At some point Hanazawa Teruki had completely lost control of his life.
It hadn't always been this way. There had been a time when he had always been in control, in charge. He had been respected and obeyed, his word had been law, and there had been consequences for anyone who….he reigned it in. He wasn't that person anymore. Those days were over and long behind him. He was the new Teru. He was a better person than he had been before and he certainly didn't want to be the leader again.
Even though he was the only one with any leadership skills.
If Teru had been the one in charge they would have been dragging Sho's father back up the mountain right now, not sitting there having breakfast with the Kageyama's. if sending him down the mountain brought him to the future then pushing him up the mountain would have, of course, sent him back to the past. It was basic logic so it had a good chance of working and if not then, well, they could have sent him even further into the future and then he could have been future Teru's problem.
But no, they were having breakfast like this was the most normal thing in the world.
"Sit down and be normal." Hissed Sho as he pulled a chair out for his father. Touichirou said nothing, he just sat down like this was normal. But it wasn't normal. Nothing would ever be normal again. Time travel was real…was this how the normal people felt when they realized that psychic powers were real? Maybe this was why so many people had dismissed what happened at the Cultural Tower. People would rather believe that it had just been the regular kind of terrorism than the psychic powered kind…he couldn't blame them.
To quote a very good movie, and a very terrible esper; this was heavy.
"Thank you for the food and your continued hospitality, Kageyama family." Said Sho's father. He even did that thing where you clasped your hands together and bowed your head. Teru did the same, quickly, making sure that the others saw him and followed suit. There was no way that Mob's parents could know about this. There was no way that anyone could know about this. Best case scenario everyone thought that they were crazy. Worst case scenario they wound up locked up in one of those secret government facilities, and they were supposedly even worse than Claw.
This was one of those things that they were going to have to keep to themselves…that Teru was going to have to make sure that they kept to themselves. This kind of thing always fell on him.
"Yeah mom, it's great." Said Ritsu quickly. He and Sho exchanged a glance. They were at either side of Sho's dad. He didn't seem to notice. He was eating like he had never seen food before. His fork was scraping the plate and everything. Teru wasn't going to pretend that it was normal, of course. There were some depths that even he wouldn't go to.
"Really top notch cooking, Ritsu's mom. Tastes exactly like what it's supposed to, and no tiny baby chickens in it at all. Not like this one time I had farm fresh eggs and there was a little chicken baby inside." Said Sho. Ritsu gave him a look.
"Sho, come on, we're eating." Said Ritsu. How he could have stood to be with someone like Sho Teru would never know. He was just so…weird. That was a good word for it. It was almost like he had been raised by wolves but saying so would have been an insult. To the wolves.
"What did you do?" asked Touichirou, at least having the decency to stop chewing before he spoke. Sho slumped down in his chair.
"What do you care?" asked Sho
"I care because it's interesting. All mealtime conversation interests me." said Touichirou
"Whatever happened to 'speak when spoke to' or whatever?" grumbled Sho. Touichirou turned his head to the side.
"I assumed that the rules here for closer to the ones at Fukuda's house. He's allowed to speak at the table whenever he chooses to. Father doesn't like me or Mother to speak unless he speaks to us first because he is often very tired from work." Said Touichirou
"Damn, I had a father like that. You know, it get's easier-" said Mr. Kageyama. Teru decided to jump in before Sho's father decided to say something stupid. Or Sho did. Mob and Ritsu…well, they probably had more sense.
"I have to agree with Ritsu and Sho, Mrs. Kageyama, this is truly your best work yet." Said Teru. He was laying it on thick but he had no choice. Happy parents didn't ask too many questions or make too much conversation. They just ate and then got back to doing parent things.
"Kind of small, though." Said Mob. Teru, if he had been a worse person, would have kicked him under the table. But he didn't, he just tapped his aura against his. Ritsu did the same. Sho looked like he wanted to. Maybe that would be enough to get it through his head that, no, this was not the time to insult his mother's cooking. They had to deal with one crisis at a time. Two would be just too much, and any more than that would have turned this crisis into a catastrophe.
