Neito Monoma wasn't brave. He wanted to be, he could assure you, but in his heart of hearts he knew he wasn't brave. It was one of the reasons he lambasted people like Midoriya and Kurosaki so much - the sheer stupidity of their bullheaded, self-sacrificing bravery was intimidating at times. They managed to make him feel like the youngest child all over again, even after managing to reach Yuuei Academy.

Running through a forest on fire, Monoma was reminded of how not-brave he really was. He could barely see through the steam rising off his skin, and the fire licking his ankles made him itch nervously. Some part of him was still terrified - despite knowing he couldn't be injured - by the act of running through a forest fire burning neon blue. There was a certain amount of security in knowing that he could lose his limbs right now and keep soldiering on painlessly, but Monoma found himself respecting Kurosaki's sheer aptitude for recklessness a little bit more now. Knowing that you couldn't be injured didn't help that tiny, irritating voice in the back of your head that screamed "SURVIVE!" when running headfirst into danger.

Hearing the sounds of running feet and rapid-fire cussing, Monoma knew he'd found what he was looking for. Veering around into a burning bush, Monoma ignored the annoying slapping of leaves and branches to the face and came out facing Todoroki and Bakugo. The two were running along one of the paths, Todoroki carrying Tsurababa slung over his back. They were jogging at a good pace, but Monoma could already tell the two were tired. In a moment of inspiration, given that this was his best chance to get away uninjured, Monoma waited for Todoroki to run past, and then leaped out at Bakugo.

Bakugo's eyes widened and he jumped back, letting Monoma land on his feet right in front of him. In an instant, he saw several expressions run across Bakugo's face: shock, irritation, and then anger. A second after the last emotion finished processing, an open palm rested on Monoma's face. "Do you have any idea," Bakugo hissed. "How much I want to blast your fucking idiotic head in right now?"

Monoma grinned against Bakugo's palm. "I have Kurosaki's quirk," he said mockingly. "Go for it."

In an instant, Bakugo's hand dropped, and Todoroki had already circled back around. "Heal this fucking deadweight then," Bakugo ordered grabbing one of Tsurababa's limp hands and offering it to Monoma. Monoma, grateful for his innate understanding of how to use the quirk's he borrowed (given how little explanation Kurosaki had offered before telling him to run - what kind of command was "don't deactivate it" anyways? Did Kurosaki really think Monoma was going to turn off his 5 minutes of immortality in a life or death situation? Really?)

With a mostly habitual, "Class A students are the real deadweights," Monoma spread the quirk over to Tsurababa. He then reached out to Bakugo and slapped his attached wrist with more than necessary violence.

When he finally reached for Todoroki, the stoic teen stepped out of reach. "Where's Ichigo?" Todoroki commanded.

"She and Yaoyorozu are fighting a Noumu right now," Monoma said, and saw the immediate realization on both of the other kids faces. Tsurababa was still sitting on the ground, staring at his hands and looking confused. "She said to find others and tell them the Villain Alliance was attacking, and that we needed to return to the facility," he repeated faithfully.

Tsurababa stood up. "Guys, what's happening?" He asked, glancing around at the burning woods and suspicious gas cloud rapidly approaching.

Bakugo huffed, crossing his arms and utterly sidelining Tsurababa's question. "And of course Ichimi fucking decided retreating was beneath her and decided to fight a damn anti-All Might super weapon. Did she order Ponytail to run as well?"

"No," Monoma said, ignoring Tsurababa as well. He saw his classmate's face growing rapidly more irate. "I think she had a plan, though."

Todoroki shook his head. "I doubt it," he disagreed confidently.

"Well you weren't there," Monoma said a bit snottily. What could he say? He was high on adrenaline and fearing for his life right now, he could act like a brat.

"Ichigo, do you have any sort of plan right now?!" Momo shrieked as we jumped from one falling tree onto another. I scrambled to my feet and tugged Momo along, dragging her over into the same tree as the Noumu toppled over the tree we had been standing on yet again. With a loud roar, the creature grabbed the tree we'd previously been in and yanked it out of the ground, throwing it at us and severely overshooting in sheer frustration. I stared for a moment as the gigantic oak made an arc through the sky. That thing was freaking strong.

