226/Large Brain Collider

Large Brain Collider
Date of Scene:	10 August 2023
Location:	School Library
Synopsis:	Takashi runs into a brilliant bluenette in the upper levels of Radiant Heart's library.
Cast of Characters:	Takashi Agera, Ami Mizuno

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Takashi Agera has posed:
    It is a beautiful summer day outside, not too cold or too hot, bright and shiny and enjoyable. It is not a day many would choose to spend in the library. Which makes it a perfect day for Takashi Agera to be in the library, because it's quiet and peaceful.

    Owing partly to it's situation as a school that provides education at so many levels, to often gifted students, Radiant Heart Academy's library is a truly prodigious structure. On a quiet day like today it's easy to feel like you're the only one in a given section, especially since you might be.

    And as far as Takashi knows, there's nobody else on this upper floor, deep in the stacks of high level books. The stack of books he carries in his hands is all about theoretical physics, quantum mechanics - and not the laymen's introduction to them, but the math-heavy information. He was hoping to use it to help explain some troublesome interactions with an ongoing project, magic, and the weird way things work on a subatomic level.

    He pulls one more book from the shelves, adds it to the stack, picks up the whole thing, and starts walking. He's not expecting anybody else to be here, not today and not in THIS section, so he's not really watching where he's going. He's engrossed in his own thoughts and theories and mathematics and more.

    This naturally results in him rounding the corner going left at the exact time someone else is doing the same but coming right, knocking them both down due to a lack of balance due the stack of books, which also go everywhere...

Ami Mizuno has posed:
Ami is enjoying a peaceful afternoon in the library, enjoying the way the sun shines through the big windows into the peaceful library. She's deep in the sciences section, studying some serious medical texts. Browsing the section for a bit, she has a hefty stack of textbooks at a graduate level.

    Peaceful, alone, enjoying a big stack of textbooks with no one in earshot. What could be better on a beautiful day?

    While walking around a corner, she slams into a stack of books, and both stacks go flying. She looks up, over her reading glasses, into a pair of emerald eyes hidden by glasses of the person's own. "Oh," Ami says, stammering. "I'm so sorry--are you hurt?" she asks, as she swiftly bends to start picking up the scattered books. "Theoretical physics? One of my favorite topics," she says, looking up again with a small smile and handing the heavy book over.

Takashi Agera has posed:
    The girl he collides with apologizes quickly which does a masterful job of cutting off his brain's first impulse (to demand said apology). Which means for a moment his hands are moving and not his mouth, trying to stack up books alongside the... Girl.

    Blue haired, blue eyed girl. That stops him for a moment, too. "Oh. Oh no it's alright, I'm alright. Are you alright?" He asks. "I'm just not used to anybody being up here. I'm pretty sure there's layers of dust on most of the books up here, you could probably date the last time anyone pulled them by strata." He notes.

     Takashi ends up with the majority of her books on his side of the collision and vice versa, so he starts stacking the books she'd pulled over by her. "So do you have something obscure you're trying to find out about?" He asks. "Whatever you're looking for you must be pretty serious about it..." He adds. The idea that someone else at the school is grabbing graduate level books because that's the level they're at doesn't occur to him initially.

    But he starts slowing down on the stacking a little bit because he's looking at her a little bit overlong. At least until he becomes aware of the fact, where he starts trying to not be rude.

Ami Mizuno has posed:
    Ami looks over, smiling and nodding. "I'm fine," she says reassuringly.

    His joke about dust strata makes her giggle a little, hand moving to cover her mouth. Once the books are stacked and he's sorting, she settles in to help. "No?" she says politely but in a confused fashion. "This is light reading for me." She peers at him. "I could ask the same of you, really."

    After a moment's peering into those green eyes, Ami blushes a bit and clears her throat. "Excuse my rudeness!" she says, and inclines her head politely. "I am Ami Mizuno, Grade 9."

Takashi Agera has posed:
    She has a very pretty smile, Takashi thinks to himself.

    "I have to say, Mizuno-san, if these qualify as light reading for you... that's very impressive." He begins. And he looks a little more intently at her, trying to decide if he's seen her before. Or heard of her? Coworker?

    "Oh, right. Introductions. Sorry! I'm Takashi Agera, grade 10." He adds. He doesn't remember seeing her anywhere near the offices. But he also knows enough not to ask.

