Between the Lines 1

Misaka Mikoto couldn't believe the story when she heard it on the news.

It began a day like any other at the Tokiwadai Girl's School dorm. After washing up and tidying for the school day, the routine was interrupted when Misaka's roommate, a member of the student volunteer peacekeeping organization, Judgment, Shirai Kuroko, dropped the usual antics and all color faded from her. Nearly did she even begin to weep.

She was checking the morning headlines on her pen-like phone. The scrolling chyron graphic divulged few details, but that's because the story was still breaking. Misaka leaned in close and listened to the anchorwoman,

"As of late last night, a gas line explosion rocked a student dormitory in the 7th District. Thankfully the damage was confined to a single unit, but the body of a tenant was found in the debris. Coroners have identified her as Saten Ruiko, 1st year of Sakugawa Middle School. Investigators believe the gas was ignited by her microwave as trace amounts of radiation was also detected at the scene. Next of kin have already been contacted and have allowed release of the minor's identity."

Both Tokiwadai girls sprang into action. Misaka immediately tried Saten's phone, while Shirai called her Judgment partner and best friend to the alleged victim, Uiharu Kazari. Neither call was given a response. Unable to accept the report at face value, they sped to the home of the incident in question. With the Level 4's teleportation, they arrived in little time.

When they arrived, the emergency workers, news crews, and general crowd were already gone. All that remained were the Anti-Skill "caution" tape and a handful of students wearing the Sakugawa Middle School Uniform. One of which happen to be Uiharu, who had fallen to her knees and was near catatonic. Some of her classmates were trying to talk to her, but she was completely unresponsive.

Seeing with their own eyes, neither Misaka or Shirai could say a thing. Their generally brilliant minds ceased working. Then, as if sensing the presence of her partner and friend, Uiharu speaks.

"I even heard the explosion last night. I thought, 'That sounds kind of close. Maybe I should even check it out as a Judgment officer. I called it in, but the response I got from dispatch was that Anti-Skill was already on it.' I thought nothing more about it, and went to sleep. Then, I came to pick Saten up in the morning like usual, but, her entire apartment was gone."

Then, if perhaps finally acknowledging the reality, Uiharu began to scream. She trashed about wildly, crying from her soul, and the combined strength of a Level 4 and Level 5 could barely keep her restrained. Ultimately, the Railgun paid the girl a courtesy and shocked her unconscious.

Even so, this far from settled the fragile situation. Shirai abused her Judgment privileges and called for ambulance, or more precisely when a Judgment member is injured in the field, a medical evacuation. Medics came in an APC, rather than the standard vehicle. After she thought about it, Shirai could have teleported her partner to the hospital rather than suffering a reprimand, but her own thought processes were far from regular. Even as a veteran Judgment who has seen worse than most students in Academy City, Shirai could barely hold on to her nerves.

The visit to the hospital was unpleasant to say the least. They've met once and for only a brief amount of time, but Saten's parents and little brother were there in the lobby. Her mother and little brother weren't at all in the condition to talk, but the father was stable enough to share a few words. Saten's remains were charred beyond recognition. They had to rely on a DNA test to even identify the body.

With Uiharu being admitted to the hospital, Shirai could use the excuse of being the Judgment's partner to skip from school. Using her own sentiments, Shirai thought it would be best for as few people to be here when Uiharu woke up. Misaka respected her roommate's wishes, and headed off on her own.

Except Misaka isn't the kind of person to simply sit idly by and do nothing. Something just felt, wrong, about this entire situation. First there was all that happen with Saten's boyfriend, Kamijou Touma, and his disappearance, and now this and Saten? And a gas leak? When was the last time something like that happened in Academy City of all places? If ever! No, Misaka's suspicion radar was beeping off the charts.

First stop was Anti-Skill. That report felt off. If there really was a gas leak, why in the world would Saten use a microwave? Normally natural gas is odorless, but a chemical is added so homeowners don't accidentally blow themselves up. Saten would have known her apartment was a bomb before getting that far. It didn't make sense.

