~~~
Akira's ears were ringing back into a muffled focus as she glared up at the underground duo, cackling away still atop a pile of rubble, their arms wrapped around their stomachs in fits of prideful glee.
Ever since Visage ushered them all with glamorous new outfits, Bakugou hadn't stopped swearing at them, threatening them with colourful insults, but it didn't come across as intimidating as he definitely wanted, not dressed like that. The students were still unable to move too, still trapped under Vibe's Quirk, so all Bakugou could do was stand there, his arms locked by his sides as he continued his slander of curses.
"This is ridiculous," a random nearby student ushers aloud, their tone laced with unfathomable awe. "This can't seriously be the actual exam, right?"
All Kira can do is cast her eyes down in shame - they were warned about the two heroes from the start, but didn't take the time to truly think about her situation and what that might actually mean. Sure, she devised a small plan with her classmates, but didn't come up with a plan B in case it all goes awry and now look at her... stuck.
"Hey!" Camie shouts from behind Kira suddenly, jerking her from her thoughts. "Instead of just yelling, how about you actually do something?"
"Oh, shut the hell up, you idiot!" Bakugou simply retorts, his eyes never leaving Visage and Vibe. "I don't see you coming up with a plan!"
"He has a point," Todoroki joins in. "Earlier, me and Kiriya had an idea-"
"But, it hasn't really panned out like we wanted," Kira cuts him off.
Todoroki moves his eyes to her slowly. "Right," he says hesitantly, unsure of her sudden attitude. "But, I did find out a possible weakness about Visage," he tells her.
"Even if you did, it's not like we can do anything about it now." Kira sighs, but when Todoroki doesn't answer, she sighs again, more forcefully this time. "You might as well spill then," she says, wanting to throw a lazy arm up to emphasise her point. "What did you figure out?"
"As I was hiding and you and Bakugou were confronting the both of them," he starts. "Vibe was getting a lot more uncomfortable with your accusations and I noticed that Visage was also wary, but not because of you, Kiriya. She seemed to want to keep Vibe calm."
"I did notice that myself too actually," Kira says thoughtfully. "Just before Vibe attacked, Visage ordered him to stop."
"Maybe Vibe has lost control before?"
"It's possible," Kira agrees. "But, how does that help us here? Vibe seems to be under control now and he's gotten the best of us."
"Maybe we have to make him angry again."
"Are you crazy?" Kira blurts. "He nearly took the building down last time I riled him up."
"But now this time, we can all be prepared for his attacks," Todoroki says. "And we can work together to stop the both of them."
"This exam has gone on for long enough," Bakugou cuts in. "You idiots come up with an idea yet?"
Kira directs her frown at him. "I don't see you chipping in here. Got anything to add?"
Bakugou moves his gaze over to her, finally looking away from the underground heroes. "I don't usually let anyone tell me what to do," he says quietly. "But, these assholes have got on my last nerve and I'm not stupid. It's clear that these two have more than a few tricks up their sleeves and it'll take more than just my strength to stop them. So, if you've come up with a plan, just tell me what to do and I'll do it."
Akira's taken back by his honesty, blunt and to the point. When push comes to shove, will Bakugou really let her tell him what to do?
"Okay," is all she can really respond with for now, as she focuses back on Todoroki, who watched the ordeal with curiosity. "How do you plan to anger Vibe, Todoroki?"
"That'll be your part," he tells her. "You did it last time, I'm sure you can do it again."
"Of course." She rolls her eyes slightly. "I'm sure I can provoke him somehow. He didn't like it when I mentioned the villain that attacked me, Kirishima and Bakugou some time ago. I'll start with that again."
"I'm sure it'll work," Todoroki says confidently. "But, we need to get close enough for us to anger him though."
Kira groans irritably. "Yeah, I think we have to go along with them for now."
"What do you mean?" Todoroki frowns.
"They're gonna make us dance, right?" Akira says. "I think we need to make them believe that they're winning, that Vibe has a complete hold over us."
"And strike when we feel the effects of his Quirk weaken?"
"Exactly."
"I'm not dancing," Bakugou says sharply.
"But-" Kira falters. "You just said that you'll listen to our plan and just do it."
"I never said anything about agreeing to dance," he grumbles.
"What's the issue?" Camie taunts, eavesdropping the whole time. "You embarrassed or something?"
Kira feels herself flinch at the Shiketsu students words as Bakugou's eyes slowly and dangerously turn to her. If it weren't for Vibe's Quirk, she'd be dead already.
"As much as I hate to agree with her, she does have a point," Kira says, watching tentatively as her classmate grows more irritable by the second. "What - you don't like to dance?"
