Chapter 8

CHAPTER 4 The Right to Become a Good Person, and the Right to Reject It
Black. 1 “They’re late…,” grumbled Aiho Yomikawa in her apartment, which was far too luxurious for a schoolteacher’s salary. “They were just going shopping at the nearby supermarket. What’s taking them so long?” “Maybe it’s good they’re goofing off a little,” pointed out Kikyou Yoshikawa, former researcher, as she lay on the soft couch watching a rebroadcast of a TV drama. “They’re kids.” “I mean, I guess so, but…” “Mmmrrr!” Unlike the two listless adults, Last Order was rather put off by all this. She kept going between the TV and the window to the veranda in spurts. “…Misaka has a bad feeling about this, says Misaka says Misaka, thinking deeply.” “?” “The new Misaka has had a jam-packed schedule lately, and Misaka still doesn’t know what that person is doing and where he is… Ah! Wait, did she steal Misaka’s spotlight?! cries Misaka cries Misaka, all shocked and stuff!!” “What do you think, Kikyou?” asked Yomikawa. “You can never underestimate a brain undergoing puberty, Aiho,” Yoshikawa replied. “Overactive imaginations can leap from one thing to the next pretty fast.” “But this Misaka hasn’t inherited that pitiful characteristic of the original! says Misaka says Misaka, springing into action!! The key to victory always lies in taking on the challenge!!” Yomikawa heard a metallic slam! “…Huh?” By the time she realized it was the sound of the door closing, the tiny girl was gone. The two adults went to the entrance, saw that the smallest pair of shoes was missing, and then frantically burst out of the apartment to search for her. 2 “That’s weird.” Hanzou looked down at his cell phone, irritated. “I can’t get in touch with Kuruwa. No matter how many times or ways I try.” “Wait, but doesn’t that mean—?” “They probably figured out I’m sheltering Fremea. Now they’re rounding up anyone likely to help me.” “We should go look for her.” “How?” Hanzou asked in reply. “By just running around? That wouldn’t give us good odds of finding her. And… And we don’t even know if she’s still alive, so—” “Exactly!” interrupted Hamazura. “So we really need to find her. Just because you lost contact with her doesn’t necessarily mean it’s too late. She might be right on the edge as we speak. Maybe she’s in too much of a rush to answer the phone. Either way, we should move. The longer we wait around, the more likely she is to die.” Hamazura began pacing slowly around the private salon, thinking. Where would they start? “Any ideas where she might have gone? Places she visits a lot?” “If she is in danger, she’d avoid her usual haunts.” “Do we have any means of locating her…? GPS, surveillance cameras, security robots—whatever might help. Is there a system we can use?” “Kuruwa usually takes routes that aren’t surveilled.” “That’s it!” Hamazura unfolded a map on the table. “There are fewer routes that aren’t being monitored. Especially when you factor in security bots. Hanzou, use a marker to draw those routes on this map. We’ve got a better chance looking along them than searching the whole city.” “Sure, there’s a few holes, but it’s called a network for a reason. It’s not gonna be that easy…” “The security bots all have specific patrol routes. After a while, they’ll cover what the others miss. The last time I saw Kuruwa, she was in District 7. Let’s mark off the safe areas in District 7 and around it, then eliminate anywhere the bots would be patrolling at this time of day.” “All right. I get it, all right?” Fremea looked at the two of them with concern, but there wasn’t time to mind her. “What should I do?” asked Hamazura as he watched the line fill up with colored partitions. “Nothing.” Hanzou shook his head. “You stay here. Fremea’s safety is our top priority.” “You can’t cover all that ground alone!” “And I can’t leave her by herself! We can’t expose all of us to danger! It’s out of the question!” The two of them glared at each other for a while. Hamazura was the first to look away. “Shit,” he spat, looking around the room. “…And this place won’t be good for much longer, either.” “I’m heading out,” said Hanzou. “Take care of Fremea while I’m gone. This building has three exits. If it comes down to it, Hamazura, you should take her and run.” “I promise.” Hamazura nodded. “Make sure to bring Kuruwa back.” After a quick tag-out palm slap, Hanzou left the private salon. When the door closed, Hamazura felt like the silence was melting into the air. And then there were two, he thought, probably jinxing the entire thing. 