Iida Tenya stood at attention in front of Normal Hero: Manual. The briefcase holding his Hero Costume burned cold in his left hand, as if punishing him for his morals. What were morals, though, for someone with his goals.

"...Don't you think so, Iida-kun?" Manual finished his opening spiel, snapping Tenya out of his reverie.

Tenya dutifully nodded. "I understand, sir." He truly didn't, but he had a mission.

The vengeance of Iida Tensei, the real Ingenium. Tensei had bequeathed his Hero name to Tenya, but Tenya had not taken up the mantle. No one could stand up to the standard Tensei had set.

And, if Tenya did this just right, he would never bear that mantle anyways.

Manual must have been disturbed by the awkward pause that followed, as Tenya hadn't actually noted what he understood.

"So... Why'd you come here, Iida-kun?" Manual asked cheerfully, handing Tenya a large paper cup full of water. A strained smile was on his face, but it was quickly smoothed out into a pleasant grin.

"Sir?" Tenya replied tentatively, putting his briefcase on the office table and taking the cup.

"After all, your Quirk would be much better suited to Racer Hero Nitro - I bet he'd give your legs a run for their money!" Manual chuckled at his own pun. He paused, seemingly waiting for an answer. When none came, he continued. "However..."

Suddenly, the cup of water exploded, and Tenya's hand was covered in the liquid, which quickly solidified into a gelatinous cube that slammed Tenya's hand onto the table. Despite Tenya's fevered attempts, he couldn't get his hand off of the table or out of the water.

"...If it turns out that you only came to my agency based on unsubstantiated rumors..." Tenya heard Manual continue, and Tenya slowly turned his head to see Manual's normally-friendly smile morphed into one of malicious intent.

The pressure in the room grew to oppressive levels. Tenya's ears began to ring from the sheer silence and the imminent threat of Manual, of all Heroes. Suddenly, Manual broke into an easy grin, and the water imprisoning Tenya's hand receded and flowed into a ball hovering over Manual's left shoulder.

"Relax, Iida-kun!" Manual assured him, "I would never bring harm to an intern of mine! I trust you chose to come to my agency for a perfectly good, legitimate reason! In that case, let's make the most of our time together!"

Tenya began to have serious doubts about his vengeance, but he shook off those concerns.

He had promised himself, after a-

"By the way," Manual interrupted his train of thought, "I was actually being pretty serious. You better not have come to my agency based on Internet rumors of Stain being active in Hoth, or else I'd have to arrest you for vigilantism."

Tenya nodded. Perhaps… revenge could wait.

Shouto stared at the man across from him.

"Hello, Shouto," Endeavor greeted him.

"Hello, Endeavor," Shouto returned the greeting.

Neither said anything else.

Endeavor opened his mouth.

"I want to make it clear," Shouto interrupted Endeavor, before he could say anything, "That as long as I am here, I want you to treat me as one of your interns. I do not want you to treat me as your son."

Endeavor, for what it was worth, didn't get immediately angry. Rather, he just seemed confused. "What? Why, Shouto? If I'm going to train you to beat All Might-"

"You've done a bang-up job of that so far, I think," Shouto muttered.

"-Then I'm going to have to make sure you get extra favoritism." Endeavor finished, as if Shouto hadn't spoken. "And while I haven't forgiven your little stunt from the Sports Festival, you've still made progress in using your left side."

"So, you chose me based on egoism and nepotism." Shouto stated.

"Watch your tongue." Endeavor's eye twitched. "Don't forget, you still chose to come here. And for good reason, too - I know for a fact that that fool Faust extended at least two invitations to UA, one of them to you. Yet, you knew that the best tutor to help your flames overcome the elements was your old man."

Shouto grit his teeth a little. Loathe as he was to admit it, that was exactly why he had gone with Endeavor - Yoarashi, as nice as he was, was a wake-up call to the fact that his Quirk wasn't totally invincible. He had weaknesses that sheer firepower - or, rather, icepower - wouldn't account for.

"Even so," Shouto managed, "I still expect you to treat this as a business relationship. We are in public, after all." Shouto let the implications hang in the air.

Yet, as Endeavor shook Shouto's hand, he wasn't sure if his progenitor had even the slightest care as to what those implications were.

"So," Native began, putting a mug of water into a microwave, "You chose the Native Hero Agency for a reason, right?"

"S-Sir?" Izuku asked.

