Editing Toaru Majutsu no Index:GT Volume1 Chapter2 (section)

===Part 2===

“Phew,” sighed Misaka Mikoto.

She was back in her blazer uniform.

The heat gathered within her clothing was still hard to miss, though.

She decided she needed to think about something else or she would cross the 42 degree border and die.

(Ugh, I feel like that kitty keeps avoiding me. Is it because of the weak EM waves I passively emit? That’s always depressing.)

They had played a few more games of darts since then.

Not only had she started with more knowledge, but she was accustomed to the mentality of ''aiming and shooting''. Her Personal Reality was tailored in that direction. When looking at the overall score, she had crushed the competition. And the limited number of male costumes had presented a problem for the special rule they had come up with. They had a penalty set up whenever someone went bust, but after that pointy-haired boy had done so several times in a row, they had run out of punishment costumes for him.

(Oh, god. And I can make a pretty good guess why he’s too preoccupied to play right, so I can’t even say anything!!)

She just about remembered what happened and felt her temperature starting to rise, so she fanned her cheek with her hand.

They were taking a short break between games, so she had snuck into the back to escape the main floor where the boy and other girl were. The door to the bathroom was here, as was a little shop with some custom goods to buy. They were of course darts. Those did not affect the score too much (and if special parts did influence it that much, the organization in charge of intentional matches would ban them), but people who were into the game could still be particular about it. Mikoto was fine with the rented darts, so to her, those looked little different from homemade parts for a bright and shining fishing lure.

Her Christmas Eve was passing by without incident.

Or so it seemed.

“…”

But at the same time, she kept feeling a tingling sensation along her spine. These were human eyes, not a machine. That would be why she had spent so long thinking before each throw during their last game before this break.

When she looked toward the exit right now, she saw nothing there.

But when she looked away, she once more sensed a presence there.

She doubted this was a figment of her imagination.

When she used the street security cameras or the security robot lenses to observe things outside, she could not see anything, suggesting whoever this was had chosen the perfect angle to hide.

She could tell where they were, but they would duck away and hide the instant she turned that way. They were clearly observing her.

She was enjoying her freedom while skipping out on Tokiwadai’s school event, but she doubted any of her schoolmates or teachers would behave like this.

(This seems more dangerous, doesn’t it?)

There was more to Academy City than the pamphlets let on.

There were real threats here.

Whether it was simple back-alley delinquents or the wealthy looking down upon the city from their administrative building, there were ominous shadows and villains here. And they were not all separated out into neat categories; it was a complex tangle of villainy. The adults would boss around the dropout students to have them do crimes or many researchers would serve a single dangerous genius.

In that sense, being Academy City’s #3 made it easy for her to get caught up in that sort of trouble.

She was not some sheltered girl who was afraid of the unknown darkness out there. She had seen a ''large project'' using her own DNA map.

(I need to check this out.)

This was why she had suggested they take a short break.

She hated how smoothly she could switch between being open with people to keeping secrets from them, but if this abnormal attention was due to her being a Level 5, it made no sense to get those other two involved.

“And on Christmas Eve of all days.”

She grumbled to herself, released the electronic lock on the staff only door next to the bathroom door, and walked in. The door locked automatically, so she let the door shut on its own and then opened the stainless steel smoke vent on the wall near the ceiling. It was about three meters up, but she could move freely up the wall by using magnetism to cling to it. She nimbly climbed outside.

The classic interior was gone and now she was looking at the exterior that looked like a few metal storage containers joined together. This was probably an application of plastic construction using large parts made with a 3D printer. She could cling to it via magnetism thanks to the rebar placed inside to increase its sturdiness.

And while she had not done much, freedom of movement was the best way to lose someone tailing you. Just like you could escape pursuit more easily with a helicopter or submarine.

However…

(The main floor’s security cameras… don’t show anything.)

She used her power to send the darts bar’s security camera footage to her phone, but that did not help. In fact, the footage itself was frozen. It was hard to tell at a glance, but it had been modified so no one could tell if someone passed by directly below the cameras.

She would have to check with her own eyes.

She still felt the gaze piercing her as she used the rear emergency exit to return to the darts bar. She circled around to move back to the previous staff only door.

(The electronic lock and the smoke vent should stop someone who doesn’t have the same power as me. I don’t know why this person is after me, but now I can sneak up behind them.)

Of course, there was a risk of them feeling trapped and striking back. It would take a lot to bring down the #3, but Academy City’s darker parts could provide a lot. There were no absolutes in this field, so she felt a weight in the pit of her stomach as she approached the previous door.

“Eh?”

The staff only door was cracked open.

The lock had not been broken. It had been electronically opened.

“Just like I did!?”

She jumped back from the cracked door as if she had seen a crocodile’s jaws there.

This should not have been possible.

She was the #3 of Academy City’s seven Level 5s. No one should have been able to use the exact same power as her.

