It's you.

"The situation's under control"

That sentence echoes in my mind. I'm still high from the sudden surge of adrenaline but I'm sure that I heard a man's voice. Must be in his 30's or so. But it's not time to think about this right now. If he's planning to hurt us, we might as well book it outta here.

"Yo, long time no see. Tsk. you look as irritating as ever. What an eyesore." The man says, looking at me with sleepy eyes. He wears an eyepatch over his right eye, his white hair is wavy and combed to the right. He wears an oversized coat, letting the sleeves fall on the sides. He wears a blue jeweled necklace above a black shirt. The man looks wild. He's probably dangerous. By the way he's looking at me, I can at least determine that he will not hurt Maya. He looks like he knows me.

"Yo, old man! Do I know you? Have we met before?" I replied. Carefully selecting my words.

"I'll forgive you for saying old man, kid. Well, you don't know me but I know you. But look at you, you're a mess." He says. He then looks at Maya like a father would. then, instructs me.

"Get the girl on the abandoned building behind you." The man points at the building behind me. The wall is full of graffiti and looks dusty.

"There." he gestures to a wooden door without a handle. It leads inside the building. I checked if there was anything of danger. Seeing as nothing was of note, I hold Maya's hand and closed the door.

"Don't go out until I say so okay? We don't want you to get hurt now." The man says with a soft tone.

"You heard the man!" I say to reassure Maya.

Maya stays quiet. I feel... unsafe.

The man looks me in the eye.

"You said you don't know me. Maybe... this will make it clear to you."

He pulls something out of his belt mounted pouch. It's a multitool. He's holding it on his left hand. It's a hammer and wrench hybrid. The slots on the bottom of the multitool includes four tools. Two blades. One sharp pointed and the other, serrated. The other two includes a screwdriver head and scissor blades. The on the top, there's slot for a retractable lighter. Why a multitool of all things? He can use much deadlier, sharper weapons if he chose to do so. And yet, he didn't.

"I guess I'm being attacked?" I say calmly, maintaining rationality.

The whited haired man stays silent.

The night falls upon us. It got darker since the encounter with the mugger. The man clicked his tongue and flicked his wrist. In an instant, the darkness got replaced by a flash of crimson. A red light is being emitted by a red halo surrounding his wrist. The flash of red quickly transitions to a faint but noticable glow. He slides one of the tools out of it's slots. It's the pointed blade.

I'm alert and on edge as I anticipate an attack. He stands his ground. Instead, he sliced the palm of his right hand. He's unfazed. There's no visible wound. I hear a sound and looked at it. The pavement on my right was chipped. A damage of this can only be made by... A sharp blade.

"T-this can't be!" the voice from my head speaks out

"Yep. It's me." The white haired man said, seemingly replying to the voice in my head.

"Yo-you..." the voice continues.

"Me?" I reply.

"It's you. It's unbelievable but that white haired man is you!" the voice exclaims.

"Spot on, Makina!" the man replied.

"I know that you have many questions. I'll reveal everything as you try to survive. The next one won't miss!" the man said with a threatening tone.

"Let's start!" he cut his palm again. I move to the left. The pavement was chipped once again. If I hadn't moved, I would've been cut! "This power of mine. Well, it'd be kinda wrong to say it's mine. You have the same power after all. Interesting isn't it?" he repeatedly cuts his palm several times. chipping the pavement below me. I manage to get away from each slash just barely. "It's the trolley problem. Manifested as a source of power. And since there are two outcomes, one in which people other than you die, and one where you sacrifice yourself, you have two ways to deal with things."

He stops cutting his palm. I'm still confused. How's this guy me?

"Ah, me? I'm using my right hand. It's the culmination of the choices where people die. It's the right hand that pulled the lever. Taking action up for yourself. The left hand is the hand of ideals. It takes your view of self sacrifice and makes it a supernatural ability to help you. Your left hand... It's the left hand of absorption. Everything around your left can be absorbed if you wished to do so. Your right hand is the reverse. It has powers of repulsion."

The voice in my head speaks

"That's not entirely true. The power of the right hand is unwillingness to die. The people that died by the choice of pulling the lever cannot be brought back. Of course we know that the trolley problem is just a hypothetical question. But the thing is, people that die almost certainly won't ever be alive again. Even in the world of hypothetical questions. People have to work. They have a family to get back to. They still have dreams that are unattained. They cling to life. The power that is infused on your right hand is the unwillingness to die. They think that they're being attacked so they redirect it somewhere else. And since you're the host, you decide where the hit lands."

"You know things even I don't know about huh. Even from my time, we never understood each other. Sure we cooperated. But that's because we had a common goal. I suppose that's true as well for the me in the past." The man spoke

"Wait. What do I call you? What do I call me? I'm still confused but if we want to resolve things quickly, the first step is to introduce ourselves!" I exclaimed, running out of breath.

"I am you. And you are me. I suppose that you want me to give a different name to myself. Well, you can call me Reina." Reina... says.

"You really like girly names huh?" Said the voice in my head.

"Maki is NOT. Girly. Reina certainly is!" I replied.

"Yeah. It's super girly. Reina means queen in Spanish. So why did I pick a girly name? Well, you wouldn't want to suffer alone right? It would make you feel better if someone had a more embarrassing name than you." Reina reasoned.

"My name is not embarrassing. I think it's pretty cool." I replied.

"I used to think that as well. I used to love my name. Then I became older and realized that it's not really that great to have a girly name."

Reina said, pulling out the cigarette lighter from his multitool.

"What now, is my future self addicted to cigarettes?" I said, looking at my future self in dismay.

"The one I'm gonna be lighting up isn't a cig." He said.

"Huh?" I replied, not knowing what he intends to do with it.

"The one I'm gonna be lighting up... is you!"