Underneath His Mask

Part 16

• Time skip, first day of school •
• Izuku's pov •

I'm going back to school today... I'm nervous... Nezu shot down my idea of working instead of school, because he wants me to be around kids, but he has instead made me a tutor for my class. This means that I won't have grades or assignments for anything other than the hero course.

"Come on kid! Don't want to be late!!" Shota yelled. I knew I wouldn't be late, both Shota and Hizashi are teachers, so they have to be early to school, and I'm leaving with them, so I'll always be earlier then everyone else.

I took one last deep breath, smacked my face into my hands, and pulled myself together. "Coming!" I grabbed my backpack, which only had a few pens and pencils, along with some books and a sketch pad. I rushed out to him, closing and locking the door behind me.

"Ready to go Shota!" I got in the back seat and buckled my seatbelt, and he started driving.
"Did you lock the door?" Shota asked.
"Why did you ask that after we'd already driven away? That's kinda counterproductive ya know..." this cause Hizashi to chuckle, and drew out a heavy sigh from Shota.
"Also, yes, I did," I let out my own chuckle, some of my nervousness disappearing.

"You excited for your first day kiddo?" Hizashi looked back at me through the rear view mirror  with a big smile on his face.
"To be honest, not really..." his face morphed to concern.
"Why not?" It was my turn to sigh.
"Well... I haven't really ever had friends... not for 11 years at least... I don't know how people my age act or talk to each-other, plus, I'm gonna be their tutor, so they'll know about my smarts, I'm very worried..." he turned to face me.

"Izuku, they're going to love you... you are a bright, strong, and kind person, anyone would be dumb to think any less of you!"
I gave him a soft smile, "thank you, that means a lot!"
"I hate to cut your heartfelt conversation short, but we're here, so out." Shota chimed in, making me look out to see UA, which seemed about 10 times bigger and more intimidating now that it was my school...
"C'mon kid, let's go, you have to see Power Loader about the cuff." I grabbed my bag and slowly got out of the car.

I followed behind the two of them, practically hiding, I don't know if there's any students here or not, I'm not taking any chances though.
Eventually Shota opened a door and led us inside.
"Hey Power Loader, I brought the kid, I'm sure Nezu filled you in," Shota said, pulling me in front as he spoke.

"Yeah, he told me all about it, some people are just horrible, but, we're not here for that, we're here to get that thing off," he gestured towards my ankle, and then walked to a chair and patted it. "Let's take a look!"

"Izuku, I've gotta go take care of some stuff, Zashi will stay in here with you while he's looking at the cuff, okay?" I gave him a nod, then he ruffled my hair and left.

I went and sat in the chair, focusing on Hizashi's presence as Power Loader kneeled in front of me. He lifted up my leg , examining the canceler, and even though I knew he had no ill will I tensed to to the touch. It was unnoticeable, thankfully, and he continued to examine it. "This'll take a while, should I get you excused from hero training till I can get it off?"

"No sir... I'm okay..." he looked concerned.
"You sure kid? 1A has some pretty strong kids, and the training is hard, you could get hurt."

"I'm sure... I passed the test quirkless and I've survived my entire life without it, I'll be fine..."
I gave him a cold, stern look, keeping my cool and dull mannerisms.

He sighed, and got up, using his right knee as a support. "Well, I can't really keep you if you want to, just be carful. I'll get started on getting that off, it should take me about 2 weeks because of how advanced it is... makes me wonder how that monster got it in the first place..."