Misaka, the Railgun and Level 5 electromaster didn't even have to break into the Anti-Skill building to find the report she wanted. Using magnetic attraction, she scaled to the roof and accessed their satellite communications. Through it, she hacked her way to their classified files. For her, it was all too easy.

Except the report repeated on the news was more or less accurate. What investigators found was that the apartment was not filled with natural gas. What they believed happened was the microwave exploded, and managed to rupture the gas line itself. The entire complex could have been lost if not for Academy City's automated emergency disaster response systems that cut off all utilities at the exact moment of the explosion. In other words, to save the rest of the building, the point of the explosion was sacrificed. "Gas Leak" was simply something told to the public. Saten's family were likely giving the complete report.

Still, this didn't completely satisfy Misaka. As an electromaster, the workings of electronics is stapled into her curriculum. She could build a ham radio out of kitchen utensils and copper wiring if need be thanks to her education. Misaka knew a microwave couldn't normally yield the force to cause such an explosion. Even an Academy City microwave. Each such device has a high tension capacitor installed to limit any surge of electricity that's fed into the appliance. But if that was say, tampered with, as well as a couple other adjustments, then yes, it could result in an explosion that would burst all the way into the walls and gas lines.

So, was it an assassination? With everything that's happened around Saten over the past couple of months, Misaka wouldn't rule it out. But who would go after her? Or maybe, they went after her to get her boyfriend Touma? Both had a good chance of being true. Still, where to start her investigation?

It was almost a repeat of her investigation into the Radio Noise, Sisters, and Level 6 Shift projects. While it took her a very long time to find any useful information, she did learn much about the workings of the Dark Side in the mean while. Using previous experience, she had a foothold to start from. Misaka had hopes she'd eventually find the truth.

Taking a bit of leg work, the Railgun finally came across a name; Hound Dog. It was a unit she had a brief confrontation with on the night of the 9/30 Incident. Actually, they were chasing after Touma and the Woman in Yellow. Misaka never learned the complete truth of the incident, but that was also the night Saten lost consciousness in the middle of the streets. Was that incident connected to what happened now? In any case, now she had a solid lead.

Uncovering the truth revealed one unpleasant surprise after another. After what happened on 9/30, Hound Dog suffered another setback on the 9th of October, where the organization was decimated. There was a restructuring afterwards, and a surprising member was added to compliment their lost strength. Mugino Shizuri.

Meltdowner; #4 of the 7 Level 5s in Academy City. With her ability, she can fire a Particle Waveform High-Speed Cannon. Misaka knows this, knows it very well. After all, she fought against the #4 when investigating the Level 6 Shift project. Then perhaps the cause of explosion in Saten's apartment wasn't the microwave at all, but the Meltdowner's beam attack? The report said trace amounts of radiation were detected, so it's easy to see how the investigators might have made that assumption. Misaka was confident she was edging closer to the truth.

Except from here she hit a dead end. There really wasn't a further avenue to pursue without confronting Hound Dog and Mugino directly. Finding them wasn't going to be easy at all. But far was Misaka from a dead end. Knowing that she knew who did it and likely how, the investigation should be shifted towards why. There still hasn't been a reasonable answer for that.

For that, she would have to dig through skeletons. Figuratively, that is. What had Saten been up to prior to being murdered? That was difficult, as she'd been playing pretty close to the vest those last few weeks. And what's worse, anything that could have given clues was vaporized with the apartment. It wouldn't be easy.

That said, there was one thing Saten couldn't hide, nor saboteurs erase or destroy; phone records. Every call she made, every text, even her location, all could be extrapolated through her cellphone bills and metadata. And with as wired a place as Academy City, Misaka could practically trace Saten's every step!