Not understanding the situation could be deadly in a battle with an esper.

It was like looking at the shogi or chess board and seeing a mysterious kid’s meal toy on the board. No matter how much of an advantage your arrangement of pieces gave you, that piece could take your king in a single move depending on how it moved.

(This is bad.)

This was worse than she had imagined.

Before even considering the specifics of distance, direction, number, obstacles, and attack method, this mystery person had stolen the general idea of “the initiative” and that clutched at her heart. How many turns had she fallen behind in this one second? If they had maliciously set up the shogi board with the intent of robbing her of her freedom, they would already be in the perfect position to slit her throat at any moment.

The enemy had opened the staff only door’s electronic lock and moved within. But what about the other obstacle – the smoke vent? Instead of opening the door and checking inside, wouldn’t it be better to blast through the door and storm inside?

She considered using her Railgun.

She had enough firepower to warrant that name.

(This is bad!!)

She reflexively reached for her skirt pocket and confirmed the presence of the arcade coin there with her thumb.

And then…

“Oh.”

She heard something through the cracked door.

It was a voice.

And to her surprise, this was no stranger.

“I see. I get that you were lost, but only the workers are supposed to go in here. Let’s head on out and I can take you to someone who works here.”

Lost?

That word and the tone of voice took the edge off of her mood, but she also recognized the voice itself. It belonged to that pointy-haired boy she had been playing darts with not long before.

(What is happening here?)

Was this an esper who looked like him? Or were they using a next-generation weapon that could change what you looked like? Or maybe it was the voice itself that had been modified.

But this meant she could not fire an arcade coin through the door at thrice the speed of sound without any warning. She was too afraid to launch an attack without checking first.

“…”

While working to remain as stealthy as possible, she placed her hand on the staff only door. Then she gradually applied pressure to push it inwards. The crack between the door and doorframe widened.

That high school boy was down on all fours like a dog with a diminutive dominatrix of about 10 standing on him with her bare feet.

“Again, you can’t reach that hole! It’s too high up! If you want to head out back, then use the kitchen door or the emergency exit!!”

“But Misaka can deduce that the Original left through here, says Misaka as Misaka sees some magnetized metal and reveals how perfect a detective she would make! Misaka can’t reach the truth without passing through that smoke vent!!”

The pig boy receiving the blessing of her bare feet required no further explanation at this point.

The small girl, on the other hand, had shoulder-length chestnut hair, a triumphant expression, and a thick outdoor coat worn over a thin dress. That made her upper body very fluffy, but her legs were entirely bare, giving her an imbalanced appearance and making her blindingly bright thighs look all the more risqué.

Perhaps Mikoto should have considered the possibility once someone was using the same methods as her.

It made sense this girl could use her powers since she had the exact same DNA map as Misaka Mikoto. Although her actual power output could not match Mikoto’s.

Her apparent age was very different, but individual parts, such as the chestnut hair and lively face, were the same as Mikoto’s.

“What are you doing here?”

“Gasp!? I-is this a case of the culprit returning to the scene of the crime!? says Misaka as Misaka nervously turns around.”

“Get off of that barbaric boy first!!”

That was not any way to speak to a young girl, but it had to be said first and foremost here.

Except Mikoto’s frantic demand caused the barefoot girl to slip. Her hips fell straight down, causing her small butt to land right on the crawling boy like he was her chair.

“Gyah! Squeal!?”

“Oh, nice catch, says Misaka as Misaka gives you a perfect score while continuing to sit on you.”

The spiky-haired (pig) boy trembled and seemed unable to respond.

Mikoto could not imagine how much that would hurt, nor did she want to. That kind of experience was not necessary to live a full life.

Also, hadn’t that boy run into trouble with a different little girl just the night before? She did not really believe in fortunetelling, but was her joke about bad luck with little girls actually true?

Anyway…

(Was she the one I sensed watching me?)

“I don’t know what’s going on with you, but should you really be out on your own? What is your caretaker doing?”

She put a hand on her hip and softly sighed, but then…

“You are correct, Original. That is why Misaka here was out searching for that runaway moron, faithfully reports Misaka.”

A voice spoke from directly behind her.

A quiet but solid sound soon followed.

Mikoto’s shoulders jumped and she quickly turned around to see a girl of about 14 who really did look exactly like her. That girl was looking to her with emotionless eyes.

She wore special goggles on her forehead and the metallic noise from before had been her slowly decocking the hammer of her handgun with her thumb.

But something surprised Mikoto more than that dangerous toy that should not have existed in Japan’s capital.

“Wait, really? How did you sneak up behind me?”

“It is true you have an anti-personnel radar that eliminates your blind spots by emitting faint microwaves in all directions and detecting the reflected waves, but it does have a weakness, explains Misaka with a smug grin. Electromagnetic waves are indeed waves, so as long as you know the frequency being used, you can negate them by sending out a reverse phase wave. Grin.”

