Sparks in the Unforgiving Night (WIP Title)

Chapter 3: Battle Trial Part 2: Shinso Vs. Midoriya Round 2

Before we get into the new chapter, I'd like to announce that I have a beta! It's Startemynx527 so blame her if anything's wrong. (Don't actually blame her). With that out of the way, here's Chapter 3!

Shinso could hear the crashes of Midoriya bouncing around below him at top speed, clearly trying to scout him out. With each passing second, Shinso felt the bangs getting closer to him. Shinso remained near a window on the top floor.

The top floor itself was a completely open plan, no walls, only a few pillars. The staircase was visible on the east side, and Shinso was positioned as far away as possible.

He felt the floor shake as Midoriya went up to the next level of the building. By his estimates, he had maybe five floors left, and at his current rate, he'd be on top of Shinso within two minutes. Not a lot of time in a high stress situation.

He looked over the glassless window's ledge, contemplating if he could use his capture scarf to shimmy down a few floors, perhaps down to ones Midoriya had already checked. In that case, he could maybe turn this into an endurance contest.

He knew he was physically out matched by far, even with all his extra training, but maybe he could out last the other student. Midoriya would also be much harder to trick than Kirishima was, having fought before.

Another bang as Midoriya went up another level. Shinso readied his capture scarf, and prepared to climb down a level. The other levels weren't open planned, so there was a low chance he'd pass Midoriya on the way down.

He tied his scarf around his waist and trapped the other end under a sufficiently heavy rock. He hoped it would be heavy enough to support his weight, but light enough that he could yank his scarf back to him.

With his nerves steeled, he carefully hoisted himself over the ledge, finding a plentiful amount of foot and hand holds in the crumbling concrete.

With much strain, and sweating, he worked his way down the outside and into a room on the floor below him through the window.

He yanked on his scarf, and after a good pulls, the other end came down to him. In all that time, Midoriya had gained about two floors on him.

Shinso grabbed another rock and prepared his setup again. He shimmied down to the next floor, in which time, Midoriya had finally surpassed his floor.

Shinso ran to find the stairs, as with Midoriya above him, he wouldn't run into him.

He found them and began to go down three at a time.

Shinso felt the ground shake for a final time as Midoriya reached the top floor. After a second of silence, he heard the student bulleting down the staircase.

Shinso took a breath and grabbed his capture weapon. He readied it and waited for Midoriya to appear in his vision.

As soon as Shinso saw the green lightning of Midoriya, he lashed out with his weapon, but missed. He didn't get a second chance as Midoriya slammed into his body, forcing the purple haired boy straight into the wall behind him, thoroughly knocking him out.

Present Mic's voice rang through the building, echoing off the concrete walls of the building, declaring Izuku Midoriya the final winner.

--

Shinso cracked his eyes open, only to squeeze them shut almost immediately due to a bright light. He groaned.

"Shinso, you're finally awake!" Kaminari rushed to the side of his bed.

"Can... Can you please turn off the lights?" He muttered.

"Right! Yes, uh... Lemme just..." Kaminari left the bedside to turn the jarring fluorescent lights off.

Shinso risked opening his eyes after a few seconds, and was pleased to see it was dark.

Kaminari returned to Shinso's side. "You've been asleep for a whole day," he informed.

"I probably needed it. I haven't slept in a week and a half," he retorted.

"You should sleep more often,"

"Wish I could,"

"Hm... Either way, I was worried about you dude. I thought you might be out for longer," he said reaching out to poke Shinso. He weakly slapped the blond's hand away. "Why? You barely know me."

"Well... I wanna get to know you better," he shrugged.

"Hmph" Shinso looked at the ceiling. "So when do I get to leave?"

"Uh... I forgot. Lemme go ask Recovery Girl. I'll be back!" He ran off to get the nurse's attention.

While Shinso waited, he thought. This Kaminari guy... He's really... Something alright... I still don't know why he wants to befriend me, but clearly he's determined to do it... Not to mention, he's kinda... God I need more sleep...

Kaminari came back soon enough, with the news that Shinso was free to leave whenever he felt ready to. Shinso really wanted to continue laying in the comfortable bed, but he had work to do.

He got up with a groan, not from physical pain but from mental pain. His lack of sleep was really starting to affect him.

Kaminari went to help him, seeing that he was struggling. Shinso tried to swat him away, but he was still weak. He ended up relenting to the help from the blond.

As they walked to the door, they passed the nurse.

"Thank you," Shinso bowed his head to the old lady.

"It's my job deary. Get well," She smiled before turning to the blond and pointed at him with her cane. "You. Keep an eye on his sleep schedule. He isn't getting nearly enough sleep. I'm putting you in charge of fixing that," at that she walked away, presumably to other patients.

"I get plenty sleep," Shinso lied quietly.

"Nuh-uh-uh. You heard the lady, and she thinks otherwise. I'm gonna be making sure you sleep more!" He smiled, and emphasized his point by pointing a thumb into his chest.

"Mhmm... Yep," He muttered, continuing out the door. They both walked down the long hallways of UA, Shinso gradually walking more on his own without Kaminari's support. When they eventually separated, Shinso could've sworn he saw a flash of sadness mixed with loneliness on Kaminari's face, but it was dark out and it happened so quickly he doubted himself.

Judging by how dark it was, it seemed to be about eight at night. He missed all his classes that day. Ugh.

"Say, Kaminari, how long were you waiting there in the infirmary? You had classes all day, right?"

"Yeah, but they finished up about 4 hours ago. I checked in as soon as I could. I didn't want you to wake up... Alone..." He shrugged and looked away from Shinso and towards the path in front of them. If it wasn't so dark, Shinso would've noticed the small blush creeping onto the blond's face.

"Well ok... I guess that's... Thanks...?" No one really goes out of their way for him, so this was kind of a first. He didn't know what to do.

They eventually arrived at the Class 1-A dorms.
Kaminari opened the door with a very exaggerated gentleman's pose. "After you."

And there's Chapter 3. Chapter 4 is almost done, and should be out soon after this. Thinking of doing weekly uploads on Mondays. Thoughts? Feel free to leave suggestions for what the students should do next, now that we've got some basic setup done. Also, favorite and share. Thanks for reading and see y'all soon. Bye!!!

-BrokenCreativity