The judge who controlled the scales of justice spoke with ice in his voice.

"You have been found guilty of the crime of killing more than 10000 human beings. As your psychological state before and during the time period, in which the killings took place, seems to have been quite abnormal, you are hereby sentenced to incarceration with accompanying psychological treatment. As you confessed to committing these crimes on your own free will, and are the current board chairman of the city, we will not send you to a correctional facility, but sentence you to life in house arrest."

The white haired boy had only one response to that, which he mumbled to himself: "At least I can still take care of the brat that way!".

But he was still the chairman of this Academy City, and while he did not like the way it was set up, he still held all the power, even after being convicted of being one of the worst murderers in human history. But this power also gave him the obligation to do everything to protect the good sides of his home, while eradicating the bad ones.

Misaka Mikoto stood before the door of the headmistress of Tokiwadai, waiting to be called inside. Her phone was flooded with messages right after the existence of the clones became public knowledge and she was still quite unsure how to respond to most of them. To her parents, who were currently spending their holidays abroad, she told the bare minimum: that she knew of them already, and that they are strange, but very nice little sisters to her. What to tell to her friends was another thing entirely. Luckily, she was able to leave the hospital the next morning, while Kuroko had to stay for a few more hours to complete some checkups. This left her at least with the solitude of her dorm room for a while. Or so she thought. Almost immediately after returning, the dorm manager and ordered her to come to the school.

The door opened and she was signaled to come in. The headmistress sat behind a large, old fashioned table and had a stern look on her face.

"Misaka-san, I would think that you know why I am sitting here a few days before New Years while I would rather spend the time with my family?"

"I would guess it is because of the fact that the world now knows about the nearly 10000 clones of me existing out there."

"Mhh, it sounds quite a lot like you already knew of their existence beforehand. It saddens me a bit that you didn't confide in us before it became public. We could have decreased the potential fallout for the school by having prior knowledge. Having a student being cloned and then murdered casts a rather unfortunate light onto us, as you can imagine. But it didn't happen to just any student, but to our most well known one, our 'ACE'."

Mikoto's face contorted slightly and if the headmistress would have looked closely, she might have been able to spot a flash of anger rush over her face.

"Does it really matter whom it happened to?"

"Yes it does."

The headmistress looked confused after hearing the interjection.

"Parents send their children here to receive a good education and become one of the strongest beings on the planet. It now seems like we can't protect one of our greatest students, so how can they expect that we protect THEIR child?"

Mikoto just shrugged.

"Anyways, as you can now see the problem, here is what I want you to do: You will issue a statement in which you condemn the creation of the clones, and to call for them to get locked up in facilities, as you don't want cheap copies of you running around. Our lawyers will at the same time draft a lawsuit against anyone who we have even the slightest suspicion of being involved. You also have to clarify that your DNA-Map was taken before you entered Tokiwadai and that you think that we are doing everything as well as one could hope in such a situation to support you."

Mikoto's face froze after hearing this demand. She then began to chuckle quietly.

"Ahahahaha, you really want me to say such crap in front of the whole world? That I believe that the clones should be locked away as their existence in the public might insult me?"

The rage returned to her face, but while the last time in went away in a flash, this time it stayed.

"Do you know how the experiment was stopped, resulting in almost 10000 of the surviving? When I found out about the killings, I did my best to end them. I attacked research facilities that were involved, and when that didn't work I planned on dying against Accelerator, hoping that that would stop the experiment. Just because of a lucky coincidence a good person found me and stopped me from losing my life, while they managed to stop the experiment anyways."

She stepped closer to the table.

"And do you want to know why I never confided in any of you here in this school? Because I knew that all you would care about is the schools image and the money you would lose by having its reputations tarnished. And your request right now made me realize that my suspicion was completely correct."

She became more and more irate, and small sparks appeared around her bangs.

"I can already imagine the advice you would have given me: 'Oh, so they get killed anyways, well, I will speak to the scientist overseeing the experiment to see if they could speed up their schedule, so we won't have to deal with it for much longer'."

Mikoto did her best of imitating the headmistresses voice, but only managed to make her sound like a heartless monster. After a few moments, it seemed like Mikoto made up her mind about something, as her face relaxed notably and the sparks disappeared.

"Misaka-san, if you would..." The sentence was cut off.

"I will drop out of Tokiwadai, consider this my official notice. I will have movers come by my dorm later to pick up my belongings, so don't worry about that. You won't have to deal with me ever again."

The headmistress just sat in her chair, with a blank look on her face.

Mikoto turned around, and started walking towards the door. After opening it, she turned around one last time.

"If you want to have some kind of revenge, send it directly my way. Don't even think of involving my friends, or you will regret it."

A metal pen laying on the desk suddenly shot up and lodged itself into the ceiling. Multiple others followed.

"Good bye, I hope one day you will feel ashamed about the way you acted today."

With that she left the room, slamming the door shut behind her. That she might have warped the hinges a bit using her ability, locking up the door and forcing it to be cut out to get the headmistress out afterwars was something that made her feel at least a bit better.

After leaving the school building and having a look at the school garden, which looked almost already completely rebuild, she felt a bit of sadness rising up. She might not see this place again for a while. She also just realized that while she didn't have that many friends at her school, there were some persons she would miss dearly. She didn't really worry about still meeting Kuroko, as her roommate / stalker would gladly meet her wherever. But others, like Kongou Mitsuko or Hokaze Junko would be harder to keep in touch with.

