Chapter 3 Day Care
Misaka's problem didn't end with the delinquents and that boy, who must have got away somehow, rather they multiplied. Her most immediate problem was trying to stop her pet from eating the delinquents.
"Stop trying to eat them; bad Pikachu, bad," said Misaka flicking the yellow mouse on the nose. She was not going to make the same mistake as earlier, and was holding her pet at arm's reach in case it decided that now was an appropriate time.
Pikachu growled back but didn't try anything.
The second problem was what to do with Pikachu now? The plan this morning was to leave her in the dorms with food and water. She didn't need to go out to do her business as she had already done that.
The only thing Misaka could think of was to take Pikachu to class with her, and just hope the teachers didn't notice a large yellow mouse.
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Pikachu decided that humans didn't taste all that nice, and it was much better to just eat the food the girl gave her. The girl didn't seem to want her to eat the prey they had caught; maybe they were off, or poisonous? In any case, she was getting free meals, so she didn't need to hunt to eat, and with the local wildlife tasting that bad, she was better off not eating them. Hunting them was fun, but eating them was bad.
Pikachu was carried out of the alley; she refused to walk on the street with all those people and those loud moving metal things.
Her girl didn't take Pikachu to the room, but to some walled in area with a lot of girls wearing the same fur her girl wore, but were different like the want-to-be-mate. Whenever a group of girls saw her girl they started to talk in whispers and tried not to look at her girl, but failed. This upset Pikachu, what were they talking about? And why where they giving her girl those looks?
Pikachu clung to Her Girl protectively; growling to decrease the power of any potential attack, but none came just a hand on her head that scratch her ears in that way she found she liked.
Her Girl carried Pikachu upstairs and into a room with some desks and about 20 other girls warring the same fur as the other girls who had been whispering.
Her girl walked over to an empty desk and sat down ignoring the wisperes that even pikachu could tell were directed at her, despite the language difference. Pikachu clung tightly to her girl, she had only met one other of her species so had no understandings of social interaction. She had wanted to find that other Pikachu but after she had zapped the red spots all she had found was that woman who smelt of pee and didn't feed her.
A woman walked into the room as a bell chimed getting the attention of the whole room, was this someone powerful? She didn't have any electric ability, but everyone in the room stood up and faced the woman including her girl, who put Pikachu on the ground when she stood up. Pikachu ahid behind her girl confused and scared of what the woman could do to someone as powerful as her girl.
After all the girls had bowed and said something unintelagibel, her girl picked Pikachu up and sat her on her girls lap as the woman turned around and started to writing something on the wall.
Pikachu looked at the wall and what was written there clicked; the woman at the front was writing down formulae for electromagnetic theory. Pikachu's attention was rapt by the formulae; the way they intertwined to describe the flow and effects of her most basic element. Wait, that last formula, it was wrong; it was to the power 2 not times 2.
"Pika!" said Pikachu indignant at the blatant error, even her girl had not written down the error; she had got it right.
"Shhhh," hushed the girl, but Pikachu could not let this error go uncorrected. She jumped down from the girl's lap and darted to the front of the room, scrambled up the woman fur until Pikachu could grab the writing thing and corrected the error.
Pandemonium ensued.
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Daisy Oak ran a day-care centre in the School Garden; it was quite a profitable venture as there were so many pets, and such a variety as well. It didn't hurt that her friend, Yorokobi, was a vet and was called in when one her clients' pets took a turn. But the tidy profit she made was not the reason for continuing her business even though it was very demanding; no, it was her love of animals, great and small that kept her going.
And out of all the creatures great and small, the 40 cm tall yellow mouse, sparking and struggling in the arms of its rather flustered owner, ranked number one on the odd chart, topping even the zebra a Kenyan girl had brought with her.
"What brings you here miss?" said Daisy, in a friendly voice.
"Misaka Mikoto; my teacher sent me to leave Pikachu here, after she corrected the teacher by writing on the board" said the young girl as she gently put the creature down on the desk and prodused a pen and paper.
"Here you go you can write down all though formula now," Misaka said exasperated.
Daisy notice that the creature, despite its struggles had not scratched its owner, so whatever it was, it was tame to some degree. Which, coupled with the fact that the two of them where in here half way through first period, showed that the owner had little experience of owning a pet. She realised she was acting like her grandfather, a professor at one of the universities in Academy City; still, she had never seen such a creature before, and was it writing down formula? She had thought the girl was just being cute but that creature was writing down mathematical calculations, all far above Daisy's level of understanding.