    "But yeah. I'm..." He pauses. How to put it. "... Working on a theoretical problem. It requires some nonstandard assumptions but it's close enough to the quantum level that I figured I could maybe find something in here to help me solve it. I hate it when I can't make an equation square, is all. Gets in my mind and I keep thinking about it." He admits.

    "So I won't call this light reading, but it's still more of a refresher than a new subject."

Ami Mizuno has posed:
Ami smiles at Takashi, but it's awkward this time, maybe a bit weird, even. "It's kind of nice not being known for my academic prowess." This is not a humblebrag or anything like it, but she even sounds nervous. "But..." She shrugs faintly.

    "Do you need help with the problem? I love quantum mechanics." She nods at the mention of a 'refresher' though. "We can't keep everything in our heads all the time," she agrees.

Takashi Agera has posed:
    "Should I know of you?" He asks, and it's not harsh or mean, it's honest. He's in another grade level, but also Radiant Heart Academy is so much bigger than most schools, it's harder to keep track of everyone. "I mean, you didn't know who I am and I'm tops in my grade across Japan." This is a brag. But of all the things Takashi was, humble is not one of those.

     When she offers to help he almost turns it down, until he looks up from reaching for that last book and stops and looks at her. "... Yeah." He says. "I mean I don't need help. But another brain to bounce ideas off can be helpful." He's honestly curious, and a bit doubtful, she can keep up with him. But when he took that long look, he decided he wouldn't mind her being around.

     She was certainly more pleasant to look at than the rows of books and silence up here. And who knows? Maybe she'll surprise him. A positive surprise would be nice for once. He's still looking at her and not the book when he lays his hand on it.

Ami Mizuno has posed:
    "You are a level ahead," Ami muses, blushing. "But, yeah, I'm... tops in my class, too. Across Japan." She looks at her feet a moment, embarrassed.

    She looks up at him agreeing to let him help her. "I will happily rubber duckie," she says, nose wrinkling a bit as she smiles. Then he looks at her a little long, and she gets embarrassed again. "...Do I have something on my face?" she asks, concerned.

Takashi Agera has posed:
    "Oh, sorry." Takashi adds, taking the book and putting on the stack. "Just.. it's nothing." He begins, turning away from her. His face feels warm. That's new.

    "Let's go ... grab a table. " he says and heads over to one, pulling a chair around so they'd be on the same side of the table. "I find it's easier if one of us doesn't have to read things upside down." He offers her the first spot, after he sets his little book tower down.

Ami Mizuno has posed:
    "Sure," Ami says, watching him with slightly wider eyes. She nods, following in his wake, carrying whatever books he had left behind. Her own are in a neat stack on the table near where they just left. She pauses a moment, and takes the chair on the left. "I'm left-handed," she says, "And if we end up taking notes, I don't want us bumping elbows." She smiles at him and gets settled.

Takashi Agera has posed:
    Takashi is able to get to business easily at least. "Oh you'll be taking notes. If you can do all of this in your head I'll buy you a fancy dinner - anywhere in Tokyo you like." He says, with a kind of haughty tone he hasn't keep out of his voice. Though he's confident he won't be paying out. In fact he's pretty sure she'll tap out on helping at all pretty soon.

    "Okay so all the normal common understood rules of QM apply. With these exceptions. They're not connected to anything, like I said, it's a set of puzzle equations rather than directly correlating to anything." But as Takashi starts to write some formulas down, those 'rules' might make some sense - in that they are what you'd correct for if you were working with energy on that level, but were handling something unlike energy - like if you were mathematically modeling something akin to magic.

    In fact this might be showing her some helpful rules for understanding that world mathematically - he's not smarter than her, but he's on roughly her level and has been doing the magic thing longer.

    "Are you following along on this? Just to make sure - if those rules are in effect you should be able to sort out what this next equation ends up as?" He says, scribbling another long equation out. He's honestly expecting her to look at him like he's a crazy person with two heads and leave in light of the entire truck of math he just dropped. Maybe he's showing off, a little. Maybe testing her. It's both, really.

Ami Mizuno has posed:
    Ami raises an eyebrow at being relegated to the level of secretary. "You're absolutely on," she says, a tiny hint of steel in her voice as she pulls out a pen and a thick notebook. "I always carry a spare," she adds, and gets ready. Her notes are quick, efficient, and in shorthand. Even the formulae! She says nothing further for the moment until he asks her that question. "I'm absolutely following," she says. Then she takes the pencil out of his hand and solves the equation effortlessly. "Don't write so fast. It was hard to tell your 2s from your Zs," she adds after a quiet moment.

