Editing Toaru Majutsu no Index:Biohacker Chapter3 (section)

===Part 7===

“Kh.”

Kaibi, second of the three sisters, held a hand to the side of her aching head and gradually stood up.

She slowly pushed back up her dress’s slipping shoulder strap.

Her sluggish movements were enough to imagine how much damage her body had taken.

One of Rikuri’s drones had injected her with a bloodstream oxygen carrier, but that did not mean the carbon monoxide poisoning symptoms would disappear immediately. She would not die, but the pain would continue.

The trembling of her fingertips would not stop and her vision grew blurry from time to time.

She would have a hard time aiming and firing a gun like this. Especially in a wild fight between her target and her family member.

Nevertheless…

(I can’t leave this with Rikuri Nee-san. She isn’t suited for the battlefield. But my Measure Heart should be able to shake him.

She did not say anything important aloud on the battlefield.

Because you never knew how that would come back to bite you.

She practically rubbed her body up against the side of a rectangular concrete pillar that had broken halfway up to prop herself up on two legs and she focused her mind on both her temples.

She pictured it like moving the electrode between her eyes and releasing sparks from there.

(He’ll know which order to do this in. He’ll defeat his opponent, create a safe zone for himself, and make sure he can keep fighting. I’ve seen how broken he is, so I can’t expect pleas to his good will or decency to stop him.)

Kaibi was part of the science side.

She had a hard time imagining ''this sort of thing’', so she had never used her power like this. But now was not the time to be picky.

She had to use any method available to her.

She adjusted the emotional distance between herself and the pointy-haired boy.

(''A god or something should work. I just need a being of absolute authority.'' That should drive all other thoughts from his mind. As long as he panics for a second – no, even a split second – Rikuri Nee-san’s poison needles or wires can reach him!!)

She clenched her teeth and glared at her target.

Since the main attack was now the carbon dioxide instead of the flames and heat, the actual fire had lost some of its intensity. The curtain of dark smoke was coming apart in places.

“Ah.”

Which was why she saw it.

“Ahh!?”

He never even glanced in collapsed Amazora’s direction.

A certain boy immediately rushed toward Rikuri and swung his right first with all his might.

Rikuri must have been absolutely convinced her cornered prey was going to mercilessly rip the mask from the youngest child’s face. She had started running toward Amazora, so the boy’s attack seemed to catch her entirely off guard. She frantically tried to swing the pen-like syringe around, but she was not used to in-person combat. She had positioned the many drones in the best positions to protect collapsed and unmoving Amazora because she had never imagined the attack would be directed toward herself.

Her initial assumption had been wrong.

She could not keep up with his unexpected action.

It was like playing a game of shogi and having a piece on the edge of the board suddenly warp to the opposite side. Even if you had moved your king to the corner and set up the perfect Anaguma defense, there was no defending against that.

A great sound burst out.

He landed a clean cross counter on Rikuri while she still held the pen-like syringe in hand.

The oldest of the sisters was knocked backwards.

“How?” she asked without moving.

“…”

“You were cornered by the invisible carbon monoxide…so how could you ignore my cute little sister there?”

“''You really think I would steal that mask from her''?” spat out the pointy-haired boy. “I already ran away once.”

In the end, this was the boy’s true nature and his limit.

“I felt this awful bitterness rising from the pit of my stomach then. I had escaped the monster created by that Biohacker and I had saved myself, but that wasn’t good enough. I never want to taste that bitterness again. No matter what.”

No matter how much he hardened his heart, there was a line he could never cross. If the enemy discovered that, they could take advantage of it. That was why he had needed to hide it no matter what.

You did not say anything important aloud on the battlefield.

So he had held his tongue and bit his lip to keep it inside.

“Oh, come on.”

She even smiled a little.

Not even Kaibi had seen this look on her sister’s face before.

She looked satisfied despite being tricked.

“Say things like that and I can’t help but find you a little cute.”

She sank down.

Gokusai Rikuri’s knees gave out and she slowly collapsed.

“…”

The girl in a dress grimaced.

The many drones lost control and fell from the air.

First Sister Rikuri and Third Sister Amazora had been defeated. Measure Heart was about trickery and lacked the power needed for a finisher. yet this opponent had the Gatling gun he had stolen from the third sister.

Plus, there were two more people on the upper floors.

The girl who had ridden the motorcycle was an unknown quantity and their original target, Mitsuari Ayu, had a psychological power just like her.

The girl in a dress had deflected Mitsuari’s Mental Stinger before, but the other girl might be able to do the same to her. How much her power would be weakened in a clash against a similar esper was an unknown until she actually tested it out. And an unknown was not good enough to call a trump card.

After all, Second Sister Kaibi was their final chance.

If all three of them were captured, there would be no one left to rescue her family.

That was true whether they were being sent to Anti-Skill or the city’s dark side.

She could control emotional distances.

She could earn the public prosecutor’s trust and have them drop the case, or she could curry the favor of someone with clout in the back alleys. As long as she knew the appropriate “etiquette”, she would have an opportunity to free her precious sisters from their cells.

(In that case!!)

Once she made up her mind, there was no hesitation within her.

Even if it meant turning her back on her sisters while they lay collapsed in front of the enemy. Even if she had no way of striking back at the person who had done that to them.

She had to escape here and resume the fight at a later date.

“Ahhh!!”

Still, she was on the third floor.

She climbed over the parking garage’s concrete fence and jumped down.

She lost her balance and her vision whirled.

She fell on her back, but she survived because she landed in the bushes planted around the structure. She could not have done that on purpose, though.

She got up.

She could not hold her shoulders at the same height and she was covered in soot and mud, but she managed to leave the parking garage on unsteady legs.

After practically dragging her legs along and reaching the road, she noticed the sharp heels of her sandals had broken. She removed the unusable footwear and carried them while walking barefoot.

She was separated from the older sister who always spoiled her family and from the younger sister who was always so annoying and got into so much trouble.

“…”

She bit her lovely lips.

And she silently wept all alone.