20 The Loud Morning

Alex slowly opened his eyes, shuttering at the bright light hanging over head as he moved the blanket that was covering his body.

He had fallen asleep on the couch and forgotten to turn the lights off.

A small smile formed on his face as he realized the kids were not up due to lack of screaming.

A throbbing sensation permeated his head, it was familiar and somewhat reminiscent of his college days.

He calmly was recollecting what he did last night and trying to sort through all the mental ground he covered as he started to make some coffee.

There were still doubts within him, his existence, his whole mentality was still somewhat in question.

So far, he had been trying to live up to the expectations his first life held while also adhering to the lessons he learned in his second. Sometimes it was contradictory and confusing to almost have two budding thoughts go against each other.

Though it had settled down very much recently, but the fact that it had become an issue since coming to this world had been a bit concerning.

While he allowed himself to wallow in his own self pity for a bit of relieve last night, he also expanded on everything else that was going on in his life.

In Percy's world, he basically forced himself to keep living life as he did before he died for the second time and thus basically shut down any kind of development. It wasn't too farfetched to say that he was a new person. He didn't allow himself to grow in the years that he had been 'born' and possibly stagnated his own mental growth with regards to the combining of multiple psyche.

There was a definite shift in his own mentality when he went to the fate world. But there were several other factors that could have influenced that, that may not have to do with himself.

Medusa.....she had a good impact on him. Having someone who knew him to that degree, to understand all the issues he was dealing with even if he didn't speak about them. She never commented when he had shifts in his personality that came about on a whim but eventually settled down.

It's not that he was bi-polar in the normal sense, he was actively dealing with an emotionless being combined with a normal young adult. It was logical, as ironic as it was in with regards to this whole situation, that there would be issues, in the beginning at least.

Even now, after he felt more of a solidified persona take hold, still had flights of fancy every so often. His whole situation was a bit odd when looked at objectively and that probably was effecting his 'mental development' in some aspect.

He was more prone to whimsicality than either of his previous lives should have dictated. And then there was the new found sarcasm that reared its head every so often.

He did not feel crazy, with as weird as that sounded.

He didn't think that someone who was crazy would be able to analyze their own disposition and recognize their own mental flaws and shortcomings.

In fact, he felt…..better? Like as he came to accept certain aspects of himself, they settled down.

Its also not like he disliked his current self. Compared to his previous lives, he felt happier overall even if he was somewhat depressed recently due to the circumstances.

In any case though, he was making progress with regards to his current 'condition'.

He was still himself, he was both Arthur Pendragon and Alexander Penn.

On a lighter note, he noticed how un-drunk he actually was after drinking last night before going to sleep.

Sure, he was out of it and a bit intoxicated and made some questionable decisions last night, but nothing like he would have expected if he had drank that much previously. (He won't ever tell anyone that he wanted to see if he could turn invisible air into a broken phantasm and got annoyed and threw it out the window when it wouldn't work. )

It seemed pretty obvious his constitution was making it harder.

Granted he stayed away from more of the 'heavier' spirits in the gate. But he did down quite a bit of the lesser stuff.

He would have to find someone in the future to be his drinking buddy so he could truly find out what the limits of his constitution was. That also lead into an interesting thought, would his 'endurance' increase with regards to his status updates?

His quiet morning was suddenly shattered by the sound of screaming and yelling coming from the bedroom.

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Misaka Mikoto was the first to wake up, she had very much over exerted her powers during the fight and was both mentally and physically exhausted. The actual wounds she suffered were minimal compared to the other two. Misaki, while not physically wounded on the outside had suffered quite a bit of backlash with her mental powers. And Touma was battered red and blue from start to finish of the fight.

She woke up with an unfamiliar feeling of warmth wrapped around her. Bedding whose color she did not recognize, and a wall that was not hers.

There was an arm wrapped around her, it was both comforting and unsettling.

It took a moment for her to recognize the situation she was in.

"YOU BEAST!" She yelled as electricity shocked the other residents of the bed.

Two high-pitched screams echoed throughout the apartment complex.

The two others in the room quickly got flung off the bed and were now entirely awake.

"WHATS GOING ON?" Touma Shouted in confusion.

It took a moment for the other two to recognize the situation they were in.

Touma noticed the bandages while Misaki and Mikoto noticed the new set of cloths they were apparently wearing.

As they were currently confused and erratic at the current circumstance a voice was heard from the doorway.

"Oh my, hold bold Touma. Waking up with two young ladies in your bed."

"but….i...…whats going on?" Touma sputtered out while the other two girls were blushing.

"Well you see, I had to pick up three idiots last night who didn't have any contingency plans in the case that they all became indisposed from fighting an opponent who was wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy above their weight class." Alex replied.

"We never told you that we were going to fight him, how did you find us?" Misaki asked in confusion.

"Brat, you're a thousand years too early to think you can sneak around without me noticing." He replied with a smirk.

