Discord: .gg/t7bHrdRY7Y
pat.reon: Keanu_Eugene (30+ chapters ahead)
CHAPTER START---
SHAMBLES!
Horizon suddenly appears at the UA pool, immediately noticed by all the girls of class 1A and 1B enjoying the mid-day sun.
They all immediately stop their volleyball game in the pool and stare at him, noticing his new body glove with the separations, appearing like armored plates.
"It's like a mini All Might..." Setsuna can't help but blurt out, earning a set of nods from the others.
Horizon was now standing at 194cm -6ft4- and 260lbs -118kg-, completely filled out with muscles, all exaggerated by the design of his body glove, a terrifyingly imposing figure.
While all the girls were wearing their UA one-piece swimsuits, effectively a skin-tight pair of shorts and t-shirt, Horizon had on a pair of shorts and a hoodie over his body glove, all in the same blue and white colors.
None of them even noticed the laptop in his hand, too busy ogling him. And Toru hides behind Momo."I'll go get the boys!" Mina says as she hops out of the pool and runs off, snapping them all out of their daze.
"I'm gonna get some work done, try not to bother me," Horizon says to the girls. He turns to make his way to the furthest of all the plastic tables and chairs set up in the shade, all in red and black, Momo's creations.
"You really can't come in?" Kendo asks, causing him to turn back toward them and sigh.
He taps his visor, "I don't like getting the body glove wet, and if the visor fills with whatever it feels similar to getting waterboarded...so no thanks."
"Oh, that's too bad I guess."
"It's fine," Horizon tells her, "it's not like I'd get in that even if I could...it's all fun and games until Kaminari sneezes..." Some of them wince at that mental image.
All the girls watch him walk away, noticing his logo on the side of his shorts and the back of his hoodie.
"Does everything he wears have his logo on it?" Setsuna asks, a short girl with sharp teeth, large eyes, and green hair.
"Yes," all the 1A girls respond at once in the same tired tone.
"He's a lot bigger than I thought, it's pretty intense," Kinoko Komori says. A short girl whose head was barely above the water, eyes covered by the large mop of brown hair stuck to her head.
"He's been bulking, a lot," Momo says with a slight blush on her face. "But yes his physique is quite, mmm...intense."
Kendo rolls her eyes, already fed up with her friend from 1A, then splashes Momo, "you know if you said that to his face...visor? Is there a face under there? Whatever, if you said that to him you'd probably get somewhere, it'd be better than just living with a crus---"
Momo tackles Kendo and slaps a hand across her mouth to shut her up, and Jiro just sinks up to her neck into the water, hoping Kendo doesn't set her sights on her next.
And all of this happens, devolving into a splash fight while Ibara is just glaring at him, remembering the only small conversation they've ever had.
Setting up his laptop and connecting it to the Hero Network, Horizon begins working as all the 1A boys enter. All were wearing UA swim trunks. Horizon notices Sero instantly make a beeline toward Kodai and just shakes his head, delving into his work.
'Last known locations...' Horizon is typing away and marking points on a map of Tokyo. The massive region had almost a hundred red pins all across it, but he eventually noticed a pattern.
'Ok, so Stain kills 6 people in each area before the Hero Presence gets increased then he hops to the other side of Tokyo...makes sense, they'd move the stronger Pros where they think he is.
So that's why he's mostly killed D-listers so far. Picking off the weakest of the pack, makes sense.'
Horizon pulls up a list of Heroes, trying to find any connection between them, and at first, he finds nothing. Until...
'There we go. All D-list losers that can't do shit, aside from Inginium at least. Plus they all had a stack of branding and endorsement contracts, completely going against his ideology of being a hero as a service instead of a job.
He doesn't randomly attack heroes, he tracks them. He's more like a hero hunter, or a creepy stalker.
He just got done in the outer region of Tokyo...so the next place would be, Shinjuku.'