"Yeah, I'm not a very popular hero," Native shrugged, leaning against the counter and crossing his arms, "Don't blame 'em, honestly. I made this costume when I was fifteen and stupid and now no one can tell it's me without it. Did you know I once showed up to my own charity ball out-of-costume and no one realized it was me? It's like those really old comic books from like, a couple hundred years ago where that dude put on his glasses and no one realized it was his alter-ego. Can you imagine having an alter-ego nowadays? What a life. I'm off-topic." The microwave dinged, and Native gingerly took the hot mug out and struggled to open the wrapper for a tea bag. "It's a green tea, so it needs to steep for four minutes…" He muttered to himself as he finally got the tea out and steeped the tea bag. "Anyways, I knew scouting you'd be a stretch, because despite what the public thinks, I know that your Quirk way outweighs public image concerns. For all I knew, Snatch or Endeavor was gonna get you, or maybe one of the Pussycats… What was her name… Calico? No, no… Scottish Fold?"

Izuku racked his brain for whoever Native could possibly be talking about. "D-Do you mean Pixie-Bob?"

"Pixie-Bob, that's it, thanks, kid." Native snapped his fingers. "Anyways, my point being, I'm not a very good Hero, combat-wise, so what made you come to me?"

"You're a great Hero!" Izuku immediately defended Native, "You raise so much charity for the Ainu community, and your Quirk is so strong and multi-faceted, and you station yourself in Hoth, and-"

"Oh, for-" Native sighed, "Did you choose me just because Stain was rumored to be in Hoth?"

Izuku fell silent.

"That's it, isn't it?" Native dragged a hand down his face, "Kid, you're not going to take down Stain. I have no doubts you're powerful, but Stain's killed people far more experienced and stronger than you. If the medics hadn't arrived when they did, Ingenium would've been worse than retired. Whoever's taking him out, it's certainly not going to be you."

"I…" Izuku gulped. "I wasn't expecting to."

"Expecting? So you want to die?"

"A little," Izuku mumbled, before speaking up, "N-No, I just… It's personal."

"Dying's kinda personal."

"I'm not going to fight Stain!" Izuku protested, "I'm trying to keep someone else from fighting Stain!"

Native stared at Izuku. Izuku began to turn red as he registered that he just yelled at a Hero, but that wasn't important as it was, because Izuku was now in rambling mode.

"I- My friend might be connected to one of the victims," Izuku explained shakily, "And- And if I can- Can stick around, keep watch on him while I train, then- Then maybe I can convince him not to go through with it, and… I don't want him to die. Dying's terrible, and it hurts, and- and he's not immortal. He's supposed to be the responsible one, so- so why-"

"Shh…" A gentle breeze that smelled weirdly like maple wafted over Izuku, and he became aware of Native's hands on his shoulders. "Hey, calm down, kid. Take deep breaths. C'mon, in…" Native breathed in, and Izuku followed suit. "Now out." They exhaled in unison. "Okay, feel better?"

"Kinda…"

"Good enough. Look, I'm sorry for accusing you of wanting to kill yourself. You obviously have some hangups on that front, so I'm not gonna press you any further. Look, if we see your friend on tomorrow's patrol, we can team up with whoever he's interning with." Native patiently explained. "That sound good?"

"Yeah… Yeah, it does."

"Good. My tea's cold, so before I make another one, how about a little exercise to get your mind off of things?"

"Exercise?"

Katsuki flew back, pain blossoming in his chest.

"Again!" Rabbit Hero: Miruko wildly grinned, sweat rolling down her arms as she licked her lips. Her eyes were wide with adrenaline; Katsuki could only imagine the rush she was feeling.

Katsuki, damn him, felt the same.

"Rrrraaaaagh!" Katsuki screamed, wildly swinging at Miruko with his right fist. Miruko's grin grew toothy as she blocked with her left forearm.

"Predictable beyond belief, kid!" Miruko announced. She gave a quick upper to Katsuki's plexus, winding him and giving Miruko the opening she needed to throw Katsuki in a sort of left-handed shoulder wheel onto the yoga mats she had set up haphazardly on the floor of her apartment. "Whew… Take five, kid." Miruko huffed over Katsuki's gasping breaths. She walked over to her kitchenette to root around for something.

Katsuki sat up and slowly caught his breath. When he had arrived to Miruko's "agency", he had expected annoying pleasantries, fawning over his Quirk - like almost every Pro Hero he had ever met (Granted, before UA, he had only met Deatharms and Backdraft, and every Hero after that had been his teachers, who were obligated to like him, but still). Miruko had done none of that, instead instantly challenging him to a no-Quirks sparring match to ascertain where his hand-to-hand skills were. It made sense, considering her Quirk was a Mutant-type that gave her rabbit powers, like Asui and frogs, so she'd be more reliant on physical skills.

