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

I said I my update schedule could vary from a day to 6 months, right? Well, here you go. This is an update the next day, enjoy!

Chapter 2: The sharing of knowledge

""You! Answers!"" Okabe's and Misaka's shouting match (although at a low enough volume so that no one outside of their room hears them) continues… until it suddenly doesn't.

"We aren't going to get anywhere if we continue this whole charade…" Okabe points out and sighs heavily "Can I call you Misaka Mikoto-san?"

Okabe is the first to step up by saying something no one could have expected from an eccentric person like himself to say. Has the void changed him?

"Yeah… sure" Misaka replies calmly, while looking down and with a somewhat dejected tone "So who are y-"

"Not now!" Okabe suddenly yells, stopping Misaka dead in her tracks.

"We need to figure this out step by step!" Okabe continues with a very pained but determined look "If we don't then this world, whichever attractor field it lies in, or at least this city are done for!"

"I introduced myself to you earlier, now please introduce yourself fully. And can you tell me more about the electrical powers you exhibited as well." our mad scientist calms his tone somewhat, but his expression remains unchanged.

"But I-" Misaka wants to retort but is again interrupted

"If Leskinen is here, if worldline convergence is still a factor, we might be facing a future, where World War 3 occurs! A future where 5.7 BILLION PEOPLE DIE!" Okabe stands up and shouts at his companion. Okabe's shouting might have been audible from the outside, but luckily no one was around to hear it. Okabe quickly realizes his mistake and sits back down; tears are starting to form.

"Or better yet…" he whispers quietly "It might be a future, where some FREAKS decide that putting everyone in clear holding tanks for them to live out their 'life' peacefully is better than life itself…" he does almost yell out the word freaks though.

"Hahahaha… AHAHAHA!" Okabe suddenly starts laughing maniacally while crying his eyes out before he calms down "And the worst part is that the future might have everyone you've ever remotely liked or interacted with die in front of you from the flip of switch… just because… THE UNIVERSE ITSELF SAID THEY SHOULD!"

Misaka looks… dumbstruck? Stunned? Absolutely shocked? The level of Misaka's shock can't even be described by words at this point. If she was somehow calm about this whole ordeal, she would have probably thought something along the lines of "Huh, so I guess senpai has had it WAY worse than me…".

They sit like this for about a minute with Mikoto contemplating what happened and Okabe trying to collect himself…

Misaka realizes she needs to ask something very important.

"Who is Leskinen?" she tries to say each word calmly, succeeding only halfway.

"Like I said-" Okabe was about to repeat his spiel, but this time he was interrupted instead

"Tell me" Misaka says with a no-nonsense tone that is reminiscent of an anti-hero, who gives the villain his last chance to spill the beans before he receives the beating. Okabe winces and is surprised at the girl's willpower to be able to say this after hearing his disturbing troubles.

"Professor Alexis Leskinen…" Okabe starts "is a man who fits the description of a true mad scientist perfectly. He cares about nothing else except his experiments and their success. He will kill, torture, brainwash and do anything in his power to ensure his success…". Meanwhile, Misaka's eyes widen in shock.

"Kihara Gensei" She says after Okabe finishes "He's the same…". Okabe returns the eye widening gesture.

"What?.." he gasps

"He's the man in charge of the Level 6 Shift project" she forces herself to say. She cannot break down, not now.

"He's the one responsible for the Sisters, my little sisters, being killed by the thousands. He is the main culprit of all the dark things happening here…" she says as she is about to faint.

"Hahahaha… HAHAHA!" Misaka is the one doing the maniacal laugh this time

"Does this mean that he'll do the same!? Kill them!? The sisters!? And then go for everyone I know only to kill off anyone else who doesn't fit his grand master plan!?" Misaka tried to yell, but it sounded more like dying gasps of a mentally broken person. Okabe suddenly jumps up and quickly rushes in to comfort her and unlike that time, the time when they met and he saw an illusion of Kurisu, she accepts the gesture.

"I'm sorry…" Okabe says "I should have known better than to trouble with something like this…"

"Don't give up!" he exclaims out of nowhere, which surprises Misaka as she starts to see why she is somehow comfortable around the guy. "He's kind of like that idiot, huh?" she thinks, with tears starting to form.

"Thank you" she replies with a smile. Okabe nods and stands up straight and does his signature 'evil' laugh with his also signature pose.

"Mu-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!" he does the laugh first "As of now, I, Hou~~ouin~~ Kyoma, call a round table meeting!"

