Chapter 7:

Koizumi, Nagato and Misaka san:

After being with Nagato and Misaka san for a few minutes, Koizumi couldn't help but feel a little… left out, both girls just walked together perfectly synchronized and didn't even seem to acknowledge his presence all that much, not only that but every once in a while they'd look at each other and nod, so it was obvious they were communicating somehow.

"Something's wrong?"

Both girls had just stopped walking completely and turned around at the same time.

"It seems there's trouble… Nagato says worried"

"What do you mean?"

"We received a report from Misaka 12854, it seems that Touma kun, Kyon kun, Suzumiya san and another subject went inside an abandoned factory after chasing a cat that was behaving strangely… Misaka informs of the situation."

Koizumi bit his thumb and made a troubled expression "Crap! I was too careless… Nagato san, Ichigo san I believe the best course of action would be to go there and make sure everything is alright."

They both nodded to show they agreed with him, as they were running towards the place Koizumi got close to Nagato.

"Nagato san, could you please send Asahina san a message, I hate to involve her in this, but Kanzaki san doesn't have a cell phone and if worse comes to worse we'll definitely need her help."

She nodded and little after that her eyes shined briefly "Done… Nagato informs."

They arrived in front of the facility near the same door Haruhi used to get in, however this time there were two girls standing in the entrance blocking the way, Koizumi recognized them as the ones that had been accompanying the meltdowner last week.

"Hello, I wonder if you could let us pass. We have some business to attend in this building."

One of the girls took a step forward, she was wearing a purple vest with a hood that barely let anyone see her face.

"I'm afraid that's not possible, I can't go into details but is dangerous right now…"

As she said those words there was a little explosion in one of the top floors of the main building,

"…see, you'll get hurt if you go in there."

As a few pieces debris were falling, Koizumi's expression changed, long gone was the gentle smile now replaced with a serious glare.

"Let's just get to the point already, you know why we are here and you also know it's foolish to get in our way, now if you could please just step aside peacefully."

The other girl emerged from behind the one that just talked, she had black hair and was kind of plain looking, to be honest she remind Koizumi of that girl that was hanging out with Tsuruya san recently, but this was not the time to think about that.

"Yes, it's true that under normal circumstances, it'd be impossible for us to stop you from entering for more than 10 seconds, but…" she pulled out a vial of liquid, drank it and her expression changed completely, her eyes were blank and it seemed like she was possessed "...with my ability , the impossible becomes easy."

She opened her arms and seemed to enchant something like Nagato always does, suddenly the area around them turned completely different, it looked like something out of a science fiction movie.

"Data jurisdiction space… how is this possible? Nagato ask confused."

"My AIM stalker allows me to memorize and track the position of any AIM field; I can also copy it to a certain degree." she waved her arms and several icicles made from the nearby fence flew towards them, Nagato quickly pushed Koizumi and Ichigo away before she set up a shield to stop them.

"Contact with the exterior broken, connection with the Misaka network ceased." Nagato speech pattern went back to normal as she quickly looked at Misaka san "Ichigo, give me battle support please"She nodded and immediately after both turned towards Koizumi.

"Ok, I understand, please take care of this you two." He stood up and moved away from the battlefield.

When he was out of the way, Misaka san quickly picked her bag and pulled out a Sub-Machine gun that was inside, she aimed as fast a she could and fired several round towards the black haired girl.

"Useless." The girl with the hood stood in front of her friend almost immediately and all the bullets literally bounced off her. "My offence armor won't break just with a few gun shots… although I do appreciate that you're using rubber ammo, wouldn't want anyone to get hurt over this."

The black haired girl shot yet another wave of icicles towards them, this time Nagato had already set up a shield that protected them without having to move, then she quickly made a sign to Misaka san who shoot once again, as the girl with the hood moved to protect her friend, Nagato dashed as fast as she could towards them, she tried to hit the black haired girl in the back of her head so she could render her unconscious, but the other one got in the way of her blow which was repelled by an strange substance.

"Nitrogen?"

