[LOG] Vision Power Practise

[chiba_waves]

Characters: Saeki Kojirou, Sengoku Kiyosumi
Location: Practise rooms.
Time: Sunday June 2nd
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Saeki and Sengoku focus on their stamina problems and chat about their daily lives to improve (or maybe decrease) their concentration.



Saeki furrowed his eyes and tried to focus. Yet again on Friday, he’d gone through another lesson where his concentration had slipped and he’d been able to see through everybody again. That had been problematic, especially since it had been the near the end of class and he’d bumped into several people, because he couldn’t see where they were and couldn’t harness his power back to be able to see them all again. He needed more control over his power and he knew it. He resumed staring down at the large steel block that covered his psychology reading assignment for that night and tried to see through it so he could actually finish and answer the questions.

Power practice was one class Sengoku was glad to be able to assign timeslots for when he finally reached his third year last. While he got in a bit of practice during lectures, especially if the... subject... was interesting, there were definitely times in which he had conked out after power practice and subsequently couldn't keep his eyes open the rest of the day. But at least this year, he was able to rearrange his schedule a bit more manageably, packing in mostly early-morning classes, and his power class out of the way early in the week so he could use his weekends to recuperate and catch up with people. If the people he wanted to catch up with were ever in their rooms sometimes, that is. But he had a fairly good idea where he could find Saeki this time of day, if only by experience searching him out before.

"Look at you, the hard worker~ Looks like you're going to bore a hole straight into that slab of metal, with how hard you're staring at it," Sengoku laughed, knocking belatedly at the door to announce his presence, and slipped off his backpack at the door of the practice room before pulling up a chair alongside Saeki's. "It's the weekend, Sae. Sunday night's party night, before school starts up again. Are you able to finish?"

Saeki looked and and smiled weakly. “At this point, I think that boring into a hole into this would be working better for me. But unfortunately, I am not Yagyuu. Though, being able to shoot lasers from my eyes would be neat. And Sen-san, despite it being the weekend, I still have a lot of work to do. For instance, controlling my power so that I can actually navigate in the school without bumping into people because I’m seeing straight through them and then I have to read some stuff for Saitou-sensei’s class and write about how my powers as affected by my mental state.” As he realised just how much work he had to do, Saeki groaned and dropped his head unto the steel block with a clang. “I hate homework.” he muttered, his words muffled by the steel.

Ouch. "Smashing your head in won't do you any good though," Sengoku said, lifting Saeki's shoulders back up encouragingly. Though yeah, he could see Saeki's point: the only thing more embarrassing than walking into a glass door, is walking into an opaque one. "And neither is passing out, if that's all you're accomplishing." He leaned over and picked up some of Saeki's papers, flipping through them. Despite being an interesting class, Saitou's was one Sengoku ultimately decided against, if only because of the professor's penchant for assignments and quizzes. And, thankfully, the profession that Sengoku was looking into, involved subjects he was interested in and could deal fairly well with, without working himself to death every school night. "At least you got through maths?" he asked, trying to find something to cheer his friend up. "...You did, right?"

Saeki laughed lightly. “Yeah, I did get through Maths, thanks to you. But, I had an excuse for being bad at Maths, because I genuinely didn’t understand it. Here, the amount of reading I have to every night is painful, but I do understand every word, which rubs it in all the worse.” He leant back in his chair. “I don’t know about that Sen-san, I’ve heard that brain damage can stimulate hidden psychic powers.” Saeki grimaced though, as the world went startlingly opaque without any warning. “Not, that I need any more psychic powers. Two is more than enough to worry about perfecting.” Saeki smiled gratefully at his friend as he flicked through the reading papers. Saeki had been looking for a challenge when he’d taken Saitou’s class, and he’d certainly found it, if perhaps not in the actual material.

"I don't think psychic powers is a good enough trade-off for brain damage though~" Sengoku grinned. Especially when one does anyone not understand maths. How does one not understand maths? It was one of the only core classes Sengoku continued with, for the explicit reason he was good at it and it didn't require tomes and tomes of reading material each night. "Not to rub it in; classes aside, I probably just have it easier than you." He winked at the other. "More time in the day," he reminded. But while his secondary power, in essence, gave him as long as he needed, sort of, to read and understand the material, that doesn't mean he could speed up his essay writing any. Those always took forever, and was not something he envied Saeki for.