    Smug? Ami Mizuno?

    Right now, you bet your buppy.

Takashi Agera has posed:
    Well, if Takashi wasn't smitten by the girl's looks, or by her show of ability, that bit of smugness would have been what sealed the deal in any case. He looks at her with a kind of disbelief. She rightfully earned her smugness. "You really weren't kidding about it. I guess it makes sense that both of us would be in the Academy together, but still. Even the other smart students in my grade struggle to keep up with me. But you make it look effortless..."

    "Alright then. Okay so I've got these equations that all are missing some sort of universal constant." He even acquiesces to her and slows down, putting particular effort into keeping those Zs and 2s clear. "Presuming -for the sake of the puzzle - that under these conditions I can get these outputs from these inputs, there should be some sort of equation or rule in the middle that makes all of these match up."

    "Everything I've found didn't match every one. But I've quintuple-checked the source... Material." He catches himself. "You're... Really following me on all this aren't you?"he adds. Now he can't keep his mixture of elation and being impressed out of his voice. Also the stuff on the paper is the kind of stuff that gives laypeople nightmares about math.

Ami Mizuno has posed:
    Ami looks at him primly, the tiniest hint of a smirk on her lips. "It isn't just looking effortless," she corrects quietly but firmly. "It IS effortless." She nods at him happily when he slows down for her, her pen speeding along the pages in her shorthand. Thank the deities for quick-drying pen ink.

    Catching that almost slip, Ami's face remains the same, but she tucks that tidbit away for later. When he asks her if she's keeping up, her look up at him is incredulous. "What, you draft me as secretary then are amazed I can keep up?" Her voice is a bit biting. "I don't have to prove myself to you," she says, but it's not said in a very acerbic tone. "You might be the reason geniuses have a bad rap in society," she adds, but there's some hint of mirth in her voice. Then she looks at his equation, fixes a little bit after stealing his pencil again, and shakes her head. "I have half a mind to leave," she adds, amusement and frustration in her voice in equal measure.

Takashi Agera has posed:
    "What, it's really that hard to believe that I'm shocked?" He asks, tilting his head. "Are you just blessed with a group of people you know who could get anything other than a headache out of all this?" He asks, tapping the paper with it's ever increasing complexity. "If there's some super genius club I'm not aware of I'm going to be perturbed." He says, jokingly.

    "So having never met anybody else who could keep up with all of this without needing to take breaks to ask simple questions, I'm a little shocked to see someone who can who is also so cut- so cunning." He says, catching himself, rapidly turning away. Smooth, Agera. Cunning didn't have a t in it. Or sound like Q at the front.

    "ANYWAYS, really, my apologies for doubting you. Clearly you're well above the curve for normal." He says, trying to move on before it gets any more awkward for him after THAT. "And yeah, sorry, you're no secretary. Just not used to seeing someone... Who gets it." He said. He taps the paper again and sighs. "Anyways this is where I'm stuck."

Ami Mizuno has posed:
    "I'm just frustrated that I had to prove myself, I guess," Ami says, the wind going out of her angry sails. "No," she adds. "I adore my friends, but no. They struggle to keep up." She says that last bit with a sigh.

    Her eyebrow raises at the word he almost says, blushing, but she says nothing. "I see," she adds, fiddling with her pen after retracting it.

    "I'm sorry I got so haughty," she says quietly. "But I've never been... relegated to that role without someone assessing my skillset, before. It stung," she says, before peering at the paper.

    "You're missing something." Ami points out the part in question. It's a tiny detail, really, akin to carrying the one. "Still, I think I'm missing something now," she adds, tapping the pen against the notebook gently after handing his pencil back.

Takashi Agera has posed:
    "No, it's not everything, but that addition is brilliant and brings us a lot closer!" He says, excitement clear in his voice. "You're brilliant!" He notes, but this is more towards the work this time at least. "And you don't need to apologize to me for that, for the haughty. We both deserved it. Me for doubting you and you for being such a genius. There's nothing wrong with being proud of yourself for being good at something, Mizuno-san. People who say that you shouldn't be happy with yourself for being awesome aren't to be trusted." He says, very seriously.