"HUH?!" was Misaka's reply (I wonder if this will become a trope)

"As of today, I grant thee the title of Lab Member 012! Biri-Biri!" Hououin Kyoma continues while pointing his finger at the girl "Follow me~"

Misaka figures if she was her 5 minutes ago self, she would have definitely slapped the creep for his improper behaviour, but she thinks she has an idea as to why he acts the way he does. Hououin Kyoma and Misaka Mikoto exit their little bathroom hideout and make sure to turn off the lights. After all, they're law-abiding and environmentally conscious citizens first and heroes second. Biri-Biri seats herself at the desk, while the lab coat wearing mad scientist reaches the window and turns around to make his speech

"Hereby I declare the name for this operation! Operation Excindo Ares!" Kyoma declares "This operation shall bring down the God of War himself and his two servants, whom we both know and loathe… Yes… It's me… I have ensured our victory in this unknown battlefield. The operation will go off without a hitch. No more comrades shall die this time.

EL

PSY

KONGROO~~"

"Hey, why do you do this Hououin Kyoma thing?" the newly appointed Lab Member asks nonchalantly "Did you originally do it for the sake of someone? A childhood friend?-" she was cut off by the laugh.

"Mu-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!" laughs Hououin Kyoma before replying "Excellent observation Biri-Biri! This was all done for my precious hostage Mayuri!"

Okabe Rintaro momentarily replaces Hououin Kyoma "Sadly, she and everybody else were killed. Many times, over many different worldlines. Before LESKINEN" he grits his teeth as he says the Professor's name "ordered the murders of her and everyone I know…"

"But!" Hououin Kyoma returns "This is not the time to fret!" he pauses for a moment before continuing "Biri-Biri! I've seen your hacking skills. We need to find out about Leskinen, right now! If he is on the records somewhere, we may be able to foil their plan before they even think it up!" he finishes his trail of thought. He realized her ability to hack stuff because the alarms would have triggered sooner without someone hacking the system. And because of his great experience of time travelling he's able to analyse someone's abilities sooner than most.

"Mhm!" Lab Member №12 confirms loudly with a smile. She was really proud of the guy for his ability to bounce back despite his circumstances. She probably won't idolize him or even Touma for that matter any time soon, she's too proud for that, but she could definitely see Okabe being a person she admires, despite them only meeting 15 minutes ago. "By the way, how old are you Okabe-san-"

"KYOMA DA!" replies the unwavering mad scientist "The one before you is none other than Hou~~ouin~~ Kyoma! The one who kept Shiina Mayuri as his hostage ever since her beloved grandmother passed away!"

"Answer my question already!" exclaims the pouting girl as arcs of electricity start to form around her. "If I'm going to give you my personal information then you should at least give me the full extent of yours! Hmph!"

"I'm glad you're alright" Okabe Rintaro says calmly as he replaces his alter ego.

"Mhm…" Lab Member №12 confirms quietly with a thoughtful look on her face.

"Thank you... again..." she says with an innocent smile.

"Don't mention it" replies Rintaro as his inner tsundere is starting to show, his cheeks appearing slightly redder than usual.

"I guess I should tell where you've ended up. Mr. Time Traveller" Mikoto says as she forces him out of his daze. She points to the bed, seemingly asking Okabe to go sit on it with her. Okabe thought of raising his brow and making a joke about it but decides to keep it to himself for now. He can tease her about that later. They reached the bed and sat down on the side of the bed on the opposite ends with Misaka sitting, where someone would have their head, while Okabe got the other end.

"Today is the 17th of August 2005-" she begins but she immediately notices the questioning look on Okabe's face and decides to focus on more important events.

"Like I've said a couple of times before, my name is Misaka Mikoto, I'm a middle school student at Tokiwadai Middle School and I'm currently 14 years old-" she says before she was interrupted

"My physical age appears to be 18 right now. When I was 18, I looked exactly like I do now, so I have to assume I am 18 right now. Time travel makes those things rather hard to calculate. Also, I have no clue how old I actually am since I've spent some time in the void." Okabe interrupts "'Some' is the operative word there, it might have been an instant or eternity for all I know. By the way, your curfew is very early compared to most places."

"Sucks to be you, I guess" Okabe makes a joke and chuckles. The note on the wall in that research facility was useful for something at least. Meanwhile, Misaka sighs at the joke and her own misfortune. "Yep, right on point there senpai." she thinks "At least I know I can call you senpai now".

"*Ahem*" Okabe coughs "Sorry for interrupting your explanation, please continue" he says bringing her out of her daze this time.

