There's a song up there you can listen to while reading! It's called Lemon by Kenshi Yonezu! Here's a link to my discord: https://discord.gg/B8YnWU4

Hitoshi stepped onto the concrete arena and stood opposite of the nervous Midoriya Izuku. When he had found out that that boy was in the Hero Course despite being mute, he couldn't help but feel proud, but also slightly angered. Midoriya was the first person to have ever treated him so kindly in a long while and Hitoshi was glad that he met him. Even though they barely knew each other, the purple haired boy considered him a friend.

Back during the Calvary Battle, Hitoshi had given Midoriya the details of his quirk and despite that, the quiet boy didn't judge his quirk to be a villainous quirk. Hitoshi was grateful.

Since Midoriya knew the aspects of his quirk, he also knew that it would never affect him. Midoriya was mute after all and he couldn't speak in order to activate the power. In their situation, Hitoshi was as good as quirkless.

Midoriya stared at him determinedly even though he was shaking slightly from nerves. When they were called to start, both of them didn't move.

(Up in the commentator's box, Aizawa looked down at the two first years through his bandages.

"What a poor matchup," he muttered.

"Oh? And why is that my friend?" Present Mic asked. His voice boomed into the mic and their conversation echoed around the stadium.

"Shinsou Hitoshi. His quirk, Brainwashing, allows him to control his opponent's actions after they verbally respond to him. It's a useful quirk to have on our side of the playing field, but it's in situations like these where it becomes useless. Midoriya Izuku is a mute. He doesn't speak. Therefore, he wouldn't be able to respond and Shinsou's quirk would have no affect on him." Aizawa leaned into the table as his eyes narrowed thoughtfully.

"I wonder how this'll play out...")

Hitoshi sighed, his shoulders drooping. "No matter how you look at it, I can't beat you. You have a powerful quirk, probably, since you managed to get into the Hero Course. My quirk, however, will have no affect on you since you can't speak to activate it. Ah— no offense. I should just forfeit."

Midoriya shook his head rapidly. 'Even if your quirk won't work on me, I don't want you to give up! I want to fight you, Shinsou-san! I want to fight you fairly and as an equal, so that means if you're fighting quirkless—' Hitoshi didn't miss the slight flinch at that word, '—then I'll fight quirkless too!'

"What do you mean?" Hitoshi asked.

'It means that I'm not going to use my quirk too!' At Hitoshi's hard look, he corrected himself. 'I'm not looking down on you, I swear! I'm going to give it my all and I hope you do too!'

With that, Midoriya charged. Hitoshi took a step back as the smaller boy aimed a fist to his gut. Sidestepping, he barely dodged before Midoriya sent an uppercut to his chin. Hitoshi bit his tongue and stumbled back as he began to bleed. Midoriya stared at him with wide eyes, watching the blood seep through his lips.

'I'm sorry!' He signed frantically. 'Are you okay?!'

In his opponent's moment of hesitance, Hitoshi quickly punched Midoriya in the face. The greenette in question held his right cheek that was slowly growing into a bright red. Hitoshi smirked. Midoriya smirked back.

They ran at each other and met in the middle. There was a flurry of flying limbs as they both moved around the arena and pulled punches at each other. Neither of them had experience in hand-to-hand combat, so they both were just going off of instinct.

Midoriya feigned a punch at Hitoshi's face before lifting his leg to kick him in the gut instead. Hitoshi dodged quickly, adrenaline pumping through his veins, and he kicked Midoriya's leg that was still planted on the ground. Midoriya fell on his side but spun around and hopped back up like a rabbit. He lunged at Hitoshi as he made to grab his hair in a downward swipe. Hitoshi stepped back, however, and Midoriya's nail scratched through his brow, leaving a small cut. Midoriya then took his elbow and jabbed Hitoshi in the side, making the purple haired boy splutter.

Hitoshi didn't falter, though, as he grabbed Midoriya by his green hairs and slammed his head into his knee twice before letting go. Midoriya flew back with a sharp intake of breath as blood poured from his nose and a cut on his lip.

While he was distracted with the pain, Hitoshi took the chance to push Midoriya towards the edge of the ring in hopes of winning without any more violence. If one of them touched the ground outside of the marked area, then they'd be counted out and their opponent would win. The other way to win would be to knock their opponent out or make them incapable of fighting anymore.

At the hard shove to his chest and his clumsy stumble backwards, Midoriya's head whipped up as he saw Hitoshi running at him with the intent to force him out of the ring. His eyes widened as desperation filled up every corner of his face. As Hitoshi got closer, his brows then furrowed and his body moved on its own, grabbing Hitoshi by the arm and flipping him over his shoulder.

Hitoshi could only register the pounding pain in his back after that. His breath came out in short huffs as the sounds of his heart beat loudly and quickly in his ears. A moment after that stilled silence, the stadium erupted into cheers. Hitoshi turned his head (that was gradually developing a massive headache) to see that he was out of bounds.

He let out a sigh and made to get up. Midoriya stepped towards him and offered his hand to help him. Hitoshi stared at it for a while before finally grabbing the outstretched hand. The cheers grew louder at the show of sportsmanship as Hitoshi made it to his feet.

Midoriya signed a small, 'That was great!', and gave him a grin, bloody teeth and all. Hitoshi winced.

"Sorry about... that.." He said, gesturing to his face.

Midoriya wiped some blood from his chin before he pointed to Hitoshi's face and mouthed 'me too'.

Hitoshi laughed and felt light on his feet. Despite being in a roughed up state, he felt warm all over. He may have lost the fight and his chance to get into the Hero Course and prove that he wasn't a villain, but at the end of the day, he received something he never even asked for in the first place.

A true friend.

———

"Slamming his head into your knee! What are we, ruffians?! Never do that again!" Recovery Girl shouted, scolding Shinsou on the cot beside him.

"Uh, y-yes ma'am," Shinsou said.

Recovery Girl put a bandage over the scratch on Shinsou's eyebrow and turned to her desk, muttering no-goods about the school and their decisions to hurt their students so much.

Shinsou turned to Izuku and signed a wary, 'Is she always like this?'

Izuku nodded in response.

"Alright, then— you're free to go back to your classmates now. Midoriya, stay so I can heal you up next," Recovery Girl said as she moved toward him.

Shinsou got up and headed for the door. He turned and looked at Izuku.

"See you, Midoriya," he nodded.

Izuku waved and watched him open the door.

Suddenly, Toshinori was there in his original form, his hand in midair as though he was just about to grab the door knob. Shinsou stared at him for a moment and Izuku broke out into a cold sweat, fearing that Shinsou would figure out that the man in front of him was actually All Might.

He let out a sigh of relief when Shinsou shrugged and walked away towards the stands.

Toshinori nodded at Recovery Girl as she started to heal him up.

"That was an amazing fight, my boy! You and Young Shinsou were simply incredible!" He praised.

Izuku flushed a bit. 'I think I need some work on hand-to-hand combat. I've never really thought about it until now, but most heroes and villains rely on their quirks to fight. If someone like Aizawa-sensei came and they couldn't use their quirks, they'd be defenseless without some sort of knowledge in hand-to-hand combat. If I learned hand-to-hand combat, I wouldn't have to strain myself or put myself at risk using One For All.'

Toshinori grinned. "That's a great idea, Young Izuku!" Izuku blushed again. "I suggest talking to Aizawa about that, too. He excels in that area and I'm sure he'd love to help."

Izuku nodded, making a mental reminder to do that sometime. 'Alright! Thank you!'