MHA: A Cat’s Way

“So, who are you all thinking about choosing for your internships?” Midorinya asks in the lunchroom from across from me two days after getting handed our offers. He’s to the left of Uraraka, who’s eating with much more fervor than usual, and Tsu is on her right. Meanwhile I’m sandwiched between Tormew and Minya. I groan in response to his question, letting my head fall to the table.

“Mew have no idea how litterous it is having to go through more than three thousand offers. Especially with how low mrowst of them are in the rankings!”

Minya snorts, nudging me with her shoulder and smirking at me. “Well~, you did break a guy’s legs on national television.”

Tormew nods her head. “Yeah. I mean, it was completely reasonable, and I got my own revenge on him for what he said, but Midoriya is always talking about how the top heroes need to keep their image in mind.”

The walking broccoli nods. “It’s true. Image management is almost as important for the top hundred as actually doing hero work and that’s not even including did you just say you got revenge on Shinso?” He smoothly changes his explanation and gives the invisible girl a deadpan look. She sticks her tongue out at him in reply, smirking at how he can’t tell she’s doing so.

“Mayyybe~.” I hold back a snort as I eye her, wondering what she did. Midorinya tries to maintain eye contact, not realizing that she’s turned her head to shoot me a cheeky wink. “Guess you’ll have to wait and see when he gets here!”

He sighs and we fall into a comfortable silence as we continue eating. Eventually, Tsu breaks it when she turns to the still dazed-seeming Uraraka.

“Are you ok? You’re eating like you just ate the worst tasting thing in the world and are trying to get rid of the taste.”

“I can still taste the hair gel.” She replies as if on automatic before seeming to realize what she said and flushing. “I-I-I mean, I’m good! Just… a bit worried about who I’m going to be interning with.”

Midorinya raises an eyebrow. “Don’t you already know who you’re going to be interning with? Gran Torino?”

Never heard of them.

She groans, slumping forward onto the table along with me. “I mean, I know their name, but other than the fact that they helped train All Might I’ve ever heard of them! I only even know their name because he literally told me about them!”

Both my eyebrows shoot up at that tidbit. Being trained by the Symbol of Hypocrisy’s teacher? That is a good opportunity. As long as she doesn’t start resembling him in personality. Then again, the number one basically just relies on his overwhelming strength for everything. Which is absolutely terrible for someone as mobile and flexible as Uraraka.

If she starts acting like him…

I forcibly discard the thought, flexing my toes to get my claws back in. Down, Cataclysm. I huff, letting my head roll sideways as I stare at her. “At least mew know who you’re interning with. I’ll be licky to figure it out by the deadline.”

Midorinya gets a thoughtful look on his face. “Did you get any offers from people with animal-based quirks?”

My ear twitches. “Yes, but also nyo.” At the questioning looks the table sends me I clarify with an annoyed tone. “The Wild Wild Pussycats sent me-owffers.”

“You don’t sound very happy about that.” Tsu says with a finger on her chin and her tongue sticking out. “Given that you share a cat theme with them, I would have thought you would be happy they would send you an offer.”

My tail bristles and I sit back up as I glare at her. “They’re fake cats, nya! Mew don’t just choose when to be a cat and when mew don’t! That’s not even accounting fur the fact that none of them are actually felines! Fur them it’s just a gimmick! It’s offensive, nya! How would mew feel if some random heroes decided to make their gimmick being frogs without a-nya of them having frog-adjacent quirks!? People act like they’re some kit of baseline for how those with cat mutations are supposed to act! It’s lick they’re making fun of us, nya!”

There’s a moment of silence as they process my sudden tirade, but it’s completely justified! I have had way too many people out in public telling me that I should be acting cuter like that pawful group! Which is why the moment I saw they sent me an offer I sent an immediate response back explaining how I’d rather become a full-time villain than join them. Not exactly like that, but the general idea for it.

“Huh. I never thought about that,” Minya says thoughtfully, getting noises of agreement from the others.

“Is that why foreigners from America are always asking me for recommendations on places to eat pizza?” Tsu asks with a head tilt, making me confused. Midornya nods.

“Probably. There’s a team in New York who’s costumes are based around turtles, but two of them actually have amphibian quirks. They’re famous for their love of pizza and acting like immature teenagers all the time.”

“Huh.” The frog girl says nothing else, falling into a contemplative silence. Midorinya turns back to me.

“Anyways, if you got an offer from someone with an actual animal mutation, then I’d recommend you go with them. Not only would they be less likely to try and use you purely for publicity as the winner of the Sports Festival, but they also might be able to help you with your tick.”

“Lick?” I tilt my head, wondering what he’s talking about before remembering and snapping my fingers. “Oh, mew mean the puns!”