"Right… where was I? Oh myself… I also have a couple of notable nicknames. Probably the one you need to know is railgun." she continues. Okabe is very curious about that last part and interrupts again.

"So, can you fire off a tank slug at Mach-3 speed or something?" he asks, his face showing visibly that he somewhat questioning her ability

Misaka pauses to think for a moment before replying "I mean if I get a suit with railgun rails that has the ability to carry the slugs, I probably could power the thing myself and fire off actual military-grade railguns." Misaka sighs "No one is going to give me one though, so I'm relegated to using arcade coins and my own arm as a substitute. The coins are convenient to carry though, and their limited range is often a plus when I'm in a crowded area" Misaka explains.

Okabe is stunned. "I'm never messing with her again!" He silently promises himself. "This Hououin Kyoma shall not be stopped by this, however! This meeting was the choice of Steins;Gate!" he continues to think to himself.

"I'm not the only one that can do this sort of stuff though." she says as once again surprises Okabe "There are lots of other ability users out there."

"In fact, 40% of this city are espers and although the correct term is ability users everyone continues to call them espers. 80% of the whole city consists of students and that's why the city is called Academy city. Back to the matter of espers, people have many unique abilities, but the most prominent ones would probably be: Telekinesis, Clairvoyance, Telepathy, Teleport and Electromaster, which is actually my own esper power." Okabe was about to interrupt, but he was silenced with a hush from Misaka "My own esper power is a level 5 esper power, so I got to give it a cool nickname. No other Electromasters can try even to imitate a railgun as far as I know. There are a total of 7 level 5s but I'll only name the ones we would probably have to deal with during this…" Misaka tried very hard not to bombard the people responsible for the Level 6 Shift with swear words and mostly succeeded "shitty experiment."

Misaka pauses to finally take her cap off, stretch and yawn.

"We'll probably have to face off against one of them. We do have ranks, but since they are based on our usefulness to researchers, I doubt they will of much use to senpai. I can say with confidence though that Accelerator," Misaka shivers, before continuing "that monster, who doesn't even remember his own name, is a boy who looks around 16 with white hair and red eyes will be the biggest obstacle, since despite his rank 1 not meaning that much in terms of power. He is widely considered the strongest and I had the bad luck of facing off against him a couple of days prior and not being able to do ANYTHING" she really emphasizes that word "to him. His ability is nicknamed Accelerator, but he can essentially control anything with vectors. He basically has an ultimate reflective shield around him at all times, which nothing can penetrate, and the ability to twist your insides to his liking" Misaka shivers again, this time much more visibly.

"I… have seen him do something like that actually…" she remembers her unfortunate meeting with him and parting with 9982.

"Are you okay?" asks Okabe with concern in his voice.

"No," replies Misaka "but I'll be fine."

"The other one I should spend time talking about is Mental Out who can mind control people. Her real name is Shokuhou Misaki, she goes to the same school I do. She's definitely not I good person but she's definitely better than Kihara Gensei," she grits her teeth, looks down and growls "who oversees the killing, and Accelerator, who performs it."

"I think Accelerator is misguided." Okabe interrupts and puts his thoughts bluntly "I've known a person called Kiryu Moeka. She was the one that ended up killing Mayuri the most. With a damn blank expression on her face." Okabe clutches his fist.

"Turns out both he and her boss were manipulated by their higher-ups and were actually nice people if you got to know them." he continued as he calmed himself "Only the true higher-ups are bad people, the ones like your Kihara Gensei or my Professor Leskinen, the others are just misguided lost souls."

"I won't forgive that guy that easily you know!?" she exclaimed with an annoyed but desperate tone "He enjoys the killing and wears a sadistic grin on his face every time he does it!"

"I didn't forgive Moeka for at least a full year." he says and sighs.

"Well, it was a year for me, more like a couple of days for everyone else at the time" he wonders out loud before turning to Misaka.

"Trust me you will, it's for the better." he gives out advice.

Misaka nods, not willing to let down her senpai, who has seen more horror than she could ever see herself.

"So, do you think we could warm his frozen heart?" she asks "Is that what you're insinuating?"

"No, neither I nor you fit the bill to reform the guy." Okabe replies "It'd be great if you knew someone who could and ask them for help. When I was down in the dumps Kurisu helped me a lot. She inspired me to move forward…" Okabe says before remembering where Kurisu is right now "I wish she was still here with us, even Amadeus would do."

"I won't ask about this 'Amadeus' for now, but I have to wonder… who was Kurisu to you?" Misaka asks with curiosity.

