first.

Sometimes Accelerator wishes he knew less.

(One man walks past him, grinning so unlike himself it's taking all the girls by slight surprise, and Accelerator knows despite never meeting the said man. He's smart, nay, a genius like that).

Saw less.

(Blood and muscles and vessels and bones and-).

Heard less.

("Ah! There he is! I wonder if he'll notice that I've done up my hair today? I bet this will finally get him to-").

Some afternoons he'll lay on his bed and wonder if he's being punished. If he'd been forced to swallow these "gifts" ("Your powers are not a curse, Accelerator! They're a blessing!") all he wants to do is spit them back out and return them.

(Is there a God? If there was, was he it now? People do think he wielding the power of God, and now? He certainly almost qualified as God.)

Saving people feels less like a choice and more like a flashing neon sign saying "This is what you're supposed to be doing all along." and Accelerator has tried to deny fate so many times only to have it bite him back, in the end, so he just lets himself get to lead by the role he feels he's supposed to fill.

Villain?

Killer?

Saviour?

(What use are his ability, exactly, if he's still a slave to destiny like everybody else?).

Yomikawa comes in and tries to save almost as much as Accelerator wishes he didn't have to. He watches her try to save and save and save and do it all with a laugh and a grin and he wonders, how, why?

"If children ask for my help of course it's my duty to help them!"

He wants to tell her she doesn't owe anyone anything, but then remembers himself, and says nothing instead.

(He saves the zombie girl, Esther, was it? when she even can't save others. Looks at her and thinks see, this is exactly why you shouldn't stick your neck out like this. But all she does in response is laugh, cheeks flushed pink, and Accelerator recoils).

She doesn't surprise him, because no one does, because he can see and think and hear and feel everything- but he surprises himself.

Worst taken to following him, and though he can successfully avoid her any time she gets too close, she is still a thorn in his side that he'd rather rid himself of earlier rather than later.

(Though he will never do that because she is now part of his...

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When Misuzu shows up, always when Accelerator wishes she wouldn't, and he and Misuzu are pushed into a closet together.

He and Misuzu are on their way for their usual coffee break when some idiots try to assassinate him. Same old, same old. Unfortunately for him, the battery for his electrode is a bit low. So after manipulating the noise and light around them, practically making them invisible, he and Misuzu quickly trying to find a hiding spot, with Misuzu as the one who found their hiding spot. And that's how both of them ended up in the cafe's broom closet.

He can hear the way Misuzu's heart hammers in surprise, feels her breath across his cheek, her slightly longer nails squeezing against his shoulder.

But then- he's thinking about her hands, mostly about what's going on outside the tiny space they're crammed into, but still part of him is aware of her fingers resting on the fabric of his black and white stripes shirt.

(He feels he's lost something. Himself, maybe).

second.

Accelerator is exhausted. Tired somewhere beyond his body and mind. Fighting Coronzon and going back to Academy City in one minute will do that to anyone.

Misuzu doesn't look like she's fairing much better.

Then they succeed, and all he feels are her unseen waves of endless relief, and then her arms around his shoulders, the tips of her fingers just barely scraping across the back of his neck.

(He realizes they have company a second too late, and by the time Misuzu draws back, removing her arms from where they'd been wrapped around him, third-rate face projecting what she thinking

"What? What is mom doing with Accelerator? That can't be right!"

and Accelerator feels exhausted all over again).

Misuzu has a way of worming herself into people's lives, Accelerator knows this. Now more than ever, perhaps, as he watches Last Order latch herself onto Misuzu. Playing the retarded frog doll with her.

He thinks about how easily she had made herself a position in his life, how she already knew more about him than most people did, how she'd touched him more than any of his other so-called friends had in the years he'd known them, and wonders if that ability is in and of itself a power.

(Accelerator finds it strange that she can dig her way into people's lives and settle like she'd been there for years as easy as she breathes).

He has no reason to doubt her capabilities, her unpredictability.

Fate is his captor, and yet again he is thrown something he cannot change no matter how much he tries, no matter how many powers he'd been given.

(She already has a family, a husband, and daughter, Accelerator mused. She should already be happy. Isn't when the vow of marriage is uttered, both participants must surrender and dedicated their love to one another?

So when her lips almost touched his in the dark closet at the same cafe as before, everything went to hell).

third.

Yomikawa and Yoshikawa realize before Accelerator does, which shames him to an extent he can't bear to accept.

("You've got to be kidding me." Yomikawa says.

"Railgun's mom?" Yoshikawa says).

Accelerator was abnormal, and he was used to experiencing abnormal things. Things like this, things that everybody else considered normal, he was far less adept at handling. Sure he can handle attempts to destroy the world, but he can't handle simple something like who he had a crush on.

(Dealing with his ability to re-create the world's law and reality had been far, far easier).

Talking to somebody about it was not an option, was never an option. He keeps himself either rude or tightlipped like he always is.

But both of his guardians know, and Accelerator thinks about how he could never really actually hate them.

("You know, if you need any advice you can always come to me, right? I have to question your taste a little considering its Railgun's mom of all people, but I guess she does have those b-")

Misuzu doesn't pretend.

(She does. She just hides it better).

Accelerator is always pretending. Nowadays he is more hypocrite than him in the past. Suppose he trades hypocrisy for a bit of humanity. He thinks it's a pretty good deal.

(Not pretending. Just shows the side the world wants to see).

Maybe that's why it's so easy for her to tell him how she feels, and how easy it is for him to hide how he feels from her.

(Why? Is it easy for her to leave her husband? Why did she leave her loving family just to be with her daughter's clones killer, psychopath? Why does she risk her daughter's resentment, anger, and hatred? When he asked her about all those questions, in certain future, all she said is

"Destiny and fate just want to have a laugh, I guess? I know Mikoto-chan will forgive me sooner or later. I never heard you complained about it either".

Huh. So she pretends she doesn't cry every night because of her daughter's hatred for her).

fourth.

(Asking Misuzu to be his girlfriend had been the lesser of two evils.

Though the end consequences of that action result are the same. One evil just slightly hurt less than another

Maybe).

Accelerator doesn't think fate knows what it's doing, tying him and her together like this. They were incompatible.

Opposites.

Fated.

Destined.

He's sitting at their usual booth in the cafe, staring ahead at nothing and everything at the same time.

She slides in a minute later, smiling like usual.

Then, she says.

"I know you have a thing for me, you can't hide it from me anymore!"

"C'mon Accelerator, let's kiss!"

Not for the first time, Accelerator wonders just what exactly he'd gotten himself into.

Is this okay?
Is this alright?

(He doesn't kiss her.

Yet).