Within the last days of the week, Sachi has been reviewing and re-teaching herself for her upcoming exams. For preparation, she focused on Calculus formulas, bodily functions, pressure points, medicine, hormonal molecules; everything she taught herself in the past decade.
Recovery Girl gave her a confidence boost during her appointment that Saturday, but the conclusion of that was expected. Due to the sudden usage of her quirk, her vital readings were abnormal and, at times, unstable. The old nurse was solemn but strict in her lecture and wrote down a new prescription for Sachi.
On Sunday, the stress was piling. With a bit of coaching from All Might and Izuku, Sachi grew more confident in her skills and hoped testing will go smoothly. She was so confident, in fact, that she thought she'd be able to stride through the halls with no doubt dragging at her heels.
When Monday came, she was more nervous than ordering pizza through the phone. The grandeur of the U.A. building sent shocks of doubt throughout her body as Sachi trembled through the main gates. She arrived early in the morning, just as the sun was peaking over the horizon, but the sun's glare in the windows didn't seem so welcoming as Sachi made her way inside.
Briskly walking through the halls, she pinched a worn map of the school's interior between her fingers. She'd gone up the correct number of flights, so she rounded a corner to the left and down the hallway. As she passed the windows and classrooms, eyes still following the invisible trail on the map, her intense focus broke when her shoulder collided with an arm. An arm that felt like it was made of stone.
"I'm so sorry!" Sachi stumbled, crumpling the map out of instinct, "I wasn't watching where I was going!"
She looked up and saw a tall boy with a head of stiff red hair. His sharp teeth glinted from the morning sunlight as he smiled reassuringly down at the tense blonde girl. He was carrying a tall stack of textbooks in his arms, and another boy stopped next to him, also carrying a stack of textbooks.
"That's alright!" The redhead laughed lightly, "I couldn't really see anything behind these things! So it's not you're fault!" His red eyes glowed with so much purity that Sachi would've mistaken them for Izuku's. "Anyway," the redhead continued, "My name's Eijiro Kirishima! This is my bro, Hanta Sero!"
Kirishima shifted away for Sachi to get a full view of his friend. Sero was slender (despite the subtle allowance of muscle) and his elbows were the main features Sachi took note of. The boys nodded toward Sachi for they weren't able to bow in greeting.
Sachi, in turn, bowed politely. "My name is–! U-Um..." Sachi abruptly stammered.
Why did she cut herself off? Talking to boys was an easy obstacle to overcome, but why hesitate now? Was it because she'd be a staff member at U.A. and should use an alias instead? Or was her mind powering off from the overcrowding of endocannabinoids?
Sero noticed her hesitance and nudged his friend's shoulder. "W-We should probably get going. We don't want to tick off Ectoplasm." Sero gave a dry laugh but Kirishima stood patiently, waiting for Sachi to introduce herself.
"M-My name is...Ch-Cherry Bomb!" Sachi tensed more, her mother's nickname slipping out. Both Kirishima and Sero tilted their heads. "J-Just call me 'Cherry Bomb'!" Sachi repeated, a nervous smile stretched across her cheeks. "I need to get going, too! It's really nice to meet you!" The young girl bowed again quickly before unraveling the crinkled map and sped off down the corridor, sharply turning another corner.
As the two boys resumed their trek to their classroom, Sero voiced his curiosity. "Hey, Kirishima. Doesn't that girl– er, Cherry Bomb, look a bit like Bakugou?"
Kirishima glanced at his friend and nodded, piecing together similarities. "Yeah, she kinda does! Do you think they're siblings?"
Sero shrugged. "I don't know, but I don't think she is though."
"Why? She has spiky blonde hair and red eyes like Bakugou! Though she's paler, smaller, slimmer..."
"That's true, plus the way she acts. She seems way too shy and kind to be a relative of Bakugou's."
Kirishima glanced back at the corner where Sachi disappeared. "I don't know, man. Maybe a coincidence?" Sero shrugged again, the two arriving at their designated classroom door, 1-A.
About four hours into the exams, Sachi was already beat. Nothing but multiple-choice questions, true or false, written answers, definitions. All of them caught Sachi off guard.
Sachi tapped her pencil against the scantron to her Calculus test, reading over her answers and fixing any mistakes. The fifth test of the day and the most stressful one...
She glanced between her answers on the four pieces of scratch paper, her scantron, and the packet filled with confusing symbols and numbers and variables. She had to redo most of the problems she ran across and she knows, for a fact, that some of her answers were dead wrong, but she managed to keep herself from breaking. Even when she stared at the bubbled answers for ten minutes.
She sighed, leaned back into her chair and stretched, popping her knuckles and back for the umpteenth time that hour. The amount of relief being washed over her body was a sign that she was not in the depths of confusing hell. She popped her neck and jaw. Her necklace vibrated, providing reassurance in an odd way.
Sachi looked to the front of the room and saw Snipe stand from his seat, stretching, and made his way to the tall classroom door. The door slid open, allowing the distant murmur of life to reach Sachi's ears. Snipe left with a nod and made room for a black figure who sauntered in with a sleeping bag.
Sachi raised a brow at Aizawa before he merely stepped inside the yellow bag, zipped it up so that only his face and hair were visible, and curled soundlessly on the tiled floor, falling asleep almost instantly. Sachi glared at him full of envy, rubbing her sore neck and shoulders with cramped fingers.
"Time's up."
Aizawa spoke, waking from his slumber an eternity later. Sachi scribbled out the last bubble on her answer sheet and slammed her pencil down on the desk, throwing her head back into a relieved groan. Her arms fell to her sides as Aizawa climbed out of his sleeping bag. He collected the scratch papers, scantron, and the test itself before heading back towards the front of the room, hauled his sleeping bag over his shoulder, and proceeded to exit the classroom.
"School will be over in five minutes," he informed. "Take your time to relax or leave, whatever's fine."
Sachi flexed her fingers before catching the pro hero's attention, who was heading towards the door. "Wait! Aizawa, I–"
"What?"
"I was wondering if there's anything else left in the exams? If you don't mind me asking."
Aizawa peered at her with a blank expression, his hand reaching for the door. "The last exams are your Bio-Chemistry and quirk handling skills. Rest up for tomorrow. You'll resume testing before lunch period." Without another word, he slipped out of the classroom. Sachi pursed her lips together at Aizawa's response as she assembled her belongings into her schoolbag and left the room she was trapped in for the entire day.
As she was walking down the corridor where she bumped into Kirishima and Sero, she began to wonder how she's going to prepare for tomorrow's quirk test.
Maybe take a long nap? Drink hot tea and read an exciting book afterward?
The two options felt like paradise was waiting, and the blonde girl became giddy at the thought of revisiting her safe haven. The lush duvet blanketing her small frame, her pillow and plushies framing her aching head, the mattress hugging her body, and a belly full of warm food her mother has graciously cooked herself. Steaming hot tea with honey lemon paired with cinnamon, and a novel begging to be read. Sachi shivered at the thought of something so relaxing!
Between fantasizing about the thought of adding candles for ambiance and her finishing the flights of stairs, her shoulder was poked a few times when Sachi walked out of U.A.'s front entrance.
She flinched out of her trance and whirled around, her tired red eyes landing on unkempt green locks, a girl with rosy cheeks, and a boy with glasses.
"How were the exams, Chi-chan?" Izuku asked, his voice soothing and clear. Sachi sighed, her hand reaching up to massage her neck. She squinted at her best friend and the two students. Both the boy and the girl were stiff, with their mouths hung agape.
"Oh, Izzy... Where do I begin?"