In His Element(s) || avatar / bnha

An Internal War

Like a good majority of times in his life, Izuku had no idea what the fuck was going on.

His heartbeat thundered in his ears. He peeked around the corner of the collapsed wall he was hiding behind, trying to catch his breath. The monster was lumbering around about fifteen meters away, seemingly unaware of his presence. He could see the ripped pink fabric of Uraraka's suit and the tail end of Shinsou's capture scarf behind it in the far building collapse. Both her and Shinsou had been standing there when that thing had burst forth from the ground like some sort of unholy behemoth. Rubble littered that area now, his friends prone and silent. At least by some stroke of extraordinary luck, there hadn't been any exam volunteers in this section of the arena.

Izuku glanced down at the torn fabric of his hero costume before gingerly letting go of his arm. The bleeding had slowed a little, and from the amount of it he probably hadn't hit anything vital. Iida, on the other hand...

Izuku turned back to his other friend, kneeling beside him once more and making sure his head was supported against something . He had dragged him as far away from the carnage that was formerly their survey area as he could. Iida's helmet was missing, as well as his glasses. Blood seeped from the gory spider web torn into the side of his still face, deep bruising shadowing the opposite cheek. It was likely that his helmet had saved his life when the monster hit. The blow might have crushed his skull otherwise.

Yeah, Izuku wasn't going to be making any safety gear jokes anytime soon.

At least he was still breathing. He didn't know if he could say the same for Shinsou and Uraraka yet and that terrified him.

There was a roar behind him. He whirled around, just in time to see the monster charging in his direction. It had found him.

Izuku braced himself, powering up Full Cowl.

"Midoriya!"

Aang dropped from the sky in a flash of orange and silver. Izuku only caught a split-second glance of bat-like wings folding into his staff before Aang had twirled it midair, the spinning end whipping up an enormous gust of wind that bowled the monster off its path and onto its side.

The monk's feet touched down beside him without a sound. Aang nodded to him, looking worried.

"Are you ok?"

"I'm fine," Izuku said automatically, covering the gash in his arm with one hand. "Just a scratch. Wait." He did a double take as his brain caught up with him. "What are you doing here?!"

The monster got back to its feet with a discordant howl.

"I think you need all the help you can get," Aang said grimly, gripping his staff tighter. "Is anyone else hurt?"

Izuku grimaced.

"Iida's unconscious behind us. Shinsou and Uraraka are over there," he said, pointing. Aang followed his gaze, lips thinning as he did so.

"We need to get them out of there. Look." He pointed as well. "That beam is going to fall any second."

Izuku swore internally as he saw Aang was right.

"Incoming!"

The pair of them sprang out of the way of the enormous, gnarled hand (paw?) that had attempted to squash them both into paste. Izuku darted for the other side, hoping it would follow him and not go for Iida, helpless to defend himself. Aang took the vertical path, soaring above the monstrosity and landing three wind strikes on its knobbly back on the way back down.

Aang spun on his toes, narrow-eyed and determined as the monster lunged for him, attention caught.

Fwoom.