Zero - A Vigilante Deku Story

Chapter 25 - Your pulse under my fingertips.

Thank you so much for your support for me and my fic and all those loving comments. Reading them makes my day everytime. <3

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POV Zero?

He was excited. His classmates kept glancing at him, which definitely made Zero nervous. Fortunately, they followed Shouta's instructions and left him in peace. The class representative also seemed quite nice.

And then there was... Kacchan.

Zero could literally feel the glances from those fiery eyes on his skin, as if they were slowly scorching him. They hadn't felt hostile, but curious and filled with suppressed desires.

Kacchan's apology kept running through his mind. His tone had been sincere. Zero wanted to believe he meant it. Was he naive? He could remember the pain which the rejection of his former best friend had caused. Zero didn't want to have to go through those feelings again. Today had already shaken him up emotionally like rarely before. Perhaps it would be better not to make any far-reaching decisions for his future, but to wait and see what the next few days would bring.

Shouta clapped his hands. "Come here, let's get started."

Zero was grateful for the rest of their teacher's lesson plan. In battle, he could forget what was bothering him and just let go. He just had to be careful not to cause any permanent damage to his opponent. He could do that without too much trouble.

"I'll call you in pairs. A match lasts five minutes. The winner goes through to the next round and so on. So we'll have a little tournament. Ashido, Uraraka, you go first."

Two girls went to the mats, one of them Zero recognized. It was the pink-haired girl Denki was friends with, and considering he had already seen her with Kacchan several times today, the two were obviously friends as well.

The other girl looked quite inconspicuous, but Zero knew how deceptive appearances could be. He was glad that Shouta had advised him to take one of his notebooks with him. That way he could take notes on the abilities of his new classmates.

Zero sat down against the wall of the gymnasium. From here he would have a good view of the mats. The two girls lined up opposite each other. Toshi sat down next to him, which Zero was really grateful for. He needed something, or rather someone familiar, to calm him down a little after this grueling morning.

"How are you?" Toshi asked.

"Fine."

"Is it true what Bakugou says? Do you know each other?"

He sighed. Toshi didn't know what he had already been through today. Of course he was curious. After all, he kept emphasizing they were both about to become brothers. So it was normal to worry about each other, right?

"It seems that way. I can hardly remember. Please let's talk about it another time. I'm exhausted."

The other boy's violet eyes scrutinized him. "Okay, whenever you're ready or need a sympathetic ear."

"Thanks."

The fight between the two girls had already begun. The pink-haired girl wasn't bad, but it was clear that the girl with the brunette bob cut had much more hand-to-hand combat experience. She had already taken her opponent down several times. She had just had the pink-haired girl in a leg press and Shouta was counting down the seconds. The fight was over and Uraraka moved on to the next round.

"Next up, Shoji against Bakugou," Shouta called out.

Zero listened up. He was very interested in this fight. The two opponents stepped onto the mats. Kacchan's opponent was huge and obviously his quirk was of the mutation type. The shape of his arms was not unlike a pair of wings. It looked like he had more than just two arms and that there were flying skins or something similar stretched between them.