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Chapter 10 : "Is this… Bleach?"​

My melancholia had left me somewhere during the night and I was still riding my high of having gotten truly and well laid when I stepped through the 1-A classroom's threshold the very next day.

That is to say, I was in a very, very good mood, the kind that leaves a healthy blush on your face when you think back on the reason why you are in particularly high spirits.

A pep in my steps and humming a song under my breath, I made my way toward my spot near Kyoka, letting Bakugo's very pointed look of thinly veiled hatred wash over me like water on a duck's back.

"Kyo-Kyo-chan!" I happily cry as I greet her with a very 'friendly' glomp, "Ara, how are you today, ne?"

She only struggles for a few seconds before giving up, which means she's learning.

Good.

All according to the plan.

"Hebi-chan," she ends up saying, a hint of amused exasperation in her voice as I try to smother her in my tits, "I'm fine, and ya?"

"Ara, I'm great, ne?" I answer peppily as I step back before sitting down on my own chair.

The dark-purple haired girl gives me a look, before slowly nodding.

"Yeah, I think I can see that." she hums.

"Ne?" I blink at her in askance behind my sunglasses.

"I don't know," she muses aloud, "Ya seem a bit different today, I don't quite know why."

"Ara, you really think so, ne?" I answer evasively, my most magnificent 'ditzy gyaru look' number 2 shining on my face as I point a finger at myself before denying it in force with little gestures of my hands, "There, like, no way that's the case, ne?"

Kyoka squints at me while I smile back at her as innocently as I can.

"...Say, Hebi-chan," she hazards as more people enter the classroom, "What exactly is ya relationship with Nurineko-san?"

"Ara, erh…" I start, sweating internally a little, before bolting out of my chair as I've just found a walking, pink-skinned lifeline coming closer, "Na-Na-chan!"

My extremely convenient two-legged way of changing the subject from a potentially thorny one stops in her tracks as I not-quite-but-close-enough vanish from my standing position before reappearing in front of her to hug her silly as she lets out a startled 'eep!'..

"There, there, Na-Na-chan, let it go, I know you like those~," I whisper huskily in her ear, making her freeze, and only then she hugs me back as I very lightly knead her shoulder blades and she unconsciously tries to melt against me.

I don't hold the embrace that long, having already abused both my subharmonics and magic-touch enough with her for the day with that particular stunt in the vain hope of distracting Kyoka, but she still makes a little noise of discontent when I step back.

All according to the plan : take two.

"Ara, how are you Na-Na-chan, ne?" I immediately pester her and it only takes her a second to reboot completely.

"En, I'm great, thanks Hebi-chan!" she answers energetically, making a wide gesture to indicate that, yes, she's at one hundred and ten percent first thing in the morning.

I giggle, mentally doing a little gig at her use of my favorite name.

"Quit yapping, you extras!" Bakugo, fed up with the happening, growls even as he slams a hand on his desk in anger, his eyebrow twitching, "This isn't a goddamn kids' playground!"

Naturally, his loud and rude interruption badly startles Mina, which makes her throw him a weirded out and slightly fearful look, making my mood sour.

She's, after all, much prettier when she smiles happily.

Luckily, I have just the thing to deal with hot headed morons full of themselves : pretending they absolutely don't even enter your eyes and ears.

I snake my arm into Mina's and start to low-key frogmarch her toward her own seat, which is only one removed from Kyoka's while I keep chattering her head off.

"Ara, so! Did you tell your family about what happened yesterday, ne?" I ask her peppily, and she immediately lights back up.

"En, yes! Like, all of it!" the pink-skinned girl answers while gesturing with her free arm for extra-emphasis, prompting a growl of anger at being so obviously ignored to get heard from behind us, "I so still can't believe I made it to UA! Like, a girl like me? I tots wouldn't have believed it a year ago!"

I giggle once more.

"Ara, yet here you are, ne?" I tell her while nudging her shoulder with my own, "So, you must have made something right, ne?"

She groans aloud, her head going downcast.