I met Momo's panicked eyes. "Would it make you feel better if I said yes?" I questioned, hurrying into the next tree.

"YES!" Momo shouted, less gracefully following after me. She had already tried shooting the Noumu with various, progressively more powerful guns, to no avail. As a result, she was currently shirtless and her face was covered in dirt. She definitely looked a mess. The only consolation was that she was injured, by way of my quirk.

"Then yes," I said, watching as the Noumu once again barrelled down our tree of previous residence.

Momo landed clumsily next to me, grabbing my shoulder for balance. "Was that a lie?" she panted demandingly.

I really wondered if this was the time to have a conversation about the potential existence of a plan to save our lives. We were very busy running for them, after all. "I'm working on it," I answered. "How good are you at making spears and nets?" I asked.

"That's simple," Momo said, sounding insulted. I was tempted to tell her it was rhetorical, but this really, really wasn't the place for a fun debate. I had never really considered how to beat myself, and I suddenly had a better appreciation for everyone else's frustration when sparring with me. Regeneration quirks were tough to handle unless you had a well-suited quirk. But I had a good example to follow, since someone had wiped the floor with me before without an OP ability.

"Then before the Noumu charges, I need you to make a metal net and give me a spear. You're going to jump down and toss the net on it when it reaches here," I instructed, watching the Noumu turn towards us. "Oh, and then run. Fast, 'kay?" My voice was overly sweet, but I was displeased with being argued with at such a critical time.

Momo stared at me for a second, and then the Noumu started running. In an instant there was an iron spear spawning out of her palm and missing my head by inches, as an iron net began pouring out of her stomach. As the Noumu reached out to topple over our tree, Momo jumped, turning and tossing the net over the Noumu's head as she fell, landing in a roll and running away. The chainsaws and blades attached to the Noumu were already starting to make quick work of the net, but a few seconds distraction was all I needed.

Leaping down, I landed feet first on the Noumu's shoulders, using my new spear to brute force my way through the Noumu's skull. Trying to ignore the chainsaws inches away from my feet, I twisted the metal, drew back my free hand, and slammed my fist into the Noumu's vulnerable brain. Wanting to vomit from the feel of squishy, wet tissue between my fingers, I used all my knowledge of anatomy and attempted to think of this as clinically as possible.

The Hero Killer had previously managed to immobilize and nearly kill me by using knives to sever my ligaments and spinal cord. The only reason I hadn't gotten right back up was because he'd left the blades in place, preventing my quirk from regenerating. Therefore, theoretically, if I could locate and crush the beast's brainstem…

I twisted my fist, elbow deep in the Noumu's skull, when the chainsaw blades on either side of me spun to a stop. I felt the instant the monster's muscles slackened, because I had to tighten my legs grip around its neck and try desperately to keep from being dislodged as it fell backwards. Shoulders slamming into the dirt while still clinging to the paralyzed Noumu, I found it hard to really enjoy my victory.

From across the clearing, Momo lowered her handgun from firing position. She looked a combination of impressed and disgusted, which mirrored just about how I was feeling right now. Walking over slowly, she grabbed the metal spear and ripped it out, lifting the heavy weapon off of me and leaving only my arm still embedded.

"That is… creative," she complimented, staring at the blood and gore spattered on my arm with aghast eyes.

I had thought I would better handle the gore, given my experience with having seen my own internal organs and severed limbs, but apparently I wasn't. Swallowing my bile, I responded, "Actually, stole this idea from someone else." There was a long pause, where both of us processed what happened. "Momo, you should follow Monoma and try to warn the others-"

"Absolutely not," she refuted. I clenched my jaw at the interruption. Apparently I had been spoiled by Monoma and the boys' cooperation, who knew? "We are in a dangerous situation and you are in no position to defend yourself. I am not abandoning you." I wanted to protest, but that was a fairly reasonable argument. I was going to insist again, for solidarity's sake, when Momo smirked. "Besides, I have a plan, since this is the second time the Villain Alliance has decided to interrupt my class' exercises. I have a duty as class officer, after all."