As she said this, the black haired girl grabbed her friend and jumped back several meters into the air using yet another wave of icicles to cover her retreat, once they landed it was easy to note she looked tired and maybe a little sick, the hooded girl tried to support her to prevent her from falling.

"Takitsubo, are you ok?"

"Yes…" she calmed herself and recovered her composure "… I can still go on for a little longer."

They stood up and quickly took the formation they had been using before… just in time as Nagato and Misaka san were closing in on them.

"I see, judging by your behavior it's easy to conclude that you're not trying to win the fight, but rather you're satisfied with just stalling from time."

"That's right!..." the girl with the hood made a little pose with her arm extended with a peace sign and even blinked one of her eyes. "…We're not stupid you know, based on the info we got it's impossible for us to defeat you in combat even with AIM stalker copying your ability because its usage is limited, but that's not needed anyway, isn't that right Takitsubo?"

"It's correct Kinuhata…" the girl with the black hair also made the same pose that the other one was making. "…we even have orders to retreat as soon as the situation becomes dangerous."

Nagato's mouth arched a little bit downwards "I assume that the fact that you're so willing to participate in meaningless conversation in the middle of a fight it's also part of your strategy to buy time and prevent something fatal happening to you."

Both girls nodded. "Yep, you guessed it; it's a brilliant plan, we even set up that meeting a week ago so Takitsubo could practice a little before the fight and used her detection abilities to make sure we could intercept you without problems."

Nagato's mouth arched a little bit more to the point that it was almost noticeable for the casual observer… I guess she didn't like to be fooled like this. "Ichigo, give me your hand." Misaka san obeyed her and once they touched a few sparks came out of their hands.

"Direct connection accomplished, initiating 'Railgun' emulation program." As she said this words, Ichigo san's eyes suddenly shined and became brownish like her Oneesama's were, she quickly snapped her fingers and a huge bolt of lightning fell on the two girls shocking them almost to the point of unconsciousness, they both kneeled on the floor supporting each other from falling completely, while the girl with the hood (which had just burned enough to show her short brownish hair completely.) tried to speak.

"What was that? There wasn't anything about this in our data, that girl shouldn't be able to use her powers like this."

"It's a secret program I've developing in cooperation with the members of the Misaka network, the idea is to utilize my superior processing capabilities to help any member achieve power of similar scale to that of the level 5 esper Misaka Mikoto, it's was made to be used in emergencies that required to get superior firepower for a brief amount of time, but since access to the network had been cut off it was only possible to accomplish it through a direct connection. "

Nagato once again grabbed Ichigo's hand.

"Now, I only augmented her processing capabilities 15 times when I just used it, according to the documentation I was provided by the system administrator, 20000 sisters are equivalent in power to 128 railguns, so I could easily augment her powers 156.25 times without any kind of problem… I suggest you reconsider keeping this data jurisdiction space in place."

They both yelled and hugged each other as their hands sparked once again.

"Ok, ok we'll let it go, Takitsubo was about to reach her limit anyway."

The space around them suddenly returned to complete normal; however there was something odd about the sky.

"The position of the sun does not match… you used a time distortion program to make time in the data space flow slower than in regular…"

She turned towards the girls once again but they had fled the scene, as she was going to pursue them Koizumi stopped her.

"Let them, go, we have wasted enough time as it is."

"Yes you're correct…" her eyes shined briefly "…Nagato agrees."

As soon as she reconnected to the network they all looked at the building and noticed a huge hole could be seen on the top floor.

"We better move on, it obvious they need our support over there."

Koizumi tried to run towards the place, but…

"Wait, I've an idea that will take us there faster… Nagato says confident…"


Asahina san and Kanzaki san:

A few minutes had passed since both girls separated from the rest of the brigade and they still hadn't said a thing to each other, in the middle of this uncomfortable silence it was Asahina san who spoke first.

"Kanzaki san, may I ask you something?"

"What is it Asahina san?"

"I was wondering if you could listen to me and maybe give me some advice."

"Sure, go ahead."

"Well… you see…" she took a deep breath before continuing "… I'm kind of jealous of you… I mean you've only been with us for less than a week and Suzumiya san already appreciates you more than me."