"En, don't remind me!" she whines aloud petulantly as we get back into the proper range to include Kyoka into our talk, "I had to cram, like, so hard to pass the exams! Thanks Kami I didn't have to work that hard for the practical, at least."

My smile turns a tad wooden at her admission, and I'm suddenly reminded that I need to kick the girls' asses into shape.

If the little wince Kyoka makes is anything to go by, she already knows where this is eventually going.

After all, she is perfectly aware of my point of view about going in the field half-assed, and if the lithe muscles I felt through her clothes when I occasionally hugged her those last two days are anything to go by, she at least took my advice to heart.

"Ara, you had to cram you said, ne?" I ask the pink-skinned (slacker) after a beat.

"En, yeah? I'm, like, pants at studying!" she admits sheepishly while looking to the side.

Well, I'm definitely going to have my work cut out for me with this one, am I?

Kyoka and I cross our eyes, and I give her a nod when she raises an eyebrow in question.

"Ara, it's decided." I decisively say, prompting the horned cutie whose arm is still trapped in mine to look at me askance, her golden pupils ending up staring into red-and-glam heart-shaped dark sunglasses, "I'm going to help you reach your true potential, ne?"

"En?" Mina blinks a bit dumbly as I nod self-satisfyingly while Kyoka weakly smiles at her.

"Welcome to the pain train, I guess?" Kyoka drawls, before gesturing in my direction, "Ya earned the direct attention of 'Miss Perfectionist' right there, ya should accept ya doomed to spend ya afternoons stuck on school grounds from now on."

"En?!" the pink-skinned girl positively boggles, a poleaxed look on her face, "But, the year hasn't even properly started yet!"

"Ara, you know what they say : 'the early bird catches the worm', Na-Na-chan." I tut at her.

"B-But, my free afternoons?!" she whimpers audibly, under Kyoka and I's looks of amusement.

"Ara, silly Na-Na-chan, why do you think UA doesn't have any club activities in the afternoon exactly?" I ask her archly.

"En, because it's good for the students' morale after a hard day's work?" she hesitantly answers.

I give her a look while Kyoka snickers.

"No, it's because they trust us to work both on our assignments and conditioning in that time period." I plainly explain to the pink-skinned girl and I watch as realization suddenly dawns on her face, "This way, we have three whole years to experiment with our quirks, with the occasional counsel of the teaching body during some electives to help us pinpoint what and what do not work, and become power-houses in truth. It's not like booking a spot multiple times a week in a gym that allows free quirk use is that easy, after all, ne?"

I tilt my head, still looking at her.

"Ara, you know the difference between those who makes top 100 in the Heroe's Leaderboard?" I ask and Mina shakes her head in the negative, "They have spent each of those free time periods given to them by their high-school working on their quirks : either it was to find some new uses, to make them 'stronger' or to just know them intrinsically in all of their nuances. More often than not, it's all the above, and it never ends being time wasted, ne?"

"You, ne?" I poke at her with my index, "You have lots of potential with that acid generation you got there. So, you're going to come with Kyo-Kyo-chan and I this afternoon, and we're going to pool our brains together to find ways to make you become the best hero you can be, deal, ne?"

I watch unerringly as Mina's inherent laziness fights with her need to matter, to make a difference, and lose badly when she finally deflates and sighs.

"En, fiiiiinnnnnneeeeee!" she petulantly whines, "But it better be worth it!"

I go to answer when another voice interjects next to me, prompting me to turn my head in its direction.

"What's 'better be worth it', kero?" a wild Tsuyu suddenly asks, her head tilted and a finger on her chin.

"Ara, additional personal quirk training this afternoon after class, you in, ne?" I ask her archly with a little gesture of my head.

She ponders the idea for a bit, before slowly nodding.

"I'd have to go to take care of my siblings at some point, but I should have a couple of hours free, kero."

"Ara, great!" I answer happily with a beaming smile, "And hello to you Tsuyu-chan!"

The frog-girl turn her attention to me and proceed to eye-fucking-smile at me, which takes me massively aback, but I also can't help myself to find cool as fuck.

"Hello to you too, Ban-san." she placidly answers.

I pout at her, and she has the gall to chuckle.

