Editing Toaru Majutsu no Index:Railgun Chapter4 (section)

===Part 9===

That brings us back to where we started.

Misaka Mikoto clicked her tongue at the changed world she saw while spying on the schoolyard.

(We’re 5000m up and the entire ground below the School Garden was remade in secret? What kind of tech did they even use?)

There was a strong tone of exasperation in Mikoto’s thoughts.

To be fair, the Eurotunnel linking the UK and France was nearly 40km long and the total length of a major city’s subway had to be hundreds if not thousands of kilometers. As a collection of 5 schools, the School Garden was only a few kilometers across. Digging below it, reinforcing it, creating an artificial space there, and using cubes of lightweight aluminum alloy to transform the ground into a giant aerial float wasn’t impossible.

(But just like with the Eurotunnel or a major city’s subway, actually doing it would require amounts of money discussed in national budgets. Some of the girls here are absurdly rich, but this goes beyond what even they could do as a prank.)

Only a few hours had passed since it had all started. It wasn’t even dinnertime yet.

Barely any time had passed since inviting Uiharu and Saten into the School Garden. The sun hadn’t set and the sky was still blue.

Nevertheless.

A redhead with shoulder length hair held a megaphone at the center of it all. Based on her figure, she had to be a year older than Mikoto, making her a third year. Unfortunately, her uniform was a Tokiwadai one.

The agitator spoke with a tiara sparkling on her head.

“How about we take a vote? Who thinks Akazame-sensei is guilty?”

“Guilty!!” “Guilty!!” “Guilty!!” “Guilty!!” “Guilty!!” “Guilty!!”

Could they run away? Even if it meant jumping from an altitude of 5000m?

No one made those reckless but understandable suggestions.

In fact, they all agreed.

Did they not care who was in charge as long as they personally were safe? Or had they taken a liking to this newfound freedom even if it was self-destructive?

A teacher had been forced up onto the “gallows”, which was actually the metal flagpole. The thick metal wire hanging from the pole looked sinister with its end tied into a loop.

The usual safe and comfortable School Garden was nowhere to be found. Academy City’s rules no longer applied and Japan’s constitution probably didn’t either.

This was an airborne jail with no escape in any direction.

Mikoto glanced down at her phone. It did have a signal, but the connection timed out when she tried to access any sites outside of the School Garden. Cell phone signals couldn’t reach 5000m into the air, so she couldn’t access the surface.

(Did whoever did this set up a huge base antenna of their own? Or is this a satellite connection?)

Whatever the case, she couldn’t call for help.

She could only trust that Academy City’s adults were working toward a solution without needing anyone to point out to them that a chunk of the city had taken flight.

If this was a scaled-up version of a flying car, then it would use electric motors. But to keep something the size of the School Garden airborne would require high-level synchronization from a large number of large motors. If Mikoto stopped them one by one with her power, the large flat structure could easily tilt and then crash down into the surface.

This could have led to a panic, but the scales had tilted in the culprit’s favor. Once it was made clear they could live here and resume their ordinary life indefinitely here, most of the students would decide it was a problem but not one they needed to risk their safety to solve right away.

How did the water supply work after leaving the ground? Maybe they could move around at will and they would resupply by passing below rainclouds.

Imagine a long line in front of a sweets shop. What if a lost child were crying right next to that line? Any one person from the line only needed to leave the line, kneel down, and help the child with a smile, but would anyone choose to be that one person? If they left the line, they lost their chance to buy the sweets they wanted.

This was known as passive acceptance.

And the culprit had provided another factor here as well: active acceptance.

“All of Academy City’s social problems were created by the adults!”

The agitator used her megaphone to speak to the crowd around her.

This was the real reason everyone was so incensed.

“Why did they need to separate us out by Level if all they want to do is mess with our brains to develop esper powers!? Why do the researchers get to cover up all the horrific things they do in the name of ‘protecting city secrets’!? Because this city is designed to benefit the adults! The growth of your students shouldn’t be something you budget out!! If they let us choose how far we take our own development, so much tragedy and frustration could be avoided. At the very least, we could accept whatever happened as the result of our own actions!! So I say to you Academy City needs no teachers. If this is truly meant to be a city of academia, it should be a city designed to promote learning. This small area – not even a full district – can act as a test case. Once we prove the effectiveness of this method, the rest of the city will follow! Our actions here will truly liberate Academy City!!”

(The agitator is the redhead from that debate. Canary-chan made it sound like a group was behind it, so I bet the other schools’ debaters were in on it too.)

Solar power and flying cars.

The ideas presented by the other debaters had been used in this as well, so it was best to assume the debaters from each of the 5 schools were the ones behind this.

Independence.

That bizarre suggestion may have been slipped into people’s minds ahead of time through the debate being played all across the School Garden. If the supposed opponents were actually in cahoots, they could use their debate to guide the listeners’ thoughts toward whatever conclusion they wanted.

