Chapter Five: Search for a Cure
"You're so gloomy." Keigo's elbow presses into his leg as he uses his fist as support for his head. He's been staring at Tenko for a while now. He was mad when he hurt Tsunade and heard he killed his family, and still is, but Tenko is a giant mess.
"Was it an accident?" He knows it's cruel to ask, but until he gets answers he doesn't feel completely safe.
Tenko's fingers dig into his thighs.
"Or did you want them dead?" He doesn't like his parents but the thought of killing them never once crossed his mind.
"Why?"
Why? Why is he asking? Does that really need to be answered?
"Why did they die? All I did was reach out." Tenko's hand left his legs and he starts pulling at his hair before hitting himself in the head. "Why? Why? WHY?"
Tenko is assaulted by the memories. Everyone. Everyone crumbled away into nothingness. The images deeply engraved into his brain. Their death overlay with his other memories of them. Mon, his dog, comforting him at his side. His sister running away to tell on him. His grandparents doing nothing but watch on. His mom rushing towards him. His dad attacking him. All his memories overlap until all that's left is the pain he's endured and the pain he's inflicted.
He removes his right hand from his hair to stare at it palm up. Are the bandages really enough? Is he going to destroy this place and kill these people too?
That's twice now that Tsunade has given him even a spark of hope. Why couldn't that hope have come from his family in the first place?
The winged boy asked if he wanted them dead. Who would want their family dead? But his dad. Tenko had been so angry that even in his desperation his dad only seem to want to harm him that for a moment he truly wanted him dead. Why? What did he ever do? Because he likes heroes?
His dad got his wish. There's no way he could ever be a hero now. His quirk causes destruction. He can only destroy things. He can only kill things. He could never be a hero with a power like that.
More than that, what is he suppose to do now? They let him stay with them at a hotel last night but what now? Would they give him to the police? Would they label him a villain?
"Snap out of it!" Keigo snaps his fingers in front of Tenko's face when he doesn't respond after multiple attempts.
Tenko swats away his hand only to aggressively shoot back to the other side of the bed, looking between the boy and his own hand. Nothing happened. It's fine.
Keigo watches each movement with sharp eyes. He cant't understand wanting to kill your family, if Tenko even wanted that, but he also can't understand being upset over it. He doubts he would care if his parents died.
The door opens to reveal Tsunade back with a back of easy to eat foods. She passes them the bag before walking back to the door and placing a rectangular piece of paper on the door. She repeats the process on the window then to the two perpendicular walls. She's far from a master, but she could handle that much. She's the proud granddaughter of Mito, after all.
She eyes Keigo digging through the bag to see what she's bought before he tries to shove food to Tenko who continues to keep his distance. He doesn't care much for personal boundaries though and moves over to the other bed. "Eat something. Even if it's just an apple."
Tsunade looks warily out the window one last time before closing the curtains. The lights are more than enough to keep the room lit. She swears that she sensed someone surveilling the area. Not once but twice. She doesn't even think it's the same person each time. She hopes she's wrong, but it's also foolish to let her guard down. Especially with her big winnings last month. Some bad has come to pass but not enough to match her winnings.
She looks back to see Keigo trying to force feed Tenko one more time before giving up and taking a bite of the apple himself.
"You should both eat. It's not good to skip meals."
"What would you like?" asks Keigo already looking back into the bag to decide what Tsunade would like best.
"Don't worry about me. I already ate."
The bigger question is what is she going to do now. Tenko needs care. The mind heals differently than the rest of the body. There's no quick fix or a guaranteed path to betterment that she could offer. She, herself, spent decades drowning in the deaths of Nawaki and Dan over just gifting them her grandfather's necklace like it was some curse. She's killed many but it wasn't ever anyone important to her, and many of them stemmed from war.
"You said," Tenko rasps out the words, "that things don't always work out." Keigo looks between the two still unsure of how they know each other. "But how do you keep going when there's nothing left." His family. His hopes. His dreams. All snatched away in a moment. "How can— What am I— Now—" Every attempt to form a sentence falls apart as his body starts to quiver.
He will crumble if left alone. "It's okay to cry." Tsunade hugs the boy and strokes his head in what's hopefully a soothing gesture. It's been a long time since she's offered tender care.
Tears spill from his eyes before he starts to wail.
"One day at a time. One action at a time. If you keep that up you'll eventually find something."
Keigo tightens his hold on his apple. It feels like he's intruding on something even though Tenko's the outsider.
…..