"I see… It's true that thanks to that incident with the Kendo club captain she seems have taken me as a role model, but I don't think that means the she likes me more than you."

"But… ever since then she hasn't made you wear any embarrassing costumes and after the match she even let you get dressed by yourself… while me… I'm still just her toy…"

"That doesn't mean she likes me more… it only means that she now sees me as an older sister, and also I don't think you're a toy to her, more like a younger sister she likes to tease."

"But, she once said that I was…"

"Asahina san, I think Haruhi san it's the kind of person that's not good at communicating with other people, she gets carried away easily by the situation and might say something she doesn't really mean, so I wouldn't take all she says literally."

"I suppose that makes sense but then… I… I just can't understand her!"

"Of course you can't… because God always acts in mysterious ways."

Both girls looked at each other eyes and chuckled.

"I feel a little better now, thank you Kanzaki san."

"No need for formalities, you can call me Kaori."

"Ok Kaori… you can call me by my name too if you like."

"Of course Mikuru… "

"By the way there is something else I want to ask you…"

"What could it be?"

"I don't want to sound rude but I'm just too curious about this… how come you were so embarrassed on Monday? No offense, but that outfit you're wearing now it's just as revealing. "

"Well that's…" Kaori blushed a little "…it was the skirt… I'm just no good with those things, especially when they're so short, I mean it feels like everyone can see my…"

In that instant Asahina san's phone received a message.

"It's Nagato san, it seems Suzumiya san and Kyon kun are together with Touma san and another girl inside a nearby factory… Koizumi kun suspects it may be a trap set up by that group that's after us."

"I see… we better move on then, there's a chance they might need our help."

"Kaori… you can go there by yourself… I'm not good at fighting so I'll just get in your way."

"I'm afraid that's not a good idea, there's the chance the enemy is aware of us and they might even take you hostage if you're alone, so it's better if we stick together."

"But…"

"Look, don't worry about it, maybe this is all a misunderstanding and if anything bad happens I promise I'll protect you."

Asahina san blushed a little "Ok Kaori I'm counting on you..."

Both girls ran towards the factory, however they arrived at the back of the facility and needed to go through another building before arriving to where Haruhi was.

"It's kind of creepy, don't you think Kaori?"

"Sure it is, with all this machinery lying around."

"I guess this must be where they assembled the toys."

"What do you mean? The sign outside said this used to be a clothes factory."

"Then why are all this dolls lying around..."

In front of Asahina san was a stuffed rabbit, she tried to pick it up but…

"Watch out Mikuru!"

Kanzaki san pushed her away as the stuffed toy exploded, they flew several meters in the air, crashing into the floor violently, Asahina san was the first to stand up completely unharmed, not only had Kanzaki san protected her from the explosion but from the fall as well.

"Kaori, are you ok?"

"Yeah, I'm fine…" She tried to stand up but stopped midway, her face showing horrible pain.

"Let me see your back!" She forcibly turned Kanzaki san around and noticed a good part of her back was burnt together with a little bit of her left arm.

"Kaori…"

"Don't worry, this is nothing! Concentrate in our surroundings instead."

She looked around and noticed there were hundreds of dolls just like the one that just exploded scattered around the whole place, to make matters worse Kanzaki san had thrown away her nodachi to protect her.

"Crap, I missed… oh well nothing that can't be fixed."

Kanzaki san managed to stand up this time and noticed a blond girl with a beret that just appeared near the exit of the building.

"Who are you?"

"I am the guardian of this place…" She bowed"…I'm afraid I can't let you pass."

"I see… I suppose I was too naïve."

She turned her face slightly towards Asahina san so she could see her without losing sight of her target.

"Mikuru… run!"

"But Kaori…"

"Run! I'll take care of this!"

Looking at how serious she was… Asahina san could only nod and run away towards the entrance.

"So I guess it's just you and me… oh well according to the data we got that other girl is useless anyway."

