Kamui: Right the video from the last chapter...

Mirko: Oh boy.

The nyan cat song echoed through the training hall and Eraserhead looked absolutely done with their $#@&*( as Joke and Hitoshi both dissolved into poorly concealed giggles, "Alright, which one of you changed my ringtone when I wasn't looking?"

Joke(while Mina started humming along to the song): We got you Eraser!

"Hey, don't look at me." Hitoshi said innocently, though the effect was kinda ruined by the smile that he couldn't wipe off his face. "I don't have your password. That's something reserved for your girlfriend."

Aizawa glared at him for another moment as Joke finally lost control of herself and started full on snorting, "Oh Shouta! You should see your face right now!"

Aizawa: I see it in the mirror everyday.

"I see it in the mirror constantly." Aizawa said dryly. "I'm going to go answer this and when I get back, we're going to have a chat about personal possessions and revenge."

Mic(chuckling): Uh oh.

The moment the door closed behind him, Hitoshi took one look at Joke and started laughing even harder, "We're totally gonna regret that one, aren't we?"

"Oh, 100%." Joke responded with a grin. "But it was worth it. I can't believe you actually brainwashed him into unlocking his phone for us."

(Aizawa slowly turned to look at Shinso like a creepy marionette and he gulped)

Hitoshi smirked, "Hey, it counts as quirk training!"

"I think you're just loopy from adjusting to the nocturnal sleep schedule that underground heroes have." Joke teased.

Shinso: You can't adjust something that never existed in the first place.

"I have insomnia." Hitoshi rolled his eyes. "You can't adjust something that never existed in the first place."

They were still grinning when Aizawa came back in, looking grim, "Hitoshi, train with the capture weapon for a few minutes. Emi, can I talk to you for a second?"

Hitoshi felt the smile slowly slide off his face as Aizawa took Emi aside and started talking in low voices so he couldn't hear what they were saying. That last prank hadn't really been any worse than the ones they'd been pulling on Aizawa all week, even if it was a little more bold than most of their others, so Aizawa's sudden change in mood must be about the content of the phone call, not the ringtone. Hitoshi didn't know if that was more or less concerning.

Midoriya: He must've heard the news...

By the time the two finished talking, Joke's mood had dipped to match Aizawa's and Hitoshi was starting to get worried.

Iida: At least none of us died...

All Might: Yes that's something to celebrate.

"I have something I need to check on." Aizawa said simply. "Shinso, I'm leaving you here with Emi until I get back. Don't slack off on your training."

Hitoshi nodded obediently and Aizawa gave Joke a quick peck on the cheek before walking back out the door.

"Um... did something happen?" Hitoshi asked hesitantly.

Nezu: Yes, quite a lot of things actually.

Joke sighed, "You'll probably find out soon enough. I'm sure it'll be all that the vultures are gonna be talking about for the next week, but for right now, let's enjoy the last little bit of productivity, alright? There were a couple things I wanted to explore with you anyway without Shouta breathing down our necks."

"You're the one who chose to seduce him, but okay."

(everyone snorted)

Hitoshi shrugged nonchalantly, pretending that it wasn't taking every ounce of willpower to not immediately die of curiosity. "What did you have in mind?"

Joke gave him a (*&@#-eating grin, "Knock knock!"

Kirishima: Knock knock jokes?

Kendo: Really?

"Seriously?" Hitoshi did his best to imitate Aizawa's go-to expression, but wasn't sure he got it quite right, since Joke's smile just got impossibly wider. "If you're just gonna mess with me, you may as well tell me what that phone call was about."

"Come on!" Joke laughed. "I swear this is important! Just play along!"

Shinso: Who's there?

Hitoshi sighed loudly, "Alright. Who's there?"

In lieu of a response, Joke just giggled.

Hitoshi rolled his eyes, "Seriously? You tell me to play along and then don't even finish the joke? You're lucky I don't brainwash you."

Shinso(pausing): ...That's the point isn't it?

Joke raised one eyebrow and gestured for him to continue, a small smile on her face the whole time like she was challenging him to brainwash her. But that didn't make any sense, because she hadn't responded to his who's there ? Wait... was she trying to get him to tell jokes to get responses?

Setsuna: Is that even going to work?

"You know, I really doubt that villains are going to respond to knock knock jokes in the middle of a fight." He deadpanned.

Vlad: You'd be surprised.

"You'd actually be surprised." Joke said. "Villains do the darndest things, and sometimes a well placed joke will throw them for enough of a loop that they'll completely forget about the fight or, more conveniently in your case, your quirk. But that's not what I was going for."

