Chapter 2 has made its way to the internet, complete with all the fun of a Sunday morning at a funeral in the rain in the middle of winter.

Chapter 2: That Which Makes People Fear

Don't cause problems, don't reveal your level, and don't let people find out about your power. I'm going to regret promising those three things, but for now I've got to help people as much as I can. With that simple thought, Reimu pulled his Judgment armband from his pocket and ran after Kuroko, using his "Instant Destruction" to propel himself using small mid-air explosions. But the people who will regret those promises the most are the fools who don't realize that my power keeps evolving even when they aren't watching me.

"Let's go Kouji-san!" Kuroko shouted as she landed on the ground after teleporting again, quite obviously put her power to better use than Reimu's.

"It's not my fault I can't teleport!" Reimu shouted back, now slightly irritated that she was taking her own irritation out on him.

"Then learn how to! That alarm already shut off, which means our culprit is starting to get away!"

"Then calm down. The problem won't get solved any faster if you're just rushing about without a plan."

"How can you spout that philosophical crap at a time like this?"

"Because it's actually useful at times like this."

Kuroko stopped at his words at turned to face him with a glare that would've made a normal person regret having been born.

"Think about this logically for a minute. If you're running around without truly knowing where you're going, do you really think you'll be able to solve the problem?"

"I-I guess not…" Kuroko looked at the ground at her feet, slightly embarrassed that he had noticed something she hadn't when she was his senior. "What should we do?"

"You're going to face that wall until I say you can look at me again, and I'm going to do something really quick." Reimu stated without trying to sound too mean to her, pointing at a random wall nearby.

Kuroko did as she was told, though she was obviously confused by what he was trying to accomplish. Once Reimu was assured that Kuroko wouldn't look, he closed his eyes for a moment and activated another ability, "Radar Field", and pinpointed two people moving about while the city was under lockdown.

He opened his eyes and gently tapped Kuroko on the shoulder before bringing out a slightly crumpled map and pointing to a seemingly random spot on it.

"I say we start searching here coming from this side. How close can you get us?"

"From here? About…" Kuroko quickly searched the map for where they were, then pointed to a spot a little more than halfway to their destination. "The closest I can get us in a single jump is here, but it would make me too tired to be useful if we need to fight."

"Then I'll fight for you. I'm a member of Judgment too, and this is a part of our job."

"Then if you can handle our little friend, I can make two jumps and give you a decent advantage if want to ambush him."

"I'll need as much height as possible to attack safely in an ambush…"

"Well then…" Without finishing her sentence, Kuroko teleported away, landed, then teleported again, looking significantly tired and almost on the verge of passing out where she stood.

"Thanks Kuroko. Stay here and rest a bit, and I'll be back in a few minutes with our culprit." Reimu said as he walked toward the edge of the building they were on, waiting for his target to show up.

"Let's have some fun…" Reimu muttered to himself as a dark smile crossed his face when he noticed a pair of people running toward him. "Wait a minute…"

The two people running toward him were already fighting each other as they went, though it looked pretty one sided from Reimu's perspective. The person he recognized immediately was blasting the other with electric charges and swinging around a whip of vibrating iron.

Reimu jumped down from the rooftop and landed in front of the pair, stopping their momentum in a matter of seconds.

"Hello again Misaka-senpai. It's nice to see that you've done a fair bit of my work for me." Reimu said with his dark smile still plastered across his face. "And I don't think I've meet you before, but you seem to have a fair amount of power yourself if you can block Misaka-senpai's attacks so easily."

The unknown boy merely walked forward and laughed.

"His name is Accelerator, and he's far out of your league." Mikoto said, trying to find a point to attack the boy she was referring to.

"I regret to inform you Number 15, but I'm far better than Number 2." Reimu replied.

"Number 15? I'm the 3rd strongest in Academy City, so how did I end up at 15?"

"Simple. I was talking about your strength compared to other Level 5's in the world."

"So he's the 2nd strongest Level 5 in the world?" Mikoto asked Reimu, looking at him like he had spontaneously sprouted four extra heads.

"Correct. But that's only referring to Level 5's."

"What do yo-" Mikoto was cut off midsentence when a portion of the building near Accelerator exploded without warning.

"It'd be a good idea ta not attack your elders like that kid." Accelerator was looking directly at Reimu, not having moved in the slightest during the explosion.

"'Vector Transformation'? That's all your ability is?" Reimu broke down into hysterical laughter. "The third strongest esper in the world really has that as his power?"

"Third? I thought you said he was the 2nd strongest?" Mikoto asked, her confusion growing by the second.