That was ten minutes ago. Miruko was explicitly holding back by not using her extremely chiseled legs, but it turned out that she was just as skilled in the "boxing" aspect of kickboxing as she was the "kicking" part, not to mention a surprising ability in judo and karate. It was really no wonder she was the Number 8 Hero.

Well, that, and apparently she was popular for her "no regrets" personality. Whatever the fuck that meant.

A water bottle was thrust into Katsuki's face, and Katsuki looked up to see Miruko offering it, a dish towel soaked in sweat draped over her arm and a water bottle in her other hand.

"Drink up, kid," Miruko said, "Then we can actually get to know each other."

Katsuki took the water, then frowned as he looked at the label featuring, of all Heroes, Laundry Hero: Wash. "Hey," He rasped out, "Is this shit like, actually safe to drink?"

Miruko paused in her drinking of her own water.

"The- The label. It has fucking Wash on it."

Miruko blinked and looked at her own bottle. "...Huh," She remarked, "Never noticed that." She stared at bit at Wash's smiling(?) face, before shrugging. "Well, I've been drinking this shit for like, three months, and I haven't died yet, so I'd say it's good." She went right back to drinking.

Katsuki grimaced, then decided that he was too dehydrated to care and uncapped his water to take a sip. It was definitely water.

"So, let's talk about what you want to get out of this," Miruko said after a brief second, "'Cause I sure as hell don't know where to start."

Rage, hot and familiar, welled up in Katsuki. "You're the one who fucking asked for me!" He shouted.

"Yeah, and I don't know the first thing about interns and shit!" Miruko shot back, "I work alone unless I have to team up, I don't know the first thing about actually taking care of someone!"

"Then why'd you fucking send me an offer?!" Bakugou demanded.

"'Cause I see a lotta me in you!" Miruko sighed exasperatedly, "You don't care what others think about you, you take life by the horns, you push yourself above and beyond to take people out! The only thing I can think of that you should improve on is that you lose your fucking temper way too easily!"

Katsuki stopped at that. He sipped his water. "I-" He began, "Yeah, that last bit's true."

"I was exactly like you when I was your age, kid," Miruko squatted down to look Katsuki in the eye, who hadn't gotten up from his seated position, "Then again, I'm only ten years older than you, so I'm still pretty much like you. The difference between us is that I keep a good handle on my emotions towards allies while I channel my energy towards Villains. I saw you screaming at that Support kid and yelling at your Cavalry Battle teammates. I didn't go to UA - I was in Seiai and hated every second of it - so I don't know what the fuck they teach you at that school, but you'd do well in learning how to control yourself. God knows I needed it when I made it big."

Katsuki wanted to blow up. He wanted to scream, curse, yell. But he knew that Miruko was right. Heroes didn't always work alone - All Might himself had sidekicks, like Sir Nighteye.

And Katsuki's temper had-

"So! I'm going to teach you how to channel your anger into destroying things productively." Miruko grinned as she ran over to the futon pushed against the wall and put on the ragged sweatpants draped along the side.

Katsuki blinked as he stood up.

"Before my patr- our patrol starts," Miruko explained, not waiting for Katsuki to ask what she was doing, "I'm taking you to a wreck room."

"Alright, kid, exercise," Native announced, stopping in the middle of what appeared to be a small gym, "We use this area primarily for workouts, but I'm going to have you do something a little different."

"Different?" Izuku wondered out loud. He had put on his Hero Costume in preparation for Native's vaguely-defined "exercise", and while there had been no real changes to the costume itself, he had found a note from Hatsume Mei that new gear was already in development, and that he should come into the Support Department when they were ready. She gave no indication how she was going to contact him, which was mildly worrisome.

"Yeah. We're gonna play keepaway." Native explained. A small breeze picked up in the room, despite the windows being closed. "Here's how you play."

Suddenly, a swift wind knocked into Izuku, launching him into a padded wall. Izuku peeled himself off the wall, just in time to avoid a small lightning bolt.

"I keep you away from me," Native smirked, winds swirling around his feet, "Using my Quirk, Forecast."

Izuku recognized Forecast - from the very few videos he had seen of Native fighting, the Half-Ainu Hero's Quirk was surprisingly versatile for how seemingly weak it was in comparison to Quirks like All Might's Superpower (which could change the weather just by punching) or Endeavor's Hellfire (which did the same thing via excessive heat). Forecast could manipulate the weather, more or less, though it seemed to drain Native physically to use it. According to an old interview, Native had stated that using his signature special moves were difficult to do on a regular basis due to the strain they put on his body, but since that interview was at least six years old, Izuku didn't know how much that held up.