Despite what she said about grinning, her face remained devoid of expression.

She was one of the Sisters, mass-produced military clones of the #3 Level 5 who were meant to artificially reproduce the Railgun but had not been able to match the original’s power.

Also, the 20,000 Sisters were linked by a weak brainwave network and Last Order, a special unit, had been created in order to control the network and prevent the Sisters as a whole from rebelling. Last Order had likely been intentionally kept younger than the rest so the researchers could more easily force that role onto her. Her purpose as a safety measure was meaningless if she led the rebellion herself.

Academy City had concentrated the negative side of science and technology like crazy.

But the fact remained that none of it would have happened without her initial foolish action.

She could easily identify Last Order as #20001, but it was hard to tell apart the other Sisters, so she asked a simple question of the girl with thick goggles on her forehead.

“What’s your serial number?”

For some reason, the identical girl opened the chest of her jacket and showed off the heart-shaped necklace there.

“Misaka is your #10032, says Misaka while showing off a slight monopolistic tendency.”

“Why aren’t you looking at me while you say that? Why are you staring at that pig boy who’s being that little girl’s chair?”

“Must Misaka repeat the part about a smug grin? asks Misaka. Because she will. As many times as necessary.”

The sisters formed a single giant brain through the network link, but Mikoto had also heard that the specific clones grew more individual the more they learned on their own. So was this a case where a clone was developing in a strange new direction? She gained the kind but pitying eyes of someone seeing a self-proclaimed genius girl who had been so fixated on memorizing pi or train station names that she failed to learn how to do anything other than that.

“M-Misaka Imouto?”

“Yes?”

“Please do something about this extreme tomboy sitting on me. Any more of this and my hips…squeal…my hips won’t last.”

“Understood. This Misaka – your #10032 – shall rescue you from this crisis while the Original stands uselessly over in the corner. Grin, grin.”

“You weren’t infected by some weird virus, were you?” asked Mikoto. “Actually, acting like this without a virus might be worse.”

Some said that it was harder to fix an AI that had been unmaliciously taught mistaken things than one that had its code or parameters malicious rewritten by a virus. Mikoto stared into the distance while hoping she could treat this like an idiosyncrasy and not a weakness.

“Misaka hates being made to work for the benefit of ''that side of things'', says Misaka to express her stance here. And while Misaka will respect Last Order’s free will and let her do as she wishes, this Misaka sides with the pointy-haired Level 0, not the albino Level 5.”

The tension ruling this place had vanished like it had been a mere illusion.

While making a mental note to look into how her anti-personnel radar could be negated, Mikoto was pleased to see she was not being immediately confronted with the dark side of Academy City ''which had found it hilarious to create 20,000 clones''.

She breathed a sigh of relief.

She had been overly cautious here for the same reason that victims of burglary could never relax until they had checked over and over to make sure their windows and doors were locked before they went out. She did not like carrying around the scars of that old incident like this, but it could not hurt to err on the side of caution. The unit the boy had called Misaka Imouto was #10032 and none of the preceding number existed any longer. Mikoto never wanted to find herself in a situation like that again. Never ever.

Misaka Imouto placed her arms below small Last Order’s arms and lifted her up, finally giving the boy his freedom back. He placed his hands on the wall and slowly stood up before tapping on his lower back like an old man.

“I-I just about had my hips destroyed after an awfully powerful girl assaulted me on Christmas Eve.”

“Please rephrase that.”

“Silly Original. When an innocent boy unwittingly says something of that nature, it is in fact an intellectual puzzle where you replace the context in your mind for your own enjoyment, says Misaka while she lectures this rookie on how to properly entertain yourself. You must not interrupt this game for classy ladies and gentlemen. You simply remain silent and grin.”

They still had to find out why Last Order had left her hospital or apartment or whatever to wander the streets, but it was time to end this little meeting. It would look odd for them to remain in this staff-only office for too long and they would stand out even more with three girls who looked exactly the same (even if Last Order was a different age). They might be able to claim to be two twins and a younger sister, but clones were banned by international treaties. And since the researchers might coldly decide to kill the clones and eliminate the evidence if word of their existence got out, “might be able to” was too risky a gamble to make when not absolutely necessary.

(So I guess we can’t just enjoy playing darts together.)

She hated having to exclude the clones like this, but trying to force it to happen held the greater risk of ruining any chance of a happy and uneventful Christmas Eve. That was not what she wanted for the clones.

Someday, even they would be able to walk freely out in the open.

Buying time for that to happen would be the best choice here.

“Let’s get out of here. Who knows when an employee will come to this office during a break.”

At the very least, there had been no suspicious pursuers or attackers.

Confident of that, Mikoto let out a sigh and prepared to bring this to an end.

But that was when it happened.

Something slammed into the building from outside and the sturdy modern architecture of the office was fully split apart.