My Hero Automata

Summary: The USJ at last...but this isn't your canon USJ event. Why? Because we finally get a glimpse of both Izumi's power level...and the limitations of that power.

Chapter 10: Unforeseen Situations

The class blinked in a little bit of surprise as Midnight sauntered in five minutes late, the students having all expected to see All Might. It was his day to handle their practicals, with Midnight having already done their theoretical studies that morning. Frowning and afraid she might already know the answer, Izumi was the one that asked anyway.

"Midnight-sensei? Wasn't All Might supposed to have our class today?"

Midnight looked annoyed at the question, though thankfully her annoyance didn't appear to be directed at any of them.

"Yes. Unfortunately, he was delayed by several incidents on his way into work today. He's still dealing with the…aftermath. Hopefully, he'll be joining us part way through the lesson. Given who he is, such disruptions are unfortunately unavoidable. Though, thankfully, your primary instructor today was always supposed to be one of our topic specialists. I'll be joining them instead of All Might, as this class is one best done with multiple instructors on hand."

Several people did make disappointed noises. Though most looked like they also understood. All Might was the number one hero. It only made sense that he would occasionally be needed elsewhere. Only Momo and Izumi read anything more than that into it, sharing a brief look and a frown. All Might was well known, or had become so in the last few years at least, for not sticking around long after an incident. For reasons they now understood completely. If he wasn't showing up, it probably meant that he'd used too much time to handle a full class. Hopefully he hadn't pushed himself too hard. Again…

Midnight grabbed their attention a moment later, holding up a card that said 'Rescue.'

"I hinted at this during our last practicals session. The last aspect of General Heroics that we need to cover, in order to build proper baselines for all of you, is Rescue operations. Make no mistake, Rescue is a major part of virtually all Heroic careers. And it actually requires the broadest skill set and most knowledge out of any single type of hero work. As such, UA has an off-campus facility that specializes in varied-terrain Rescue training. We'll be heading there via bus as soon as you all get changed."

Holding up the now-familiar remote, Midnight unlocked the wall panels holding their costume cases.

"On that note…our previous training may have highlighted issues for you with your uniforms that make you disinclined to use them for this. As such, today you have the option to choose between your hero costumes and a gym uniform. This option will not be provided often, as you need to get used to using your gear even when it might be more convenient not to have it. In this specific case, where you're still dealing with any issues from your Mark 1 prototype designs, it will be allowed."

That was met with varied murmurs of acceptance and understanding. Midnight had been ungentle with her opinions for many of their Mark 1 designs. In point of fact, only Izumi and Momo had gotten virtually no negative feedback, only observations. Momo's, of course, couldn't really be properly assessed by anyone but her or Izumi. And Izumi's had been gone over, repeatedly, by herself, 2B, Momo, and several design and materials experts from Nishimura & Croft. It was already a cut above the costumes of most fully licensed pros, and Midnight's only feedback had been regarding aesthetics and image rather than practicality.

It was a testament to how brutal the feedback had been for a few others that several students made no move to get their costume cases when Midnight unlocked them. A few of those grimaced, looking a bit haunted by the memory of that blistering feedback. But most simply seemed resigned to the fact that they needed massive changes. Like Kirishima needing a damn shirt. Cases in hand or not, all of them soon shuffled out of the room, heading for the locker rooms…

... ...

Given the relative bulk of a few costumes, even Momo's which added significantly to her mass despite being mostly skin-tight, the open layout of the bus made sense. It was also how Izumi found herself face-to-face with a curious Mina, who had actually survived the Great Costume Massacre fairly unscathed. She'd gotten a lot of feedback from Midnight, but it had been mostly due to the lack of things rather than anything being wrong with Mina's basic premise.

"So, Izumi…what the heck actually is your Quirk even? I mean, I know you said a bit about it before you ran the obstacle course, but you never actually transformed! Do you just, like, turn into a robot version of yourself or something? And how much more powerful do you get? You said it was a major boost, right?"

Having honestly been surprised she managed to avoid this topic for this long, Izumi had already considered how she wanted to answer. Though the question about appearance was…a little less expected than the others. She supposed, objectively, it made sense.

