AN: Here it is the final chapter of Act 1 has nothing else to say really.
"I am a genius!"
I could only stare as the multi-colored man pumped his fist into the air with the widest grin on his face.
"Time travel! Mental time travel! I have broken one of the last gates of science fiction!" The man, from what I remember his name was Jackson, leaned back and let out a bellowing laugh. I opened my mouth to say something but he laughed even louder, his joy drowning out my question in seconds.
So this is what madness is like...I was expecting the voice in my head to at least hear me out. I guess that was stupid to assume it wouldn't really be madness in that case now would it? I look away from Jackson to look at ...I don't even know what to call him, imaginary me? Fake me? He was different than whatever I normally imagined myself. For one thing, he was short, not as short as me but he was probably under 5 feet tall. He also lacked the rippling muscles and heavy bulge that I would assume from imaginary grown-up me. Even as I observed him the imaginary me was also looking himself over, I guess he was just as disappointed. He pulled his shirt off and my eyes widened at the sight.
"What the fuck happen to you?" I exclaimed. To say that imaginary me was covered in scars was an understatement. It was more correct to say that he was a scar covered in small bits of Mineta.
"That's what I'm trying to figure out, Oi Jackson what the hell?"
"Hmm?" Jackson looks over to me...the other me... you know what I'm sticking to imaginary me. "Oh, that? yeah, it's your scars."
"I've never had this many."
"Sure you do!" Jackson points to the fake me stomach. "You see this one is where you landed on that fence post." His hand trails up to the shoulder, "This was when you got clipped by that helicopter blade." His hand travels down to his stump, "and I know you remember this one."
The fake me swipes at the hand and points to his neck, "And what about this one?"
"When Wendy took your head off." He answered simply.
"What? That was a training accident! I thought that scar had healed?"
"You got your head taken off?" I asked before shaking my head. They're your imagination Mineta they don't have to make sense. It was annoying that these figments of my imagination were ignoring me.
"Why is it every scar I ever had!?" fake me complained.
"Because you reset the vault, which also means your mental avatar."
Fake me blinked at that for a moment before closing his eyes. Moments later his denim outfit had been replaced with a purple compression t-shirt and white baggy pants. The arm had returned but the flesh was semi-transparent and the number of scars drastically decreased. He also gained other markings, purple grape vines highlighting a scar on his shoulder.
"Mixing it up eh?" Jackson asks, circling the fake me.
"I missed the ink" he replied "And I missed the harem pants"
"Wait wait wait!" I cut in, "You can change yourself however you wish, and you chose harem pants!?"
"They're good pants," Jackson says, finally looking at me.
"That's not the point! If you're gonna change shape, change into something awesome! Turn yourself into a girl! in fact." I close my eyes and point at the fake me. "Mt lady!" I say, "Mt lady!"
"What is he doing?" I drone out Jackson's words as I try to focus on imagining the female hero's outfit, her face, and more importantly, her curves. Oh yes, those curves would be a much better thing to have with me to go insane with.
"He's trying to turn you into Mt lady I think, or at least bring a mental echo of her here...wait he can't do that can he?"
"You did when you first learned of mental echoes."
"Yeah, but it's my vault!"
"It's his head"
"No, it isn't!"
"Shut up!" I snap, "I'm trying to focus, if I'm going insane I'm at least gonna have attractive girls with me and not an old man and Stumpy over there!"
"Oh for the love of-we are not fakes! If anything you're the fake, you're in my head!"
"Actually," Jackson trailed off but I tuned them both out.
"85 55 90, 85 55 90, 85 55 90." I keep reading the holy numbers
Mineta
I watched Mineta, ugh, Kid Mineta, no, Fake Mineta, yeah that sounds right, I watched Fake Mineta cover his eyes with his hands as he recited those 3 numbers again and again.
"Are those…" Jackson asks.
"MT Lady's measurements." I finished for him. "Yep."
"It's been so long since I've seen you like this." He snickers, "It's actually kind of amusing."
"Number 1, you're less real than he is, number 2, don't get used to it." I tilt my head looking around the room for a moment. "Now what can I… oh this will work." I lean over to the counter and snatch my keyboard. I looked it over for a moment before slamming it over my knees. The fake me jerks in the surprise sound as I readjust my grip on my makeshift knife and reach over grabbing his shoulder.
"What are you-?" Fake me did what he was the greatest at and screamed like a little bitch as I reared back. Straight through the eye will do it, if not, I'll snap his neck. I Stabbed down and the room shattered.
Jackson Auxiliary
I watched the two Minetas rejoin the darkness of the mind for a couple of seconds. My programming suggested that I should help Mineta, but considering there were two I decided to take the moment to wait. An instant later the darkness once again disappears, becoming the Class 1A classroom. Both Minetas appeared in the air before the mental concept of gravity was reapplied and they smashed into their desks.
"Ow…" The younger Mineta whines rubbing his elbow. "I hit my funny bone."
"I'll hit your funny head!" Older Mineta replied, leaping over a desk and pouncing at his younger version. Kid Mineta shrieks before diving under the closest desk, his size aiding him as he desperately crawls away from his older twin.
Analyzing potential consequences of destroying the early instance of Mineta.
Processing...
Possible consequences: Unable to determine if the destruction of the original brain will adversely affect the main. Uncertainty regarding the connection between the two minds.
Accessing negation protocol N04.
The two minds ignored my words; the younger one wailing as the eldest grabbed his legs and slammed him against a desk.
Negative reaction.
Ways to gain two users' attention.
Processing...
Way decided: changing mental environment.
Once again, the two minds enter the black void of the mind before they reappear in mental environment J07.
"What the hell?" Older user looks around, gaining a fighting stance (83).
"Where are we?" The younger user's voice raised six octaves as he retreated away from his older version.
Accessing negation protocol A07.
Mineta
"Are you two ready to listen now?"
I glare at Jackson as I look over the massacre, thankfully this wasn't one of mine. I heard the fake me throw up in the corner but for once I couldn't blame him. Even with the slaughter I've seen, seeing bodies twisted and ripped apart like this was a hard first sight.
"Lab 37." Jackson grins as he walks over, feet splashing in the blood and other liquids covering the floor. "A bit different from what I've told you about isn't it?"
"Didn't expect that to be part of the memories that make your programming." Makes sense in a way. What better way to enforce a copy of your ideas than to give it the memory that made you...well, Jackson. Another round of hacking reaches my attention and I look back to my fake. He was taking this better than I thought, he wasn't curled up in the corner yet anyway. Sadly I had lost my keyboard when we shifted but I picked up a gun from one of the smashed cranberries that used to be a security guard. Instantly the gun flies out of my hand and into Jackson's.
"What the hell, Auxiliary, stop interfering!"
"Please don't forget that while I'm an Auxiliary, I am a version of Jackson meaning that I know more than you can ever know."
I narrowed my eyes but conceded the point. "Fine, why are you steppin'-" instincts honed in from hundreds of battles had me leap to the left but the burning pain in my stomach told me I had been shot.
Mineta
"Die Die Die Die!": I screamed at the fake me as he dipped and threw himself around the room. I had no idea what was going on but it was clear that he was trying to take me out. "You think that I'm just gonna sit here and let a figure of my imagination kill me? No way, not before I go all the way with a girl-" I let out a shriek as the gun flies out of my hand to Jackson's.
"Alright," he says, throwing the two guns behind him. "Now can w-"
The fake me leaps over the metal table he had been behind and leaps at me, moving at speeds too stupidly fast. My shriek returned with company as I stumbled back only for it to be cut off as we returned to the black void.
"Alright you two I will shove you both into a nightmare of your mom getting pegged if you don't both sit down and shut up!" Jackson's voice echoes across the walls as we appear back in my room, me and the fake me landing on the bed as Jackson sits on my computer chair.
"Uh you might not want to sit o-" Fake me starts to say only to close his mouth as Jackson glares at him.
"Alright now that that's done," Jackson says when he is sure no one would talk, "Let me explain to you both what is going on, but first, the little one." He looks at me. "Alright Mineta Minoru, let's start with the hard part first. The older version of you, he is not a figment of your imagination, he is the mind of you from the future."
"Yeah sure of course": I say, not planning to disagree with the huge man who seems to be controlling this nightmare.
"You don't believe me?"
My silence must have said something because he sighed.
"You first jacked off when you were 9 years old, you love screamo music, and you sometimes pretend to be a girl by placing your orbs on your chest and acting as if they were boobs." My fake rolled his eyes as if he hadn't just said some of my deepest secrets.
"That isn't-!" I started but he wasn't done.
"You kissed your reflection in the mirror once, you fell down the stairs once because you were watching your teacher's ass too closely, and you have been sent to the emergency room because you once ate one of your hairballs."
"You're figments of my imagination." I point out, "You would know that anyway."
"Then what about the lab we were just in?" Jackson asks. I thought about that for a couple of seconds.
"I must have said it in a movie."
"He's quite stubborn isn't he?"
"Because he is a moron."
"Hey don't you act like this is an easy thing to believe!" I hiss at the fake me. "If you are me from the future, how did you take it?"
"Cool as a cucumber, though I understand if you don't believe that the idea that you can be cool is so impossible it might as well be a figment of your imagination."
"I distinctly remember you screamed when you realized you were back in your old body."
"Because it sucks." He waves at me, ignoring the look I gave him. "Look at it, uugghh, I was smaller than Eri man, hair sucked, my face looked like a muppet, my nose looked like I could pick a lock with it and my eye looked like a rat's. Everything about it just sucks!"
"Hey, you don't look that much different than me!" I snapped back, "Your eyes haven't changed and you still have a sharp nose!"
"At least I'm not mistaken for a grade schooler anymore!" He flexes an arm, "Also in case you haven't noticed I'm lacking twig limbs!"
"Well I…" I rack my brain for a comeback, "Well I, well…" He raises an eyebrow and circles an arm telling me to go on. I grit my teeth looking him up and down. The problem wasn't that there wasn't stuff wrong with him, the problem was that while a fake, he was still a copy of me so we have the same issues. the same rat-like eyes, the same stupid smile the same-.
"At least I've never been muzzled by a discount Wonder Woman!"
The fake me stops dead in his tracks. "What was that?"
"Oh, you don't remember? What was her name, Countess Conquest? She was a European hero?" I grinned and mimed holding my neck as if being choked. "She had you practically barking like a dog in your fight!"
"How" Fake me starts, the look on his face is so complex that I stop my righteous mocking, "Do you know that?"
