Darkest Before Dawn - 3 (Patreon)

Chapter 3

“Stupid pretty boys,” Mineta grumbled, hunching over his drink and glaring all around him. “Stupid shallow girls.”

Kazuki rolled his eyes, because really, he was one to talk about being shallow, honestly. At least it seemed that his short friend’s anger wasn’t as ridiculously large as he showed, from what he could sense. It seemed to be mostly theatrics, which was fine for him. The most he could feel was mild annoyance, actually, which was a little surprising.

It was also the only reason he put up with the guy, since it would have been very annoying if he was as he looked to be.

“Get over it, Tiny,” Kazuki told him, taking a sip from his drink to hide a smirk. Mineta, expectedly, groaned loudly as he bemoaned his nickname. Which was all sorts of amusing too, since, once again, Kazuki barely felt her annoyance spike the smallest bit. “So, let’s get on with it, yeah?”

“Thought you’d never say that, Creepy,” Mineta said, grinning at Kazuki as his eye twitched. Well, that was fair, he supposed. Regardless, the white-haired boy looked at the letter his new –Friend? He supposed was accurate enough.– friend pulled out from his pocket. “I got in,” Mineta told him then and he just grinned at the shorter boy. “But you knew that already.”

“You felt remarkably not sad or dejected or anything. I guessed you had gotten in,” Kazuki nodded and chuckled.

“I’m guessing you got in too,” Mineta hazarded, which was fair. Kazuki didn’t think he looked like someone that had failed the exam. He likely wouldn’t even have shown up. Mainly because he would have been sent back to prison, of course. “So, how many points?”

“I guess I don’t, huh?” Kazuki replied with a nod, ignoring the question. Pulling out his own letter, he looked at it for a moment. Remembering opening it in his apartment, alone and in silence. The holographic projection had been a shock, but at least it was a relief that Mineta and him hadn’t wanted to wait and open their letters together. If they had done so, and in public, it’d have been… something. “I got 49 Villain Points and 23 of the hidden Rescue Points,” he said.

“Man, that’s a whole fucking lot,” Mineta breathed out, trying to sound annoyed but mostly sounding awed. It didn’t help that Kazuki felt no actual annoyance from the boy. He did get a sense of envy though. “I barely got 30 Villain Points and 10 Rescue Points.”

“I mean, the important thing is getting in, right?” Kazuki pointed out, to which Mineta hummed, then he paused.

“Wait, there was supposed to be a top ten, right? There always is. Did you make it?” the shorter boy asked, to which he only grimaced. “Lucky bastard, what did you place?”

“First,” Kazuki answered bluntly, and he could fully relate to the silence that followed. He still couldn’t believe it, even after he got the letter and Nezu’s hologram told him. He couldn’t make sense of it, if he was honest. Hell, he didn’t even understand how they’d allowed him to be first place, considering everything. “I still can’t believe it,” he added, looking at the latter.

“Some people have all the luck,” Mineta grumbled, but Kazuki noticed that there wasn’t nearly as much annoyance, anger or envy coming from him. “How’d you even get that much from an empathy Quirk?”

“Well… It’s not actually an empathy Quirk,” he pointed out weakly, his shoulders deflating. “When I sense negative emotions, I gather this… energy, or whatever. From that, I can create creatures to do what I want.”

“All the fucking luck,” Mineta grumbled. “Well, at least I can brag about being your friend, I guess,” he muttered, gulping down what seemed to be half his drink in one go. “Man, how am I supposed to compare when all I can do is throw out sticky balls.”

“First, that sounds terrible,” Kazuki said, shaking his head and chuckling. “Second… I don’t know. It sounds like a good Quirk to contain threats. You know, bind villains with it so they can’t attack or anything.”

“Yeah, I know that, but that’s easier said than done,” Mineta replied with an annoyed expression that was mirrored by his feelings. “I can bounce off of them too and… Well, I’m trying to work on that, but it’s freaking hard.”

“Sounds like it is,” Kazuki agreed. Doing stuff while moving sounded hard enough on its own. Doing so while literally bouncing off spheres sounded like a nightmare. “My Quirk doesn’t have anything all that bad… but it still sucks?”

“How so?”

“Do you have any idea how it is to feel it every time someone even remotely close by feels bad in any way? Even slight annoyances can be bothersome, but people feel like shit a surprising lot, you know?” Kazuki explained with a grimace before taking a sip from his drink. He could continue on and rant, but he didn’t feel like doing that. He’d done a lot of complaining to himself already.