    Then he turns to the work again. "So if we start what you just did, and then we consider this a part of it..." He takes the pencil back and scribbles some more nearly arcane numbers and symbols to go with hers. "... It's not there yet either but this is closer than I've ever been..." He says, his voice almost an excited whisper now, like he's afraid the paper might run away if he scared it by telling it how close he was.

Ami Mizuno has posed:
Ami looks over at Takashi, smiling faintly. "Thank you," she says with a nod. "That's very true." And her smile widens at his continued excitement. It was kinda infectious. When he turns, his face is in profile for a split second before he dips his head, and Ami finds herself looking at his lips. She does that tiny headshake thing again. Focus, Mizuno, she thinks to herself, and her eyes fall on the open notebook.

"Wow," Ami says in a thick voice. "I don't think I've ever seen that application before, but--if that works, then this--" It's her turn with the pencil, picking it up and adding a tiny bit at the end. A few careful symbols, and she puts the pencil down with a trembling hand after a moment. Her gaze moves to his face and she says, "I don't--We're really close, I think."

Takashi Agera has posed:
    Takashi is extremely excited. This has been giving him headaches for weeks, and now they're nearly to a functional equation to test. This could open so many doors. As Ami adds her next bit to the shared work, and they go closer, he's almost too excited. The kind of hold back an evil laugh excited. "I've forgotten what it was like to work with someone on my level. The power of the two of us together is... Amazing." He says, looking down at the work.

    And maybe a side glance at something else he considered amazing. And not his reflection for once. "I didn't know there was someone else so brilliant attending this school. I'm not sure how a lie of the students ended up getting invited but it's as obvious with you as it is for me..."

    He only needs to add the last bit, an inspired finishing touch, and he adds it to the ongoing equation with what is practically a flourish of the shared writer. Then he starts checking their long complicated equation against the data and... "It works out. It actually works out. Together we sorted this thing out." He adds.

    He's in awe, of the functional equation, of her, of them together. "Just... Wow." He says, leaning back in his chair. "What did you say your name was... Mizuno-san, right? Grade 9? I don't want to forget." He explains.

Ami Mizuno has posed:
Ami looks at him with a happy smile, blushing at him as he compliments her. Then she looks at the paper in front of them, her eyes wide. "What?" she asks softly, staring at the equation. "It's a little sloppy, and I could tighten it up a bit, but..." She trails off and looks up at him again. She nods, mutely. She's a bit shell-shocked.

Takashi Agera has posed:
    "No, don't change a thing." He says. "It's not sloppy. It works. It's perfect." He says. And he might be looking at her when he says that. For a moment, anyways.

    "So... The nod was to me having the name and grade right?" He asks. "I just wouldn't want this to be the last time we're able to work together on something." He continues. "I could get used to having someone like you around more often, honestly." He adds, his voice at least a little bit more normalized when he says it. "Assuming that's okay with you?"

Ami Mizuno has posed:
Ami blushes when he's looking at her and says those words. But she nods again, and clears her throat. "Yes. Ami Mizuno, Grade 9." She swallows hard, mouth dry. "I would... yes. That would be acceptable," she says, but there's this look of incandescent joy in her eyes. Sure, Agera-san is attractive and all, but someone who can match--maybe outmatch--her intellect? It's no wonder her heart is pounding so hard she's afraid he can hear it.

"Um." Ami clears her throat again, and picks up the shared pencil. She scrawls--far less neatly than her work before, to note--her name and a phone number on the notebook, away from the equation. Likely in a corner. Before he can say anything, she gathers the items immediately around her, gives a bow of her head, and flees, taking the pencil with her.

She forgot her stack of medical texts, but they'll likely be there another day. For now, a shy, mousy bookworm needs to go recalibrate her brain.

Takashi Agera has posed:
    Takashi is about to say something, but she left her phone number so... He manages to just kind of sit there and let her go without making too much of a fuss. He does, however, watch her leave and he's not terribly subtle about doing so.

    "Ami Mizuno." He repeats to himself under his breath after she's out of sight. Then he scribbles it by her number. To his own surprise he's at least as happy she left her number, than that he has the equation he's been needing for so long. Both sets of numbers on that paper will be important soon after all. And now he doesn't need to cart these books around... An absolute win of a day really.