"I've already attended a few galas because of Endeavour's reputation," Todoroki adds. "If you want to, I can give you a few tips, Bakugou."
"Shut the hell up, Icy-Hot!" Bakugou snaps. "As soon as I can move, you're dead."
"It's not like this is the first time I've seen you guys in a suit either," Kira says. "We went to I-Island together and saw each other dressed up then."
"We didn't get the chance to really dance though," Todoroki says slowly.
"Yeah," Kira drones. "The bad guys really ruined it back then, didn't they?"
"It wasn't all bad," Todoroki replies, looking like he wants to shrug. "No one got badly hurt and we - well, Midoriya and All Might stopped them in the end."
"Why are you talking about that damn nerd!?" Bakugou yells, and Kira swears she can see a puff of smoke erupting from the top of his head, as if he were a volcano waiting to explode.
"We're talking about him because if he were here instead of you, then he'd helpfully go along with the plan!" Kira argues.
"That bastard isn't here," Bakugou answers, his tone dark and stern.
"Exactly," Kira says. "Midoriya passed the provisional exam. Which means no matter how much you claim to be better than him, he's still ahead of you and will be if you don't suck up this stupid exam and get on with it!"
Everyone had silenced during her mini rant and Bakugou just glares daggers at her, as the other students watch their argument with hushed tension. It seems even Visage and Vibe have stopped cackling to ogle at the scene. Kira's a little stunned that Bakugou hasn't told her to curl up into a ball and die, but he must see truth in her words. And like Bakugou mentioned before, he's no idiot.
Akira can just see Bakugou shaking with tremendous rage, seething with the thought of Midoriya being ahead of him, his ultimate rival.
"You guys come up with a plan yet!?" Visage hollers down from atop her throne of debris, cupping her mouth with her hands. "You want a bit longer!?"
"I can't believe she's still taunting us," Kira says quietly, staring up at the underground heroes.
"The key here is patience," Todoroki says, eyeing the heroes too, his voice loud enough for the surrounding students to hear.
"I can already feel Vibe's Quirk weakening," Kira comments. "I can wiggle my toes and my fingers."
"What's your stupid plan then?" Bakugou whispers, his voice gruff with embarrassed defeat.
"We need to go along with whatever it is Visage and Vibe want," Kira tells him. "I know patience isn't really your strong suit, Bakugou, but you need to stow away your pride for just a little bit until we can take these two down."
"I can be patient," Bakugou comments, his voice mumbling slightly.
Kira tears her eyes away from the duo to frown at her classmate in bewilderment. "If I didn't know any better, it sounds like you're sulking. How old are you - five?" Kira ends with a chuckle.
Bakugou locks eyes with her. "Would you shut up and tell me the plan or not?"
His reply only causes her to frown even more. "Okay, which one do you want? You want me to shut up or tell you the plan?"
"Are you two really arguing about this now?" Yoarashi finally speaks up, his loud voice booming from somewhere behind Kira.
"Whatever," Kira grumbles. "Once we have the both of them fooled, then you and me will confront Vibe, like we did earlier, try and get him angry. Then, Todoroki will protect us when Vibe loses control again... like he did earlier."
"Have you got a back up plan?" Bakugou asks.
"Yeah, I think so," she says. "Try and pit them against each other."
"Back to your original idea?"
Kira sighs heavily, second-guessing herself. "It's all I got."
Bakugou finally looks back up at the heroes. "Fine."
"Alright! That's enough time for you young heroes!" Visage calls out as she slides down the rubble with Vibe.
"We should probably clear some space," Vibe suggests, throwing his arms about, as if gesturing to where all the students are standing.
"Oh?" Visage turns fully to Vibe as they reach level ground, eyebrows raised. "You making a big deal out of this?"
"After all these little brats just put us through?" Vibe comments. "You bet your ass I am."
"Alright," Visage says breezily, as she makes most of the surrounding debris disappear with her bubbles, sending it all God knows where. "How big you want it?"
"I trust your judgement," Vibe says.
"Well, this whole thing was your idea!" She argues, creating a pretty big bubble, her palms facing upwards, with her fingers splayed apart. "Come on! How big?"
"Ugh," Vibe groans irritably. "About... here. That long, both ways." He gestures, flinging his arms about the room.
"Right, you better move these kids then," Visage orders.
"On it, boss," Vibe mutters sarcastically, faking a salute, before spinning on his heel.
Suddenly, Kira feels her body start to move against her will, although she can now move her wrist and nearly her ankles, which would grant her some sort of willpower.
"You three can go over there," Vibe mutters to himself, making Kira, Bakugou and Todoroki stand against a nearby wall. "You guys go over here... you four here..."