"How's the search coming?" HPSC President Mae Shinji asks a few of his admin employees who are clicking away at their computers.
"We found the kid. His quirk was registered from birth. Between the wings, age, and description we were able to narrow down individuals from the database. Then we cross-referenced with the CCTV footage we were able to recover."
"The verdict?"
"Takami Keigo." Takami? The name already doesn't match the woman he was with. "Son of Takami Tomie and Takami Kurou. No address. There's a notice to arrest Kurou if he's ever sighted."
Shinji frowns. "Reason?"
"First-degree murder and theft."
"And the mother?"
"No criminal history. Has never held anything more than a part-time job." His mind whirls as he tries to process everything into something he could use. This could have been an all-around win. Arrest a wanted man and make a proposition to a vulnerable woman. If they don't have an address they could be potentially saving a kid too.
The woman is still a problem. A kidnapper? The kid seemed comfortable around them, but kids could be easy to sway. Though, the more obvious answer is that he likely hadn't been growing up in a good home. The woman, Senju Tsunade if that's her actual name, also didn't report the murderer. Considering her attitude and the other circumstantial evidence she may not even care.
"And we're sure the woman who left with him isn't Takami Tomie?"
"Absolutely. Quirks and photos don't match."
Shinji mentally groans. He sees the headlines of 'HPSC and police allows child hero to be kidnapped.' "What have we found about Senju Tsunade."
"There are no name matches in the database. We've been scanning both Senju and Tsunade individually too with no success."
Another subordinate speaks up. "We don't have her identification but we have been able to find some other information. We have inside claims that she's been involved with a popular gambling ring and battle ring. Notes from the battle ring mention superstrength. The only mentions from the gambling ring is that as far as the insider knows, she has no affiliation despite easily talking to whoever joins on a given night. However, that may be because of the name she's made for herself."
He knew the woman was no good. "What's the name?"
"The Legendary Sucker." He has no words. "Apparently she has notoriously bad luck. She's hit it big a few times, but she's a money pit."
Wealthy enough to keep up loosing streaks and a no-name. That sounds like high-up underground criminal. Someone who would likely have to be born into it or know someone on the inside who could delete her records.
"And we've searched the database based on quirk?"
"On-going. Augmentation quirks are fairly common but widely named so we're trying to cover all our bases. So far no luck. Heh. No luck. Maybe her bad luck is contagious."
"Keep at it. Inform me when you find something."
…..
"I wish I never got a quirk." Being quirkless would be better than this. His fingers are still wrapped, but the quirk and bandages are all so new while his memories haunt him.
"Do you mean that?" Tsunade peers down at Tenko. "If you mean it I'll look into it."
"You shouldn't tell him things that are impossible," adds Keigo.
Tsunade crosses her arms and raises an eyebrow. "Impossible? More like a challenge." There's a reason clans are protective of their bodies even post-death. If the answer is in the body then there's the potential for replication, or in this case the potential for reversal or at least suppression.
"Can you really do something like that?" Tenko doesn't want to get his hopes up. Why does Tsunade always do this?
"I can't make promises, but the human body is a specialty of mine and I've done the impossible before." Konoha's medical knowledge had been horribly insufficient before her.
Keigo thinks that healing is very different than doing something no one has ever done before. He wants to doubt her for that very reason but when has anything ever stopped her before. She puts in her all when she's determined.
Tsunade raises a finger at Tenko. "One condition." The boys stare at her wondering what the condition is. "I'll do the research, but in the meanwhile we are going to work on you controlling your power." Tenko shakes. "Think of it as Plan B. With control comes confidence."
Keigo things about it. He's smart enough to pick up that this is so Tenko isn't scared of himself, but he can't help as view it as early hero training.
"But I'll destroy things."
Tsunade scoffs. "Like that's a hard thing to do. It just comes easier to you than others. Want to know something? I can destroy a boulder with a single finger too. I could crack the earth down the entire road we're on. It's what you do with that power that matter."
Keigo's never witnessed either of those claims but he has seen some of her other abilities allowing him to immediately believe her while Tenko seems more hesitant. He puffs his cheeks with air. "Don't doubt her! If she says something is true than it's true!"
"I'll think about it." Tenko wants to reach out to hope, but he still has fears of ever using that power again.
…..
It takes longer than Tsunade would have liked to find a space and equipment to conduct her Quirk research. She was turned down from several places because she 'needs certification and a degree for starters.' She's probably accomplished more than any of them so screw them. She had to heavily dip into her winnings to pay someone off even though she's almost certain their operations are illegal due to how stringent everyone else had been.
