Bants & Rants [Eli & Jun] - Event

Well, this was going to be fun.

Jun always managed to get herself into strange situations with even stranger company. Not to say that her attending a hero school in Japan was the oddest part, but already choosing to be a part of the first ever Sports Festival held at it is. There wasn't much on the line for her except to look as cool as possible, which wouldn't exactly be tricky for someone like her. 

Sporting the gym uniform that was given to her and the biggest size of slushie she could buy, the sugary girl would make her way to the hallway just before the entrance to Ground Beta, eyebrows raising at the presence of a familiar face,"Yo, Eli!" It wasn't often that they saw each other- only knowing of his existence through P.E. class and the chatroom she frequented nowadays. His hair was as bright and prickly as ever, and she'd step up to him with a lazy wave,"It's me, your best bud Jun~" Slurping noisily at the straw with red-stained lips, Jun would find it quite easy to keep up the small talk. She had no reason to be anxious when near an almost-stranger, and she'd reach into her pocket to pull out a grape sucker as an icebreaker,"Gotta come prepared when you have a Quirk like mine." Giving him a toothy grin, she'd lean on the wall near him. 

She'd never noticed that they were the same height, and would make many mental notes as she watched him with slightly intrigued turquoise eyes. It wasn't often that she stood still long enough to smell the roses, so it was a refreshing change for the girl. Life tended to move too fast for Jun, and she found enjoyment noticing the smaller details when she could- the curve of his jaw, a small twinkle in his eye. Though she tended to act the part of a fool in the chatroom, the girl was much more observant than she led on. 

Breaking the stare as she realized she'd done it too long, Jun would shrug,"Listen, I dunno what I'm expecting outta this, but we gotta look super cool doing it. That's like... the one rule." The jokester inside of her came out to entertain Eli a bit in case he was feeling nervous for the course to start, the sound of slurping cutting through the silences that would occur between them every now and then. Some prepared with stretches and mental hardening.

Jun? Jokes and sweets.

"Also, don't worry about a thing." Bringing up a hand to pat his shoulder reassuringly, the girl would try a different approach if jokes weren't the boy's cup of tea while everything was so tense,"When I'm involved, things tend to go right." Shrugging with a cocky grin on her mouth, the teenager would take yet another gulp of her slushie down her gullet. The action would start soon, she was sure of it, and her sugar levels were just where they needed to be!

Wherever Huang Lan walked there was a caustic air of irritation. The wind itself blew hard through the hallway, unmitigated by the breaks of strewn pallets and maintenance equipment. His heavy steps followed the crash of a swinging door. Intense eyes lanced down the tunnel-like hallway, catching sight of students in U.A’s sports uniform. Huang hung back, awaiting his teammate to come through the same door that, through the obnoxious network of ways, lead to their changing room.

When she joined him, he wordlessly stalked towards who he could only think was their competition for this stupid event. Some kind of high-budget obstacle course. Huang gave neither the loud mouth redhead or the bespectacled noirette the time of day, not even a glance; his focus maintained on a sprocket he fiddled with as he walked. To them, he’d probably come off as very rude.
Good.

If his partner, in all her bounciness, would want to greet their competition. Idiot. Huang had better things to do. Win, for one. He peeked his head out the mouth of the hall, glancing out to the grand expanse of Ground Beta.
His plan was simple.
His plan was decisive.
Fiddling further with that sprocket, he strode forth. Unto victory.

It would be mere moments before the heroes and villains were decided.
Before the hunters chased prey.
He tossed aside the sprocket, a jagged edge digging into the dirty concrete.
Fenghuang would take today as a medal and trophy.

Though Jun was quite satisfied that someone she knew was her partner, his long speech about how is Quirk functioned threatened to put her to sleep. The keywords stood out to her, and she made mental notes on them all. It was the way she studied in class, and it seemed to have worked so far,"Diamonds, got it. No need for that winded explanation, Eli. Sheeeesh~" Nudging his arm jokingly with a slight grin tugging at her lips, the crystalline girl thought it wise to mention her own,"I can make sugar." Short and sweet, just like Jun. Well, she was about average height. But that was neither here nor there.

