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CHAPTER START---
SHAMBLES!
Suddenly Horizon and Momo are standing in the back of a small lecture room.
Long rows of desks curved on varied heights, looking down at the board toward the front.
"Looks like we're the first ones here," Momo says. "Where would you like to sit for the meeting?"
"This is fine," he gestures to the back right corner of the room, then begins walking to his seat in the corner. "I don't plan to really get involved, unless something that would inconvenience me comes up atleast."
Momo takes her seat beside him, and notices him putting his feet up and already taking out his phone, behaviors she was sure would continue during the meeting.
"Do you have anything to say to them?" Horizon asks."Not really, UA is rather open about suggestions from students to improve the quality of life around campus. Such as us not having a Student Council and instead hosting these meetings between all the class representatives twice a semester."
"Well, its also because with the Hero centric culture of Japan and especially UA only the Hero Course students would get elected."
"Oh, so you would have been student council president?"
Horizon scoffs, "Do you know how much power and freedom I'd have to give up to do that boring job."
"Right," Momo glances at his feet on the desk. "You prefer to give off the façade of being a disinterested delinquent, but you're reliable and have a heart of gold."
Horizon shrugs, "the girls like it, clearly," he looks over at her. "Besides, with great power, comes---"
"---great responsibility," Momo gives him a beaming smile, "I always did love that saying."
"Uh...no, with great power, comes no accountability," Horizon shakes his head at her. "Power not worth abusing isn't worth having Momo, because the only thing you ever have to ask yourself, is 'who's going to stop me?', makes life much easier."
Momo freezes, and her smile drops, "you're kidding, right?"
Horizon continues scrolling through his phone, receiving some new information from Sir. NIghteye.
"You're kidding, right? Please tell me you are?" Her breathing begins speeding up, noticeable even through the corner of his eye. "You're talking like a villain."
"Relax babe, it's not like I want to do anything bad, I just want a nice peaceful, and quiet life with the people who matter," Horizon shrugs. "Besides, nobody could stop me if I wanted anything else."
She briefly thinks about it, then gives him a warm smile, "I suppose it says more about you since you do have the power to do anything you want. But you choose to be here, becoming a Pro Hero to selflessly help others...you really are amazing."
"I know," he puts his phone down and gives her his full attention. "It says more about a person who has unlimited power and chooses to do good, rather than being just another pathetic loser with no power to do anything and calling themselves good.
I can't imagine many people in this world could be given power like All Might's and still be the hero-worshipping losers they always were. That power is corrupting, because suddenly you'd be able to do whatever you want and nobody could stop you, so choosing to still be selfless and do good becomes the most difficult choice."
"A choice you make every day," Momo says. "Because you're more powerful than All Might, or atleast you will be...are you?"
"He punches harder, but I've got real power, the power to manipulate the world around me, much better."
"Right, so every day you wake up and resist the temptation to simple become the next great supervillain, you choose to fight them instead, and I think that's very admirable."
"Well, it's not selfless, like I said at the Sports Festival---"
"I remember what you said, very well in fact," Momo says. "But does the reason matter if you're still a Pro Hero helping people?"
Horizon pauses for a moment, then chuckles quietly, "I see." He reaches out and gently lifts her chin so she's looking at him, "I'm rubbing off on you, a few months ago you never would have said that."
"I tried to argue, but the harder we fight, and the more people we lose... I still want to help people, but I must admit there is merit in how you view the role of Pro Heroes."
"Because sometimes, the choices we make have to be weighted," she leans in a bit closer. "As if we're the only people in the world."
"Hey guys!" Kendo interrupts from the front of the room.
Momo jolts back into her seat and faces forward, trying to act all prim and proper even with her red face as Kendo walks up the aisle to them.
"Sorry for interrupting," Kendo says, then gestures to Shoda beside her, the vice-representative of 1B. "Weird how we're here first huh, well, us, not mister 'I can warp'," she nods at Horizon.
"Well our homerooms are closer than the others," Shoda says as they take their seats.
Kendo sits beside Momo with Shoda to her right at the aisle.
"So, you guys ready for midterms?" Kendo asks. "Well, I'm probably asking the two most ready people at UA huh, the super genius and the bookworm," she sighs. "Meanwhile I've been training so hard I fell behind a bit."
Overjoyed that their peers decided to ignore what she was doing moments ago, Momo jumps at the opportunity to change the topic. "Well, we could host another large study group leading up to exams, just as we did for the license exam, both classes together!"
"I was hoping you'd say that," Kendo admits, sheepishly. "Honestly some of us have been struggling and we just know with your style we'd learn a lot faster."
"I'm always happy to help!" Momo says. "Most of our class will be studying together in the afternoons, only a few people won't be there actually...I suppose we'll need a bigger place."
"Just use one of the meeting rooms like this, UA always has a bunch of empty ones."
"Will they really let us use one of these?" Kendo asks.
"Nezu won't mind," Horizon shrugs. "Either way, not my problem. But try to have Sero and Yui sitting far apart, otherwise, he won't be able to focus..."
"We'll keep that in mind," Kendo says, giggling a bit. "Why don't you join us, maybe you'll be enjoying teaching. Doctor Professor Superhero God Emperor Horizon... it's a mouthful but it could work."
"Just Horizon is fine," he says. "And I don't have the patience for it. I've never had to read things more than once to understand them, so when people don't get things the first time it annoys me."
"Sheesh, maybe teaching isn't for you," Shoda says. "Well I guess not even you can be perfect at everything."
