As the nomu shot up past the point he could safely jump off, Minoru considered his options.

  They weren’t great. The nomu was flying along the street that Midoriya had run down, and they were still gaining height. The Fly remained unconscious somewhere in the plaza behind them, and Endeavor would be utterly useless to Minoru since he didn’t fancy getting burned alive today. Oh, and along with wings, the nomu had longer-than usual arms tipped with talons that it was now swiping towards him to try and dislodge him.

  Minoru cursed, kicked the wrist of one arm to force it into a near miss, and desperately wriggled his way upwards until his hands were close to the base of the creature’s wings. Thankfully, the nomu’s arms didn’t appear to bend quite right to allow it to reach any higher than its waist, but he still had to take a moment to reach down and secure a couple of grapeshot that he could brace his feet against.

  The nomu made a couple more attempts to grab or slash him, but when they all failed stopped trying and focused on flying again.

  Minoru peered ahead. Sure enough, down the block was the group of heroes who had run off after Endeavor arrived, clustered around Todoroki, Midoriya, and Ida who appeared to have the Hero Killer in custody.

  Well, they were no help. This damn nomu was too high up for any of them to—except the nomu chose that moment for some reason to dive straight towards the group.

  “Shit!” Minoru hadn’t been able to do anything about the creature before, but he was damned if he was going to watch it injure yet another hero, or worse yet, his friends.

  He braced his feet more firmly against the grapeshot at the nomu’s waist, took a deep breath, and launched himself at its right wing.

  The nomu had canted its wings slightly back as it dove, no longer needing to flap them to maintain altitude, which meant when Minoru jumped for it he didn’t end up buffeted by it but instead impacted the wing with his midsection and desperately grabbed it. The nomu had a split second where it tried to flap the wing and throw him off, but Minoru held firm.

  As Minoru’s weight bore down on the wing, it sagged and the differential with the left hand wing caused the creature to abruptly turn in the air and slam up against the side of the building nearby, pulling a pained screech from its mouth that attracted the attention of the heroes ahead.

  Then they were falling, tumbling in circles through the air as the nomu slashed at him and Minoru did his best to avoid getting gutted. Unfortunately, needing to grip the thing’s wing meant that he didn’t have access to his grapeshot, so the best he could do was lash out with his feet and shift his weight, leading to him collecting several bloody clawmarks along his legs and waist.

  He’d lost all track of the world around them, everything condensing into himself and the nomu’s claws, when an impact hit the nomu’s main body.

  Minoru found himself ripped away from the wing by blunt, human hands and he and his rescuer went sailing away from the nomu who was sent slamming with stunning force into the side of the building once more.

  Minoru and a short, older man in a black mask and yellow cape—see, Minoru knew there were heroes out there with capes!—landed near the edge of the street just before the nomu crashed to the pavement back on the sidewalk. The hero set him down, and Minoru threw a hand onto the man’s upper arm to maintain his balance.

  “The nomu has a sonic attack!” he gasped out, causing the hero to give him a sharp look. “I think that device on its muzzle focuses or enhances it somehow!”

  The hero wasted no time, shoving Minoru aside, crouching, and rocketing back towards the nomu just as it was raising its head. He somehow redirected himself midair and his feet came directly into contact with the nomu’s muzzle before blasting the hero away and sending the creature’s head crashing into the pavement with a painful-sounding crunch.

  Minoru staggered over to it, grabbed a grapeshot off his head with one hand, and with the other shoved the nomu’s head to the side so that its muzzle was pointing at the building before slapping the grapeshot between it and the pavement then hurriedly backing away out of range of its thrashing claws. That should at least prevent it from hitting the group with its sound attack, and had the side benefit of securing it in place until someone could arrive who was able to safely capture it.

  He looked ahead towards the group of heroes, all of whom were staring back at him and the old, yellow-dressed hero while in their midst Minoru could see the Hero Killer slipping what appeared to be some sort of blade out of his sleeve where his hands were tied together with simple rope.

  As Minoru took off in a somewhat drunken sprint towards the group, he silently promised himself to never work in Hosu City after graduation, even if the Fly asked really nicely. These people were utter amateurs.

  Minoru was three steps away when the Hero Killer flicked open the switchblade he’d pulled. He was two steps away when the Hero Killer sliced through the ropes binding his hands. He was one step away when the Hero Killer spun in place to face him, blade lashing out to score light wounds on several of the heroes around him. And then he was throwing himself through the Hero Killer’s lower legs—and holy shit the man had some huge spikes on his boots!—before slapping the grapeshot that he’d ripped off his head onto the pavement, grabbing the man’s belt, and kicking him in the back of his knee as hard as he could as he leaned backward.

