Controlee

14. The UA Sports Festival

Rule 14: Centre yourself.

Two weeks of individual training for the Sports Festival was the next thing for class 1-A and, for Otsuka in particular, it was a fortnight of hell. It wasn't that the training Aizawa forced her to undergo was difficult or left her aching and half dead, it was nothing like that (in fact, she would've preferred that, it was what she was used to). No, his training, it was much worse, but he ignored any and all attempts to refuse— even with his injuries from the USJ— so she was stuck with it.

But it was over now, and the sports festival was here and Otsuka was more than just excited. Her whole body was on fire with tingles. There was terror for the cameras and the crowd but she told herself that none of that mattered, none of those people would know her, what they saw her do, failure, winner, it didn't matter what they thought of her, not really. Plus this was only the first of three sports festivals in the three-year hero course; the third years would be far more interesting than her. There was also a lot of excitement, because she'd never done a competition like this before and it was bound to be incredible. At the very least, she knew it would be highly competitive and that every class would be doing their best— the ambush and subsequent declaration of war at the entrance of the 1-A classroom just as they were trying to leave two weeks ago was sign enough of that

The UA Sports Festival was so big, the entire world watched it. They were even recorded onto DVD which meant Otsuka had got to watch a few at the control school. They'd only had three years, all of them completely different, but each one amazing to watch. And she'd watched them so many times she practically had each one memorised.

Standing in the waiting room now, it was pretty clear that Otsuka wasn't the only one brimming with anticipation. All the other twenty students were sitting around waiting for the call, maybe idly talking when Iida finally made sure they were ready. It wasn't long now before they'd be walking out into the arena.

But even with all this going on, Otsuka still found her mind drawn to that letter. It was sitting under her bed right at this very moment, tucked into her rulebook inside her suitcase where nobody would look. And of course, since her mind was on that, her eyes were drawn to where Todoroki was now talking to Midoriya.

"Speaking objectively, I think it's clear I'm stronger than you."

Todoroki was definitely the blunt kind of person. Otsuka couldn't be sure if he just didn't care how words like that could affect a person, or if he just didn't understand. Was he merely cold, or was he cruel?

"But All Might has his eye on you, doesn't he?"

He did? Otsuka knew Midoriya really looked up to the number one hero. Even someone who didn't know Midoriya well would have to be an idiot to miss it, it was pretty clear just from his hero costume and the way he acted when anybody mentioned All Might. It was hard to blame him, All Might was, well, he was All Might. The man had been number one for as long as Otsuka had been alive, maybe longer. The lives he'd saved were beyond anything she could imagine. 

"I'm not trying to pry about that."

Sometimes, looking at Todoroki worried Otsuka. She couldn't exactly say she knew him well. Sitting with someone in silence for regular lunches did not close friends make, but they appreciated each other's peace. But there was something other than peace in his gaze every so often, and it was practically burning here.

His eyes, his expression, his whole demeanour, it looked dead. It made her stomach churn to think it but it was like he'd given up on the world around him. There was more to it than that, she was sure of it, she just couldn't see what.