Chapter 9: Upside Down

Kai Chisaki groaned, slouching forward to gaze at the paper on the desk in front of him. History had always been his weakest subject. As a youth he had excelled at science and math, but remembering all of the old dead people of import had always seemed less than useful to him, so he had dumped that information from his mind.

That was, if he had ever paid attention to those lessons at all. If he remembered correctly, he had only ever managed a barely passing grade when it came to that subject. He glared down at the paper, but wasn't really reading it, simply lost in thought as Eri watched him from his side, her crimson eyes full of curiosity.

When Eraser had shown up the previous day and declared that he would be serving his community service today, and that it would be by tutoring Eri, he had been shocked. Over the next few hours, he had acclimated to the idea, though, thinking he might understand Aizawa's motivations for having the former yakuza do so.

Shota had made it clear early on that he felt that the girl he had tortured was somehow his key to redemption, and apparently was unsatisfied with Chisaki merely apologizing, asking him the same thing he had when he'd said he was sorry to his mentor. Kai was pretty sure he didn't give a damn about redemption, but he did want that old man's forgiveness.

He would likely never know what Chisaki was doing in his efforts to help Eri, but if it was something that would make him smile, maybe it was worth doing. He glanced down at Eri, whom was still watching him patiently. Kai supposed it might be nice if Eri could one day forgive him too; the things he had done had made him lose sleep at night when he realized they had been for nothing, after all.

With a sigh he returned his gaze to the paper, this time getting himself to focus on the writing. He had not been surprised to find that Eri was a couple of grades ahead of other children her age, but he had not expected her to be quite as far ahead as she was. It seemed that Aizawa was a harsh instructor, and constantly challenged her.

After taking on the role of her tutor earlier in the day, Togata Mirio had explained to him that he might have given her too much help, and now poor Eri would be really pressed to absorb the much higher-level education without a lot of assistance from the person acting as her tutor. So now Chisaki glared at work that should be easy for him, but which he had simply forgotten...

"Okay..." he said at last, "Get the textbook. Looks like we are going to have to learn this one together."

Later that day, Chisaki stretched as best he could, standing on his tiptoes and then carefully bending over at the waist, making sure he didn't set himself off balance. Falling forward was no joke when you didn't have proper hands to catch yourself with. Lifting himself slowly upwards in a fashion that unrolled his spine, he sighed as he loosened up.

Working all morning and afternoon with the brat had been exhausting to his patience, since most of what he taught her was terribly simple and tedious to a man of Kai's education level. He had been glad when Aizawa had declared that they would be doing some physical education and then ending their schooling for the day.

He wasn't sure why he had to participate, but the ocular hero had insisted that he attend as well, stating that he could use the exercise. So now Chisaki stood on one of the flat tracks in the outdoor area that students of U.A. used for such activities. No one else was around, likely all of the high schoolers were in the buildings or released for the day.

That made sense; Chisaki doubted that Aizawa wanted to allow him to come into contact with any of the school's aspiring heroes. Especially the ones whom had been part of the raid on the Shie Hassaikai headquarters. Kai himself certainly did not want that to happen. Just the thought of them seeing him like he was made his face flush in shame.

After all, he had fallen far from the man he had once been. He started running on the track, making sure to take a different lane than Eri, since even with his atrophied muscles, he would certainly be lapping a six-year-old girl. She would be seven soon, but she was small, even for her age, and Kai had not allowed her to go out much...

This caused him to feel a slight twinge of guilt for the childhood that he had denied her, but he pushed the feeling aside just as he had his previous embarrassment and focused on running hard. There was something about extreme exertion that helped a person to push aside unwanted negative feelings, so Chisaki sought relief in endorphins.

As he ran hard, though, he glanced over at the large windows of the main school building and had to wonder if they saw him, awkwardly plodding along the flat track, huffing tiredly even though he hadn't even been running for long. Even when he had been at his best, he hadn't really been what he would have called an athlete.

He wondered idly what they would think of his missing arms, those two valuable appendages simply vanished, instead twin nubs of his former glory pumping in the wind as he ran. Before he knew it, he had worked himself into a furious pace, trying to outrun his own building resentment, but he simply couldn't outpace his bitterness.

