My Hero Academia: EMTs

Passing the Bar

Yuka:

Henry, you're going to be my death. I sit in the principal's office across from Mr. Nezu himself.

"Mrs. Yamada, I'm honestly concerned, is all. Henry is brilliant, in his ways..."

"Your letter explained it perfectly, and I see the same problems. Henry's memory problems aren't going away, though I must ask if you really expected them to, and his authority problems keep mounting."

The small rat dog... creature... continued. "Henry is incredibly thankful; everyone reports that even if he doesn't always know proper decorum- which I must stress if decorum was the only issue, we could handle that easily. The problem is that his instincts are to doubt authority's intentions and protect what he loves. It's like he has nothing in his brain for trust." He sighs, looking at another stack of reports on my son. They aren't complaint letters, just monthly reports, but that doesn't mean they're positive.

"Well, you can't blame him on the authority thing."

"Mrs. Yamada, he's twelve; I can't blame him for half the things he does. Not blaming him is one of the reasons I'm holding out on serious disciplinary action, but I warn you, this school isn't normally designed for kids his age. The problem is, how are we supposed to fix his issues if he doesn't trust us? If he cares about someone on a personal level, he doesn't revert to obedience; he reverts to being protective of them." He looks down at a space on his desk. "Honestly, it's pitiable. He only wants what's best- what am I supposed to do? Punish him for caring too much? That just doesn't feel like a solution."

"Right- so you already know why I haven't done that."

"Well- we've got to figure out something." Nezu sighed. "Mrs. Yamada, I feel I must remind you that staying in this school isn't as easy as entering. Henry's graduation depends on meeting and often exceeding our expectations."

"Most students don't fight the school champion just to get it," I say, putting my chin on my fist and raising my eyebrows. "I'm aware that what you put my two kids through was more than what most kids go through, and I'm aware that what they offer is more than usual. You lose Henry, and you lose access to his knowledge of the inner workings of crime syndicates." I feel I've made a point, so I sit back a little. "You can call me Yuka, by the way. We know each other, after all." Imagine trying to keep Henry from graduating- ridiculous. Anyone who spends more than five minutes with the boy could tell you being some kind of hero is his biggest dream.

Nezu lowers his eyebrows. "Yuka, this school doesn't play favorites; we can't. Pro-hero is a dangerous career. I can't, in good conscience, lower our standards for anyone."

I fold my arms. "Fine- well, what are those standards?"

"Four minimums- something to recommend them, no failed classes, a GPA of at least three, and at least passable behavior."

"And, dare I ask, if Heny had none of those, he would have never gotten in so- what does he have?"

"His mental speed and adaptation in high-stress scenarios are hard to come by, and if I'm being honest, his misbehavior isn't really beyond the problems we have with average students, even if the professors do think it indicates deep-seated problems."

"So he's failing classes- but it's only been a month. How many classes can you formally fail in a month?" I say with a slight chuckle.

"If Henry had already failed something, we wouldn't be talking; he would be done. I can tell he will fail, though. Kanji and History are both hopeless for him. He barely made it in science for the first few weeks but somehow pulled things together."

I bite my lip. "I guess that would be Henry "playing the odds" that got him ahead in science."

Nezu's shoulders slump, "That's it? Just playing the odds? So Henry just maximized possible points- he didn't discover any method of overcoming his problems in that class; he just maximized the number of possible points he was shooting for?" Nezu examines the paper on his desk again. "I was hoping there was some method he found in science that could be applied in the other classes- really, all of his scores went up a little two weeks ago- but if that was just a change in approach, not an actual breakthrough..."