Leaning back in his chair, and remembering to hook one shoe on the table leg so he wouldn't fall backwards completely, Sengoku regarded the ceiling with much interest. Girls shared the building's practice rooms too. He would much rather have Saeki's powers sometimes, though he thought Saeki was wasting his gift practicing looking through steel at a textbook when he could be practicing looking through layers of... fabric. That was a sort of fine motor control too, right?

Saeki laughed as well, rolling up his sleeves. “I don’t know, Sen, there are some weird people out there. Slackers too, who’d think that a power would just lead to insta-success.” He cricked out his neck slightly as he frowned slightly. Back in normal school, he’d known plenty of those slackers and idiots who barely cared about their intelligence. Morons. “You probably do have an easier time of it, but despite my hatred of homework; actually being in the classes is really fun. I took all those classes because I wanted to and I felt I was prepared. And you know, unlike you, I actually enjoy writing essays and taking notes.” Saeki winked and smiled easily, as he ran a hand through his hair.

As Sengoku’s expression changed to something somewhat wistful, Saeki sighed. It was a familiar expression and one that Sengoku always used when... “Please stop thinking about girls, Sen. Not a single one on campus wants to date you.” He teased. “Besides, I’m the one that can look through ceilings, not you.” Not that Saeki would want to anyway. He’d exploited his power as a horny teenager, but really, it had been nasty of him, especially during that stage where everybody was so self-conscious. Nobody appreciated the violation of privacy and it was always annoying to get an eyeful of naked people when you weren’t expecting it, as his power slipped up with his emotions.

Insta-success might have happened, if Sengoku were old enough to gamble when it wasn't the year that it was. But his powers helped, at any rate, even if his life was lived relatively normal with or without them. "Maths is fun," he argued, "everything works out once you understand it, so you don't need notes, or explain things in essays-- you just... do it." It took a bit to restrain himself from flicking a hand over Saeki's hair where bits of it stood up after his hand passed through it. Taki hated when he messed with his hair, and Sengoku just now got rid of that habit. He supposed something good came out of that after all.

It was a fierce struggle between amusement and protest at the jab about the girls, but amusement won out at the end and Sengoku settled for punching Saeki playfully on the arm, though he almost toppled his chair in the process. The desk was safer, he decided, swinging around to sit at the edge with his feet propped up on the chair seat. "In that case~" he leaned in close, almost bumping noses with Saeki's, and trying not to laugh and ruin the teasing, "if not girls, think I have a chance with the guys?"

Saeki shrugged. “Each to their own, I guess. Personally, essay writing and explanation comes to me like that.” He snapped his fingers, loudly, “So, I’m not too fussed about Maths, especially when it’s not going to be my major. As long as I pass, I’ll be content.” Saeki pulled at his hair self-consciously as Sengoku’s glance remained a tad too long upon the ruffled area. Had he ruined his style or something? Was Sengoku secretly in the Hair-Care club as well and cared about these things?

Saeki fell backward into his chair slightly at the light punch and chuckled. Not like he hadn’t been expecting that. But as Sengoku leaned his face in closer and asked the question, Saeki blinked slightly. Unexpected. Very much so. But one thing about being friends with Fuji was how you gained the ability to adapt to anything and adapt quickly. Saeki tapped his finger to his nose and smirked. “Well, I’m sure there are many people in this school you could have a chance with. Ryou would probably jump you if you said yes. Koharu-san’s a flirt. And you never know who’s up for some loving.” Saeki leant forward, flicked Sengoku’s nose and leant back with a satisfied smirk.

