BUMP OF CHICKEN - クロノスタシス (chronostasis)

Same Difference Ch.18

A/N: Shoutout to Kurono, The Lawful Evil Wingman™.

Making the long trek down the hallways, Nanami began mulling over her hypotheses about what transpired. She opened the door to find Chisa—I mean Overhaul—looking pensively and found herself glad they were on the same, confusing page.

“So, I think we should go over the chain of events.”

“Agreed.” He concurred as he pulled up the notes he made earlier and she went to the whiteboard to write.

“Ok, so at 5:30 AM we woke up like usual,” how easily the ‘like usual’ part came out after only a week together made her stomach flip, but she did her best to ignore it, clearing her throat before continuing,” we ate the same thing for dinner, and neither of us had eaten breakfast or ingested anything besides water.”

Having no idea what caused their shared quirk, they thought it best to keep track of their eating habits and refrain from taking any medication unless absolutely necessary. It resulted in a couple days of cranky Nanami as she rode out the odd headache every now and again, but it was just another rule to help ensure their results were as accurate as possible.

“At 6 AM, we began running. And I remember my phone reading 6:15 AM when I changed the song, so the reaction had to have happened around 6:20 AM.” She said, finishing the timeline on the white board. “At 15 minutes in you wouldn’t have been using the latent abilities of overhaul yet, so we were both neutral at this point.”

Considering the facts for a moment, he interjected,” I think this would work best if we tried to replicate this scene exactly to our best ability in the testing area. Kurono will spectate so we can avoid injury like last time.”

“I figured,” her voice gave away a hint of apprehension as her back was turned to him, still facing the board but writing nothing. She knew whatever it was was an accident, but the possibility of sustaining injuries like she had before was still very unappealing. She heard a chair move and then footsteps.

“As I said, it won’t happen again. This is just a reenactment, you’ll be safe.”

She turned to see him a safe distance away but could tell the look in his eyes was sincere. After a beat, she simply nodded, “Ok, let’s do this.”

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

The next day, they woke up at the same time and went out doing the same routine, except they would jog in the testing area so Kurono could take notes and supervise. When the reaction happened, he’d at least be able to slow them down and mitigate the intense injuries from before. Nanami put in her earphones, listening to the same music and making the same movements as the timer they’d made to signal events buzzed, letting them know when to begin each interaction. They jogged around the room at the same pace and the timer sounded again, signaling them to begin talking, or rather arguing.

“It wouldn’t make sense to ignore that we were pretty riled up at the time, even though neither of us activated our quirk. So, do what you do best and get on my nerves.”

“I was going to say the exact same thing.”

“You’ll have to escalate this further, your heart rates have risen, but they’re still not high enough.” Kurono remarked, checking the charts. Thankfully Nanami had been wearing a BitFit when running so they knew the goal was at least 189 BPM. As it stood, they were only at 150 with only another 4 minutes to get it up.

Thinking quickly, Kurono decided it wouldn’t be very plausible for them to work themselves up if they were aware of it. He thought it best to help, “By the way, Dr. Watanabe, did you still need me to text that guy friend of yours for you to reschedule your date? I’ll need to drive a bit so the signal hits the right cell tower, but Tanaka just sounded so excited to see you again.”

At this Nanami was a bit confused. She was supposed to reschedule her dinner date with Tanaka, but Kurono had already done that last week and both of them knew it. What’s he talking about…

“…Date?” Overhaul’s voice was low and accusatory.

“Yeah, we go on them all the time, but I’ve had to put them on hold since this whole obligatory quarantine with you.” She replied plainly.

“’All the time’.” He intoned, sounding almost disgusted at her response.

“That’s what I said… Is there a proble– ”

“Exactly how long has this been happening?”

“A while.” She wasn’t sure why the air had shifted between them, but his temper was starting to grate her nerves, “I followed procedure and haven’t left this entire time. Why do you even care?” she asked half-jokingly.

“I do not care. It is physically impossible for me to care any less about you and who you associate with.”

“What the – why are you being such an ass?”  She said getting closer, similar to before.

They continued to argue as Kurono calmy monitored their vitals, satisfied they were now at the appropriate BPM. Making his notes, he looked up to see them dangerously close and noticed something they hadn’t considered before. There was usually a noticeable tension between them, but today it seemed more like the air was almost electric or filled with a static of some sort. Soon, due to their proximity and Nanami’s tendency to gesture with her hands when she spoke, Kurono took a gamble. Hoping they were too entranced in their own spat to notice he quietly and quickly walked up to them stopping short to cut them both with his hair. Both of them now slowed, he moved them into the safety of the observation deck, hoping his gamble would pay off as Overhaul and Nanami looked royally pissed. He explained before unfreezing them, “You know I wouldn’t do it unless I absolutely had to. Just look closely at the spot I moved you two from.”  Unfreezing them, they tabled the argument to observe. Then an explosion happened, just like before.

They gathered around the monitor in the room and played back the recording, zooming in on the spot and fast forwarding to the exact moment the explosion happened. Seeing it in slow motion, a spiderweb of blue light fractured outwardly before the explosion happened. It looked like lightning and was just as fast, so missing it in the midst of the blast was easy. Watching it back again, they all shared a look of realization.

“It’s the air.” They said in unison.

“I’ll compile the footage. Dr. Watanabe, could you retrieve the supplies for collecting blood and sweat samples as well as the barometer? Fluid samples and air conditions need to be collected and noted as soon as possible,” Kurono reasoned.

“Agreed, be right back!” Nanami nodded, jogging out of the room.

Kurono turned to Overhaul, the terminal he was using to monitor their vitals still in hand, “Kai, you can relax a bit, I only needed it to be 189 not 21—”

“Do not speak to me.”