Except Misaka really couldn't. Saten wasn't really one to text, electing to call and talk. The Level 5 could trace who was called, but not what was said. With texts she could read the conversations outright. A bit of bad luck on Misaka's part, but there was still a wealth of information to be had.

Except there really wasn't. For some reason, Saten's phone kept experiencing sudden losses of service. It was strange. Even turning your phone off couldn't disconnect you from the network completely. The phone would have to physically lose power to be get entirely disconnected. Saten wasn't the kind to get careless and forget to charge her phone. It was almost like she was removing the battery completely. There shouldn't be a reason to do that.

Unless, of course, it was on purpose. Then, did she do so so she couldn't specifically be traced? Misaka never really thought about it, but when she was doing her own illegal investigations and trespasses, she could emit a jamming frequency so nobody could spy on her. A normal Level 0 like Saten wouldn't have such a tool at her disposal. So to compensate, she'd remove the battery from her phone? Then the question is, what was she getting into that she had to completely hide?

Misaka wanted to yell and curse, but knew she had no right to. In an ironic twist of fate, wasn't Saten following Misaka's own example? What right did the Railgun have to complain? But before she would let any self-pity set, she shook her head and tried this investigation again from yet another angle. After all, she couldn't exhausted every route, right?

Except maybe she had. Saten had been careful those last days. Very limited calls, dropping off the radar completely for expanded periods of time, and otherwise keeping to herself. Misaka would have to start searching CCTVs, traffic light footage, and all sorts of other random sources in this wild goose chase. The manpower alone was far more than what she was capable, and it was possible she wouldn't find anything at all. Perhaps the reason Hound Dog was so brazen in assassinating Saten Ruiko was because they knew the girl's trail couldn't be traced. In many ways, Saten had fallen to the Dark Side well before she was killed. How would Misaka proceed from here?

No, she couldn't let herself be dismayed! Even if no obvious answers were apparent, the Railgun still uncovered a wealth of information thus far. Something must lead to what Saten had gotten herself into. Misaka just has to study it, look for that faint piece of information that will shine a light on what was really going on! There must have been something she overlooked!

And she found it. Misaka didn't immediately know what it was, but knew it was something important. Saten's GPS data from her last night. Saten returned home immediately before the blast. No surprise, since it was an assassination and all. Mugino wasn't the kind to wait around. After the blast however, Saten, or her phone at least, ran away. The phone was disconnected again shortly thereafter.

Did someone pick up the phone and take it with them? No, it shouldn't have moved at all. It should have been destroyed in the blast, along with Saten.

Unless, she never was.

A deep pain was felt in the pit of Misaka's stomach. Were, were they perhaps under the wrong assumption this entire time? Could Saten possibly still be alive right now? But, there was a body! That couldn't be identified. They had DNA! Which test results could have been faked. But why didn't Saten try to contact them? Why would she?

In spite of herself, Misaka laughed. She laughed, and tears ran down her cheeks. Even when learning that Saten was dead, Misaka hadn't shed a single tear. She managed to distract and stall her emotions, but upon finding this glimmer of hope they were finally overwhelmed. Saten is alive!

But wait, Misaka couldn't get ahead of herself. She needed proof before she could baselessly spread word to the still-fragile Uiharu. That should actually be simple enough. The body recovered at the scene of the explosion. All she needed to do was get a tissue sample and have it tested by a doctor she could trust. Hopefully her parents haven't had it cremated yet.

Two days have gone by since Misaka started searching, and she hasn't had a wink of sleep. It's now late at night and what she was about to do was far from legal. Breaking into the hospital, she sneaked all the way into the morgue. It wasn't her brightest achievement, but it had to be done.

Thankfully they hadn't cremated her yet, but by the chart is was scheduled for first thing in the morning. It might not be a great idea to only take a single small sample if the DNA test can't be completed before the body's burned. She'd hate to do it, but it might be best to take the entire body.