"Well, Shigeo, this is why you have to tell me how many people you're having over. I can't be expected to feed the whole neighborhood." Said Mrs. Kageyama. The sarcasm was, of course, lost on Mob. He just did that thing where he looked adorably confused, normally it was enough to put a smile on Teru's face.
But now was not the time.
"I don't think you even could. I mean they wouldn't fit." Said Mob. Mrs. Kageyama sighed.
"Oh Shige, I can't stay mad at you…but your father told you the new rule, right?" asked Mrs. Kageyama
"One friend per person per sleepover…but this is kind of an emergen-" Said Mob. This was bad. He loved Mob, he was a good friend and powerful ally, but he was also denser than a bag of bricks. Teru had to redirect the conversation and, normally, it would have been easy but right now all he could think about was the fact that time travel was real and a younger version of the guy who tried to take over the world, and had ruined Teru's life, was sitting there at the table drowning his omelet in ketchup!
"Is this a different kind of ketchup, Mrs. Kageyama? It's very good." said Teru quickly
"No. It Costco brand, same as usual." Said Mrs. Kageyama as she eyed Sho's Dad wearily. Teru caught Ritsu's eyes and motioned towards Sho's dad.
"That's enough, I think it's mostly ketchup at this point." Said Ritsu as he took the bottle away and put it on the table. Sho's Dad glared at him. Teru could see his aura, what was left of it, and it didn't look good. Murderous intent rolled off of him. Thankfully Mob had mostly drained him…he wasn't looking too good either. Where Sho's Dad was dim Mob was bright…and a little bit painful, too, to focus on…
They had to get out of here.
"Ritsu! Be polite." Said Mrs. Kageyama
"He was hogging it." Said Ritsu
"We have another bottle in the kitchen, a Costco sized one. Don't be stingy when we have company." Said Mrs. Kageyama
"But mom, you just said that you couldn't feed all of us." Said Mob. Teru wondered, sometimes, if Mob did this on purpose…of course he didn't and it was stupid to think that he did. That was just how he was. Teru wished that he could shut Mob up, sometimes, with just a look the way Ritsu could shut Sho up but that was a boyfriend thing and he and Mob were not together…and even if they had been he figured that Mob would have been immune to things like that.
"….Ichimaro, you take over." Said Mrs. Kageyama. Mr. Kageyama shook his head.
"We had an agreement, Hana, before noon they're your children." Said Mr. Kageyama
"Alright then, they can be my children and you can go to Costco in that case." Said Mrs. Kageyama
"Don't you threaten me with a good time, woman." Said Mr. Kageyama. Teru decided to focus on the mounting list of problems in front of him and not Mob's smiling, laughing, happy parents.
"What's Costco?" asked Sho's Dad. There, another problem Teru could focus on. The fact that Sho's father was incapable of keeping his mouth shut! Even when he was eating!
"It's a grocery store…wait, kid, have you never been to Costco before?" asked Mr. Kageyama
"No. Mother has our food delivered." Said Sho's father
"Oh you poor child. Well let me tell you, it's-" said Mr. Kageyama
"It's a grocery store with a lot of free samples and really big boxes of things, it's not interesting." Said Ritsu quickly. He gave Sho another look. Sho quickly picked up his plate and scraped the rest of his food into his mouth.
"Wonderful meal Ritsu's mom and dad but we have to go upstairs now and…and do our homework." Said Sho, his mouth disturbingly full. He grabbed his father's arm and dragged him away. He grabbed his plate as he was removed from the table, his aura broadcasting murderous intent the entire way up the stairs.
"Such a strange boy…" said Mrs. Kageyama
"He's probably related to the redheaded kid." Said Mr. Kageyama
"That's just Sho's-" said Mob before Teru kicked him under the table.
"That's his brother." Said Teru quickly. He couldn't tell if Mob was giving him a look or not. He would apologize later. Right now he needed to keep this chaos contained to the four of them.
"He's a twin? That boy can't be much older than him." Said Mrs. Kageyama
"That's his half brother. He has a half sister and a half brother, both from different mothers." Said Teru. Mrs. Kageyama shook her head.
"That poor boy." Said Mrs. Kageyama
"Hey! I was right! Well, half right, anyway." Said Mr. Kageyama. Mrs. Kageyama rolled her eyes and poured him some more water.
