Author's notes added 12/3

'Thinking'

"Speaking"


Chapter 4: Level 2

"Come on hurry up! We're losing them!" A certain teleporter yells back to me. "You just keep up with them, I'll take a shortcut and cut them off." I reply. I take a glance at my judgement armband, it was my first day out on the field. Turns out the same robbers who so rudely introduced me to this world struck again. A small smile appears on my face, "Time for some payback." I whisper to myself.

Adrenaline courses through me, I turn a corner and go into an alleyway I had learned about while wandering around and taking in the sights one day. I turn another corner into the street and cut them off. I give the area a quick scan and see that there are three of them, each looking as thuggish as ever. The guy in the front has a bag of money. I put my hand up and begin charging up a fire ball, this intimidates the theives. My body tempature begins to lower.

I sigh, "A bunch of theives stopped by a guy who has extra ordinary abilities, now where have I heard that one before?" I quip. I spot Kuroko turning a corner and coming towards us. "I was hoping that my first day on the job wouldn't be so generic. But I guess beggers can't be choosers." I finish while aiming my hand down near their feet and firing the fireball. It wasn't enough to hurt them but it was enough to cover the area they were in with smoke thus disorenting them.

I was about to yell out to Kuroko but a rock flys at my head, I duck and just barely dodge it. 'Hey it turns out Misaka's excuse for training was useful afterall.' I joke to myself. I didn't notice the second rock though and before long I feel a sharp pain in my stomach and I'm knocked down on my back. Before I can be pelted with any more rocks though the rock throwing thug was slammed onto the ground. I get back up to my feet and thank my teleporting savior. I take a look around and realize that she had taken out all three thugs.

"Good work you two." Uiharu's voice comes through our ear peices. "Did you really expect otherwise?" I say with bravado. Kuroko turns back to the theives, "Anti-skill will be here to pick you boys up in a few minutes." she states.

Back at judgement office 177

"Slow down Kuroko!" I yell out as she barges into the office with me trailing behind. "Uiharu run a backround check on the recently apprehended criminals." she orders. Uiharu begins typing furiosly on her computer. "What's up?" a female voice asks curiously. I turn around and spot none other than Konori Mii, de facto leader of our little group. 'And quite a looker' I shake my head to get those thoughts out of my head.

Kuroko explains herself "The theives, we've apprehended them before but there was no record of them having esper powers. A bit suspicious that only a few weeks later their leader suddenly has them don't you think?". "And this isn't the first time this has happened either, all over academy city people have suddenly either gained or enhanced their esper powers." she adds.

"Yep, the database has them all as level 0." Uiharu confirms Kuroko's suspicions. "Curioser and curioser." Konori mumbles. She takes a glance at a clock on the wall, "It's getting late, you guys should head home. We'll start a formal investigation tomorrow." she says. "A level test is coming up tommorow isn't it? We can just compare those results with what we have in the database to see if something's actually going on or if Kuroko is just being paranoid." I suggest. "Sounds good, we'll meet back here after the tests are done." Konori orders.

The next day

"Now all we want you to do is hit the target. Give it everything you have." A scientist with a clipborard tells me. "Will do!" I say enthusiastically. The scientists had explained that this machine was specially created for pyrokenetics like myself, they said that it would analyze the force and heat behind a fireball. 'Makes about as much sense as me even being here in the first place.' I decide.

I take a deep breath and begin concentrating on my body heat along with some heat from the world around me, manipulating it to gather in my palm. Eventually the fireball gets to the size of a baseball and it gets a bit unweildy the fire threatening to disperse at anytime. With a flick of my wrist the fireball is launched towards the wierd machine.

The smoke clears and some wierd numbers show up on a screen on the machine. The scientist eagerly begins to write them down. She walks back up to me and begins to explain my level and what it means. "Espers are categorized by levels, there being six in all. The levels are 0-5 with zero meaning you have no powers and five being the strongest we've recorded thus far. There are only seven level five's so don't expect to be that powerful just yet." She starts. 'Wait a minute, there are only 7 level 5's? I heard some people refer to Misaka as a level 5, so that means-' "Awesome I'm friends with a celebrity!" I exclaim. "Uh, yeah. Anyway according to our results, you are a level 2." she says blandly before walking off.

Back at Judgement office 177

"All right, what do we got?" I say while walking into the office. "Turns out Kuroko was on to something after all." Uiharu replies. All of a sudden Saten and Misaka burst into the room. "Good news, I found a lead on your investigation!" Saten exclaims while opening up her laptop. She sets the laptop down and clicks on an article. "Level Upper?" I mumble. Turns out this place is even more interesting than I first thought. The first of Academy City's conspiracies have been revealed.


Author's notes: Sorry for the one month wait, no real excuses I just kinda got lazy. Also this offically marks the end of the prologue and is the offical start to the "Level upper" arc. Doesn't really mean much but I felt it was worth noting. See you guys next time in Chapter 5: Level upper.