It took two months for the special order air rifle to arrive from the United States. It had been held up in customs for an extra week because they had to do some research into the import and export laws. If they had checked their business email, they would have seen that Tanya had already sent them the relevant articles and quotes from the law books.

There were no regulations or restrictions on what was classed as a children's toy, so they had to let it through (it couldn't be bought in Japan and had to be shipped in from overseas). The funny thing was, the large container of 10,000 pewter pellets, the modified magazines, and the extra compressed air cartridges had gotten through without any trouble. Tanya and Izuku had a good laugh over that one.

It arrived just after the new school year had started, so Tanya had to delay her plans for modifying it to her standards. She knew that she would need several weeks of uninterrupted time before she could tackle the job. It was put on the back burner for the time being and she concentrated on studying the aerodynamics of the rifle itself and the pewter pellets in her spare time.

Izuku helped her with a separate viewpoint and his novel ideas on how to modify the pellet heads for what she wanted them for. Different shapes for knock-back (flat), penetration (pointed), explosive (air pockets), and long distance (corkscrew), were the things they had come up with. It took them several weekends and visiting several hardware stores and hobby shops before they could find the tools they could use to make the modifications.

“I just had a weird idea.” Izuku said as he was using a soldering iron to flatten the head of a pewter pellet. He had already made several hundred of them and was quite adept at it.

“Hit me.” Tanya said as she twirled the screwdriver around the pellet she held and made the corkscrew shape with the sharpened end. She had made the same amount of ammunition as Izuku and it was almost second nature.

“Could we make a little mold or something? I remember reading about how people used to reload their own ammunition. It was like a little press and they just put their stuff into it and pulled it down to secure the bullet into the casing and crumpled the end to keep it intact.”

“It's possible.” Tanya said and loaded her latest pellet into the magazine clearly marked for 'distance'. “We'd have to see what it entails and then try to adapt something into making one. The damn things are tiny, though. A press might just snap apart the little air scoop at the backs of the pellets that the rifle uses to propel them.”

“Yeah, you're right. It might not be a good idea.” Izuku said, a little saddened.

Tanya reached over and smacked him in the back of the head.

“Ow! What was that for?” Izuku asked and rubbed his head, careful of the hot soldering iron.

“No idea is bad unless proven bad by either you or the enemy.” Tanya said. “If the press thing works, we can do dozens of these things a second instead of one for every ten seconds.”

“Dozens.” Izuku said and nodded, then he looked thoughtful for a couple of minutes. “What if we commission a mold to be made... no, a two part mold... and the press can be any normal hand press or even a bench vise?”

“Why two parts?” Tanya asked and did another pellet.

“You're worried about the air flange being damaged, so we make the bottom of the mold into one that fits inside those flanges. It will hold the pellets upright and keep integrity as we push the hand press down to give the pellet heads different shapes.”

Tanya stopped working and turned to Izuku with a slightly manic smile on her face. “Now that my friend is a brilliant idea! Grab several handfuls of each type and put them into separate containers. We're heading over to the mechanics shop at my old school to meet someone that might be able to help.”

Izuku nodded and did as she asked as she left to change. When she came back, she wore a stylish military-like uniform and she looked very handsome in it. “W-wow.”

“Keep it in your pants, Romeo.” Tanya said with a laugh and pointed to the bathroom as she took the containers from him to put in her backpack. “Clean up and let's go.”

“R-right.” Izuku said and ran to the bathroom to wash up.

They caught the train and made their way to the academy that was an hour away.

“You travelled this every day?” Izuku asked as they stepped off the train.

“I had a dorm room and a roommate. She was a real bitch.” Tanya said and walked down the platform to go up the stairs.

“Maybe we can introduce her to Bakugo.” Izuku joked and Tanya stopped to stare at him. “Wh-what?” He asked, a little nervously.

“You just made a disparaging joke about your old bully!” Tanya said and her manic smile was back. “I'm so proud of you!”

Izuku's face flushed red and he didn't know what to say.