3 Umidori Kuroyoru was extremely conspicuous. She was around twelve, with black hair that reached her shoulder blades, save for a single tuft of hair near her ears that she’d dyed blond. She had a white coat on, but her arms weren’t in the sleeves; she wore only the hood, pulled up over her head. Underneath were punk-style clothes featuring black leather and studs that constricted her petite frame. Most would have expected to find someone who looked like her on a stage, not randomly walking around the city. And the inflatable dolphin she carried under her arm added an entirely different sort of surrealness to her getup. She didn’t bother sneaking around. Instead, she walked straight into the private-salon building through the front entrance. Taking the escalator to the second floor, she headed right for the counter—which looked like the desk in a hotel lobby—and spoke to the young part-timer working there. “I’m looking for two people,” she said. “Shiage Hamazura and Fremea Seivelun. I know they’re using this establishment right now. I’d like to know what floor and what room they’re in.” “Ma’am, I can’t…,” said the young man, putting on a businesslike smile at first. But he saw that her expression was entirely unchanged, and he went over the protocol for these situations in his head. He’d play it by the book. “This establishment takes its guests’ confidentiality seriously. I’m sorry, but I can’t divulge any information related to who is using what rooms.” This was one of the most basic rules of customer service. Besides, the point of private salons was to give their customers a reprieve from being under the otherwise-constant gazes of adults. Giving client information to everyone who came in looking for it went against the salons’ very purpose. But then Kuroyoru smiled a little. “No, it’s okay,” she said. “They might be using false names, so I just wanted to ask to make sure.” “I, um. I see.” The part-timer wasn’t quite sure whether to confirm or deny that one. Kuroyoru continued, saying to herself, “And getting the answer or not here doesn’t change what I have to do anyway.” “?” The young man’s question never found a voice. A moment later, something zoomed past his face, then crashed into the wall behind him—right into the anachronistic public phone installed in case of emergencies. It had traveled at a blinding speed, the force behind it tearing the phone apart—and left a dent in the wall, dozens of centimeters wide. If that had hit someone, they would have died. The young man squealed in panic, but he’d already realized the girl hadn’t thrown it herself. The other guests didn’t make a fuss—they weren’t able to. The girl was so obviously dangerous and abnormal that no one dared move. Something strange was floating in the air right behind her—a ring-shaped machine about seventy centimeters across. On the inside of the ring was a propeller shaped like a shower visor for little kids, providing the machine with lift and propulsion. And all around the outside of the ring were chain-like blades. The portions that protruded from it could catch onto objects, then build up centrifugal force before releasing them at the perfect time to wreak optimal destruction. As if to explain that mechanism, the blades of the machine hooked onto a metal trash can and began whipping it around and around. Within just a few seconds, it was going so fast that it was leaving afterimages. But the young man didn’t have time to scream. Suddenly, he heard an awful screeching, like cogs squealing against one another, come from the thick walls behind him. Gree-gree-gree-gree!!! No, that wasn’t quite right—it was more like several chain-saw blades were tearing through the wall from the outside. Breaking it down. Not cutting it, but demolishing it to get inside. “Wha…wha…?!” He couldn’t even turn around; multiple chain saws were already just a few millimeters away from his neck. Four lethal disks, one in each direction. Now he couldn’t even sink to his knees. One sneeze, and his head would go flying. “Don’t kill him,” said Kuroyoru, sounding peeved. “Not yet anyway.” She seemed to be talking to whoever was controlling the machines rather than the machines themselves. I suppose it’s best to keep it easy to understand, she thought, kicking away a metallic magazine rack that was as tall as she was. It fell apart, the metal parts scattering; she grabbed one shaped like a club, then used it to lightly tap the killer disks that were almost touching the young man’s neck. The part-timer squealed pathetically again, but the disks didn’t move in the slightest. Somehow, they were being held in place there so precisely that a casual