Giving out a cry of dismay, his tired legs suddenly tripped over themselves as he pushed himself too hard too fast, and with a horrifying feeling of almost slowed time, his feet left the pavement entirely as the ground started to rush up at him seemingly in slow motion, likely because his stunned brain knew there was no way for him to right his mistake.

Unable to so much as catch himself, all he managed was to reach his arms forward, which didn't even reach far enough to keep him from slamming down face first into the unyielding rock. His nubs collided with the ground and helped to slow him from taking further damage, but only after he felt his skin tear from what he knew was horribly abrasive force.

He bounced and rolled several times, trying to catch and slow himself almost in vain. He had simply been running way too fast! Pain erupted in places other than his face; the nubs of his arms, his elbows and his knees. Finally, he skidded to a halt, laying there gasping in pain and feeling like even more of a fool than he had a moment prior.

Tears of pain and humiliation stung the corners of his eyes as he shut them tightly, lowering his head as he curled up and groaned his pain.

Eri ran up almost immediately, having been a short way behind him when he fell. He could hear Aizawa shouting from the other side of the track, likely also on his way over. Chisaki felt her tiny hands grabbing his shoulders, her small voice panicked, "Kai sensei! Are you okay?!"

He heard her gasp, for a moment thinking that it might be the awful scrapes that now decorated his bleeding face, but in that same moment he realized she might also be shocked that his eyes were wet with tears of helpless humiliation. With that thought in mind he quickly turned his face away from her as he closed his eyes tightly.

It was really unsightly to be caught looking the way he did, and his less than stoic reaction only made it more embarrassing. To make matters worse, she actually went so far as to call him out on the matter, "Kai sensei, you are crying!"

Her voice rang with sympathy, but being the sort of man whom was so pathetic that he would be pitied by a grade schooler made him flinch with even more self-loathing. Sadly, this did not help his emotional stability, and to his great shame his tears slipped free from their moorings in those frozen moments when she saw him at his weakest.

Bent over on the ground as he was, in the wake of a self-destructive fall that seemed to represent his path in life pretty well, Chisaki felt that he was on the verge of drowning in his own misery. This all happened in the space of a moment, and as he started to turn from her, he was halted by a flash of light so intense it stung his eyes even though they were closed.

Everything happened quickly then. Kai Chisaki let out a gasp as he suddenly started to feel like he was falling, his body flailing a bit in her grip as he heard Aizawa call out in dismay once more, the hero much closer now, just a few paces away. Heat radiated through his body almost searingly hot, but strangely not painful.

He blinked, opening his eyes to see a vanishing corona of dissipating energy, and saw Eri, her red eyes still locked on him with a determined look. He frowned; her horn looked smaller than it had just a few moments ago. His addled brain started to put together what was happening as he brought a hand to his face, which was completely healed.

His hand. Eyes widening in disbelief, Chisaki gasped to see that both of his hands were whole, though something felt a little off. He was slenderer than he remembered being... As Eraser finally caught up to them, Kai could see from the gleam in the hero's eyes that he had activated his powers of erasure, and Chisaki connected the last of the dots.

Shota had erased Eri's quirk, but not before it had rewound him considerably. Staring at his own body he guessed his new current physical age to be something like what he looked like when he was in his teens. Chisaki gulped as he finished his analysis; if Eraser Head had not stopped Eri, she would probably have rewound him from existence.

In a scolding voice Shota walked up and took the little girl by the hand, "That was dangerous, young lady. I have told you that you shouldn't do that without asking."

The gray-headed child frowned, sounding apologetic, "Sorry... he just looked so sad..."

As they spoke Chisaki could only sit there on the ground where he had fallen, staring at his miraculously returned hands. He had never imagined things turning out like this, but now that they had, what in the world was he going to do now?

Aizawa stood there watching the stunned Kai Chisaki for a moment, then waved Eri back the way they had come, "Return to the house, Eri. Mirio is there, tell him to make you something for dinner."

She practically bounced at the idea of having Mirio cook, since he always made her whatever she asked for, springing away jubilantly as she waved goodbye, "O-kaay!"