Horizon looks up to see the other students setting up a game of water polo with a net Momo made, then focuses back on the screen.
'Top heroes in Shinjuku Tokyo...' before long he finds his target, or more accurately, his bait.
'Reacher...the stretchy arm hero, honestly Stain, you'd be doing us a favor...'
He continues compiling the data and double-checking his thesis along with a few others. Hoping to catch Stain before his interview Saturday night, five days away.
Leaning back after an hour of working he sees almost everyone getting out of the pool. He also notices Momo and Sato missing.
ROOM!
He immediately finds them at the entrance to the school collecting a stack of pizzas, fifteen boxes high.
Since UA is already closed for the summer Lunch Rush isn't available, so other arrangements were made.
Closing his ROOM and ignoring everyone again he puts the finishing touches on his plan, taking out his phone and checking Reacher's public 'Yay!' profile.
'The idiot is always uploading, still working in Shinjuku, guess I'll head to Tokyo tomorrow and keep an eye on him.
The cops must have found this pattern by now, but I guess they either didn't connect the final part. I guess it makes sense, Stain operates like a more sloppy version of how I'd plan hits with mom.
He's clearly got some training in guerilla warfare, and I hear he uses a sword, could be fun.'
"Hey, mind if I join you?" Horizon looks up to see Sero holding a pizza box in his hand, and two cans of cold soda in the other, already taking a seat beside him at the rectangular table.
Horizon was currently sitting at the head on one end with Sero to his right.
"I'm surprised you aren't eating with your girlfriend," Horizon says as he takes a slice of pizza.
All the other tables were quickly filling up as everyone got out of the pool to eat, and Horizon noticed Kendo making her way over to him and Sero.
"Dude it's really not like that," Sero says.
"Yes, it is," Kendo sits at the other head of the table with a paper plate in hand carrying her pizza, and a can of soda in the other. "C'mon everyone knows you like Yui."
"What!" Everyone stops what they're doing and turns to look at their table, causing Sero to just pretend he didn't yell anything. "I mean, I don't know what you're talking about."
"C'mon, it's super obvious, you should just tell her already," Kendo says. "I'm pretty sure she knows and is just waiting, if she didn't like you she wouldn't spend so much time with you anyway."
"What? Really?" Sero asks.
"Do you really think she'd spend so many lunch breaks eating with someone from another class just because...really?"
Sero looks genuinely confused, "but you eat with Horizon all the time, does that mean---"
"No," Kendo chuckles at that. "I almost did at first...then I spoke to him and I realized," she looks up at Horizon. "No offense, but you're kinda the worst."
"You're objectively wrong," Horizon says. "I'm the best thing that could ever happen to any of you."
Kendo raises a brow at that. "Do you not remember the first time you spoke to Ibara?"
"Hey I call it as I see it, and I don't waste time when I talk."
"She didn't deserve that."
"Yes, she did," Horizon says. "I mean c'mon, who walks up to someone and asks them to repent and go to church to 'cleanse their soul,' that's not normal."
"She means well, and you didn't have to call her...that."
"Well in my defense," Horizon says. "If she wasn't such a 'god-fearing cultist cunt,' I wouldn't have called her that."
"Heathen," Ibara says, standing a few meters away and clearly eavesdropping as she gets her food.
Horizon looks directly at her, "pretentious nun..."
"Ok stop it," Kendo says loudly, stopping this from escalating any further...again.
"You need to repent," Ibara says, completely ignoring Kendo.
"Well I'd say 'go fuck yourself,' but you people still think that'll send you to some fire pit right?"
Ibara's vine hair stands up and Kendo hops out of her chair, then raises her hands to try and calm her down.
"He is a disgusting being!" Ibara tells Kendo, and before she can respond Horizon speaks up from behind her, still casually eating a slice of pizza.
"In all the best ways babe, give up the chastity vow and I'll show you..."
