Trial and Error

Hope's Peak Academy - Ultimate Marine Biologist's Research Lab, Two Weeks Later...

In the time that you and Seiko began to work together on your project, the two of you eventually reached a decision for your project. One that would hopefully not endanger the fish involved in the experiment.

Seiko decided that she was going to test the effects of mood stabilizers on the niche and behavior across different species of fish, which you agreed to. You thought this was an interesting idea, mostly because if it worked, it could show how some of the patterns the natural fish experienced differed in comparison with the mood stabilizer. You also wanted to test to see if normally aggressive fish could be made passive.

The second part of the project would go over the effect of stimulants on the growth rate of fish over time. Two groups of the same species of fish would be kept in separate tanks with similar conditions, but only one would be exposed to the effects of the stimulants. This would ensure that you and Seiko could measure the changes between the two groups accurately. Seiko wanted to see if her growth stimulant drug would be effective in time for midterms, so she decided to let you borrow a small dosage amount for the experiment.

Right now, Seiko was right beside you, holding a plastic bag filled with water that contained a small yet wonderfully bright red Siamese fighting fish. This fish was notorious for the males being very territorial, and being prone to attack and kill each other if two males were housed in the same tank. Often, if there were no means of escape, it would result in the death of either one or both fish. Luckily, Seiko exposed it to the mood stabilizer, so she hoped it wouldn't end bloody for the other fish.

"You sure this will work, Y/N? I-I made sure to give both fish the proper stabilizers, yet I c-can't help but feel like something will go wrong," she told you. It was no secret to you that Seiko tended to be somewhat pessimistic, but you knew she was trying to improve.

"Hey, don't worry, Seiko. I'm sure this will turn out fine. And if it doesn't, then we'll just have to figure out what we did wrong. That's what experiments are for: to test whether our hypothesis is right or wrong," you tried to reassure her. She seemed to be slightly comforted by your words. As she approached the small fish tank where the other (indigo-colored) Siamese fighting fish was waiting, you helped her gently take ahold of the water bag and release the red fish into the tank. You knew that you had to be extremely careful when transporting a fish into a new tank, so you did your best to guide her.

The red fish and the indigo fish were aware of each other's presence now. They stared at each other, each ominously waiting to see what the other would do first. You and Seiko decided to wait a few minutes to see what would happen. She told you before you began experimenting that the mood stabilizers often took a few minutes to function properly. Neither of the Siamese fighting fish attacked each other. You made sure to check both of them were male beforehand, and yet, they weren't doing anything. They were acting surprisingly passive.

"I-it worked? It really worked?," Seiko said, surprised. "I-I can't believe it. It's actually working!"

"It appears so. We should probably wait to see what happens in a few more minutes, though. Maybe we should give them half an hour and we'll see if it's truly working then. But don't give up hope yet, Seiko. It looks like we're on to something", you told her. You noticed that her eyes beamed with joy at the sight of this.

"Y-yeah, you're right. Let's go see how the other fish are doing," she told you, before you both headed over to the second fish tank. This one was larger than the first, mostly because it held much larger fish. This tank was home to four deadly fish that could definitely injure either you or Seiko if you weren't careful around them. These were piranhas, one of the most aggressive fish species across the globe. Despite their small size, an entire shoal of these miniature river monsters was enough to tear a chicken apart in minutes. You heard the stories about some of their attacks on humans in South America along the Amazon River. Although it usually only happens when the fish are stressed out, like during breeding season.

Surprisingly, they can also be kept as pets. At least the smaller red belly piranhas, which you made sure of. The last thing you wanted was to have one of these little demons nibbling at your fingertips. Which is why you made sure to put only four of them in this tank. Anymore and it would probably be much harder to maintain.

"How did you get the school to permit using piranhas for this experiment? Can't these things hurt people?", Seiko asked you. Despite her care for animals, she was a bit uneasy at the thought of handling the piranhas. Even though she made sure to expose them to the mood stabilizers, a hint of doubt still remained in her mind.

"Well, to be fair, a large shoal of them can definitely cause some damage, but some of the smaller breeds, like the red-bellied ones, can actually be bought and kept as pets. I know it sounds crazy, but it's true. One of the biggest you have to pay attention to is just how fast these guys can grow. Some of them can grow up to 10 inches if given enough time," you told her.

"Really? I did not know that. Uh, Y/N, I hope you don't mind, but could you please transfer the other fish into the aquarium? I'm... kind of nervous to put it in with the piranhas," she asked you. You could understand her concern, especially since these critters could get hasty.

"I don't mind it at all," you told her. You looked at the smaller fish tank that held the fish you were going to release into the piranha tank: a sleek, long creek chub, about eight inches long. If the experiment was a success, the piranhas wouldn't attempt to feed on the creek chub and leave it alone. If it wasn't, the piranhas would probably devour the poor chub alive. I think we should try to keep it in there for a good amount of time, just to be sure that it's the drugs that are keeping them passive. You knew that if the piranhas weren't hungry, they might not attack the chub.