Keeping her eyes to the floor and a her lips pursed around the straw of her slushie as she thought to herself, the bespectacled girl hardly noticed the entrance of their opponents. The two of them could make crystals, but what good would it do? No flashy combo attacks meant no exciting screen time for the viewer, and Jun had come into the competition looking to impress the ladies watching all around the world. Well, there was also that bit about making her mom proud, but the half of her that her dad had part in creating said otherwise. Girls first, heroism later. 

It wasn't until the bouncing red-head burst into the room throwing out what she could only assume was Chinese that her train of thought was derailed. It's destination? A one way ticket to cloud nine. She looked rather plain, but that just meant she was a blank canvas. If the girl was this beautiful now, Jun could only blush at how she'd look at their date she was already planning for in her head. The girl approached, calling herself Jin in broken- or moreso shattered- Japanese,"Ni hao~!" Jun had learned nearly every way to greet someone in another language. It was in case she found a cute foreign girl, which seemed to be the case right now. Considering herself lucky that she'd decided to learn such a silly bit of knowledge, the blackette would bow to her opponent respectfully. It was there when she noticed the other boy that had joined them in the hallway, looking rather mute in comparison to the bubbly girl in front of them. He looked scrawny, but Jun knew that she couldn't rule him out as weak so soon. There were plenty of surprises at U.A., and she had to stay prepared for each of them as they came.

"I'm Jun. He's Eli." Gesturing with her head towards her blonde friend, the crystalline girl would give one last smile to her before the red-head headed off to meetup with her own partner. And, though Jun had just finished a study session with a certain Irish beauty, the womanizer in Jun couldn't help but speak up to her best bud with a sleazy tone to her voice,"Damn, she's cute~" Her free hand would be pushed into her track jacket pocket as she leaned into the wall, slurping her drink rather loudly before continuing,"Too bad we're kickin' their asses, right?" God, it was taking a while for the four to be given their instructions. Jun would stand against the wall idly as she waited, taking the last couple of drinks of her slushie before placing it on the ground next to them. It was unfortunate that there was no garbage can nearby, but she assumed that it would be cleaned up eventually anyway. 

Either way, she couldn't worry herself too much about trash at a time like this. There were a lot of people that were watching them, her parents included, and Jun knew that she couldn't let them down.

Or, at the least, embarrass herself on live television.

Eli looked at his partner for the obstacle course, how did she make it seem like death wasn't a big deal? His mind was full of anger at the girl next to him, but at least she gave him a semi-decent explanation. Still to act as if death wasn't a big issue...Eli couldn't even begin to understand it. Death was the end of all things for everyone, regardless of your past. Not even a quirk could prevent death. At best it might be able to prolong it, but there wasn't anything real that could make someone cheat death. Eli decided it was best to push the thoughts away since the exercise would require his full focus.

Eli ignored the comment about Meara, but listened intently to the girls strategy. They were both better at close ranged fighting huh? It would definitely be bad if their opponents were both ranged fighters. If nothing else, Jun had confidence. Hopefully her words would ring true and not be simple arrogance. "All right, I'll leave mister gloomy to you Jun. Don't think you not fighting the girl slipped past me though. You just keep your guy from escaping and I'll fight the girl. I'm also a lot better at close ranged fighting, I tend to use a sword and shield. However I can control my weapons up to around ten meters so if either of them end up using ranged combat, it would be best if I take them on I think." Finally they had the basis of a strategy at least. They didn't know the enemies quirks, but Eli would definitely do his best to beat them to a pulp!

Finally the teacher overseeing the obstacle course appeared. Ningyo was a woman of short stature. Eli noticed Jun looking at their teacher in the way she did almost every girl. He nudged her with his elbow as an attempt to get her to focus on more important things, like the rules of the exercise. Before she begun to explain, a puppet as Ningyo called them, walked over. Eli didn't give it much attention though, he was gonna have to pay attention enough for Jun and himself after all! Eli continued to listen through his teachers explanation of the rules.

