Rejected Stones

A Test of Mercy

Beta'd by kylekatarn77 and Poliamida

38. A Test of Mercy

When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, "Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.

-Fred Rogers

"So, you thought cheating on the License Exam would be a good idea?" Mr. Aizawa demanded as he strode up to them.

Izuku swallowed, stepping forward. "It's my fault, sir. Mei just...wanted to help. I had Yaoyorozu make the radios like she did in Kamino and the Training Camp, and well, Mei just sort of started coordinating us like she did then, too."

"It wasn't cheating, anyone can make a radio," Mei grumbled. "You can even just buy them at the store!"

"Hey, don't take the blame for this, Midoriya," Todoroki said, stepping forward as well. "Any of us could have shut it down or taken our radios out, but we didn't."

"Didn't seem right to," Kirashima said, looking down at his battered hands. His knuckles were sunken and bleeding; even with his quirk he'd taken and given quite the pounding. "Hatsume's part of the class, we-"

"I keep telling everyone to call me Mei! Hari's right there! How am I supposed to know who you're talking to?! She's Hari, and I'm Mei, how hard is it?!"

"I don't mind if she doesn't," Hari said with a shrug. "But maybe we have more important things to worry about, Mei?"

"It was on all of us, sir," Iida said, hanging his head. "I'm sorry we let you down."

"Oh don't worry, you didn't," Aizawa said, suddenly grinning. "That was perhaps the most impressive display I've ever seen. Do you realize they originally suspended the test because not enough people were going to pass?"

"What!?" the class looked up in shock.

"But, I mean, we only got like a 1000 points or something right?" Kaminari said, sounding puzzled. "Did they just put out exactly the right number of points?"

"You may have only collected 1167 points, but you also put down so many testees that are going to require medical attention that they weren't going to have enough left over to pass," Aizawa explained. "They only realized Mei was feeding you information when she hopped onto their radio line and started explaining to them how flawed their process was, and when someone noticed that Hari's camera still had the lense cap on."

"Crap," Hari muttered. "I knew I had forgotten something."

"Their design is seriously flawed," Mei ranted. "Look at how many people got hurt! If you want to make people heroes you can't go around having them beat up each other, you should only beat up bad guys! And for people like Izuku who rely on power and equipment, there's no way to refit and refuel during the test! I explained to them I have a system for refueling Izuku mid-fight if he needs it but-"

"You do?" Izuku asked, surprised.

"Well, I will, I came up with the idea just now but it will be very easy to implement, along with the surveillance drones," Mei said with a dismissive wave of her hand.

"Who cares how it happened," Bakugo said, not even bothering to open his eyes from where he was sprawled on the seats. Uraraka was next to him, snoring softly.

Izuku felt like laying down and joining them; he was utterly exhausted from his exertions during the test and his arm stump ached horribly. He really wasn't fully recovered yet.

"Whatever happened, they caught us, so we failed. Big whoop. We're gonna get expelled or something now?" Bakugo demanded, opening one bloodshot eye. "I figure we can all just go vigilante. Too much paperwork to be a regular hero anyway."