Kurono sighed, realizing it would be best to put his friend out of his misery before he said anything else stupid today to potentially ruin his chances with the good doctor, “I won’t say another word, but… it’s probably important to note Dr. Tanaka has a cute wife—not as attractive as our dear doctor, but a looker nonetheless. She and Nanami seem to be great friends…” glancing out the corner of his eye he could see Overhaul’s brow furrow as he reluctantly listened,” All three of them hang out pretty regularly, you know. They go on these things called ‘dinner dates’. They poke fun at Dr. Watanabe for being single, but she seems to enjoy her time with them nonetheless. Just a bit of information I thought I’d share.”

At this Overhaul’s head slowly turned to his direction, an incredulous look on his face as Kurono finished speaking, “You motherfu—”

“Dr. Watanabe! You’re back.” Kurono interjected with a level of enthusiasm that felt foreign as he wisely walked over to her, creating distance between himself and his friend.

“Um… yes. Here I am.” She said, a bit confused as to why the usually even-keeled Kurono was so animated while Overhaul now looked like he was having an existential crisis. “You guys good…or?”

“We’re fine.”

“We’re great!”

Not wanting to be in the middle of whatever had happened in the 2 minutes she’d been gone, she thought it best to gloss over it. “Oki doki then… let’s collect these samples.”

Kurono withdrew blood from Nanami then placed gauze on her to absorb the sweat before walking over to Overhaul to do the same. His glare told him it was best not to be within striking distance and promptly handed the supplies to Nanami. “I’ll just be back in the lab computer lab while you guys get some air readings and finish collecting the sweat samples. Be back in 30.”  Kurono said while hurriedly collecting his laptop and the camera’s SD card before leaving. He spared his friend a sympathetic look that was spitefully ignored before closing the door to the observation room behind him.

They sat in silence for the first 5 minutes as Nanami tried to think of a way to break the ice. Having been in the situation so often, she felt like an expert and decided to just go for it, “So, what was that all about?”

“What was what all about?”

“Oh, you know, the plotline of the soap opera that was on last night,” she mocked in an airhead voice before continuing seriously, “—you know exactly what I mean. Don’t play dumb, you were so mean back there!”

“Of course, I was.”

“I can’t believe yo—wait what?”

“I said of course, I had to be rude. We needed to recreate the scene and you were too calm in comparison to that morning for it to be accurate.”

She raised her hand to point at him, her mouth opening to speak, before stopping short and putting her index to her lips, a pensive look on her face. “So, that was just you… acting?”

“Exactly. Your acting skills being so subpar, I’m not surprised you didn’t recognize it.”

Brushing off his comment, she continued thinking, “But how did you get your heart rate up so high?”

“Practice. Plenty of people can control their heart rate and work themselves up with enough discipline.”

She didn’t have anything to say to that, feeling a bit foolish for letting her feelings cloud her judgement, “Well, wow,” she chuckled derisively to herself,” now I feel silly for getting genuinely worked up at you. Sorry abou—”

“Don’t be. It was for the experiment; your reaction was as it should have been.”

“… Ah. Alright then. Well, how do you want to spend the next… 23 minutes? Besides just working up a sweat, of course.” He gave her a look and she realized it could have been worded better as she rubbed her temples hoping to hide her now very warm cheeks, “… I’m just going to stop talking for the foreseeable future.”

“That’s acceptable, however,” he looked over to her his hand extended as his eyes glanced from her to her bag in the corner.

“… I hate you.” She grabbed her planner and a pen, flipping it to the bookmarked page. Begrudgingly, she handed it over, refusing to give him the satisfaction of eye contact. He’d been merciful letting a multitude of opportunities slide since that night in the bar, so this time she knew it had to be done.

He placed the tally mark next to her doodle portrait as he first had months ago, satisfied the score was close to being even. “Now, let’s talk theories.”

thinking about chronohaul teaching dabi to dance

If you asked him, Nemoto Shin would say that he is a religious man. If you asked for details, he would politely decline your request and say that religion is a private matter for him. This is true. Nemoto Shin, nowadays, does not say anything that is not true.

It simply is not the whole truth.

You could not blame him, if you knew, for holding back the details of his religion. To worship what everyone else perceived as a mortal man seems like delusion, like the symptom of a cult’s predation. To go so far as to kill for that man would shock and mortify anyone. And Shin’s insistence that Chisaki Kai is more than human might have landed him in a mental asylum.

Shin knows he’s not insane, thank you.

Shin murmurs prayers and dedications under his breath every time a bullet of his meets its mark, and when he comes back from his mission he’s greeted by a knowing-yet-confused look in his young master’s (young god’s) eye and knows that he’s received the blood of the offering. Shin survives things he shouldn’t be able to, and Chisaki always arrives just a hair quicker after than any normal man would. And when he uses his Quirk just a hair too much and falls into a narcoleptic sleep, he dreams of feathered serpents and the birth of dark planets and the molecular makeup of the universe.

Even the other Precepts have started to notice it. Tengai murmurs that he’s been hired by a demon; Setsuno admits that he’s no longer sure he can die; Sakaki cries on his shoulder, terrified of the visions he sees when he drifts off to sleep. Shin comforts him the best he can, but as an oracle he’s been having these dreams and knowing these things since he was a child, so he has no reference point for how to approach this when it is all new and overwhelming.

And Kurono–well. Kurono is an angel, an angel of death, the kind that gleefully sends sinners into the clutches of the hungry god both he and Shin serve.

Kurono scares Shin.

Best not to dwell on it, though. Whatever it is he’s scared of, it’s not like he can leave now.

I had to do it, its all i thought of when he said it Horikoshi give them love please

Also i know @wildcrisis would appreciate this from how much we talked chronohaul, miss talking to them!