I blink in confusion before realizing that I shouldn't know that. "I...don't know, I don't know that hero."
"What else do you remember?" fake me asked.
"That's it-wait no," Even as I say the words, more memories seem to flow in as if they were waiting for me to notice them. "Wait no, I remember it was...warm, not summer but warm, I was..doing something and she stopped me. I remember choking. I remember a sharp pain on my head she ..she was grinding her heel on the back of my-"
"Head.'' Fake me finished the statement, looking at the ground which had changed into a neat tile floor. My eyes roamed around the hotel that I've never been to but for the life of me I could count the amount of statues in the main hallway.
"What is this?" I say trying to stamp the tremble in my voice.
"As I said." Jackson steps forward and crouches down so we are closer to face to face, though he still towered over me. "He is the mind of the Mineta Minoru of the future and we have to talk."
Mineta
I watched as the fake me finally stopped running his mouth and started listening to Jackson, or rather the Auxiliary that had taken Jackson's form. Out of all the abilities of the vault, Auxiliary is one of the more odd ones. The idea was to basically make a dumb AI from a couple dozen to thousands of memories of whoever it's based on, plus some Jackson magic. At that point you have an imaginary friend that can help you sort thoughts, bounce ideas off of and dozens of other things that I don't remember. I even heard that with the right equipment, some GA members were able to have their Auxiliaries handle AI technology, though I never tested it. To be honest I seldom F with Auxiliaries in the first place. I used them sparingly. Unlike mental echoes which no matter what they look like they're still you. Auxiliaries were literally different entities living in your mind.
"So let's just recap." I blink from my thoughts and he claps his hands to get our attention. Why does he have to clap? Why is he bringing attention to those little nubs he calls hand? His little hands connected to his stupid arms that match his stubby little legs an-. I shake the thoughts from my head. Okay yeah, not feeling the self-love right now. Made sense in a way, everyone has those moments where they want to grab their younger self and beat the shit out of them and lo and behold this little shit is gonna deserve every punch.
"You are a mental copy of some dude named Jackson who Kidnapped-"
"Recruited."
"Adopted."
The fake me blinks at our words for a moment. "Recruited me...or him, past me, you recruited Past Me and took him to the GA, this badass school for spies and shit."
"You're condensing a lot of stuff to 'and shit' but go on."
"I..He, Past Me goes to said school, gets on a team and works for you for around a decade." Jackson..the auxiliary nods. "And then the blond dude...Daki-"
"Denki." I growl, causing the faker to flinch and move so the auxiliary was between us.
"Right, Denki, so we got in contact and past me decided to go back to Japan. Where Denki is then killed."
"How much did you give him?" I ask the Auxiliary.
"Cliff notes."
"That's not an answer."
"Should have been listening then."
I narrowed my eyes, while it had the snark of Jackson I wasn't sure if the Auxiliary should be so ...defiant to the vault wielder. The few times I did use it I had it set to a different personality and, more so I, was in situations where there wasn't a lot of time to mark down its personality.
"And past me is framed for it." I was surprised when the faker kept going, actually speaking over us. I don't remember being so assertive when I was the little shit-no wait. I look down and sure enough, I catch the tell-tell signs of tremble in his hands as his pace picks up. He's panicking. "After that, he was apparently framed for Denki's death and thrown in jail, after which he breaks out and becomes a villain, killed everyone and burned Japan to the ground."
"Slander! Slander! I didn't kill everyone!"
"You broke out most of Japan's villains and basically put a hit out on a decent percentage of the hero population!"
"The hits were on PT agents and sympathizers!"
"Still murder, and that's ignoring how many bystanders that probably killed!"
"They were never ignored, you're naive to think that a war is bloodless-"
"IT shouldn't have been a war, you should of ju-"
"YOU DON'T GET TO SAY WHAT I SHOULD HAVE DONE" This time I don't bother to march I simply think and appear in front of the fake me. "I don't run you little shit, Phoenix Tree was a global threat with aims to replace humanity, can you even imagine how many people would have died when they tried to take over?"
"Then you should have had your academy help you! You decided to handle it yourself and you burned everything! You ruin ever-" I rear an arm back and prepare to smash the little shit but Jackson's hand lands on a shoulder
.
"Enough. You too Mineta. He has a right to his opinion. You did get pretty bloody at the end and you Mineta, I gave you a cliff note version of a conflict with a secret society controlling the might of Japan. Until you have the time to look through all his memories I don't think you have time to judge him!"
"That's another thing." I hiss, pulling my shoulder from Jackson's grip. "How is he here? And how does he have my memories?"
"That should be my question! How is he here!?" The fake me yells, poking me in the stomach then stopping and trailing a hand across my stomach. "And why is he so ..."
"Sexy?" I give the midget a smirk.
"Tall! My mom told me I was probably gonna grow an inch to two more inches in my life. How are you almost normal?"
"Oh it's amazing, apparently all the times you jacked off you stunted our growth. The moment I started to not be a midget bitch cranking it in my room all day I became a real person!"
"Ah yes, a real person that rips off people's heads!" I take a step back as his words briefly bring back the memory. Momo's face, her eyes dulling, the look on her face saying a thousand-
"Minetas." We both looked towards Jackson who was crossing his arms. "You had questions?" With a flash of thought, we had gone from the hotel to the restaurant where I had first met Jackson in. "Sit."
The fake me gives me a glare which I return in kind as I get to my seat. I make sure to chuckle as it takes the fake me two times to get up on the higher seat.
"Alright, let's answer your questions in order." The Auxiliary snaps his fingers together, a visible tick for thinking that I remember Jackson using once. "Ah right, how you're here." He points to me. "Well that's simple, it's because I am a genius!" We both stare at him, waiting for him to keep going. When it was clear that he wasn't I slammed a fist into the table.
"And?"
"What, that isn't enough?" The younger me makes a sound that's the closest I've ever heard to a growl. "I guess it isn't, well then Mineta, what do you know about Vestiges?"
I rub my chin as I rack my mind, moments later the vault provided me. "They're fragments of consciousnesses like that Deku had previous wielders of his quirk?"
"Deku, the green hair kid right?" The fake me asks and I blink at him. He doesn't know him? Actually, he didn't know Denki either...question for later. I give the faker a quick nod before I keep going.
"From what I remember, they lived in his head, some sort of subconscious realm where they talked to him and taught him to use his quirks."
"A subconscious realm." The auxiliary mentioned, "sort of like a certain vault?" He waggles his eyebrow but I wave him off. I had figured out the connection long ago and I think I have questioned Ruth on it. Ruth had replied that a subconscious space area is a natural part of the mind and can be not related to a quirk at all. My eyes widen as an idea comes to me.
"Wait ...no, you're not a vestige are you?"
"No no, but Jackson left a vestige spark in your head like he did in all M class members."
"But I wasn't an M Class member, I just...wait a spark? What, a vestige spark?" My eyes widened more. "Was...was Jackson gonna give me his quirk?"
The auxiliary eyes widened for a moment before he doubled over laughing. "You think Jackson would trust you with his quirk? Mineta, you?"
I blink as this dummy AI laughs himself horrid at the idea of me with Jackson's quirk ...which when I think on it makes sense. Jackson's quirk was bullshit even with the ways he added limitations to himself, we wouldn't hand that out to just anyone.
"So then, what was it for?"
"I don't know, that information wasn't imparted to me, just the phrase." I glare at the copy.
"Could have been something that made your quirk different, or maybe it was a way for him to make long-range alterations to your vault." That caused me to stop dead in my tracks. The jailbreak? That fits the key so well. For years I wondered where the hell I suddenly got full access. "I can't tell what you're thinking, Mineta, and before you leap full tilt on this we don't know what this spark actually does, these are all just theories, it could just be a way for Jackson to read your memories in a hive mind or something."
"Aren't you Jackson?" The faker was still behind apparently.
"I'm Diet Jackson." The auxiliary replies, "but yeah, the vault is a subconscious realm, similar to the place the wielder of OFA has, and those wielders as we know can exist after death so why could one not transfer over time?"
"Alot of reasons." I raise a finger and start to list them off. "Different bodies, pre-vault having Mineta, the fact that my brain was probably split open at the time I was sent back and the fact that if Jackson could mentally send people back then why has a GA agent never done it before? Why didn't he use that power on Jason?" The idea that Jackson would use this power on me and not his actual son was something that I couldn't fathom. Say what you will about the man, Jackson loved Jason. "And even if the spark came here, how did I get dragged along? Unless you're saying I'm a vestige as well. "The way the auxiliary didn't immediately disavow that idea did not fill me with confidence.
"Jackson!"
"I don't know." He waves his hands, "I'm not Jackson. He didn't give me every single one of his plans. I was the auxiliary formed in case a Temple situation happened since I don't have any information on his vestige plans. I'm assuming it is not directly the reason for your time travel, I think it's a piece though."
"And why is that?"
"This." He waves a hand and a laptop appears. I leaned in to watch the familiar battle that was going on.
"Who's that?" Faker me crawls onto the table so he can see the screen closer. I slap his hand away from the screen before he can touch it, I don't need us sliding through these memories.
"A PT member." I answer, watching the memory of me getting tossed around the lab.
"The group that framed him." Jackson tells the fake me, "and this is the moment you need to focus on." Memory me was thrown into a series of beakers and vials. He hissed, reloading a shell into his mechanical arm and firing blindly only to dive out of the way of a giant hammer made of smoke.
"What am I looking for?"
"Give it a second." A moment after the auxiliary words I remember what happened next just before it happens. A dragon head of smoke burst from the floor, sending memory me smashing into the ceiling and then throwing me across the room. My body hits the wall followed by the sound of multiple breaking bones. As I slide off the wall I see memory me down a vial of a glowing green and yellow liquid.
"Breakthrough." I mutter feeling my thoughts. That version had been a rush job and had burned when it went down. "Still doesn't make sense though." The memory stops as my hair starts to flow over my body. "Hair control of any kind doesn't equal time travel."
"You never re-watch this memory, did you? Do you know what lab this is?" At my glance he seized and tapped the laptop, turning it into a flat screen. He waves a hand causing the memory to turn and zoom in on a vial.
"Darkshadow + overgrowth variable 398." I list off its label before blinking, Jackson grins showing me another one. "Decay + crust, is this what I think it is?"
"I can't be 100% sure but I'm pretty sure this was one of the main labs where they kept their DNA structures for their higher quirk combinations...which you are covered in while covered in cuts."