When Saten's dad said the body was burned beyond recognition, he wasn't kidding. Only a charcoal husk remained of this person. Misaka wondered who it really was. Also, the father didn't expand to them all the gory details. The body didn't weather the blast whole. As grotesque as it sounds, that at least saved Misaka some trouble. Instead of cutting off a peace of skin or something for the DNA test, she simply took an entire hand.

Misaka brought the "sample" to the Frog-Faced doctor, to say the least to his surprise. Aside from the absurdity of being handed a, hand, he reluctantly agreed to run another DNA test. Academy City's facilities could handle these things much faster than the outside world, but it still took some time. Misaka got some much needed rest.

Unfortunately, she was awoken to some horrible news.

"The DNA is conclusive. There is a 99.8% match to Saten Ruiko."

Misaka's heart sank. It couldn't be, after all this time, only the worst result remained?

However, the doctor wasn't finished.

"Except, it might not be your Saten Ruiko."

Of course Misaka wouldn't understand, "What do you mean?"

"You of all people should understand what I'm getting at," it's unclear if this was meant to be a joke. "If I ran the DNA test alone, I could have been fooled. Heck, everybody would have been fooled. But you brought me an entire hand. And while the finger prints might have been melted off, there were still the fingernails. The cuticles were the dead giveaway, but I ripped off an entire nail and tested it to be sure. And my second tests concluded that the fingernail, from base to tip, was approximately 90 hours old."

It took far too long for Misaka to realize, and the doctor was right that she should have picked up on it immediately, but, "Are you saying, it's a clone?"

Nodding, "Yes. This hand came from the body cloned from the cells of Saten Ruiko. I'm certain. I wouldn't have even considered it if not for all the extra work you personally brought in for me. Clones might be near-perfect copies of the original, but there are telltale signs everywhere. Perfect cloning is still beyond even Academy City. You yourself should be well aware of that."

Then it really was true. Saten is still alive! This was reason to celebrate!

Except it really wasn't. After all, if a body double was made, that meant they knew they didn't kill her. So she's out there, perhaps on the run or worse, and needs their help!

Thanking the doctor, Misaka began the search for the living Saten Ruiko.

Except if it were going to be so easy, she'd have done it already. Saten is dug in deep. If she hasn't been captured yet, then she's hiding from the near omnipotent eyes of Academy City. Misaka won't find her. At least, not on her own.

Finally Misaka brings her discoveries to Shirai and the still hospitalized Uiharu, who's developed heart palpitations. At first they don't believe her and Shirai gets upset and accuses Misaka of evading reality. However, the investigator carefully goes over every step of her investigation, exposes all uncovered evidence, and even shows the results of the DNA and clone (fingernail) tests. All of which points to the fact Saten is alive, and likely in a lot of trouble.

Uiharu wants to leave the hospital that very moment, but was far from a clean bill of health. A number of panic attacks had been suffered since Saten's best friend discovered the news, and she fell into a deep depression. A sizable amount of medications were administered and it wasn't exactly safe for her to be moving around. Fleeing the hospital wasn't difficult as her partner was a teleporter, but Uiharu couldn't be expected to be helpful except from behind a computer terminal.

The Judgment computer specialist had to work remotely while Misaka and Shirai took to the field. They scoured every information database they had legal access to. If they were going to find Saten, there wouldn't be any clear signs. Anything unexplained. Anything out of the ordinary. Any one of those could be Saten. They just had to find it.

A shootout on the outskirts of District 7 hours after the explosion. Murder of one of Academy City's Board of Directors, Thomas Platinaburg. A hostage situation at a private Salon. Hijacking of Sky Bus 365. Explosions at an unused runway in District 23 and a warehouse in District 11 (suspected to be linked). Car chases and shootouts in broad daylight near District 7. The assassinations of members of the British Royal Family and outbreak of World War III. If any of these are connected to Saten Ruiko, their friend has been on a veritable warpath since going underground. It would take time to run thorough investigations on each of these incidents.