Kanzaki san ignored her and tried to chant a spell but…

"I won't let you!" The blond girl pulled out several portable missiles and fired them towards her, she had no choice but to dodge and despite the pain she managed to move out of the way, however… "shhhhhh" she heard a buzzing sound behind her, she tried to move again, but the pain from her burns prevented her from doing this fast enough and a second later a doll exploded launching her several meters into the air.

"I don't know the details but our informant told me that I shouldn't let you do that… what are you a witch or something?" she laughed.

Kanzaki san managed to stand up, but the pain in her back was getting to the point of being unbearable… noticing this, the blond girl began moved walking towards her.

"You know, this is almost disappointing… I kind of expected a nice fight but I guess this is what you get for protecting useless weaklings."

"You! Mikuru is not useless!"

"Yeah, yeah whatever… just die!"

The blond girl let several weird tools fall on the floor over some white tape, quickly tracing it with her eyes, Kanzaki san noticed they were connected to several dolls positioned right behind her…

"I see… so this is how it works…" She couldn't help but smile at how easy she had been tricked.

"Goodbye…" The blond girl laughed, but… "Kaori!" she turned around to see Asahina san tossing Kanzaki san's nodachi towards her, she tried to catch it but was unable as it landed securely on its owner hands, who didn't waste time in using it…

"Nanasen!"

She drew her sword and several almost invisible strings sliced through the concrete of the building and stopped the chain reaction in the tape, however they didn't stop there as they moved towards the blond girl (who was now yelling gibberish.) but fortunately for her Asahina san jumped and pushed her out of the way.

"What are you doing Mikuru?"

Asahina san just looked directly into her eyes.

"Thou shall not kill Kaori."

Kanzaki san chuckled briefly.

"Indeed thou shall not." They laughed together.

The blond girl looked at them confused, but before she had a chance to move Asahina san hit the nape of her neck rendering her completely unconscious.

"Wow! Mikuru, where did you learn to do that?"

She let the girl fall into the floor and then turned around and made a little pose "its classified information"

Kanzaki san smiled and tried to answer but the pain from her burns had finally beaten her, she kneeled on the floor trying to rest, Asahina san got close to her to help.

"Kaori, are you ok? Sorry because of me you had to…"

"I'm… ok… Mikuru… tell me something… are you an esper of some sort?"

"Kaori , that's… classified information." However her body betrayed her as she shook her head slightly.

"I see… then I guess you can help me with this…"

She helped Kanzaki san move towards a nearby office and went to gather several objects in the factory she requested, when she returned, Kanzaki san had drawn a weird circle with a star on a table, and then took all the items that Asahina san brought her and placed them in the circle.

"What's this Kaori?"

"This represents the room we are in… Mikuru listen to me we're going to perform a magic spell that will heal me, so I need you to follow my instructions perfectly, bad timing could cause reverse effects."

She swallowed "Ok, just tell me what I should do."

"Please follow my chant…"

They recited a spell together and suddenly the objects in the table began resonating with the ones on the room, it felt like the entire place was shaking.

"It linked… Mikuru, Imagine a golden angel, a figure with two beautiful wings."

Asahina san did as she was told, she tried to visualize an angel with all of her strength, as she was doing it felt like there was another presence in the room, she opened her eyes and saw the figure of the angel she was imagining, completely marveled at the scene she saw how Kanzaki san levitated a little and some weird energy moved around the room, it focused on her wounds completely healing them and even fixing her clothes… when it was done both the angel and the energy disappeared and Kanzaki san fell slightly into her arms.

"Kaori, are you ok?"

"Thank you Mikuru, you saved me not once but twice today."

"Don't worry about that, you protected me as you promised, so it was the least I could do… but what did just happened?"

Kanzaki san stood up on her own and fixed her clothes.

"We created a field using the unseen mana of this place; since it succeeded it was possible to heal my wounds."

"I see…" she wanted to ask what she meant with "reverse effect" but that wasn't important right now as suddenly a huge explosion could be heard from the direction of the main building.