Sengoku scrunched his nose at the flick and stuck his tongue out at Saeki in retaliation. Yey. Good friend, right here. Running a hand through his own locks in imitation of his friend, he pretended to consider his options here at the school. "Ryou's got a cat. And I'm not usually the one answering the proposals anyways," he responded honestly. Neither did he ever expect his proposals to be answered properly either; last time that happened, it had caught him completely off guard and he just panicked and went for it and thought it to be good on him for doing so. But remembering that now would only serve to depress him, and he wasn't really up to dealing with that now. "Looks like this is what needs some lovin' right now," he said, poking at the book laying open on Saeki's desk instead. "Not fair to show neglect the moment someone else comes into the room~ That's how girls get snatched away ♥"

Saeki stuck his tongue straight back out at Sengoku, but he couldn’t stop the smile extending over his face. A smile that vanished as Sengoku started talking. “Just because you aren’t answering them, doesn’t mean that they aren’t there.” said Saeki seriously. “You’re not unattractive, even if you’re a horrendous flirt.” At this, he waggled his eyebrows at Sengoku, with a grin, just to lighten the mood slightly. Neither of them were particularly good at serious conversations. “If you truly want a romantic relationship, there are plenty of people who could give you that. Just not a girl.” He winked at Sengoku, knowing that the reaction to that would be funny. Saeki followed Sengoku’s hand and gaze, then sighed. Homework. “You’re right, of course, but I can do it later tonight. Homework was just an excuse to exercise my vision powers. I’m no longer happy at being static, power-wise.”

"Ha! Thanks for the vote of confidence," Sengoku grinned back, though in disagreement about being a horrendous flirt (he wasn't that bad. ...was he?). Because flirting was like a courtship ritual; how else was he supposed to attract another's attention without putting himself out there, girls or not? Being like Saeki, he supposed, who tended to get along with most people regardless of who he was with or what he was doing. "What, am I doomed to live among the masculine population all my life? Honestly, I'm fine by that, so long as they're not jerks like you," he laughed, picking up the steel block Saeki had been practicing with. He could hardly lift the thing, let alone imagine how it would be like to stare right through it. "...Might want to consider aventurine for stimulating mental powers and eyesight. What are you working on, anyways?"

“I’d be a pretty crappy friend if I didn’t boost your ego in some way!” said Saeki, with a laugh. At the comment about being a jerk, Saeki laughed and lightly shoved Sengoku, making sure to not push too hard and make him fall off (though the idea was tempting). “Yes, you’re doomed.” said Saeki, flatly. “You will never know the wiles of a woman because you both attract them and scare them at the same time.” Saeki grinned lightly. “The trick is to not act too eager, You have to be casual and smile and act normally around them. Then they’ll flock to you, whether you want them or not.” Saeki grinned ruefully. Didn’t he know that so well? But he also knew that you could never make meaningful relationships acting like that. Acting like you were casual and cool got you popularity and lots of instant, trophy-relationships, but they never loved you for who you were. Saeki had learned that the hard way.

“Working on?” Saeki shrugged. “I want to hold my concentration for longer. My concentration on actually making sure that I can see clothes and people has been slipping lately and I haven’t gotten any better at seeing through thick objects, like steel or titanium. So I’m working on the latter half for now, since the first part is slightly easier concentration to hold when I’m talking to somebody.” Saeki shrugged. His power was weird. He had no other way of explaining it.

That would be asking a lot from Sengoku, holding back eagerness when enthusiasm was his usual code of conduct. And there was that part of him that was almost scared of a meaningful relationship, at least at the present. But he wasn't too worried about what happens in the later years; palm lines don't lie, after all. "Yeah, right, doomed." He laughed, setting the block back on the table. "Just you watch. The day I get married, I'm making you my best man and sticking you right up front so I can rub it in your face~" he promised. Now power practice was something he was at least on par with Saeki. He had long stopped trying to comprehend his own, but while random chance was something he would never try to meddle with personally, concentration was another aspect completely when it came to vision powers. "Is it the material, or depth?" His own was at least time based, and a bit easier to gauge his progress with.

Saeki laughed. Imagining Sengoku getting married was a difficult image, he had to say. He seemed almost too flighty for it, but Saeki wasn’t too sure. His ability to be able to read people still wasn’t back to the way it had been the year before. and Sengoku had changed a lot during his long absence.“The day you get married? I’ll wait for that one with bated breath. But I am glad that you consider me worthy of best man status.” Saeki finished, with a smile, “Even if it is for selfish purpose. I shall transcend above all of that and will beam at you when you’re about to melt into a quivering mess of nerves. And perhaps let a black cat into the shrine when the priest is about to wed you.”