Shota kept his gaze fixed on Chisaki as he watched her leave with his peripheral. By the way that Kai glanced up at him he could tell that the always tactical yakuza was evaluating him even as he considered the dark-haired youth. To say that Aizawa was on guard would be an understatement. It was a relief that Eri had absconded from the area.

Eraser was fairly certain that Chisaki wouldn't attack her or try to use her as leverage, but if the villain did start using his quirk, things would get messy fast and he didn't want to risk letting her get caught up in the cross-fire.

Slowly rising to his feet, Kai continued to regard him, "You have yet to blink. Too easy to see that with your goggles down..."

As usual, Aizawa didn't react much to his statement, just continuing to frown at him as he replied, "Old habit. Since Eri has used her dangerous and unlicensed quirk on you, I'll need to take you to medical to have you looked at."

There was an extreme vibe of tension in the air, but for his part Aizawa Shota looked just as relaxed as he always did. Chisaki knew better, though. The man stood close by with his eyes firmly fixed on him. If Kai so much as twitched in an aggressive manner, he would find his quirk erased and likely have that special weapon that Shota wore on his neck used against him.

Was he going to fight? That had to be what Aizawa was wondering right now. Chisaki was outside of the walls of the rehabilitation building, and Shota was the only person yet aware of the sudden threat level that Kai represented. Chisaki sighed; there would likely never be a better opportunity to escape his confinement at U.A.

Except that the man who stood in front of him barred him completely. Whatever twist of fate that had placed this particular pro hero as a barrier to his exit had ensured him a hopeless defeat. Without his quirk, Kai had no options for combat, while his hero opponent had many. Not only did he possess a weapon that would leave Chisaki bound and restrained in moments, but Aizawa was a fierce fighter when it came to close quarters melee.

Though Eraser looked relaxed, Kai knew that the reason he was unblinking was because he was waiting for their fight to start. The first thing he would do would be erase his powers, and the struggle would end in short order after that. Maybe he could stall until the hero was forced to blink, and then use that moment to attack or create a diversion? Then what? Should he be trying to escape now? No, it wouldn't work anyway.

Chisaki could feel it even if there was no visible change in Aizawa's demeanor. If he waited much longer, the erasure hero was going to go on the offensive before he had to blink and neutralize him so as to remove the threat. Kai lifted both of his hands up, palm forward, sighing again. Damn his luck, "Alright... I'd say 'lead the way', but I figure you aren't about to turn your back to me."

Shota's reply was short and to the point, "Nope."

Trying his best to remain calm even though he felt like he might be making a massive mistake, but not wanting to go through the humiliation of being dragged back into his room wrapped up in Aizawa's weird white tape-cloth thing, Kai stuck his hands in his pockets and began making his way to the nurse station.

Recovery Girl likely wasn't the expert specialist that Eraser wanted looking him over, but she was a licensed general physician with a lot of experience and a ton of fancy expensive machines to scan and probe him with. She could at least make sure that Eri's powers weren't going to make him spontaneously combust or something.

Having seen firsthand what the little girl's power of reversion could do to human beings, Kai Chisaki was very glad that Eraser had been present. While the hero made for a serious bur in his side now that he had a quirk, if Aizawa hadn't used his own powers to cancel hers, Kai would probably have been de-aged into nonexistence.

Glancing back over his shoulder he saw that Aizawa had pulled his goggles up over his eyes, likely as soon as Chisaki had given him a blind spot. He could now blink freely, since Kai wouldn't be able to see him doing so to take advantage of the lapse in Eraser's ability to use his erasing quirk. Chisaki didn't know every major hero power, but that one was one he'd memorized.

After all, being able to turn quirks off was really useful; a large reason for Chisaki's push to create a drug that had the same effect. He'd even managed to make one that turned off powers permanently, a huge step towards his goal of cleansing the world of the disease that quirks represented.

As he walked, he almost tripped, his gaze becoming unfocused as he suddenly seemed to remember that he could do things now that he couldn't before. So many doors that had become shut to him due to his debilitating injuries were suddenly open again. He had been so worried about escaping his current incarceration that it hadn't sunk in yet.