  The Hero Killer lashed out with his knife almost faster than Minoru could see, scoring a light wound on Minoru’s cheek, but he stumbled half a step backward while he did it, pulled off balance by Minoru’s unexpected attack, and stepped directly on top of the grapeshot.

  Minoru scrambled away backwards on all fours as fast as he could but was only a few feet away when he suddenly found himself unable to move. What the—was that how the Hero Killer was so effective? He had some sort of immobility Quirk? Several of the heroes around him also appeared to be frozen, so perhaps the man had to wound them first?

  It ultimately didn’t matter, however, because the Hero Killer hadn’t been able to hit everyone and before he could inflict any more damage Todoroki’s ice crashed into him and locked him in place from the ground to halfway up his chest.

  “You fakes!” the Hero Killer wheezed. “All of you, this sham-filled society, the criminals who wield their power in the name of petty mischief, you’re all targets of my purge…!”

  “Why are you all bunched up together?!” someone shouted from down the block. Minoru recognized Endeavor’s voice. “One of them should have headed your way! Wait, is that…Hero Killer!”

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  “Endeavor!” snarled the Hero Killer, seeming to rally some of his flagging energy. “You fake!”

  Endeavor, however, was evidently uninterested in engaging with the Hero Killer as he was already secured, and strode past them all to reach Todoroki. “Shoto!” he boomed. “I see you captured the villain! Excellent work!”

  Minoru, however, didn’t have the attention to spare for Endeavor’s grand-standing or the Hero Killer’s increasingly incoherent yet impassioned muttering. With the immediate crisis over, his classmates safe, and the villains secured, his exertions and wounds finally caught up with him and he fainted dead away.

  Minoru thrashed himself awake, sheets tangled around his legs as he briefly panicked upon waking in an unfamiliar environment. He stilled, his breathing remaining heavy from a nightmare that was already fading out of memory. Right. He was in Hosu General Hospital. His memory of how he got there was hazy, but he had woken some point after arriving, hooked up to an absurd number of fluids and being harangued by a nurse with a Quirk that manifested as a lovely set of fish-like scales stretching from behind her ears down beneath her uniform.

  Things had been a little fuzzy there for a while, but he must have stabilized enough to be moved into the hospital proper because he was in a room with three other beds. He sat up, disentangled himself from the sheets, and looked around to find himself staring into the faces of three of his classmates: Midoriya, Ida, and Todoroki.

  “Mineta!” exclaimed Midoriya. “You’re finally awake! What on earth happened to you? How did you end up on that nomu?”

  “Buh,” said Minoru intelligently. He was extremely glad they had made it out, but hadn’t realized he was going to be grilled the moment he woke up.

  “Give him some space, Midoriya,” said Ida, the boy’s demeanor significantly more restrained than usual and without his trademark weird arm gestures, his arms both being secured in slings.

  “Oh, sorry!” said Midoriya. “We’ve been awake for a while. We were just wondering if someone should wake you up, too.”

  “No, it’s fine.” Minoru rubbed the sleep out of his eyes with one hand as he swung himself around in the bed to face the other teens. “My mentor led those two nomu to Memorial Plaza, but he got injured. I was trying to lock that flying nomu down when it jumped skyward, and it kind of took me with it.”

  “Oh, that’s why you didn’t follow me!” said Midoriya, their brief encounter at the plaza evidently having bothered him. “If your mentor was in trouble, you definitely needed to help him.”

  Ida grimaced, presumably pained by his dereliction of his own mentor, and Minoru redirected the conversation. “What about you three? Did you really defeat the Hero Killer on your own?”

  Midoriya deflated. “I dunno. I keep thinking about it, and I’d say it’s a miracle we’re still alive.” Midoriya laid a hand on one of his legs, which was heavily bandaged. “With my leg…if he’d wanted to kill me, he easily could’ve.”

  “Yeah,” said Todoroki, looking at his own injured arm. “He definitely let us live.” He turned toward Ida. “But you. Even with him coming at you with all that bloodlust, you still stood up to him. It was impressive. I came to save you but ended up needing your help.”

  “Not at all,” protested Ida. “It’s not like that. I…”

  But he was interrupted by the door of the hospital room sliding open.

  “Oh, all the little wounded warriors are awake!” It was the incredibly old, short hero who had rescued Minoru from the nomu.

  “Gran Torino!” exclaimed Midoriya.

  Gran Torino was followed by a hero in a strange-looking, spiky helmet—Minoru recognized him as the hero at the plaza who had been looking of Ida, and sure enough Ida exclaimed, “Mr. Manual!” upon seeing him.

  However, Minoru didn’t pay either of them much attention because behind them was the Fly.