"Um, power is hard to measure past a certain point. So far, my peak known strength is maybe only 85% of All Might's known limit? And that's an estimate. The same estimates actually say I'm probably a little faster than him, though…and have significantly better agility and reaction speed."

Even having expected it, Izumi shrunk in on herself a bit as the whole bus was suddenly staring at her. Gulping, she pushed through.

"Like I told Midnight-sensei, though…I can't fight at that level for very long. I've only been able to manage a full transformation for the last year or so, and even just holding the form starts eating through my energy fast. Out of combat, I'd get maybe half an hour. In combat? Fifteen minutes if I'm not fighting something that's able to keep up. Less than ten if I have to fight at absolute Max, with a Pod and weapon summons. If I tried to actually fight All Might, he'd just wear me out in like, five minutes."

That knocked the levels of visible shock in the bus down a bit…but nowhere near all the way. As Kirishima proved a moment later.

"That's still crazy! I mean, all I can do is harden! Good for combat, but not exactly super eye catching!"

That comment started a back and forth…that somehow still ended up back on Izumi, with Mina determinedly repeating a previous question.

"You never said what it makes you look like! Should we expect, like, mecha-Izumi…or maybe Giant Mecha Izumi?! With that crazy power level…"

Mentally picturing that, Izumi couldn't help but giggle.

"No. I don't actually look mechanical at all. The changes are mostly to my internals. I do look a bit different though. If I fully transform…well there are actually two versions. One looks like me but a bit more…uh…"

Izumi stumbled and Momo came to her rescue in the most embarrassing way possible.

"Mature. Her ass gets even more incredible and her eyes start glowing. It's super-hot."

"MOMO!"

Her girlfriend was utterly unrepentant as Izumi uselessly slapped her armor, flushing brightly. The rest of the class, hearing Momo of all people teasing like that, was stuck between laughter and incredulity.

"What. It's true. Her second form is also super-hot…but more in the cool, refined beauty sort of way. She physically changes a fair bit more in that form. Slight facial feature changes, different movement and voice, white hair. Still recognizable but enough different to make you do a double take."

Ever curious, Mina couldn't help but ask.

"What's the difference? Aside from looks."

Momo and Izumi looked at each other, teasing completely gone. There was a silent exchange between them, and Izumi shrugged. She didn't want to explain it herself but didn't mind Momo doing it. It was probably better they know anyway.

"The first one means Izumi is still in charge. The second one means that 2B has taken over. If that happens…run. Not because 2B will hurt you. But because shit has gotten so bad they've essentially said 'safeties, what are those?' Izumi instinctively holds back. 2B doesn't. And being near her while she's fighting seriously is…not a good place for relatively fragile things like humans. Or buildings. Or cities."

A few people snicked at the last bit…until they got a good look at Momo's eyes and realized she was serious. A few people looked at Izumi askance for a moment, but any farther conversation was thankfully cut off by Midnight announcing their arrival…

... ...

The specialist was, of course, Thirteen. Izumi had known since the moment she mapped out where they were headed. Which didn't stop her from being excited to see the heroine. For once, however, she appeared not to be the biggest fan in the crowd, as an enthusiastic Uraraka had immediately gone into fangirl mode, spewing facts about the rescue hero. It was a bit surreal to see that sort of enthusiasm from the other side. But Izumi didn't hate it. She was definitely going to have to make sure the gravity girl was able to join them at The Blue Nova next time, though. If she was as big a Thirteen fan as Izumi suspected, she had to have been crushed when she heard about the other girls going! For now, though, she really ought to be focused on Thirteen's speech.

"…And that's why a major portion of the U.A. Heroics course is dedicated to Rescue. Quirks should always be used to benefit mankind, to help and push us forward, not to repeat the sins of the past in yet another new way."

Huh. A rather elegant speech from the usually shy heroine, maybe working with the Yaoyorozus had boosted her skills at—

"Warning : Maso Anomaly Detected!"

Thirteen stopped mid-sentenced, blinking as the small recon Pod 2B was occupying blared that warning. Before anyone could even try to make sense of it, 2B's voice spoke right after the warning.

