Age: 15 (4 months before the U.A. exam)
POV: Izuku Midoriya
The sound of waves crashing against the shore should have been relaxing.
But right now, the only sound filling my ears was the frantic beating of my heart and the squawk of a seagull that seemed to be judging me.
I had just dropped the bomb.
I had told them everything. All Might's secret, One For All, the inheritance of power, and the fact that yesterday, for breakfast, I ingested a hair follicle from the Number One Hero.
I expected screaming. I expected disbelief. I expected Kacchan to tell me my analysis was glitching.
"So..." Toga broke the silence, rocking back on her heels with a smile that showed too much fang. "You ate his hair?"
I blinked, thrown off by her priority.
"Eh? Y-yes."
"That's gross, Izu-kun," she laughed, scrunching her nose with amused irony. "And mind you, I drink blood from strangers, but hair is... fibrous. Did it get stuck in your throat? Did it taste like hero hairspray?"
My jaw dropped.
"Is that your only question? The taste?"
"It's the important part," she said with a shrug, before walking over to Yagi-san (who was in his skeletal form, coughing uncomfortably) and sniffing him shamelessly. "He smells like medicine and old secrets. But if you say it's the ultimate super power, I believe you."
I turned to Kacchan.
He was sitting on the hood of the rusted pickup truck, arms crossed, wearing that expression of perpetual boredom. He didn't look surprised. In fact, he looked like he was crossing a chore off a mental checklist.
"Kacchan... do you believe me?"
Kacchan snorted, hopping off the truck.
"It was obvious, nerd."
"Obvious?" Yagi-san and I asked in unison.
"Let's run the numbers," Kacchan said, holding up a hand and counting on his fingers. "One: All Might appears in town and stays longer than logical. Two: He has an injury that limits his time, ergo, he has an urgent biological need for a successor. Three: You."
He pointed at me. His gaze wasn't mocking; it was clinical.
"You already proved during the gas incident that you're a hero. You didn't need a Quirk for that. You would have gotten into U.A. and been a great underground or technical rescue hero. We already knew that."
Kacchan paused, and his expression grew more serious.
"But you had a ceiling, Izuku. A biological ceiling. You couldn't be the Pillar. You couldn't hold up the sky alone against guys like All For One or high-end Nomus. You would have fallen behind in the raw power scale."
He lowered his hand and looked me in the eye.
"And suddenly, the Old Skeleton looks at you like you're the second coming of Christ and you start talking about 'supreme responsibility.' The only variable that breaks that biological ceiling is a power transfer. It's the only way you, a tactical genius, can compete in the league of gods."
Yagi-san opened his mouth. Closed it. Opened it again.
"Young Bakugou..." muttered the world's greatest hero, visibly intimidated. "It scares me how fast you dissect reality."
"It scares me that you thought you could hide it from me," Kacchan retorted. "So, the ceiling is broken. You have the power."
"Yes..." I looked at my hands. "It's in my DNA, but I haven't... activated it yet."
"Good. Because we have work to do."
(...)
Ten minutes later, we were in the clearest area of the beach.
Yagi-san had regained his composure and was now in "master mode." Or at least, he was trying to be. He looked enthusiastic, vibrating with that paternal energy that was sometimes a bit... intense.
"Alright, Young Midoriya!" he exclaimed, striking a heroic pose (even though he was still in his skinny form). "You have the vessel prepared! Now you just have to start the engine!"
"Yes!" I nodded, nervous but excited.
"How do I do it?" I asked, ready for a technical explanation about energy flows or mental concentration.
All Might gave a thumbs up, beaming.
"It's easy! Close your eyes... Clench your butt cheeks and yell SMASH from the bottom of your heart!"
Dead silence fell over the beach.
The wind blew, dragging an empty plastic bag across the sand.
I looked at my idol.
"Excuse me? The... butt cheeks?"
"The feeling!" he insisted, gesturing vaguely with his hands. "It's like a 'fwoosh' inside you! You just have to let it all out at once! Imagine you're going to hit that refrigerator and release 100%!"
"Oh... I understand," I lied. I didn't understand anything.
But it was All Might. If he said to clench my butt cheeks, I would clench them until they turned into diamonds.
I turned toward the rusted refrigerator. I closed my eyes.
I felt the ember in my stomach. That new, immense, terrifying power.
Let it all out, I thought. Like he said. All 100% into my right arm.
