Chapter 1: Beginnings

"Stand down and surrender peacefully!" Anti-Skill member Hokari Haruka shouted as she and her team charged into the room, guns raised and ready. Of course, for some reason they still refused to listen to reason, as the rogue scientists activated their robotic defenders. However, for some reason or another, they were all retreating back into a single room, probably another research room, and not trying for any of the emergency exits they should not know are already covered.

"Don't worry sis, I got this!" Hokari Ai told her as she jumped into the room. One of hte robots fired a rocket at her, but then two rings of energy with a vortex in the center appeared inbetween. The rocket went into one, and came out the other right at the robot, causing it to destroy itself. She was a Level 4 member of Judgement, a 14 year old girl who was a student at Luna Academy.

The two of them were currently undergoing a joint operation between Anti-Skill and Judgement to shut down an illegal lab they had discovered in School District 9. Supposedly, based on a report from a confidential source, they were doing unethical and illegal human experimentation, and had engaged with dangerous terrorist elements outside of Academy City.

However, they had no idea yet about the full situation...

Meanwhile, inside the room the scientists were desperately working on something, afraid for their lives. But it was not Anti-Skill or Judgement that they felt threatened from.

"Oh no, oh no...if they find out, they will kill us all!"

"If we get captured...they will definently kill us! Damnit, and the ones responsible for all this are not even here right now!"

They all then looked back at a boy, sedated and bound to a table by restraints. He had white hair and red eyes, and was completely naked. His skin seemed almost perfect, his hair incredible. He looked scrawny, maybe even weak at first glance, but in truth his body was deisgned with a focus on muscle density.

He was their test subject, something they had been forced to make. This boy looked like a ten year old boy, but the scientists...they had been forced to make a monster. A monster with the strangeness of a fellow prisoner, who was also currently not here convienently enough. Some wondered if they had failed in some way, and this was how it was decided they would be eliminated.

ANd then, one scientist made the decision...and disconnected the sedative.

"What are you doing?!"

"The only way we can survive! We will use its Protocol 1 to our advantage! With this, we will absolutely succeed!"

"Of course! We just got it implimented! Its still a bit twitchy, but it should work! Quickly, increase the process! Give it some adrenaline!"

One of the scientists injected him with something to speed up his recovery, but only seconds later, the doors were kicked down. The scientists turned around and cowered as Anti-Skill and Judgement stormed in, with Hokari Ai using her wormholes to travel next to them and twisted the arm of the scientist closest to her down to the ground, while her older sister tackled another scientist out of the way. Anti-Skill came in and quickly caught them all, which gave the sisters enough time to notice the boy.

"Oh no...he must have been their latest victim..." she said, wormholing up over so she could stand on the table and over him. She also then realized he was naked finally. "Oh..."

"Hey, Ai. Dont hover over him like that! Besides, look, that monitor over there shows he is alive, so dont write him off as dead!"

And meanwhile, the boy's consciousness, stirred by the words and the drugs, finally woke up. He sleepily opened his eyes, and the moment he did the images of the two sisters was permenently burned into his brain.

"...registration complete..."

"Huh? Did he say something? Hey, wait...his eyes are open! Oh!"

Ai hopped back to the ground when he saw the boy waking up. Once he was fully awake, he looked at the two sisters, looked around, and then back at the two sisters.

"What is going on?"

The two sisters backed away a little, and with that room, the boy finally got off the table, testing his legs, before he turned back with an innocent smile and looked at the two of them.

"Hello! Could someone tell me what is going on? Who are you also?" he asked, as if he was not even aware he was naked in front of everyone. However, his forehead scrunched up a bit when he realized something. "Hold on...umm, who am I?"

It appeared he had lost his memories.

"Hey, hey!" the boy said energeticly, his blanket falling off again as he chased after Ai. "Come on! You gotta tell me!"

She looked back at him, only to get a bit embarrassed again. It seemed that the boy did not just lose memories, but common sense as well, as he was not even phased in the slightest.

"I keep telling you! We don't know! Sis, please tell me you found something in the records?!"