“I'm buying you an ice cream on the way home.” Tanya promised and took his hand to lead him into her old academy. “That was amazing! If we see her, I swear I'm telling her that to her face! Ha ha!”

Izuku couldn't help but laugh at his friend's happiness and his blush faded.

“ID?” A male voice asked as they approached the front gate.

“It's defunct.” Tanya said and held the ID out to the guard. “It's still me, however.”

The guard raised his eyebrows at her and she grinned at him. He stayed stoic for barely a second and then grinned back. “Go on in, Tanya.” He said and the gate opened. “Are you here to see anyone specific?”

“Max. If he's in.” Tanya said and the guard laughed.

“He's always in. I'll let him know you're coming.”

“Thanks, Kinoki.” Tanya said and pulled something out of her backpack.

“That is not what I think it is.” The guard said in a stern voice as he saw the package.

Tanya opened the wrapping and held it out to the man. “If you're thinking that it's a Hero Special Sub Sandwich from Archie's, then you're right.”

“Tanya, you are an absolute doll!” Kinoki said and reached for it, then stopped. “What do you want?”

“We were never here.” Tanya said.

The guard gave her an incredulous look, then chuckled. He hit a button on the console next to him and then turned back to take the sandwich. A hiss of static came out of the speakers and monitor behind him.

“Who were you again?” Kinoki asked and bit into the sandwich. “Ooo, that's so good!”

“Enjoy.” Tanya said and took Izuku's hand again as she led him inside.

Izuku was a bit too stunned by what he just saw to speak. He knew Tanya was a likeable person, charismatic even. He never suspected that she could enter a guarded military academy and also get in without any record of her being there.

The trip across the fairly large campus didn't take long and not one person looked their way or wondered who they were. They also weren't stopped by any of the people with MP on their arms that Tanya whispered were Military Police.

They entered what looked like a garage big enough to fit an airplane in and Izuku gasped when he saw that there was an actual airplane inside!

Tanya chuckled. “That's Max's pride and joy. He won't let anyone but trained military personnel above the rank of private to touch the thing, so don't ask.”

Izuku nodded several times and stared at the sleek airplane that was half jet fighter and half troop transport.

“MAX!” Tanya yelled and her voice echoed of the walls.

“Workshop!” Max shouted back and they went over to the opened door on the side of the hangar. “Kinoki told me you weren't here.” He said with a grin.

“Did he also tell you I didn't give him an Archie sandwich?” Tanya asked.

“I could barely make out what he was saying!” Max said with a laugh. “What can I not do for you today?”

Tanya took off her backpack and pulled out the four containers with her special ammunition in them. “My friend had a great idea to save us hours and hours of work.” She said and put them on the workbench.

“What are these?” Max asked and opened one and poured out several pewter pellets shaped with points.

“They are ammunition for a toy air rifle from America.” Tanya said as her smile became a little manic.

Max looked at each different type of ammunition. “Do you have some of the normal ones? I can tell you modified these for different uses.”

Tanya pulled out a handful of normal ones. “We've been modifying hundreds of these by hand.”

Max took one of the normal ones and compared them to the others. “You came up with these yourself?”

“We both did.” Tanya said and pointed to each one. “Door-buster. Penetrator. Boomer. Sniper.”

Max looked at them and thought for several moments. “Pewter won't last long as a projectile.”

Tanya nodded. “I can't get a firearm carry license until I'm legal age.”

“Which is a long ways after you can legally become a provisional hero.” Max said. “Did you bring the rifle?”

“No, I can't do anything with it until summer.” Tanya said with a sigh. “If it hadn't taken all damn summer to get here and been held up in customs, I could have been here working on it.”

Max nodded. “They really don't want you with a gun of any kind.”

“It's a good thing it's only a toy and not a gun.” Tanya said and used a thumb to point at Izuku. “Thanks to him giving me some sense.”

Max gave Izuku a glance, saw the nervousness, and chuckled. “Even smart people need another opinion occasionally.”