Numbly Daisy clicked her fingers above the creature's head to get its attention, and then she offered it a berry noting its teeth were rodent-like, so it could probably live off a dumpster, and yet it was smarter than her...
"Well let's get Pikachu settled in so you can get back to class," said Daisy far to cheerfully. If 'Pikachu' settled down quickly she might get the girl back in time for second period, letting her call her grandfather during his mid-day brake so he could tell her what the cute but very intelligent electric mouse thing was.
Daisy led Misaka and Picachu into the pen area, deciding that she would use the new pens that were not quite ready, but were empty as she didn't know how Pikachu would react to her other clients, there were too many horror stories from zoos that had put prey next to predator.
"How long have you had Pikachu?" asked Daisy out of curiosity, she suspected not long.
"I found Pikachu last night out the back of the dorms," said Misaka stroking the things ears.
"Have you tried leaving Pikachu in a room on its own before?" asked Daisy, the normal response in this situation was something like 'why would I do that, insert pet name here might get lonely.'
"I tried to leave her in my room this morning with water and food, she broke out and follow me to school," said Misaka.
"What about if she needed to go to the toilet?" asked Daisy, the girl probably didn't realise that even if she let her pet out in the morning she might still need to go several times during the day and was it even house trained? Still if her pet had become so attached to its owner that it had brock out to follow her to school then it might take some time to get it used to the idea that it owner would come back for it.
"She already went, on my bed," said Misaka looking annoyed at her pet that was looking around in wonderment, its little nose twitching at the smell, oblivious to the ire of its owner.
Second thing Daisy was going to have to do was find a way of house training a mouse before this girl had to give up her new pet or sleep on the things toilet, she had known girls who had been so attached to their pet that such a thing was only a 'minor' inconvenience.
First things first, time to get it setteled in. Daisy thought as she opend the door on a large dog pen.
"I need you to put eh, Pikachu in the pen then feed her this," Daisy said pulling out a berry.
"Ok" said Misaka as she put her pet into the the pen.
Pikachu was happy enough to get some food and get back to writing down formula, but was not happy when the door closed getting, rather distressed and electrifying.
"Give her another," said Daisy quickly, she didn't want the thing melting the plastic door.
Misaka did so and Pikachu somewhat calmed down, even more so when she started to pet the thing and verbally reassuring it.
"Ok now I want you to walk out of sight, then turn around come back, and feed her again," ordered Daisy. this was an old trick with dogs, she didnt know if it would work, but by the third time Misaka went out of its line of sight Pikachu had started to see it as a game.
"Ok now wait around the corner a minute," ordered Daisy. she could tell after 30 seconds Pikachu was getting upset so sent Misaka back to feed it, this continued a few more time with steadily increasing time increments until Pikachu was settling down between snacks. At this point Daisy decided to take Misaka upstairs so her pet could not smell her and see if Pikachu would react different on the cameras. Then she would repeat the cycle of feed, leave, come back in a few minutes, until Daisy was happy the girl could leave it alone for the rest of the day without another breakout attempt.
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"'Misaka believes this is the best opportunity to recover Pikachu,' states Misaka uncertainly," said one of the Misakas, looking at the other who looked back at Misaka, unblinking behind her night vision goggles.
"'Remember the plan,' reminds Misaka of Operation Pet Kitten," said the second one.
"'Misaka wonders what would happen if Misaka asked Yoshikawa for a kitten?' asked Misaka speculatively," said the first one.
A litany of curses came from behind them.
"'Misaka think Accelerator is jealous, after Yoshikawa didn't let Accelerator have a fire-breathing PokeMon,' smirks Misaka, lording Misakas superiority over Accelerator" said the second one.
Accelerator growled menacingly at Misaka, who was nonplussed as the sole purpose of herself and her sisters was to help Accelerator reach level 6 by level-grinding, so any threats against her were pointless, and besides, they were just Lab Rats. Strap electrodes to their heads, put some cheese in a maze, and they would be happy.
A/N
Thanks to all who have reviewed this story so far; the anonymous reviewers seem to have had low expectations going in, but have liked it enough to review, which is always appreciated. I don't blame anyone for having a low expectation of this story going in, as this is a fairly wacky idea, but I am glad that people like it and hope you all continue to do so as I update very slowly.
Was going to put in some proper formulae, but I am a mechanical engineer, not electrical, so I don't understand it above high school level, and probably neither would my audience, so I left it out.