AN: (Parentheses and underline): (Author's point of view as if he was a reader)
Underline: Actual author's speech
Italics: English in both dialogue and exposition
Normal text: Japanese and exposition Do you expect me to write sissy instead of Onee-sama? No way. I'm a purist. Somewhat at least.
Also, I do use the kanji for one 一 -Ichi, courtesy of Google Translate- to show the passage of time. If you see 2 of these bad boys then oh boy did the time pass. -I tried other methods, but seemingly this website, which also doesn't allow me to write its own name, doesn't want me to express my artistic freedom...-
Chapter 1: The Schrödinger-Kerr collision
August 17th
It was a wonderful starry night outside. Couples could be seen stargazing everywhere. Everything was quiet and peace-
一
*Boom*
一
An explosion could be heard coming from the Geomagnetic Anomaly Research Laboratory. There was a lot of smoke and anyone close to the facility could have heard screams. However, if they did, they would be very surprised. Those would not be the screams of someone getting killed and begging for mercy. And there were no terrorists in sight. You could only see two young people bickering amongst themselves. One of them was a young girl who was around 14 with chestnut coloured hair and brown eyes. Many Academy City inhabitants would immediately recognize her. After all, she's the Railgun herself! But who was the man in front of her?
"I am the great mad scientist… Hou~~ouin~~ Kyoma!" The scruffy-looking man, who has black hair and brown eyes and wore a lab coat, baffles the girl with his antics. She looks completely dumbstruck, even more so than when her level 0 fighting partner does something that makes her question if she loves him.
He immediately continues "Introduce yourself! Are you an Agent from the Organization!?" He brings out a phone, but does not turn it on "Yes, it's me… Understood… Judging from the sparks you emit, girl, from this now on I shall call you by your code name." (Hmm… what's a good one… Oh, I know! Electricity kiddo! Hey, at least she won't get mad at him. Girls hate bad namecalling, right?) "Biri-Biri!" (Yep, probably a bad choice in hindsight, sir) He pauses and while he does sparks start appearing all around him "Any questions!?"
He looks over to the girl. Needless to say that the look on the melodramatic, 177cm tall man changes instantly. "Like I said… My name is not Biri-Biri… It's Misaka Mikoto!" shouts Misaka Mikoto, sending a big wave of electricity at the poor soul in front of her.
"Sorry! Terribly sorry! Please forgive me!" 'Hououin Kyoma' shouts back at Misaka, while doing a Japanese 90-degree bow.
He then starts stating his real identity seemingly faster than the speed of light in the hope that he finishes his speech before electricity burns him to a crisp "My name is Okabe Rintaro, born December 14th, 1991, Male, Student of Tokyo Denki University! Never have I wished to inflict any verbal or physical harm to a wonderful lady such as yourself. And please forgive this Okabe Rintaro for this improper display of manhood!"
She stops right before Okabe's fears become reality.
"Hmph. Given your chuunibyou antics, I should have figured you're not one of the people working here. That is despite your lab coat and you calling yourself a mad scientist of all things" she puts it bluntly and sighs. Misaka slightly chuckles reminding herself of the true mad scientists who ruined her life with a certain despicable project.
"Kurisu… Kurisu!" Okabe desperately calls out to something.
"Wha- What!?" Misaka screams, while very surprised, at the man, who suddenly started charging her after he saw seemingly an illusion of someone named Kurisu. He charges in to hug her only to find out that she stepped out of the way.
"Oops…" Misaka says while trying to grab the gigantic (by Japanese standards) man "Hey, you're not as heavy as I thought you would be".
"Kurisu…" Okabe stares at the floor, while Misaka is holding him, and realizes that Kurisu was not there with him. Tears start to form, but he quickly brushes them off and stands up only to remember how he got into his current predicament.
"Lintalo!" says a man with a very American accent, while he enters the cell "You were trying to get to the past using your time leap machine. You failed. Your comrades are dead, and we have secured your hideout. Special thanks to Amadeus-"
"Kurisu!? Leskinen, you bastard! What have you done to her!?" Okabe interrupts Leskinen with a shout.
"Relax, Okabe-kun, she has already joined your other friends" was the only reply he got, to which Okabe gasped, clenched his fists but somehow maintained his cool.