Unlike a speech where one person spoke to the audience, a debate between two people did not let the audience construct their own ideas. The audience was only meant to decide which of the two viewpoints they agreed with. Even if both sides’ ideas were crazy, the audience was forced to choose one or the other. And if both sides were supporting independence with different wordings, what would the audience end up choosing?

(I can’t believe they’re actually trying to hang someone over all those stupid school rules about underwear and deodorant. Too many people here don’t know how to blow off steam, so their frustrations just build up until something lets it explode out like this!!)

“But it’s more than that.”

Yes, they may have contained a bomb ready to blow.

But most any ordinary person was the same. If anyone really was living a truly stress-free life, they were probably unintentionally causing untold amounts of stress for everyone around them.

The current state of affairs required a spark to cause that powder keg to explode.

What had done it?

(I doubt they would explode this readily even with all the small daily frustrations building up. Was it the pressure of suddenly finding themselves trapped up here? Was it the mental backlash of finding themselves freed of the city’s rules? Or is the lower air pressure up here affecting their blood flow?)

No, it wasn’t any of those.

Misaka Mikoto was focused on a specific person. And the technology she held.

“That megaphone is producing more than just sound.”

It depended on the wavelength, but electromagnetic waves were reflected by a lot of things.

That included moisture. Even an invisible mist could have its location and thickness accurately measured from how it reflected those waves. A weather radar used that principle on a larger scale.

(Even simple moisture can make people feel sweaty and subconsciously make them irritable. Add specific chemicals into the mix and it would be even more effective. For example, an ''itching'' compound like a polypeptide or urushiol.)

If something physical had triggered this explosion, it was unlikely words alone could dissuade them now. But grabbing Shokuhou by the collar and forcing her to use Mental Out was a fundamentally flawed idea.

For example, what if Shokuhou used her psychological power on someone under purely chemical general anesthesia? Would they break free of the effects of the halothane or nitrous oxide to get up and walk around on her command? It might be possible to let that arrogant queen smugly push out her oversized chest and solve this, but there was no guarantee. The sample size was too small.

“Well, this sucks.”

Mikoto hated that she still hadn’t gotten the full story out of Yugure Kanaria since she was too weak.

What was the factory she had mentioned?

“Of course, running the School Garden costs money. A very large sum of money. However!! Do we really need the teachers for that!? In case you hadn’t noticed, we have a fair amount of wealth ourselves. Some of us have started our own businesses instead of just using our parents’ money! So again I ask you: do we really need the headmaster and director ordering us around to keep the School Garden running? We do not!! We already have enough money to look after ourselves!! And we know how to make more money! So why compromise and bring the teachers’ dirty money into the mix!? That brings only corruption!!”

Mikoto looked away for a moment and then sighed.

(Yeah, I don’t think Shokuhou can help here.)

Mikoto had been less interested in the #5 herself and more in the Tokiwadai’s largest clique using its superior numbers to solve this, but it didn’t look like they would be able to act right away. For one, Shokuhou would have to protect everyone who idolized her and, even if she did have superior numbers, she would have a hard time protecting all of her people if it came to all-out war. So she wouldn’t make that choice until she saw a real chance at victory.

And even if her clique was the largest in Tokiwadai, that proportion changed when looking at all 5 schools. In a conflict with everyone involved, the Shokuhou Clique would be the hunted minority.

Would Shokuhou and her clique choose to feign agreement with the agitator regardless of what they actually thought? She could even use Mental Out to guide her people’s actions so they didn’t let the truth slip.

Playing the long game like that wasn’t Mikoto’s style, which may have been why she and Shokuhou didn’t get along. Which in turn meant it wasn’t Shokuhou’s style to make the childish choice to immediately battle the harm before her eyes like Mikoto did.

Of course they got irritated whenever they saw each other.

“Anyway.”

Mikoto looked back to the schoolyard.

At this rate, that teacher was going to be execution #1. The students would place the wire around her neck, turn the crank, and hoist her corpse high like a flag to flap in the breeze.

And most likely, once they ''actually'' executed someone, something deep inside the School Garden would break and there would be no stopping them. Whether they woke from this dream or not, the students gathered here wouldn’t be able to trust they were doing the right thing.

And while having trouble breathing, Yugure Kanaria had said she hadn’t been able to stop it. She didn’t need to feel responsible, but if anyone died from this, it would apply even more pressure to the already weakened girl. And to the little sister who had to see her older sister like that.

Mikoto couldn’t just sit idly by and watch.

Shokuhou had her way of doing things, but so did Mikoto.

A strong crackle of electricity burst from her bangs as she made a decision only Tokiwadai’s Ace could make.

“It’s time to jump into the thick of things!! Because preserving life matters more than anything else!!”