began cleaning a couple of cuts that Gwen had probably taken one of the times the Nomu had sent her down. Even with all the times she'd been banged up WAY worse than she had been a few minutes ago, being cleaned up like she was still- literally- stung a bit.
It didn't last long, however, before the stinging faded, and a couple of small bandages were slapped on her arm, and a quick check of her stomach and lower chest revealed nothing on the scale of the bruise on her back. And a check of her right arm revealed no visible injuries at all.
"Yeah, I don't think you need any extra treatment from Recovery Girl." The EMT remarked, gesturing that Gwen was allowed to roll her sleeve down as she got up, before handing her an ice pack. "Those bruises you have'll heal on their own in a day or two, tops, but if anything starts aching, use this. If it doesn't help, let Recovery Girl know and she'll patch you up properly."
Gwen took the ice pack, nodding and raising a hand in thanks as she hopped out of the ambulance, allowed Aoyama to shakily step in behind her, and took a breath of the afternoon air. Sirens, assorted voices and the sounds of shuffling feet met her ears as she looked over at the bus that had brought Class 1-A up here about an hour ago, and began making her way over to it.
Though as she walked towards the bus, she sounds of her classmates talking with each other drifted past her ears.
"I really thought… that I was going to-" Tsuyu's voice was quieter than she'd heard before, and trembling slightly around the edges. "He- Shigaraki was so close… if Gwen hadn't…"
Iida and Uraraka were on either side of her. Uraraka had an arm firmly wrapped around Tsuyu's shoulders, holding her close and whispering something comforting in her ear as she returned the hug, while Iida was half a step back: he'd been leaning in and listening intently, posture rigid, hands clenched at his sides. When he straightened up, probably to tell whoever was passing to keep clear of their classmate, not to crowd her, he paused when he saw Gwen. His eyes- wide behind his classes- met hers for a second before he shifted slightly closer to Tsuyu and Uraraka.
Gwen didn't break stride, continuing towards the bus before another recounting of what had happened down in the central plaza caught her temporary attention.
"-moved faster than Aizawa! I kid you all not, she was FASTER THAN AIZAWA! Just fired some of that energy-Quirk straight at his hand and then- BOOM! A-and-"
The seemingly-floating pair of gloves in the middle of a small circle formed by Koda, Sato, Sero and Shoji told her that it was Hagakure giving a far, FAR more excited recounting of what had happened between Gwen and Shigaraki than Tsuyu currently was.
Gwen saw Koda going even more still than he already was, his fingers gripping the shield that she'd handed over to him back in the USJ even harder than before.
Sato almost stumbled back half a step, a hand jumping to his mouth.
As Hagakure continued talking, her mouth going at (Gwen could only presume) a hundred miles an hour at LEAST, she heard Sero letting out a nervous chuckle followed by a quiet "H-holy shit…", while Shoji's only external reaction was a slow clenching of one of his large fists.
"-screams, you should have heard it! Shigaraki sounded like he was getting murdered! Totally deserved it though, after what he almost did to Tsu-"
Gwen kept walking, half-amused at how Hagakure was recapping things now but half-dreading what the story was almost definitely going to balloon into within a day or two. As she got closer to the bus, Kirishima (who had a bandage wrapped tightly around one of his arms) was animatedly recounting events of his own to Ashido.
"She was gonna fight that thing head-on, ONE-ON-ONE!" he called out. "Like, straight up, she pushed Mr. Aizawa away with some magic-barrier thing and squared up to that brain-thing by herself! Manliest. Thing. I've. Ever. Seen!"
Ashido leaned forward, her eyes practically sparkling, not even noticing Gwen was right there walking past the pair of them as she hung on Kirishima's every word.
"NO. WAY!"
"WAY."
"OHMYGOD-!"
Gwen kept moving, resisting the urge to let out a giggle at Ashido's over-the-top reaction. Finding a slightly quieter spot just next to the bus- which would probably open as soon as everyone had been checked over and either cleared to leave or was on the way to the hospital for further treatment (she'd seen one ambulance leaving the USJ already, so at least a few of her classmates must have already been judged to require said further treatment)- she leaned against the front of the vehicle itself.