"She was… ironically the one that made time travel possible in many worldlines and the one that indirectly caused all of the terrible scenarios. She was the one I fell in love with though…" Okabe says with a visible blush "I probably would act all tsundere about her if she was still with us, but that's just wishful thinking…"

"Misaka note to self, no more tsundere your love might die. Is that what you mean senpai?" Misaka asks.

"Kinda" chuckles Okabe.

"So, how do esper powers actually work? Is that known? Or is that still being researched?" asks Okabe.

"I don't know how to answer that." Misaka replies "Depends on the power, but all operate under the same conditions. One must have an understanding of different concepts related to quantum theory. Simply put an esper can ignore the Uncertainty Principle and bend the laws of our microscopic world.-"

"You're telling me that you're using logic similar to the one used in the Schrödinger's cat thought experiment to bypass the natural laws of science!?" exclaims Okabe "Then again, your powers are very real… wait… if espers exist here… and…"

Okabe pauses to think.

"What is it?" calmly asks Misaka.

Okabe has finally figured it out, along with the reason his dreams in the void never included him being in this 'Academy City'. Okarin is no more, Hououin Kyoma reigns supreme.

"Yes… It's me… The Organization's plans have been foiled. Operation Excindo Ares can no longer be prevented by anyone. However, convergence might not be on my side or anyone's side. Yes…" Hououin Kyoma starts 'talking' on the phone again. She sees that it's turned off, but she's seen weirder people, so she shrugs it off. Misaka starts to wonder what has Okabe understood from this.

"Biri-Biri!" this breaks her trance and she sees Kyoma now standing "This Hououin Kyoma is an alien to the likes of you! I am a messenger sent by god from my uncertain" (the pun is strong here) "time travelling world! As of now, I dub this world after your ability, Railgun! And my own world shall be called by one name and one name only… Steins;Gate!"

She still wonders how he can do this all day but that's a discussion for later. She starts to think about what he said…

"Wha- WHAAT?!" she yells "Then… Are you from an i- i- isekai!?"

"Yes… this Hououin Kyoma has travelled dimensions to reach this place. It's all the choice of Steins;Gate!" he continues the spiel.

"Your world?" she asks.

"How rude! Steins;Gate is more than a nickname for my world or the happy worldline that I planned to reach. Steins;Gate is Steins;Gate!" he exclaims while showing his unhappiness through his movements. Okabe stands up and starts looking around the hotel room

"*ahem* Tonight we need to find out two things. The thing first is Leskinen. We need to find out if he crash-landed in this world as well. The second are the laws of physics and existence of convergence are the same here as they were in my world." says Okabe Rintaro with a serious tone. After all, Kyoma is one for great speeches but he cannot hold a candle to Okabe Rinatro's serious albeit generally dejected tone.

"Where's is the nearest supercomputer we can 'borrow'?" he asks.

"Hold up! How did we get from theoretical discussions to going out and hacking a supercomputer?" she asks, visibly confused at Okabe's leap of logic.

"Shaddap! You dengeki tensai shoujo! If you're a middle schooler and know of the quantum theory, then you must know my intention!" exclaims our male protagonist.

"I still don't get it." meekly replies our female protagonist.

"Physical simulation!" exclaims Okabe "Is there any other way to find out about physics laws other than simulation!?"

"Well there's theory and there's practice…" guesses Misaka, still not being used to being less smart than someone she's talking to.

Okabe facepalms.

"Do you really think we can build a time machine just to test it out using the items from the hotel… room…" he says as he notices a CRT and a microwave oven in the room. Welp, if they do need the time machine all they need to do is hack into the SERN here and use the LHC to compress data… "Misaka might even take less time than Daru did back in the day. Way to go!" Okabe thinks to himself and is visibly happy. He notes to self that the two might also prove useful in the future

"No, we cannot!" he regains his composure, a local supercomputer is better than the LHC for now, less security. "Where's the nearest above 1 Terraflops supercomputer?!"

"You know we can't just hack them remotely, right?" Misaka deadpans.

"Really?" Okabe is very surprised by this.

"I did go and remotely hack the Level 6 Shift experiment's facilities before, took down around 70% of them." Misaka replies "They probably locked the Supercomputers out as well."

"Shit! What do we do then?" questions Okabe, looking rather disappointed by such news.

"I only did one facility tonight. I was planning to do 5 and return to my dorm to sleep. I'm not returning to my dorm." she explains and glances at the mechanical clock on the wall. Its outer layer is made out of wood. "Man, do the hotels like to show off" Misaka thinks.

"At least not before we figure you out." she says in a quieter and somewhat annoyed tone.

