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CHAPTER START---
"Welcome to Lone Star Base," Star and Stripe proudly announce as Horizon warps onto the rooftop just beside her.
"Kind of on the nose, don't you think, I mean we are in Houston Texas," he says while walking to the edge of the massive air traffic control tower to stand beside her.
Below and all around them was a massive military base, more akin to a city, 13km wide making it larger than Manhattan Island by a large margin.
"Well this entire base was built to protect and train me, and it happened to be placed in the Lone Star State, so I suppose you could say the stars aligned," she nudges him playfully.
"All the power in the world and that's the best you could come up with?" Horizon shakes his head. "Anyway, you said you wanted to make an introduction before we got to business, who is it?"
"That will come later, he's in a meeting right now, so first, the tour."
"I can sense everything in the base from here, remember?""Yeah, but that's no fun, let's go," Star flies off across the runway where some massive cargo planes were landing, past the hangars and toward the far end of the base.
Eventually after following her around for a while, they arrive at one of the last stops.
Sensing her landing and waiting for him, Horizon swaps places with a pebble at her feet, and finds himself in a massive dirt field with a few hills and barricades, and targets down range from them.
The firing range.
"I know Japan has strict gun laws, but have you ever fired one before?"
"Compared to America, everywhere has strict gun laws," Horizon says as he warps a grenade launcher from the firing range armory into his hands. "But that's part of the American charm you're all famous for."
"The range is closed to anyone but us, so..." Star' gestures to the field where the targets are.
With no hesitation, Horizon fires a grenade from the large weapon and scores a direct hit nearly 50m away.
Star' whistles in response, nodding proudly, "So, not your first time huh? We knew you had some kind of training, more than Pro Hero training, and you mentioned your parents trained you, was one of them military?"
"Advanced security contracting," Horizon says.
"I see, so what weapons can you use?"
"From what I can sense in your armory, and on the base...everything that doesn't require piloting."
"So you're saying you can't drive a tank, well I'm sure we can give you a crash course," Star' says with a mischievous smile.
"Emphasis on crash most likely," Horizon rapid fires a few more grenades down range, hitting each of his targets perfectly. "Projectiles weapons with Takt is kind of cheating."
"I figured as much, but you seem so comfortable with it, I doubt your Quirk is making that much of a difference, right?"
"Best be prepared for anything," Horizon says. "And learning how a weapon works allows you to better understand how to stop a villain that's using it."
"That's what Agpar said, he's the person I want you to meet," Star' says.
"Well, at least he sounds like he knows what he's doing," Horizon says as he warps a tripod-mounted 80.cal anti-material rifle into his arms.
"You're a sharpshooter too?"
"It's hard to miss when you can see exactly where everything is," Horizon doesn't bother going prone, simply using Takt to handle the recoil as he takes just over a minute to line up his shot, adjust the scope, then destroy a target that was behind a few layers of a brick wall without using Takt on the projectile.
"So, know any other tricks?" Star' asks. "Because around here, bending bullets and finding targets behind walls, isn't that special."
"And here I thought the UN doesn't allow soldiers to use their Quirks."
Star' shrugs and looks down the range, "Accidents happen in the heat of combat, we're only human after all."
"Or at least we all started that way," Horizon says as he waves his hand, causing a dozen pebbles in front of them to hover in the air. "Shambles."
Each pebble is swapped for an assault rifle at this firing range's armory.
The guns begin moving, disassembling themselves before quickly putting themselves back together in mid-air as dozens of magazines are warped in place beside them and quickly loaded.
"Wow," Star' nods with an amused smile, "are you sure you aren't American? Because the way you handle guns is very practiced, and I doubt Japan lets you get that much time with them."
"They don't," Horizon says as the guns are ready to fire. "But I'm a quick learner," he raises his right hand and snaps his finger.
All the guns fly from in front of them facing down the range, to now surround both Horizon and Star' And Stripe.
The woman raises a brow at this, but doesn't bother giving anything more than a curious look at him.
"I don't recall you being bulletproof, are you?"
"Not exactly, I can take a beating but bullets would still hurt me, if they hit."
"And if you aren't actively enhancing yourself," Star' says. "Well, get started."
Horizon raises his hand once more, and snaps his fingers.
All the rifles immediately begin firing directly at both heroes.
Star' doesn't even flinch, knowing that even if he didn't have something special planned, the bullets could never hurt her.
