Equations of Love

Time Signature

Summary: N found mathematical equations beautiful, because the answers were simple – just right or wrong, black or white. Then he meets Touko, and even though she is more complex than Fermat's Last Theorem, he finds her more beautiful. A collection of unrelated Ferriswheelshipping drabbles or one-shots, centered on mathematical terms.

six, subtraction

There must be a reason that we met…I think my heart will stop beating. "Shinpakusu #0822," papiyonP

Touko privately thought that N was part machine. He certainly had the brains to be a supercomputer. And she did not mean to be insulting of the effort he was making to express himself, but he still was missing a few crucial emotions that humans had. He was like a machine, so whenever one part broke or disappeared he broke as well.

She hid a tiny smile. She had become much more indulgent of N over the years. It had been about five years since she had first met him, and she now was an adult with a respectable job. N in turn simply continued his journey around the world (she had no idea how he was making money, as he hated to battle trainers for any reason) and sometimes popped in.

The odd thing about his journey was that although he wandered off on his own, he needed to call her at least one time every three days to feel "safe," he said. There had been that one time that she had been unable to pick up on his call because she was battling the Elite Four (electronics were forbidden), and after that there had been a flood of messages and calls to her X-transceiver. She refrained from mentioning to him that it was borderline stalker action. He probably had had no one to tell him about it (and he used to have official stalkers called the Shadow Triad) so she needed to tell him about it little by little.

Going by her machine analogy, that meant that N considered Touko a part of him. She was touched by that. He had told her often that he considered her his first human friend (and right now, that was enough).

He was probably still not ready enough for romance. She would indulge him in this lukewarm relationship until he was ready or until he no longer needed her.

She would indulge him in whatever he wanted. It was her present of sorts – she would let him become human, little by little, in his own way. If he found some other lovely girl to be with, so be it.

Her emotions were of no matter in this situation. It was her responsibility to make sure he would fit into society, as she was the one who had brought him out to it from his impenetrable castle. If she thought about it this way he was like Rapunzel as well.

He was like a machine, and he was also like a princess. Well, he certainly did have the hair.

She failed to stifle her giggle this time.

On the other side of the screen, the man in question asked what she was finding so funny. She quickly replied "no, nothing," and then asked him what it was like in Kalos.

He burst into rapid talk (she had come a long way now – she could pick up on about eighty percent of what he was saying) about how there were statues of Zekrom and Reshiram over there, if she had heard correctly.

At the end, he told her, "I wish you were here to look at them too."

She smiled sadly. "Yeah, me too."

She's the one that's breaking when he's not there, not him.

A/N: Thank you for reading!

Please tell me what you think! Good, bad, I should toss it in the trash and rewrite the whole thing…

Requests are also welcome! I can't guarantee that I'll write it, but suggestions such as "such-and-such" math term or "more fluff!" will be taken into consideration.

For the Great Race competition, 13 (some assembly required). I took some more liberties with this one.

See you soon,

Time Signature