His goal was possible again if he could get back to his lab. With his quirk he could... he could heal his boss. He stopped on the steps of the office, swaying a little at the thought. Finally, he could do more than empty words and pointless tears.

That grandiose goal of his to save humanity suddenly seemed less important when he held it up against the possibility of helping his mentor recover from the illness Chisaki himself had stricken him with. Of course, the two points conflicted; if he healed his boss that man would never aid him in continuing the work he had been doing on his granddaughter.

But that didn't feel anywhere near as important now. The possibility that he would lose the man whom had raised him had woken him up to what his real priority should have been all along. In that light, Kai suddenly felt aching embarrassment that he had so easily justified his previous foolish choices as 'necessary sacrifices'.

He would never again take for granted the connection he had with the person he had only belatedly realized to be the most important person in his life. He had now been paused on the stoop of the medical building for a few moments, as he became self-conscious again and realized that Aizawa had stopped as well.

The hero might think he was up to something if he continued acting erratically, so he moved to enter the office, noting that there was a nurse at the main desk whom was already looking his way. Despite his behavior, Shota followed without saying anything, only addressing the lady at the counter once they had both gotten inside.

"I have brought inmate Kai Chisaki for an impromptu medical examination based on a recent development concerning his quirk."

Chisaki grunted, marveling on how concise what Aizawa said had been without saying much of anything about what had just happened outside. The nurse looked Chisaki over and nodded, her eyes widening a bit in realization; she must have known enough about him to know that he was supposed to be missing both of his arms.

A grumpy voice could be heard down the hall, arguing with the nurse before a small old woman with a bob of white hair and thick spectacles can sauntering down the hallway to greet them. She looked Kai up and down briefly and then sighed, "Alright... I was about to leave for the day, goodness you young heroes give me no time off...!"

Nonetheless she waved them along as she turned to go back the way she had come, "...but clearly this is something that can't wait until tomorrow. Let's go back to my lab and run a few tests." The two men followed the bent old woman as she plodded back to her office, and over the next few hours she gave Chisaki several x-rays and took a few blood samples.

Most of that time Kai simply sat in the treatment room, counting the minutes as Aizawa stood leaning against the wall across from him. The hero never once turned his face away from Kai, giving him the definite impression that he was being watched like a hawk. The guy probably wasn't even blinking much, Kai thought.

As they waited, Chisaki felt that if he was going to do what he wanted, he might as well speak up now, "Is the fact that I can use my quirk again going to mean I can't leave the rehab building anymore?"

Shota responded immediately, "I don't know. I have yet to see how the others are going to react to this new development... you want to use it on him." It was a statement, not a question.

Kai blinked; he hadn't expected Shota to read him so easily. Was he really that transparent? He supposed he had been rather single-minded lately, certainly an effect of his strained sanity. For some reason he felt like maybe being subtle would yield him less with Aizawa, so he answered honestly and simply, "Yes."

A protracted silence occurred, and Kai nervously wondered if he had made a mistake in revealing his most fervent wish, but finally Shota responded, "My boss has hyper-intelligence and an uncanny ability to map out how things are going to happen once he has enough information on all of the factors involved."

Another moment of thoughtful silence and he continued, "The Principal isn't a bad mouse, but I really would have liked a warning that this might happen, though maybe telling me would have changed things? In any case, I'm now absolutely certain that I am your guardian so as to keep you from using your quirk."

"This said, our judgement as teachers is also a factor for getting assigned to you rehab villains. So, I'm going to also assume that he knows I'm not going to stand between you and doing the right thing. Just know that also means I'm going to make you fall hard if you try to take advantage of the situation. I'm not as gullible as many, and that is likely another reason I'm watching over you."

Kai nodded, understanding that he was being given a chance along with a warning, "I won't betray your trust."

Eraser didn't reply to his words, clearly, he was more interested in actions. Given his disposition, Aizawa probably assumed he was going to try something.

Was he? This question rattled around in his mind as he continued to struggle with the enormous shift that had occurred in his world. Not so long ago he had access to this same all-powerful quirk, with a criminal empire behind him and seemingly nothing that might truly bar his path to progress; he had imagined himself a destined savior.