Kira's able to turn her head a fraction as Vibe moves over to another part of the hall to control a few students. "I know you can probably move just as much as I can, Bakugou," she says, keeping her attention on Vibe. "Maybe even more with the kind of strength you have. But, if you attack him now, we're back to square one. Don't. Do. Anything."
"I know," Bakugou says quietly next to her, his teeth gritted together, struggling against the temptation to strike.
Kira turns her head back to Bakugou, noticing him watching the underground heroes with unmatched intensity. The second he gets the go ahead to attack, he'll be the first one on the scene. His eyes offer only hatred and a burning desire to win. That sort of resilience frightens her, but also fills her with something else... perhaps she can feel his determination radiating through her, sinking into her skin, soaking up his strength of character.
"You think you can make one this big?" Vibe questions, looking over his shoulder curiously at his teammate.
"Of course I can!" Visage bites back, revealing offense to the assumption. "You're the one who had better be prepared. You think you can handle this many kids?"
Vibe makes a sound like air blowing through his lips, his tone nonchalant and smug. "I swear sometimes you forget that we're twins," he scoffs. "Seriously, you always try to 'one-up' me when we do stuff like this."
Visage lowers her arms in shock, the bubble evaporating with a harsh pop. "I do not!"
"Uh, yeah... You do." Vibe turns away from the kids, shrugging his shoulders up to his ears. "Just because you were born a few minutes before me doesn't qualify you to act as the bossy older sister!"
"I don't boss you around," she argues. "We're a team. We work together" - Visage throws her arm at her chest and then towards her twin brother a few times - "and we always end up on top."
"Doesn't feel like a team." Vibe rolls his eyes, crossing his arms over his chest.
As the two continue to argue, Kira can feel her shins start to tingle, feeling her own willpower overcome her senses. Before, Vibe lost some sort of control, unleashing a much more powerful attack, causing the effects of his Quirk to last a lot longer, but so far it's never been permanent.
"I can move most of my body now," Todoroki announces, and Kira notices him flexing his hand by his side.
"Yeah, me too," she replies breathlessly. "Don't do anything though."
"Now's the perfect opportunity to strike," Camie suggests, her voice low too. "They're just arguing. They're distracted."
Kira turns her head to the side ever so slightly, so she can spot Camie from the corner of her eye. "Are they?"
"Don't do anything stupid," Bakugou mumbles from beside Kira, causing her to raise an inquisitive brow in his direction which he ignores. "These guys have already proven that they're prepared and well-organised. We can't make the same mistakes - that would make us look like some kind of half-assed idiots."
Kira frowns at the comment, reminiscing on the beginning of this exam where Bakugou lunged at the two underground heroes, ready to blindly attack. Perhaps he's learning from his previous actions, knowing to think before heading straight in for a fight.
"See!" Visage blurts loud enough for the entire hall of students to hear. "That's why I have to be the mature one! Because you act like a child all the time. Look at you: you're literally sulking right now."
The other students around the hall are already starting to look around, finally realising that they have control over their limbs again. She had hoped that the students around her would have passed on the message of her and Todoroki's plan. But, technically they're opponents in a way too. Everyone must be tired of Visage and Vibe too - hopefully they'll listen and follow along. Have a little patience.
"I bet it's an act," Akira says suddenly, watching the two heroes carefully.
"You think so?" Todoroki wonders, keeping his eyes locked on their opponents.
Kira nods slightly. "Oh yeah," she affirms. "They just said that they've been doing this sort of thing together as underground heroes. As twins. They have the experience and they have the skill. They're not going to throw all that away just to have a sibling spat in the middle of it all."
"You reckon he knows that his control is slipping?" Todoroki asks.
Kira pauses, watching the argument unfold. "Definitely."
"They're just waiting for some moron to slip up, huh?" Bakugou says, a sly grin forming across his lips.
"It's like we said earlier," Kira adds. "It's a waiting game with these two."
"How long are we gonna have to wait though?" Camie whines from behind the three UA students. "I'm getting bored."
"Shall we speed this up then?" Kira wonders, looking left and right at her classmates as they nod their agreement.
They've been taunted long enough.
"Hey!" Kira calls out and the two heroes stop arguing immediately. "Stop putting on a show and get on with it already! I thought the whole point of you two was to do something fun for a change. You didn't dress us up like this for nothing."
Visage and Vibe share a glance with one another, before replying. "She's got a point," Visage says.
She gets to work forming a massive bubble, like she was doing earlier, as Vibe approaches Kira.
"You're the one who really pissed me off earlier, aren't you?" Vibe wonders, eyes narrowed at her, before waving a lazy finger at Bakugou and Todoroki on either side of her. "These two your classmates then, I take it?"