"I said he was the 2nd strongest Level 5, didn't I?" Reimu replied, fighting back his laughter just long enough to reply.

"Then that means… They didn't!"

"Nobody made one Misaka-senpai. It was a natural creation through birth, not science or training."

Mikoto covered her face in her hands and curled up, still not sure how to deal with what he had just confirmed. After all, just 4 years ago, she was forced to stop Accelerator from becoming a Level 6, and now there was one in her school, helping Judgment, and laughing psychotically in front of her.

"Level 6…" She said slowly, still not truly believing his story.

Reimu stopped laughing completely and looked directly at Mikoto. "Yes, that is how most people refer to me. Let me reintroduce myself. I am Kouji Reimu, also known as Adapter, and I am both a Gemstone and the world's only Level 6 in existence." He smiled slightly, but didn't do much else, obviously waiting for someone else to make the first move.

Mikoto was the first person to snap and attempted to blast Reimu with a bolt of electricity, which he easily deflected in a similar manner to Accelerator, surprising everyone in the area.

"I'm breaking a promise by showing you my real power, but I already broke the same promise when you guys figured out my real level… Oh well…" His smile darkened slightly. "My power is the ability to use any power I've seen in person at the same strength as a Level 5. Of course, it wouldn't be fun if I knew everything about the powers I manipulate, but I can use those copied powers as long as my body can hold out, whenever I feel the need to use them."

"Then does tha-"

"No, Misaka-senpai. I'm not a Multi-skill. I merely copy the basic abilities of a person when they use their powers in front of me, then I toy with those powers by myself to find out how those powers work and what applications they have in certain situations."

"Ya know, I'm gettin' kinda tired of you explainin' shit all the time. Just fight like a real man and let's see if your half-ass power is legit!" Accelerator shouted at Reimu before knocking over a palette of concrete blocks that were nearby, sending them toward Reimu at high speed.

"Normally…" Reimu started speaking, but then was forced to focus more on calculating Accelerator's ability and reapplying his over it, essentially stopping the concrete blocks in midair between them. "I'd just blow scum like you to dust and be done with it, but I have a feeling that none of my good exploding abilities would be able to touch you…"

"Then try! I'll even let you have a few potshots at me, just to test your theory."

Reimu's smile darkened even more at those words, then he disappeared.

"I lied earlier when I said I didn't know about your guy's powers. One of the first powers I copied was an ability known as "Perfect Check", and unfortunately for you, it allows me to slowly understand everything about any ability I see as long as I'm looking at it being used in person. Which is a bad thing for you Accelerator, because you have your ability active at all times, giving me plenty of time to fully comprehend your ability while we were talking."

"And you think I care?"

"I did say 'everything', correct? I do believe that everything includes weaknesses."

"Motherfu-"

Accelerator was interrupted by a massive explosion directly beneath him, giving him just enough time to back up and force the explosion away with his ability.

"You know, I used to have this really good friend of mine when I was younger. His ability was spatial distortions, but he remained no higher than Level 2 for the rest of his short life. Unfortunately, I was the once that helped him reach Level 2, so what do you think my next attack will involve?" Reimu asked as he raised his hand and slowly lowered it a fraction of an inch with his palm down. The simple motion was enough for the gravity in the nearby area to rip apart anything within a few feet of Reimu, but it didn't seem very effective on Accelerator, who was merely having a problem trying to keep from slouching too much.

"I already told ya to shut up and fight!"

I think he's the first person I've legitimately pissed off in this city. Not that I've been trying to make everyone hate me in the first place, but this guy obviously can't take a joke and has no patience for me explaining what my abilities do so he can counter them… Or maybe he's just that stupid and ignorant… Or he might be faking it…

A sudden blast of lightning woke Reimu from his thoughts, forcing him to move away quickly and lose his concentration on slowly crushing Accelerator.

"Misaka-senpai, I'd prefer it if you waited until I'm finished with your boyfriend to blow me up."

"He's not my boyfriend!"

If he wasn't someone you cared about, you'd've probably just blow us both up with ease. After all…

Reimu's thoughts were interrupted once more when he noticed Mikoto searching her pockets for something.

"Railgun… I can't match its power… Not in my current state…" He muttered softly before teleporting away.

"I'm just happy nobody got hurt too much yesterday." Reimu told Kuroko, trying to keep the details of the fight to a minimum for her.

"So you're saying that Onee-sama was chasing after Accelerator and you jumped in to help her, but then she attacked you for no reason and you were forced to leave?"

"If I told you I have a good idea of what her reason for attacking me was, would you believe me?"

