Part One
Chapter Five
Things went well with Teruhashi, but I'm not ruling anything out with the rest. It was both a relief and an annoyance when the bug and baseball bit from my prediction occurred as expected. I planned to minimize Takamiya's interest in having me join the baseball club by throwing with my right hand this time. As a psychic, I was perfectly ambidextrous, but ordinary people always have a dominant hand, even if they are ambidextrous. Considering my 120km performance with my left hand, I determined I was left-hand dominant.
I am not.
Not only was my right-hand throw better, Takamiya predicted that it clocked at about 140km. Worse, I didn't throw my hardest. Takamiya was thrilled and probably would have followed me to the classroom where the others were if he and I had been on the same school level. As it is, he tried to climb up the outside wall and into the second-floor window; terrifying.
But this doesn't prove anything. The broken window was a coincidence and so is this. It may not be common for a high-schooler to throw such a hard fast-ball, but it's not impossible either. Adachi Mitsuru made an entire manga based off the main character's promise to throw 160km as a high school student. This doesn't make me un-ordinary.
Yare, yare, I'm off track.
After escaping Takamiya, I arrived at room 2-3 and revealed everything as planned.
Not Even a Little
"Ehhhh!?"
"Youth is wasted on the young!"
"—like bend spoons and levitate spoons and call spoons into his hand and set spoons down on the table—"
"You've got to be kidding me! You expect us to believe you had psychic powers all this time and just happened to get rid of them right before the start of term? You need to take a hard look at reality!"
"Now hold on, you guys. If you really think about it, doesn't this explain some things?"
"Eh? What sort of things?"
Akechi launched into his exhaustive list of evidence, but everyone managed to avoid his over-packed speech bubbles to focus on Hairo.
Excellent. Everything is progressing as expected.
Minus that, of course.
"Like what happened back on sports day during second year. Remember how Saiki just collapsed after that thing was taken out of his head? And then he took off flying during the relay race without breaking a single sweat."
"That's true, isn't it? There were those times too, weren't there? I wondered how it all turned out so badly…"
"How what turned out badly? Did something happen to you, Yumehara-san?"
That's right, Kaidoh. Give her some encouragement.
"No, no, no, no, no! It's nothing like that! Just a misunderstanding between Saiki-kun and I that got resolved; I'm just realizing that there were some weird things about it is all."
Kaidoh looked over at Kusuo, his brow furrowed darkly. "That snake, right at the start of second term after summer break our second year. Was that you?"
Kusuo nodded once. Kaidoh bit his thumb and looked away, minute tremors running through his body. Akechi being Akechi couldn't read the atmosphere and instead hovered around Kaidoh, bombarding him with questions about the incident.
"Hey, now that you mention it, wasn't there that other time too? Remember when we built that treehouse together? Saiki didn't really do much, but after we finished it and decided to try it out, it collapsed right after he passed out, yeah?" Kuboyasu met Kusuo's eye. "Does that mean you were holding it up?"
Kusuo nodded once. Kuboyasu threw his head back and laughed. "Man, what a riot! Could you imagine how bad it would be if we'd climbed up inside it before you went down like that? We'd all be deader than roadkill!"
"My ship!" Saiko leaped to his feet and stomped forward to grasp Kusuo's shirt in both fists. "Was it you who destroyed my darling yacht and left us stranded on that island?"
"Ah," Kusuo said, looking away with a bland expression. "That was Teruhashi-san's fault."
"Eh?" Teruhashi pointed at herself with both hands. "Wh-what did I do?"
Kusuo rolled his eyes and pointed at his head, not bothering to shake himself loose from Saiko's grip. The rich snob 'tch'ed and let him go anyway, stocking back to his chair with a muttered monetary excuse that made no sense whatsoever.
Tapping the left side of his head twice, Kusuo said, "You pulled out my limiter. Again."
"Again?" Teruhashi put a finger to her lips as she thought. "Oh, right! When you saved me from that bear."
"Eh?!"
"Teruhashi-san was attacked by a bear, and Kusuo-kun saved her? Of course he did, because Kusuo-kun is amazing! He saved me too, lots of times, back in elementary school when I was being bullied, though there were a few times I saved myself by wetting my pants…"
Teruhashi pointed to Toritsuka, who still sat huddled in a corner. Again, he seemed to have aged several decades in the last few minutes. "I still can't believe you used that guy to avoid saying 'offu'…"
"Huh?"