"Incoming spatial warp! Multiple incoming spatial warps! All disaster zones! Intruder alarms disabled! Exterior coms jammed! We are under attack!"

That processed faster…but not fast enough. The doors to the USJ abruptly slammed shut and a large swirling portal appeared in plain view, down in the central plaza. People began disgorging from it almost immediately, Midnight reacting barely an instant later.

"Thirteen! Get the students out of here! Destroy the doors if you have too! I'll take care of the central plaza. Get an alert out as fast as you can."

Izumi, having actually understood the first warning and gone into a state of hyper-cognition before the portal opened, had reacted even before Midnight. 2B's recon Pod vanished, pulled back into her Quirk…and a much more heavily armed Pod design materialized even as Midnight snapped her order. Before her sensei could move, the Pod darted to her side under 2B's guidance.

"Take 2B, Midnight-sensi! She can provide non-lethal fire-support and is effectively immortal. Even if they destroy the Pod, she'll just end up back in my Quirk."

Midnight hesitated for only the briefest moment, then nodded acceptance.

"2B with me then, everyone else, out! This is not a drill. Get your asses in gear!"

Midnight exploded into motion an instant later, hands already tearing at her suit, her Quirk beginning to spill out from the tears even as she fell into the plaza. Her entrance caught the villains, still disorganized, off-guard. A few with ranged abilities tried to line up on her…only for 2B to rain down electrified rounds from her Pod's guns. It was a non-lethal modification to the gatling gun configuration that Izumi and 2B had developed…and it proved brutally effective now as half a dozen villains dropped in the first three seconds. And seconds after that, the villains closest to where Midnight had landed started dropping as her Quirk's fumes reached them.

One of the last Villains to step through the portal made an aggravated noise as he saw his minions already under assault. He scanned the retreating class and hissed.

"Where the fuck is All Might? And why is Midnight here! Kurogiri, stop them from leaving! We might need them as bait."

A man made of black mist twisted in place, purple smoke forming a portal…and he stepped through to appear in front of the retreating class, who'd almost made it to the door.

"Hello. We are the League of Villains. I'm afraid we can't let you leave until All Might is dead. Where is he, by the way? We know he was supposed to be here."

Izumi noted the caps popping off of Thirteen's fingers, her hand subtly rising even as she answered the Villain.

"He is not here. Out of the way, villain. Or suffer the consequences."

Izumi reached out, grabbing Kirishima by his gym uniform out of sheer reflex as he tried to lunge for the villain. Unfortunately, he hadn't been the only one to try. Bakugo leapt into the smokey cloud, fouling Thirteen's line of fire on the Villain. For a brief moment the attack seemed to have worked, the cloud dissipating. Then, however, the voice of the Villain returned from a few meters to the right of where he'd been.

"Now, now. That wasn't very nice. Since you won't answer my question, I suppose you'll just have to be scattered and die!"

The purple mist rushed towards the group and Izumi made a split-second decision. Fully transforming took barely a second…but she was already within the cloud when that second passed. Others were as well and they vanished from her tactical visor's sensors, warped away as far as she could tell. As the cloud attempted to close around Izumi, however, the portal that was forming collapsed. Izumi grunted as thin cuts penetrated several millimeters of her skin, the collapsing portal having sent thin arcs of bent spacetime out as it collapsed. But that was fine. It hurt like a bitch, of course. And the fact that it had managed to slice even her fully transformed skin told her everything she needed to know about how hilariously dangerous it was. But her gamble had paid off.

Very few people stopped to think about where the energy for Quirks came from, most thinking it was a fully biological process. But that was bullshit. Momo could, even before One for All, create a canon that massed more than she did, even with the increased body density from her Quirk's mutation aspects. No, most Quirks might use some biological process as a catalyst, but the majority of the ENERGY involved was absorbed over time. What 2B's original world would have called Maso was Quirk Energy here, and QE was absorbed into the body to fuel the bullshit reality bending that Quirks did regularly. It also meant, since 2B's original body had been designed to channel Maso…that Izumi's full transformation absorbed and stored QE at a staggering rate compared to anyone or anything else on the planet. Fast enough, in fact, to do something like destabilize a spacetime warp that tried to form around her.