Yet as the cacophony of gunfire rattled their ears and the entire shooting area, not a single bullet hit them.
Star' smiles as she sees what he was doing, all the bullets were being fired at them before curving, slamming into each other, and falling to the floor in pairs, one embedded into the other.
Star' bursts out laughing as the gunfire stops, then picks up one of the pairs from the floor.
"Your precision is so freaky," she closely observes that just like all other pairs, one bullet tore through the shaft of another before stopping halfway through.
"My mom said it happened way back, two soldiers fire at each other and their bullets end up like that, and they both survived the battle. She said it was something like divine intervention on the battlefield."
Star' raises the bullet to her eye level and observes it closely, then lowers it to scoff.
"And now you can do it at will, divine intervention," She says. "Trying to say you're a god?"
"I've never said that, but people talk, what would you call me?"
"The name of your Quirk says otherwise."
"I was five," Horizon shrugs.
"Well, you're certainly not human, not anymore. Personally, I was betting that you were a cyborg under there," she reaches forward and casually taps his visor. "Would have explained this fishbowl, but the truth is just so much worse."
"That I'm too impossibly handsome for anyone to focus in my presence?"
"That you're a human becoming living energy, and that suit is keeping you held together, right?" Star And Stripe gives him a serious look as she puts the one pair of bullets away. "You don't even feel human anymore, they may not be able to tell, because no matter how much we care about them, they aren't like us."
"No, they aren't," Horizon says. "And don't worry, regardless of what the future holds, I don't see myself becoming a threat to you."
"Good, because why make enemies when you can make friends," Star' gives him her million-lumen smile.
"Friends, is that what we are?" Horizon asks.
Star's voice becomes somber as she speaks, looking down the range, away from Horizon. "Well, as far as I can see, you're the only person I can even really be friends with, the distance between you and everyone else...I know what that feels like.
To feel like the entire world is at your fingertips, and to have nothing at the same time. You and I, we quite literally view the world in ways they could never comprehend, these Quirks that were given to us, they're not just a tool to help people, they're---"
"---A wall to box us in, away from the world itself," Horizon sighs and gently reaches up to touch his visor. "Without my parents, the closest thing I have to family, is Nezu, and...he'll never really understand what's under here."
"And what if he did, what if I did?"
"Either your mind would collapse from the sheer shock, or you'd hate it."
Star' chuckles, "Well, it's a good thing the fishbowl never comes off huh?"
She turns and begins walking away, and Horizon falls into step behind her.
"It does feel pretty good, for the record," Horizon says. "Being able to talk to someone that's not terrified of me or dropping to their knees to worship me, the only other people like that are Pantu and Nezu, but they still treat me like I'll snap at any moment."
"Well, history isn't on your side with that one," Star' says as they leave the firing range and begin walking toward a hangar a few buildings away. "But I get it, everyone is either a fan of us, or scared of us, it's nice having you around, no need to walk on eggshells around you."
"And a powerful sparring partner is nice," Horizon says.
"Oh yeah, that reminds me, I got permission from President Skyline for us to have a real fight sometime, you know, just to see how it would go."
"Seems kind of risky. This entire time your people have been trying to figure out Hand of God and I've been figuring out New Order, a direct fight like that...probably means you guys hit a roadblock in observing me."
"Probably, but that's not really a problem for me."
"Right, because you can simply tell your body to resist my Quirk, that really is annoying."
They take a few more steps as Star' silently nods, then waves to a few soldiers running nearby.
"So you can detect that huh, just like I can feel whenever I'm in your 'range', I guess it's only fair for it to go both ways, anything else?"
"Yeah, it's weird how much you trust me," Horizon says. "I'd always have that command on when I'm around, but you only have it on when you don't want me to warp or cut you during training."
"All Might said you'll be the next great hero, of course I trust you," she gives him a dazzling smile.
"Sheesh, you really are just like him."
"Thank you."
"Again, not a compliment," Horizon says as they arrive at the hangar. "But if you're really curious about how a real fight between us would go, let's save it until the week I leave."
"Finally, something that's really fun happens around here."
"We're heroes, boring is what we should celebrate, anything else usually means we have to work."
"C'mon, aren't you excited, just a little bit."
"Mmm, maybe a little, but don't get too excited, because we both know how it ends."
They both think about it for a moment, and Star' nods.
"I'll win," they both say at once, looking at each other in surprise.
END CHAPTER---