Aside from the nature of the incidents, finding further information on all these through legal channels was rough. However, Uiharu was driven to the point where such no longer mattered to her. Once she ran out of means, she didn't hesitate to hack into private databases, Academy City's restricted servers, and even Japan and American agencies for any sliver of insight to find Saten. Her efforts were not without rewards.

The shootout after the explosion; all matter of evidence was missing. Security footage, clock-in records, and phone services were all destroyed/interrupted for the period of the incident. There was a clear conspiratorial blackout in place. Obvious sources were either mysteriously malfunctioning, turned off, or lost all together. If Saten was wrapped up in this, it was big.

Thomas Platinaburg, Sky Bus 365, and the Private Salon couldn't be related to Saten at all. World War III likely wasn't her fault either. Veritably no information at all could be found about the unused runway in District 23 other than the initial report.

However, in the explosion in District 11, the body of Gotou Rize was found. Former JSDF, 31, worked in private security in Academy City. In other words she was a mercenary. Though it was still a guess at this point, Misaka would say she was a member of Hound Dog. Then is this the link they were searching for?

Still, that meant Saten killed this woman. It was a hard pill to swallow, but given the stakes, the girls who still remained on the Light Side couldn't deny the possibility. Every step forward they made, the scarier the path became.

And they finally hit pay dirt. Gotou Rize purchased a scope worth four million yen. Moving around something that expensive left a hefty trail. It was converted to fit a model of rifle by a legal retailer of hobby goods. In truth, that hobby retailer works heavily on modifying firearms for the Dark Side. Leaving no stone unturned, Uiharu managed to get into his personal computer and compile a list of names, address, phone numbers, banking account numbers, sponsors, etcetera, on all of Hound Dog. She even learned the frequencies and encryption of the radios they use. This was it!

Immediately Uiharu got to work stealing all of their personal information. Picking one at random, she emptied their saving's account. It didn't take long, and a phone call to the bank was made and an identity theft report was filed. But Uiharu was monitoring the bank's phone lines, and managed to trace the call back to the Hound Dog's unregistered cell phone. Hacking the cell phone itself, she unraveled a web of contacts that brought every member of Hound Dog into the light.

"Ruiko still hasn't come out of hiding?" they heard of the voice of Mugino Shizuri herself say. Uiharu accessed her cellphone's receiver and activated it; turning it into a mobile bug. She's using it in real time to spy on them.

"I don't know," a youthful feminine voice, if they had to guess it was Kinuhata Saiai, the other esper who joined Hound Dog. "She super went into hiding after last time."

"When I find her, I'm going to rip her to pieces. Her and Frenda too!"

Uiharu writes a note and passes it to the others. On it is an address for an office building in district 15.

"You're just super mad that she managed to slug you. You went out like a light."

"That won't happen again! Seriously, what's the deal with her eye? Do you think it can really see the future?"

"I don't know, but we super had her dead to rites. If it really could, we wouldn't have cornered her like that. If it can see into the future, it's range is very limited. We have a plan in place for that."

"Any word yet from Districts 11 and 23?"

"No. If she's looking to escape Academy City now that World War III has started, she either has to steal a plane from the airport, or sneak aboard a shipment heading for the subs in Tokyo Bay. Those are the only two ways. If she's looking to run away, she'll show up in one of those two places eventually."

Uiharu clicks a button to end transmission. Warm tears stream down her cheeks. Her best friend is still alive, and fighting for her life. For now, that's enough to heal her devastated psyche and fractured heart.

"Why did you stop it?" Misaka asks.

Uiharu shakes her head, "Spying on them like that drains the cellphone's battery. If we use it too much they might realize what's happening. They're professionals after all. If they catch wind I'm on to them, they'll dump everything and we'll lose them."

"What were they saying about her eye?" Shirai couldn't have missed. "Was her prosthetic eye not normal?"

Nobody knows what to make of that. They'd already been over this. Sometimes Saten may where an eyepatch, sometimes a glass eye, but she is in fact half blind.