“Max is in the same boat as us.” Tanya said to Izuku. “No one really gets him unless they are somewhat close in intellectual potential.”

“I'm glad you found someone outside our very small circle of two.” Max said and barked a laugh. “You need me to make a mold?”

“One for each kind and about this big.” Tanya said and held her hands six inches apart. “Two part, fitted to the bottom to keep the same shape and the tops for each kind. We want to use a hand press to make dozens of these things at a time instead of one every ten seconds.”

Max thought about it and looked at the pewter. “That's easily doable... except... your ammo would be inconsistent. It would be the same in the middles of the molds; but, on the outer edges, the less pressure would start producing poor products. I wouldn't trust poor ammunition. Would you?”

Tanya took a deep breath and sighed. “I guess we'll keep doing it by hand.”

Max reached out and touched her shoulder and she looked up at him. “I have a better idea.”

“Don't yank my chain, Max.” Tanya warned and the man chuckled.

“Follow me and watch.” Max said and led the two eleven year old students to the part of the shop that used injection molding machinery. He used the carved pellets to quickly create a reversed mold. It was in two parts, only it was side to side and not top and bottom. He checked it with several measuring tools and cleaned up any slight mistakes from either air or dirt, then he reproduced the molds from the slightly flexible materials into steel.

Max checked them once more and nodded at the clean lines and complete molds. He went back to get the containers and brought them over to an oven-like thing. He opened it up and checked a large stone dish inside, dumped in all four containers of pellets into it and shut the door. A flick of a button and twist of a dial later, the heat from the oven-like thing blasted them.

“What are you doing? We worked for an hour to make all of those!” Izuku said a little angrily.

“I'm showing you what to do.” Max said and a couple of minutes later, the oven-like thing dinged and he put on really thick gloves and picked up a large pair of metal tongs. “Get the door, Tanya.”

Tanya opened the door and stepped back from the heat as Max reached in to grab the stone bowl that was now full of liquid pewter. He carried it over to a machine and slowly poured the metal inside. Surprisingly, the molten metal didn't stick to the stone bowl.

Max quickly put his mold on the bottom of the machine and clamped the separate parts to two swinging brackets. He set the machine up and hit the button, then stepped back as it closed. A couple of seconds later, the machine started to whir and the swinging brackets moved into position and little streams of metal squirted out.

A second later, the brackets moved out, had water sprayed on them and the mold, then the mold popped apart and dropped twelve perfectly formed corkscrew pellets into the emptying tray. The mold closed again and swung under the machine and the process repeated as the used water was recycled and cooled again.

When all of the molten pewter was gone, Max showed them how to clean the machine and then divided the perfect ammunition into the four containers that had been brought in.

“So, what do you think of my idea?” Max asked, smugly.

“Do you want to smack him or should I?” Tanya asked Izuku.

“Go ahead. He'll appreciate it more if it comes from you.” Izuku responded.

“Good point.” Tanya said and jumped slightly to whack the back of Max's head. “Thanks for wasting our time!”

“WHAT? I just saved you tons of time!” Max exclaimed and rubbed his head.

“No, you undid hours of our work to do something we could have brought a giant container of normal pellets to do!” Tanya said and then huffed before sighing. “It works, yes. You also took away all of the ammo we made for testing.”

“We also need to get going to get home before my mom starts to worry. We can't make any more ammo until tomorrow night.” Izuku said.

Tanya let out another huff. “We'll be back next weekend with any modifications that need to be made to that mold and also proper working samples to make the other molds.” She said and put the containers into her backpack. “Let's go Izuku.”

Max watched them walk towards the door, stunned. “W-w-w-wait! My sandwich!”

Tanya paused and seriously considered not handing it over, then sighed again and dug it out of her backpack to give to the man. “I won't have one for you next week.”

“S'fine!” Max said and seemed to bury his face into the sandwich.

Tanya shook her head at the man and took Izuku's hand to lead him out of the academy and to the train station. They arrived at Izuku's home just before his curfew. Inko was quite pleased to see them holding hands and didn't berate them for not calling earlier.