"Oh no, I'm a perfect teacher," Horizon says. "That's why Cellophane and Simon are gonna be exceptional, that's why they already are exceptional, I just don't think the collection of wimps in our classes can handle the intensity of my lessons."
"So what you're saying is," Kendo gives him a deadpan look, "you just don't know how to use positive reinforcement and be nice to people."
"I don't see why people need a reward, not failing should be all the motivation you need to do your best."
"Honestly, how did you ever get such a sweet girl to fall for you," Kendo pulls Momo into a side hug, and rest her head against her friend's. "I'll pray for you sweetie..."
"I swear he's much nicer when it's just us," Momo weakly defends.
"Probably because when it's just us, there's fewer clothes," Horizon says.
Momo covers her face, mortified, "That's not what I meant and you know it!"
Kendo can't help but laugh at her friend, then leans forward to look at Horizon, "do you always tease her this much?"
He shrugs, "I like watching her squirm, it's fun."
Kendo sighs and pats Momo's head, "You really know how to pick em..."
---5 Minutes Later...
The room was half filled by now, with a few more minutes until the meeting began, and now both girls rolled their chairs back a bit to Shoda and Horizon could get closer, for what would look like a game of patty cake.
"So it works like this," Shoda says, raising a hand to give Horizon a high five. "Once I make contact, I can snap my fingers and the impact happens again, but its a lot stronger than the first time.
So if I just lightly grazed your cheek with my finger, when I activate my Quirk it feels like I punched you in the face. And there isn't a range limit, just a time limit."
"Is it only in your hands?" Horizon asks.
"Nope, I can do it with an object I'm touching, but for those it's difficult to reign in my power and I always do the maximum...so to avoid breaking people in half I just use my hands and small rubber balls, stuff like that."
"Right, well I'm sure you'd be great at baseball, now lets's do this," Horizon holds his hand out.
Shoda casually gives him the most gently high five they'd ever seen.
Horizon pulls back his hand and looks at his palm, flexing his fingers and inspecting the fabric. "Huh, interesting."
"What do you mean?" Shoda asks.
"Well, when you touched me, I used Scan on your body, to see exactly what was going on."
"Shouldn't you ask before doing that?" Shoda asks, looking a bit creeped out.
Horizon looks up from his hand at Shoda, pauses for a moment, then goes back to inspecting his palm.
"Your body has a lot of built-up kinetic energy, when you activate your Quirk it effectively transplants some of it like a directional bomb into whatever you touch. But you can only build the energy from your own muscular movements, would have been better if you could absorb it too."
"So I'm like a battery for...motion?" Shoda asks.
"Something like that, that's why you say a light tap becomes a hard punch, you think you're amplifying the tap but you're just bad at limiting how much of your reserves you use. I recommend running your reserves down to noting, then starting over, learn what you're like at 0 before going back to 100."
Shoda just stares at Horizon, amazed, "I didn't even know my Quirk could work like that."
"What, did you think you could just magically multiply kinetic energy? That's not how physics works, unless you're me you can't just make more energy."
"You can make energy?" Kendo asks.
"Mystery Class."
"Oh, right, beyond comprehension."
"Well, thanks for the advice," Shoda says. "I guess I've been thinking about my Quirk all wrong, no wonder I haven't been able to improve my control that much since joining UA. But uh, why'd you offer to help me?"
Horizon shrugs, "I like studying Quirks, and people are usually more receptive to invasive Scans when I offer something in return."
"But you didn't ask him first," Kendo says.
"Honestly, no pleasing you people," Horizon mutters, then looks at Shoda and gestures to his own palm. "The energy diminishes over time if the subject is moving, so how about you trigger this to show me what you've got."
"Sure," Shoda raises a hand to snap his fingers, "Twin Impact."
BAM!
Horizon's hand slams back into his chest and he rolls back a bit in his chair before stopping himself.
The entire room looks back at him, seeing him apparently fine but staring at his hand.
"Sorry I might have overdone it, are you ok, I mean, I figured you could take it so---"
"I'm fine," Horizon says. "Just didn't expect it to push me back so easily, but not even a scratch," he raises his hand and flexes it to show them, but the body glove was covering all the purple and blue bruises quickly healing across his hand.
'That's a dangerous Quirk, if we ever fight I need to just kill him with Injection Shot, a kamikaze attack from that could be problematic if I let him get close... especially since detecting potential energy in others and objects will be impossible, that's why I had him use my hand.'
"But don't use that much force on a regular person," Horizon says.
"I'll keep that in mind," Shoda says as he rolls back for the girls to get back between them.
"This meeting is taking forever to start, it's not like her to be late," Kendo says.
"Who are you talking about?" Horizon asks.
"Oh, I figured you'd know, since she's your friend and all..." Kendo says.
"Friend? The chairperson for these meetings is always a third year, and the only third-year girl I'm even remotely friends with is," The realization dawns on him, and he opens a Room, sensing her about to enter the doors. "Fuck---"
"Heya everyone!" Nejire, Class Representative for 3A proudly enters, followed by her vice representative and best friend Yuyu Haya.
Most of the room lights up, always excited to see UA's most cheerful student.
But her eyes immediately lock onto Horizon.
"Hey Horizon!" she waves, as if he somehow wouldn't see her. "You haven't been answering my calls or text, stay back a bit afterward alright, we've got some stuff to talk about!"
Most of the guys in the room immediately give him a death glare, and he just sits back and puts his feet up.
But beneath the visor he gives a low groan and rolls his eyes, 'great, now I have to deal with this ball of energy and people will think those rumors are real, just what I needed..."
END CHAPTER---