Himiko and I spent practically the entire weekend glued to each other. Classes would return to normal on Monday, and it wasn't much time to make up for everything, so we made the most of it.
In the meantime, I finally gathered the courage to open the 1-A group chat, which had accumulated an incredible 150+ messages. Simply wonderful.
One of the first messages was a location sent by Midoriya, just that. He didn't send anything else for several hours.
It turns out the "unidentified teenagers" who were attacked by the Hero Killer were Midoriya, Todoroki, and Iida.
The class had gone crazy in the group when they found out, sending tons of messages asking if they were okay.
Midoriya eventually sent a selfie of the three of them in the hospital, after some insistence from everyone.
They were pretty beaten up, but it's better to be battered than dead.
I kept scrolling through the messages, most of which were memes being shared, until I stopped at a certain familiar report.
I clicked on the video.
["Ah, that guy? *Mirko points at me with her thumb* He's just a—"] I paused the video.
"Sigh… they found my interview…"
"Hehehe," Himiko laughed at my reaction.
I turned to her and narrowed my eyes.
She crossed her arms in an X.
"Don't look at me like that, it wasn't me!" she quickly defended herself, and with a quick glance at the message, I saw that was true.
"Toru…" Unbelievable. Sometimes the stab in the back comes from someone you can't even see.
I kept scrolling.
[Toru: *Video*]
[Toru: "GUYS!!!! Look what I found on TV!!"]
[Himi: "OMG!"]
[Mina: "LOL, doesn't it look like Kaneki-kun is being held hostage???"]
[Kirishima: "Blink twice if you need help, man…"]
[Jiro: "#StayStrongKaneki"]
[Kaminari: "#StayStrongKaneki"]
[Uraraka: "#StayStrongKaneki"]
[ … ] The copypasta repeated several more times, from different people.
They even paused the interview right when Mirko grabbed me and made a sticker of me being lifted into the air by my collar, completely expressionless, just accepting my fate.
"Sigh…"
"Pfff." Himiko was trying her hardest to hold back her laughter while looking at the sticker again.
"I hate them."
"Nah, you don't."
─── ◆ ───
The weekend passed, and our lives returned to their normal pace.
Himiko and I were already in our classroom at UA.
"Toru… Just know there will be payback." I narrowed my eyes at my dear invisible friend, who had recently posted something embarrassing about me in our class group.
"Heh??" She pointed at herself, but I swear, if we could see her face, she'd be smiling and sticking her tongue out at me.
"KAKAKA!" Kaminari threw an arm around my neck, I had to bend down a bit to let him.
"Look at your face, man!" He showed me the sticker. My face was slightly distorted from the speed Mirko had pulled me.
"This is the best thing that happened during these internships, seriously!" Sero approached, and upon seeing the sticker, started laughing.
"We need to take more pictures like this to make stickers!" Kirishima clenched his fist, overly enthusiastic for some reason.
"The hard part is actually… taking… the picture…" Kaminari started, but his voice trailed off along with the rest of the class as we saw a figure enter the room.
Bakugo walked in with his folder under his arm, trembling slightly with anger, but that was normal.
But his hair was completely flat, almost slicked down with gel, styled in a way that made him look like a rich kid.
"..."
Silence completely took over the room.
"Pff." Cheeks began to puff with held-in laughter.
"PFFFFF—"
"HAHAHAHAHAHAHA"
"STOP LAUGHING, DAMN IT!!!!" Bakugo shouted.
"Man—haa, hahaha—what… haa, what is that??" Kirishima struggled to breathe.
"I tried washing this crap out, but it wouldn't come off!"
"Click." A classic camera sound echoed through the room.
Mina wiped away a tear and posted the newest sticker in the group: Bakugo with "good boy" hair screaming exaggeratedly.
I had to hold Himiko, she almost hit her head on the edge of the desk from laughing so much. Even I was tearing up, despite not being able to laugh out loud or smile.
─── ◆ ───
Somehow, Bakugo's hair returned to normal after he… exploded it? Seriously, his quirk is stranger than it looks.
Another thing that caught the class's attention was how Todoroki, Iida, and Midoriya were after the Hero Killer's attack, they seemed fine.
Iida, in particular, was in his usual state, doing "karate chops" to prove his point.
─── ◆ ───
Classes went on as usual until it was time for hero training, when we were called to Ground Gamma, but first, we had to put on our costumes.
And this time, our new costumes were ready!
We kept the stealth theme and the masks with teeth and respirators.
Our costumes had black as the main color, with subtle, almost faded gold details.
Each outfit had a hood, Himiko's, in particular, had an opening so her buns could stick out.
She also had that same fang scarf replica, now serving as a collar design instead of an actual scarf.
My outfit had an extra, a medium-length cape (I couldn't resist this time).
Our gloves were fingerless, and the boots were some kind of comfortable military-style boots, recommended by Nemuri.
Himiko's blood extraction device was also ready and already part of her costume.
Overall, the small machinery was "hidden" in a small pouch at the back of Himiko's belt.
Hatsume had done a great job making it compact and functional.
The design was based on the Nightingale set from Skyrim. It wasn't exactly the same, but we thought the final result looked really cool.
[Image]
"That's a nice change for your costumes, Kaneki-kun," Midoriya analyzed our new outfits before turning with a notebook and starting to write something, muttering in a slightly unsettling way.
"Heh… thanks, man…" I replied, but he kept talking to himself.
Himiko was showing her costume and her blood suction device to the girls.
I ended up in a discussion with the guys about the use of capes, but we had to stop when All Might arrived.
─── ◆ ───
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