She sat down on the floor and patted the ground next to her until Hitoshi gave in and joined her, "Shinso, we know that your quirk works based on verbal responses, but we haven't yet explored what counts as a verbal response. Words do, obviously, but things like laughter or snorts or groans? They're audible too, so they might just activate your quirk and give you even more tools to use so you don't have to act like an asshole all the time."

Ojiro: Yeah that'd make making friends a whole lot easier if they only meet you after you used your quirk on them.

Shinso: Something tells me it's not going to matter much.

"But I am an asshole all the time." Hitoshi grinned. Ms. Joke shoved him and he laughed, "Fine! Fine! So, um... if knowledge is knowing that tomatoes are a fruit, then is wisdom knowing not to put them in a fruit salad?"

Kaminari(frowning): That's actually a really good point though...

Bakugo: Ugh seriously dunceface?

Joke immediately dissolved into giggles and Hitoshi reached for his quirk but, disappointingly, realized that hadn't been enough to form the mental connection he needed. He frowned and shook his head.

"No luck?" Joke pouted. "Fine, let's try again. Laughter doesn't cut it, but maybe another response will?"

Recovery Girl: Well something has to work sometime.

Hitoshi wasn't quite as convinced, but he shrugged and tried to think of another joke, "Dang it, you're probably better at these than I am, but... uh... if you think nobody cares you're alive, why don't you try missing a few payments?"

(everyone snorted)

Joke snorted this time and Hitoshi tried to activate his quirk again, scowling in frustration when it went about as well as their first experiment.

"Still no?" Joke frowned for a moment, then smiled. "Alright, one more time, and choose a really dumb joke this time."

Shinso: Yeah no not doing that.

Joke: Not if I have anything to say about it!

Hitoshi rolled his eyes. It had been a good thought and adding some knock knock jokes or something to his go to ways of getting responses probably wouldn't be a bad idea, but whatever Joke had in mind wasn't going to work.

"Please?" Joke pouted. "Just one more try and I won't tell Shouta you saved him as Eraserdad in your phone."

(Aizawa stared before looking at his problem children)

Aizawa: None of you have me saved as that do you?

1A(panicking): Um...

Aizawa(looking at Jana): Give me names.

Jana: it doesn't matter.

Aizawa: Why?

Jana: Because half of them have you listed as Eraserdad... and the other half have you saved as Dadzawa. (Aizawa groaned as class 1A looked sheepish and everyone else laughed)

Hitoshi froze, "You wouldn't."

Joke grinned, "I would. Come on, Shinso, one more joke, the dumber the better. Hit me."

"Don't tempt me." Hitoshi muttered. "Uh... did you know that a clear conscience is usually a sign of a bad memory?"

(everyone groaned)

Toga: But no really that's a good point.

Ms. Joke groaned and Hitoshi couldn't hold back a small smile, even as he halfheartedly reached for his quirk. This time, however, it actually worked.

Shinso: Seriously?! How did that one work?!

"What?!" Hitoshi couldn't stop his jaw from dropping as he lost his control over her, "Seriously?! How did that work?"

"Beats me." Joke shrugged. "But it probably has something to do with the fact that groans use the vocal cords, whereas laughs and snorts don't necessarily. I don't know, but what I do know is that this opens a whole slew of amazing opportunities."

Shinso: I'm going to have to learn dumb jokes now don't I?

Midnight: Hey you're learning from Shou and he should know some good dad jokes since-

Aizawa: I'm not a dad!

Mic: Your class's contact names say otherwise!

"I seriously have to learn the dumbest jokes in existence?" Hitoshi groaned and pulled out his phone to google dumb jokes, apparently. "The things I do to be a hero."

"Wait!" Joke reached to stop him just as Hitoshi unlocked his phone, but she wasn't fast enough to stop him from being assaulted by a million notifications. His eyes widened as his eyes scanned the headlines.

Todoroki: Uh huh.

"The... the hero killer... UA students..." He glared at Joke accusingly. "Is this what that phone call Aizawa got was about? Why didn't you tell me?!"

"Because it wouldn't have made much of a difference, Shinso." Joke sighed. "The hospital isn't allowing a lot of visitors right now..."

"The hospital?!" Hitoshi read through the notifications again, looking for the names of which students were involved. It had to be at least one student from class 1A if Aizawa was allowed to visit already, and Hitoshi had a sinking suspicion he knew exactly which one it was.

Endeavor: Midoriya.

"Deku wasn't hurt badly!" Joke tried to calm him down, but she was having the exact opposite effect. "If he was, all the security in the world wouldn't be enough to keep me out of that hospital room. From what Shouta said, the most injured one was Iida, but Todoroki also had a couple scrapes. It's not bad! But, apparently somebody caught footage of part of the fight, so security at the hospital is having to work overtime to keep intrepid reporters from bothering those poor kids."