“How close do people have to be?” Mineta asked, a frown appearing on his face.

“I can feel people around a block away in all directions… So far. It used to be less when I was a kid, a lot less,” Kazuki answered, doing his best to keep his calm. Didn’t help that there was someone supremely bored across the street somewhere and that there was a very sad person somewhere far behind him.

“Yeah, that sounds… not good,” Mineta agreed. “Still better than my shit, that’s for sure.”

“If you say so, Tiny.”

Kazuki privately envied Mineta a great deal. He wondered how much the boy across the table would want his Quirk if he knew what the thing had done to him through his life. How badly would his new friend think of him if he knew what he’d done with his Quirk too?

He’d find out, eventually, but Kazuki could still enjoy it while it lasted, he supposed.

[}-o-{]

Kazuki’s first day at UA came eventually and he found himself in uniform, tugging uncomfortably at the tie. He didn’t remember the last time he’d used something like that, honestly, if he ever had. The whole outfit felt constricting, if he was honest. Self-consciously, he checked for wrinkles or anything of the sort. Still, surely UA wouldn’t have a problem if he wasn’t perfectly dressed, right?

‘1-A…’ he read on the massive door. ‘Is it that big for people with Mutation Quirks?’ he wondered for a moment, even though he knew it was likely that. He’d seen similar things before. No, the real reason he stopped was because he was nervous.

It wasn’t even just him. People inside the building were feeling quite the same, which might have been the reason he was so affected by it. ‘Stupid students, what reason do they have to be nervous?’ Maybe it was hypocritical of him, but Kazuki thought he had better reasons than most.

‘God, I almost wish Mineta was here,’ Kazuki grumbled to himself before sighing and pushing the door open. He didn’t expect there to be people inside, if he was honest. First, because he’d arrived fairly early, mainly because he lived close by. Second, because he hadn’t felt anyone inside at all.

He was wrong, however, because there seemed to be three people inside already. A girl, tall, black hair and with a body that he wouldn’t have been surprised to see in some magazine, and not the tasteful kind. A boy, with red and white hair, the colors splitting in the middle, and a scar on his face. And finally… what he thought was a boy, although since the person had a bird’s head, it was difficult to tell.

“Kazuki Endo, nice to meet you,” he said plainly with a slight wave of his hand before he started moving towards a desk. None of them looked particularly friendly, in all honesty. Instantly, he felt a spike in his senses. A slight sadness coming from the girl, although he couldn’t fathom why.

“Kazuki Endo, the first place in the Entrance Exam?” the bird person, most probably a boy considering the voice, asked. The negative empath turned to regard him for a moment. Only people that were in the top ten got to see the list so… “Fumikage Tokoyami,” the bird-faced guy introduced himself then. “Nice to meet you.”

As he spoke though, Kazuki also felt another spike, this time from the other male in the room and of annoyance.

“You were in the list too, right? I think you were… Ninth?” he asked, frowning as he tried to remember.

“Tenth,” the boy corrected with a nod. Kazuki was almost impressed that he didn’t feel any envy or anger from him, actually. He’d half expected that.

“I’m Momo Yaoyorozu,” the girl said then, making them both turn towards her. “I hope we’ll learn much together.”

“Same, I guess,” Kazuki replied hesitantly, judging by the nod that Fumikage offered, they’d already been introduced to each other. When he turned towards the still slightly annoyed half and half boy, he didn’t say anything for a long moment. “And, what’s your name, if you don’t mind me asking?” he said in the end, more than a little uncomfortable. He was certainly underprepared for social settings, he thought wryly.

“Shoto Todoroki,” was the curt response he got, and that was that.

Nodding, Kazuki decided to leave it at that. Someone wasn’t a very social person, and he could respect that. Neither did Fumikage seem to be, really. As for Yaoyorozu… She seemed like a good person. Too good, maybe. Mineta was one thing, he was a bit of a shitty person himself, so Kazuki had no problems being on friendly terms with him.

He didn’t have any delusions of how things would go once his classmates found out what his backstory was like, after all. It was better to be prepared for when things blew over and having a nice person for a friend would likely backfire, he imagined. He did have to wonder if he’d be able to keep that up though.

