Act 2: Chapter 13 - The Midsummer Festival II (Part 2)
Lunchtime came for the guests of the Midsummer Festival, and our heroes are serving themselves food.
"15 plates of food should be enough." Theron says to himself aloud, literally holding the amount of plates of said food he's carrying.
He then walks over to an empty table and sets them down with the Force gently. After that, he takes a seat and digs in.
When the girls finished serving themselves and noticed Theron's pile of plates on the table, they sweat dropped.
"He's literally eating THAT much food?" Shirai questions in disbelief.
"Well, people do say that they have a second stomach." Uiharu says.
"Tell that to the one who ate over 20 plates in last year's festival." Saten rolls her eyes, recalling one of Yomikawa's Anti-Skill partners getting a stomachache.
"We're going to be over at that table, Saten." Misaka informs. "Go enjoy your date with Theron."
"Right." The Level 0 nods before realizing what she said. "Wait! It's not a-!"
But her friends have already left to find themselves a table to eat lunch at, in which Saten groans in annoyance.
"Great idea, you guys." She sarcastically mumbles with her own plate of food in her hands. "Leaving me alone with him is such a good plan."
Saten walks toward's Theron's table and sits on the other end of it.
"How're you enjoying yourself, Saten?" Theron asks with food in his mouth.
"Good." She answers. "I'm surprised you're eating that much food, Theron."
"Guess I have a second stomach." He shrugs without a care in the world.
"I'm hungry, Touma!" A childish girl's voice exclaims, getting the two teens' attention.
"Come on, Index!" A boy with spiky hair groans in annoyance. "You need to control your appetite! We don't need to keep pressuring Maika from serving you more like last year's festival! There are other people here that need to eat too, ya know!"
"Hey, it's that guy again." Saten said, recognizing the said spiky haired boy.
"Who's that?" The Jedi asks her.
She looks back at Theron after realizing that he's still new around here in Academy City.
"Oh right. Forgot that you're new in this city." She says. "That's the guy I met in last September's Daihasei school sports festival. Touma Kamijou, was it?"
"Wait." He says, immediately recognizing the spiky haired boy. "I think I've seen that guy somewhere before."
"You have?" She excitingly questions him. "Where?"
"On the news. During the final hours of WWIII in October, and that incident in Hawaii a month after." He answers.
"Huh." She says before sitting back down. "Curious."
"What's curious?"
"Oh nothing." She casually shrugs. "It's just that I've heard from Shirai that Misaka sneaked out of Academy City to follow her boyfriend out to those locations you've told me about."
"Boyfriend?" He raises an eyebrow. "There's nothing special about a Japanese boy running around in a warzone, ready to get himself killed in action."
Saten glares at him for what he just said.
"Hey, just because he's a Level 0 doesn't always mean he's Force sensitive like us." She lectures him. "Trust me, I've been there before. And it nearly cost me my own life."
"What do you mean?"
Saten only looks away, not wanting to bring up her troubled past experiences as it still traumatizes her. Somewhat, but still.
"I'm sorry." He apologizes when he sees her face filled with regret and dread. "I shouldn't have asked you that."
"No, no!" She waves her hands defensively. "You have nothing to apologize for. If you don't want to talk about your past with me, then I won't either. At least, until we're ready to do so when that time comes."
"Thanks, Saten." He smiles at her.
"No problem, Theron. What are friends for?" She smiles back at him.
The two then look in the direction of Touma who is with a nun in white attire.
"Who's that nun with him, by the way?"
The rumor hunting girl only shrugs, wondering the same thing as he is.
"Not sure." She shrugs again. "I don't remember seeing her with him. Not to mention, I've never seen a sister from outside Academy City before."
"Isn't there a church here, though?"
"I think so. Something about being a safe haven or an embassy of sorts for its members?"
"Huh." He simply says, a little suspicious of the nun and spiky haired boy. "He does look like a shonen character, though."
"Right?" She agrees with him. "It must be the spiky hair he's sporting. I wonder if he's born like that."
"Saten, this is the real world." He deadpans. "This isn't Dragon Ball."
"Hai, hai." She casually waves his statement off before putting a finger on her lip in speculation. "I wonder what the readers are thinking right now about this?"
"Uh, who are you talking about?" He asks.
"Them."