"It's only 21:00 right now, so we I'd say we had enough rest and have plenty of time to do this and get to sleep." Misaka explains "Besides they would have probably transferred the staff away from Delta 7, which is not the nearest one, it's about 1.5 blocks away but we don't want unnecessary attention do we?"

"Can we use the window to enter and exit? You asking the receptionist twice in a row is a dead giveaway." Okabe asks.

"Sure, just hold on. I need to make a phone call." Mikoto says as she starts calling someone, who is listed as "perverted roommate" on her gekota phone.

"Onee-sama, why are you calling me so late?" the girl on the other end whispers "Is it more of an emergency than yesterday?"

"Kuroko, I won't be coming tonight." Mikoto said in a very serious tone.

"Onee-sama… has your situation gotten worse yet again?" Kuroko whispers in a dejected tone. Mikoto looks at Okabe and thinks very carefully about what she should say so as to not endanger anyone uninvolved. Okabe nods and gives Mikoto the thumbs up. She turns around and continues talking

"It's better… I think…" she looks at Okabe "I found a way to fix my problem quicker. Don't worry I've rented a hotel room. I am the great and almighty Railgun after all!" she says as she massages her forehead with her left hand's thumb and index finger, while holding the phone in her right hand.

"Ahaha" Misaka nervously chuckles.

"You sound more troubled than when you stayed up all night somewhere, Onee-sama…" Kuroko notes and hopes to finally get some answers from your friend.

Okabe realizes that Mikoto is probably not going to be able to get the message across. He lightly taps Mikoto on the shoulder and starts mouthing what she needs to say. Mikoto nods and repeats what Okabe said word for word.

"I just need a couple more days to deal with this Kuroko, please trust me on this one, okay? My situation hasn't gotten worse, but I now have an illegal foreigner on my hands, they are a friend, don't worry, but I will feel really bad if I can't help them because of "Tokiwadai's unnecessarily strict curfew time" and I quote them there. Kuroko, I just need to do some paperwork for them tonight and maybe tomorrow, the 'paperwork specialist' we need only accepts customers after 21:00. *huff*" Misaka 'explains' and sighs into the phone.

"Well, I'd rather you ask me to help with such things, but I understand your position, Onee-sama. I'm in judgement after all and I would have to report your friend to Anti-Skill. I'm glad you have someone to help you out there, Onee-sama. Please stay safe." whispers Kuroko in a relieved tone. Misaka puts the phone in her pocket and sighs, she walks over to the small table beside the bed and puts on her cap

"Did it work?" asks Okabe.

"Yeah." she replied.

"How did you know what to say?" Mikoto asks.

"It's more of a 'I knew what not to say than anything else'" says Okabe while doing air quotes "I have a LOT of experience of making my friends" he clutches his chest as he still didn't get over the trauma.

He exhales and continues "worry for me. I figured I should mouth you the exact opposite of what I usually said." he looks troubled, his PTSD experience is written all over his face.

Mikoto inhales and exhales in order to concentrate.

"After we're done… do you want to use the shower first?" she asks in order break the tension.

"Usually I would let any female kouhai go first. But I think literally didn't shower in an eternity. Also, the Time Machine reactor residue that might be in my clothes needs to be taken care of first. Who knows? It might be radioactive or contagious? Never had the time to check" Okabe chuckles at his own pun.

Misaka bursts out laughing shortly followed by Okabe doing the same.

Both of them know that the night is not over yet…

As you can see, I focused on the dialogue a lot more in this chapter compared to the last one. It's a no brainer. I mean Okabe and Misaka did pretty much misunderstand each other last time, so it's a given that they have to 'catch up' on some important stuff.

(1. Hopefully, no one heard them after they exited the bathroom; 2. will they meet someone at the supercomputer facility?)

1. No one heard them, can confirm. They didn't make that much noise after their respective breakdowns. 2. It's a spoiler and I don't do spoilers.

Side note: If anyone thinks that Misaka and Okabe seem like they have everything going for them, they don't. If they didn't get their leeway that they get now, then Leskinen and Gensei would've had them by the end of the Sisters arc. Or at least that's how good 'the two true mad scientist tag team' will be.

The next chapter will finally show us what happened to Leskinen. Although, our heroes don't know if he's even alive right now.

Also yes. Delta 7 is my OC creation here. -Toaruverse doesn't really go into depth on its supercomputers, just the fact that there was this Tree Diagram and now it's no more. Thanks in no small part to Touma's first frenemies in the series, while he went on his first magical adventure but I digress.-