Saeki frowned at the block and tapped his fingers on the table. “I reckon it’s a bit of both, really. The walls of this room are about the same thickness of the block and it’s easier to see through them compared to the steel block. But, at the same time, I can’t see through the outer wall if the building, because there are several layers of brick inbetween. There, depth is key.” explained Saeki, as he quickly tested what he was saying, to check if it was still accurate from last week. “And you, Sen-san? What are your limitations?”

"Oh~ I see that doubt in your eyes, Sae," Sengoku laughed, though he would have suspected the same, hearing himself talk, "Mention those cats again, and you might just find your best man status revoked." Never too keen on talking about black cats, or negative superstitions in general, he turned his attention on Saeki instead while listening to his problems. It seemed... complicated. Like how the zoom system of a dissecting microscope depends on depth and material. "Uhm," he offered, when he was posed the question. "I guess just time, for me. It's not my vision itself's gotten any better or worse." Truth be told, his power wasn't something he made such a big deal of to practice as stringently as others did. It was a convenience, but whether or not his control of it was any good seemed to hardly matter other than for marks.

Saeki put his hands up in the air, eyebrows raised. “Okay, okay. The cats will stay out of the shrine. I quite like the best man position, thanks.” He tilted his head sideways at Sengoku’s answer. ‘Hmmm, well, that doesn’t seem like something needs to be urgently mastered like mine, but wouldn’t it be neat to have everything slow down for a long time?” asked Saeki, leaning on his hand, “I mean, I’m not sure of the specifics of your power, but if you had that time to constantly see things slower and without constraint, I would probably overuse it.” Saeki grinned, he would love a couple extra minutes to be able to look at the formulas in Maths or watch chemical reactions in Chemistry.

“Oh, and I was wondering, when you slow stuff down for a long period of time, does your brain continue to age while the rest of your body is in normal time? So potentially, if you stay in accelerated vision for a long time, your brain would be older than the rest of your body?” Saeki realised as he finished, that it sounded like a really stupid question, but he was curious. He loved learning more about other people’s powers, it was why he enjoyed the Mutant Psychology class so much.

Abusing his power in class wasn't something Sengoku was completely innocent of, but what was the point of practicing if not to use it for his own advantage? It would be a waste otherwise, he had reasoned. The professors could usually find out anyways, if he's overdone it, with tired eyes and an unfocused gaze as if he sat a three hour final instead of a simple half hour quiz. Not to mention conking out in the middle of an exam if he lost hold of his concentration, it wouldn't be a first.

"That might be a question better posed to Hanamura-sensei," Sengoku admitted, though it had crossed his mind before whether his brain and body aged at increasingly unequal rates every time he used his power. Thoughts like what it would be like to suffer from Alzheimers before he had even come of age; and then he would always shy away from the idea and decide it was best not to dwell on such things. "As for upper limits though, there was that one time with Dan..." But he was interrupted by a shudder running down his back-- his body's way of telling him it was not a good idea to remember. Reflex was rarely wrong, cases such as these.

Saeki frowned and nodded. ‘Hmm, I’ll do that then.” said Saeki, pressing a finger to his chin in thought. He was always curious about other people’s powers, because powers were fascinating things. He had his for a long time, but some people had only recently discovered theirs and some people’s powers were activated by conflict. It fascinated him, in a way like little else (other than Shakespeare) did.

At the mention of Dan, Saeki grinned. “What’s this about upper limits and Dan-kun?” asked Saeki, his mouth twitching slightly. “You’ve got me curious now, Sen-san. Telllllllll meeeeeeeeeee.” he said, leaning forward until his face was in Sengoku’s, and opened his eyes comically wide.

Sengoku aimed a flick at Saeki's nose but it was too close and he missed. He made a show of expressing his discomfort as he pulled back but soon relented, knowing that Saeki would not, though it wasn't all that exciting a story to tell, especially on hindsight. Even if he were terrified when it was happening. "It was last term, but nothing so disastrous that the story's gone out through the school, I suppose. Half an hour at the nurse's, nothing worse for wear." Putting it like that didn't seem too bad either, but it wasn't as if holding things back would get the topic dropped any quicker. "I thought the year was pretty auspicious, not at all like this one, so I thought even hugging it out with Dan, that maybe nothing bad might come out of it. Lord knows he needs those hugs, and messing up my powers doesn't cause the end of the world, you know?" Stupid reasoning, and even stupider consequences, but that was then.