She grabbed the ice pack and slipped it under the back of her shirt, resting it against the bruise on her back and letting out a slow breath. She was prepared for a few minutes of relaxation before the inevitable rush to get on the bus back to U.A. began, though a light tap on her right shoulder jolted her out of any attempts at such a state.
Opening her eyes and glancing to the side, she initially saw no-one there, but half a second later-
"Hey, Gwen!"
Gwen blinked as- it was unmistakeable- one of Ben's aliens, XLR8, poked its head out from behind the bus before retreating. Glancing around to make sure no-one was looking in her direction (no-one was), Gwen stepped behind the bus, out of the rest of her class' collective line of sight, where Ben was waiting for her.
"You okay?"
"Am I-? I'm fine, but-" Gwen tripped over her words slightly as her mind caught up with the fact that Ben was here, rather than at U.A. or at home. "Why are YOU here?"
"Figured something was up when Midnight and Recovery Girl ran off in the middle of class." Ben replied, jerking his aerodynamically-shaped head in the direction of the USJ, where most of the villains he'd rounded up earlier were being led out in handcuffs. "Turns out, I was right."
Gwen followed the direction in which Ben had jerked his head with her own gaze, before looking back at him.
"Please tell me you didn't do anything too reckless, Ben." She spoke, pinching the bridge of her nose with her free hand.
"…I wasn't seen."
Gwen sighed.
"I guess under present circumstances, that meets the criteria of 'not too reckless.'" She remarked. "And to elaborate, I got a little banged up back there, but I'm okay. Nothing that won't heal on its own within a day or two."
Ben nodded.
"Good."
It was a little harder to tell because Gwen wasn't looking at his human face, more his Kineceleran one, but she had a feeling Ben was a bit more relieved about her safety than he was letting on.
"Oh, by the way, don't worry about work tonight." he remarked, half a second later. "I'll tell Mr. Mekakohi you ate something funny at lunch, or something."
"Wouldn't it just be easier to tell him I was involved in a villain attack and need to recover?" Gwen asked, gesturing behind her. "I'm pretty sure the media'll be here within a few minutes. So, you know…"
"Good point." Ben replied, shrugging. "I'll tell him that, then. But when I get home-" He lightly jabbed a claw in Gwen's direction. "I want the details of what happened here, later."
Gwen snorted.
"Of course, you would." She replied. "Deal."
XLR8's visor slid back into place on Ben's face.
"See you later, then." He replied. "You can, uh…"
He vaguely gestured with one claw to the bus, before leaning forward and taking off in a barely-visible blue streak, leaving Gwen alone for half a second before she heard the sounds of people moving towards the bus, and moved around to join them in getting on. She found a seat somewhere near the middle and settled into it, along with the seventeen other students of Class 1-A that had filed on and found their own seats. At the back of them was Aizawa, who nodded to whoever was in the driver's seat as the doors closed, and the bus began to slowly pull away.
"Midoriya and Mineta are on their way to hospital, right now." He addressed the students at large, resting his bandaged elbow on an armrest. "They'll make full recoveries by the time class resumes on Monday, they just need a bit of extra treatment."
The relief among the class was palpable, as was the silence as the bus pulled onto the main road and began the journey back to U.A.'s campus. As Gwen continued to rest the ice pack against her side, her eyes on the passing streets, she could feel them: she'd felt them before on the way here, as Kirishima had named her among the most likely three of their class to make it big in the Pro Hero circuit (the other two being Todoroki and Bakugo), but not as many as there were now on the trip back.
All of her classmates' eyes- even Aizawa's- were on her. All of them had born direct witness to, or at the very least heard secondhand, of her exploits back at the USJ.
She didn't look over at any of them. She didn't need to, to know that today was a turning point.
Things were gonna be different between her and the rest of her class, from now on.
----- -----
Indeed. The danger may have passed for now, but there's so much more to come for not just you, Gwen, but Ben as well.
So many more opportunities to demonstrate to not just your classmates, but also your teachers and the rest of the wider world, that there is far more to you than meets the eye.