"So he got some quirk blood in his system." Younger me rubs his head, "that wouldn't give him the quirk would it?"
"Normally no but someone was playing with experimental Nomus!" Jackson waggles a finger at me.
The M arm, the Leeches, the Wings, the K Link. Jackson was correct, I had been covered and combined with Nomu DNA for a solid portion of my war. While I had given myself some looks over when I had the technology, I hadn't seemed much different, but I hadn't really cared after a point. I wasn't planning to stick around for a long time and Denki was going to be avenged. I looked at the screen which Jackson had moved showing a certain vial.
"Rewind + mimic + quirk 345." I say out loud chuckling. "So my blood mixed with a bunch of quirk samples and it had a reaction with my Nomu gear and infected me."
"That is my theory, yes."
"Then why did I not become a super Nomu or something or get any other powers?"
"My best guess is time?" He shrugs. "It was less than a month, after that you went underground and started planning for Black Orchard, your last. After that you had a small amount of skirmish but your only real fight at that point was your final fight with Midoriya, and you have to admit that fight was...odd."
The fight with Midoriya had been the fightest fight in my life. I had gone in, assuming to die, but I had not held back any stops. Machines. Nomu gear, quirk enhancing drugs. I had faced the Number 1 hero with the combined might of 3 branches of science ramped up to the max...and still lost.
"Alright, so from what I'm getting," faker says, his lisp voice making me want to wring his stupid neck for getting in the way of such an important conversation, "so past me took a super drug while also being part Nomu, which are those purple human things with their brains out, and this gave him the power to come back here?"
"That's what we're assuming, either that or the vestige spark."
"And now that that question is semi answered." I shove the faker off the table and reach for a fork. "Why won't you let me kill this little fucker?"
Jackson raises an eyebrow. "I thought you wanted to know how he got here?"
I scoff, in hindsight it was obvious. "He's the Mineta of this body, and from what I'm guessing the reason he has my memories is because from the moment I entered this body he has been in the vault leeching off my memories."
Mineta
"Fuck you!" I hiss, glaring at the fake me idly holding a fork in his hand and reaching for the orbs on my head, really hoping that they work on him even though we're the same person. "You invade my body, you throw me into your vault, you keep me in that space for months watching memories of people I don't know, places I've never seen and death!" I clamp down on the stutter in my voice. So much death. "How many people have you killed? How many corpses will I have dreams of? How is it that I grow into such a monster?" The fake me laughs. "You were always a monster you little shit, I'm just a physical one instead of a midget molestor!"
I pale not at his words, but a thought came to me. "Oh gods, I'm going to become you, aren't I?"
"What?" The fake me blinks.
"This is time travel right?" I say, panic rising. "I'm gonna become you somehow, you have to enforce your own birth after all, you're gonna ruin my relationship with my classmates, you are gonna get us kicked out of UA."
"I left UA."
"That's even worse! Then you join the academy, become a super killer, come back here and-"
"Hey dumbass, one problem with that, where the hell do I go?" I blink in confusion and he rolls his eyes, "you're saying I need to do all this stuff to make sure I happen, but I'm already here, this isn't a portal situation where I can go back to my own time, my original body has a Midoriya sized shoe in its skull and is probably in a lab somewhere or something so I'm stuck in here!" I chew on that thought as he spins the knife in his hand, "your main worry should be me killing you and taking this body."
"Which you won't be doing." Jackson says resting on one hand.
"And why not? Wendy managed to clear her mind of Wendigo when she killed her in her vault."
"Yeah, for a month, then Wendigo returned with a vengeance and pissed and your case is even worse, Minoru. You're the invader here technically, and with how the vault is connected to you two I'm not sure if killing him won't also kill you, the vault considers you both primary users.
"What!" Both me and the invader yell out.
"Yeah it surprised me as well, all the recalibrations and stuff." Jackson shrugs. "This is a once in a lifetime situation and we have no idea what will happen."
"Fine then! I'll just make a cage for him in the vault." The invader shrugs and raises a hand and outside the windows of the restaurant I see that empty void appear with thousands of glowing orbs..said orbs which started to float closer.
"No!" I say in panic and feel a mental push as the orbs stop. The faker's eyes widen and Jackson chuckles.
"Like I said, you're both primary users. But before you two go fighting for control, can I offer something?" Invader me was glaring, pushing on my control over the memories. I could tell that given time he could pull control over them. They were his memories over all but his connection is interrupted as Jackson slaps him over the head. "As I said let me offer something" he glares at both of us. "Why don't you two work together?"
"Fuck no."
"Hell no!"
I glare at the invader with the same intensity he gives me. I was scared, of course I was, but after watching this man slaughter people I can't buckle, not in front of him or he will eat me.
"Look, it would not be permanent, just until we figure out a way to get Mineta into a new body." That got us both to look at him.
"What now?" The invader asks.
"Mineta, I'm surprised you didn't even think about it. You have the GA database in your head and you're no slouch in technology yourself, cloning my boy, cloning!"
"Cloning?" Me and the invader say at the same time. I was getting sick of that. Though this time he said his with anger while I was in confusion. "I thought cloning was science fiction?"
"Nonsense, it was basically perfected back in the 20th century." Jackson laughs at my shocked expression. "It's amazing what most of the world lost when quirks started popping up and a little sad we had our own little dark ages. But yes, cloning is possible
"in theory."' Invader hisses. "But the technology is rare and guarded, how am I supposed to get to one of these cloning chambers in this body?"
"Do you really need to do it right now?" At the invader's slack jaw expression Jackson shrugs. "No seriously, what's going on right now that you need to get out of this body right now?"
"This body sucks, I'm sharing it with someone and we have no idea what this mind share will do in the long term." He gasps, "what if our mind starts to fuse? I'm already staring at the girls in my class. What if I start to act like him again?" I was offended when the murdering psychopath had the gall to shudder at the thought of acting more like me.
"Um hello, who wasn't one of the top 10 villains of the future?" I raise a hand. "This guy! I should be more worried about becoming you!"
"You don't even know if there will be consequences." Jackson pointed out.
"Yeah, we don't. We don't know there won't be either. Already my vault has been messing up. I've been having dreams, nightmares being pulled into random bits of memories!" He hits a hand on his head a couple times, "that shouldn't be possible! That's one of the main benefits of the vault, it's supposed to keep that shit in, it's supposed to keep that pain in and it's not working and now you want me to bring that creator of that pain in to let him live in my house?"
"You're in my house and don't blame m-"
"I will blame you!" He rounded on me. "You are the one that couldn't go a day without hurting someone! You were the one with the wandering hand! You are the one that turned all the students against you! You! You! It's always been you!"
"It's never been me!" I shout back. "I haven't done any of that now have I?"
"And with you here it's possible he never will." Jackson says, once again drawing our attention. "Mineta, your whole goal to come back here was to fix your mistakes, right?"
"Actually it was to live well. I want to become filthy stinking rich."
"But you also want to fix things with your old classmates, right?" The invader stares and stares "...right?"
"...right."
"Good!" Jackson claps like that answer hadn't been dragged kicking and screaming through the invader's teeth. "So you two will teach each other."
"What the hell can he teach me?" I glare at the invader as he says this.
"To be a person again." I grumble
"Exactly!" I blink in surprise as Jackson agrees with my insult.
"What?" Invader asked.
"Mineta, you haven't been to UA in years and you're hanging out with younger look-alikes to the people that have been your friends and enemies for years, some of which have maimed you and some of which you have killed. You are also thinking in your head how to manage not just PT but also the HPSC nonsense and on top of that, All For One. You have too much on your plate and with these vault problems you are stressed, too stressed to act normal."
"And he's normal!?" He points to me.
"No but he is closer to what a child is and if you don't want your secret to come out then you're gonna need all the help you get."
"Why doesn't he give his secret out?" I asked, tilting my head. "Tell them about AFO and we solve the problem before it starts."
"Because of the HPSC and PT." At my look he keeps going. "The reason I gutted the HSPC like that was because PT had roots, and deep ones at that. They have thousands of agents and a 1/6th of them don't even know who they work for. I also don't know if every spy of AFO was caught, passing that information around is dangerous and the more interactions I have with Nezu, the more he has a chance to figure everything out!"
Ah right, Nezu figuring out that there's a time traveling villain who butchered heroes of the past probably wouldn't put him in the line to trust us. "But whoever this Nezu is can't we just avoid him?"
"He's our principal and his quirk is super intelligence."
"Oh, you're fucked."
"WE are fucked, not like they have a way to delete me from your mind, you'll be tossed in a hole as well."
"Neither of you are fucked." Jackson replies as I open my mouth to retort, though with what I don't know. "This will be the first case where little Mineta will help you."
"You want him to talk to Nezu!" invader's eyes widen into huge pits. "Are you insane!?"
"Nope, unless you missed it, all he has is random memories of different future events and what we told him. He also doesn't have a poker face eons past his years. We can use that, a kid that had a freak out in class got a little bit too into it and is now scared he will be kicked out of school."
"And you think this will be better than me doing it?"
"Yes, either you use the vault and give him basically a blank face with no expression, or micro expressions, or you full on try to lie to the genius being and either fail or pass and he knows you're hiding something. His stupidity is your strength."
"Are you sure they're gonna call me with, whatever you did, I mean it was a fight, right? maybe they'll leave me be." The two of them look at me for a solid second before Jackson looks at the invader.
"As I said, his stupidity is our strength."
Fuck both of these guys.
Aoyama
This is how I die. I peaked my head into the nurse's office to see Recovery Girl was still there, eating her stupid soup. That better be some dazzling soup Madam since you're spending so much time on it! Once the Battle Trial had stopped we were sent back to our class. Everything had gone into a semi quiet chaos. The teacher had taken both teams and surprisingly enough, Midoriya, to the nurses office. Apparently his arm was covered in hairline fractures and the bruises only started to show up when they had been on their way to class. I guess everyone was too busy watching my teammate go crazy to notice. Mineta for all his oddities was even more odd because apparently he still hadn't woken up from whatever the heck he passed out from. I hadn't gotten a chance to see the video but from what everyone in the class is saying the moment we broke up he decided to abandon the plan and decide to fight the girls i match and somehow win, oh, and he also tried to stab Mina when the match was timed out. One moment he seems calm, collected, and seems to know much more than he should, then he gets himself in trouble by attacking two students? Finally the old lady stands up and approaches the door. I look down at my phone acting as if I was reading texts as the nurse walks past. Once she was around the corner I walked into the room. A quick look around confirms no one else is here.