He sighs, looking tired. “Yes, the puns.”

“Mrrr.” I hum, thinking about it. I did notice an offer from Mirko that I put aside to look at more later… But I’m also pretty sure that she’s still recovering after the raid…

I shrug, deciding to think it over during the next few days. Instead, I question Midorinya. “What about mew? Who are mew interning with?”

He hums, tilting his head one way then the other. “On one hand, someone who can help me improve my hand to hand would be good… On the other, someone who can help me with utilizing my support equipment might be more beneficial in the long run…”

My tail flicks dismissively. “Mew should purrobably focus on your support equipment. We both knyaow how good your hand to hand is.”

“I hope Gran Torino helps me with my hand to hand…” Uraraka grumbles to herself, causing Midorinya to roll his eyes and pet her head.

“If he doesn’t teach you close combat skills then I’ll do it when we get back, sound good?”

She leans into the touch, making a sound of agreement before blinking. “Wait. Earlier, how did you know that I’m interning with Gran Torino?”

Midorinya smirks at her, pitching his voice high when he speaks. “Help! All Might is a pervert!”

I exchange surprised glances with Minya and Tormew, mutual understanding passing between us as we all pull out our phones and start recording. Just in case.

Uraraka’s face immediately turns red and she jerks upright in her seat, pointing at the now suspicious looking boy with a trembling finger. “Y-y-you! Did you know!?’

He laughs, leaning against the back of his chair. “Who do you think is the one who set that up?” Definitely suspicious.

She seems to freeze, her eyes widening in shock. “Does that mean you know about… everything?”

His smile dies down a bit, but doesn’t vanish. “Yeah, I do.” He sighs, putting a hand on her shoulder. “Don’t worry about what All Might wants. What’s important is that you become the hero you want to be.”

She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath, letting it out slowly. When they open again, they’re filled with determination. “You’re right Midoriya, screw being a symbol! I’m going to become the best rescue hero I can be!” She pumps her fist in the air, her previous nerves nowhere in sight.

Tsu coughs, dragging their attention to her. She speaks bluntly, covering Uraraka’s hand with her own in a comforting gesture and getting a head tilt in response. “Ochako, I’m usually blunt so I’m sorry if this makes you uncomfortable. Did All Might try to force himself on you?”

A pin drop silence surrounds the table as we wait for her reply, keeping one eye on Midorinya just in case since he admitted to setting ‘it’ up already.

Yes, I know it’s probably a misunderstanding, but still. Doesn’t hurt to be cautious just in case.

After a few moments of being stunned, the two react. “NO! WHY WOULD-” Uraraka seems to replay the conversation over in her mind for a moment before planting her face into her hands and groaning. She looks up though, to glare at Midorinya who’s fallen from his seat due to the force of his laughter. “You asshole! You planned this!”

“N-haha-no, no proofs! Hahaha!” Uraraka kicks him as well as she can from her seated position, her face steaming red to the point we could probably boil water on it. She lets out another groan, explaining the situation.

Apparently All Might appreciates her ‘fighting spirit’ and wants to nurture it, which he thinks is best done by introducing her to his mentor. Is it incredibly suspicious? Yes. Does she acknowledge that it’s incredibly suspicious? “Yeah, I think it’s weird too, but…” She shrugs. “The number one knows best, right?”

Yeah… he absolutely passed his quirk on to her. I forcibly push away the mental image of an exceedingly buff Uraraka going around yelling ‘SMASH’ at everyone. There’s more important things to consider. Like what passing on his quirk means for him. If it means he’s lost his quirk now…

Then it means I just need to find him off campus during internships.

I let out a mental sigh, knowing that it won’t actually be that simple. It would still be good to figure out, so I’ll have to make sure I have a spy cat following him around whenever he’s not using it to make himself buff.

I look at Midorinya picking himself off the floor, wondering just how much of a grudge he has against All Might. It’s clearly not to my level of wanting him dead, but it’s pretty clear by this point that he’s not above making his life more difficult. Or at least pranking him to an excessive degree.

I wonder if I can get him to make me something under the excuse of a prank…

Before I can broach the subject -in a more tactful way- I’m distracted by someone entering the cafeteria. Not unusual, even if it is later than it should be. It’s not even unusual that I recognize them. No, what’s unusual is what has Minya falling against me in laughter and Tormew beaming at me in a ‘praise me’ manner.

Hitoshi Shinso, the Gen Ed student I fought in the finals, walks into the cafeteria with a murderous look on his face warning everyone off. But he looks different from the last time I saw him, and not just because his legs are fixed. Instead of a full head of seemingly fluffy, gravity defying purple hair, he barely has any.

Tormew shaved his head.