Internally sighing, Kazuki moved to a desk and took a seat. He resolutely ignored the disappointment he felt coming from Yaoyorozu. As he waited for something to happen, however, he was struck by a sudden realization.

None of the three had reacted whatsoever to how he looked.

Not in a way he could sense, at least.

‘Then again, this is a hero school… It’d make sense for students here to be less discriminatory, right?’ Kazuki mused, nonetheless pleased that at least he wouldn’t have to deal with feelings of fear, disgust or such. ‘At least until they find out,’ he added with a grimace.

Many people came in after that, and Kazuki amused himself contemplating ideas for Grimm, like he’d been doing ever since his future had been sort of decided for him. His current “designs” were adequate, but he had no delusions that he’d need more. If only to cover for more roles in any hypothetical situation.

Beowolves were his fighters. And tracking too, Kazuki supposed.

Nevermores were good for mobility, nevermind the fact that they flew.

Imps were good for utility, what with having actual hands.

Not a whole lot of variety at his disposal, that was for sure. However, it was a good enough set for the moment. There were glaring holes in that arsenal though. Beowolves were decent enough for defense, but they could certainly be better at it. Imps were all rounders, but maybe Kazuki could come up with better options for utility that were more specialized. Besides that, flying was all well and good, but maybe he could make something that moved well on ground and water too, just in case. One could never know.

‘Lots of ideas to consider,’ Kazuki thought to himself, absently tapping on the wood of the desk. ‘I need to get better at sensing too,’ he considered, closing his eyes for a moment. He didn’t need to do that to increase his ability to feel others’ emotions, but it certainly helped better filter what was what, where it came from and such things.

The nervousness was increasing in number, which made sense, since slowly the school was welcoming more and more students into its halls. There were specks of annoyance, anger, envy, disappointment, sadness and so on, however. Kazuki did his best to place where all of them were. Pinpointing locations like that was something he was less skilled at, he’d admit. He also wasn’t sure he could get better at that, but he could try and that’s what he would do.

He took a deep breath in.

‘This is hard,’ Kazuki thought, his hand clenched into a fist. ‘Why did it have to be negative emotions?’ he lamented, not for the first time. He knew they weren’t his, but that wasn’t how his Quirk worked. He felt them just as much as if they were his own emotions, that’s why it’d always got to him as a child. Hell, it still got to him then, if he was honest. He was just much better at keeping it under control.

“Creepy!”

“Tiny,” he greeted, a slight smile forming on his face. Mineta looked somewhat fine, he noticed, but his sense was telling him that the guy was nervous. Very much so, actually. A second look confirmed that the short boy wasn’t doing a very good job at keeping that hidden, but that was fine, he supposed. “Nobody walked over you today?”

“One goddamn time,” Mineta muttered through gritted teeth, eyes twitching as he took the seat next to Kazuki. “Anyway, have you seen? It seems that there’ll be at least one beauty in our class,” he added, staring rather… lustfully towards Yaoyorozu.

Kazuki grimaced then.

“Dude, don’t do that. You are making her uncomfortable,” he said, which was… not quite the truth, but also not a lie. Uncomfortable was certainly a word for it, even if it was quite the understatement.

“I don’t-” Yaoyorozu started but Kazuki raised an eyebrow at her. “I’m used to that,” she said then, looking away. They’d drawn the attention of the other two in the classroom, but they didn’t seem interested enough to actually participate, from what Kazuki could tell.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if you are,” Kazuki said with a half-smile. She was beautiful, after all. “That doesn’t change that his comment and stare made you uncomfortable. Don’t bother denying it,” he added, waving off her protest before it happened. “My Quirk lets me feel the negative emotions of others around me.”

The girl pursed her lips then, clearly put off by the fact that she couldn’t get away with lying. Or maybe she saw his Quirk as an invasion of privacy? She wouldn’t be the first, and Kazuki didn’t have it in him to feel guilty anymore. It wasn’t like he could control it.

“I see,” she mumbled, turning to look away from Kazuki and Mineta.

“Not gonna apologize?” the former asked the latter, who rolled his eyes.

“I’m sorry,” he said, barely sounding half serious, but that was enough for Kazuki. He wasn’t the guy’s mother, after all. “Don’t know why you had to make a big deal out of that,” Mineta added then, turning to look at him.