"Ah!" Aiura slapped her fist into her palm with an audible 'poof.' "He must have used the idiot as a body double, overlaying his face on the idiot using his power of hallucination."
"Hallucination?"
Again with the tandem speaking.
Except Akechi, who was explaining the power to anyone he could force to listen, and Kaidoh, who was still silently shaking.
"How many powers do…did…you have, Saiki?"
Kusuo shrugged at Hairo. He still had no clue.
"You don't know?" Kuboyasu scratched at his head. Mera, as expected, was drooling with an occupied look on her face.
Still not paying attention.
Nendou stood staring with a blank look on his face while picking his nose.
I'm pretty sure he has no clue what's going on.
"I knew a lot of my powers—telepathy, super strength, petrification, x-ray vision, teleportation, etc.—but most of the time, I didn't realize I had a power until I needed it."
"Ah." Hairo crossed his arms and nodded knowingly. "Like Superman."
Kusuo's eyebrow twitched. That comment was a lot more annoying the second time around.
"How could you?" Kaidoh spoke so softly, Kusuo almost didn't hear it—no one else seemed to. But then, Kusuo had been focusing intently on his chuunibyo friend, waiting for this exact moment.
Here it comes.
"Eh?" Hairo lowered his arms and glanced over. "You say something, Kaidoh?"
Now's your chance, Yumehara-san. Kusuo cut a glance at the nervous looking girl. You've done this before, and it always ends well.
Kaidoh clenched his fists with a 'tch' and dragged his head up to glare at Kusuo. He had tears in his eyes. "How could you keep this a secret? I thought we were friends! Friends don't keep secrets from each other, Saiki!" A shocked shadow passed over his face. "Is that it then? We were never really friends? You just played me like a sucker from the beginning, probably laughing at me behind my back because I was so useless and pathetic! You—!"
"That's not fair at all!"
Excellent! Wait…what? Kusuo blinked owlishly. That wasn't Yumehara's voice. It wasn't her words either.
Who changed the script? Glancing around, Kusuo's eyes landed on Teruhashi who stepped forward with a combative expression on her pretty face. He rolled his eyes. Yare, yare.
"Offu, T-Teruhashi-san…"
Offu? Really? Then again, Teruhashi was, as expected, quite beautiful when angry.
"No!" Teruhashi cut her hand through the air and stocked forward to shove her finger in Kaidoh's face. "You can be upset about his powers, you can be upset that he gave them away, you can even be upset that he didn't tell you, but don't you dare say Saiki-kun was never your friend!"
"Offu." It was barely a whisper, but Kusuo still turned away with his fist to his mouth. Yare, yare.
"Would someone who wasn't your friend, someone who could literally blow up the world with his mind if he wanted to, let you hang around him for so long? Would he indulge you like he did? Would he save you from your own stupidity?"
Hurt, confusion, and sadness warred on Kaidoh's face as he raised his hands and backed frantically away from Teruhashi's burning rage.
"He saved you from that snake because he cared. He held up your stupid treehouse because he cared. He went to ramen with you and visited your house and joined your Okinawa group because he cared. Because he's your friend."
Guilt pinged in Kusuo's heart—none of that is true—but he didn't refute it either. Whether he liked it or not, he and Kaidoh were friends now, even if they weren't back then. And as long as Teruhashi was arguing in his favor, Kusuo wouldn't have to argue his own. Although, if Teruhashi didn't stop, Yumehara would lose her chance to confess again.
Yare, yare.
"Everyone has secrets they can't tell," Teruhashi continued, suddenly swinging on Yumehara. "Right, Chiyo?"
"O-oh! Um…" Yumehara looked around a bit, nervousness prevalent on her face. "Yes. Right."
Damn it.
"Right!" Mera said, snapping from whatever food induced daydream she'd been indulging. "Saiki-san must have used a lot of his powers to help us, didn't he? It could only be because of him that we survived the shipwreck."
"I don't know about any of that," Aiura put in. "But he definitely saved Chiyo-pipi's life when she fell off the school roof."
"What!" Kaidoh looked at Aiura in horror before racing over to grasp Yumehara by her upper arms, almost shaking her. "Why didn't you say you fell off the roof?! When did that happen? Are you okay?"
"Obviously, she's fine," Aiura muttered, rolling her eyes, but only Kusuo seemed to hear.
"Oh! Ah…um…" Yumehara managed to snap out of her love daze just long enough to set a crooked finger beneath her lower lip. "I thought that was a dream…"
She looked over at him, and Kusuo stiffened, certain her fickle affection was about to transfer back to him. Instead, she shocked him when she took a step back from Kaidoh just far enough to bow.
