From Vinegar to wine

Reconciliation & Reunion

AN: Here it is the final chapter of Act 1 has nothing else to say really.

Edit: 8/19/24

Alright, so for some reason, this chapter posted missing the horizontal lines and the separation, as well as a couple of other things that make it readable, so I did some quick edits on it. I'll double-check the chapter in more detail later.

Mineta

"I am a genius!"

I could only stare as the multi-colored man pumped his fist into the air with the widest grin on his face.

"Time travel! Mental time travel! I have broken one of the last gates of science fiction!" The man, from what I remember his name was Jackson, leaned back and let out a bellowing laugh. I opened my mouth to say something but he laughed even louder, his joy drowning out my question in seconds.

So this is what madness is like...I was expecting the voice in my head to at least hear me out. I guess that was stupid to assume it wouldn't really be madness in that case now would it? I look away from Jackson to look at ...I don't even know what to call him, imaginary me? Fake me? He was different than whatever I normally imagined myself. For one thing, he was short, not as short as me but he was probably under 5 feet tall. He also lacked the rippling muscles and heavy bulge that I would assume from imaginary grown-up me. Even as I observed him the imaginary me was also looking himself over, I guess he was just as disappointed. He pulled his shirt off and my eyes widened at the sight.

"What the fuck happen to you?" I exclaimed. To say that imaginary me was covered in scars was an understatement. It was more correct to say that he was a scar covered in small bits of Mineta.

"That's what I'm trying to figure out, Oi Jackson what the hell?"

"Hmm?" Jackson looks over to me...the other me... you know what I'm sticking to imaginary me. "Oh, that? yeah, it's your scars."

"I've never had this many."

"Sure you do!" Jackson points to the fake me stomach. "You see this one is where you landed on that fence post." His hand trails up to the shoulder, "This was when you got clipped by that helicopter blade." His hand travels down to his stump, "and I know you remember this one."

The fake me swipes at the hand and points to his neck, "And what about this one?"

"When Wendy took your head off." He answered simply.

"What? That was a training accident! I thought that scar had healed?"

"You got your head taken off?" I asked before shaking my head. They're your imagination Mineta they don't have to make sense. It was annoying that these figments of my imagination were ignoring me.

"Why is it every scar I ever had!?" fake me complained.

"Because you reset the vault, which also means your mental avatar."

Fake me blinked at that for a moment before closing his eyes. Moments later his denim outfit had been replaced with a purple compression t-shirt and white baggy pants. The arm had returned but the flesh was semi-transparent and the number of scars drastically decreased. He also gained other markings, purple grape vines highlighting a scar on his shoulder.

"Mixing it up eh?" Jackson asks, circling the fake me.

"I missed the ink" he replied "And I missed the harem pants"

"Wait wait wait!" I cut in, "You can change yourself however you wish, and you chose harem pants!?"

"They're good pants," Jackson says, finally looking at me.