“Besides wanting to be a hero and that implying I have to help people?” Kazuki asked, raising an eyebrow at the short boy. “Feeling negative emotions isn’t fun. If I can do something about that, I’ll do it. It’s worse and worse the closer they are, so I’d like to keep people in the same room as me in as good a mood as I can.”

“Ah… Suppose that makes sense,” Mineta mumbled to himself, looking around for a bit. “Think there’ll be any other hot girls in here?”

“For fuck’s sake,” Kazuki sighed. Then he did it again at the scandalized look Yaoyorozu shot them. “Anyway,” he continued then, already feeling done with it all. ‘This is gonna suck, I can already tell,’ he thought to himself, holding back a grimace. “I’d guess there’ll be a few more girls. It’d be weird if there’s only one. Besides that… I dunno. Heroes have good builds though, don’t they?”

“That’s the spirit, Creepy.”

“Maybe I should get new friends,” Kazuki mumbled to himself.

“You hurt me, man. You hurt me deeply,” Mineta said, dramatically putting a hand over his “wounded” heart. “So, what were you doing before I got here? This seemed quiet.”

“I was trying to work on my sensing, think up new Grimm,” Kazuki told his short friend. “People here didn’t… seem very sociable, and I’m not the best at that either so… Yeah.”

“Hm… Guess I can see that,” Mineta said, looking around. His eyes inevitably found Yaoyorozu once more. “I wouldn’t mind being sociable with-” he was interrupted by a punch to the shoulder. “The hell, Creepy?!”

“I’d much prefer to feel pain to what you make her feel with your shit, Tiny,” Kazuki grumbled. “Control yourself, will you?”

“No fun at all,” Mineta muttered to himself. “Anyway, feel like brainstorming together, man? I don’t think there’s much to do and I think you’ll punch me again if I look at… What’s her name again?”

Kazuki rolled his eyes and wondered why, again, he’d made friends with the short guy.

“Yaoyorozu Momo, the guy over there is Todoroki Shoto and… What was your name again, man?” he asked a little louder, aware that their conversation could be heard by the others. He fidgeted with his fingers nervously for a moment after voicing the question. “I’m… sort of bad with names, sorry.”

“No worries, fellow dark dweller,” the crow-headed guy replied and Kazuki blinked. ‘Dark dweller?’ he mouthed to Mineta who just shrugged. “My name is Tokoyami Fumikage,” the boy said, nodding with utmost seriousness. Something that looked weirdly expressive, considering he had a bird’s head, but whatever.

“Sorry again,” Kazuki said, before turning to his friend. “There you have it.”

“Hm, I’ll probably forget all of them except the beau- Ouch, okay okay, relax, damnit,” Mineta started before crying out and raising his hands placatingly. After that, the two of them just sat there and waited while talking about ideas for their Quirks. They didn’t really bother being too quiet, but it wasn’t like they were shouting the stuff either. Kazuki idly wondered how much the others heard.

Soon, more people started coming into the classroom. Some more forgettable than others, like the guy with a tail that Kazuki had already forgotten the name of. Some others left a much more lasting impression, like Mezo Shoji, who had three arms on each side, which had some sort of skin webbing connecting them. Kazuki honestly did his best to remember all of them, but it was a bit much for him, if he was honest. If he could recall a handful of them, he’d be surprised and a little proud, really.

“Ah, an eye buddy!” a pink girl cried out, immediately beelining towards Kazuki.

“Eye buddy? What?” he said, confused as he was snapped out of his conversation with Mineta. Or maybe it was more accurate to say his lecture with Mineta, since the guy hadn’t been able to control himself quite so well when more girls walked into the classroom.

“Yeah, our eyes are similar!” the girl said enthusiastically. ‘Huh, she’s right,’ He mused, blinking his black and red eyes as he looked at her black and yellow ones. “I’m Mina Ashido, nice to meet you!”

“Kazuki Endo, nice to meet you too,” he replied, leaning back a little since the girl was a little too close. That is, until a hand settled on her shoulder and pulled her back.

“Don’t mind her, she can be a bit… enthusiastic,” a boy with red spiky hair said apologetically. “Eijiro Kirishima.”

“And I’m Minoru Mineta, but nobody cares, right?”

“I call him Tiny though,” Kazuki offered, drawing a snort from both teens.

“And I call him Creepy,” the short one shot back, drawing a chuckle and a giggle from the two newcomers in their little group.

