Three people Practice. [Nick and

Nick had been waiting. He leaned against the far wall, arms folded, brows knit and forehead creased in clear annoyance. Fate seemed destined to pull himself and this ‘Rin Kurama’ together no matter how hard he wanted to resist. First there had been the baseball exercise, then her beating him to be the first one to undertake the rescue class, then her being voted president over him – an especially sore spot – and now this.

He knew, however, that this exercise presented him with the opportunity to answer some questions that had risen about her in the last couple of weeks. He was not going to let her escape answering him, that he vowed.

He saw Rin, then, shuffling her way in as fragile as ever.

“You’re late, Rin.”

He emerged from the shadows, taking slow, deliberate steps towards her as his eyes sized up her thin form. Like a predator.

“You know, I’ve had a lot of questions for myself, lately.” He spoke conversationally, as if simply discussing last night’s football scores, but an underlying current of menace was most definitely there. “Why would they vote you, over me? Someone with power, training and a Quirk that’s second to none – I’m the natural best fit. Yet they chose you.”

He stopped barely an inch from her and glared down. If he had been cold during their baseball exercise, he was a blizzard now.

“But it’s not just that I’m wondering about. It’s not even the main thing, surprisingly enough. I saw you come out of that house, you see. You were covered in blood. I went in immediately after you and I encountered nothing capable of doing the damage that had been done to you. What happened in there, Rin? Tell me.”

It was not a request: the firmness of his voice made that abundantly clear.

Predictable. Weak. Cowardly. All these words and more erupted in Nick’s mind as the feeble little girl fell apart before him. He was scaring her? Please. He had not done anything remotely scary.

He narrowed his eyes as she began to back off. He knew better than to threaten her or otherwise resort to violence, however. He wanted to succeed at Yuuei, not get kicked out barely a month in.

Instead, he let out a long, tired sigh and folded his arms while giving her a look of utter dismissive indifference. “Very well. Do as you will, as pointless as it may be. You’ll have to face me sooner or later, you understand. Even if you prefer it to be later, it won’t change a thing. Your rampant stuttering and clear reluctance to answer me just make it even more obvious you’re hiding something. Like it or not, I’m going to find out.” Even more so now. “And if I don’t…”

Was he low enough to go there, when he was hiding something himself? Well, to him, it was not a matter of being low and his own secret was irrelevant in that moment.

“Perhaps Yuuei’s board might.”

He would absolutely go there. His expression remained the same, but the threat was clear.

To say Nick was surprised when she cut her own wrist was an understatement. For once he gave Rin the satisfaction if she so took it of seeing him stunned. His eyes widened, his eyebrows lifted and his smirk faded into a grimace. No sooner had this happened, though, he forced his usual smug indifference back.

Of course. The blood from the rescue exercise. It all made sense now: her true Quirk must have involved using her own blood in some way. The ‘stamina boost’ she had told him of before was merely a side-effect of it, the same as his own enhanced stamina was. There were a myriad of possibilities: could she shoot her own blood as concentrated blasts, transform it into weapons or even manipulate his own blood, just to name a few. Perhaps all three, though he doubted she was at that level.

He had to play this smart. He recalled the rescue exercise, how he had overdone it with his Quirk and forgotten he was limited with how long he could use it. He doubted she had forgotten the state he had been in after using his Quirk in their baseball exercise.

Please, consider your quirk and how you must conserve energy.

The words of his teacher echoed in his mind. So, he assumed a fighter’s stance – and did not transform. He could take one hit, he figured. Perhaps it was not that smart, but in their sparse area he did not have many options. She would be expecting him to charge her head on. Instead, he just stood there. She could move first.

Nick was disappointed, truly. He meant it when he said he wanted to see her real power. Perhaps she would actually change his mind about her if she showed him what she could really do – he was not adverse to it, despite his posturing.

Instead she chose to stand there and goad him. Her words might have actually angered him if it were not so painfully obvious what she was trying to do. He was reminded of those ‘bait’ memes from the old days of the Internet.

He did not drop his stance, keeping his eyes on the blood dripping from her wound, but he tilted his head to the side and smirked. “Cute. But I’m afraid I’m not as simple as you seem to have decided I am. Your obvious attempt to rile me into attacking you first isn’t going to work.” He let out a mock-sigh. “What’re you going to do? You’re obviously too afraid to fight me, so the only other option I see for you is it to walk away. Which means I’m going to have to tell Yuuei’s board you’re not cut out for the tasks they set, only willing to do the bare minimum required to shamble through them. Perhaps you’re not cut out to be a hero at all. Especially given you would have failed the rescue course.”

He did not understand her. She disliked him as much as he disliked her, and here he was giving her a golden opportunity to hit him and she was refusing to take it.

Once again, she merely stood there. He took note of the way she hardened her blood, however. So that was what her true Quirk involved, though such a little glimpse was not enough. He glanced up again at her face as she proceeded to deny him a second time. She was not going to play into it. She was smarter than she seemed, he would give her that.

And infuriating. Oh so very, very infuriating.

Nick’s lips curled in distaste. “As you wish. Walk away.”

‘You coward’ he almost added, but she was already gone. He could have chased her down and struck at her, but she would have been expecting it, he was sure. No point playing into her hands, which would just be embarrassing after she had avoided playing into his. That, and attacking her now as she was leaving carried too much risk of getting him in trouble with the teachers.

Now that she could no longer see him, he let his indifferent face darken with clear irritation and anger. If she thought this ended things, that she had managed to escape him, she had something else coming. She had not escaped at all: their classes would present other opportunities for him to find out her capabilities. He would find out. One way or another.

It suddenly hit him – was there not supposed to have been a third person here? An overseer? He had been so wrapped up in confronting Rin he had not given it much thought until then. Some use they had been, indeed. He had half a mind to wait for them and scold them for their lack of punctuality, but he doubted they were even going to show at all.

With a sigh, he walked off in the direction of the dorms. He needed to get lost in a good, thick book to forget about this mess.