"Thank you, Saiki-kun, for saving my life." She straightened up with another bright smile. "There are still many things I want to do."
Kusuo smiled, his tense muscles relaxing, and returned Yumehara's bow. "No need for thanks. I'm glad I made it in time, Yumehara-san."
"Oh, hey! We should get ramen to celebrate! Buddy's paying, right?"
Kusuo's eyebrow twitched.
"I'm okay with that." Yumehara shot Kaidoh a cheery smile. "Are you coming, Kaidoh-kun?"
"I…um…ah…" Still can't talk to girls. Yare, yare. At this rate, Kaidoh and Yumehara really wouldn't get together.
"Why don't you all come to my café instead of ramen? I owe Saiki-san a coffee jelly, at the very least, for all he's done for us."
You are a god.
"Not me, I'm afraid," Hairo said, rubbing the back of his head. "I have judo practice after school, and Matsuzaki-sensei will be upset if I'm late." He offered Kusuo a grin and held out his hand. "I always knew there was something special about you, Saiki. I'm just sorry I couldn't get you to bring it out sooner. You would have been a truly worthy rival."
Kusuo's eyebrow twitched, but he accepted Hairo's handshake anyway. Still not dead, moron.
Yumehara led Kaidoh from the room, talking softly to him as he blushed and nodded along. It was too much to hope she was confessing now, especially since Kusuo heard his name every now and then. She was probably finishing what Teruhashi had started, helping Kaidoh accept everything Kusuo told them.
Does this mean I have to play cupid for them later? Yare, yare.
"Naturally, I wouldn't be caught dead eating in such a plebeian place as what is frequented by the likes of peasants such as yourselves, but I suppose I could make an exception in this case seeing as blah, blah, blah."
Kusuo scowled. No one invited you.
Everyone filed out, all talking merrily about Kusuo's powers loud enough that anyone could have heard them if school was still in session. Suddenly, Kusuo realized he'd neglected something very important.
Damn it.
"Wait, you guys!"
Everyone paused at the door. "Offu," Hairo said. "What is it Teruhashi-san?"
"You guys do know you can't tell anyone about this, right?" Teruhashi put one hand to her chest and flung the other in Kusuo's direction. "Saiki-kun put a lot of trust in us; we can't take that for granted by spreading this information around."
Aiura raised an eyebrow at Teruhashi, her expression surprised. "What are you saying? Of course, no one was going to—"
"Oh, wow, yeah." Kuboyasu shared a surprised look with Hairo. "I didn't even think about that. Sorry, man. Your secret's safe with me."
Aiura gaped. "Seriously?"
"Me too, Saiki!" Hairo gave Kusuo a thumbs up. "I won't even think about what we discussed today ever again, just in case there are other psychics listening."
You don't have to go that far.
"I suppose if you're asking, Teruhashi-san, then I have no choice but to keep this pathetic peasant's pathetic little secret."
A vein popped on Kusuo's forehead. Go home! Why did I even include you?
Again, everyone filed out, following behind Mera as she chattered to Kuboyasu about the different jobs she's done. He watched her, occasionally commenting, with something akin to awe as though he wasn't entirely sure what to make of her.
Join the club. Kusuo had no idea how she worked all her jobs and still made time for school. Not only that, she was even ahead of Kusuo in the rankings (but only because he got average grades on purpose.) He paused mid-step at that thought and felt a thrill of cold terror run up his spine. How was he supposed to regulate his grades now? Even without his powers, Kusuo had an eidetic memory, which meant test taking came as easy to him as breathing.
"Are you okay, Saiki-kun?" Teruhashi leaned into his personal space, concern sparkling on her too pretty face. "You went pale. Are you sick?"
She raised her hand—to check my temperature?—but Kusuo blocked her with his bladed palm.
"Yare, yare. It's nothing."
Teruhashi didn't look convinced, but she still shrugged and dropped her arm to clutch the handle of her school bag with both hands. "If you say so, Saiki-kun."
I do 'say so.' Kusuo suppressed a sigh and followed Teruhashi out of the classroom and after his trail of friends. He hadn't planned to get food with them, and he definitely hadn't expected to pay, but he supposed this one time wouldn't hurt. He did owe them, after all. Just a tiny bit, but there were few things Kusuo hated more than being in someone's debt.
Yare, yare.
And just for the record, he wasn't smiling. Not even a little.