"You will now show me how to use the Time Machine, so your friends won't have to die… in that time..." orders Leskinen. Okabe doesn't believe that someone as bad as him will save his comrades but it's the only shot he got. He wonders if he should actually help him come back to the past and actually see his friends once more.
"Yes…" meekly replies our mad scientist, already affected by the terrible news he received. He needs a plan. He desperately needs one. The both of them and some security start walking the two from Okabe's holding cell to the place that was his home for 1320 time leaps. While walking out of Leskinen's facility Okabe thinks up a plan. No, THE PLAN. He readies himself to enact it. "Like hell I'm going to give Professor Leskinen the Time Machine" he thinks to himself.
On the way there two 'escorts' start talking amongst themselves.
"Hey, what do you think will happen to us?" says a dumb-looking soldier
"Who knows!? As long as we're getting paid, we'll survive this mess and live the rich life!" says a smarter sounding soldier, who in actuality said something dumber than his colleague.
They reach the hideout, the door to which has been pried open, and thankfully all of the bodies that were there have already been cleaned out leaving only the bullet holes and a couple of craters in the floor (probably from back and forth grenade throwing) as the evidence of the terrible occurrence. Professor Leskinen played all his cards right, there. Had our time-traveling protagonist seen the state of his comrades, he would have thrown up and fainted right there. In fact, if he was still his Alpha world line self, then he would have fainted even if there were no bodies or blood, but this time… This time was different. He had a plan. THE PLAN
Leskinen instructed him to open and start up the prototype time machine, followed by his signature "Hurry up." Which was both an instruction to Okabe and the soldiers.
"All done!" exclaimed a tired Okabe, who used an emergency top hatch to get inside, while trying to not give away what he was trying to do by making sure that his quiet chuckle would not be heard by anyone.
"Start it up." Leskinen ordered after getting inside the time machine.
"Yes" said Okabe with a somewhat annoyed tone before pressing a couple of buttons. The hatch closed and the Time Machine started doing its thing. Okabe slowly made his way to a white glowing sphere on the side of the time machine, which was starting up.
Leskinen heard Okabe perform his signature mad scientist laugh along with the pose where he outstretches his arms and looks above him. The time machine was already leaping through time and making its distinct noise.
"Mu-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!" laughed our hero "Professor Alexis Leskinen! We are mad scientists first and foremost! We strive to control the world! We hold hostages! We fight Organizations! We try to achieve our ambitions! But! We are different! You fight for yourself! I fight for my comrades! Let us fight no more! For no one at all!" While this was happening, Alexis Leskinen was trying to figure out if Okabe has gone mad or is betraying him. That was until Okabe gave him the answer. No, he showed him what he meant.
Okabe grabbed one of the time machine's seats that he previously unscrewed and smashed the white orb on the side of the time machine, which was the power generator for the whole thing. Leskinen was dumbstruck but started to charge Okabe despite the surprise, falsely hoping that this was all a joke on Okabe's part and that he didn't just send them to their immediate death. This swift action all happened in about a second.
"The universe has no end or beginning – Infinite! But people have – Finite! We are no universe, we are people! Sayonara! Leskinen!" shouted Okabe at the top of his lungs, while maintaining an evil grin aimed at his co-passenger.
The time machine exploded.
Okabe found himself in some sort of void with Leskinen nowhere to be found despite him being 30 cm away just a second ago. "He might end up in the same place as me. We were about a hand's length apart in the physical world of the time machine" Okabe figures.
"Serves you right, Professor!" exclaimed Okabe to no one in particular as the void did not appear to have anyone or anything else present. It wasn't black or white or any colour or lack thereof for that matter.
一
一
It
一
一
was
一
一
a
一
一
literal
一
一
void.
一
一
He didn't know how much time had spent there; his watch broke along with the time machine. He might have been replaced by a different worldline version of himself for all he knew. He just floated there, somewhere there.
一
一
Staring
一
一
into
一
一
the
一
一
nothingness.
一
一
The next thing he knew was that the ground was approaching. He thought he would die from the rough landing, but he didn't. The speed of his fall was greatly exaggerated.
He blacked out.