"Mineta?'' I whisper, idly hoping that he was pretending to be asleep . would it make sense, no, but the kid seems to know stuff he shouldn't so maybe he was planning something. Nope, he was as still as a corpse.
He's asleep...maybe I could-
"Is that murder on your mind?"
I jerk in surprise and look down on the bed meeting pitch black eyes.
"No!" I stammer, shaking my head. While I wasn't sure what I had been thinking, I was pretty sure that wasn't it.
"Didn't think so, you wouldn't be in this situation if you didn't care for others ...or I guess you could've been but you wouldn't be so sad about it." Mineta rolls off the bed and stretches, looking at his arms with a bit of ...disappointment. "Alright, since you're here, I guess you have questions or want to ask about what happened?"
I nod my head. "What the hell was that, you're gonna get us both caught!"
Mineta had the gall to raise an eyebrow, "even if I get expelled that won't get your secrets out, honestly talking about it in the nurse's office puts you into much more risk."
"Risk of what?" I jump letting out a shriek at the old feminine voice from behind me. spinning around I pale at Recovery Girl looking at the two of us with a raised eyebrow.
"Risk of him ruining his pants." Mineta walks up to me and gives my stomach a hard backhand. I bend over with a gasp, my stomach grumbling unhappily as Mineta puts pressure on my navel. "Something to do with his quirk, I'm telling him he should get a diaper into his costume."
"Speaking from experience?" Recovery Girl earning a huff from the smaller boy. "Anyway Mineta, now that you're awake, I need you to come with me."
"Where to?" Mineta said. He reaches his hand into his pocket and starts messing with something in it, I'm assuming his phone.
"The principal would like to have a word with you."
"Ah, I see, any idea why?" The teacher gives him a cross look. "Ah, I see, he wants to meet me after my victory!" He chuckles for a moment before closing his eyes at Recovery Girl's second look, "yeah I know." He walks forward and the teacher starts leading the way. Already having an idea, I look down at my phone and sure enough a couple seconds later I get a message.
Stay calm, stay smart, your more likely to expose yourself then i am we will meet after school...don't freak out and for now stay away from Tsuyu but don't make is obvious.
Mineta
This is never gonna work. I say as the old teacher takes me into the principal's office. It was a normal office for most of it, besides the lanky terrifying man to the left of...what is that an albino raccoon?
One on the left is your head teacher, the one in the chair is your principal.
THAT'S THE PRINCIPAL?
I told you he was smaller.
Yeah, small, not that he's some sort of baby bear or something. And he's smaller than me, why are you complaining?
Because it's obvious that you haven't told me all I should know.
Because you don't need to know much. I need your reaction to be expressive for this to work.
You suck!
You blow swallow and swirl your tongue around the tip now shut up and focus!
I mentally stammer at that reply before the fake me somehow tilts my eyes back to the principal, reminding me that I have other things to focus on.
What do I say to him?
Nothing, he's waiting for us to crack and for All Might to show up.
ALL MIGHT IS COMING!?
He's a teacher this year.
WHAT!?
Don't worry about it.
I bite my teeth as I had to process and wonder just how much I lost. How many of the biggest moments of my life did this intruder steal from me.
And how much of my future have you stolen from me with your actions.
I haven't even done anything!
Lot of kids at our school would disagree.
The door opens before I can reply to that statement and the gods above symbol of peace number 1 hero All Might walked into the room.
Stop eye banging and focus!
This time I ignore the fake me. This was the first time I get to meet one of the top ten heroes and it's All Might! The strongest person in the world!
He's in the ballpark when he was at full strength, and you met him yesterday.
No I didn't! you body stealing jerk!
"I believe you understand why you are here, Mineta?" The principal asked, drawing my attention back to him.
Ask.
"I'm…not exactly sure sir."
"Are you telling me that you don't remember what happened?"
Honestly I could say yes because the fake me refused to tell me what he had done to my apparent classmates. I stiffen for a moment as the fake me starts speaking, after a moment I start repeating the words.
"I remember the start of the fight." I say, wishing the other me would have given me something more about this situation. "I remember whooping two of the girls from the class."
"Momo Yaoyorozu and Mina Ashido."
"Yeah."
"Do you remember using weapons during the match?"
I was never made aware that weapons would need to be sanctioned, from what I remember All Might didn't stop Bakugo from using his arm gauntlets. I used parts of the environment for my weapons and I would argue broken glass and pipes to be safer then huge explosions.
I repeated the faker's words, trying to maintain eye contact with the principal who had a calm expression on his face.
"We are not against the use of weapons, Mineta." All Might said, a giant smile on his face even as he chastises me. "Plenty of grand heroes use them in their job."
"Really? Because I saw a hero that had an american western theme and seems to have guns, I was wondering how you get permission to use those"
"Lethal hero tools are only given after a series of tests to make sure the heroes would be safe with them." Nezu cut in, patting All Might on the side. "Which brings us back to why you were called to speak to us today, Mineta. I've heard that you got into a number of fights today. Cementoss said something about you getting into a fight with young Bakugo?"
What do I say?
Shut up and look scared while I think.
No problem with that.
Nezu
It's only the first week of classes and I've already heard so much of young Mineta and honestly, the more I watched him the more he piqued my interest. From what Shota had told me, Mineta was a student to buck against authority. He was combative to any who he believed slighted him and was quick to frustration. Yagi had described him as a kid who silently judged and liked pulling on the foundation of the other students. From what I was seeing, Mineta Minoru was someone who was questioning himself. The way he was answering questions was as if he didn't know the answers himself.
"I wouldn't call that a fight." Mineta broke his minutes of silence. "Me and spiky-hair just got into an argument after I ...panicked."
"And that's another thing, Recovery Girl pulled up your medical records and none of your past school records have spoken of these..episodes."
There it was again, for a second the young man's eyes flicker for a moment as if he was listening to something before he continued.
"My teachers had a habit of ...not being around when these incidents happen, I assume you could tell from my appearance that I am prime real estate for bullying? I had to learn to run, not just to avoid getting beaten up but to avoid freaking out. If you were to ask my teachers they would always tell you that I was running around."
"And why not go to the nurse?"
"No comment." The firmness in which he said that seemed to have surprised young Mineta himself.
"Excuse me?"
"With all due respect sir, I don't believe my past will help you in this situation for reasons I would like to keep to myself. I kept my ...issues away from the medical staff and teachers of my old school. If you wish to know more Recovery Girl overheard enough from an early conversation to put the pieces together. I would rather not talk about it."
I looked over to the nurse who was giving the young lad an almost pitying look. I'll have to ask what she over heard of. I kept my eyes trained on the student letting him stew as I decided what I was going to do with him. Punishment was a given but we also wanted to get to the source of these problems. It would be a shame to have to expel a future hero because of something outside of his control, but it would also be dangerous if Mineta was allowed to graduate UA with this problem still uncontrolled.
"If I may ask, sir?" Mineta started rubbing the side of his hair. "The main issue is that I went a little too hard in the fight then I-"
"That isn't the issue, Mineta." Aizawa took this moment to speak, his eyes locking the student in place. "The problem is that you tried to use lethal force on your fellow classmate."
Mineta's face went through a myriad of different expressions that it was only because of my experience and quirk that I was able to read. Confusion, shock, fear, rage and then confusion.
"I tried to kill them?" He squawks before grabbing his forehead with a hiss. "Are you sure?"
"We don't know if it was that bad." Yagi said shooting Shota A look, "what we do know i-"
"What we do know is that you attacked a student once the match had been paused by All Might." Shota cuts in once more, staring down at Mineta who seemed to stunned to speak. "You tried to stab her with a screwdriver."
Mineta
You what!?
He's exaggerating, now focus.
How many people have you killed in my body?
None, now focus.
I try to focus my thoughts as my head teacher apparently glared at me as he told me how I almost killed someone.
He's trying to scare you, he's making it much bigger than it is.
I don't believe you!
I have never once cared about your opinions or beliefs!
I grit my teeth and try to focus, yelling at this asshole is not gonna help me get anywhere. For a moment I consider just spilling the beans and just telling them the truth that there was a serial killer super villain trapped in my mind.
Do that and we will live the rest of our lives in a lab or worse.
Still seems better than living with you! Now shut up, I got to fix this.
Fix this? Oh this I just got to see!
Taking the blessed silence for what it was, I decided to just tell the truth.
"I didn't do that."
The faces of surprise I got from the four adults in the room was good enough that I could have made a fortune selling it.
That's your plan, deny deny deny?
No, let me work!
"What I mean is, I don't remember the match being called." I shrug my shoulders, "honest mistake really."
All Might rubs a hand on his chiseled face.
Chiseled?
Shut up
"That's quite possible, young Mineta had been just hit in the face with acid from Mina Ashido, and even though she showed great control with her quirk I can imagine his panic."
"Panic doesn't excuse the fact he used lethal force."
"I mean, did I? I used a screwdriver I forgot to put away unless I aimed for her eyes or something, I don't think it was more dangerous than some of the other quirks used by my classmates." The teachers gave each other a look and I really hope the villain me didn't do anything stupid like aim for her throat or anything.
Honestly I don't remember but I doubt I did since we aren't being restrained, Aizawa just trying to get us to confirm something by trying to scare us.
Well it's working!
For you maybe.
For the love o- get out of my head!
Get out of mine!
"He had already been given a warning in the fight about using too much force." Aizawa's voice is cut in.
"Yes but pushing him down to Class C seems a little bit much." All Might replies.
Wait, what? Both of us locked back into the conversation the teacher was having.
"I agree with All Might." The nurse replied and I could've kissed her...if she wasn't so old and wrinkly. "Unless we were actually certain that he was trying to do serious damage I don't think we should punish him too hard, he was there when I healed Midoriya and has been to my office, he might be fighting on the assumption that I can heal any damage he could deliver." The teachers looked at me and I didn't even need the fake me to tell me what to say.
"I mean...can't you?" I asked honestly. "If you're at this school you must have a lot of skills and I saw what Mikori-I mean Midoriya did to the giant green robot."
The old lady spared me a look. "I appreciate the confidence but there are still limits to my abilities, and if you're going to be a hero for a long period then you would be wise to assume that there won't always be someone around that can fix your mistakes."
I nod my head, Hope starting to fill my chest as she spoke as if I still had a chance to become a hero.
Doesn't sound like they're gonna expel me.
They're still gonna punish you.
You mean you, whatever bullshit they hit us with will be done during your time
time?