"Do you think she might have gotten a hold of a type of neural-visual sensor, with analytic and mass calculative functions?"

Any other group of girls would have no idea what was just said. But both Tokiwadai students have a general idea.

"You mean like a miniature Tree Diagram that could fit in a prosthetic eye?"

"It might be possible," Uiharu acknowledges. "It wouldn't be anywhere as powerful, but it wouldn't need to be. Say if what those girls were saying is true, and Saten-san could 'see' a limited vision of the future, it would likely only need to be 1/255th as powerful as the original. If they retrofit it for a type of cybernetic prosthetic, they might be able to shrink it that small."

This being Academy City, it wasn't the craziest thing imaginable.

"But how in the world would Saten-san have gotten a hold of it?" Shirai states the big mystery.

None of them had an answer. None of them could have an answer. And from the sound of it, Mugino from Hound Dog didn't know either. Misaka thought about it. A clone of Saten isn't something a mercenary group like Hound Dog could easily get a hold of. Even the people who were involved in the Radio Noise project had to get Misaka's permission for her DNA Map. To bypass all that, it had to be a very powerful figure. Perhaps the biggest.

"I think this might have come from the very top," Misaka couldn't afford to keep this to herself.

"You mean-"

"The Chairman of the Board of Directors. He's perhaps the only person who could have set all this up."

"That's a bit of a stretch," Shirai dismisses. "If it goes that high, that means Saten-san's stumbled her way into the darkest secret in all of Academy City. She has a knack for getting in trouble, but I doubt it's that bad."

Still, it was the closest thing they've gotten to an explanation. Misaka isn't upset that she's been shot down. She at least floated the idea, so now they're all thinking about it.

"Well, I'll continue to monitor Hound Dog's cellular and radio traffic," Uiharu proclaims. "Honestly, if they never find Saten that will be the best thing, but if they do, we'll know immediately. I'm just glad to know she's safe."

"Speak," Uiharu's recording program autostarted as a call was received on Mugino's hacked phone.

"Mugino-san, we've pinged the target, but for some reason can't get eyes on. We believe she may be deploying some kind of stealth shield."

"But we know where she is, right? Quickly, tell me!"

"District 23, the airport. We believe she might be trying to sneak aboard one of the high speed bombers headed for Russia."

"Damn, it'll take us a while to get there. Don't move until I arrive, got that?"

"Yes Ma'am."

The line goes dead. Uiharu, Shirai, and Misaka can only look at each other. Apparently Saten's luck is that bad after all.

"Quick!" Misaka orders. "We have to get there now!"

Shirai nods, "Yes, onee-sama!"

"Bring her back in one piece!" Uiharu, far from being in a condition fit for strenuous exercise.

"Yes!" Level 4 and Level 5 respond.

I actually wrote this chapter before the previous. I wanted to place a situation where Saten overstepped her bounds and got herself in a situation where she couldn't get herself out of. Except if it was a situation she couldn't get out of, then how the heck is she going to get out of it? This caused the biggest delay in my posting because I couldn't decide what to do. Then, I don't remember how the idea came to me, but I had the thought, "What is Misaka and the gang doing in the mean time?" So I started playing around with idea and ended up writing this chapter separately. So there you go.

I'm taking a risk calling this chapter Between the Lines 1, because I don't know if I'll write a 2nd or 3rd. In Never I purposefully restrained myself from writing a BtL because it would have spoiled the secret of the world far before I would have intended (though I'm a fan of giving hints throughout). I ended up keeping that mindset for the sequel and neglected a tool I had at my disposal. So once I finally wrote this chapter, my writer's block was cleared and I sprinted through a few chapters off the bat.

I'm not sure what chapter for what story I'll publish next. I'm pushing myself to start publishing regularly again, and it's not like I'm short on content, so I'll make certain to keep you guys entertained. So until next time,

~Kyle Castorena