Thirteen was saying something and the Villain was looking at Izumi with confusion, but that didn't matter. What did matter was that the pain of the deep cuts had frozen Izumi for a few critical seconds…and Thirteen had tried to use their Quirk on the Villain during those seconds. Izumi growled as the warper used his own Quirk to turn Black Hole on its owner, Thirteen shutting it down fast enough to not die immediately, but obviously seriously wounded.

Pushing past the pain, Izumi summoned her Type-40 Great Sword, ignoring the horrified reactions of the remaining students as they saw Thirteen fall. Pushing off, she pushed herself into her highest state of hyper-cognition even as she launched herself at the warper. In her fully transformed state Izumi covered the distance between her and the cloud villain in the space between heartbeats. Unlike Bakugo, her tactical visor could easily penetrate the cloud of the man's Quirk, showing her the metal brace that must hold some physical portion of his body. Calculating the maximum force she could use without killing a Quirked human outright, Izumi slammed the flat of her Great Sword into that armored piece…and felt it connect. The brace shot off like a rocket, slamming into the inner wall of the USJ, even as the wind from her passage blew away the smoke. Izumi, still in hyper-cognition mode, took in who was left.

Iida, Shoji, Kaminari, Koda and Kirishima. Plus the wounded Thirteen. She'd managed to push Kirishima free of the destabilizing portal, thankfully. She hadn't been completely sure she'd managed that, mid-transformation. Her brain was always a little fuzzy when she was between states. Now…what to do. Sensors had already pinpointed several of her classmates in other disaster zones, so it had likely been a purely local warp. Her feed from 2B said she and Midnight were doing fine. The class was too scattered to help them all and Thirteen needed medical attention soonest. That meant she needed to prioritize getting help to them instead of being the help herself. Coming up with a plan, she dropped to a lower level of cognition. It was much too hard to communicate with her speed of thought cranked up to the max. Everything started moving normally again even as Izumi began to speak, opening her inventory as she did.

"Shoji, my visor is telling me the class is still in the dome, locate them and figure out if any need help. Iida, I assume you have basic first aid training. Take this," she tossed him a comprehensive med kit from her inventory, "and do what you can for Thirteen. I'm going to bust the door and move far enough away from the USJ to get a signal out. I'll return as soon as I can. Koda, follow me outside and see if you can summon up some animal help to send after anyone that gets in trouble. Kaminari, Kirishima, guard the stairs against anyone slipping past Midnight!"

Not waiting to see if they obeyed her…she supposed 'suggestions'…Izumi braced and charged her blade. A moment later she was in motion again, launching a brute-force AOE at the door. Whoever had built it had never intended it to stand up to that level of assault and it crumpled outward as a shredded ruin. She flashed out through the opening at high speed, using a second attack as she passed to clear some of the debris for Koda. Boosting her cognition speed again, if not quite to the height she had before, she split her thoughts into multiple threads. One pushed her physical body out and away from the USJ in a straight line at high speed. Another watched her cell and satellite signals like a hawk, waiting to escape the jamming. The third wrote a brief message and prepared her cyberwarfare suite.

It took less than three seconds for her to get signal and, even as her body was skidding to a halt in a three-point landing, blade digging in as a break, her mind was busy with that signal. She brutally hammered her way through UA's firewalls, not caring if she got caught right now and disregarding that they were still in a heightened state from the break-in the day before. Reaching out to the Alarms, she took only a moment to confirm that the USJ was the only place under attack. With that confirmation, she flipped every Alarm for the USJ…and sent a terse message straight to Nedzu's personal computer.

USJ Under attack. Thirteen critically injured. Class scattered by mass teleport. Villains numbering at least in the high double digits. Midnight engaged with leaders. Stated intentions to Kill All Might. Signal jamming field in effect. Require immediate backup. Require immediate medical evacuation. Returning to USJ to render first-aid and protect classmates. Sorry about the firewalls. – Midoriya Izumi

It was signed with not just her student credentials, but also her personal credentials as the co-creator of the Hero Scan Network which all variants of the Scouter Momo and she had designed tapped into. Credentials that the UA system would recognize via that same system. It wouldn't do to make them think someone had hacked the system just to pull them away from the main campus. Hopefully, her personal credentials would be enough to avoid that.

