Author's Note: Here it is! Just like I promised, within a week of the last one because I got the reviews I wanted. It's actually done in a day which is a personal record.
Now I know some of you are wondering why if I can write a chapter in a day I normally take so long to update. However this is not a normal situation, there were two reasons I could do this. First of all I had a day off and I devoted the entire thing to writing and proofreading this. And secondly I had been envisioning this chapter for a long time so I didn't even get a seconds worth of writers block.
I hope you enjoy the chapter
Yuriko caught up to Kamijou quickly. It required wasting some of her precious battery power to fly, but it was worth it if it meant Kamijou didn't have to face Kumagawa alone. "Are you okay?" Was the first thing that she asked him. He was covered in bruises and his limp had gotten much worse.
"I'm fine." He reassured her. He glanced her over, obviously looking for injuries, and Yuriko tried to pretend that she wasn't hurt in any way. "What happened to you?" He stopped walking to ask. He was looking at her mouth with worry.
With a frown Yuriko remembered that she had been hit in the face by the man whose power could get around her reflection. She wiped her mouth with her arm and to her surprise there was blood. She was so unused to getting injured she hadn't even thought to check. "I'm fine." She assured him.
"You're bleeding."
"So are you."
"I…don't want you to get hurt." Touma said.
Yuriko's heart skipped a beat when he said it but she didn't back down. "I can handle myself." She said stubbornly. She walked past him without waiting for him to follow.
He seemed to agonize over the decision for a minute before he suddenly caught up to her. She didn't know where the sudden protectiveness had come from but she was hoping it was a good sign. She leaned on him a little for support as she had forgotten to pick up her cane in her rush. They walked in stoic, but not unfriendly, silence the rest of the way.
As they grew closer Yuriko began to hear something, a sort of buzzing that grew louder as she grew closer. "Electricity?" She realized.
"Electricity?" Kamijou echoed. "Is Misaka somehow involved?"
Yuriko felt a bit of sadness at how immediately his thoughts jumped to Misaka Mikoto, but she was too worried to focus on it. WORST had been injured, and if WORST had been here then that might mean Last Order was nearby as well. They picked up their pace.
What they found was different than what they expected. Instead of finding Kumagawa hurting Last Order or Misaka Mikoto, they found one of the Misaka sisters kneeling over Kumagawa and delivering a constant stream of electricity. Yuriko was about to smile with relief when the Misaka sister fell over and Kumagawa stood up without a scratch on him. Yuriko hit the switch on her collar immediately.
[I guess this was a loss huh?] Kumagawa said. He sounded bored, like he hadn't just been within an inch of death.
"…Get away from her." Kamijou said. When Kumagawa didn't respond he added "Get the hell away from Misaka Imouto. Can you not hear me?" with anger practically steaming out of him like in a cartoon.
For a split second Yuriko was suddenly thrown back in time. Those had been the exact same words he had once said to her as she stood over a Misaka clone about to kill it. For all she knew it was even the same one. Was this what she had looked like? Standing there while an innocent person suffered without a care in the world? Had she really been this cold, this cruel?
Yes she had been. She had been far worse than Kumagawa. She had soaked herself in so much blood she was still surprised she hadn't drowned in it. But that didn't matter now. She would never be truly forgiven for her crimes not by the people who mattered, the clones she had killed, but that didn't matter. Regardless of whether she was a good person or a bad one, a hero or a villain, she was still going to save that Misaka clone and protect herself and Kamijou.
Yuriko snapped back to the present as Kumagawa spoke. [Shouldn't you be telling her to get away from me?] He asked. [You saw how she was attacking me after all.]
"Shut up." Yuriko told him. Kumagawa liked to talk but she had no intention of listening to him.
[Ah, shouldn't you be falling over right now, Accelerator-san?] Kumagawa asked her. [I just made your battery into nothing.]
"You can only affect my battery and not me because my battery isn't a part of me right?" Yuriko explained. "So all I had to do was accept this collar as part of my personal reality.
[Is it really so easy to do something like that? Wouldn't that mean that that collar is now a part of you? That you could never be separated from it again, even if a miracle restored your brain to full power?]
Yuriko felt no hesitation as she answered. "As if that matters. I have already accepted that I will wear this collar for the rest of my life."
[…Things like that are what makes me hate you.] Kumagawa frowned.
"Just tell me why you are doing this!" Kamijou demanded from Kumagawa. "You and all those other people, why do you feel the need to attack us?!"