You made sure to carefully grab ahold of the creek chub in your hands (with gloves, of course), while it tried to squirm to get back in the water. Seiko looked nervously at you, as you placed the chub gently into the piranha fish tank. The chub instantly swam away and explored its new tank. Seiko began writing down her observations in her experiment log book.

At first, the piranhas noticed the chub, and two of them decided to start following it around. One of the two decided to try and bite the chub, though the fish was able to get away just fine. Eventually, the rest of the piranhas began to chase after the chub for several minutes. You were quite surprised the chub had lasted this long in there already. Normally, those red bellied fish would've devoured the poor thing by now.

It took about ten minutes before the piranhas decided to give up the chase. By that point, they weren't trying to attack the chub any longer. The mood stabilizers must've kicked by now, I bet, you thought. Seiko breathed out a sigh of relief. Neither of you wanted to witness those piranhas tear that fish to pieces.

"Looks like the drugs are taking effect. They're not attacking the fish," Seiko said. You were recording the experiment using your phone, in case you needed to show any proof of your results later.

"That's good to know. Your mood stabilizers did the trick," you told her. "Now, let's go check up on our other test subjects and see their progress."

You and Seiko headed over to the back of the room, where two large aquarium tanks of tiger barbs were being kept. They were called that because their stripes resembled that of a tiger's, despite lacking orange color. One group of tiger bards was left unexposed to the growth stimulant, while the other was given the growth stimulant. Other than that, both groups lived under the exact same conditions: the same sized area, food, water level, amount of fish, etc.

The first group of tiger barbs didn't seem to be experiencing any difficulties. In the past two weeks, they looked like they mostly retained their original size, colors, and behavior. Seiko wrote down her observations for you. Their population also seemed to be the same as before. All seventeen fish were present and accounted for.

As for the second group... they showed much different results. Both you and Seiko were taken off guard by the drastic difference in this group. Usually, tiger barbs to grow up to around two and a half to three inches long, but the ones in this tank looked around nearly six to seven inches in length. Their fish scales, instead of bearing their natural white with black stripe pattern, showed shiny, bronze-like scales, with dark blue dots ranging across their bodies. Their dorsal fins seemed much longer in comparison as well.

You noticed that two of the seventeen fish in this tank were dead. You concluded that one of them might've died due to either starvation or as a side effect of the stimulant, while the other was probably beaten to death by another tiger barb. You could tell because the second one had visibly bloody wounds. Seiko made sure to write all of these drastic changes down in her notebook.

"Oh my... these fish are definitely being affected by the stimulant. Most of the larger ones seem to be healthy, but some of the smaller ones don't look completely healthy," Seiko said, with visible concern. She could tell because some of the smaller fish were swimming much slower than the larger ones, and that the smaller fish's scale color seemed pale, too.

This batch of fish also required a lot more food to survive than the normal barbs did. Seiko looked at you nervously once she finished writing her observations. You both clearly knew the stimulant was working, but you were concerned about just how deadly the side effects it was having on the barbs were. You decided to take some pictures for evidence, and scooped out the dead fish from the tank for further research.

"Well, the good news is that the stimulant does seem to be affecting their growth and appetite rates. The bad news is that it's not affecting them all equally. We might need to do some further research tomorrow to study this further," you told Seiko.

"I agree. We can't let any more of those test subjects die. We need to figure out how the stimulant is affecting their biology," Seiko said.

Despite not getting too much time today to talk, Seiko was happy to work with you for the past two weeks. Now she could hang out with you and get to show you what she could do. And she also enjoyed how you always tried to lift her spirits up whenever she doubted herself.

---------- A few hours later... -----------

Chemistry Lab in the Old Building Section of Hope's Peak Academy

Seiko was busy using several testing tubes and a dropper in the lab. She was mixing chemicals together to improve her growth stimulant drug. With the mishap involving the tiger barbs earlier today, she knew it still needed some finishing touches before she could present it to the judges at the midterms. I have to make sure that this drug is safe, and doesn't cause any kind of health problems.

She tried to pinpoint where the problem lied in the drug. Maybe I added too much of something, or not enough of another chemical, she wondered. The good thing was that she knew the drug was effective, evident of the larger size of the fish. But she wondered if she could increase the effectiveness, as well as fix any other of the side effects.

Man, it's getting late again. I'm getting tired again. I think I should try to go to sleep earlier. Staying up late doing work is very tiring, especially if I don't get enough sleep, she thought. Besides, Y/N says it would be good for my mental health if I got proper rest. She decided to pause her work for now, and made sure to pour her newest work in separate containers before cleaning up. While she was in the middle of that, she noticed someone was knocking at the door.

"Miss Kimura? Mind if I come in?", the visitor asked from the other side. Seiko definitely recognized the voice of the visitor. Well... let's get this over with already, she thought. She opened the door and let the short boy inside. The boy had a white chef outfit with a neat red apron, along with a red hanker-chief around his neck. He also wore a little chef's hat, and he had dark brown hair combed to the left.

