A Silent Kind of Strength

Chapter 51

Izuku gave Hitoshi and Kaminari one last hug before he darted off to meet his train, following Iida to the line heading for Hosu. "I-iida-kun! Wait up!"

The tall, broad shouldered, teen paused, looking back to see who made the request. Midoriya caught up and looked up at him with a shy smile. "I- uhm. I thought that si-since we were heading i-in the same direction m-maybe we could ride together?"

"Of course Midoriya-kun." Came the stiff response, before Iida spun back towards their train and walked off stiffly. The shorter boy hurried to keep up, chatting nervously at his new classmate.

They managed to find a bench on the bullet train, sitting across from a businessman and a pregnant woman who were dutifully ignoring each other as they shared their own bench. The boys settled their duffle and suitcase in the overhead rack, but kept the cases with their costumes with them, settling them on the ground between their feet protectively.

The hour ride was filled with Izuku's nervous rambling. His travel companion's broody silence only served to make his anxiety worse and thus his rambling more obnoxious. He sweated from the tension, his past encounters with the other boy had given the impression of a loud but nice boy, who respected rules. But maybe he had gotten the wrong idea about Iida.

Or maybe the speedster was just in a bad mood?

Eventually though they made it to Izuku's stop and the small teen made his retreat with a polite goodbye. As the train pulled off to head deeper into the city, freckled hands dug a cracked phone from the battered yellow backpack Izuku had slung over the opposite shoulder from his duffle bag. He pulled up a map with the location of his destination that he had pinned the night before. With an excited grin he hurried off to meet up with Power Loader.

The pro hero agency was about a ten minute walk from the train station. When he found the building he looked up at the modern facade in curiosity. It was done up with lots of glass, all tinted so that no one could see in. He bet the inside got a lot of nice lighting during the day though. In between the large panes the metal framing glinted a metallic yellow, showing Power Loader's color preference. The freckled boy grinned before hurrying towards the large double doors.

They opened into a simple lobby, everything was concrete, the floor, the pillars to the vaulted ceiling, the front desk, and the benches in the waiting area. Though all of the seating had comfortable looking cushions in black and yellow. And what wasn't concrete was the same metallic yellow. It looked industrial but tasteful. Like the person who owned the building had money, but knew better than to spend it on prissy decorations. Down to earth in a way that Izuku knew Power Loader prefered.

He scampered up to the front desk, standing nervously for a moment as he waited for the receptionist to look up from his computer screen. The young man seemed to be wearing some sort of mechanic's uniform in a dark grey, his purple black hair pulled into a high bun to keep it out of the way. When he seemed to sense Izuku's presence he looked up sharply, seeming a bit startled. "Sorry! I was in the zone! These calculations won't finish themselves after all!" He chuckles brightly, solid silver eyes reflecting an image of the room. "How can I help you today?"

Izuku tamped down on the urge to ask about his obvious quirk mutation, smiling shyly as he replied. "H-hi, I'm h-here for an in-intership? M-my name is Mi-Midoriya Izuku, hero name Doryoku." This piqued the receptionist's interest. "Oh! You're one of the students PL kept talking about! Nice! I'm Kagami Yu, an apprentice mechanic here at Power Corp.!"