"At this point, yes."

"I'm pretty sure she likes Acc-"

"Who likes who?" Mikoto asked, walking into the classroom and causing mass chaos at her sudden appearance amongst the second years.

"Eh… Ur… Nothing… I was explaining how this interesting product makes women's skin look 10 years younger, and I thought you might like it."

"Are you saying I look old?"

"I was merely trying to help you girls keep your beautiful skin looking as pretty as possible, even if you don't need the extra help right now."

Mikoto took a few seconds to watch Reimu, though his expression hadn't changed from its bored looking state since she had come in, so she figured it'd be best to drop the conversation.

"You know, you kinda make me want to hit you every time you say something now…"

"Now, now, Misaka-senpai. You should know why that's a bad idea."

"Oh? Care to explain why I should know?"

"Because your boyfriend let me see his power yesterday."

"I forgot about that… And you're sure I can't find a way around his power?"

"Not within the next few minutes that doesn't involve destroying the school or hurting my classmates."

Mikoto glared at Reimu. He was right, and she didn't like it.

"Wait, Onee-sama got a boyfriend? What blasphemy are you creating Kouji-san?"

"It was merely a joke Shirai-san. Mikoto and Accelerator were playing with me yesterday, remember? They seemed to be having a good time together too."

Kuroko's mind couldn't hold back the flow of fantasies, and her expression quickly adapted to the overflowing perversion. "Onee-sama…"

"4 years and you haven't changed at all Kuroko." Mikoto stated the obvious before returning to her classroom as the bell rang overhead.

Quite honestly, messing with Misaka-senpai is just too fun… I just wish she could take a joke every so often. Then again, she's had to deal with Shirai-san long enough that she probably can't handle jokes at all… At least Shirai-san is cute…

"You can't just do it like that! You have to start with the tip and slowly move toward the base!"

"I'd prefer it if you made the instructions for cutting carrots a little harder to misunderstand Shirai-san."

"Hmm?"

"Never mind. There's not much point in trying to make you stop anyway…" Reimu said with an exasperated sigh as he finished cutting the carrot in front of him and shoveled it into the pan on the stove between them to make room on the cutting board for preparing a potato.

"I still didn't hear what you said the first time."

"I said that you should help out more instead of watching me cook."

"But I didn't learn to cook, and you seem to know more about the kitchen than most of the girls here…"

"You try living without parents and having a job at Judgment for 10 years. You'll find out quickly that you have to feed yourself or you go for days without eating."

"But couldn't yo-"

"Food's more expense in America." Reimu said flatly as the knife in his hand made an ominous noise as it cut the potato in half.

"I'm sorry…"

"You didn't do anything wrong."

"But I made you mad, didn't I?"

"Not really. It was just a hard potato." Reimu handed Kuroko half of the potato, quickly confirming his words.

"I still shouldn't have brought it up…"

"You didn't know, so don't worry about it."

"But I-"

"Just stop… I don't want or need your apologies right now. I just want to get our curry made and eat before I go crazy from the scent."

Reimu woke up the next morning looking like he had been in a fight with a hurricane, and his bed looked more like a small pile of smoldering wood and shredded blankets than a place to sleep.

Looks like it's started again… "Adaption Overload"…

"Well that was total bullshit. I only got a handful of lines, and most of them were me bitching about that one kid trying to sound smart whenever he explained how he's a Level 6. It doesn't matter what you know or what level you are, what matters is that you can kill someone with your power! And you all thought I was gonna be philosophical today…"

Thank you Accelerator… That was… lovely. Anyways, I managed to type out Chapter 2 far faster than I thought I would, considering how many other fanfics I'm working on right now. Reimu gave up on keeping his promise to the scientists who "raised" him, but he might have found something else instead. And oh god it's going to be fun messing with Mikoto and Accelerator until I decide to bring them together.

I figured having Kuroko not knowing how to cook would make for a fun little scene later on involving private lessons, but I couldn't resist letting her little delusional world leak out every so often just to have a chance to show everyone's reactions to Kuroko being Kuroko (just wait until you find out what a legitimate reaction from Reimu involves and you'll understand what I mean).

All in all, this chapter flowed fairly well despite the constant scene changes. And while I do realize that the manga states that Kuroko's range for teleportation is about 80 meters, that was also when she was younger, so I figured I'd give her a small power boost (because two consecutive 200 meter jumps are what I consider small for 4 years of practice).

"Just shut up. You're as bad as that kid, and it's starting to piss me off."

Please review if you can, and look forward to questions being answered in the next chapter if I can answer them.