"It was sort of like... everything stopped," he tried to explain, hands waving vaguely in the air unhelpfully, "like time was broken and I couldn't get it to move again. I couldn't break out like I used to be able to, and there was nothing to do but wait it out, and I wasn't even sure if that'd happen either." He could conjure up the image in his mind with surprising ease, even after all this time, of the dragonfly's wings, and of Dan's face then. That was scary enough. Better leave out the details in the locker room.

Saeki bit his lip. He’d been expecting something somewhat funny so he could joke about it. That wasn’t funny in the slightest. “Come here.” he said opening up his arms and putting them around Sengoku. “I’m sorry for bringing it up. But you’re right in that Dan-kun definitely needs more hugs. Perhaps we should wear gloves and surprise hug him?” asked Saeki. His power had a massive potential for backfiring on him though, so he was slightly concerned about it, but helping people came first on the priorities list.

Sengoku leaned into the hug; he'd rather they be out of friendship or greeting, but he'd take them when he gets them too. "No worries, I've gotten over it by now," he assured Saeki. He imagined that a surprise attack hug on Dan could go both ways, but it was more likely that the kid would freak out like he had when Sengoku suggested doing just that. He shook his head. "Gloves are a bit of a hit-or-miss for Dan as far as I can tell, and I don't think it would be any better on our side. I don't want to hug him through a hazmat suit either..." It wouldn't be as much of a problem if his both powers weren't latent, and could instead be activated at will, as his perception could be. Then, it was just a matter of not using the powers, and there shouldn't be any problems. "I think instead of brainstorming nullifying materials, it would be best to work on our own powers," Sengoku pitched the idea. "You think maybe if we had perfect control on our powers, then we'd be able to resist Dan's power altering?"

Saeki sighed as he let go of Sengoku. “Huh. If gloves are hit and miss, that’s rather irritating. And wearing a hazmat suit isn’t my idea of fun, either.” he said, tapping his fingers on his cheek. “I wonder if that’s a viable solution...” mused Saeki, “After all, don’t the teachers react to him, even though their control is much better than our own? I don’t think a perfect control really exists. But it couldn’t hurt to try.” said Saeki, with a light grin. “Why don’t you practise with me now? It’s for a good cause.”

Power practice, blah. But Sengoku couldn't disagree that it was for a good cause, for the betterment of everybody actually, if they were able to achieve control at a level high enough to be considered safe for the public. "Okay! Study time!" Which meant pulling up the chair to sit in properly this time, back straight and flush against the wood and feet planted squarely on the ground. He broke the perfect-student facade for a brief second to grab practice papers-- transparent sheets of Where's Waldo-- out of his bag, but was right back in it as he took the steel block and set it so that the sheet was on his side. "All right~ We're going to play a game, okay, Sae? Your job is to bypass the steel and write down everything you see on the sheet behind it within ten minutes. I'll do what the professor has me do and try to memorize everything I can by stretching out that ten minutes, and writing them all down at the end. Loser gets to buy dinner~"

Saeki snorted at Sengoku’s position. He didn’t suit the perfect student stereotype at all. Neither of them did, even if Saeki did try his hardest at schoolwork. “Your top button’s undone.” he said, easily, before actually getting to the task at hand. He let his usual concentration drop completely, until all he could see around him were the outer walls and the earth underneath him on the ground floor. It was disorienting to look down, as it always was, but he slowly let the world fade back into focus, layer, by layer. He went as quickly as he could, to phase through to the point where the steel was able to see through. Now, the tricky part. He needed to be able to keep one eye focused through the steel, and one eye focused on the paper. That always tired him out and usually backfired.

Top button was usually undone, and for a reason, but there didn't wasn't much point of it in this room and with this person. Sengoku wasn't too worried about the practice sheet-- it was his practice sheet, after all, and he had already looked through it once-- instead, he let time slide into a comfortable languid pace and studied Saeki's face instead, mostly his eyes and the way his brow furrowed in the concentration Sengoku didn't have for his powers which he had grown up with and found more second nature than something he could readily control. Imagine having to do this with a block of metal. Maybe strapped on his head or something to be of any effect to him, but still!

