Chapter Text
Academic lectures were interesting.
Of course, the softly-snoring college student to Izumi’s left was clearly of a different opinion- but there was a reason she had talked her mother into letting her attend these events during the weekends when the historian needed to dig through the more restricted archives.
There hadn’t exactly been many lectures on... well... much of anything back in the days of Amestris.
If there had been lectures, they were restricted to specific groups, and often required military affiliations just to get in the door.
(And like hell was she going to become a military dog just to get thirty minutes of only possibly-relevant information.)
But now, these academic lectures were available to almost anyone who had the time to sit through them- and Izumi found them fascinating .
She attended almost every single lecture she could find- and found digital versions of any that she missed due to schoolwork or other obligations.
(Those ‘TED talk’ videos were especially useful during long train rides.)
She’d learned quite a bit about the advancements that had been made since the end of her first life, and far more than she’d expected about the way the emergence of Quirks had impacted society.
From the controversial emergence of the Pro Hero system, to impacts in the focus of science and technology as organizations like NASA took a hard swerve away from space exploration to combatting, and eventually managing Quirks and their less than savory effects on their users.
This particular lecture was actually one Izumi had been hoping to attend since the day it had been announced: Evolutionary Acceleration and the Quirk Singularity.
The speaker, Doctor Fukabun Nara, rarely made public appearances. If ever.
He was an incredibly private man, and even he name he used on papers was known to be a pseudonym. In fact, when read in the western order, the name literally meant “atomic shadow,” a reference to both the carbon-burned shadows created from death in proximity to an atom bomb- and the man’s somewhat-eerie Quirk.
(Looking like the lovechild of a red-eyed grim reaper and a sleep-deprived romance-novel vampire that had gotten lost in Hot Topic tended to throw people off.)
(It was a look, that was for certain.)
Still, to have him give a full lecture? A public lecture?
It was like clouds had turned to cotton candy and started raining chocolate milk. Doctor Nara giving a lecture was nothing short of a miracle.
Although, a good twenty minutes into said lecture, Izumi was starting to see why the wraithlike man had deemed this knowledge so important he’d left his usual hermit-like state to give a public speech about it.
The Quirk Singularity, the man had explained while ghosting across the stage, was not a new theory by any means- but it was beginning to look more and more probable.
Quirk Singularity was fairly simple in and of itself. It was the idea that, as time went on and generations of Quirk users combined, Quirks themselves would begin to grow stronger and stronger- until they became too much for their users to control.
The theorists believed that even the recently-accelerated evolution of the human body simply could not keep up with Quirk evolution and that, at some point, the Quirk Singularity would be reached and humanity would quite literally tear itself apart under the weight of its own power.
Doctor Nara disagreed.
His studies had shown that the side effects of Quirk useage were actually decreasing as generations passed, and that the human genome was quite literally rewriting itself the longer it was exposed to whatever Quirk the holder possessed, in order to better contain and manipulate the ‘rules’ of the Quirk in question.
In fact- it was becoming increasingly common for Quirk users who practiced regularly to surpass their supposedly hard limits and break into entirely new subsections of their Quirk- a phenomenon most seen in Pro Heroes.
So, in Doctor Nara’s view, the Quirk Singularity was not necessarily the problem.
The problem was the emergence of what he called ‘X-Quirks.’
They were the Quirks that manifested early, and manifested badly. They were the Quirks that warped their users’ mental state. They were the Quirks that manifested without limits- the Quirks that required pinpoint control that a child simply did not have.
They were the Quirks that made Villains by circumstance, forcing a child down a path of darkness from even a single mistake- or even without one, as society ridiculed and labeled their abilities.
It was these X-Quirks and their effects- not the Singularity- that were the real danger to their world.
And quite honestly, Izumi agreed.
X-Quirks were dangerous if not handled properly, and right now, there was no one to handle them.
She planned to change that.
As a budding Quirk Researcher- it seemed she had found her specialization.
= = = =
“I am freaking tired of makeup not fucking working on me. I’m going to fix it.” Mitsuki announced, slamming her lunch tray onto the table with unnecessary force as she slid into the seat beside Izumi.
Jotting down another line in her notebook, Izumi flipped to a blank page, setting down her pencil and turning her attention to her blond friend.