observer would have assumed they were bolted onto a platform. Kuroyoru’s metal club was sliced through diagonally in a shower of sparks and a cacophony of screeching metal. She prodded the young man’s brow with its sharpened, uneven tip. “You don’t seem to understand, so let me explain. This isn’t one of those torture scenes from TV or movies. I don’t need to get that information from you.” The man, sweating all over in tension and terror, heard a series of screaming and stomping noises from above—on the floor above them. This wasn’t the only place where chaos was erupting. Killer disks flew through the air, slicing through walls and windows. The assailants would have no problem getting to the upper levels. “It doesn’t matter whether you squeal or not. I’ll get my answer either way,” said Kuroyoru slowly. “So? I’d be glad to kill you for nothing, if you want.” That got him to reveal the room number. He even lent her the master key used by maintenance workers. Decent results, if she had to say so herself. The girl discarded the metal club, leaving the counter in a good mood. Then she tossed the inflatable dolphin under her arm into the air; by some mechanism, possibly magic tape, it landed on the back of her coat and stuck there. “Now then!” she said, opening her now free hands a little. “Time to get serious about the job, I guess.” With a boom, two colorless, translucent spears erupted from her palms. Weapons born of something only students of this city were given: an ability. 4 Shizuri Mugino stood on the side of the road, unsure of what to do. She’d run out of clues in her competition with the other members of Item to find Hamazura first and avoid being humiliated by their bet, so that was part of it. But there was another, more direct reason she was baffled. She had no idea why, but a little girl who looked about ten was clinging to the hem of her coat. She had short brown hair, and her face exuded energy. …I feel like I’ve seen her before… Where was it? I know it was in one of the reports… “What do you want?” Mugino demanded. “Please stop that bee-bee-bee for a moment, requests Misaka requests Misaka. The waves are already faint, so if you do that, it makes it harder for Misaka to find him, explains Misaka explains Misaka.” “…?” Mugino furrowed her brow. But not because she didn’t understand what the girl was talking about. …How did she know about my false eye and hand? “That bee-bee-bee! No more bee-bee-bee!” Annoyed at the girl tugging on her coat, Mugino switched off her false eye for the time being. Her field of vision narrowed somewhat, and her depth perception took a hit, but it wasn’t bad enough to get in the way of going about her day. The mysterious little girl slightly swung her head left and right, the stray strands of hair on the top of her head swaying in the wind. “Okay, Misaka has him! says Misaka says Misaka, finding her target’s position. Ugh, it’s real tough scanning for someone without a regular network account, says Misaka says Misaka, trying to sound like a proper command tower.” Does she have a search ability like Takitsubo? wondered Mugino. But the situation wasn’t yet urgent, so she didn’t ask the girl to search for Hamazura, too. “…That’s one crazy coat you have there,” Mugino remarked instead. “Whoa, what is this? The fur is so thick.” “Heh-heh-heh! It was made in the Elizalina Alliance of Independent Nations, brags Misaka brags Misaka. But yours looks warm, too. Misaka wonders if it’s made of super-lightweight cold-resistant fibers, the kind made of tiny tubes filled with air, says Misaka says Misaka in a very knowledgeable way and stuff.” She swung the hem of her coat and skirt up and down together with a rustle, flapping them like wings. And then she noticed something. “But your underwear seems pretty cold, says Misaka says Misaka in surprise.” “That’s how it’s made,” Mugino replied. “It takes a lot of work being the token sexy one of the group, you know.” After their random conversation, the two of them parted ways—each to look for someone. Anyone who knew Number Four’s past would have probably been shocked by this exchange, but this was just another indication of how Shizuri Mugino’s personality was shifting. 5 It happened a few minutes after Hanzou left the room. Something in Hamazura’s mind was very subtly prodding at him—an unpleasant sensation. After thinking over it for a moment, he realized what it was. Although the room was soundproofed relatively well, he could hear people making a commotion outside. Not just from one direction, either. He felt like the noise was coming from all over the place.