"Yes honey, you followed the trail of clues starting with the fact that they're both blue eyed redheads." Said Mrs. Kageyama before she leaned over and kissed him on the top of the head. That was Teru's cue to finish his own food and drag Mob away. He didn't think that was something for him to see. Parents being together was weird enough, being affectionate was too much.
Teru couldn't even imagine his parents speaking to one another without fighting let alone actually wanting to be near one another.
But this was not the time to be thinking about parents, his or anyone else's. He could think about his parents if they remembered their weekly phone call this week. It didn't matter if they did, what was he going to tell them? That not only was time travel real but the guy, the one who had not only broken their family apart but had also made a bid to take over the world, had managed to do it and now he was at Teru's mercy-
He wasn't that person anymore. He wasn't going to let himself become that person anymore.
He was better than that…and people who were better than that didn't drag their friends around. as Teru reached the top stair he let go of Mob's arm. He didn't seem to mind, or at least if he did he wasn't saying anything. He could be kind of a closed book when it came to how he felt, if he didn't feel like sharing. Teru didn't need a closed book right now, he needed someone to at least talk to. He needed someone who had some idea as to what to do about this. A good idea.
Because right now the best thing he could come up with was leaving Sho's dad on the side of the road and hoping that he hadn't broken the space time continuum.
"Teru-" said Mob
"Yeah, yeah, I know. I shouldn't have dragged you." said Teru
"No, that's not-" said Mob
"And I need to figure out what we're going to do about…everything. I'm trying my best to-" said Teru
"It's not that." Said Mob. Teru sighed. Mob was as impenetrable as ever. Anything could have been going on behind those eyes of his. Sometimes the best thing to do was to ask.
"What, then?" asked Teru. He braced himself for the worst. He was a terrible person for wanting to abandon Sho's father. He was a terrible person for thinking that he was a terrible person. Mob was done with him and he was going to be alone and-
"You have ketchup all down the front of your shirt." Said Mob. Teru looked down and…and how had he missed that? Great, another problem. He was going to have to do a load of laundry when he got home and it wasn't even laundry day…actually, no, he was going to have to pretreat this for a day unless he wanted to permanently ruin it…great.
Well, at least this problem had an easy solution.
"You can borrow something of mine, if you want. I mean I don't have anything as nice as what you normally wear but you can borrow something." said Mob
"Thanks, you're a lifesaver." Said Teru
"Do you think I should lend Touichirou something, too? He only has what he's wearing and it's all dirty and ripped." Said Mob
"I…have no idea." Said Teru. Lending him clothes, dressing him, implied that he was going to be here for a while…not that Teru had any idea as to where else he would be. Claw was gone, according to Sho, and it's members were scattered to the four winds. Even if it hadn't been they probably wouldn't have listened to some kid. They hadn't listened to Sho after all and they definitively knew who he was. They couldn't just abandon Sho's father, either, Mob wasn't that kind of person…why had they had to get themselves involved in this mess?
Because they were them, that was why.
"Or maybe Ritsu should lend him something, since they're closer to the same size. Or Sho, since they're related…but I don't think that Sho has that many clothes. He usually wears the same thing every day." Said Mob
"Mob…don't take this the wrong way but I think that we have more to worry about then how we're going to clothe this guy." Said Teru
"You're right, we have to feed him, too. I don't know how many nights a week my mom is going to let him come over. She complains, sometimes, about Sho eating us out of house and home. Ritsu says that she's exaggerating but I don't want us to be homeless or for my mom to be upset." Said Mob
"Damn it, he does have to eat…I don't know, we'll figure something-" said Teru
"And we have to figure out where he's going to sleep, too. It's too cold out for him to sleep in the park, and he doesn't have a coat either…well he can have my old one, Ritsu didn't want it, so that's a problem solved…but he needs somewhere to keep warm and somewhere to be during the day, too, while we're at school." said Mob
"Yes, well-" said Teru
"And then I think that we should figure out a way to get him back to his own time period before something bad happens. I mean if he's here then why is Sho still alive? If Sho is alive then that means we get him back to the past, right? Or maybe Sho's going to slowly disappear but then if he does then…then does that mean that Claw actually takes over the world or…I mean I would have stopped them, I think but…but also maybe I wouldn't even be here? I mean I would be born but…but maybe it's like that movie about the butterfly-" said Mob
"I've seen the Butterfly Effect, yes, but I don't think that it's going to be like that. I mean I don't know for sure-" said Teru
"Or maybe because Sho's still alive that means that we do get him back to his own time period so we just have to figure out how to do it….but I have no idea where we would ever start and also I didn't even know that it was possible to travel through time but first I think that we need to figure out-" said Mob
"I know! I know that we have a lot to figure out and-and just let me think, alright?" asked Teru. He didn't have to be a mind reader to see that he'd hurt Mob, there. It was written, somehow, all over his face…
It took a lot to get Mob visibly upset.