"Who's them?"
"You know, the-. Actually, nevermind. It's kinda complicated. Though honestly, I'm not sure myself since maybe I'm not breaking the fourth wall at all."
Theron sweat drops at her weirdness.
"Oh, hey there Zapper." Touma said, now noticing Mikoto with all her friends.
"Idio- I mean Touma, I told you to stop calling me that!" Mikoto exclaims with a deep blush on her face, and becoming red as a ruby.
"Oh, hey Mikoto." The young silver haired nun said with a smile.
"Hey Index."
How are they close, you ask? Sometime after last December's incident in England, Touma and Mikoto became closer than before, and both Index and the Railgun no longer hate each other. And by close, I mean them finally becoming a young couple the Kamikoto shippers have been waiting for. Though the reason why Index and Touma aren't together together is because her nun status won't allow her to have a romantic relationship with him, and knows that Mikoto has a better chance to be with the misfortunate boy than the silver haired girl herself, just like Mental Out and all the other girls that ended up falling for him. Thankfully, she and Touma managed to keep it a secret for the time being to avoid the wrath of Shirai's teleportation. And the rest... well, use your own imagination.
"Keep your hands off my Sissy, troglodyte!" Shirai snarls as she leaps forward between the secret couple.
Touma had a look of fear on his face while Mikoto is annoyed with her antics before she electrocutes her, restraining the perverted Teleporter.
"Knock it off, Kuroko!" She lectures while blushing. "I'm sick and tired of you attacking him whenever I'm with him!"
"With him?!" Shirai berates. "No, no, no, no, no, no! It can't be true! Please tell me you're not dating this barbarian!"
"It's not like that at all!"
"Then why call him by his first name then?!"
"Shirai, I swear on my life that she's telling the truth!" Touma lies for his and Mikoto's own sake, blushing. "We're close, but not THAT close. You understand, right?"
"Hmm." Shirai suspiciously eyes the two teens before dropping the subject. "Alright, you two are off the hook as long as you're not thinking about being romantically involved."
The two nervously nod and chuckle at each other. Meanwhile, Saten and Uiharu in relief as Theron's confused.
"Uh, can someone explain what's going on here?" He whispers to the Sakugawa girls.
"Shirai has a love obsession with Misaka, and ends up assaulting Kamijou whenever he's around her." Saten whispers back without Shirai knowing.
"Is that normal?"
"You could say that." Uiharu answers with a sweat drop.
"Well I don't tolerate perversion." He admits, still annoyed by her perverted advancements on Misaka. "She could end up suspended from Judgement if someone saw her like this out in public."
"I'm surprised she hasn't yet." The long haired girl concurs with a shrug.
"And even if Shirai is reported for her behavior, she has little chance of being kicked out of Judgement because of her reputation as a skilled and experienced officer, and that they need her." The Level 1 further states for him.
"But she needs to be made an example. Her actions must have consequences." He points out.
"You have a point, but how can we make her stop?"
Unfortunately, the three that are huddled together are interrupted.
"Uh, what are you three whispering about?" Shirai suspiciously questions.
They perk up in panic and turned around to face her.
"Oh! Uh, nothing! We were just talking about stuff, that's all." Uiharu nervously chuckles.
"Yeah! What Uiharu says!" Saten does the same as her.
"I have spoken." Theron says with his arms crossed.
"Hmm." The Teleporter keeps eyeing them for anything out of the ordinary but sighs and gives up.
Just then, Touma notices Theron and walks up to him.
"Oh, I didn't see you there." The unlucky boy says. "You must be Misaka's new friend that just moved in here.
"Yep! Mikoto told me all about you."
"Everything?" Theron questions as he eyes Mikoto.
She nods to him as she hasn't told Touma about Theron being from space and about the Empire, mainly because he doesn't need to be pressured about it while he's trying to keep his grades from falling behind.
Touma nodded, and the young nun, now known as Index, walked up to Theron and smiled at him.
"Oh, hello there." Theron politely greets.
"Nice to meet you. My name's Index." She greets back.
"Theron Skywalker. A pleasure meeting you too."
...
After lunch, the group are walking down the halls when Theron notices something outside through the window.
"Hey, what's that outside?" Theron asked, while looking outside.
"Oh, that's an auction." Shirai explains.