He had dreams of his old life, even his life when he was trying to save Mayuri didn't seem as bad in comparison. "Huh, never once felt any pain physical pain in them. It's a similar concept to the dreams where someone is falling and wakes before they hit the ground" Okabe figured.
There was one 'dream' in particular though.
In that dream, he appeared in a dark room (appearing somewhere was quite common, 'the void', which Okabe thought controlled his dreams always spat him at random times in random worldlines.) with desks. The desk, where he was seated, was halfway from the window to the exit from the small office space. There was a wall next to him. For some reason, Okabe started to think about explosions. He figured if someone would blow something up, the wall next to him would be their first target. He checked the clock and calendar that were hung up on the wall. He saw the time and date August 17th, 2005, 20:00. There was a note next to the clock. It read: "Remember to not let Pila-chan out after 20:30, they have curfew at Tokiwadai at the time and she will be swept up taken to the authorities". Okabe chuckled at the thought of this woman's (the handwriting made it obvious) situation with her kid, whatever their relation to each other might be. He also thought that this Tokiwadai place was too strict. Well, unless it was a kindergarten. He went to check outside the window and found an unfamiliar city. It looked too futuristic for Tokyo. He appeared to be on the second floor of the building. Maybe it was a dream, whose world had a bright future, but then he remembered the date and understood his mistake. He didn't like this dream. He liked being with his friends. Okabe knew himself pretty well and he understood that this dream will give him PTSD and remind himself of his failure to save his own future, despite this place being the 'past'. He also promised himself that if he finds himself back in reality, he will save it. At the time the world didn't seem real to him. As such, he went back to his desk where 'the void has spawned him'. He knew full well that if he falls asleep, he will be transported to another dream. He wanted that. And he knew it'd happen. After all, that happened so many times.
一
Too
一
many
一
to
一
count.
一
He thought he fell asleep on that desk.
一
*Boom*
一
He jolted and sat up straight. He caught a glimpse of the time on the clock. It was 20:34 An explosion could be heard very clearly. It was the wall next to him. What a surprise. He internally chuckled at his own sarcasm. At first, he thought the wall was blown up by terrorists. He'd wait a minute to hear them rumbling below only to confront them and look at them from above through the hole. Then he would exclaim something cool. Something like: "Gotcha, sonuvabitch!". After all, he fell asleep and this was a new dream, right?
Then it hit him.
He is still there. It isn't a dream. He is going to get killed by terrorists of this unknown Japanese city.
After a couple of seconds, a girl, who appeared to be a middle schooler, wearing some shorts a black t-shirt and a cap, jumped into the hole and landed near another desk. She had electricity going in arcs around her body.
Okabe no longer thought this was real.
He chuckled again internally. He guessed he should play along with the whole charade. He can't die after all. You can't die in the void, right? You're already dead.
She looked around and noticed him sitting at the desk. "Oh great… This time it's not empty" she sighed.
"Why do you keep doing these experiments you sick scientists!?" she suddenly shouted.
"No! Science is infinite! Like the universe!" he exclaims.
"There's also the fact that it's fun" he mutters under his breath.
"Are you the Agent of the Organization dengeki-shoujo!?" he shouts
"The name's Misaka Mikoto!" she yells back with an annoyed tone.
"And who are you!?" she exclaims, while maintaining a deadly glare and a small pout.
As Okabe is not bothered by the powers people have in his dreams, he ignores the glare she has. "Unless she threatens me for real, I'm not caving!" he thought to himself.
He started to introduce himself in his usual fashion. "I am the great mad scientist… Hou~~ouin~~...
End of flashback. Yes, it's abrupt, but I'm not going to rewrite the dialogue for basically no reason.
Okabe stands up and looks very dejected. Misaka is wondering what's going on through her eccentric senpai's head. Is he-
"Hey, is this real?" he interrupts her train of thought in a tone she recognizes. That's the same tone in which she spoke to Shinobu a couple of days prior.
"Yes, the clones… My clones… They are getting killed left and right…" she starts crying.
"Is that what you mean Okabe-senpai?" she asks him through her tears, presuming he's a friend on this adventure. "Wait" she thinks to herself "He's not my senpai, he was born the same year I was". What is go-"
"CLONES?!" he shouts "I'm not talking about clones!
Is
this
world
real!?" he emphasizes each word.