It wasn’t so much that Saeki wasn’t used to controlling his powers, since he’d had them since he was five or six, more that he wasn’t used to actually use them beyond trying to keep his vision “normal”. Actually, trying to steady one thing with one eye and look through another with the other was far more difficult than it sounded, since both eyes were used to working in tandem, being two halves of an image, not acting separately. It was with some difficulty that he finally did it and saw through to the sheet. “Now that I can see through to the sheet...do I have to actually find Waldo?” asked Saeki, dryly. He hoped not. He was pretty good at it....but he’d feel like such a child.

Sengoku missed the first few words, garbled until he was back up to speed, but then he grinned. The moment Saeki asked the question, he was inclined to say yes, Saeki should have known better. "Why not? That's where all the fun is~" Of course, when Sengoku was first handed the practice sheet, there wasn't as much practicing as there was searching for the iconic red and white stripes, among the other reds and whites and pseudo-Waldos. "Find him under two minutes, and dessert's on me, regardless of who wins." The grin grew only wider. "Consider this slight mercy to your wallet~ ♥"

Saeki tossed Sengoku a look and regretted it as he lost his concentration. “Fiiiiiine.” he said, as as he picked it up with a little more ease this time and quickly scanned through the picture. Geez, this was more difficult than he remembered. Had Sengoku picked up an advanced level or something? Finally, he grinned. “Gotcha, you sneaky little bastard! Hiding behind an elephant, shame on you.” he said, with a grin. “That was under two minutes, right?” he questioned, hoping so. He would never pass up on a chance to make Sengoku pay.

Sengoku laughed. "Yep, under two," he allowed, though he didn't have an internal timer like Taki had so he wasn't altogether sure. But it was less two minutes from the allotted ten, and that look of sheer pride when you finally find Waldo? It never gets old, no matter what age you were. But okay, power practice time, or Saeki might actually beat him and it wouldn't be just dessert he would be paying for. Sliding in and out was more difficult every time he was interrupted, and he could already feel the complaint from behind his eyes, but that was what practice was for. The sheet wasn't as much fun this time though, especially after being instinctively drawn to the elephant on the page and then behind it to confirm Waldo's location, but there were a billion other things to recount as well, though he thought if he were to just list out all the nouns he could think of, they would probably be on the sheet and Saeki wouldn't be able to disprove him without taking the extra several hours to comb through the image.

Saeki started scratching down all of the things that he could see, grateful for the break-neck speed he’d cultivated from writing so any in-class essays. He had no idea when the ten minutes would be up, but he was going to beat Sengoku. He was pretty sure that his handwriting was going all of the place, but he couldn’t care less. He had no idea whether Sengoku was going to cheat or not, after all, he could just pretend that he’d stayed for longer and listed a bunch of random things and Saeki couldn’t have disproved him. Still, Saeki trusted Sengoku.

Ah, trust. Blind trust, as ironic the term was, considering their current activity. But Sengoku didn't need to cheat to win; besides, food tasted better won fair and square-- and best won from Saeki. Actual looking around wasn't as much a problem for him as maintaining the timing, so he was able to split his time between the practice sheet, the wall clock, and watching Saeki's list slant gradually to the side as often happens when one wasn't watching the paper to correct it, and gave Saeki the one minute warning when the time struck.

Saeki’s hand was starting to cramp up, but that was okay, since he was fairly sure that he was going to win this. He shot a cocky grin at Sengoku, just as the time came to a close. “Done.” he said, with a wide grin. He was confident in his finding abilities. And his shorthand. He’d abbreviated as many things as he could get away with and even the headache that was starting to build from the intense concentration wasn’t enough to break the grin. “Let’s have it.”

"You wrote practically an entire novel in the span of ten minutes," Sengoku laughed as he passed Saeki the practice sheet and metal block to hold while he tore a sheet of lined paper from his notebook to jot down his own list. "But I'm still going to win~" He took his time writing things down, occasionally closing his eyes to bring up the mental image of a separate part of the sheet to describe. This was generally easier than remembering individual words, as things in a complete scene were all interrelated somehow, and for the most obscure, there were stories to be made up about how Waldo met the elephant and had a tea party together with a postman, the four statues of David, and a blue whale wearing a tophat.