"Hello again, Miss Kimura! Terribly sorry to bother you at this hour, but I was wondering if you could do a simple favor for me," Teruteru said. Seiko didn't mind him asking her for favors, despite his reputation amongst his classmates. Seiko noticed that Teruteru's left eye looked somewhat black, like he had been punched in the face. She bent down to his height level to get a good look at it. Yeah, that's definitely a black eye.

"Teruteru? Wait - is that a black eye? Did you get into a fight or something? I can take you down to Mikan's office to get you some ice if you need it, you know," she told him. Teruteru was flattered by her concern.

"Why, thanks for the offer, madame, but Mikan already gave me some ice before I got here. My eye still kind of hurts, though, but I'm fine right now," Teruteru replied.

"I can get you some painkillers if you need it. One second, please," she told him, before into her cabinet to grab a bottle of aspirin. She handed Teruteru two pills, which he placed in his pocket.

"Thank you kindly! Now then, I need something from you, Miss Kimura," the chef told her. Seiko was kind of surprised that he wasn't acting like his usual perversive self, but she wasn't complaining. He was much more manageable this way.

"Alright. What do you need from me?", she asked.

Teruteru hesitated at first. "Could you... uh, could you please cook up some more of that corn doping syrup for me? Oh, and I also need a fresh batch of a-aphrodisiacs, too," he anxiously said. He knew very well that Seiko gave him some aphrodisiacs not too long ago, but then there was the... incident with Class 77-B. Seiko gave him an irritated look.

"I thought I gave you a few aphrodisiacs two days ago. Did you seriously use all of it up already?", she asked. I know Teruteru can get rowdy, but come on, she thought.

"N-no, not exactly," the chef tried to explain. "It's a b-bit of a long story, to be honest."

"Go ahead. I have some time to listen."

"Well, it all started when I was trying to prepare a scrumptious lunch for my classmates. I served them a Versailles-styled queue de boeuf and they were begging for seconds and thirds! But then that Saionji bitch thought it would be funny to put my Sexy Sexy Soup and mix it in with the nikujaga!" He was getting progressively louder as he ranted. "Then the rest of my classmates ate it and started acting all horny on main and then I couldn't control myself and then Chiaki sent me flying halfway across the room and EVERYTHING WENT TO SHIT!"

Seiko was a little startled by the chef's loud tone. She waited until he breathed in and out to respond. "Is that how you got your black eye, then?"

"Well... yes," he said, acting much calmer now. "Chiaki punched me straight in the face. Although I don't really blame her. I deserved it, honestly."

Seiko was surprised when she heard that. Chiaki Nanami? The Ultimate Gamer? She really punched him so hard that it sent him across the classroom? She never would've expected Chiaki to be the kind of person to do that sort of thing.

"Chiaki? She punched you? Her of all people? I didn't take her for that type," she said to him.

"Yup. Never underestimate a gamer girl. I know that now," Teruteru replied. "So, could you whip me up a new batch of aphrodisiacs for me soon or not, Miss Kimura?"

Seiko thought about this for a few moments. On one hand, she was hesitant to trust him with this considering the event he described. Plus, she didn't want to get involved should he use it and cause trouble elsewhere in the school. But she also knew Teruteru wasn't completely malicious, if you looked past his perversive side.

"Sure, I can do it. But you have to promise me that you won't lose them, or let anyone else abuse them again. I don't want to get involved in anything like that incident. Understood?"

"Loud and clear, madame! Now, if you excuse me, I've got a kitchen I need to attend to! Thanks for the help, Miss Kimura!", Teruteru said enthusiastically. He quickly made a beeline for the exit once he was done asking.

"Your welcome. See you around… I suppose," Seiko told him before the chef ran out the door. I suppose it couldn't hurt to help him.

Seiko decided to pull out her phone and check her notifications before she left. She saw that she had a few missed texts from Ruruka she hadn't read.

R: *So, how's your talent project going, gal pal?"

Seiko figured the least she could do was text her back. (S for Seiko, R for Ruruka)

S: *I'd say it's going alright. Y/N really seems to know what he's doing. We've been making good progress so far. How are you and Sonosuke doing?*

R: *It's going... fine. Yoi-Yoi and I just got done making weapons out of rock candy today! Although it's not the same without you.*

S: *What do you mean by that?*

R: *You've always been such a helping hand for me, gal pal. Your drugs have helped both Yoi-Yoi and I more times than I can count. We always work so well together. I don't know where I'd be right now if you weren't here.*

S: *Look, if this is about Y/N, don't worry. I wanted to work with him because I wanted to step outside of my comfort zone. You and I are still best friends, Ruruka. If you wanted some help from me, you could've just asked.*

It took Ruruka a few moments for her to text back.

R: *Really? Well, I was wondering if I could borrow some sweetness enhancers, if that's okay.*

S: *Sure. Just stop by my lab tomorrow and I can get it for you. It's no problem at all.*

R: *Thank you so much, Seiko! See you tomorrow! Bye! :) *

With that, Seiko decided to head out of the lab and return to her dorm for the night.

To be continued...