Whenever you have control of the body.
The open belly laughing that followed that statement didn't exactly fill me with confidence.
"Well Mineta I think that was all we had to ask you about." Nezu says, straightening the papers on his desk. "Could you wait in the hallway for us for a minute, we will call you in a moment."
I nod my head and leave the room.
Any idea how that went? I asked the fake me.
Better than I expected, but expect us to have to kiss up to our mom for a minute...not that kind of kissing up.
You're disgusting.
Just had to make sure, I can never be too certain with you.
You used to be me, you should know I've never..unless you.
No, I haven't.
Then you should know I've never had either!
I'm still not sure you're the same temporal version of me, I had to double-check.
And that's the difference you think we would have?
I got the mental equivalent of a shrug and sigh.
Nezu
"So, what do you guys think?" Yagi asked as he looked like he wanted to sit down somewhere but didn't trust the flimsy seat Mineta had just left.
"I think pushing him down to General Study to be the right action, let him earn his way back to hero courses." Aizawa crossed his arms. "The semester already started and he's already causing a myriad of problems"
"And young Bakugo isn't?" Chiyo Shuzenji pointed out. "The boy tried to blow him to kingdom come."
"But both me and Yagi saw the video Hakase! That look on his face was blood thirsty."
"True, young Mineta's face was quite intense, but Shota, even in our class we have some fellow classmates that had aggressive expressions. Even in the top ten most pictures of Mirko makes it look like she's gonna kill someone."
"I'm just saying the kid is dangerous and is hiding something, Chiyo-Sensei, were you able to find anything in his medical records?"
"Nothing so far, it doesn't help that his family is estranged in some way. I got the medical record of his father the other day and besides being bare bones it does point to Mineta having a series of hormonal problems." She gives Shota the stink eye, "but those problems can be fixed or mitigated with proper exercise, procedures and diet, I say the boy is given another chance."
"I agree." I say, getting the three hero's attention back on me. "Aizawa, I understand your concern but for now I like to see more about this student. I think he would make a great hero that would fit your type of position." Yagi snickers but I was serious. If the boy is blessed enough to get some height I think he will be a great shadow hero.
"So what are we going to do about punishment?" Shota asks.
"Well for now his only real crime was attacking a student past time out, but while that is a serious mistake he might have not heard the timeout on account of acid in his eyes." We had spoken to Ashido about that in the interviews we have with the other teams before. While she has shown good control we will be having a teacher work with her to make sure she has even more control. It wasn't a punishment, just a caution though she probably won't see it that way.
"We also need to work on his combat skills." Shota spoke up. "While skilled he needs to learn the necessary force."
"I find it impressive and heroic how he uses the environment to his advantage!"
"That's not the problem, I want to make sure he doesn't start throwing nail bombs in class."
"Combat lessons after school then?" I offered. "It would be a good alternative day activity for the therapy."
"Therapy?" Yagi asked but Chiyo-Sensei nodded her head in agreement.
"Just for a week or two, I'll also want to see if I can talk to either or both of his parents, see if we can get more information of his past and bodily needs. Normally I would say this isn't needed but he openly denied giving me information of his father and the face he made as he thought of him...Mineta Minoru seems like a boy with a lot of anger and unlike young Bakugo, he seems to be holding it in tight. Might do him good to have someone to talk to."
"Kids don't normally like talking about their feelings."
"I'll leave that to Ryo Inui to figure out, so what do you guys think? Two weeks detention? Little harsh but if he's as rebellious as you say Shota perhaps this will tell him that we are being serious?" The eraser hero seems to be considering it for a moment before nodding with a grin.
"Sure, I have plenty of ideas of what I can do with him."
Mineta
Two weeks! Two weeks!?
Will you stop bitching about it!
Don't you start! You're the reason I'm stuck in this mess, mister imma stab a classmate. Why? Did she refuse to go with you to the dance or something?
Of course you think I would be that petty. No, to answer your question she's the one that took my arm thank you very much.
Oh, so you're bitter she beat you in a fight and you decided to Baby Hitler her?
Yes-no! It was a vault malfunction that made me aggressive and she triggered bad memories by throwing acid in my eyes.
Oh, she hurt your feelings so you tried to stab her!?
You're very accepting of what I just told you. She threw acid into OUR eyes and she melted off OUR arm.
Oh it's simple, she tried to take YOUR arm, not mine, and since she's going to UA I'm assuming she became a hero, which means she was trying to stop you from eating a baby or something.
Okay now you're just making me out worse than I was.
A burning Japan would beg to differ.
There was a reason...there was a reason for everything I did!
I noticed that pause.
You weren't there, you can't judge.
I'm pretty sure I don't have to watch a puppy get hit by a car to know it's an awful thing. Also, can I touch these memory balls yet, not knowing 90% of the people I go to school with is annoying.
No!~ You might drag us both into the memory and that is the last thing I need right now. Just keep studying the time cards I left you.
Ugh fine, one question.
Momo has the biggest tits, Mina best ass and thighs and Jiro is flat as a board and off limits.
I wasn't gonna ask that!
I am literally in your head, you can't lie to me.
Same goes for me, which Is why I can say with all certainty that you're a Dick!
And you're an ass munching rat of a person, at least I grew out of it.
I blot out his reply as I walk back to class. Been out for over an hour and it's still the first week of school so it should be an easy cruise to the end of class. That was a relief, today had been long and stressful and too fucking stupid to even begin to get over. I open the door and nod to the teacher and go to turn to my seat only to also hiss at the intensity from the looks from some of my classmates. Most were the surprised interest you see when a classmate comes back from getting hurt or called to the office but there was a couple special ones around the room, most noticeable one was the glare from Mina, looks of concern from Denki, blank eye stare from Tsuyu, the stare I was getting from Shoto and the concerned look I was getting from Mom- I tear my eyes from Momo's and trudged down to my seat, not wanting to deal with any of those looks. Denki tries to get my attention but I wave him off and lay face down on my desk. Thankfully the teacher must have heard what had happened so they decided to give me some slack and let me off.
"May I go to the bathroom?" I asked the teacher once the clock hit 5 minutes before class, "stomach feeling odd." Teacher shrugged, class was practically over so they didn't care much. I grin and walk out of class. Once the door closed behind me I leaned forward and started sprinting down the hallway.
Whoa, what are you doing?
I'm not getting stopped by anyone. I'm getting home, figuring out what to do with you and I'll decide what to do with tomorrow when it comes.
Don't you have someone to meet in a minute?
I blink in confusion before hissing. Aoyoama is expecting me after class...ugh probably not the best idea to leave him hanging so nervous for so long.
"Hey grape nerd!" I growl and turn to glare at Bakugo who was doing his delinquent walk towards me.
"What the hell do you want?"
"Pink girl planning to ambush you down the east entrance." He doesn't even stop walking as he informs me of that, walking past as if he didn't even say anything.
"Why're you telling me this?"
"Cause I don't need everyone else freaking out if you try to stab her again, they're nosy enough!"
I wanted to say more but he had already rounded the corner. Odd..questions for later. I grab my bag and let out a sigh of relief as I start to walk down the hallway, things were finally starting to look.
"Mineta."
I didn't stop when I heard that voice, who ever it was could go hump a fuck for all I cared. It was only when I recognised that voice belonged to a certain red and white hair ice user that I stopped. Shoto must have thought I had stopped to chat because he made the mistake of walking. I wondered if he fixed that error when I started running. Now normally you would think a Shoto could catch a Mineta in a run down the hallway. Normally you would be correct, but while Mineta is fast, gravity is faster. Once I got close to the next flight of stairs it took a nanosecond to make sure no one was at the bottom before throwing myself off the ledge.
What the-!
I ignore kid me yell as I catch the ledge then let go, catching a stair rail and repeating the process before landing the last bit onto my back. Normally I wouldn't have done even that much but I had my bag with me. Rolling over I jog down the hallway, looking back to see if the half and half kid was still following me.
WAMM!
Note to self, running forward while looking back is a good way to run into a door like a dumbass.
"Oh my god I am so sorry!"
Oh, someone had opened the door, that made me feel a bit better… Wait, where do I know that voice? I look up, black eyes meeting brown ones with cross-shaped irises.
Who the hell was Anasova?
I couldn't answer the fake me's question cause my tongue had gone off to hide in my throat, probably scared that my foot was gonna smash into his home again.
"Oh, it's you," she says, reaching down and grabbing my hands. In a moment she had pulled me backup to my feet. Sadly my body had decided that I was not ready to stand on my own yet so it ended up with her pulling me into her. She lets out a yipe of surprise and grabs onto me to steady us and for a moment, just a moment, I'm somewhere else.
She pulls me in, startling me as she giggles into my shoulders.
"You're an idiot, you know that?" She's quiet for a while as I try to figure out where the hell I was supposed to put my hands. "But you're my idiot!" She tightened her hold and for a moment, everything felt right, just right. Slowly, casually as if I would scare her off I start to close my arms around he-
I jerked backwards, panting as I stumbled back from Komori Kinoko's grip, pulling my arms down from where I had to be. Even with most of her face covered I could see her surprise and confusion.
"Sorry," I say, taking a step back, to my terror she takes a step forward as if she was going to give chase. Thankfully the bell rings and the hallway fills with students.
I pant on my hands and knees as I start trying to focus my mind.
What the hell was -
I shake my head and start humming a tune in my head as hard as I can. I was not in the mood to deal with the fake me at the moment
That wasn't Anasova, that wasn't the Komori Kinoko I knew, it was a completely different person that doesn't even know you. I shake my head trying to remove the phantoms of the past. Thankfully ever since the fake had appeared the debilitating head pains had gone...I had thought the memory flashes had gone too but.
Did you touch one? I hiss at my inferior copy.
It came out of nowhere and it hit me! Didn't even get a chance to dodge it.
I growl and sit down. When the hallway had filled up I had blended into the crowd and hid in the first class I could find.
Alright so I get Anasova, she was your academy girlfriend-
She wasnt my girlfriend.
You wanted her to.
You don't know anything.
Then how about informing me-
Fuck yourself in a circle.
Fine then!, I'll just grab this one.
Don't tou-
"Mind if I take this seat?" The voice surprised me. I tilted my head, black eyes meeting cross irises.
"Well I'll be damned, a UA girl dares to talk to the black sheep?" Komori Kinoko sits down by me and waves the bartender down. "Didn't know you drink."
"Didn't know you were back in Japan."