Saeki grinned. “I’m pretty much broke so I was kinda trying harder than usual...” he grinned sheepishly. “I’ll be getting more in like a week, but you know. Free meals are heaven.” He laughed as he watched Sengoku write down his version of what he saw on the sheet, while absently balancing the steel block in one hand. He wasn’t ripped like Sanada, but his training for kendo and tennis usually helped him with things like that. “And you wish you’d be able to beat my novel.” he said, with a wide grin. “It’s like Shakespeare, with the subject matter of Dr. Seuss.”

Even if money wasn't a pressing matter for Sengoku, he knew that problem well; the stomach is a strong motivator when it came to boys. "Yeah, but Shakespeare made up half his words," he laughed, sparing a glance over at Saeki's sheet before returning to his own. Upside down text was made even worse by that hurried scrawl, so that Sengoku wouldn't have been able to read anything unless he slowed down time and turned his head like an owl to decipher the words. He stifled a yawn with the back of his hand as he set down the pen and looked down his sheet-- how Saeki still had the energy to juggle metal was beyond him. "Thirty two, times four columns, plus one... two..." he counted the remaining words left over in the final column, double checked his math in his head, and announced: "147! Do yours Sae, then we'll see~"

Saeki laughed. “We don’t know that! It was probably just the slang of the time.” He rocked back on his chair and waited. It wasn’t like he wasn’t tired, but he was tired in a different way. He had quite the headache pounding behind his eyes, but headaches didn’t stop there from being muscle strength. Saeki sighed as Sengoku finished. He wished he’d written his words neat enough to be able to do that....He quickly counted in his head, tilting his head sideways every now and then to read the squeezed in descriptions on the margin. Then he grinned, smugness pouring from every pore. “Sen-san...guess how many I’ve got?”

Well, it's not jellybeans in a jar, but Sengoku was good at Fermi problems. Take the number of items found in a randomly selected inch by inch square, multiply by the total area of the sheet in square inches, factor in the difference between his memory versus Saeki's time limit... and take into consideration the almost humorous level of satisfaction on Saeki's face, and he'd have to say, "147... plus or minus a hundred? No way you got more than me!" He laughed, making grabby hands at Saeki's paper to double check, "I think the strain's addled your head; don't know if I can trust your math~"

Saeki just handed over the paper, the smugness not leaving his face. “My brain is perfectly fine, Sen-san. Though plus or minus a hundred is a very large error margin.” he said, feeling a tad amused. Sengoku looked entirely non-plussed. “I counted 150, see if you get the same.” he said, tossing his hair with a smirk. Oh...if he hadn’t made a mistake,. he couldn’t wait to see the look on Sengoku’s face.

Sengoku's face gradually sank into an expression of mock despair as his eyes flitted across the page, up, down, sideways, sometimes having to cross his eyes just to figure out what something said as he circled words into groups of ten for easy counting. He couldn't find any repeats he could call Saeki out on, so he finished up and drew the last circle, with no remainders. "One... two..." he counted under his breath again, though there was really no point, as plus or minus ten was just as large an error margin as plus or minus a hundred. "...Fifteen. One fifty." He threw his hands up in defeat. "Where do you want to eat?"

Saeki laughed both at the expression on Sengoku’s face and the dejection in his tone. “I really don’t mind, Sen-san. You can choose, since you’ll be paying. To me, food’s food.” he said, as he finally placed the metal block down on the table again. “Chin up. Your control was awesome.” He said, with a grin as he twirled his pen around his fingers.

"Not awesome enough. And so close, too! Unlucky~" Sengoku stretched his arms up above his head, feeling the muscles in his back tense and relax again as he let his arms drop to his sides. "Comfort food," he decided, rolling his neck from side to side to loosen the stiffness. There was a family owned restaurant he liked to go to when he was feeling down, and the chef there always knew how to sympathize with him when he just came back from a rejection. And if there was any time he needed sympathy points, it was now. "I think some sort of casserole, or meat pie."

Saeki laughed. “Comfort food it is.” he said, with a cheery grin. “Casserole sounds great!” He rolled out his shoulders a little before shouldering his school bag and beckoning towards the door. “Come on, bus for the town’s probably stopped by now. We’ve got a walk ahead of us.” It’d be fun.