The Force of Attraction

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With every ounce of his lackluster strength, Senku attempted to shove the trunk door to a close. The back of the be-up was filled with a hefty cargo load of groceries and metal scraps. He jerked his shoulders one final time, unsuccessful in his attempt to close the trunk, "Oh woah is me, I do wish I had an assistant of some kind to help. Especially one that's being paid to do so." His sarcasm was wasted on you. You seemed to be more focused on finding the two of you a spot to enjoy your picnic. "Earth to y/n?" He stared at you for a while before slowly waving his hand in front of your face. Senku shrugged and made his way to the car, "Come on we can eat on the way."  He stood in front of his blind spot mirror, picking at his teeth with his pinky. "We got a lot to do today. Schnell, beeil dich. Chop chop." "The Ulm." You looked back at him with a smile. "Let's eat at the Ulm, we can't expect to run like machines. Even machines need a bit of oil now and then." Senku, caught off guard by your excitement, let out a soft confused sound, "Ah?" He stared at you puzzled, slowly becoming disgusted . "Eat... at the church?"
Offended by his reaction, you began walking toward it with the picnic basket. "Get back here space cadet, you're on duty!" Senku called after you, eventually catching up.

The leftover rain clouds peeled away from the sky opening into a rich dark blue. As the sweet perfume of flowers wafted through the streets, the weather felt perfect and mild. Senku walked with his hands shoved in his lab coat pockets as you took in the beautiful summer atmosphere. A few times, you glanced over and caught him admiring it as well, a smile filling his face. A swell of emotion caught in your chest.

At the top of the Ulm Minster, the two of you sat on the staircase watching the city from above. Senku thumbed the bread against his utility knife. It was a gift from his dad but he only really used it to open packages. He cut the loaf in half as you poured a thermos of lemonade. It was perfect to wash down the pieces of bread and cheese that stuck to the roof of your mouth. "First lesson." Senku spoke in between chews. He broke a piece of leftover crust and dropped it off the side, causing it to hurdle toward the earth. "What...gravity? I think I might already know that one." You raised an eyebrow at him. "Gravity pulls on anything in our universe that has mass. Which is everything. Even light. That's something old man Einstein found out." The piece still was falling, it was a long way down. Eventually it bounced off a street lamp below. Senku continued, dropping an even bigger piece, "The gravitational force of an object is proportional to it's mass, i.e the bigger piece is going to fall faster than the smaller piece. Because it's heavier and has more mass. Do you happen to know the formula to the 'Force of Attraction'?" He turned towards you and tilted his head. "Uhh.. well I guess we might've talked about it in grade school. At some... point.. ah! Look! Look! The geese down there totally are in a hissing match over your bread. Ahaha." You pointed below. Senku took another bite, "Y/N your attention span is a force as strong as gravity." "Really?" "Gravity is the weakest of the four fundamental forces. Pay closer attention I'm not repeating this a million times." He sassily continued on with his lesson.

The sun had begun to set by the time you finally understood. Senku, in fact, did end up repeating it a million times, "Okay so the Force of Attraction law, F equals G... uh... M...m over R squared explains the law of attraction between two masses? So that we can calculate the weight of something on the surface of the earth, so that, we can figure out how much energy it would take to 'escape' and stop the pull of gravity?" "Uh... more or less, I suppose. We'll work on it. I think you may be more of a hands on learner." Senku shrugged it off knowing that if you both spent anymore time there you'd go insane.

The drive home was terrifying. It was pitch black and Senku's headlights were way too dim to see ahead. The whole time he spoke on the phone, switching between languages like it was nothing. "Taiju, we're home!" Senku dropped off the ingredients in the kitchen as you brought in the parts. As you did, you continued to mumble the equation to yourself so you'd remember. "We got back late. Ramen dinner will have to be postponed to tomorrow I'm afraid. I'll be out on the observation deck." Just like that he disappeared out onto the porch where he usually did. After snacking on a few things and washing up, you retreated to your room, ready to turn in for the night. There were three books sitting on your bed about gravity and space travel. 'How did he even get in here..?' You thought to yourself. "Nope." You said out loud, shoving the books off the bed and crawling in. You slowly reached for the crystal that was left on your nightstand the day you moved in and moved it underneath a beam of moonlight, bits of rainbow softly illuminating the room. 'Space Cadet', the name that was thrown at you as an insult kind of suited you.

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⏰ Last updated: Apr 11, 2023 ⏰

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