Even as good as UA's security was, the entire hack and message delivery had taken less than two minutes. Izumi's body had, meanwhile, already braced for a return to the USJ. Snapping her attention fully back to that thread of thought, Izumi launched herself back. She had to take it a bit slower, needing to avoid Koda who was just scrambling out of the door. Then she had to slow down farther as she maneuvered to a stop next to Iida. He hadn't wasted time, and she'd been right to pick him out. He'd identified and prepared the disinfecting spray and the clotting agent infused bandages.

She knelt next to him, dropping her thought speed down again even as she helped him by dismissing her blade and grabbing a set of specialized shears from the kit. They were a much upgraded version of the medical shears used to cut clothing free, designed to be used on hero costumes which often had armor or cut-resistant weaves built it. They still wouldn't have gotten through Izumi's own suit…but thankfully whatever Thirteen's was made out of wasn't nearly so combat-oriented. There was only light resistance as she cut away the suit around the wound, letting Tenya apply the disinfectant and bandages. His hands were shaking a bit, but he applied the pressure bandages with an instinctive skill that spoke of serious drilling. She'd been right to assume that his family had probably forced him through dozens of hours of basic first aid. Enough for him to do it on autopilot, even when his mind wanted to shut down.

Good. They could all break down later. And get therapy. Lots of therapy. They were definitely going to need therapy for this. For now, they needed to get everyone out alive so they could overload UA's therapist's office properly. Izumi's scans of Thirteen were showing that the lacerations were deep…but not bone or organ deep. The clotting agent and pressure bandage should stabilize her until medical assistance arrived. Which meant it was time to check on the rest of the situation.

"Shoji, how we doing?"

His response was fast, one of his tentacles forming a mouth to reply even as the others swiveled, tracking various clashes across the USJ.

"Good. I think. Asui and Mineta have gotten clear of the flood zone but didn't engage with the villains there. That might be a problem, long-term. Todoroki cleared the landslide zone. I don't think he even realizes Toru is also there, which is slightly concerning. Yaoyorozu, Jirou, and Sero are still fighting in the Mountain Zone…but your girlfriend is terrifying and I'm pretty sure every villain there is regretting their life choices. Tokoyami and Uraraka are in the windstorm zone and seem be doing okay, mostly playing hit and run. Ojiro, Sato and Ashido are in the fire zone and the villains are regretting the discovery that some of her acids are flammable. Bakugo is alone in the ruins zone but seems to be utterly decimating the villains there. I haven't been able to locate Aoyama, I'm still looking. I assume he's hiding in one of those zones since his laser is rather obvious."

Izumi took that all in, nodding and thinking where she could do the most good…and then she clutched her head and grunted as 2B's consciousness was snapped back into her Quirk, both of them dazed for a moment. A moment later, 2B spoke through their connection, mental voice urgent.

"Midnight is in trouble! They have some sort of bioengineered monster. It destroyed my platform!"

The urgency in 2B's rapid-fire speech was enough for Izumi to crank up her speed of cognition again, maxing it out between heartbeats. 2B fed her data and Izumi paled, lurching to her feet as she summoned Virtuous Contract. A quick glance at her QE levels made her internally curse. It had been nearly 7 minutes since activating her full transformation. And 3 of those had been high intensity. That was effectively 10 minutes shaved off of her total time and she had to assume that monster that had hit 2B was going to require her to go all out. If she was very lucky, she might manage to eke out another ten if she drained her QE reserves bone dry. But then that would be that, she'd be reduced to only her permanent changes. Which were nowhere near enough for that…thing. She'd just have to hope her remaining power would be long enough to deal with whatever that monster was.