“Oh oh, would I be Pinky?” Ashido asked, bouncing excitedly. Her question went unanswered for a moment, because her motions did something to her chest that had Mineta more than a little distracted. As for Kazuki… Well, he liked to think he fared better, mainly because any lust was overridden with annoyance at his friend’s behavior. Guy had never heard about subtlety, it seemed.

“Fits well enough in my opinion.”

“And I’d be Hardy?” Kirishima wondered, tilting his head. Seeing the confused expression on the white-haired teen, the boy explained then. “My Quirk is Hardening. I can make my body… Well, harder.”

“Hm… Nah, you’d be Pointy, I think,” Mineta said, having eventually snapped out of his… thoughts, for lack of a better word. Kazuki had to agree with him there though, looking at Kirishima’s hair.

“Yeah, it fits,” Ashido agreed with another giggle.

“What would I be then?” a new voice asked, making them all jump. When Kazuki turned to see who this new person – A girl, judging by the voice – was… He saw a uniform, floating there as if-

“Hagakure?” he said, blinking at the new arrival. He was pretty sure there wouldn’t be more invisible students, Quirks were usually pretty distinctive, even if some could be rather similar to others. “When did you get here?”

“Just now,” the girl replied, and even though they couldn’t see it, Kazuki was pretty sure she was grinning. “We both made it, Endo, and we are in the same class, isn’t it great?”

“Didn’t tell me you already knew a beauty that’d come here,” Mineta grumbled, a whisper that was barely heard. “Some friend you are, Creepy.”

“Know is a strong word,” Kazuki said then with a wry smile. “We met during the practical exam.”

“So cold of you, Endo, I thought we were friends,” Hagakure lamented, and he could hear the pout in her voice. Fortunately, she didn’t seem to be actually offended.

“Wait, she’s asking the real questions,” Ashido interrupted before they could continue, eyes narrowed in utmost seriousness. “I’m Pinky, he’s Pointy, they are Creepy and Tiny. What will you be?”

“Well, we can’t really decide by appearance, can we?” Kirishima mused, as if it was an actually important thing to decide. “Ghosty, maybe?”

“That sounds scary though!” Hagakure protested.

“Bubbly?” Kazuki suggested, leaning back on his chair and wondering when had so many people gathered around him. At least he wasn’t picking up any emotions from them, which was good.

“I like it!” Hagakure said, pointing at him with her hand… Or so he thought, since he could only see the sleeve of her uniform doing so.

“Yeah, besides, we already have Creepy for the scary factor, right?” Mineta muttered, still sulking without feeling any actual annoyance, or at least not all that much.

“I don’t know, guys,” Ashido said, placing a finger over her lips thoughtfully. “Pointy had a point. We are going by appearance.”

Their conversation, and the others for that matter, was interrupted when someone kicked the door open. No longer distracted by the relatively calm chat, Kazuki instantly picked up on a lot of anger and annoyance coming roughly from the door’s direction. It was interesting, really, since most of the feelings he was picking involved nervousness in some way, except for this guy.

“Is Kazuki Endo here?” the blonde boy that had walked in asked, all but growling. The crowd around him looked between the new arrival and Kazuki, curious as to what was going on.

“Ah, that’d be me,” he replied, giving the new guy a confused tilt of his head. “Do I know you?”

“You should, goddamn side character,” the guy said, his emotions bleeding into his voice as he stalked towards the white-haired boy. “I’m Katsuki Bakugo.”

‘Ah, second place, wasn’t he?’ Kazuki thought to himself.

“I don’t know what trick or stroke of luck you got to take first place from me, but I’ll prove it to you and to everyone. I’m the best here,” Bakugo declared with utmost certainty. “I’ll be the Number One Hero, mark my words.”

“Ah… that’s nice?” Kazuki replied blandly, making the blonde’s eyes twitch. A second later, the guy all but stomped his way to a further chair. “Well, we can agree that he’s… Angry, right?” he asked, still looking at the guy.

Ashido groaned.

“That was terrible, Creepy.”

[} Chapter End {]

Hey guys! How’s it going?

I… don’t really have much to say. No, that’s a lie. I do want to say that I have no idea where this nickname thing the guys started in this chapter came from. The blame is solidly on my characters, I swear.

With that said, I hope you enjoyed the chapter.

Discord Link: discord.gg/UTDransjJZ

Random Question: Speaking of nicknames, what do you think everyone else in Class 1-A would be?

See you.