"Geez, you mumble a lot, huh?" Native noted, snapping Izuku back to the exercise. "Well, whatever. The game ends when you tag me, okay? I'd say start, but…" He shrugged, his fur cape moving with his shoulders as well as the swirling wind.

I need to either drag this out or end this quickly, Izuku thought, warily watching the Pro Hero, If Forecast still drains Native to use it, I can easily outpace him by forcing him to make as many moves as possible. However, that runs the risk of my being defeated before I can get in. However, if I rush him, there's a greater chance he'll bust out a super move. But if he does, he'll get drained quicker, so…

"Kid, you don't seem to know how to play," Native tilted his head, winds dying down slightly, "Do you even want to be here? I can recommend you to someone else, like Pixie-Bob-"

"No, no, I have to be here," Izuku protested, "Just… Planning, is all."

"Hm…" Native frowned, "Then consider this your first lesson."

A piece of ice fell to the ground. Izuku stared at the hailstone.

"Planning during a fight only works if you're moving." Native announced, having created a small cloud over Izuku. Suddenly, it burst, hailstones falling at breakneck speeds. Izuku dove out of the way, only to be met by a small lightning bolt, shocking him.

"Oh shit, sorry, that wasn't meant to hit you," Native immediately apologized, "You still good?"

Izuku got up, static arcing off of him. "Yeah… I can still move."

"Alright..." Native seemed unsure. "You know you can use your Quirk here, right?"

Izuku knew that. However, Izuku wasn't sure which abilities of his Quirk would be useful and not immediately give him up. They were indoors, so Self-Destruct was out. Kinetic could work if he was able to pass it off as air manipulation or earth manipulation, but not both at the same time. Speed wasn't useful in an indoor setting, Water Jet could be easily redirected by wind, and everything else…

Everything else…

"Well, maybe I'm going too easy on you…" Native wondered, as a fogbank slowly began to roll in. "Maybe what it is is that you won't take this seriously if I don't. Kids are weird like that, huh…" Slowly, Native became indistinguishable from his surroundings. "So, here's a move that you'll have to use your Quirk against: Rime of Irura."

Rime of Irura. A special attack that created frost by rapidly freezing fog. It was a move intended for instant capture, used to great effect against Kirigami, who was made out of some sort of paper-like material. Izuku knew all this, and if it weren't for the hoarfrost creeping up his arms at that moment, he'd be ecstatic to see it in person. As it was, however, Izuku had to put aside his fanboy tendencies to focus on not being frozen solid. It was like the Sports Festival all over-

The Sports Festival.

Izuku slowly turned up the temperature around him.

After dying at Todoroki's hands (a fact that he had gotten distressingly used to), he had gained the ability to manipulate temperature - to what extent, he wasn't aware of, but he knew he was able to not only cool things down, but heat them up as well. Slowly, but surely, the frost growing on his costume began to melt away, and the fog around Izuku began to evaporate as well.

"See?" Native gave an easy, if a little tired, grin. "Don't just hold back."

Izuku cut off the temperature control and sped towards Native, who created a swift updraft to send Izuku flying up.

"Up-up-up, not that easy," Native taunted Izuku, "If you're gonna-"

Izuku flipped in midair and, using Kinetic, kicked off of the ceiling like a bullet.

"-Oh shit." Native swore as Izuku slammed into him head-first, sending the two crashing onto the floor.

Izuku's hair regained its soft curls as he de-hardened. "A-Are you okay, Native?!" He shouted, jumping up.

"I-I'm fine," Native coughed, "You're just - You're really strong for a first year. Jeez, what does UA teach their kids…" Native slowly sat up. "Well, that's enough exercise, I think."

"Native, I'm so sorry-"

"I'm fine, kid; I take those kinds of falls all the time." Native easily grinned. "Besides, it's our day off - I'm supposed to be resting anyways. You got a lot of tricks up your sleeve - though, I'm not sure why you're so reluctant to use them. You should also work on your mumbling thing - if the enemy manages to figure out what you're planning, you're toast. All in all, you're pretty good already, but there are some… Psychological blocks you have, kinda. I'm not surprised you beat me, considering I was still holding back, but you were also holding back, so I'm not sure how to feel, honestly."

"Okay, but…" Izuku tried.

"No buts, kid." Native shook his head. "You're now an intern at the Native Hero Agency. Or, well. Technically, this is a work-study, since you don't have your Provisional yet, but we in the business just call you guys interns just for shorthand."

Despite how Native probably meant for that to come across as, Izuku could only feel a sense of apprehension about the upcoming week in Hoth.