First, she explained that the puppets with police uniforms would be acting as law enforcement in the exercise, obviously putting the hero team at an advantage. They could even cause the villains to lose points! This advantage was countered by the fact that after fifteen minutes the villain team could escape through one door in each of the four quadrants. She followed this with more information on the particular situation they would find themselves in to the two Chinese students in their language, once finished she would explain in Japanese for Jun and Eli.

The situation seemed rather...odd to Eli. He didn't generally feel like villains went for jewelry stores but he supposed it was possible. Then again, he didn't look at the news much so maybe it was a common occurrence. As Ningyo flipped the coin in the air, Eli could feel his heart stop, this would decide whether they were hero or villain in the scenario. Why couldn't it be something he could control! Like picking straws or something! Either way he wouldn't have known the outcome, so it really didn't matter. 

Just like that, his teacher announced that they were the hero team! Eli wasn't sure which he really wanted, both had their advantages, but at least he would be doing what he planned in the future! Ningyo asked them which quadrant the hero team would start in, and Jun answered almost immediately. She joked about going to the fourth quadrant to gamble at first, but then said her actual decision. The first quadrant would make it easier to fight. There would be less buildings in the way, making it easier to see if the enemy was there. Plus there was a significantly less number of civilians there that could get hurt, even if they were puppets. Less buildings also meant less obstacles in their path. Eli was shocked, it almost seemed as if Jun actually thought this through! He looked at his partner with a grin, "First quadrant sounds good to me, let's give Ningyo a great show!" He joked, this was gonna be a blast!

It was clear to Eli that his opponents didn't know the slightest thing about teamwork, or at least Huang didn't. Jin and her partner went separate directions, which meant Eli and Jun would be splitting up as well, "Yea I don't like what either of them are doing, and if you need help just...I don't know figure out a way to tell me okay?" Despite how much Eli and Jun joked, the rag tag duo did indeed care for each other, even if it was deep in their subconsciousness. 

By the time the doors opened for the heroes in training, they're two opponents were long gone. From what little Eli had seen of Huan before he left, he seemed to be a faster fighter. Based on the tournament, Eli believed Jun to be better than him in that regard, which was good. At least they had chosen opponents that suited them...in Juns case that is. Eli wasn't sure what to make of Jin yet, clearly she was the more qualified of the two in mentality since Huan just seemed like the guy who thought he could do everything alone. Regardless of his mentality though, he probably had a quirk to give him the perspective he had. Eli wondered if the ever snarky Jun would be alright. Finally choosing to stop thinking, and act instead Eli gave Jun a warm genuine smile before leaving, "We got this best bud."

Ningyo's description of the first quadrant was fairly accurate, it was very open, which gave them space for the inevitable violence that would occur. He could see how Ningyo came to the conclusion that it was like a rural area of Tokyo. The openness also gave their opponents an advantage though, which caused Eli to be much more cautious than usual. He wondered around for a while, up until he heard an alarm, signaling that a robbery lever was pulled! Not sure if it was Jin or Huan, Eli hesitated going to the location. However, once he remembered his opponents words that explained what each would do, Eli knew it was Jin for sure! With the alarm though, her partner could come running. He hoped Jun would be nearby to come to his aid if needed.

The moment he found Jin, she took a hostage. Eli instantly brought his hands up in submission, but he didn't plan to submit. He allowed her to feel safe and walk outside before he struck. Creating a small, blunted diamond the shape of a snow cone behind the girl, Eli launched it towards the puppet in an attempt to free him from the villains hands. He made sure to use the circular end so there was no injury as well. Knowing that the girl would then be aware of his plans whether it succeeded or failed, Eli also made a sword to be prepared for combat. Usually it would be accompanied by a shield, but the girl didn't seem to want a close up fight so he figured she didn't have much experience with it! Therefore, he decided he could deal without it for the time being. He waited for the girl to make her move.