Running Solo

Chapter 30 - Itamie Nashio

-Uraraka's Perspective-

To win, the heroes had to either capture the villains or touch the fake bomb. The villains had to either capture the heroes, or keep them from touching the fake bomb for thirty minutes. With the objectives set and the rules explained, it was time to start the battle trials.

The first match was pretty intense with Kaminari and Kirishima as the villains and Aoyama and Shinso as the heroes. Aoyama and Shinso just barely won with Shinso doing most of the work with his quirk, though he did a good job of disguising what his activation requirements were. Sometimes he snapped and sometimes he just moved his hands. I could only guess that it had something to do with his hands. Aoyama did get some minor injuries from his time as a distraction and Kaminari made himself vulnerable by over-using his quirk.

The second match saw Souro and Asui as the heroes vs Sato and Sero as the villains. While both teams did really well at working together, Souro and Asui excelled at strategizing. Souro also had some sort of fire quirk that seemed really powerful. From what I could tell, he probably got the heat for his fire from the spice of the peppers and hot sauce he occasionally consumed throughout the course of their battle trial. Although unusual, I'd certainly heard of stranger quirks. In the end, Souro and Asui took the win.

Next up was Ashido and Shoji as the villains vs Hagakure and Bakugo as the heroes. It was a long fight. Bakugo didn't seem very good at working with others, though he did at least try. Ashido and Shoji worked together really well, placing traps and constantly moving the bomb when Shoji heard the heroes getting close. In the end, Bakugo and Hagakure won when Bakugo cornered Ashido and Shoji on the top floor a few doors away from the bomb and held them back while Hagakure snuck into the room with the bomb and touched it, earning them the win. Bakugo looked upset that they didn't win by taking out their opponents, but he surprisingly kept to himself and simply fumed in the corner for the rest of the battle trials.

Yaomomo and I were up next against Tokoyami and Iida. Yaomomo and I were the villains and Tokoyami and Iida were the heroes. Yaomomo - or Momo as she'd requested I call her - and I used a bunch of traps made from a combination of our quirks. We strategically placed the bomb and had a bunch of back-up plans prepared. We wanted to avoid direct combat, so our plan was to keep them busy until the time ran out. Our plan worked until the last five minutes. Iida had been sufficiently distracted, but Tokoyami had stumbled across us. We struggled for another three minutes to keep him and Dark Shadow at bay when I noticed Dark shadow avoiding the light flooding in from the few windows in our corner room. I was quick to point it out to Momo and she and I took advantage of it with a high-powered flashlight. Iida arrived in the room just as the buzzer went off.

After us was Ojiro and Fai-chan as the heroes vs Todoroki and Koda as the villains. Out of all the previous battles, theirs was definitely the most intense as well as the most captivating and unbelievable. Todoroki had Koda stay back as he froze the entire building, except the room they and the bomb were in. I watched as Fai only grinned in response and talked to Ojiro who smiled and nodded. Then the two of them separated and walked around the outside of the building. It took less than five minutes for Ojiro to stop and talk into his earpiece. Fai stopped, talked into hers, and then quickly made her way to where Ojiro waited. Once there, they talked for another five minutes before Fai stepped away and began to shift. It happened too fast to process. One moment Fai stood a few feet away from Ojiro, the next there was a large brown and black owl. The owl was obviously Fai, as no regular owl would be tall enough to reach up to Ojiro's waist like this one did. The tailed boy stood in slack-jawed shock for a few minutes before the owl let out a chirp and spread its colossal wings.

Ojiro pulled himself together and spread his arms to the side, his tail wrapping around his waist. The giant brown and black owl beat its wings down to lift itself off the ground. Then it gently wrapped its talons around the blond boy's outstretched arms and slowly rose into the sky. I couldn't help but wonder why Fai went with an owl. There were stronger birds. I didn't have too much time to consider as Fai reared her talons back and tossed Ojiro through one of the open windows. Before diving in herself. The whole class was quick to whip their attention to the screen showing Todoroki and Koda. We all watched as Ojiro came diving through the window and directly into a roll. He smoothly rolled onto his feet, his tail unravelling from around his waist and held up ready alongside his fisted hands. Todoroki and Koda didn't get much time to react before a still large, but shrinking, owl dove in as well. A blink and then Fai stood beside Ojiro, clawed hands up and ready to fight. Ojiro looked to Fai who nodded to the boy with an almost feral sharp-toothed smile. He returned the smile, though his was much more tame and gentle.