"Sorry, but they only refer to him as Subject 07. Otherwise, its mostly incomprehensible code. It makes reference to the Nova System, whatever that is, as well as his Esper alias, codenamed "Vector". But otherwise, we got nothing. They dont have any name on file for him".

"Oh, oh! I know!" he said, raising his hand.

"Hold on! Put the blanket back on first!"

The boy looked down, saw the blanket was gone, and so he ran back, wrapped himself in it again, and ran back. Except the moment he stopped, it fell off again without him realizing.

"Give me a new name!"

"You might as well Ai...we cant just call him boy, and he seems attached to you. Heh, maybe he imprinted on you or something".

"Umm..." Ai said, looking back at the boy. He was just so damned innocent, she wasn't sure if she should be looking at him like this. She tried to think of a name, focus on his red eyes... "How about...Akari?"

"Akari. Akari. I like it! I will be Hokari Akari!"

That last remark made the two sisters almost fall to the ground with shock.

"Ehh! Wait, hold on..."

"Actually Ma'am..." one of the Anti-Skill officers started, looking at the peculier situation. "As we have no idea where to return him to, and given his status as a witness, after having him checked out at a hospital, command wants you to look after the boy. They also requested that to help restore his memories, you try to expose him to normal life in Academy City, maybe get him to remember something. And before you ask, they said that due to his lack of a common sense, sending him to an orphanage or child services is also impossible, as it would be too easy to take advantage of him, and the people behind him...might consider him an investment, or a liability, and go after him".

At the officer's words, Haruka sighed as she placed her hand on her face, and took a deep breath before removing it.

"Fine then. But as for the last name..."

"They want you to hide him under the cover of being either your little brother, or your so..."

"You will die if you finish that sentence".

"...as your little brother, and only your little brother, Ma'am".

"...very well. Fine, Aka..."

"Alright Aka-chan! Just remember I am the boss!" Ai said, interrupting her sister with a proud and dominant voice. "That means, you have to do all sorts of things, like do what I say, appear naked in front of me daily, cook delicious food for me, and try to learn new things! Oh, and be my sweet adorable little brother! Got it?"

"Aka-chan...nickname? And got it, prime directives set!"

"Prime...whatever! We will work on your vocabulary!"

"...Ai, dont make Akari-kun do weird things".

Ai pouted at her sister's words, and Akari's lack of reaction.

"BUt...I just think its weird that he is not reacting to the current situation! So, I wanted to see if he would react if I brought something like that up casually!"

"...lets just go home. And Akari-kun, keep the blanket on! YOu two, I couldn't get his name, but I did get his sizes from the data. Go buy some boy's clothing, at least ten days worth, and bring it to my home! Got it?"

"Yes, Ma'am!"

Once again wrapping Akari in a blanket, and thick enough so that it would hopefully not fall off (and made it appear more of a cloak then a blanket, she left one hand free to gram as Ai led him out of the lab and into the open city. It took some time, the laboratory they rescued him from was deep underground, but eventually the group emerged out into the open space of Academy City.

And as they did, the moment they got into the open daylight of evening, Akari's small legs wandered forward in amazement of the sights he was seeing.

"So pretty..." he muttered, and then he saw some flowers nearby on a bush. He ran over, his hand getting out of Ai's for a moment, and grabbed a flower, putting it to hold in his ear. "Look! Its a flower!"

"Hey, Akari! Don't wander off!" Ai said, chasing after him and firmly grabbing his hand again so the little boy would not wander off and get into trouble.

"Oh, look! Look look Ai-neechan!"

"Ai-ai-neechan?!"

"Yep! Look look! Its a Nun!"

That odd statement caused them to look over, and indeed along with a high school student, there was a girl dressed as a young nun. Hearing her called out, she locked eyes with Akari for a moment, but this focus was interrupted by Haruka getting in the way.

"Sorry, but please leave this area. Anti-Skill is currently doing a sweep and investigation".

"Ah, sorry. Come on Index, lets go" the boy said, grabbing the hand of the nun and pulling her away. For a moment, Akari felt something...weird...but it ended up canceling.

"Alright Toma...but lets get some food!"

"But we just ate!"

"To-ma!"

Akari then heard his own stomach grumble.

"I am hungry. Can we get some food as well?"