[…Kamijou-kun…If you saw someone about to die in front of you what would you do?]
"I would save them of course." Kamijou responded without hesitation.
[I see, I see. It's that sort of answer that makes me hate you so much.]
"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"
[Accelerator-san.] Kumagawa said, completely ignoring Kamijou's question. [Why are you able to save people? Shouldn't someone like you who has been a killer for so long be unable to save anybody?]
"…As if that matters." Yuriko told him.
[It's because of that that I hate you.] Kumagawa was giving off an aura of foulness and hatred that almost made Yuriko want to cower. [I hate people like you who can save people when I can't! I hate people who can get over their dark past when I can't get over mine! I hate how you can be strong when I'm weak! I HATE PEOPLE WHO CAN BE HAPPY WHEN I'M MISERABLE!]
Kumagawa's screws stabbed at Yuriko's body. Her reflection broke them effortlessly, but it didn't matter. Kumagawa was gone before she could retaliate, and Kamijou let out a cry as Kumagawa stabbed two giant screws into his body.
Even with that Kamijou did not give up. He touched the screws with his right hand almost immediately after they pierced into him, causing them to shatter. His body was already stabbed into, but he had stopped the attack before it had gotten life threatening.
[I guess it's pointless.] Kumagawa admitted. [Accelerator can block my power effortlessly and you just have to touch my power to negate it. I suppose it's impossible for me to win after all.]
"So you're going to stop fighting?" Kamijou questioned.
Yuriko didn't believe that. Kumagawa still had his malevolent scowl. She would have to-
Kumagawa clapped his hands. The world shuddered.
Yuriko couldn't see. She wasn't blind, she didn't have her eyes covered or closed, and it was the middle of the day. But she still couldn't see. It was just so dark. There wasn't a single shred of light anywhere to illuminate things.
[Even if I can't make you into nothing I can still make the things around you disappear.]
"Did… did you make light into nothing?" Yuriko squeaked out. She couldn't move, she couldn't even turn her head. It was just so absurd. It was like they were children in a fistfight and one of the children had just revealed that he had a gun. The difference in power was overwhelming. Yuriko was absolutely paralyzed with fear.
"Why isn't my hand negating it?" Kamijou asked. He was laughing nervously, likely as overwhelmed as Yuriko was. "I should be able to erase any thing supernatural my hand touches so why…?"
[Of course that's because you aren't touching the light Kamijou-kun. You can negate anything supernatural you touch, so obviously if there is nothing left to touch your power will become worthless.]
"This… this is insane!" Yuriko yelled. The aura of Kumagawa had finally overwhelmed her. "You'll die! Everybody will die! Every plant, every tree, everything will die!"
[That's fine Accelerator. Now the whole world is finally like me. Unable to grow. Unable to live in the light. Unable to be happy.]
Yuriko attacked him more out of desperation than anything else. She didn't suddenly gain the courage to stand up to a monster who was far stronger than she. She didn't have a sudden inspiration that made her believe she could win. She just attacked because she felt it was the only thing left that she could do.
She kicked with her foot in the direction Kumagawa had spoken from. As she did so her foot collided with a tiny pebble. Her power accelerated that pebble to almost impossible speeds. It was faster and more powerful than the railgun that the number three could send out, and infinitely quicker to use. Of course it hit Kumagawa, and of course he wasn't able to block it.
Yuriko listened as Kumagawa died. She didn't want to kill him, she didn't want to kill anybody anymore. She was even aware that he would come back to life in a second. Her mind had just grasped onto the thought that if he brought himself back to life maybe he would have to bring the light back as well. She was like a cornered animal, unable to think clearly, merely grasping at straws.
[That was painful, Accelerator.]
The sound of his voice was one of the most devastating things she had ever heard. She fell to her knees. She had lost all will to fight. She had lost.
"Turned light into nothing?" Kamijou's voice cut through Yuriko's despair like light through the darkness. "As if I would ever allow that to happen!"
Yuriko couldn't see it of course but she knew what happened. Kamijou ran towards Kumagawa and punched him in the face just like he had to so many others. Regardless of the fact that he couldn't see, regardless of the fact that Kumagawa was capable of so much, still Kamijou ran towards him.
There was a sound of shattering glass and suddenly Yuriko could see again. Light had returned to the world as though it had never been gone.