Seeing the wicked gleam in Momo's eyes, I found myself getting excited. Whatever she was planning sounded exciting, for sure.

Somehow, Monoma had been convinced to start running back towards Kurosaki and the Noumu. Somewhere between Todoroki declaring Kurosaki had died before and Bakugo exploding into the sky, Monoma and Tsurababa had started running. Monoma only had a minute or so left of his regeneration, so he'd taken it upon himself to copy all the quirks in his vicinity already. Bakugo was free to get pissed about it once they were safe.

Falling back to allow Tsurababa get ahead, Monoma used Todoroki's fire quirk to begin melting the ice path said teen was creating a few meters ahead. No point in making them even easier to track than they already were. Bakugo was running right behind Todoroki and using explosions to blast stray tree branches and rubble out of the way, which wasn't exactly inconspicuous.

Monoma wasn't entirely certain what the plan here was supposed to be. He assumed they were heading back to help Kurosaki handle the Noumu, and then flee for the headquarters as a unit, but it was difficult to be certain with people like Bakugo on the team. For all he knew, the blonde would declare a villain-hunting competition and get them all killed. Good thing they were heading for Kurosaki then, she could handle him better-

Hearing an odd rustle, Monoma glanced to the side. A flaming stick crashed downwards, nailing him in the face. With a hiss of surprise, he hurled the stick away, feeling his skin itch with the now familiar feel of something healing.

Suddenly there was a masked man in a top hat standing between him and Tsurababa. Monoma screeched to a stop as the panicked Tsurababa failed to notice and charged ahead.

"You're the 'regen-brat', then?" The man said. Monoma instantly tensed. This guy was villain, they were after Kurosaki? For a moment, Monoma cursed the fact he'd never bothered to question the others more about the Class A villain encounters, clearly there was information he was missing. Raising his arm to explode the villain away from him, Monoma felt something click into place, and knew nothing more after that.

Mailbox

DianceDiamond: yep! Although in the one shot I didn't really focus on it, villains do have soulmates like everyone else.

bbymojo: okay, so I've been working on part two for almost a year now. The issue is I've never really written (or experienced) romance before, so it's really difficult for me to actually finish it. I keep writing and scraping it. It will be out eventually though. Hopefully. Also, thank you so much! I'm sorry it's been so long since I've updated, I'm probably never going to be back on schedule like I was before at this point, but know that reading your review was one of the main reasons I sat down and started writing again after many months. I will make sure you don't have to wait so long again anytime soon!

SilverBladeStar: I will fix that, adding to the list of revisions to be made. Thank you. Guest: Cliff-hangers galore! Thank you!

Snickerdoodle97: Thank you for the high compliment! Hopefully it stays that way! :)

RainbowMaze: Thank you very much, I hope you didn't cry too much though. I actually had a friend(?) back in elementary school who had a stutter, he inspired Ichigo's behavior in this story. We were never very close, but he said that he usually liked to talk to me since I never judged him. I was the quiet bookworm in the back. To hear from someone who experienced Ichigo's problems firsthand that she comes across as true is a great compliment to my writing skills, so thank you so much for that. I did a lot of research about stuttering and homelessness leading up to writing this. BNHA does a great job with world building, but there are certain issues not touched upon that no amount of heroes could ever fix. Addressing your second comment: so there's 3 reasons for Ichigo's shortness. 1) it's a physical part of her quirk, her mother and grandfather were very short as well. 2) she was a premie. 3) she's actually a year younger than all the other students. So she'll still grow a bit, but I don't ever see her cracking 5 ft. As for future romance... my parents are 5'2 and 6'7, so to me that's pretty normal XD. It actually can look pretty adorable. Your question about Ichigo's hair and growth: Hair is actually made of dead cells, which is why Ichigo's hair grows super fast but not the rest of her body. Her quirk isn't rapid growth, its rapid reset, which is why she doesn't grow taller but things like hair and nails grow super fast. If that makes sense?

BluePhoenixRising15: I'm glad you loved the cooking chapter! It actually took me forever to write since I had to come up with the trial ideas on my own, but once I sat down and started really writing and not planning it all seemed to come together. The characters really seemed to just write themselves, y'know?