Episode 17 - Precognition
Shaei Miyama explains that he's been trying to find some way of averting the tragedies his precognition reveals. Nothing has worked... until Kuroko somehow managed to prevent today's accident. When he mentions that his predictions are based on three-dimensional calculations, Uiharu notes that Kuroko's teleportation uses 11-dimensional vectors, which perhaps the predictions can't account for.
He demonstrates his ability for them, using an instant camera and his smartphone app to predict an upcoming incident nearby. They head off to investigate, Shaei surreptitiously wiping away a slight nosebleed. The accident proves to be a young girl who falls into the river and is caught in the current. Kuroko succeeds in teleporting her to safety, seemingly confirming that this is the key factor in averting the predicted outcome.
Over the next several days, Kuroko and Shaei team up to prevent a number of potentially tragic incidents. However, it seems his ability doesn't pick up on every negative event — such as a strange mass unconsciousness that occurs on September 30th. Then, on October 3rd, Shaei brings them a new prediction for a time and place which are very close to one which he's already made. He says the first prediction showed what looked like raging flames, which makes them suspect there will be a disaster that covers a wide area. Both predictions are for the following evening, in a nearby park; they wonder what could cause such a large fire.
Throughout the next day, Judgement sets up checkpoints to screen everyone entering the park for incendiaries or fire-related abilities. Meanwhile, Kuroko and Uiharu arrange to track the movements of everyone inside the park once the predicted time arrives. As they're setting things up, they notice cherry blossoms in bloom, despite it being October. However, they pay no attention to a number of nutrient ampules planted in the ground here and there.
That afternoon, Shaei gives Kuroko several more predictions, all for inside the park at around the same time. As she studies them, he suddenly collapses. He turns out to be suffering accumulated damage to his red blood cells, due to constant over-use of his ability. At the District 7 hospital, Heaven Canceller tells Kuroko that Shaei will have to stop using his ability until the damage heals.
Asleep in the hospital, Shaei dreams of past events. Other children constantly ostracized him, especially after one of his classmates was injured in an accident that he predicted but couldn't prevent. His only real friend was a stray dog living in the park, which he named "Perro". Then, one day, a prediction showed Perro being caught in a fire inside the park. Desperate, he began using his ability again and again, trying to figure out how his predictions could be averted... and then he found Kuroko. When he wakes up, the sun is setting; realizing the time, he runs out of the hospital towards the park.
At the park, Kuroko and the other Judgement members keep watch as the predicted time approaches. Unseen, an electrical fault in a vending machine ignites some fallen leaves deep inside the park. The resulting flames reach a cherry tree with one of the nutrient ampules under it... and a massive explosion occurs.
Jumping into action, Kuroko starts teleporting around the park to rescue people near the fire, with Mii Konori and other Judgement members helping escort them to safety. The flames rapidly spread around the park... but Kuroko soon realizes that the only trees burning are the strangely-blooming cherry trees. She and Uiharu quickly identify the nutrient ampules as the cause: they have highly-flammable contents which have effectively transformed all the cherry trees into gigantic fuses.
Shaei arrives, out of breath and frantic. Kuroko asks him what the matter is, and he tells her about Perro. Telling him not to worry, Kuroko teleports back into the park, taking Konori with her to help search. They eventually find the dog trapped by fire in the middle of the park, and successfully rescue him.
By the next day, they've tracked down the girl who planted the ampules. It turns out she only wanted to make the cherry blossoms bloom, and didn't realize she was turning trees into bombs. She has no expertise in chemistry or horticulture — she learned everything from an Indian Poker card.
Shaei tells Kuroko that one of his classmates has agreed to adopt Perro. Kuroko says his ability helped save a lot of people; she tells him that when he can once again use his ability safely, he's welcome to come and find her.
Tropes
- Blessed with Suck: Shaei's precognition can predict nothing but tragedies, and (until he meets Kuroko) there is no way to prevent them. This is clearly not good for him either emotionally or physically; it also has the effect of making other children see him as a jinx.
- Continuity Nod: There's a brief mention of recent "mass unconsciousness" incidents, along with the fact that Shaei's precognition didn't predict them. Viewers familiar with A Certain Magical Index (and who are paying attention to the dates shown on-screen) may realize this is a reference to the September 30th attack on Academy City by Vento of the Front.
- Cool Big Sis: Kuroko finds herself becoming this to Shaei. He very quickly (and without prompting) starts calling her by her first name; she raises an eyebrow at this, but rolls with it.
- Hard-Work Montage: Kuroko is seen preventing various accidents predicted by Shaei in rapid sequence. This covers the period from September 27th to October 4th, including the change from summer to winter school uniforms, and straddling the September 30th incident from Index (which is briefly alluded to).
- Intergenerational Friendship: Kuroko and Shaei develop one of these.
- Not So Stoic: Shaei barely shows any outward sign of emotion until Perro's in danger. Then, when Kuroko saves the dog and gives it back to him, he starts crying. Kuroko teasingly tells him boys shouldn't cry so easily; in response, he asks her to look away.
- Four Lines, All Waiting: Starting here, the focus jumps around from episode to episode between the various main characters, covering what each of them is doing over the same general time period (late September through the first week of October). This episode follows Kuroko and Uiharu.
- Outside-Context Problem: Kuroko's teleportation ability acts as this to Shaei's precognition — because teleportation is based on 11th-dimensional physics, his predictions (which use three-dimensional calculations) can't factor it in. This means that Kuroko can avert the predicted outcome as long as she uses teleportation in some way.
- Shaei also fails to predict any of the magical comas that occur during the September 30th incident (see example for Continuity Nod). He speculates this is because the victims weren't permanently harmed, but a more likely explanation is that magic is also beyond the scope of his ability.
- Psychic Nosebleed: Shaei gets one when he uses his ability at the Judgement office, although he hides it from Kuroko and Uiharu. This turns out to be a symptom of blood damage caused by the over-use of his powers, and foreshadows his later collapse.
- Spock Speak: Shaei hardly sounds like an elementary schooler, speaking in precise, factual sentences filled with highly technical concepts, and in a perpetually dispassionate tone of voice.