A single vein bulges on Ibara's forehead, then a moment later she takes a deep breath and calms down. "Violence against thy neighbor is not the way of the lord," she says before walking to the other side of the shaded area to join Kodai and Toru.
Kendo huffs and returns to her seat, giving Horizon an annoyed look. "You know as a Class Rep and HERO, you're supposed to de-escalate situations like that, not make them worse."
"Oh please, if she did anything I would have just warped her to the other side of UA, she could use the walk to calm down."
"That's still awful."
"Whatever, can we get back to this moron now," Horizon gestures at Sero.
"Can we not?" Sero asks.
"So anyway, why haven't you just asked out Yui yet?" Horizon asks.
"It's not that easy man."
"Uh, it literally is---"
"What's easy?" Momo asks as she and Jiro join the table with their meals, sitting to the left side of Horizon, with Jiro closest to him.
"Sero is being a pussy about asking out Yui," Horizon shrugs.
"Oh that," Jiro says.
"You guys know too?" Sero facepalms, now even more embarrassed.
"Dude you told Mina, all the girls in our group chat knows about it, including Kodai."
"That blabbermouth is the only reason I'm even here anyway, girl can't keep anything to herself," Horizon grumbles.
"What do you mean?" Momo asks.
"Well when you made this pool party for the girls from our classes, she told Kirishima, then he told Sero, then Sero asked me to come so he could talk to Kodai and see her in a swimsuit," Horizon says. "I only came so he could ask her out, otherwise I'd be in Tokyo right now..."
"I thought you came because I explained that this is a great opportunity for our classes to bond?" Momo asks.
"What? Don't be stupid, why would I ever care about something like that? I'm here because Mei has some equipment for me, wouldn't have come to the pool if Sero wasn't begging me."
"I didn't beg," Sero says.
"I have the chat Sero...it was pathetic."
Sero opens his mouth to respond, but just closes it and accepts his fate.
"Too bad Shodai couldn't make it," Kendo says. "Without him, the boys from our class couldn't come, since he's the male Class Rep...technically the overall Vice Representative."
"The short silver-haired guy?" Jiro asks. "I thought Tetsutetsu was the Vice Rep..."
"Nope, it's Shodai."
"What's his Quirk?" Horizon immediately asks.
"Oh, Twin Impact, he gets to remotely trigger a second impact after making contact with something, it's pretty cool and unpredictable," Kendo says.
"Honestly I'm kinda glad they couldn't make it," Jiro admits. "Kirishima and Tetsutetsu together always gives me a headache."
Everyone at the table nods in agreement.
After a few moments, Sero asks something that's been bugging him a bit.
"Hey Horizon, why are you so adamant that I ask out Yui? I mean...aren't you all about being the best Hero or something, I figured you'd see girls as a distraction or something."
"A life without love isn't really worth living," he says casually, causing all the nearby tables to fall silent and glance over at him, never expecting to hear something like that.
"You sound like you talk from experience..." Momo says.
"Yeah, I do. I figure if you're interested in someone, you owe it to yourself to tell them, because one day they're here, and the next they're gone. Especially in a career path like ours," everyone immediately thinks of Iida. "You can't afford to waste time, because before you know it, they're gone and you're all alone..."
"But, what if they say no?" Sero asks.
"Then don't be a pussy, just get over it..."
All the girls who were listening sighed in disappointment.
'So romantic, but he had to ruin it at the end.'
After a few minutes of casual chatter, all while Sero was deep in thought, Kendo nudges Momo.
Momo gives her a confused glance, before Kendo gestures to Horizon, then stares directly at Jiro.
She was the only girl who knew about their shared crush, mainly from Momo confessing about it one night at their internship with Uwabami.
Both girls pretend not to know what she's trying to get them to do, so Kendo decides to raise the stakes.
"So Horizon," she calls out to him, causing him to look up from the messages Mei just sent him. "Since you're so gun-ho about people dating and following their passion for one another...what if, let's say, I liked you?"
END---