Aizawa(scowling): Screw the vultures.

Hitoshi scrolled through the seemingly endless articles that had already been published despite the fact that the attack had concluded less than an hour ago until he finally found the video and clicked on it. The footage was shaky, obviously taken on a cell phone as whoever was recording struggled to get their window open with one hand.

"There was a gunshot..." The guy behind the camera said shakily. "It woke me up, but there's a lot of other stuff going on too, and then there was another gunshot just now. I think... what the... what's happening?"

Mirko: Some kids decided to take on a serial killer.

Midoriya: Hey I was trying to rescue Iida!

Todoroki: And I was trying to rescue Midoriya.

Iida: ...And this is all my fault.

The guy had finally managed to open the window and he zoomed in on a few figures standing in an alleyway across the street. Hitoshi didn't know who the guy holding a katana was, but the one he was standing off with was obviously Midoriya and the one on the ground must be Iida, considering that he was dressed all in white armor, not that it seemed to have helped him much.

Iida(wincing): This looks even worse from an outside perspective...

The guy recording was too far away from the fight to get any audio, so it came as a complete surprise when Stain lunged forward and the alley filled with a bright light. When the camera readjusted, the alley was filled with smoke and it seemed like forever, but was probably only a few tense moments before Midoriya came running out of the alley dragging Iida and someone else that Hitoshi hadn't even realized was there.

He was vaguely aware that Joke had come up behind him and was watching over his shoulder as Endeavor and Todoroki arrived. Endeavor immediately launched himself into the fight, interrupting the other hero who had already been fighting the guy. Was that Nezu? It had to be, since that was who Midoriya had been interning with. Joke gasped as they saw the villain move in a blur, running through the flames, probably enduring ridiculous burns just to get close to Endeavor, who... wait, did Endeavor just collapse?

Dabi: Yup.

"Oh my god..." The guy holding the camera sounded shocked and slightly terrified and the camera started to shake. "I think that's the hero killer. That's the hero killer!"

Spinner: Yes it is.

It was then that Midoriya, like the idiot he apparently was, shot the hero killer. His rubber bullets obviously weren't enough to take him down, but they were enough to save Endeavor's life and give the heroes a chance to regroup and move the fight onto the street. It was then that Hitoshi realized that the fight was close enough to the camera now for the phone to pick up some of the audio, at least the parts that the hero killer was shouting at the top of his lungs.

"The word hero has lost all meaning in this society!" He was starting to fight even more desperately as he was overwhelmed by a pro and three hero students. "The world is overrun by fakes and criminals like you who chase petty dreams! You must all be purged! The only one allowed to kill me is All Might!"

Nezu(sighing): And of course his ideology still spreads.

Honestly, Hitoshi had to admit that the guy had a point. A lot of heroes were really only in it for the fame more than the desire to save people, but that didn't give him the right to try to kill Hitoshi's classmates after he'd worked so hard to get into the hero course!

Twice: Don't see how those two are related but okay. Everything's fine.

Hitoshi facepalmed as he watched Midoriya grab the hero killer's tongue and use the hero killer's own quirk against him to trap him. Only he would think of something so brilliant and simultaniously stupid at the same time. If Hitoshi wasn't 100% certain that Aizawa was already going to ground that idiot, he'd be tempted to find a way to do it himself. Maybe he'd figure out a way to use his quirk to do it.

Midoriya: Why is everyone trying to ground me...?

Inko: Because you need to stop almost dying!

The fight was over and the guy seemed like he was about to stop recording when the people on the street started shouting again.

"Get down!"

"Everybody look out! Get to cover!"

Bakugo: The nomu... Tsubasa...

Joke screamed as a freaking Nomu came out of nowhere, grabbed Midoriya, and started flying off with him to god knew where. Hitoshi knew Midoriya would be alright. Otherwise Joke wouldn't be there and Aizawa wouldn't be going to visit his problem child in the hospital. None of that stopped Hitoshi from cheering when that creepy third year who sometimes popped out of the walls came shooting from the floor and punched the Nomu in the face, carrying Midoriya to safety.

Mirio: I'm not creepy... am I?

Tamaki: Well you do play pranks on people by sticking your face out of the walls or floor... or at least you used to.

Nejire: Yeah you're a bit creepy.

There was a few more minutes of footage as the police arrived and first aid was administered before the guy finally stopped recording. He must have uploaded the video almost immediately, considering how many views the video already had.

"Well, I see what you meant now." Hitoshi said finally. "But I think this is gonna keep the vultures busy for a lot longer than a week."

Tsukauchi(groaning): Yup.