"Are you insane?!" Kamijou demanded. He relentlessly punched Kumagawa again and again. "How many people do you think you just killed?! How many people just died in accidents?!"
[Don't be silly Kamijou-kun.] Kumagawa effortlessly denied. [If I can make light into nothing than surely I can make a little thing like 'accidents' into nothing. Oh but since you punched me that's no longer in place so I suppose that people might be dying again now.]
"You… you can erase light from existence, you can even erase things like accidents from existence, but you still call yourself weak?" Kamijou asked in bewilderment.
[I don't expect someone like you to understand!] Kumagawa shouted. Screws appeared in his hands and moved towards Kamijou far too fast for him to dodge. However this time Yuriko was ready and the screws were knocked out of his hand by the wind before he could stab Kamijou.
Yuriko stood up. Just because she had given into despair earlier did not mean that she couldn't get back up now.
Yuriko's formed her four black tornadoes onto her back again and flew at Kumagawa. He dodged with impossibly fast speed but that didn't matter. She still had control of the wind and she grabbed him with it. She chucked him up into the air, twice as high as the tallest building in Academy City, and caught up to him to deliver a punch that easily shattered his bones.
Then she started to really attack him. Yuriko was the #1 esper in Academy City. Even if she couldn't do something as ridiculous as turning light into nothing that didn't mean she wasn't still powerful. She used every trick she had ever even half thought of on Kumagawa, regardless of how impractical, hoping that eventually something would stick. There was a reason that her control of vectors was so feared, and that was that it effectively allowed her to control almost everything.
Wind ripped his flesh from his bones, her hands tore off limbs with ease, she reversed the flow of his blood, suffocated him, drained all moisture from him, broke every bone in his body, and more. Yuriko used everything she had ever even conceived of, every dark thought, every idle musing, and every carefully practiced move. She delivered such horrors onto him that any onlooker would have thought she was some sort of professional torturer.
And through it all Kumagawa just glared at her. [If I hadn't made my sense of pain into nothing I would have gone delirious from it by now.] He informed her.
Yuriko felt despair as she realized what that meant, that all of her efforts had been for nothing. However this time she did not kneel to that thought, she just wracked her brain for some way to get around it. She had fought someone stronger than him once. That inhuman thing known as Aiwass had once appeared before her, and although it had not done something like removing light from the world she still knew that it was more powerful than Kumagawa was. If she could stand up to Aiwass she could stand up to Kumagawa.
[I wonder what would happen if I turned the wind into nothing?] Kumagawa asked.
Just like that he and Yuriko fell. She lost her wings, which were created by controlling the wind, and plummeted to the earth. For a brief moment she thought she would die, but she managed to survive by slowing down the vector of her fall so that she descended slowly enough that she wouldn't be hurt. Kumagawa on the other hand took no such precaution and hit the ground like a stone.
Kamijou caught Yuriko in his arms like a princess before she could hit the ground. He was blushing at her and she realized he had likely just seen the very lacy red panties she was wearing. She answered his blush with one of his own. Even so she lingered in his arms for a few seconds before hopping out so that she could stare down Kumagawa.
[So you two can even get into a romantic comedy moment at a time like this huh?] Kumagawa said. As expected he was completely unharmed. He didn't say it with a smile like he would have before. He had not stopped scowling at them since the fight had begun.
"So you can even turn something as abstract as the wind into nothing huh? How the hell is someone like you 'weak'?" She shot back.
[There is no limit to my power. I am someone who has to be careful not to erase this world itself.]
He had made the claim that he could erase the world before but this was the first time that Yuriko believed it.
"Those other people… who attacked me and Yuriko. Are they like you?"
[Yes. We are minuses. People who can only make the world worse. No matter what we do we will only end up making whatever situation we end up in worse. If we tried to save someone we would only end up causing more deaths, if we tried to protect ourselves we would only end up getting ourselves hurt, and if we tried to live a happy life we would only make everyone miserable.]
"…I don't get that." Kamijou said honestly. "I don't get how someone as strong as you thinks he can't help anyone."
"Of course you don't!" A voice yelled from behind Kumagawa. It was a woman, with long black hair and bandages on her arms. Yuriko didn't recognize her but Kamijou obviously did from his startled reaction. "How can people like you who are capable of overcoming your problems hope to understand people like us who can only fail?!"
