The smell of fried food filled the warm air. It was a massive festival ground with traditional stands and rows of games that made the space feel pretty packed. The scent of grease and sugar drifted through the humidity, mixing with the distant sound of flutes and the chatter of the crowd.

  Kirishima and Tetsutetsu walked side by side, wearing traditional outfits that were identical. They looked like carbon copies of each other as they navigated the edge of the festivities.

  "Hey man, sorry for inviting you last minute," Kirishima said to him with an apologetic grin.

  Tetsutetsu shook his head. "No worries dude! I'm happy to be here anyways."

  They were standing at the outskirts of the festival. The orange light from the lanterns hadn't reached this far yet, so they were just painted in the pale, cold light of the streetlights. Those who had come to the festival had already split into their own groups. Unsurprisingly, the attendance sheet for the night was miserably low. Most of the class had enough of each other after the beach day and decided to stay back. Only a small group had actually shown up: Kirishima, Tetsutetsu, Mina, Kaminari, Momo, Sero, and Jirou.

  "So who isn't here yet? Or why are we waiting?" Tetsutetsu said, scratching his ear while he looked back toward the main road.

  Kirishima glanced back down the road. "Yeah Uraraka said she was running late, and it wouldn't be manly of me to leave her alone."

  Tetsutetsu’s hand clenched into a fist as he nodded firmly. "You're absolutely right!"

  They both turned back to the festival to admire the view for a moment, the colors of the stalls blurred together in the distance.

  "She wouldn't be alone you know," a familiar voice said from behind them.

  Kirishima and Tetsutetsu turned around. One was definitely more surprised than the other.

  Robinn stood there with her arms crossed. She had a smile on her face that looked bright and confident. She wasn’t dressed for the festival at all. Shorts and hoodie, casual enough that it almost felt deliberate.

  "Robinn!? You said you weren't coming," Kirishima said, louder than he meant to.

  "I diid," she started, but before she could finish, Uraraka popped out from behind her. hair pulled up neatly in a traditional bun despite the rest of her outfit being normal clothes. "But I convinced her to come!" She said with a big smile.

  Kirishima’s shoulders relaxed immediately as his smile widened. He moved to greet them without thinking. Tetsutetsu followed a moment later, his attention drifting toward Robinn with open curiosity.

  "Nice to properly meet you two," he said, extending a hand to the girls.

  Robinn shook it right away with a firm grip. Uraraka did it a moment later, looking a little bit confused by the formal gesture.

  "Why are you both dressed the same?" Robinn said, looking between the two boys and their matching jinbei.

  "A coincidence," Kirishima said quickly.

  She looked at them, unimpressed. "...sure..."

  They merged into the flow of people heading toward the heart of the festival, Uraraka and Kirishima naturally drifting to the front while Robinn and Tetsutetsu lagged behind.

  "How did you convince her? She seemed adamant on not coming," Kirishima said in a low voice, leaning toward Uraraka so the others wouldn't hear him.

  Uraraka sighed. "It was hard, but surprisingly easier than usual. She's in a good mood I guess?"

  Behind them, Tetsutetsu glanced sideways at Robinn. The question came easily, almost casually, like something he’d been meaning to ask for a while, his voice sounded almost challenging rather than intrigued.

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  "So how long can you hold your steel form?"

  Robinn looked down at him and pursed her lips. She took a moment to think about it before she spoke, her tone staying completely even and professional. "If I do my whole body, then probably a minute. Two if I really push it."

  Tetsutetsu’s stride didn’t break. But something in him eased. His shoulders loosened just slightly, the tension he hadn’t realized he was carrying slipping away. A minute. Two at most. Shorter than he’d expected.

  "Mmm I see."

  They continued deeper into the festival, stopping briefly at a stall or two as the noise swelled around them. Music floated overhead, lanterns swayed, the crowd pressing closer.

  "So we'll regroup with everyone when the first fireworks show starts?" Uraraka asked, already snacking as they stopped in front of a game stall.

