Chapter 15 – Ren Kimura

"Well, we got a lot accomplished in a week, even if we have to stop for a while," Kando Watabe said enthusiastically. It had been over a week since their very first meeting to go over safety protocols. They had met every school day since then, in the mornings before class started. Kando Watabe was a very convivial man who had put Ren at ease immediately. He was known as Squidman, the Squidirific Hero. Although he was humanoid in body, his head was large, broad, and reminiscent of a squid or octopus. He had no hair on his head and his skin was a dark orange that had the appearance of supple leather. His face housed a flat wide nose, a human-like mouth, and bright blue eyes that exuded a child-like excitement most the time belying he was middle-aged. Although bald, he had several tentacles that spilled over his shoulders giving him the appearance of having long hair. These tentacles he could use like appendages and were quite useful for the lab work he conducted. Although he was a practicing physician, he also had a PhD and seemed at home in his lab.

The last week had been eventful as far as garnering more information for the study, but some of the outcomes had not been what they had all hoped. Aizawa had not been able to separate Pain and Restoration with Erasure. He could only Erase them together; he was not able to pinpoint one or the other. Ren had been hooked up to several machines that were able to track her quirks and through this data, with Aizawa having spent roughly three hours over three days trying to pinpoint these quirks in Ren and separate them, it was shown to be unsuccessful. Aizawa didn't seem too discouraged by this information. He didn't really seem to show any real discernable emotion about anything Ren thought. He mentioned that in some individuals he was unable to separate multiple quirks so this outcome wasn't too surprising. It would have just made things much easier.

The next leg of the study would concentrate on Aizawa using Erasure on Ren and hoping through the shutting off and on of her quirk she would be able to discern any difference and be able to recreate this feeling/action on her own eventually. The last two days, with both Aizawa and Ren connected to machines and many monitors showing displays of both their quirks, had given them much information although Ren felt she had not learned anything. The many times Aizawa had erased her quirks she could not feel any difference. Whether Aizawa activated Erasure on her or when it was dropped, she felt the same. The monitors that displayed many growing and descending lines meant nothing to her, but Watabe seemed pleased. There had been one downside though. Ren's quirk would after a couple of hours destroy the sensors on the machines. Watabe had been fascinated by this outcome, he rarely had quirks that would damage his equipment when measured. This had set them back. He had replaced the sensors three times already and now had to wait and get their budget updated because of this unexpected expense. It would take a couple of weeks. This news seemed to make Aizawa irritated, which surprised Ren since he had been so impassive up until then. Having just fried the last sensors, they were done experimenting for a while. Watabe started to remove the devices from Ren's arm, neck, and head. Aizawa did not wait for Watabe and started to remove his equipment on his own.

"Watabe, what about doing this old school?" Aizawa asked as Ren stood up from her chair.

"What do you mean?"

"Continuing this leg of the study without machines until we get the budget amended."

Watabe became thoughtful a moment. "How would you quantify Pain after the exposures to Erasure?"

"Through skin-to-skin contact," Aizawa replied. "The pain intensity could be quantified on a written scale of your choosing. Even something as simple as a scale of 1 to 10 could be beneficial."

"That could give us some data and Kimura could continue to practice concentrating on her own quirk. Perhaps she could start finding or feeling the catalyst that starts it, but that would also be dangerous. It would be exposing someone to her Pain quirk."

"I would be the one doing it and I'm fine with the side effects and would agree to any risks. I could sign consent forms if needed," Aizawa replied evenly.

"Now wait a minute," Ren interrupted. "That sounds risky. You would be taking the full brunt of my quirk. You could pass out or even worse things could happen…."

Aizawa turned to her completely non-plussed, "In the study data you seem to have a pretty consistent scale of Pain versus time of contact. Neurological damage only seems to happen with contact that surpasses roughly 10 seconds. As long as I don't touch you over a few seconds I should be fine."

"Well, if by fine, you mean writhing in unbearable pain then, yes," Ren said sarcastically.

"Good. We are in agreement then." Ren's jaw dropped from shock and Aizawa continued. "Watabe and I will work on adding this temporary protocol to the current study. It will also give me first-hand experience so to speak which could help in my discernment between Pain and Restoration with Erasure. I don't want to give up on being able to erase Pain, leaving Restoration, just yet. It may still be possible. Watabe, do you think we could start tomorrow?" He asked.

"I, well, yes." Watabe stammered a bit. "If you can type up the protocol you would like to use by noon today I should be able to get it approved. Provided I also agree with what you propose," Watabe smiled with a wink.

Aizawa nodded. He turned to Ren, "I'll see you at 4:15 tomorrow after school in my classroom. We'll do it there." He turned and left before she could answer.

She stood there in silence feeling like she had very little control over this study situation which mainly involved her quirk so she found it a little insulting. Her cheeks became flush with both embarrassment and anger. Well, if Shota Aizawa wanted to be so nonchalant about her quirk like it was child's play and something so innocuous, he would have a rude awakening when they put what sounded great on paper into practice. This temporary protocol would be quickly forgotten after he got a couple of zaps of her pain quirk. Aizawa was still the enigma he was a decade ago. She thought that perhaps time would have made him better at communication and more expressive, but if anything he was more cold and curt.

Watabe saw her standing there while she was deep in thought. "Kimura, it will be fine. Aizawa takes things seriously and won't do anything dangerous. He isn't reckless or thoughtless. He's a tough old boot too. Your quirk will probably not phase him as much as you think."

Ren sighed. She was starting to have immense regret for agreeing to this study.