"HUH?! Of course, it is!" she shouts back and proceeds to slap him on the cheek to make sure he feels it is real. Okabe falls over from the slap and feels a sensation. What was it called? Uh, yes. Pain! He makes it sound like a truck hit him as Misaka wonders if this guy is actually less athletic than Mental Out. "Nah, no way. She'd be hospitalized after that. This Okabe guy is okay" she brushes of that trail of thought.
"Mu-ha-ha-ha-ha!" he stands up doing his signature laugh.
He starts crying but continues to laugh. He is out of the void. And he is in a world which has no conflicts. (He obviously didn't hear Misaka...)
"Yes… it's me… I've escaped Leskinen and the Organization... The Time Machine no longer threatens the world, World War 3 is stopped, I've travelled back from 2036 and I've met a girl who seemingly has electricity powers… I've escaped both beta and alpha attractor fields… Yes… Steins;Gate version 2.32 has been reached…
EL
PSY
KONGROO~~"
he finishes his chuunibyou speech.
"HUH?! Which time machine are you talking about!?" she shouts at him… Again.
"The Time Machine!" he shouts back at her "The one and only!".
"No, our problem are the Clones!" she shouts back. (Sure, but only one of the two)
"Time Machine!" he shouts back.
"Clones!" she shouts back.
" C_L_O_N_E_S" she spells her word out for him.
" T_I_M_E_M_A_C_H_I_N_E" he spells his out for her back.
"CLONES!" she shouts back.
"TIME MACHINE!" he shouts back.
They continue this for a minute or so until they are out of breath
*Both are huffing and have bent down from the excessive shouting*
""Wait!"" both of them exclaim.
"CLONES!" he shouts for once.
"TIME MACHINE!" she shouts for once back.
""What the hell have you been dealing with, huh!?"" they collectively shout at each other.
Misaka hears sirens in the building. Despite the shouting match, she's not tired. She's athletic and she often has those with Kuroko albeit for different reasons. She has studied the facilities' blueprints beforehand. She quickly blasts the hole in the wall that has all the server hardware in it. Luckily, that wall was the wall on the other side of the room. She picks him up and the swiftly make their way out of the facility through the convenient hole in the wall. She has to practically hold the university student, but they both know he practically has no muscle, so Misaka should be all right. He is still out of breath from the shouting match, but he realizes from the experience of other parallel Okabes from the Alpha and Beta worldlines. More so the ones from the ones of the Alpha attractor field that getting caught was a no-no and survival was paramount… wait… "How the hell do I remember that?" he wonders internally. "I swear someone wrote the story of my life; the ones who read that story would consider this an asspull… I guess I can call myself void Okabe now though" he thinks and shrugs. "Oh, wait. I saw dreams of other mes, right? Damn, I guess I can't call myself Void Oka-" he thought as he was about to start laughing
"Stop moving!" Misaka yells.
"I'm trying to keep my magnetic field so we get away, don't fall to our death and so our possible pursuers don't kill us!" she exclaims.
Okabe stops moving but starts talking.
"You know girls are not supposed to carry older men, especially when it's a princess style carry." he chuckles.
Misaka's face is priceless. At the very least, it certainly is if you consider the red, as red as the most molten metal, and embarrassed faces of girls around 14 the most invaluable thing in the world.
"Shut up!" she yells at him again, while blushing profusely.
This time he complies silently. Misaka uses her lvl5 Electromaster ability to slow down their descent. She puts him down, grabs his hand and starts sprinting away. Somehow Okabe is able to somewhat keep up. Luckily the Facility had no fence around the main gate, not since around 5 minutes ago thanks to a certain girl with electromagnetic powers who broke it and went in the old fashioned way because she was upset at not beating the boss at the arcade.
While running, Misaka realizes that, because of this 'Okabe' she met this would probably be her first and last facility tonight. She needs answers. She might not even be able to go back to the dorm tonight. Yeah, she'll call Kuroko. This Time Travel business seems pretty important she figures.
Okabe's thoughts parallel what the Biri-Biri Misaka girl is thinking. He figures they need to stick together and collectively figure out where 'this' is and what to do with these clones… Clones? This girls' clones? "Oh no! Not good! If Leskinen is also in this world… and he works with the person who created Biri-Biris, they'll have an unstoppable and unbeatable army of Electropeople!" (Semi-foreshadowing right there) Okabe gasps internally. Whenever they stop, he would need answers immediately. No time to be exhausted from a first run in god knows. He would need answers immediately after they stop at a safe place.