  Kirishima nodded at her then looked back at Tetsutetsu and Robinn who were lagging behind. He couldn't quite hear but they looked like they were talking eagerly, his gaze lingering for a moment too long. Then Uraraka pulled on his sleeve and pointed towards the illuminated tanks filled with tiny goldfish that were flashing orange and white as they darted through the water.

  "Do you think we can catch one?" she asked, crouching down to peer in.

  Kirishima blinked, pulled back into the moment. "If we try hard enough," he said, a little blankly.

  Uraraka blinked, then leaned over the tanks to ask the price and rules of the game. Meanwhile Kirishima had turned his attention to the crowd, admiring the sparkling lights and delighted faces, the kids running around, it made him smile.

  A strange sound pulled his attention back to his friends. He looked over with wide eyes just as the two came into earshot. Robinn was laughing, warm and unguarded, at something Tetsutetsu had said.

  The orange glow from the lanterns overhead made her look different than she usually did. The light caught the side of her face and made her hair look a lot brighter, almost vivid against the dark. He noticed her freckles again, they were much more obvious now that her heavy sunscreen had mostly worn off, scattered across the bridge of her nose and her cheeks, making her face look softer.

  Seeing her like that felt strange in a way he could not quite name. She did not look like she was mentally logging a training session or waiting for an excuse to leave. She just looked like she was actually there, having a normal conversation at a normal festival. It made her seem like a completely different person, and the thought caught him off guard. For a second, he hesitated even moving.

  Uraraka broke through his thoughts again, but this time walking over to Robinn excitedly.

  "Robinn get over here! Let's try this game." She said before taking her hand and basically pulling her towards the stall, surprise flashing across the taller girls warm expression.

  Kirishima took an unconscious step back as the girls leaned over the tanks together. A strange sense of separation settled in his chest, quiet but persistent.

  Tetsutetsu noticed his strangely calm demeanor and suspected something was wrong with his friend, stepping next to Kirishima and crossing his arms.

  "Hey man, are you feeling alright?"

  Kirishima looked over slowly and nodded out of instinct. "Yup, just tired."

  Tetsutetsu frowned, unconvinced.

  At the other end of the festival grounds, the rest of the students had gathered in a loose group. They had found a quieter edge of the celebration where the crowd thinned out, near a few scattered tables and a low stone fence that overlooked a dark patch of trees.

  "Don't those things hurt your feet?" Jirou asked Momo. She pointed a half-eaten ice pop toward Momo’s feet, specifically at the traditional footwear that looked far too stiff for a night of walking. They were sitting on top of the stone fence, their legs dangling over the side. The air here was cooler, away from the heat of the grills, but the distant hum of the festival still hummed in the background.

  Momo looked down, wiggled her toes a bit against the wood of the zori, then looked back up at her with a small smile on her face. "Only a bit."

  She didn't look bothered by the discomfort. Instead, she watched the way Jirou was sitting, observing the casual way she was swinging her feet back and forth against the stone. "You're in a better mood," Momo noted.

  Jirou blinked at her, the cold sweetness of the ice pop still sharp on her tongue. She took another bite, looking away for a second as she processed the observation. "Yeah, I guess. Not sure why, though..."

  Her voice turned to a whisper at the end of her sentence. She turned back to look into Momo's eyes, caught by the way the warm, flickering lights of the festival were reflected in them like tiny, dancing embers. For a moment, the noise of the stalls seemed to fade, leaving only the sound of her own heartbeat and the crickets in the nearby trees.

  "Guys, we can't just sit around and talk, there are games to play," Sero said, leaning nearby with his usual easy-going posture.

  Mina was right by his side, nodding fiercely in agreement. A few steps behind them, Kaminari was standing with his hands in his pockets. He looked remarkably tired, his shoulders slumped as he tried to keep up with the high energy of the two next to him.

  Momo and Jirou both turned back to the group, the private bubble they had been in popping instantly. Shortly after, they climbed down from the stone fence and followed the others back into the heart of the festival. They spent the next hour snooping around the stalls and having fun, drifting through the crowd as a messy, laughing unit.