  “Fly!” said Minoru as he tried to get up, before wincing and relaxing back onto the bed. The Fly had definitely seen better days; he was in a hospital gown, just like the four students and had quite the set of bandages wrapped around his chest, but that he was mobile at all was a huge relief. “You made it!”

  “That I did, Minoru!” exclaimed the hero, striking a pose before wincing himself. Seemed neither of them was in top fighting shape after the battle.

  Gran Torino approached Midoriya. “I’m still gonna chew you out, but before that, you’ve got a visitor. This is Mr. Kenji Tsuragamae, Hosu’s Chief of Police.”

  The fourth and final member of the delegation of heroes ducked into the room and loomed over them all. He was a bulky man wearing a black suit with a Quirk that manifested as the head of a beagle.

  The students staired. “Tsuragamae! Ch-chief of Police?!” exclaimed Midoriya.

  “Please stay seated, woof,” said Tsuragamae. “So you’re the U.A. students who put a stop to the Hero Killer, woof. As for the Hero Killer, he’s currently in treatment for his burns, broken bones, and a number of other serious injuries, woof.”

  Minoru glanced around at his classmates. Was no one going to comment on the fact that the man with the dog head kept saying, “Woof”? …Evidently not.

  Tsuragamae continued on. “At the dawn of this extraordinary era, the police moved to prioritize leadership and to maintain the status quo, so they decided not to use their Quirks as weapons. The profession of ‘hero’ rose as one that would fill that void, woof. Authorizing the use of such might, of these powers that could so very easily kill, was a heavily criticized decision at first, but it would garner public support.

  “All because your predecessors acted morally and complied with the laws, woof. But those without permission, those who inflicted harm without explicit instruction from the police and powers that be, even if they were to face someone like the Hero Killer…such action would represent a stunning breach of the law, woof. You three, as well as your pro hero mentors: Endeavor, Manual, Gran Torino, and the Fly. The eight of you must be dealt with strictly and impartially.”

  Minoru glanced at the Fly, but the man didn’t appear to be paying very close attention. He’d let himself partially collapse back against the wall behind him, and it looked like he was zoning out. Hm. Minoru had the feeling this was more of a “teachable moment” than any sort of actual disciplinary action, and indeed as Todoroki immediately lost his cool and had to be restrained by Ida and Gran Torino, the Chief of Police continued.

  “All of that is what I’m obligated to tell you, as the police. But the real question is whether or not to deal with this issue publicly, woof. If we let the story out, you’ll all be lauded by the public, but you won’t be able to avoid punishment. But if we keep all this nasty business to ourselves, the Hero Killer’s burns will support the story that Endeavor was the key operative. He’ll receive the accolades, woof.

  “Fortunately, the number of eye-witnesses was small enough that we can hush up this whole matter before it causes problems, woof. But in that case, you decisive action and achievements will remain unknown to the general public.”

  The dog-faced man held out a thumbs up. “What do you say? I’m an understanding man, so when it comes to a promising group of young people, I’d rather not have to pursue charges over this admittedly massive indiscretion, woof!”

  As the other kids were confronted by their mentors and eventually ended up bowing in apology and gratitude to the Chief of Police, the Fly pushed himself away from the wall and came to sit on the bed near Minoru.

  “I hear I have you to thank for not being a smear on the pavement,” he said quietly. “I’m not such a stickler for regulations as the police, so I can thank you whole-heartedly for the save.”

  “I’m just glad you’re okay,” muttered Minoru.

  “Right back at you,” said the Fly with some of his original verve. “You never should have been in a situation like that in the first place.” Tell Principal Nezu that, Minoru wanted to say. “But you kept your head and performed admirably. And before you ask, Endeavor managed to burn up every single one of your signature purple balls. If the other heroes hadn’t ratted you out, you wouldn’t have even been implicated in the mess at the plaza.”

  Minoru just grunted in response to that. He was still annoyed that all his hard work had literally gone up in flames as soon as the pro hero arrived.

  His attention was once more drawn to the Chief of Police as he addressed the group. “The world’s an unfair place. You’ll receive none of the commendations that you might have otherwise but, at least as someone invested in keeping the peace, I can thank you!” He bowed deeply to the room, before nodding to the pro heroes and exiting back into the hospital proper.

  “Well, all’s well that ends well!” exclaimed the Fly, clapping Minoru on the shoulder. “I’m proud to have been your mentor, Minoru. I look forward to seeing what you accomplish now that all this nasty business is behind us.”

  “Thanks, Fly,” said Minoru. Although he was well aware this incident wasn’t the end.

  Their summer training camp was just around the corner, after all.

  consequences.