Meanwhile, Misaka silently praises herself for paying for both 5 days and nights in the hotel beforehand in case something happens. It did. She somehow isn't bothered by the handholding. I mean literal time travel is actually far fetched despite there being espers in Academy City. Embarrassment is only necessary when someone teases you. She looks over to him, while maintaining pace. "No, doesn't look like he will" she internally figures.
They don't really look like a couple from the onlookers' point of view. More like a young girl dragging her uncle or older friend somewhere. Most of them figure it's some kind of sale. Luckily, Okabe's and Misaka's clothes are in good enough shape for people to think like that.
They reach the hotel after another couple of minutes of running.
"Wait" Misaka huffs and puffs as they reach the entrance "We'll go in separately, no need for people to see us together, especially given the age difference."
She figured he's around 18 since he's a university student. First year of university probably, since his looks would probably be less messy if he was a second year or above.
"Yeah" Okabe huffs and puff back "Good point. You go in first and get to your room. I'll pretend I'm seeing a friend."
"No, they keep records of residents. I distract them you go first" she continues the huffing and puffing as she gives him the door key
Okabe stands straight, rubs his eyes and nods. Misaka successfully manages to distract the receptionist by asking random questions about the city, while making sure that the cap is blocking her face enough for no one to remember her being here and keeping her voice in line, so no one asks why she is in such a hurry. In the meantime, Okabe is able to sneak past. His unsuccessful attempt to save Kurisu and the knowledge from his dreams are doing their job. He manages to successfully reach the 4th floor of the Hotel where Misaka's room is located and he successfully sneaks in. The electromaster has already taken care of the cameras, by causing a little power outage on the way to the hotel. Cameras are the last place this Okabe guy's face needs to show up if the time travel shenanigan is as bad or worse than she predicts. She then calmly makes her way to her room. Okabe sneakily pulls her in keeping the contact between the hallway and whoever might see his face to the minimum. Okabe then gets to the window and closes it dead shut. He once again catches the glimpse of time. It was 20:40. Misaka signals him to go inside the bathroom. He doesn't question her and complies. Bathrooms have the best sound isolation in hotel rooms, right? They enter. He seats himself on the edge of the bathtub, she seats herself on the toilet with the lid closed. If you expect me to ship them here then no. This is not the story for that. Although... if someone truly wants a Misaka x Okabe ship for some reason then please PM me, I might consider it. It has to be a separate story thou-
""Alright!"" both of them exclaim while stopping my speech dead in its tracks.
""You! Answers!"" the shouting match (although at a low enough volume so that no one outside of their room hears them) continues.
(So did anyone understand the true difference between his speech in the original anime and here? Here he said that the Universe has NO beginning. Maybe he generated an AIM field or something that made true Multiverse theory possible, instead of the parallel worldlines that we have before)
Thanks for noticing. Not gonna spoil.
(1. Can someone who's never been in the void truly understand something without colour or lack of colour? 2. Most voids have one as far as I know)
1. Nope 2. Not this one though
P.S. The best ways to support stories in general is to is participate in reviews, as well as follow the author/story. Personally, I tend to look at the number of reviews any particular story has to see if the story has engaged many. Please consider giving this story a review if you liked it.
(When's the next chapter?)
Hopefully not never. Stories depend on the authors' ability to think them up and have time write them up. It -the next chapter- could be in 6 months or tomorrow. I promise there will be a chapter 2 though.
Preemptive Q&A:
The first chapter did take around 8 hours to write though -along with the commentary, grammar checks and whatnot-
All in one sitting by the way. If anyone's got any tips then please feel free to PM me and share them.
I did write stories before. Kinda. Never published one for the whole world to see though -even if it's a fanfic on this website-
I love writing detailed stories rather than expansive ones. So expect big chapters, maybe comparatively slower updates -depends if you're comparing me to people who write a chapter every 3 days and never stop or the people who write a chapter and drop the story really-
Yes, I'm a fluent English speaker. Or at the very least, I hope I am by your standards.