Then all of that had fallen away, his name and his pride had been pushed into the mud. He had lost his power, all of it, and seen only a bleak future of nothingness with no hope whatsoever spinning out into the eternal horizon. His hubris had been cut short and humility had been forced onto him, and his mind had threatened to snap.

Not just because he was unable to escape filth, that part had been terrible and wrought a heavy toll on his mind. Day in and day out that he had been forced to wear dirty clothing that wasn't properly washed, forced to eat food that he was uncertain of and sleep in a bed that he didn't feel was properly sanitized.

But all of his neurosis were being triggered in addition to the crushing feelings of despair and hopelessness concerning his own powerlessness due to his lack of a quirk, not to mention having to live his life as a cripple. He had gone from lording it over people he considered to be his inferiors to being unable to wipe his own ass...

Now, on the other side of all of that humbling experience... how was he going to conduct himself after a sudden, unexpected miracle had given him back the means to have a life? For a moment there he had almost gone back to the Kai Chisaki he had always been out of habit, back on the track. But now, as he allowed himself to reflect, he himself wasn't certain what he wanted to do going forward.

Chisaki was snapped out of his contemplation by the sounds of a set of small feet making their way down the hall toward the room he and Aizawa were waiting in. This late in the day no one else was in the small hospital wing dedicated to helping heroes injured during training at U.A., so other than Recovery Girl's approach, all was quiet.

The silence had been good for him to think, but destined to be broken as the little old woman entered the room and waved a chart at him as she broached conversation, "Alright, I have the preliminary bloodwork mapped out and am done studying your x-rays. As far as I can tell young Kai Chisaki is in perfect health, almost to the point of being too perfect."

Aizawa raised an eyebrow at her, "Meaning?"

"His cellular data shows that his physiology has literally been regressed, as anticipated with the introduction of Eri-kun's quirk into the equation. He doesn't just look like a teenager now, his body right to his hormones and growth development have been reverted back to those of his childhood, likely exactly as his genetic memory remembered him to be."

Shuzenji Chiyo pushed her visor-like spectacles up onto the bridge of her nose, giving Chisaki a wry smile, "Honestly, I'm really jealous... if that little girl had altered my own cellular makeup to the extent that she has yours, I would be back in my prime, young and beautiful again!"

In his usual monotone voice Eraser cut in, "Actually, ma'am, given the number of years that he has actually regressed and your current age..."

Shota cried out in surprise as she suddenly elbowed him in the ribs viciously, keeping her kind smile locked on Kai as she continued, pointedly ignoring Aizawa's interruption, "Other than your return to your younger days, I see no sign of stress on any part of your body due to the use of Eri-kun's powers on you, though I council caution."

Chisaki frowned, "What for?" He stared down at his own hands, smaller than they used to be.

She tapped the chart in her hands, "I may be able to verify that everything in your body is in perfect working order, but even if there are no physical side effects, I can't say this won't have sort of consequence on your mind... have you had any issues with loss of memories since the event? I know it was recent, but do your best to think on it."

He shook his head, still frowning, "No... at least I don't think so. Why would I forget things?"

In answer she shrugged at him, "An educated guess, dear. Not only am I not a neuro-specialist, but the human mind is something of a mystery even to the greatest minds in the field. From what I know of how the brain works, it would seem to me that suddenly returning the physical container for memories to a previous state could possibly alter the memories themselves."

Kai's brow knit as he thought on her words, "I'll inform you right away if I seem to lose anything that I should have remembered. Though with your theory, it would seem that I would have lost all memory back to the point of regression..."

She smiled at him again, "You're a sharp one. Yes, I'm curious how you retain what you do, but as I said, the mind is a vastly uncharted labyrinth." Turning to Aizawa, she handed the erasure hero the chart, "He's fine for now; you'd better get the rest sorted..."

After the old woman walked out, Kai questioned the tall hero as the latter stood with the chart held high, likely intentionally making it hard for him to tell if he was looking at the chart or Chisaki. "What else has to be done?"

Aizawa let out a long sigh, "...Mostly paperwork."