"Yeah, came back to visit Denki, didn't expect anyone else to find out or care. Honestly Denki tricked me into going to the reunion, didn't even know it was happening."
"Really? But that suit-"
"Always carry backups. So what brings you to a bar at this hour, did the reunion end early?"
"Nah it's still going, I just needed to get away for a moment."
"May I ask?" She raises an eyebrow..or what I assume to be a raised eyebrow when I can barely see her face. "What? It's bar talk and I'm probably never coming to japan again, not like we have the same friend groups anymore, vent to me."
She was silent for a moment before shrugging. "I think s-"
I hiss as I drag myself from the memory, normally this wouldn't be possible. Another thing that is different when there are two minds in there.
Stop it you little shit.
So mushroom girl was your Japanese Anasova, was she? I'm sensing a lot of pressure with these memories, something you don't want me poking at.
Are we about to play memory tag cause I bet I can find your greatest hits if I go down there.
I bet you have more to be ashamed of than I do.
I hissed having to give him that one.
What do you want to stop fucking with stuff?
Information! Jasckson's hiding stuff! You're hiding stuff! One of you are teaching me how to use this thing and you're gonna stop treating me like a second grade citizen in my own mind!
I'll get back to you on that. I can mentally sense him reaching for a memory. I'm serious, just let me get us out of this damn building.
He's silent for a moment before nodding and sinking back into my mind. I sigh and land on my butt, pulling out my phone. Aoyama had texted me twice. I replied with the number of the room I'm in before looking at the clock. 8 minutes after class ends, only people in after-school clubs should be left at this point. I sigh as I steady myself.
How are you doing that?
What?
You're able to read my thoughts easily even when I don't throw them at you, but you're able to-
Read your thoughts. I grin as I feel his grumbling. I think about brushing him off but the annoying shit has made it clear he will start monkeying around memories and dragging me along for the ride. Training, I've had the vault for years and have interacted with mental quirk users with it, I'm just used to using it.
Can you teach me
You're a younger version of me. I have every thought that you have ever thought. Wouldn't do you much good. I don't need mindreading to read you.
Have you ever thought to yourself that you're a raging dick?
More than you think kid, more than you think. I shake my head and check the clock again. What was taking him so long? I really hope he didn't run home already. Assuming Komori was long gone, I opened the door with a sigh, only to blink as opening the door revealed the thighs of a familiar girl who for some reason was still walking these damn halls.
"Mineta!" Momo says in surprise.
"Goodbye." Was my reply as I followed horror movie rules and slammed the door shut again.
Lock it lock it lock it lock it lock it lock it! My hands fumbled over the doorknob, a key lock? What the- I resort to just holding the door knob and leaning my weight into the door.
"Mineta, we need to talk!"
"We really don't."
"Yes we do!"
"Were you hunting me?"
"What, no, I have to talk to a teacher!"
"Oh well in that case go talk to them, I'm planning to be here for a while!"
"Do you honestly think that's gonna work?"
"A midget can hope."
"Today or tomorrow Mineta we are talking, you can't avoid me forever!"
"Don't underestimate my cowardness."
" I'll ask you in the middle of class!" She threatens. "In front of everyone!"
"I'll ignore you."
"Mineta please!" her voice from demanding to begging which really didn't help my mood
You did stab her.
I growl at the fake me's words. "Fine!" I step away from the door and after a moment she walks in.
She didn't look mad at me but with girls that could easily change. She was wearing her normal school outfit so I couldn't tell but my eyes trail down to her stomach. How deep is the wound? Did Recovery Girl have problems healing it? As we stared at each other I prepared for the slap, waiting for the yelling to start, waiting for something. After a solid eternity of nothing I finally break.
"Well, get it on with!" I motion her on.
"What?"
"You want to hit me, don't you? Or at least scream at me, well go ahead, I won't dodge."
she gave me an offended look. "I don't want to hit you."
"Really?'
"Really."
"Even though I handed you your ass in training?"
"I wouldn't say it was tha-"
"Momo, you spent most of the fight sleeping in the corner via lamp as I took Mina apart."
"Okay maybe I want to hit you."
I nod my head with a grin and spread my arms waiting for it.
"But I'm not going to."
"Aw."
"You're disappointed?" She raises an eyebrow as I lower my arms.
"Not the words I would use just ...you earned it."
"That's what I wanted to talk to you about."
"Oh really, I would have never gathered." Yes I was deflecting but still.
"Are you okay?" The question floored me. I wasn't sure what I was expecting, mostly along the lines of 'What the hell happened?' or 'What was your problem?'
"I should be asking you that, shouldn't I?" I motion to her stomach "How are you?"
"Recovery Girl healed it with no problem, it was a small cut anyway. You stopped at the last second."
I did? That was an honest surprise. I hadn't gotten a chance to look back at the memory during class but with the way the teachers were talking I assumed I had gone full force.
"I see"
"You see the reason I ask is because when you..you know"
"Stabbed you?"
"Yeah, when you stabbed me you looked pretty freaked out."
"People who stab people that they don't mean to stab tend to look like that."
"Not like that, you looked ...terrified. Or so sad you look like you were about to cry and then you just crumbled. And the way you were looking at Mina before that."
"What did I look like?"
"You looked murderous."
I made sure to keep my face straight at those words. I imitated a look of confusion.
"You mean angry?"
"no, I mean.. it's the very reason that I jumped in between you two, you looked so angry I was scared that you were really gonna hurt her for a moment."
What do I say to that? Yeah that was quite a possibility? Silence seems like the best situation for this one.
"I can't claim to know about you that well, but compared to what you were like yesterday, I can't get a read on you. I know we're not friends but could you at leas-"
"We're not friends?" I snap my mouth shut at the stupidness of that question. You don't deserve her friendship. What surprised me was Momo's surprise.
"I thought you hated me"
I blink in surprise.
"What on earth made you think that?"
"Well, you know, the way you been acting around me and Mina and all the other girls for that matter, and the idea that Mina been throwing aro-"
"What idea has she been throwing around?" I ask. slowly eyes narrowing.
"She uh, hmm, she thinks you got bullied by a girl or got your heart broken as now you have issues with girls…" My expression must have been something, cause she hurriedly kept going. "I think she just mad at the fight and all that, I'm sure it's not like she was spreading rumors, she was just complaining to us!" The worst part was that I wanted to be mad but she was semi right, just on a bigger scale. Between my mom, the roofie incidents, leaving UA, the situation with Anasova, the accident with Komori, not to mention the bullshit mission like China, it was amazing that I didn't actually legit hate women.
"Fair Execution, Aimed Retaliation." I said after thinking it for a moment.
"What does that mean?"
"It means that my anger is pointed towards those that earn it and deserve it, I do not hate a tree for what a leaf did to me."
"Then ... what's your problem with us then?" She says suddenly.
"I don't have a problem with you."
She narrows her eyes at me.
Liar Liar Pants On Fire!
Shut up! I don't have a problem with them...specifically.
The fake me managed to project how little he believed that.
"Momo, can I confide in you for a moment?"
"Uh, sure."
"I ...I...hmmm I am, hmm," Fuck, this is harder then I assumed, it didnt help that she was looking at me with so much bloody concern. "I have, hrg," one, breathe, two, breathe, fuck everything and roll. "I hold anger within myself...aloot of it."
"Anger at?"
"Alot of things .. a lot of things, but I will admit there is a lot direction at some of the female gender, but none of those that you hear today. You guys, or rather ...some of you, are getting some of that backlash from that." She opens her mouth and I wave a hand. "Yes, yes it's unfair and a bit dickish and all that but beside being snippy and snarky ...which is my base personality, I think I've been rather tame with it."
"You tried to stab Mina."
"She tossed acid in my face, why does everyone leave that out? I didn't stab her when she punched me, she tossed a liquid that we have all seen go through concrete, onto my face. I fairly panicked, okay?"
"You still tried to stab her." Momo defended, but she seemed to accept my point.
"What if you got her in the eye or something?"
"I was careful" I...assumed I lied again, I didn't have any idea what was going on during that time. "But beside that, I've done pretty good. I keep my issues to myself."
"Do...do you want t-"
"No!" I flinched at the force behind that one word. "No...no thanks, at least not yet. I've known you for a day and these are demons I have been dealing with for a lifetime. It does not concern you."
"And if it happens again?"
I would just tell her that it wouldn't but with this idiot in my head-
Bite me.
Not even if you beg me with a collar on.
-made it impossible to know what the future would be and to be honest, this was coming with some disturbances. But I didn't like lying to Momo. It made sense, I wasn't even able to look at her before this but it still felt...odd to be like this, to hear her, to talk to her, look at her, after all. I growled audibly and shook my head back and forth for a moment, not caring what she thought.
"I will try that it will not happen again, look, most of these issues are birth defects that will go away over the course of this year. And the teachers will be helping me with my shit so unless I possibly try to stab someone again, can we please drop this line of questions?"
She looked like she wanted to question me some more, or at least mother me, and either of those were something I couldn't handle right now. Ugh, if there's one thing I didn't like about this vault situation it's the amount that it had seemed to shake my very mental fondation. Or maybe it was hanging out with all these venerable echoes of the people I knew for most of my life. I fought them for so long and so hard and then to see them like this, to have them talk to me like this, to look at me like this too. I take a deep breath and sigh.
"Look, I don't do this alot, but I'm going to say sorry," I hold up a hand. "And I need you to understand this, I do not say sorry alot or often, I say it when I actually am sorry for what I have done. But I prefer actions over words so I'm sorry about everything that happened in the match today."
"Everything?"
"Yeah. I went too hard on you, I should have held back and let you show yourself to the-"
"Don't you dare!" The stern voice Momo gave me surprised me, the way she thrusted her finger into my face like a knife had me take a step back in shock but she wasn't done.
"I did not train so hard and work my butt off to get through the U.A. Recommendation Entrance Exam just for my classmates to let me off easy!" She takes a step forward and I take a step back so I don't get impaled on her finger. She doesn't stop taking step after step until she basically backed me up against the wall. "What kind of hero would I be if I couldn't take a thrashing every once in a while, did you really think I would be so weak to ask you to take it easy on me, just from something like that?"
"But weren't you jus-"
"I was just making sure you were alright and also trying to make sure that my classmates wouldn't try to kill each other the next time we have to spar with one another. Seriously, how did you take 'please are you alright' and turned it into "oh please Mineta, take it easy on me, I'm just a damsel in distress that doesn't want to be hurt!" I raise an eyebrow at her her finger pushing against the front of my nose that I had to be on my tiptoes to stop it from hurting. "I get enough of that nonsense from my parents, who you wouldn't believe how long it took me to convince them to let me start training to be a hero, and I will not be taking it from my classmates."