"That's right," Kira answers, fighting the urge to headbutt him, he's that close.
"And you said... this one" - he gestures to Bakugou - "was with you when you saw that person that had a similar Quirk to Visage?"
"Uh huh," Kira murmurs. "You didn't seem to like that I knew that. Why? Is he related to you two?"
"No," Vibe says, though he doesn't sound entirely truthful, his tone a little higher than it should have been. "Just- we tried to apprehend him one time, that's all."
Kira frowns at the blatant lie. "You two?" She repeats. "You two: the underground heroes? I feel like we would have heard about you then, at least."
"It was before we were heroes, okay?" He blurts and Kira raises her brows at the news before Vibe forces himself away from the conversation, backing away to Visage.
"I feel like I'm getting somewhere now," Kira says slyly, her tongue traveling across her teeth in a foolish attempt to stop herself from smiling.
"Save it for the plan," Bakugou reminds her, as his shoulder brushes against her own.
"I should be the one telling you that," she retorts.
Visage seems to be struggling with her newest creation, as visible strain appears across her features, the bubble now stretching across the entirety of the hall, pinning the other students flat against the wall.
"Good enough?" Visage grunts.
"Good enough." Vibe nods, staring in awe at the size of the bubble.
With a thunderous pop that threatens to burst Kira's eardrums all over again, the bubble explodes and a great, big stage magically appears, with stairs all around the platform.
"And now, the details," Visage says, as tiny bubbles float around the place and decorative assortments burst from within, scattering around the hall.
Akira would have been especially intrigued and in absolute awe with the sentiment were she not held captive by these two underground heroes. She'd definitely have to compliment them after this ridiculous exam.
"Now, don't think I haven't noticed..." Vibe starts as he rolls back his sleeves as they start to fall down past his elbows.
"Dammit," Kira mutters, before Vibe spreads his arms out and another deafening sound wave erupts from the speakers sticking out of his skin.
Kira's brain wobbles and she feels her limbs go stiff again, as Vibe controls her body once again.
"That guy's really starting to piss me off," Bakugou says, his voice slightly muffled.
"Starting to?" Kira gawkes.
Bakugou only grumbles in response.
Vibe points directly at Kira and she feels herself take several steps closer to him.
"Consider this my own personal revenge for saying those things earlier," he says quietly, as she nears, before facing the crowd of paralysed students. "Oh, look everyone! We have a volunteer!"
Kira mutters a series of curses under her breath, willing her legs to stop moving, praying and begging for her feet to go deathly still.
"Oh, come on, Vibe!" Visage complains. "This is no fun! It's supposed to be all of them. Don't just pick on one."
"But, this is the one who-"
"I know who she is," Visage cuts him off. "She's the one who knows about our older brother. The one who went rogue."
Kira's eyes widen at the sudden confession.
"Visage!" The twin blurts.
"What?" She retorts. "The truth was gonna come out one way or the other. The fact that he was stupidly caught and the law enforcement and the other pro heroes stopped the news from leaking that he was related to us is amazing... until it isn't. So, stop picking on this poor student just because they discovered the truth."
Vibe grumbles something unintelligible before Visage approaches Kira.
"You said you and your friend encountered our reckless older brother?" She asks, tilting her head to look past Kira at Bakugou. "If he used his Quirk on you, I'm sorry. I've got no idea what you might have experienced and how hard it must have been to get back."
"You know about his Quirk?" Kira asks, her voice barely audible.
"Of course I do." She shrugs. "He's my brother, after all. And-" she hesitates, finding it hard to look Kira in the eye. "He accidentally sent our mother away when we were younger and... she never came back."
Oh," Kira answers dumbly. "I'm sorry. I just-"
"No need to apologise!" Visage bellows, taking a few steps backwards with her arms raised at shoulder height either side of her. "After all, we're playing the bad guys and you used your knowledge against us. If I were one of those judges up there, I'd give you top marks!"
"Why?" Kira scoffs. "Because I've been lucky enough to be abducted by someone with the same ability as you?"
Visage frowns at Kira, lowering her arms slowly. "No." She shakes her head. "I'd say your luck comes from experience. Getting out there and knowing the world and all its bad parts already. That's your winning strategy: your experience, not your luck."
Kira's speechless at Visage's way of thinking, her outcome of the situation placed between them. The luck. The experience. Its all one big package that's been handed to Kira on a silver platter. It's her skill - and Bakugou - alone that freed her from the prison of the alternate universe. Experience.
Visage takes her place beside her twin brother, staring gleefully amongst the crowd of baffled students. "Let's just hope that your experience can prepare you for what's next."
~~~