"People like you have no idea what kind of suffering we have to go through!" Another voice yelled out. This person also appeared from behind Kumagawa, and this one Yuriko recognized. He was the one whose power was capable of hitting her. She would have been alarmed but he was still so obviously shaken up she highly doubted he would be of any use in a fight. "Have you ever seen the look of derision a girl you have failed to save gives you?! Have you ever tried with all your might to succeed and only been able to hurt yourself?!"
"Have you ever had to try to explain away your bruises from your parent's beatings?!" The woman cut in.
"Have you ever had to lick the heel of a perverted teacher?!"
"Have you ever had to have everyone you love as an enemy?!"
"…No." Kamijou answered sadly. "I have never had to face those things however… it's not like those things have to make you into something like a 'minus'! If a girl can't be thankful for your best effort than that is her fault! If you can't succeed at one thing no matter what then just do another! If your parents bruised you then blame them! If you have a perverted teacher then they are the one in the wrong! If everyone you love makes you their enemy then you are still innocent. Things that other people do to you are not something that can ever make you worthless! Even if you fail at things you still have worth as a person! So don't call yourselves something as derogatory as a minus!" He yelled with all his might. He poured his heart and soul into the speech as if he was trying to save them just by using it.
"As if that kind of idealistic speech would work on a minus." The man said. With that he and the girl collapsed onto the ground. Yuriko didn't know what was wrong with the girl but the man was obviously still shaken up.
[…So minuses like us can't even give a dramatic speech to help our comrade properly huh?] Kumagawa mused to himself as he looked at his fallen allies.
"Kumagawa… tell me why you're fighting us." Kamijou demanded. "Stop jumping around the question and trying to sound cool! Just tell me your honest reason!"
For a long time there was silence.
"I want to beat you!" Kumagawa erupted. Yuriko and Touma jumped back at the way he spoke. He sounded like a normal, angry, human. It was probably the most genuine thing he had said in a long time. "I want to beat you! Even though I'm not cool, or strong, or just. I want to beat people like you who can only be described as cool, strong, and just! Even though I'm not smart, even though I have no natural talent, even though I am always hated, I want to beat people like you who are smart, talented, and liked! I want to beat people who can win even when I can't! Even if I'm hated, even if I'm despised, even if I'm useless, I want to prove that I'm better than you heroes!"
A screw appeared in Kumagawa's hand. Impossibly it stretched until it was twice as long and half as wide as his normal ones.
He stabbed it into Yuriko.
Even though Yuriko's power could deflect his, even though Yuriko's barrier was absolute, even though Yuriko couldn't even be harmed by a nuke, Kumagawa still managed to stab her.
Yuriko instantly lost all hope. Everything seemed so... pointless. So meaningless. She knew with absolute certainty that no matter what she tried it would fail. She couldn't reason out why this was happening to her. Her dizzying intellect that had earned her the spot as Academy City's number one was gone. Her absolute power that could control anything she touched was gone.
"What the hell did you do to her?" Kamijou demanded. He ran towards her but this time Yuriko wasn't able to protect him when Kumagawa moved faster than humanly possible and stabbed him in the chest with a giant screw. It went all the way through Kamijou this time, and Kamijou wasn't stupid enough to negate it and be stuck with a giant hole in his body.
"Book maker." Kumagawa told them. His horrible aura had tripled in strength since he had started speaking normally "It's one of my skills. It makes people just like me. As stupid as me, as weak as me, and as worthless of me."
Even though Yuriko was not as smart as she was normally she was still able to pick up on what that meant. "Multi-skill?" She asked. "That's supposed to be impossible." She was staring at Kumagawa as she spoke. She felt like she still didn't understand something about him, something that would make this whole situation click into place once she learned it.
"I merely made that restriction into 'nothing'" With that simple sentence Kumagawa threw away one of the very foundations that Academy City's society stood upon.
"How can you do something like that and still call yourself weak?" Kamijou asked in blatant disbelief. He tried to rise from his knees but the screw imbedded in him obviously hurt too much to allow him to.
"It is impossible to grow stronger by taking something away. Even by removing that restriction I have only gained the ability to make other people as weak as I am."
"I don't understand." Kamijou said. "But if you think that I'm going to let you hurt Yuriko because of something like that then I'll break that illusion!"
Impossibly Kamijou stood up. Even though he had a screw sticking through him, even though he was covered in bruises, even though he was still limping from his toe, he still stood up. He punched Kumagawa with all his might and the wind returned, but Kumagawa didn't even look shaken.