I raised my fist. I began to channel the energy. I felt the veins in my arm start to glow red beneath the skin, throbbing with a pressure that seemed to want to tear me apart from the inside. The air around me began to vibrate.
"SMA...!"
"STOP!"
A hand grabbed my wrist with crushing force, halting the movement instantly.
At the same time, I felt something cold and metallic pressing against my neck.
My eyes snapped open.
Kacchan had me by the forearm, wearing an expression of genuine horror and fury.
Toga was behind me, one of her training knives touching my jugular, immobilizing me.
The energy in my arm dissipated instantly, leaving only a painful cramp.
"What are you doing?" All Might asked, confused. "He was going to do it! He was going to shoot!"
"He was going to explode his damn arm like a water balloon, that's what he was going to do!" Kacchan shouted at All Might, a vein throbbing in his forehead.
Kacchan let go of my wrist and gave me a soft but firm smack on the back of the head.
"Are you an idiot, Deku? Were you going to use 100% in a body that has barely adapted to the power?"
"But... All Might said..."
"All Might is a natural genius, he doesn't know how to teach!" Kacchan interrupted, pointing at the hero with zero respect. "'Clench your butt cheeks' isn't a technical instruction, it's assisted suicide!"
Toga sheathed her knife and stepped in front of me, examining my arm with clinical curiosity.
"Izu-kun, your skin was turning a very ugly color," she said, poking my bicep with a finger. "And it smelled like bone about to splinter. I like the smell of blood, but I prefer your arms to stay attached to your body, thanks. It would be very hard to hug you without arms."
I froze, staring at my own limb.
"Was I... going to break?"
"You were going to turn your humerus into confetti," Kacchan diagnosed, crossing his arms and glaring at All Might. "Hey, Skeleton. If your lesson plan is 'use all the power and hope you don't die,' you're fired as a teacher."
Yagi-san coughed blood, embarrassed, shrinking a little.
"I... well... it worked for me..."
"You were two meters tall and weighed a hundred kilos when you received the power, right?" Kacchan deduced, rubbing the bridge of his nose. "And you probably already had a passive physical mutation or absurd muscle density."
"...Yes."
"Exactly. Izuku is 1.66 meters and weighs as much as one of your legs. His chassis is a family sedan and you just put a space rocket engine in it. If he accelerates to the max, the car disintegrates."
Kacchan sighed, frustrated. Then he looked at me with that analytical intensity, that "I'm going to fix this" look.
"Forget 'all or nothing.' Forget 100% and the Smash."
Kacchan crouched down and drew a quick diagram in the sand with a stick.
"The power is hydraulic energy. If you concentrate it in a single point (the fist) and fire with that pressure, you burst the pipe (your arm)."
He looked at me intently.
"Don't be a cannon, Deku. Be a mesh. Distribute the energy. Don't use 100%. Use 5%. Spread it throughout your entire body to reinforce your muscles, not to destroy them. Turn it on like a full suit, not like a gun."
I looked at the drawing in the sand.
Distribute. Don't concentrate. Full Cowl... although Kacchan didn't use that name, he described the concept perfectly.
It made sense. It was the opposite of what All Might did (or what he appeared to do), but it had all the logic in the world.
"Toga," Kacchan ordered. "If you see his veins turn purple again or if he concentrates energy in a single point, cut off his circulation or tackle him to the ground."
"Aye aye, leader!" Toga said, giving a military salute with a sadistic but loyal smile. "I'll be his safety valve!"
Yagi-san watched us, alternating his gaze between Kacchan giving an applied physics lesson and Toga monitoring my vitals like a psychopathic nurse.
"My goodness..." murmured the Symbol of Peace, running a hand down his face. "I've created a monster... or rather, I've adopted a team of monsters. But..." he smiled slightly, "they're right. Perhaps my method was... too intuitive."
I looked at my friends.
Kacchan, correcting my posture roughly but saving me from self-destruction.
Toga, ready to protect me from myself.
And Yagi-san, the legendary hero who, despite his clumsiness in teaching, had given me the chance to break my ceiling.
I smiled.
All Might might be a novice teacher.
But with the Delta Squad watching my back... maybe, just maybe, I would master this before the exam.
"Let's try again," Kacchan said. "But this time, use your brain, nerd. Energy mesh. 5%. Or I'll beat it out of you."
"Yes, Kacchan!"
Author's note: Sorry for not uploading the chapters sooner, I had to work unexpectedly. Haha, that's what happens when you're poor and from Latin America, haha.