What Makes a Hero

57

You traumatize one kid and threaten to take away the quirk of another, and suddenly your readers think you're going to cripple everyone in the book.

___

Trigger warning:
Self-harm
(I marked the beginning and end with little ***
So you can skip the scene without missing much)

Kirishima glanced at the two empty seats next to him at their lunch table. A quick look up showed that he wasn't the only one who kept looking back at it, his friends tried to play it off as if something else caught their attention, but it was hard to miss the way their gaze lingered on the table where two lunch trays used to be.

Bakugo and Midoriya should be here laughing at poorly made jokes and scolding them about their class grades. Instead, they're with the same villains that attacked their camp and abused Midoriya since he was a kid. The thought of his friends facing against the villains alone made Kirishima want to cry.

"Kiri..."

Kirishima looked up at Mina who gave him a sad look, "the teachers will get them back, they're trying their best" Mina's voice was strained as she tried to blink away tears.

"They've been gone for three days, and no one has any clue where the villains are. What part of that is trying their best?" Sero crossed his arms.

Mina let out a muffled sob and Kirishima opened his mouth to scold Sero. But was interrupted but a certain blond.

"What's that I hear? Two of class 1-a students were taken by villains? How pathetic, no one from our class was taken. Shows how weak you guys are" Monoma sneered.

"Hey man," Kirishima shot Monoma a glare, "that's not funny, those are our friends."

"Friends? One of them acts more like a villain than a hero, and the other one is a vill-" Monoma was cut off as a fist collided with his face.

Kirishima and the rest of the lunchroom stared in shocked silence as Monoma fell to the floor and Shinsou stood over him shaking off his right hand.

"If you can't dodge a punch, then what makes you think you could've done better if the league was after you?" Shinso scowled as he took a step back to let Monoma stand up.

"Is that... Character development?" Kaminari whispered across from Kirishima. "I never saw that coming."

"If the villains could easily take two of our strongest students without breaking a sweat, they could kill you ten times over before being bored of you" Shinso sneered.

Monoma glared at Shinso, "what, are you defending them? Didn't Midoriya attack you?"

"You're annoying, you know. Don't you have a babysitter who keeps you from doing shit like this?" Todoroki asked, looking over his shoulder from his table behind theirs.

Monoma stuttered out an excuse before turning around and storming to his table.

"Thanks, man, I thought you and Midoriya weren't on good terms?" Kirishima gave him an awkward smile.

Shinso turned to Kirishima and sighed, "I don't like Izuku, but I do like Midoriya and I will not tolerate someone shit talking him."

"What about you, Todoroki? You seemed pretty pissed at him in the hallway that one time" Kaminari spoke up.

Todoroki turned around to face his food again, "I'm still mad," he paused to eat some of his soba, "but I have learned new things about him and no one should be laughed at for being taken by villains."