“You’re going to ‘fix it?’” Izumi questioned, raising an eyebrow.
“Yup.” Mitsuki replied, nodding as she yanked open the paper milk-box. “Makeup is almost always powder based, water based, or cream based- and it always-” she took a shot of milk like it was high proof alcohol. “-gets ruined by my Quirk.” she finished, slamming the box back onto her tray.
“So.” Mitsuki continued, “I’m going to fix it. I mean, I figure I’m not the only one with a Quirk that makes normal makeup fucking useless- so if I can figure out how to make a bunch of different types that work around Quirks and weird skin types, I could solve a huge fucking problem in the cosmetics industry.”
Izumi blinked. “...You know you’ll need chemistry for something like that, right?”
Mitsuki grinned brightly. “Biochem, specifically! And a bunch of dermatology too. Though, since I’ve gotta know so much about dermatology to deal with my Quirk anyway- that part shouldn’t be too hard, ya’know?”
The greenette nodded slowly. “That… is actually a good point.” Izumi conceded, “and it would fit with your goal to break into the fashion industry.”
“Exactly.” Mitsuki exclaimed, pointing the back of her fork at Izumi.
Izumi held up a hand. “But didn’t you say you hated chemistry?”
“I hate the math, not the experiment part.” Mitsuki replied, waving a hand flippantly as she stabbed a baby carrot. “But even if I hate the math, that doesn’t mean I can’t do it. I just don’t like it. Unlike some people I know.” The blond teased, smirking as she popped the baby carrot in her mouth.
Izumi smiled, shaking her head in fond exasperation.
(Only Mitsuki. Izumi almost wanted to laugh. She loved being her friend.)
“Plus!” Mitsuki interjected, grin widening. “Since you’re going into that high-class science-y High School for your Quirk Research degree- and I need to go there for their biochem degree- we’ll be going to the same school!”
(That time Izumi did laugh.)
= = = =
The idea of theme parks confused Izumi on a primal level.
They just didn’t make sense. Sure, the adrenaline rushes from the roller coasters probably brought in a lot of people- and even she would admit to enjoying the racing excitement they generated.
It was more the theme part Izumi didn’t get.
What exactly was so fun about a bunch of poorly-paid actors in cheap superhero costumes? Or those gaudy pro-hero themed decorations that just looked plastic-y and bad?
And sure, some of the plushies and other merchandise were cute and all, but they were either bizarrely overpriced or locked behind the counters of blatantly rigged games.
Much like the grease-covered heart-attack-inducing crap they had the gall to call food.
Still, Mitsuki thought these… things… were ‘super freaking awesome,’ so Izumi would grin and bear it- for friendship.
(And if Izumi happened to terrorise a couple of those game attendants by repeatedly beating their rigged games- that was her business.)
(She did rather like this Gran Torino plushie, though.)
(...It was cute, chibified and soft, sue her.)
Izumi had actually been waiting in the queue for the park’s miniature train, mostly-listening to Mitsuki’s excited ranting about the newest coasters in the park and their supposed ranking on Buzzfeed, when a flash of bright yellow caught her eye.
“Huh?” Izumi muttered as she glanced over at the other side of the fake-street, hoping to catch a glimpse of what ever had-
Izumi froze.
That.
Was sunflower kid.
Even without her Gate-given memory, Izumi was fairly certain she would’ve recognised him anyway. He’d grown maybe two inches since she’d seen him at the mall a year ago, but that hair and gangly frame were unmistakable.
But this time- unlike the first- sunflower kid saw her too.
He’d been walking on the other sidewalk, glancing around at all the hero merch and ridiculous fake-buildings and looking for all the world like a kid in a candy store- but the moment he turned to look at the park’s train station-
For a full second, all that came to mind was ‘holy fuck his eyes are blue.’
That thought was closely followed by a very quick realization that sunflower kid was looking at her and not where he was going-
And with a very loud smack, sunflower kid walked directly into a lamp-post.
“FUCK!” sunflower kid swore. In English. Loudly.
Mitsuki- having long since abandoned her rant to see what had caught Izumi’s attention- snorted.
As the train whistle blew, and the conductor ushered them aboard, all Izumi could do was drop her head into her hands and wonder if this was going to become a trend.