It gets her what she needs in the end.
So much for retirement. Here she is giving it her all because of a kid. The results won't matter when she goes home. If she can get home. As the months pass she starts to wonder if she'll ever find a way back. Travelling around the country had been fruitless.
…..
Tenko comes around to agreeing. He's startled when Tsunade picks Keigo and him up and they speed through the city by rooftops. He closes his eyes as the momentum makes the still air feel like a gust of wind. Not only is it fast, but they are really high up. Higher than he's ever been. He doesn't understand how Keigo can laugh all giddy but then remembers he has wings. A train of thought that makes him wonder if he could fly as fast as they're moving now.
They eventually come to a stop in a forested area. Just them. No others around.
Safe.
Tenko almost feels safe here. He is still waiting for anything and everything to go wrong, but the isolation of the woods almost lets him relax.
Tsunade lets them have a moment to take in their surroundings. She took both with her since she doesn't trust Keigo alone. It has nothing to do with him. It's entirely because she still hasn't verified whether someone had been watching them that day. She can't watch over them every second but for now it's best to limit how often they're left alone. If someone is spying on them there's no telling who it's on. It could equally be any one of them.
"Let's get started," she announces. Thankfully, this isn't her first time teaching.
Keigo pulls on her pantleg. "I want to train too."
She'll need to tailor training to the two boys separately, but that wouldn't be a problem. "Sure." There's no reason not to. She'll be training Tenko on control anyhow. Another specialty of hers even if the power comes from another source. She'll need to assess what Keigo can do and look for areas of improvement she can help with. Practicing his flying and learning to dodge is probably a good start.
Besides, this world starts formal training so late. She started training when she was half his age.
Keigo grins. He nearly thought she wouldn't take him on too. It's hard to get Tenko to talk, but Tsunade seems to have taken him under her wing. When Keigo first met her she asked what he wanted to do and gave him a list of reasons why he shouldn't stay with her, but she didn't mention any of that to Tenko. He was scared he would lose his place at her side, but Tsunade is still Tsunade. She still accepts him and still caters to his whims…usually.
Keigo points at Tenko to give his declaration of training rivalry.
…..
Tsunade keeps to a room in the laboratory designated for her. She just assumes it's to help keep privacy and separate people's experiments so people don't run off and claim it as their own. They even gave her a plastic card that's opens the door to the access room. Without it, the room remains locked.
It's been another long day and she's about to leave when someone else in the building calls out to her from down the hall.
"Do you think you could help us? We've ran a bunch of experiments but my partner and I are looking for a second opinion. We've been asking anyone else whose been using the facility."
She's going to decline when they temp her with 'never before seen'.
She's expecting some kind of poison or explosive. Something someone would want to keep hidden.
Instead, they show her some oversize rat.
Or is it a dog?
Maybe a baby bear?
It makes a noise that is assuredly human. It talks.
"A summon?"
No one seems to know what she's talking about and the researchers inform her that it is an animal but he's the first animal with a quirk. As such his mutations are a fascination to them.
What she infers from their monologue is that the bear-rat thing person is functionally a person in everyway that matters. She would hate if anyone ever did this to her slugs.
The nature of the study reminds her too much of the stories she's heard about her teammate. Not the perverted one the other one. Orochimaru. She always thought he was creepy and she had finally been proven right.
This experiment isn't on as grand of scale but it's still disturbing all the same.
Tsunade unbinds him as a researcher yell demanding to know what she's doing. Her hand glows green to help heal what she can. The anatomy of animals could be different, but she's studied the anatomy of various animals. They had been safer to practice on before utilizing on humans.
So much for using the lab space. She's already paid the monthly fee. She'll grab some of the supplies on her way out. For the crooked price it's what she's entitled to.
A fight break out to them which leads to one of the researchers being smacked with enough force they crash through the wall. This brings attention to the few people walking by.
She hears someone mention law enforcement and that's her queue to leave. The others should be incapacitated enough that it's safe to go back in the building. She enters the building and grabs everything she can. She had just started making progress and she would be damned if she let this incident take her money for no reason.
Tsunade hears sirens. A sound she's come to equate with emergency services. There's no time to go back down and finish healing whatever he is. She peaks out the gaping hole in the wall and see the animal lifted onto a stretcher. Good. Medical attention is what he needs.
Fortunate for her, because there's only so many people you can shove in a small room without starting to drive each other crazy.
Two kids is pushing it as it is.
Thanks everyone for your support! I love you all.