"We should probably invite the other girls too, don't ya think?" Kyoka asks as the conversation lul.

Before I can answer, another person enters the conversation.

"Excuse me, Ban-san, may I have a moment?" a decidedly masculine and strained voice asks, and my eyebrows furrow.

I disentangle my arm from Mina's as I turn on my heels to face its owner.

"Ara, yes Tenya-san?" I politely -if a bit frostily- answer as I take in the countenance of the class discount speedster.

He definitely looks a bit stressed and frazzled, like he was at war with some instincts, and carries a convenience store's plastic bag with him.

We stare at each other for a heartbeat, and then he proceeds to bow at ninety-degree, prompting me to balk at him.

"I wanted to apologize for my unseemingly conduct, Ban-san!" he starts, a bit strongly but my [Communication Talent] tells me it's one hundred percent genuine even if I already knew that the guy can't possibly lie to save his life, "I judged you harshly for your apparent disregards of the rules, yet now that I know you were able to decipher the true meanings behind the entrance exam like Midoriya-san did, I know that you're just not acting flippantly for the sake of it. Again, I apologize for my harsh words and my conduct, please, accept this as a token of apology."

He straightens and gives me the bag, and I can only look at what's inside a bit dumbly.

"Ara, bleach?" I questions aloud.

"Yes!" he answers, his right arm doing that weird as fuck robotic gesture for emphasis, "My mother told me that this was most useful to get rid off unwanted stains, I hope it'll help you with your wardrobe problem until UA's staff can provide you another uniform. Thank you for listening to me, and have a good day."

He turns heel, and goes back to talk with Izuku and Ochako, leaving me to look at his back with bemusement and a no-small amount of hilarity rising inside of me.

"No. Fucking. Way."/"En, did he really, like, believe what you said yesterday, Hebi-chan?"/"Is it really possible to be that gullible, kero?" Kyoka, Mina and Tsuyu all seem as flabbergasted as I from what I can see.

"Jiro-san, Asui-san, Ashido-san, Ban-san, good morning." Momo calmly insert herself in the conversation as I still try to internalize what the fuck just happened without busting a rib laughing, before arching one of her perfectly manicured eyebrows as she looks inside the bag I'm still clutching in my hands, "Is this… Bleach?"

"Ara, yes Mo-chan, ne?" I answer as I smile at her.

"I see, a good choice. I've read good things about that particular brand, it'll help you fix the issues you had with your uniforms' blouses quite nicely." the sheltered heiress offers with a smile.

I look at her, before hazarding a glance at the girls around me.

"Kishu!?" I try to smother my laugh even as the girls don't, which only makes me fail even harder at it, "Kishu-shu-shu-shu-shu-shu-shu!"

It takes us a while to calm down, even with an increasingly confused Momo asking us what's going on.

Our laughing fit only stops when Azaiwa enters the room and gives us an angry glare, prompting us to tell the taller girl that we will explain to her afterwards.

As I try to settle my nerves, once more seated and richer of a bottle of bleach, Kyoka whispers to me.

"Ya know," the dark-purple haired girl says in a low voice, "I can't help but notice ya didn't answer the question."

I side-eye her.

She looks back at me, then, as if to put an extra-extra emphasis, her jacks raise, coiled like serpents, before pointing alternatively between her eyes and me, making my lips quiver in barely restrained amusement.

What the fuck girl? What are you? A serial-killer?

"Don't think I've forgotten, girl, ya gonna give me some answers later." she says, and I know that it is a promise.

I can only groan inwardly at her statement as I turn myself back toward Aizawa.

I already knew that I was dogshit at hiding when I got off the night before, but this somehow takes the cake.

Barely two days at UA and people have already started to realize that I'm a naughty, naughty girl.

Good job, Hebi-chan, good job.

[AN : And back to school we are, and shenanigans ensue!

Honestly not much to say about this chapter beyond the fact that Momo is precious, and Ida is kind of endearing once he got his worldview shaked a good dozen times.

So, ten more times to go before he becomes a decent human being, I guess.

Hope you enjoyed, xoxo]