As she launched down into the plaza her eyes widened. Even in hyper-condition mode the monster was fast. And it was pulling its arm back to finish an already badly fucked up Midnight off. Gritting her teeth and forcing herself to summon energy faster than ever before, Izumi made a deliberately sloppy air slash with Virtuous Contract. The resulting blow still cut deeply into the brute's arm…but more importantly it pushed it clear of Midnight's head, cratering the floor of the plaza next to her instead of ending her sensei's life. Izumi was only an instant behind the shockwave, but barely got her blade up in time to stop the blow the monster redirected at her. Holy shit it was fast. But that blow had cost it. Izumi hadn't had time to use the flat of her blade…and it had flat out lost an arm. It jumped away and she came to a halt in front of Midnight's fallen body. Okay, she could…

SON OF A BITCH. IT WAS REGENERATING?!

"Who the fuck are you?! Some sort of extra mini-boss?"

Izumi blinked as her focus shifted to the only other remaining villain still awake in the plaza. Dry, chapped skin, angry eyes, and hands all over his body?

"Well, I guess it doesn't fucking matter. You might have hurt Nomu. But he'll just regen anything you do to him. He was made to fight the End Boss, you're nothing. Kill her, Nomu."

The monster moved…but so did Izumi. She couldn't let Midnight get caught between them. Clearly more instinctively wary of her blade now, the monster still didn't have the skill to avoid it completely. But it was fast. Faster than Izumi. She had it soundly beat in reaction time and it was telegraphing enough that she could keep up with it, but she wasn't doing critical damage. And she did not have time to be fucking around with this. She could feel her QE reserves dipping fast to keep up…and there was only one thing left she could do. She took a blow…which hurt like a bitch even riding it…and used the space to grab the Nomu and throw it. It wouldn't be gone more than a few seconds. But that was enough for…

"2B. Switch."

2B, bless her, didn't hesitate. Izumi released control of her body to the Android…and that body shifted. Her hair, which had been emerald-green shot through with silver after her transformation, bleached white even as little details of her face shifted. She didn't quite look exactly like the 2B that Izumi had seen in her friend's memories, but someone could be forgiven for not noticing the small differences that resulted from technically 'possessing' Izumi's body.

The Nomu returned a bare moment after 2B had full control…and if it had any ability to regret left in its existence, it would have felt all the regrets the moment it did. 2B had constantly fought things just as fast and tough as Nomu for years before finding herself as Izumi's Quirk. And that was on top of literal millennia of combat data from thousands of androids pre-installed in her brain. Unlike Izumi, she also had absolutely no hesitation in employing brutal, lethal force to achieve her ends. Three seconds after the Nomu reengaged, it was missing an arm. Half a second later it was missing both arms. Five seconds after reengagement it was missing all four limbs. Six seconds after reengagement it was missing all four limbs and had Virtuous Contract brutally impaled through its brain, down its neck, and into its torso.

Eight seconds after it reengaged, Nomu slumped forward onto the floor. If it was dead or not no one there knew. But its regeneration wasn't going to help it with an entire oversized katana thoroughly stuck through its brain. There was dead silence as 2B turned to coldly regard the remaining Villain, summoning a standard YoRHa-issue blade in place of Virtuous Contract.

Izumi winced internally at that action. Switching took power, and so did maintaining each blade. Normally, when they switched, Izumi went to a Pod, just like 2B usually did. But she didn't dare now. They were well into the red. 2B had maybe 45 seconds of activity or three minutes of passive operation before the transformation failed. And 2B was not the type to be passive. She could practically feel 2B calculating how best to kill the last remaining threat even as her Android partner shifted…

And then the cavalry arrived.

All Might landed between 2B and the Hand Villain. Not smiling at all.

"You've done well 2B, Izumi. Please leave the rest to me and see to Midnight."

There was a moment of hesitation before 2B relinquished control to Izumi. Izumi, in turn, immediately depowered her transformation, and everything else save for Virtuous Contract. She dared not let it fade away, in case the Nomu got up again if she did. But she could maintain it indefinitely with everything else shut down. She rushed to Midnight's side even as All Might quickly dealt with the remaining villain…and just as quickly rounded up her classmates. Momo appeared next to her from somewhere, and started helping Izumi apply first aid to Midnight.

Izumi didn't relax fully until the paramedics arrived.

When they did…she staggered into Momo's shoulder…and blacked out.