"I'm sorry." Said Teru
"No, I'm sorry." Said Mob softly.
"What do you have to be sorry about?" asked Teru
"Making you upset." Said Mob
"I'm not upset I'm just…" said Teru. He didn't want to say it. He was supposed to be better than this. He was supposed to be…to be better than the person he had been before. He wasn't supposed to act like this. He was supposed to be able to admit it, admit it when he was…when he felt…
"I'm just scared." Said Teru, looking away. He could still feel Mob, though, looking at him. His aura against his.
"I know. I'm scared too. I think that we all are…except for Ritsu, he's almost never scared…and Sho too, I guess. He mostly just seems mad. I don't know what he's mad about, though." Said Mob
"I can think of a few things, starting with the fact that he hates his father and his father hates him just as much." Said Teru
"I don't know if Sho hates his Dad but I know that his Dad doesn't hate him. His Dad loves him a lot, actually." Said Mob. Teru wondered, sometimes, what happened in that head of his.
"If that's the case then he's got a really strange way of showing it." Said Teru
"It's true. He really does love Sho a lot, he's just unhappy with him. I saw it when his life flashed before our eyes. When we were done fighting and he exploded so I tried to contain the explosion and we both left our bodies and kind of became one person for a little bit." Said Mob. Teru opened his mouth, closed it, and then opened it again. That was…a lot to take in. More than Mob had ever given him. Mob didn't seem bothered by any of it…but then again it was hard to understand him sometimes….to puzzle him out…
One puzzle at a time.
He was saved, it felt like, by the feel of an aura. Sho's. He was pissed off. It was so obvious even a normal person could have noticed. The aural scream was followed by a real one, this one filled with words that he knew the Kageyama's didn't want to hear. He was, for once, grateful for the weirdness of this day.
It saved him from having to deal with whatever that weirdness had been between him and Mob.
It wasn't a long trip to Sho's room, and it hadn't been a long pause in the hallway, and yet in that time Sho's father had managed to steal one of Ritsu's hoodies and was, it seemed, attempting to make a break for it. Sho was holding him back. Ritsu was off to the side looking as conflicted as Teru felt…one the one hand they could have just let their current problem walk right out the front door and, on the other hand, if he did walk right out the front door then he would wind up being the rest of the world's problem.
Teru couldn't let that happened. He wasn't that kind of person anymore.
"Are you out of your fucking mind?!" shouted Sho as he blocked the doorway. Teru did his best to slip past him. Mob, it seemed, was much more polite.
"No…and why do people keep asking me that?" asked Sho's father
"Because you're out of your mind! You can't just leave like-like-like it's nothing!" said Sho. His father took a step forward. Sho held his ground. There was another aura, there, for a brief second. Then it vanished. Sho's father's unfortunate eyebrows furled together like a couple of confused caterpillars.
"I'm so weak…why am I still so weak?" muttered Sho's father.
"That's because I-" said Mob before Teru practically threw his arm back and covered his mouth.
"I'm with Sho on this one, you can't just leave. You have nowhere to go." Said Teru quickly. Mob turned his head away. Teru shook his head before he could do anything stupid like give a younger version of his ultimate enemy a head-up as to how he was defeated.
"There's always back in time." Said Ritsu
"You have a time machine I don't know about?" said Teru sarcastically
"Hey, don't talk to him like that…but do you know how to go back in time?" asked Sho. Ritsu gave him a long look.