"Ok, now that we are done, it's time to go where Haruhi san is…"

"Yes, let's go…"


Touma, Haruhi, Index san and me:

We have just entered the facility when I started to notice something strange about this building, the whole place was arranged oddly, I mean the furniture and other stuff was laid out as if trying to guide us towards the next floor, not to mention that Index san's cat was acting too weird, every time we tried to approach him, even when he was completely calmed he would get scared and run away when we got too close, definitely not a natural reaction in the slightest.

"Come on Sphinx, what's wrong with you?"

"Yeah, what's wrong with him? It's like he's afraid of you…"

"Of course he's not; I don't know why he's acting like that…"

Touma moved near her and grabbed her shoulder "Come on, Index he just went up another floor, we'll have time to figure this out once we catch him."

Great we have to go up again, the worst part is that I'm the only one that looks tired, Index san, Haruhi and Touma weren't even sweating.

"Come on Kyon, move it… "She sighed"…Are you tired? Because if you are then starting tomorrow I'm putting you through special training, as a member of the brigade you have to be in better shape."

Great… just great… "Of course I'm not!" I ran past her and climbed the stairs, I've to admit, I not sure if it's on purpose but she definitely knows how to motivate people.

We finally reached the top floor and it seemed the cat was getting tired of running, he was panting near a door that led to an office.

"There you go!"

Index san finally managed to grab him.

"At last, that little thing sure runs fast, I've never expected to have to climb to the top floor."

"Sure, thank you for your help, Haruhi san, Kyon san." She hugged her cat so tenderly… you know such adorable sight almost made this whole thing worth it.

"Don't worry about that…" Haruhi kind of blushed a little "…it's not like we did much anyway."

"Oh well, we better get out of here before we get in trouble, huh?" Touma tried to open the stairway's door only to find it was locked "That's weird; I could swear we came through here…" he tried to pull but it only caused the handle to broke in his hand. "Crap! this thing is made out of steel so we won't be able to force it open, now how are we going to get out of here? Such misfortune…"

"Calm down; this place has been abandoned for a while so something like this is to be expected…" Haruhi looked around "… I doubt this is the only staircase, so we just have to look for another one, worst case scenario we'll just call 119."

"Yeah, I guess you're right, better get moving then." Touma moved away from the door and tried to lead the way through the hallway… before leaving however I just had to check something that called my attention… hmpf… the lock on the door was hot and it seemed like it was melted a little bit near the frame.

"What are you doing Kyon? Let's go!"

"Yeah…" Ok there is just no way this is not a trap… now what should I do? I've already contacted the others so I could only wait for them to arrive, but… damn I feel so useless right now.

As I was too busy lamenting my own misfortune, I swear I could see a ray of light going right in front of me, the thing hit one of the walls that lead to the outside and caused a little explosion.

"What was that that?"

"Atom Breaker or Melt Downer, basically it's just a bunch of electrons transformed into unstable matter, useful for blowing things up, melting locks, creating artificial limbs and of course scaring little kittens from a distance."

"Oh well thanks…" wait a minute I think I've heard that voice before.

"The name's Mugino Shizuri, a pleasure to meet you."

I turned around and found none other than the girl I bumped into the other day, unlike then however today her expression was completely changed, she looked like a tiger that's just ready to jump on her prey, I swear that sight was enough for me to completely freak out, unfortunately that felling wasn't shared by my dear leader.

"Wow! That was awesome Mugino san, how did you do that? Can you do it again?"

Haruhi, how much do I wish I had the courage to tell you to shut up.

"With pleasure…" she extended her arms and then made a little gesture with her fingers.

"Watch out!" Touma pushed Haruhi away with his left hand and then used his right hand to stop the light beam that was coming this way. "Kyon san, please take Index and Haruhi san and run, I'm going to try to block her attacks so we have a chance to escape."

"Heh? But that's no fun, I want to see this, it's too good to miss." The worst part is that despite the obvious attempt to kill us just now, Haruhi looked the happiest I've seen her in months.

"It's not fun if they're trying to kill you stupid."

"Hey! Who are you calling stu… hey what are you doing!" that's it! I've had enough; I grabbed her by the arm and dragged her through the hallway, Index san was running beside us, while Touma was behind us running and blocking the energy beams she was shooting at us, luckily she only shot one at a time and with a little delay between them so Touma could easily use his right hand to stop them without problem.