Yuriko laughed. It was not a laugh filled with malice, or mockery, or desperation. It was pure and beautiful like a young child.
Kamijou and Kumagawa looked at her like she was crazy but Yuriko was beyond caring. She finally, finally understood. Wings as pure as snow appeared on her back and a halo of the same colour appeared on her head. This was the angel like transformation that Yuriko had only undergone once before, near the end of the hell that had been World War Three. The screw in her body broke apart and vanished without leaving a mark.
"The fact that you can still pull a dramatic turnaround at this point is one of the things I hate about you." Kumagawa told her.
"Kumagawa." Yuriko said. There was no malice or content in her voice, only compassion. "You think that because your power only takes away from the world you are weak."
"Of course it does."
Even if Kumagawa made his injuries into nothing, even if he made himself faster by making his 'limit' into nothing, even if he even erased the absolute barrier of only having one skill that all espers had to face he still would only be left with the impression of having lost something. Regardless of what spectacular things he did the thought that he had 'lost' something would still overwhelm him. This was what truly prevented Kumagawa from leaving the life of a minus behind. Every time he fought someone, every time he protected someone, and every time he used his power, Kumagawa would only get weaker. That was what he meant when he said he was unable to grow.
"However this love that I have is not something that can be made into nothing." Yuriko assured him.
"Love?" Kamijou asked stupidly.
No longer feeling nervous Yuriko calmly walked over to Kamijou and kissed him. It was long and sweet despite his obvious surprise. When she pulled back he just looked at her in shock. "I love you Touma." She told him. She finally fully understood her own feelings enough to say without a doubt that she did love him. In a way she had been in love with him since they had first met when he had stopped her from killing anymore Sisters.
She gave Touma's lips one quick more peck, and turned to face Kumagawa for the last time. "I'll teach you Kumagawa. I'll teach you how to be strong."
Yuriko swung her pure white wings at Kumagawa and they hit him. Had she been using her full strength that she had used to stop whatever had descended from that fortress in the sky back in Russia he would have died. However Yuriko was in complete control of her power and all that happened to Kumagawa was him getting hurt. Not injured, but hurt.
Kumagawa fought with Yuriko and for once in his life his power was of no use. He couldn't make her wings into nothing, he couldn't escape by making his speed limit into nothing, and he couldn't stop her by erasing light, wind, or sound. Even if he erased the world itself Yuriko would still be able to fight him.
Yuriko attacked Kumagawa with a shove of her wings, and Kumagawa learned how to set his feet.
Yuriko hit Kumagawa with an attack that hurt him without leaving injuries to erase, and Kumagawa learned how deal with pain.
Yuriko attacked Kumagawa in a pattern, and Kumagawa learned how to think quickly and reasonably in battle.
Yuriko gave Kumagawa an opening, and Kumagawa learned how to attack.
For the first time Kumagawa who had easily made all his stepping stones into nothing was forced to climb them. For the first time in his life Kumagawa grew.
"Take this strength I have given you and use it to grow even more! Use it to grow the other minuses as well! Only someone like you can understand them enough to teach them!" Yuriko yelled as she made one final swing of her wings.
"I will." Was all the reply she got.
Yuriko swung her wings and Kumagawa learned how to grow stronger from a loss.
Author's Note: So that's the final chapter. No I'm not ending it like that, with the Touma/Yuriko situation not completely resolved. There will be an epilogue.
There will also be (*insert drum roll here*) a sequel. However this will not be for a while. I plan on writing a bunch of one-shots between now and then so it will be a while. Also the next story will not be a To Aru/Medaka Box crossover but a To Aru/Hidan no Aria crossover. I'm sorry Medaka Box fans but my plan is to write a trilogy of To Aru crossovers each of which focus on a specific part of Yuriko and Touma's relationship. This one focused on it starting, the second will focus on the first stages (the can't keep their hands off each other stage included) as well as Yuriko having to come to terms with the reality of Touma's life (explaining he knows about and is involved with a secret society of magic will be hard to explain as will the disappears randomly with no warning, and being very close to several attractive women things), and the third will focus on the serious long term relationship stage.
Kumagawa's reasoning was a little different from the original manga but I wanted to avoid a copy-paste of that so I changed it up a little. I don't think that the whole "feels like he is losing something" thing is too much of a stretch though and I hope you all enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed writing it.
The only impression I got from Accelerator's angel-stage personality was "kind and honest" so that's what I used here.