"Is that literal or….." Misaki couldn't finish her sentence before a gold coin suddenly shot out and hit her in the forehead.

Misaki was looking at her sworn enemy as she law sprawled on the ground, dazed from the sudden hit, calming down quite a bit.

"Did.....you wrap and change us?" She asked in hesitation.

She didn't hate the man infront of her, in fact she had a rather good impression of him and his presence was usually comforting.....but it felt similar to if an uncle saw her naked.

"Don't look at me like that, I'm not so uncouth to take advantage of a little girl. I had Kaori take care of you." He said.

"Who are you calling a little girl!?" She said in annoyance, though a small relief was felt at his explanation.

"He's talking about you little girl." Misaki prodded as she recovered.

"You're barely older than me!" Mikoto shouted.

"Yes, but I'm a 'big girl'." Misaki said, emphasizing her cleavage.

"And Touma like's big girls." She said again as she wrapped herself around Touma's arm.

Mikoto's face turned red as embarrassment set in which quickly turned to anger and lighting began to coalesce around her.

"Oi, none of that in my home." He said as he smacked Mikoto on the head.

She finally settled down with a 'humph' as the lightning dissipated.

"Now, would you be so kind to entertain your girlfriends as I prepare breakfast Touma?" Alex said with a cheeky smile as he quickly departed the room.

"What did he mean girlfriends?" Mikoto asked, emphasizing the plural of the world, to which Misaki also turned to look at him with a death stare.

"REMEMBER MY WORDS OF WISDOM TOUMA" Alex shouted from in the kitchen.

"I hate you so much...…." Touma said in defeat as the two girls began to bicker again.

Though beyond the annoyance and the constant teasing…..he couldn't deny that he felt something for the girls.

He had never spoke of this before to anyways as it never comes in in a regular conversation, but he was someone who truly believed in love. He could 'admire the female form' as much as the next guy but he wasn't someone who would do a one-night stand. He would want a relationship and mutual affection between whoever he was intimate with.

It was many a boy's dream to be surrounded by beautiful woman and many woman probably wish the opposite as well. But Touma could honestly never picture himself previously with 'multiple girls' at his side. He didn't think he could emotionally do that, yet here he was with two girls that made his heart beat a little faster and who he enjoyed being around.

The whole thing was very ironic considering a couple of his friends were very renown perverts at their school and he was often associated with them.

He wouldn't fight it....if something happened it would happen if nothing comes of it then that's fine too.

He sighed with a small smile on his face as he looked at the two of them.

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The group sat at the table and were eating in silence.

It was Alex who broke the silence.

"Well, you lot won....barely." He said.

All three of them had a smile take hold.

Regardless of how it came about, they did indeed win against a superior opponent.

"But that's not what I'm mostly concerned about, you did show an adequate amount of strategy and fighting ability... but I need to bring into question your combined wisdom." Alex stated.

"What do you mean?" Touma Asked.

"Why....did none of you think it was a good idea to inform any of us ahead of time when the battle would be taking place and where?" He said with a hint of anger in his voice.

"..Y....you said you guys couldn't interfere….." Touma replied meekly.

"Yes, we couldn't interfere in the fight you idiot. We couldn't directly go into battle against Accelerator that didn't mean we couldn't provide aid." He scolded.

"You three are lucky I was following you and was watching the fight." He said again.

"Oh, were you stalking us?" Misaki said, trying to ease the tension with a cute reply.

Alex turned to glare at her.

"This isn't a game. You three could have died because you didn't think things through. You obviously had some degree of confidence that you would win, but did none of you think that injuries may occur that required immediate attention?"

"No, something worse happened. All three of you were incapacitated at the end of the fight and had a damn building falling down ontop of you."

"Don't get me wrong, I'm proud of you three for pulling through like that, but at the same time you lot are incredibly stupid in some regards." He said with a sigh.

He turned to look at Misaki again.

"You know who I am."

"I have been through more battles than you can fathom. I have drawn enough blood to fill an ocean. I have been fighting since I was a child and have experienced battlefields none like you could imagine. So tell me, why did none of you come to me for advice or help?" He asked.

Their expressions darkened, they didn't have an excuse. They didn't know how to answer. Was it pride? An inflated ego that came from their powers?

"Please....don't make the same mistakes I did. You can't shoulder all the burdens by yourselves. Its okay to ask for help from others, you don't have all the answers nor all the knowledge. "

He had been holding this in for awhile now. Since they started to run around by themselves.

Yes, he was proud of what they had accomplished, but he was also angry at what they had overlooked or just outright neglected.

Yes he couldn't interfere directly, but he could have helped them draw up a battle strategy or even train them a bit. That wasn't even taking into account the magicians that were next door that would be more than willing to help indirectly as well.

They had to learn this lesion themselves though, he couldn't just waltz in and act like a nagging older brother.

These wounds that would heal with scars would be reminders, they were triumphant but also very foolish.