By the time they reached the lodge, the outdoor kitchen looked very much like the pre disaster it was going to be, just waiting for their input.
'They're ... Actually serious.' Those were the thoughts of every one of them as they staggered toward assigned stations after changing from their workout attire. "Alright, everyone." Well, most of them anyway. Iida naturally took charge before anyone could object.
"Please work carefully. We are all exhausted, which means this is exactly when accidents happen."
Kaminari groaned, poking suspiciously at a potato. "Um… alright, so how do we go about this?" He turned the potato over once. Then twice. "What exactly are we doing again?"
"Oh! I know, I know!" Toru Hagakure exclaimed, waving her invisible hands enthusiastically. "These are all the ingredients for curry! I've seen my mom make it, like, a bunch of times!"
"Me too," Tsuyu Asui said. She looked toward Momo Yaoyorozu. "Right, Yaomomo?"
All eyes turned toward Momo. She straightened instinctively. Then, to everyone's surprise, her confidence visibly faltered.
"Um…" Yaoyorozu lowered her gaze. "Well, I… don't really know."
There was a bit of silence. Momo clasped her hands together, clearly embarrassed.
"We have dedicated chefs in my household, so I was never properly taught to cook." Her cheeks colored faintly. "I know how to brew tea and I understand the chemistry behind food preparation, but… I lack practical experience."
She bowed her head slightly. "Please forgive my lack of usefulness."
The girls blinked. The collective thought: Right ... I forgot she was rich.
"That's okay!"
"Ribbit," Tsuyu added with a small nod. "Nobody expects you to know everything."
"Yeah," Ochaco Uraraka said quickly. "We'll figure it out together."
Momo looked up, visibly relieved. "Thank you."
The reassurance helped. Unfortunately, it did not help them cook. Within minutes, the girls had gathered around the ingredients and begun holding a deeply earnest but increasingly uncertain discussion. "So… do we cut the potatoes first?"
"Or fry the onions?"
"Wait, do we wash the rice before or after cooking it?"
"You wash rice?"
"Of course you wash rice!"
"How much water do we use?"
"A lot?"
"How much is 'a lot?'"
Across the kitchen area, several of the boys, Yuta included, stood in a loose cluster and watched with increasingly grave expressions.
Kirishima scratched the back of his head. "Do any of you know how to cook?"
Sero shrugged. "Beats me. I only ever slice vegetables."
"Satō should know," Kaminari said immediately. All heads turned toward Rikido Sato who immediately raised both hands in surrender.
"What?! Don't look at me. My expertise lies in baking."
Kaminari stared at him. "You're telling me the guy whose quirk is literally Sugar Rush can't make curry?"
"I can make an excellent chiffon cake."
"That doesn't really answer the question though, does it?"
Satō looked mildly offended. "In pastry circles, that is a far more impressive achievement." Hearing this, Yuta turned towards the girls. The scene had somehow become less organized.
Momo, Mina, Uraraka and Hagakure were trying to formulate an optimal cooking sequence while simultaneously doubting every conclusion they reached. Asui and Jiro just stood to the side, watching them move. Question marks might as well have been floating over all their heads. Kaminari swallowed.
"Yeah… honestly, they don't look like they know much of what they're doing either." A brief silence followed. Then Kirishima voiced the question everyone was thinking. "Um… are we going to eat anything good tonight?"
Sero glanced at him. "Would you rather cook it instead?" Kirishima looked back at the increasingly chaotic kitchen operation. "…You know what? It can't be that bad."
Tokoyami was much more direct. "We're all going to die." In the end, the boys' collective faith in the girls' culinary abilities proved to be less an informed decision and more an act of desperation.
Somewhere between the arguments over how much water was enough, Kaminari nearly peeled his thumb along with a carrot, and Mineta was forcibly removed from the girls' station after offering what he described as "moral support."
Sato eventually took pity on everyone and quietly began correcting the worst mistakes under the guise of "light suggestions," while Momo, once she stopped apologizing for being born into wealth, contributed by creating a perfectly measured ladle after they discovered the camp had only one. Against all statistical probability, dinner was produced. The resulting curry was not a culinary masterpiece.
Neither was it poisonous. In the current circumstances, that qualified as a spectacular success. Bowls were filled. Teenagers descended upon the food with the intensity of starving wolves. "This," Kaminari announced through his second serving, "... is edible. Bless the gods."
"This can barely qualify for good food at a restaurant, but I'm so hungry I'll eat it anyway."
"Hey! That's rude," Mina Ashido protested, puffing out her cheeks as she pointed her spoon accusingly at Kaminari. "We put a lot of work into that."
"I'm not complaining. I'm just saying I would complain under normal circumstances."
Todoroki took a spoonful. "He's not wrong." It truly was bad by normal standards. The curry was too watery. The potatoes were unevenly cut. Some carrots were inexplicably crunchy while others had dissolved into the sauce. None of it mattered. After ten straight hours of being brutalized by the Wild, Wild Pussycats, it was the finest thing any of them had ever tasted.