"I can see that, Shirai" He deadpans.
"They did this last year too." Misaka said.
"And the year before that." Saten butts in. "Though honestly, this is my second time to be at this festival."
"Say, is that Konori?" Theron said, now noticing the Judgment officer outside.
The group looks outside to see Konori carrying more purses in her hands.
"Wha- Again!?" Saten said, shocked.
A few moments later, they went outside to talk to the chief judgement officer.
"Hey there, Konori." Saten greets.
"Wha-? You guys!" Konori exclaims. "And Saten, that's a beautiful dress you have. It suits you."
"Why thank you. By the way, you're getting more purses, I see?"
"Huh?"
"I know it's for charity and all, but I know that's not the only reason." Saten mischievously grins.
Konori was blushing madly from that comment.
"I told you, that's not true!"
"I can tell you're lying. I can read your emotions like Theron, remember?"
"Oh right, I completely forgot." Konori sighed in defeat.
"Saten, please don't tell me you're using your powers for stupid reasons." Theron facepalms at her for misusing the Force for petty reasons.
"Weeeeelllllll... maybe a little." She sheepishly chuckles.
"Wait, I thought Saten was a Level Zero." Touma states in confusion.
Misaka nervously steps in and lies.
"We're talking about her woman's intuition, that's all."
Touma and Index blinked in confusion. They don't get what she means but decided to just accept her answer.
Meanwhile, Theron turns toward the Acution and saw that they started on a bid that caught something interesting in his eyes. However, he quickly looks away when Saten came up next to him.
"You're thinking about bidding on something, Theron?"
"Who me? Nah." He lies. "Don't think I have the money."
"But I saw you having your eyes on those items over there."
"No you didn't." He says before slyly looking at the auction.
"You're doing it again!"
"Nuh uh."
"Yes, you are." Saten deadpans.
"Nope."
"Are you trying to press my buttons?" She questions, annoyed and getting angered by his trolling.
"You didn't see anything." He avoids her question, frustrating the girl even more.
"I don't know what's going on in that head yours, you know."
"We'll start the bidding at 100." The student in charge of the auction announces.
"200!"
"300!"
"400!"
"1000!"
"2,000!"
"3000!"
"4000!"
"2 bits."
Everyone looked at Theron in surprise.
He then tosses a small pouch onto the table on stage that's across him.
"Going once. Twice. and sold, to the young gentleman in the back."
The student then opens it and is shocked in seeing a small amount of Krayt Dragon pearls.
"T-This is-! A single one of these pearls I've never seen before is worth a small fortune." She announces, holding one in her hand.
"WHAT?!!!" Everyone screamed.
Theron walks past the students and walks up on stage before snatching the old relics.
"Have a wonderful day, miss." He grins at the auction girl, being so smug at winning the bid with ease while walking off stage.
Thank his bounty hunting work, though. It took those last few years to earn that amount of Earth money in dollars and convert it into Japanese yen.
"Worth... a small... fortune?" Saten stutters.
"Who knew that you were THAT rich?" Uiharu questions, dumbstrucked.
"I look for work." He shrugs.
Saten then notices the stuff in the opened box. It's mostly books inside.
"Hey Theron, what are those?" She curiously whispers a question to him.
"I'll tell you later." He whispers back at her.
...Soon, the Midsummer Festival was finally over, and Touma and Index are heading back home.
"Nice meeting you, Kamijou." Theron says. "Hope that we meet again."
"Yeah. Me too." He nods with a smile before walking away. "Come on Index, let's head back home."
"Coming, Touma!" The nun answers, following the unlucky boy who accidentally trips on a can in the distance.
"Rotten luck." He laments his trademark catchphrase.
Theron's eye twitches at that unexpected moment.
"Is he gonna be okay?" He asks.
"He'll be fine." Mikoto casually answers. "He's pretty much faced a lot of bad luck in his life. Literally."
"He's THAT unlucky?" He further questions, a bit shocked that he's literally cursed with misfortune.
"I don't know." She shrugs, even though she already knows. "The Idiot always complains about it."
"Now with that ape is gone," Shirai changes the topic. "What's that you're holding, Theron?"
The girls then look at the box the Jedi's holding.
"Do you have somewhere we can look at this from prying eyes?" He suggests in question.
To be continued...