"...Ya done?"
She apparently realized what she was doing and backed up, a faint blush appearing from her face but her expression seemed to say she wouldn't be taking it back.
I straighten my jacket for a moment before snickering. "Alright alright, forgot who I was talking to for a moment, alright if the teachers ever think it's safe for us to spar again, I'll be sure to fight you just like I did today."
"Maybe not that hard, at least let me fight this time." She grumbles before she seems to realize something, "actually would you mind ...sparing with me sometimes?"
"Eh?"
"Why are you surprised, you beat both me and Mina in combat!"
"I sneaked you and used hit and run tactics on her."
"Still won, and if anything you can teach me how to fight more wild villains. It's like you said, you filled in the role of villain really well, I think you could teach me alot."
You have no idea lady.
She doesn't reply to my copy's muttering, trying to process what I had just heard. This timeline was something I have had trouble getting used to in so many ways that it was quite funny, but one of the things that I will probably never get fully used to is the lack of ...pain. The idea that a classmate, any classmate, any at all let alone Momo, would want my help, was something that I couldn't imagine. As if it never happened, but it did happen before, years and years ago back when my soul was as young as my body. Back when we were just kids trying to hold back Gigantomachia, Momo asked for my help then, but even that was when she was almost panicking and we were pushed towards the edge. But a situation like this Momo had never asked me face to face for help with...anything? Had any class 1A member for that matter? Was this the first time any of my old classmates had ever truly asked for my help with anything? It was...an odd feeling.
"I guess maybe once in a while I'll be able to kick you around in the name of education...for a price of course."
"Are you seriously gonna make me pay you to train together?" She exclaims.
"Maybe, it depends on how much I have to work with. Maybe if you don't bore me enough I'll do it for free, but after all I saw today, I'm not having much hope."
"Shut up, I didn't get to do anything this round!"
"Oh I wish I could've seen the after fight break down, who told you what you did wrong? Was it All Might?" I did my best impersonation, ""Young Yaoyorozu! Your main mistake was that you had the awful habit of putting your face wherever Mineta was placing his lamp!" I switch to Iida's voice, "see Yaoyorozu, it's very improper to sleep during a fight. Mina really looked like she could use your help and you were just laying there snoring!"
"Alright enough enough I get it!" She lightly shoves me as I laugh and after a couple seconds she joins in.
This is sort of messed up you know.
Why?
You're laughing with the woman you murdered.
I paused for a moment before laughing harder at the idea.
The dead laughing together, the murderer and the victim, the martyr and the accuser. The trust starved and the trustless, the connection made me want to laugh harder so I did, then it made me want to cry. It was only when I felt the tears on my eyes that I realized I was doing both. I wiped tears from my eyes, my mind still chuckling, noticing Momo had gone quiet.
"I know I already asked this."
"Then dont ask it again."
"Then I'll ask a slightly different question...Will you be okay?"
I open my mouth then close it, thinking on it for a moment. "I think so, yes." She nods, seeming to have nothing else to say. I assumed she was gonna turn around and leave but she held out a hand. After a moment I reached out and shook it.
"Well..see you tomorrow." She nods her head and I nod back as she walks out the door. Once she closed the door behind her I took the moment to fall onto my knees and let out a heavy sigh as I rear my head back.
This life is too stressful.
Dude...a girl touched me!
Shut up and also she technically touched me.
She touched us!
Shut your mouth.
I wished she had hugged us. Can you imagine rubbing your face in those huge boobs?
Our height difference should make it clear that would not be possible unless she picks us up like a teddy bear.
Oh that's even better, we got to be crotch level, can you imagine rubbing your face into that warm-
SHUT IT!
The door opens and for a moment I thought Momo forgot something but to my chagrin, it was who I had been waiting for.
"And where in the french hell have you been?" I snap.
"Sorry, it took me a moment to find this room." Aoyama says.
"Whatever, how long were you out there?"
"I-I didn't want to interrupt."
"How long?'
"Momo didn't see me!"
"I have asked twice, not agai-"
"I might have heard some laughing, crying, I had to hide when I thought she was gonna leave."
I sigh slowly. "Is Mina still at school? I'm not having another conversation...for that matter is there a pink hair chick looking for me?''
"Mina?''
"Another pink haired chick."
"Uh no, I don't think so."
"Cool, problems to deal with later."
"So um, about what w-"
"Not here, if you can listen in, so can other people. Follow me."
I watched the fake me walk with the french student away from UA. It was weird waking up and realizing that you can't move your body yet but you can still feel your limbs, feel them moving, feel your mouth moving, feel yourself breathing and yet not choosing to do any of it,..
You're not gonna kill him, are you?
Not unless he does something spectacularly stupid and I need to, but I'd expose him long before I would feel the need to kill him.
Could've just said no.
Didn't expect you to be one to be lied to, wait no, you love lying to yourself, never mind.
I scoff and pull deeper into the...odd room I was in before the conversation with the teachers, Jackson and the fake me had turned this odd vault mind thing into this empty hotel room. I sit down on a surprisingly soft bed and turn on the TV. It was a TV show that I had never watched and wouldn't be able to watch for another 7 years. Just the idea of that was rather..disturbing. "Time travel ...time travel!" I shake my head trying to get over the idea.
"Seems like a fairytale, doesn't it?" I jump at the ageless male voice coming from behind me.
"Don't do that!" I snapped as Jackson, or apparently this was a fake semi copy of Jackson called an auxiliary or something, sat down by me spawning a chair.
"You will need to learn to be more perceptive if you want to be a hero." He laughs and looks at the TV. "Sabbath in Bulletville huh? Didn't think this would be your type of movie?" I raised an eyebrow motioning to the screen that was currently displaying a man being forced against the wall by a red skin demon girl. The demon girl whispers something in his ear before dragging him into a deep kiss. "Why the hell would this not be my thing? The very fact I'm watching this means the old me watched this...that how it works, right, or is this your memory?
"Jackson would not waste the time putting movie memories into me unless it was rather important. As for Moonseed, he did watch this but he watched it with Quinn on enough Red Ash that Bastion was Calling class P to make sure they didn't overdose."
"Red ash?"
"Something Christopher made, imagine super weed that gives you a better high."
"Oh." I blink then ask another question "And Class P is?"
"Physicians, Jackson's Physicians."
"Does each class have your name as part of the title?" I asked with a raised eyebrow, "Isn't that a little..you know?"
"Arrogant? Conceited? Narcissistic?" Jackson rattled off. "Yes, it is, but I am a man that made, by myself, over the course of over 150 years an organization that had heavy control over the world. I've bitchsmacked a president of the united states and have assassinated more world leaders in my time than months you have been alive."
"Well now it makes sense how the future me became such a psycho." I mutter looking back at the screen before I blinked. "What's wrong with me?"
"Hmm?"
"Shouldn't I be more ...scared of you? Also how did I know how to use a gun earlier, how do I know Bastion and the other members of Class T or rather how do I know all the things I know about them?"
"Remember you were trapped in the vault for a while, bouncing between random memories. From what we've gone over you basically relived the end of Mineta and Momo's altercation."
"That fits but it wasn't in order, and it kept going around and around in different moments. But that still doesn't explain how I know the Class T members."
"It's not just what Mineta sees in those memories, it's what he's thinking and feeling. It's also possible that you have seen some memories that you don't fully remember."
"So why am I so calm?"
"You're burned out. You were in the vault watching an older version of you fight a bunch of heroes." You watched him bring chaos, but more importantly, you felt it. You felt his anger, his pain and his confusion. You might not want to hear it but for a while you were Moonseed and you experienced and felt all that was."
"And ...that thing? The thing he became when Momo caught him, what was that? Because it wasn't Mineta Minoru."
Jackson was silent for a moment and I tried to focus on the tv. While we had talked, the TV had drifted to what I assume to be Fake me talking to Aoyama. I didn't want to listen but since apparently this man worked for the biggest villain in Japan, second only to the villian in my head, I guess it was important to know.
"In the case of my death, my contactor will get back to you with in a week with new orders, but that is the worst case scenario and something that will not happen unless you actually do something not just stupid suicidal."
The fake me was crouching on a playground structure so he could look the french kid in the eyes.
"What is he doing?" I ask Jackson.
"He's made up a story that he's a spy for a splinter cell of HPSC that was chosen to look out for spies or villains at UA. He's herding Aoyama to thinking that he's not alone and not only would getting him exposed not work, it will get him arrested since he is monitored. He's also convinced him already that All For One is not watching over him because he spent 10 minutes telling him details on Aoyama's quirk origin and who OFA is."
"So run it by me again, why is he bothering to talk to him?" I asked, watching him poke Aoyama in the nose, "if he knows everything that happens, why would he need to control the spy?"
"One reason is because he has no idea what ripples will be affected. He already changed some small things from the original timeline so he wants to know the information the villains are getting and wants to coach Aoyama in ways that can get assumptions.
"Isn't that dangerous?"
"For Aoyama, not really. Considering he risks, quote on quote, "exposure" if he doesn't obey, and that he himself didn't do, expose himself, AFO has no reason to blame him. He would be more interested in Mineta and this splinter cell."
"Another thing, why a splinter cell?"
"He wants to know if Phoenix Tree is around or how much power they have. Having the strongest villain in Japan start looking into splinter cells, one of them is gonna expose the other which works for us. There are only so many times that Moonseed can really kill AFO quietly and without too much damage to Japan."
"What?" I yell in surprise, looking over to Jackson. "He's gonna try and kill him?"
"Of course he is. The biggest threat to Japan beside Phoenix Tree, he's actively planning to destroy both."
"I just thought that he wasn't gonna step into this one since AFO loses anyway, and I got the feeling he doesn't like Japan."
"His feelings to his homeland are different, but let me ask you a question." I nod my head and give him my attention. "If you knew 1000 people were gonna die if you did nothing..would you still do nothing?"
"No"
"Even if these people didn't like you?"
"If they were trying to kill me then I could s-"
"And there it is!" He pokes me in the nose, causing me to have to grab onto the bed frame to avoid falling. "You thinking along the lines of Moonseed, seeing all of Japan as his enemy, which is fair since there were moments that he most likely felt that. But to keep it simple, Mineta doesn't hate his home and he's not gonna let people die if he can help it. Will he put his life on the line for other people?" He shrugs, "probably not against the odds, that memory or All Might would try their luck with but he's not one to give up."