Not far away, Aizawa watched the whole thing expressionlessly, both hands in his pockets. Once dinner was done, and it was time to head to bed, he headed for the staff building. He didn't have to look far. Near the tactical briefing table at the back of the staff room, Tomoko Shiretoko ... Ragdoll, was busy sorting through a stack of laminated regional topographical maps. "Shiretoko,"
"Oh! Eraser." Ragdoll turned around and replied cheerfully. "What's up? You need anything?"
"It's ... Something like that."
_
The next morning, the mountain once again awoke to the sound of explosions.
"DIEEEEEE!"
BOOM!
Explosions boomed across the mountainside as Bakugo resumed his personal war against the ambient atmosphere. Yuta barely glanced toward the distant column of smoke. After yesterday's training, his body had begun adapting to the weighted gear better than before, which was probably a good sign.
Or an alarming one. He was still adjusting the cuffs around his wrists when Aizawa approached.
"We're changing plans." Yuta looked up. "No sparring today?"
"Not yet."
Aizawa turned and began walking toward one of the quieter sections of the forest. "Come with me."
Yuta followed without question.
The path wound through the trees until they reached a secluded clearing where Ragdoll stood waiting, hands clasped behind her back and practically vibrating with curiosity.
"Hiya, Akutami-kun!" Ragdoll burst forward, her face suddenly inches from his chest as she inspected the metallic bracers on his wrists. "Wow, your training gear looks super heavy! You must be really strong. But forget about the gear for a second. Let's look at the real merchandise!"
Yuta slowed down. His eyes shifted from her to Aizawa. "…Should I be worried?"
"No" Aizawa said. That single word did very little to reassure him.
Ragdoll nodded vigorously. "Yeah yeah yeah. You have nothing to be afraid of!" That was somehow even less reassuring. "Um sensei. What's going on?"
"We're here to have your eyes checked out." Aizawa slipped his hands into his pockets. "You can't turn them on, right?"
"Yeah .."
"That's why she's here." He replied. "Shiretoko's quirk is 'Search', which allows her to gather detailed information about a person's physical condition and weak points," he said. "Since you still can't use your eyes, we're checking if she can identify anything abnormal." Yuta blinked. That… actually made sense. In hindsight, he was mildly annoyed that he hadn't thought of it himself.
'I've forgotten a lot, haven't I?' He thought, making a note to make notes of everything he remembers of the plot after this.
"I see. Sorry for the trouble." "Don't worry about it. Let's give it a go. Just stand still and ..." Ragdoll chirped and activated her quirk. The next moment, her eyes glowed a beautiful rainbow aurora.
For an instant, Yuta felt as though a spotlight had settled over his entire body. Ragdoll's expression shifted almost immediately. Excitement, confusion, then finally astonishment.
"Wow," she whispered. Yuta frowned. "…Is that a good wow or a bad wow?" She didn't answer right away.
Her eyes darted minutely, as though reading lines of invisible text. "Your body is ridiculous," she said at last.
"..."
"I mean, seriously! It's like you're not even a regular human being! Usually, when I look at people, I see muscle fibers, bones, and nice, neat little quirk factors. But you? You're just stuffed to the brim!"
Ragdoll puffed her cheeks out, circling him like a hawk inspecting a shiny toy. "It's like someone took a giant hose and pumped a billion gallons of glowing energy into every single cell of your body! It's sloshing around everywhere! In your pinky toes, your liver, your hair—everywhere!"
'Huh?' Yuta was surprised. She could actually sense his chakra baseline. Aizawa sighed heavily, rubbing the bridge of his nose. "Focus, Ragdoll."
"Oh! Right, right." She leaned closer and directed her glowing eyes toward Yuta's face. She leaned in so close Yuta had to tilt his head back slightly.
"Hmmm…" Ragdoll muttered, her brow furrowing in genuine confusion. Yuta waited. Aizawa waited. Seconds elapsed. Finally,
"I don't really see anything wrong. Just the same hyper-dense energy I see everywhere else in your body. There's nothing really special or broken there..." The rainbow glow faded from her irises. She tapped her chin thoughtfully. "As far as Search can tell, you look perfectly fine." Yuta's brow furrowed. So even this didn't reveal anything.
For a moment, disappointment tugged at him. Aizawa, however, remained completely unbothered. "Akutami."
Yuta looked up. "Try activating it under her Search."
"Huh?"
He replied expressionlessly. "If there's no visible abnormality at rest, then the problem may only become apparent when the ability attempts to activate."
That… was actually logical. "That's actually a good idea."
"Let's just get this over with."
"Alright."
Ragdoll's eyes glowed once again. "Ready!" Yuta closed his eyes for a moment. When he reopened them, darkness assaulted him once again. "…Same thing as always." Yuta uttered.
"Okay, let's see .... Whoa, whoa, wait a minute! What the heck is going on inside your skull?!"
"Huh?"
__
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