"No…why would I?" asked Ritsu
"Because you're the smartest guy I know and clearly time travel is totally possible so…yeah. If anyone could have figured it out it's you." said Sho. Ritsu ducked his head low even though it was pointless. Everyone could see him blushing.
"I'm not that smart." Said Ritsu quietly. Sho rolled his eyes and took his hand.
"Are too. You're smarter than me, anyway, but then again I dropped out in the first grade so…yeah. Maybe not the guy you should be comparing yourself to." Said Sho
"Shut up, you're smart and you know it." Said Ritsu, still looking down. Sho's father was staring at the both of them like they were pod people…right, yeah, Teru knew a fight brewing when he saw one. He may not have known the man well, or not at all, but he got the feeling that Sho's father wouldn't have been alright with Sho being the way he was no matter if it was the past, the present, or the future.
"So yeah, unless you have a DeLorean stashed away somewhere I'm pretty sure he's stuck." Said Teru
"It doesn't have to be a DeLorean, it just has to be a vehicle capable of reaching eighty eight miles and hour and generating one point twenty one gigawatts of energy. That's 5 by ten to eighth or the ninth jules, which can easily be achieved with enough focus and a big enough power source like five by ten to the fourth batteries. Plus two spares for my Walkman….Walkman…" said Touichirou as he felt around his waist.
"A Walkman which I have lost and therefore am in no hurry to go back to the past and tell my parents which I have lost. Father hates it when I'm reckless with my things." Sighed Sho's father. Mob squeezed past Sho and pulled the Walkman out of the pike of junk with his powers and handed it to Touichirou.
"Thank you for that, I am forever in your debt. Now if you'll excuse me I really must be going. Thank you again for your hospitality." Said Touichirou before he bowed. Mob bowed back before Teru could stop him.
"You can't just leave! You're going to die out there and-" said Sho
"That's over a hundred million batteries. That's more than there are in the world, probably." Said Ritsu. Teru wanted to walk up and shake him back and forth until he got his priorities in order.
"That was my initial figure, yes, and yes I didn't have that many. I had to find the equivalent of that many batteries. I mostly used batteries, car batteries, gasoline, plutonium I stole from the power plant, and my own focus. Obviously it worked." Said Sho's father. Ritsu pulled Sho away from him. Teru did the same for Mob.
"What?" asked Touichirou
"You're probably radioactive right now." said Ritsu. Touichirou shrugged.
"Clearly it's had no detrimental effect on me since my son exists. I didn't even steal that much and I'm not even sure if it's plutonium. Fukuda is as far from stealthy as a person can be and also nuclear reactors are actually heavily guarded." Said Touichirou
"Maybe you should go to a hospital." Said Mob
"I don't need a hospital, I need Fukuda. I'm assuming that he's still alive, correct?" asked Sho's father. Teru faced Sho first. Then Ritsu. Then Mob. It took Sho a moment to realize he was being stared at.
"Yeah, ok, he was alive the last time I talked to him but that was weeks ago! He hasn't picked up his phone in forever and I think he's in hiding with the rest of them…I don't know, I don't care." Said Sho. Touichirou cocked his head to the side.
"Fukuda is a lot of things but he's no coward. Why would he be in hiding?" asked Touichirou
"Because you los-" said Sho
"You know that you can't leave, right? You're not…however old you are anymore, you're an adult, so technically nobody is going to believe that you are who you say you are and, anyway, you could destroy the universe if you alter the future…present." Said Teru. Not his most convincing speech, not even by half, but it wasn't like he'd had time to rehearse!
"Wouldn't be the first time you tried to end the world." Muttered Ritsu. Teru slapped him over the head with his powers. What was wrong with everyone? This was why he was the defacto leader. He was the only one who had any kind of experience, and any sense of the sheer gravity of the situation.
"Wouldn't be the first time you fucked up, either." Said Sho much more loudly.
"What do you-" said Sho's father
"Maybe you should just go home, I mean it would be safer for you and for everyone…not to be mean or anything. I'm not trying to kick you out, I'm just kind of…kind of worried." Said Mob
"That's exactly where I was planning on going. If anyone is going to shelter me while I complete my mission with will be my own mother and father." Said Sho's father. Again everyone's eyes fell on Sho.