"At home. We cant take you into a resteraunt dressed like this..."

"But...I am really hungry!"

At this point, Akari's stomach growled louder then car horns in traffic.

"Alright, alright! Lets just...head to the nearest burger place".

In a way, these two half suspected it would be something like this. But still, it was a sight to see.

In order to eat, the blanket he had been wrapped in had fallen off as he moved his arms to eat. It was still covering his lower body, but his upper torso was completely bare, which was not exactly something one would expect in any eating establishment, except if it was by some body of water and meant to be like that. But, anyone who was watching probably would be more focused on the fact he was downing his fourth burger, third set of fries, and was on his second milkshake.

Of course, who knows how long it has been since he ate with his own hands and mouth. They decided to go with food that did not need a fork or knife also, just in case, though he at least seemed able to use a straw just fine...but, it was a bit insane just how hungry he was.

That was when someone who Ai was familiar with just happened to walk by, along with another friend of hers. Kuroko Shirai, and Mikoto Misaka.

"Shirai? What are you doing here?"

"Ai?! Oi, this is my eating place!"

"You dont own it! You only frequent it!"

They are friends, for sure...or maybe more like rivals. As two people with a teleporation based ability, they are bitter rivals who often race with each other.

"You two, you really shouldn't..." Misaka started to say, when her eyes wandered over to Akari...and the blanket that had fallen to the floor without anyone noticing. "...uhhhh...who is he, and how much trouble has occured?"

"Ah, well, you see, he is just my odd little brother who has come to..."

"His hair and eye color are both different you know..."

At those words, Haruka shook her head. This was what she was going to point out, until she was stopped.

"He is adopted?"

"Yay! Adopted!" Akari said, happily kicking his legs as he continued to eat and drink.

"Alright, the truth now? I am a level 5, so you know I have the ability to find out on my own" Misaka bluffed, totally not knowing how to find any of this out on her own.

"Fine fine, just keep it down okay?" Ai said, with her and Shirai finally rejoining the conversation. "My sister and my judgement team got word of some strange experiment, using odd data recovered from the background of data collected by some...diagram satelite or something".

Although none of them noticed, Misaka and and Shirai got very interested the moment the satelite part was mentioned.

"Anyways, it looks like he was being experimented on. Highly illegal, very bad stuff, and when we rescued him, we were unable to find any information on his true identity, and his own memories are gone...he remembers some weird stuff, but information about himself he cant recall".

"Oh, I do know something though!" Akari said, looking at Mikoto Misaka. "You are Mikoto Misaka. A Level 5 Esper, nicknamed Zappy and Bug Zapper and beleived to be Touru Kajima's Girlfriend..."

The moment Akari said those words, Shirai, Ai, and Haruka all suddenly felt intense levels of fear and danger. So much so that they all slinked away a bit from Misaka, who was giving off sparks while having a red face.

"Where the hell did you hear that from?!"

"Data the scientists collected and put into my brain. They gave me information on all significant people who have a likely chance to shape Academy City's future. Accelerator, Railgun, Index, Imagine Breaker, Control, Doctor, GROUP, SCHOOL, CLASS. However, not all information is always accessible. Often, information only becomes accessible on an individual if I am in the pressence. There are exceptions though, such as Touma Kajima AKA Imagine Breaker. According to data given to me, I must absolutely never make physical contact with him at all costs".

This information sparked some interest in Misaka, enough to lean in and temporarily forget about his current state.

"Why is that? Why cant you make contact with him? ANd why is he called Imagine Breaker?"

"He is called Imagine Breaker because that is his power. And I cannot make contact with him because as a side effect, his power will kill me. I dont know why, but if his right hand touches me, I will cease to exist".

And so, the situation went from awkward to...concerning...in a short period of time.

After some time had passed, a man, who looked average and everyday, walked into a dark alley and took out a radio.

"This is Watcher. Red Alert Status. Information Gathering has uncovered critical information. He knows".

"And this is it! This is our home!" Ai announced as they walked through the doors. At the same time, the two officers from earlier came in and dropped off bags of boy's clothes for Akari. With this, he would finally have something to wear...which is good because the blanket fell off again.