"Run… run or you will be well done… "She chuckled "...you know, I've always wanted to say that." Mugino walked really slowly while laughing like a psycho, it was obvious she was enjoying this… and she wasn't the only one at that.

"Man this is great, do you think she's an assassin sent by some unknown organization to stop the brigade before it becomes too big? Or maybe she's from the future trying to eliminate one of our descendants by killing his ancestor… I've always known that my bloodline would end in greatness."

Haruhi, please for the love of everything that is right and clean in the world shut up!

"By the way Touma kun, how come you can block her attacks? I knew you were hiding something."

"Now is not the time for that!" we finally arrived at a door that led to another staircase, as we approach it to try to open it, one giant ray of light far bigger than anything we had seen before went through the walls of the building hitting the door, blowing it up together with the walls, floor and a pretty good chunk of the ceiling.

"Now you're out of places to run…" We turned around only to find that she was there right at the end of the hallway around 10 or so meters away from us. "…now if you just do as I say then we can end this quickly and without too much pain." She smiled sadistically.

"Never, I don't know what you want but we'll never surrender to you… hmgpf… hmmght" I covered Haruhi's mouth; I don't care if she bites me but I just have to stop her from talking.

Touma got in front us with his right hand in a defensive position. "What do you want?"

"I want you to touch that noisy girl with your right hand."

"Huh…" Touma raised his head confused "…that's it? you blew up half the building just for that? Why?"

"Yeah, our client hired us to do it, and I like to do things the flashy way." She moved her hand through her hair and made a disturbing grin as she said this.

"You were hired? You know, do you honestly believe that you can trust someone that tells you to force two people to touch each other? And what this about a client? no offense but if a girl like you talks about a client paying her to do shady stuff then I can't help but think very badly about your morals; look I know that some brands are really expensive and there is social pressure to have them, but if you really believe that you can go around blowing up buildings and forcing people to touch each other to satisfy some weird guy fetish just to get a little money then I'm going to have to break that illusion."

So this is what he meant when he said he liked long speeches… that wasn't that long.

The girl just sighed "you done? Now if you won't cooperate then I'll just have to force you to…"

"Wait!" right behinds us and from one of the holes in the ceiling, Nagato appeared, she was carrying Koizumi and Misaka san in each of her arms and… are those angel wings on her back?

"Tenshi san! Misaka... Imouto? What are you doing here?"

"hmgf…" Haruhi hit me with her elbow to escape from my grab… ouch! "…Wow, Yuki is an angel? cool! Today is the best day ever!"

They landed on the floor and joined our group; however despite the obvious numeric advantage Mugino still looked confident.

"Already… I really thought those two could keep you people occupied a little longer, oh well no big deal…"

"Nanasen!"

Mugino stretched her arm to her side and suddenly one giant shield made of energy appeared, blocking several near invisible strings that moved through the concrete.

"Haruhi san!"

Suddenly from the other side of the building Kanzaki san appeared with her sword pointed towards Mugino, Asahina san was right behind her as well.

"Kaori neesan, you too…? man today just keeps getting better and better."

"I guess Frenda failed too… oh well I suppose there is just not helping it… I admit defeat…"

Still smiling she raised her arms into the air and then from one of the sleeves of her coat she brought out a weird card.

"...Not!" she tossed the card into the air and shot at it, upon contact her beam turned into dozens all of them directed at Haruhi.

"Careful Suzumiya san!"

Touma moved to get her out of the way, we tried to stop him but it was no use, thanks to the other beams it was impossible for any of us to prevent his right hand making contact with her left arm… you know today is the first time in my entire life I resent that a girl is wearing a sleeveless shirt.

As they touched, I couldn't move or talk, it was like the entire universe just stopped in its place, suddenly I started to see and hear static, like the ones in those old TVs, the thing began to grow larger and noisier until I couldn't see or hear anything but that, it was horrible… after a short while all the static quickly concentrated into one place and disappeared… such misfortune.