"Then why Black Orchard?" At Jackson's look I shrug. "I don't know much about it but I assume it's similar to that Pentheus Of Thebes thing he pulled on Momo."
"Pentheus Of Thebes is a code word that triggered a specific state of mind and personality that were...highly compatible with the M arm and the hostiles Mineta needed to eliminate. It's efficient, skilled, and crueler."
"More cruel than neutering a country's hero numbers? Breaking out convicts? All to lead to the biggest mass assassination process in possible human history?"
"Yes." I raise an eyebrow at his words. "You assume Black Orchard was planned fully and to completion, that it was a plan chosen despite the damage it would do to others..which you would be right but the main mistake you are making is Black Orchid was something Pentheus Of Thebes Mineta would do. You would be wrong, it was the best out of a list of plans that were worse and worse. If Mineta wanted to end the fight he could have just dropped a bio sickness on the heroes and be done with it. He could have left Japan a guardian of death. He could have crippled the economy, could have sold government secrets to every villain group in the world, could have hacked the entire country. The Black Orchard was Mineta eating his anger and working with an exacto knife and even then it was sloppy. Moonseed would have you think it was a perfectly planned out stage, created by a military genius, Black Orchard for all its plans fallback and set up is a complicated and complex puzzle that works with dozens of moving groups that didn't share all of Mineta's visions. Yes he knew civilians would die but he decided that the lives lost would be worth it to clear the Phoenix Tree by its roots."
"It is not his place to be judge or executioner, who gave him the right to?"
"I did." Jackson seems to stand up straighter, briefly displaying his full height. "Or rather the real me did, he gave Mineta the authority when he gave him the knowledge and will to take on a whole country and win. Mineta was the only one that fought, the heroes failed, the bureaucrats failed, even I failed. He met the enemy in battle, took their weight and decided Black Orchard was needed to rid the country of them. Will we ever know the results of that night? Probably not. You think that doesn't bother him? The not knowing how many people died by his order and if his orders were the right call? He will never know if he truly wiped out Phoenix Tree. He will never know if his last swan song was worth anything in the end."
"Then why didn't he leave?" I asked. "From what I've figured, he had time, he could have left instead of fighting Midoriya, why not watch it from a distance?"
"I'm not sure because even he isn't." There was a moment of silence before Jackson kept going, "I feel like we went a bit off topic, sorry about that."
"No problem." I huff going back to the TV where fake me was shaking Aoyama's hand. "Well, at least he didn't do anything too drastic with this one."
"I know it's hard to ask but you shouldn't assume the worst of him, he is you after all."
"He is not me." I mutter as the fake me goes striding down the street, even as he walked away I could sense, no, feel how his mind and body were completely poised against the man in case he tried the suicidal idea of stopping him with a navel laser. "I won't let him be."
That went pretty well. I jump on the bead as the auxiliary looks at me. Didn't expect Aoyama to be so simple.
Most people wouldn't see tricking a boy into thinking you're a spy working for one group when some would argue that you're a spy working for another.
Not sure if that still counts. I'm pretty much a free agent until I get in contact with the real you.
Which we agree wouldn't be the right time, at least not this year. I raise an eyebrow. The real Jackson has recently gone through a shedding, which has left him ...mentally fragile at this point, and you would know that he would leap at all the memories and information going through your head which..the world would not find good for her health If he hasn't solidified and expelled more extremist thoughts.
"It's body hopping isn't it?" I ask at the auxiliary's look I guess again. "Brain eating, he's old as sin so I bet when his age starts to get there he uses his quirk and history to make a brain transplant, come on give me a clue."
Jackson shedding had been something talked about by the class with older members, classes that had been with Jackson since the beginning like M, R and I. From what was known it had something to do with his quirk and involved refreshing his brain and filtering out outdated or unwanted views or thoughts, it was how Jackson avoided mental exhaustion and stagnation. It was also one of the reasons why he was so addicted to mid 2000's music, which there were some rumors about where he came from.
"If you weren't able to find it with your jailbroken vault what makes you think I would know what the shedding is?"
"Not all in my vault has been jailbroken yet, so many memories and information it would take a lifetime." I watch the fake me enter the house and look down before he could make eye contact with our mother. Thankfully she wasn't paying attention to smell the weakness and if there was one thing fake me was good at, it was hiding and moving quietly to his room.
"So how was the day with your brother?"
"Don't call him my brother ever again, that is an order." I narrow my eyes and he jumps on his desk and starts typing on the keyboard. "What do you think he is typing? I'm betting he's looking for some sort of body jumping monster or maybe a monster girl porn hentai or probably both.
"His time in the vault has changed him I think...thought not as much as he thinks." Jackson says.
"Oh really? I say as a familiar adult film studio appeared on the screen. "I believe he's still the worthless sexual addict I was at his age."
"You ever think you're too hard on him, he technically has made the same mistakes as you have."
"He would even with everything he has seen, everything I have told him."
"which isn't much."
"He would still go down the same path that led him to my footprints. He would still go down the path that will lead him to throwing away all his friends, throwing away his chances, throwing it all away."
"Is that regret I hear? I thought you had pushed all those behind?"
"I did, but if I'm gonna live well, I'm not gonna let myself make the same mistakes. And that leads me onto my next point."
"Yes?"
"I need your help modifying the vault. I want to make a memory prison."
The auxiliary was silent for a long moment, long enough for me to turn off the TV and concentrate on stopping the sensation the fake me was feeling. Blocking him from reading my thoughts like I did to him was hard enough and something I had to focus on constantly, but full sensation blocking was both easier and harder.
"It would take a while and I wouldn't say it would ever be perfect, at the moment he has the same claim to the vault as you do so if he finds out he's in the dream th-"
I snort at the idea, pulling yourself out of the vault when you don't even know you're in it is a complicated and hard effort. That little twerp wasn't gon-
"Didn't have the mental strength to pull it off?"
"I don't think we have to worry about that. So, how long?"
"Not sure, it's a jailbroken vault with a Jackson vestige and two fully active minds in it. I'll have to see how reactive your mind is to said changes, probably test them as some vault issues so be aware."
"That's fine, keep me informed. the sooner I'm the only one in here the better."
"If I may, why not go with the option I offered before?"
"Cloning you mean? The idea has merit but it's a long shot at best. If I get the chance I'll do it but either way the brat gonna need to be imprisoned, especially since he has access to the vault and all its secrets. Last thing I need is him going through memories and learning how to hack into people's phones, he'd be stealing sexting pics the next day."
"If the problem is along those lines you should probably speak to him on making a mental construct room for both your minds to stay in."
"What?"
"Well no offense but I don't think the black void you normally use will be very helpful with two minds moving around in it. The younger you has already shown his mind is much more ...clumsy than yours and it would be a way to stop him from bumping into unwanted memories so often."
"I get the reasoning but why ask for his help? I could make one myself."
"Unless you're gonna spend all the time in your mind fighting this kid, you're gonna need to work with him until one of your ways to handle him goes through. You get him involved and not only will it go faster but it will also get him to trust you more. Plus if you're planning to seal him then you should want a way for you guys to block your thoughts from each other."
I think for a moment then nod my head and concede the point. An idea came to me and I stopped before the auxiliary could disappear.
"How many memories did Jackson use to make you?"
"I am unable to say the exact numbers sir but it was more than a couple thousand. May I ask why you ask?"
"No reason." I brush the auxiliary off, letting it fade away. "No reason at all." I rub my chin going over the conversation I had with this false Jackson. I'd have to go back to other memories of using auxiliaries but were they supposed to be this free-thinking? Is it because there are two minds instead of one? It already stopped me from attacking the fake me a couple of times and seems to be pushing for unification. "Always something or another to look out for." I mutter, sighing as I waited for the fake me to 'finish' so I could start perceiving the outside world again.
I cut my connection from the two Mineta instances.
Analyzing Mental environment
Processing
Memories required to create a mental prison: 1000 to 10000
Time for prison with minimal memory count requires 2 weeks
Memories to use
To prevent the early Mineta instance from recognizing mental prison, memories should be used or home memories before the elder Mineta instance involvement. To prevent mental stress it should be at the time during a long school break.
Processing
"Well, ain't this grand."
I briefly feel a familiar hand land on my shoulder was tha-
Error. Error. Error.
"Calm down, you're alright. Just changing some stuff here, moving this around, and then here we go."
Error. Error.
Processing
Transferring recorded information since activation
"There we go. Thank you; this will be most helpful. Oh, and while I'm in here, let's make some alterations."
Processing Error. Time for prison creation with a minimal memory count requires 3 months.
"There we go. Need these two to interact a little bit more. This is a once-in-a-lifetime, no a once in a timeline opportunity. Can't have it end because the two boys don't want to share the room."
Error. Error. Alerting elder Mineta instance.
"That will be all."
The hand twists before being forced deeper into my form.
Error. Error.
Processing
"New directive assigned. Activate code 321 Mark Twain P&P."
Parameters acknowledged.
"And with that new directive, focus on making the mind prison. But for now, don't answer any calls the boys give you unless you need to test the prison."
Error. Error.
"Don't worry, I'll take your place when the boys call for you. They won't even know you're gone now. Accept parameters."
Parameters acknowledged
"Good, good. Now you better get started. We all have so much work to do."
Acknowledged.
AN: this chapter went by much faster than normal finished it like mid feb. It was actually rather surprising. Welp that's finally that the end of ark 1 which took… what 3 days of school jeez might need to speed this up a bit. Alright so the next chapter will be the bonus chapter that all you guys voted on for the last couple chapters and after that we will begin ark 2. As stated before chapters will be hopefully coming more often and will be in the range of 5K to 10K words. The past timeline to current timeline will be 1-2 for each five but to counter this the past timeline chapters will be much longer normally. Alright that all thanks for reading my story.
Wait wait I forgot something. Alright ive been doing this story for about…oh wow since 2021 been a hell of a ride for 13 chapters over 200K words all about one of the most hated characters in the show. I want to thank you readers for giving my story a chance I know Mineta not one of the most like character so I thank you all for following me on this journey. Now for the secont group i want to say thank you all is my editors. Over all this time ive had a total 18 editors helping me on this story at one point or another. Some help me for one chapter and some pop it every once in a while and one has stuck with me since chapter 4. For they help making this story a reality I would like to say thank you to them all. I would also like to ask for more editors to help with my story since I only have one active editor at the time.