"What? I don't know where they live…I've never even met them." said Sho. A dark look crossed Sho's father's face, one the looked like it went just a step beyond being worried.
"Are they…I mean…I need to know…have they perished in the thirty three years since my leaving?" asked Sho's father
"I don't know, you never mentioned them." said Sho, looking away. The look of worry left Sho's father's face.
"Oh. That means nothing. I was probably too busy ruling the world to tell you about my parents, that's all." Said Sho's father
"You don-" said Sho
"How ab-" said Teru quickly.
"Where do you live? It might not even be there anymore." Said Ritsu. He met Teru's eyes and nodded. Finally, someone understood that, yeah, maybe it wasn't smart to tell the unstable megalomaniac that he had been beaten and was now rotting away in maximum security esper prison.
"The Saffron District. The big house with the red door." Said Sho's father.
"I live in Saffron. It's all condos and apartment buildings." Said Teru. Another dark look, gone as quickly as it came. Teru braced himself, they all did, but he was still too drained to do much more than show his aura. Teru didn't know what they were going to do when his powers came back, or when he found out that he had lost, or when he found out that his new…friends? Acquaintances. His new acquaintances were the ones to have defeated him…
One thing at a time.
"Show me." said Sho's father. There. That was the thing, the one thing that they could focus on. Saffron was far from here but that was good, it gave Teru time to think. So did getting all of Sho's father's stuff out of Ritsu's room. It wasn't easy gathering it, or carrying it, but he understood why Ritsu was so insistent that they do this.
Shos' father needed a place to stay and the Kageyama house couldn't be it.
Teru knew that there was no way that the Kageyama's wouldn't noticed an extra guest in their house. There was no way, too, that they would say 'yes' to their house turning into an inn. There was also no way that they would believe a single word of this crazy story. No, there was no way that he could stay with the Kageyama's.
Or Sho, too, for that matter.
Sho lived in a house with his mom, stepfather, and half siblings. There was no way that his mother would take in a younger version of her ex-husband. She would believe their crazy story, of course, since she was probably used to this having been married to the man before, but then there would be an entirely new problem to be dealt with. If she knew then she knew too much. The more people who knew the bigger danger that they would be in…
Sho's house was out of the question.
And so was Teru's, and for the very good reason that he just didn't want the man around. Even if he was just a kid. Teru didn't have a big place, only thirteen tatami mats, and most of those were taken up by him and his stuff. He wasn't equipped to host someone, for one thing, and for another he just didn't want the company…but he knew that these weren't good reasons. If it came down to it his place would be the one offered up. He didn't have parents, after all, not any even in the same country as him and it wasn't like they sent their people to check up on him anymore. It made perfect sense that this…he didn't even have a good word for him…he knew plenty of good words but none were terrible enough to fit the man who not only tried to take over the world but ruined Teru's life, too….
He hoped to God that the house with the red door was still there.
But it wasn't. There weren't any houses there. It was all condos and apartment buildings, like Teru had said. It was all shiny and new, and barely even damaged from the fight. He had no idea when all of this had been built and he got the feeling that it didn't matter. They could have been built a day, a year, or a lifetime ago. That didn't change the fact that the house wasn't there.
And it didn't change the dark look that crossed Sho's father's face.
That time the sidewalk under him cracked. His face stayed nearly frozen, it was his eyes that went dark. The sidewalk cracking was loud, he was quiet. He seemed so angry and…sad? He didn't know, this wasn't his father, and he wouldn't have been able to read his own father anyway…and anyway this wasn't about him or his parents or what he would have done if this had been one of his parents. This was a problem that he was going to have to solve. Sho was too impulsive, Ritsu overthought things, and Mob was kind of a people pleaser. No, it was up to Teru to come up with something.
Some brilliant idea-
"We should ask Master Reigen for help. He always knows what to do." Said Mob. Teru had been about to come up with something brilliant but, luckily, Mob had come up with something serviceable. He hadn't had any intention of bringing anyone else into this but, unfortunately, they needed an adult and Reigen had already dealt with a lot of this weirdness already. Teru knew that he wasn't going to tell anyone so, yes, Reigen was their best chance at a solution.
Sometimes you had to give up control to get it back in your lige.