Chapter 14: A Warning, a Wardrobe Malfunction, and the Weight of the World.
Shota Aizawa's final report on "Operation: Gauge the Anomaly" landed on Principal Nezu's desk with the soft thud of a death sentence. His conclusion was not a recommendation; it was a warning. "We are not studying a Quirk. We are observing a physical absolute. Continued direct stimulus is not only pointless, it is catastrophically reckless. I advise immediate cessation of all active tests."
Nezu sat in his office long after Aizawa had left, the chilling words echoing in the silence. The sheer, unthinking, accidental nature of Saitama's deflection of the projectile was more terrifying than any conscious display of power could ever be. It implied a level of existence so far beyond their own that it broke the very concept of conflict. You cannot fight a hurricane; you can only board up the windows and pray it passes.
With a heavy sigh, Nezu typed a new directive to his faculty. The title of the operation was changed. It was no longer about gauging an anomaly. The new file name was simpler: "Protocol Chimera: Passive Observation Only." The new goal was not to test Saitama's limits, but to meticulously document his daily life, to understand his patterns, his motivations, his diet—anything that might provide a clue to his nature. From this day forward, the teachers of U.A. High were no longer scientists prodding a specimen; they were wildlife biologists, cautiously observing a sleeping leviathan from a very, very safe distance.
Saitama, the subject of this high-level paranoia, was dealing with a crisis of his own, one far more immediate and devastating than any existential threat he posed to the world order. The zipper on his hero suit was broken.
The battle at the USJ, followed by a particularly vigorous cycle in the staff washing machine, had been the final straw. A tiny, crucial seam had come undone at the base of the zipper, causing it to go off-track. It was, for all intents and purposes, a catastrophic wardrobe malfunction. He stared at the yellow jumpsuit laid out on his bed, his heart filled with a genuine, profound sense of dread. This suit was his most prized possession. It was the symbol of his hard-won, boringly absolute strength. And he didn't know how to sew.
His first attempt at a solution involved a tube of super glue he'd borrowed from the janitorial closet. This resulted in him getting his thumb and index finger stuck together for twenty minutes. His second attempt involved a stapler, which proved wholly ineffective against the suit's strangely durable fabric, the staples simply crumpling against the yellow material. This was a problem that brute force could not solve.
While Saitama was wrestling with his domestic disaster, the students of Class 1-A were wrestling with their own destinies. In the two weeks leading up to the Sports Festival, every student was engaged in a frantic, personal training montage. In the engineered wilderness of the U.A. training grounds, Bakugo was honing his AP Shot, creating explosions that carved deep scars into the earth. Todoroki stood between a glacier of his own making and a roaring inferno, sweat and frost covering his body as he pushed the limits of his dual nature. Midoriya, his mind a whirlwind of All Might's advice and Saitama's impossible example, was on a secluded beach, trying desperately to channel One For All through his entire body, the green lightning of his Quirk flickering and sputtering with uncontrolled power. Their struggles were epic, their determination palpable. They were fighting for their futures.
Saitama was fighting his zipper.
In a moment of desperation, he wandered the halls of U.A.'s main building, holding his neatly folded suit, hoping to find someone, anyone, with a needle and thread. He took a wrong turn, ending up in a wing of the school he'd never seen before, one filled with the sounds of whirring machinery and the smell of ozone. A sign above a massive bay door read: "Support Course - Department of Inventions."
The door suddenly blasted open, and a girl with pink, dreadlocked hair and goggles shaped like zoom lenses nearly ran him over. She was holding a smoking, sparking metal glove.
"It works! The electro-grip functionality is a complete success!" she yelled to no one in particular. This was Mei Hatsume. Her wild, gear-like eyes then fell upon the yellow suit in Saitama's hands. Her manic grin widened. "Whoa! What a unique design! The material composition feels incredibly durable! Is that a poly-aramid fiber blend? I've never seen a weave like this! Let me see it! Let me see your baby!"
Before Saitama could react, she had snatched the suit from his hands, her eyes scanning it with an intensity that made him uncomfortable.
"The zipper's broken," Saitama said simply. "Can you fix it?"
Hatsume's eyes lit up with a terrifying, creative fire. "Fix it? Oh, I can do more than fix it! I can make it better! Stronger! Faster! This baby is crying out for some upgrades! Imagine this with integrated rocket thrusters! A deployable energy shield in the cape! A beverage dispenser in the belt!"
"I just want the zipper fixed," Saitama insisted, his voice flat.
"Of course, of course, the zipper first!" she said, already dragging his precious suit into the chaotic, oil-stained depths of her lab. "But you just wait! When I'm done, this baby will be the pinnacle of hero support technology!"
She disappeared behind a wall of sparking machinery. Saitama was left standing in the hallway, wearing only his standard-issue U.A. tracksuit, feeling oddly naked without his uniform.
Across campus, in a quiet office, Toshinori Yagi sat with a pale and determined Izuku Midoriya. "The world will be watching you at the Sports Festival, my boy," the skeletal hero said, his voice grave. "You now carry the weight of One For All. You must smile in the face of pressure and show them… that you are here."
Midoriya nodded, his hands clenched into fists, the burden of a legacy weighing heavily on his young shoulders. The fate of the world, the future of heroism, rested upon him.
Saitama just hoped he'd get his suit back before the weekend.
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