The Hokari Home was in a nice apartment complex, in fact it was at the very top. The penthouse. They had a pool outside, a great view of Academy City, a wonderful living room/lounge as the first room to enter, with a fantastic entertainment setup, along with a curved couch and everything. There was a bathroom on the first floor, along with a kitchen, a workout room, and one bedroom. There was also a second bedroom upstairs, along with a den, and more storage space and so on. The place basically had everything someone could possibly need.

However, when the two turned around, Akari had fallen down on his butt, and was making a difficult face. The Blanket had also fallen down, though it was still sort of covering him...though his fidgeting legs didn't help.

"Aka-chan, is something wrong?"

"Umm...I feel...really built up..." he said as his face turned red. "And really bad..."

"Is he si..." the two started, when they realized the OTHER thing he had not done since waking up. "Oh no...please please tell me he still remembers that..."

"W...where is the bathroom?"

"Okay, he asked for a bathroom! Thats a good start! Ai, help me get him there!"

The two then quickly brought him to the bathroom, and after awkwardly making sure he knew how to, got him to use it. At least, he seemed to know enough that he wont cause any incidents that way, and that he could use it on his own in the future.

It was just, he didn't really know where in the house to run to. Or what to sit on. Explaining everything was super embarrassing. But what happened next...

"Alright Ai. As your new role as big sister, go and give Akari a bath".

"What! Surely he can..."

"How do I take a bath?"

"Uhg...okay..."

And so, Ai took Akari back into the bathroom. First off, she made sure to have him sit on a stool and rinse him off, and then started to apply the soap and shampoo across his body. Needless to say, this required a lot of mental stamina on her part. And after which...she got undressed herself, and joined him in the bath so he could make sure he did it properly and didn't make a mess.

"So, you really do have quite a difficult mental state, don't you?"

"Not sure. But if it makes you feel better, by tomorrow I will reboot".

"Reboot?"

"Yep! I remember the scientists saying something about me Rebooting after I go through a sleep cycle, something about Protocol 1 and ensuring safety standards. I think that is what it was anyways. Apparently, until then, some stuff or another is sealed inside my mind".

"Wait...maybe, you think you might remember something? Also, could you wash my back a bit?"

"Maybe? And sure!"

"Good to know...oooh...that felt almost like a massage. I think we should bathe more often".

"Got it! Information updated!"

"Information...why do you talk so weird?"

Suddenly, Akari began to yawn.

"So...tired..."

"Oi, Akari. Dont fall asleep now! Come on, be a boy. Well, actually its kinda cute...so be a cute and adorable little brother...whatever! Just, try not to make me worry okay?"

"...got...it..."

As he got so relaxed by the hot bath, Akari began to pass out and fall asleep. Ai managed to catch him in her arms, as he fell asleep.

"Happy rebooting...but now, I have to dry you off and dress you in pyjammas. Great".

"Is everyone ready?" the figure wearing the dark mask asked another, as htey prepared their weapons. They were right outside the apartment building where the Hokari's lived, and each one had grenades, assault weapons, sidearms, body armor, and various mechas and advanced weaponry ready. "The mission is simple. We bust in, and eliminate the two females. The boy must be captured and awakened before his sleep cycle can be allowed to finish, which should reset him and allow him to be maleable to our programming. There is always the backup, but this solution is the easiest. Remember, one is Anti-Skill and the other is a member of Judgement. So, do not hold back no matter what, and work as a team".

The captain of the assault said this, before they locked and loaded their weapons and prepared to engage.

AN: Me: Well that was fun...

Ai: I feel like you cut that bath scene short a little.

Me: Well, little Akari was so tired. A longer one can happen later. Besides, only so much comedy I can fit in at once. You seem to have mixed feelings about Akari though...

Ai: I just hope this "Reboot" gives him a personality. I mean, how are the readers supposed to enjoy this is he is not squirming with embarrassment?!

Me: Shouldn't you be more concerned about the gunmen?

Index: Did someone say gummy?

Ai: No, thats not what we sai...

Index: But I want gummys!

Me: Oh shi...she is hungry! Someone call Toma! Red alert! Protect the fridge!

*transmission gets eat...cut off*