To at least leave on a positive note, she went to her favorite café and ordered a piece of her favorite cake. While waiting for her order to be brough, she took out her phone, dismissing another 20 messages that were received in the time she spend in the school. She opened up a group message and started typing:

'Hi Kuroko, Saten-san and Uiharu-san, I think I have some explaining to do. Meet me in three hours in front of the Hospital in district 7. I think Kuroko's last checkups should be done by then.'

Her order arrived, and before being able to over think anything, she hit send and just focused on her cake for the moment.

Touma had just gotten back from his trip to LA. The Anglicans wanted to take him with them to England, where he could receive medical attention, as all the healing spells they tried to use failed. But Touma claimed that he wanted to get back to Academy City as quickly as possible, as he was worried about the fallout of the sisters getting revealed.

He wasn't worried about his own persona, as he was informed on the way back that a computer virus was spread by Academy city that apparently deleted every piece of evidence of him even being in LA. That, coupled with the fact that all eye witnesses would only describe him as a Japanese high-schooler made him hope that for once his luck did not betray him. At the same time, this worried him, as normally a time of less bad luck was a harbinger of even worse things happening in the future.

As Touma was still heavily bruised when returning, he made his way to Heaven Canceller's hospital to have a quick checkup before returning to his dorm. Instead of having them wait for him. he sent Index and Othinus ahead to their appartment, while he went inside.

The doctor was pleasantly surprised that Touma was in a surprisingly good shape all things considered. After the examination was finished, and he was about to leave, the doctor spoke up.

"The world knowing about the sisters might make them an even bigger target. While your friend, the Railgun, is able to defend herself, a single sisters is a different story. A lot of people will be after the DNA of a Level 5, and as I know Misaka-san, I can guess that she will do her utmost to deter any person of even thinking of doing it. At first, I told the sisters to form bigger groups and to rely on their military training. But as they are public knowledge now, they deserve the chance to live the lives they wish for, which means that this should only be a temporary solution."

Touma looked the doctor in the eyes:

"I know that they will be in danger, and I know that Misaka will try her utmost to protect them. I am a bit worried about her doing something rash which might endanger herself, so I have to think of something to keep a promise I once made and keep her and her sisters save."

The doctor started to smile.

"You don't have to carry the problems of the whole world on your shoulders, but you could at least listen to Misaka-san's worries, not as a fighter, but as a friend. As far as I know her, that could be the biggest help you can give her right now."

Touma nodded, and left the room.

Saten and Uiharu just arrived at the bus stop near the hospital and were walking together towards the meeting spot. They didn't really speak much on the bus, both unsure what to say. Now, with the meeting mere minutes away, Saten finally found the courage to broach the topic of Mikoto's clones.

"Do you think she knew of them before? Her message made it sound a bit like it. She is a Level 5 after all, we can't really have a look into her world. But I can't imagine her being okay with clones being killed. She did everything in her power to save Febrie and Janie, who also were no normal human beings."

Uiharus sighed.

"I also can't really imagine her being okay with clones being murdered. But I am also a bit disappointed the she didn't tell us earlier. We have been through a lot with her, maybe more than anyone else, so why didn't she trust us with this?"

Saten nodded.

"Maybe it would have been dangerous for us knowing it, but we can handle danger ourselves. We fought against Kihara Lifeline and STUDY. How much stronger can other enemies even get?"

"No idea, especially Shirai's and mine connections in judgment would have probably been very helpful if she had problems with criminals."

"Speaking of criminals, isn't it quite surprising how many there were. This operation that you and Shirai were involved in was quite big, wasn't it? I only ever though that there would be some rogue scientists and that the majority were just delinquents from Skill-Out."

"Yeah, the information the new board chairman gave us showed just how many rotten elements there were in this city. Especially Anti-Skill payed a high price with a lot of them dying. I just hope that it stays quiet now. A lot of parents are getting scared for their children, with quite a few pulling them out already. I would think that Academy city is just one big disaster away from collapsing."

With that last sentence, they arrived at a bench and sat down. After sitting in silence for two minutes, they saw Kuroko coming out of the hospital and sitting down next to them.

"Hi you two. Have you seen onee-sama yet? Sadly I got knocked out last night somehow and can't remember all that much anymore. When I saw the news this morning about the clones, I immediately went to her room to console her, hehe, but she was already gone."

Saten and Uiharu both looked worriedly about the way Kuroko behaved while talking about consoling Mikoto, but ignored it and let her continue.

"Sadly, they wanted to keep me there for some more tests, but every minute I was away from her, my desire to just teleport out grew. Right when I wanted to do it, I got her message. I told myself that I will show her how responsible I am by following her every command. And then tonight, when we are back in our dorm room, hehehe... ."

Kuroko suddenly was stopped mid sentence by receiving a chop to her shoulder, knocking her out momentarily. Saten looked up and saw Mikoto standing right beside the bench. She must have arrived while the three were immersed in Kuroko's perverted monologue.

"Hi guys, haven't seen you two in a while. How is it going?"

Saten looked Mikoto in the eyes and noticed something sad in them. It seemed like she tried her best to seem cheerful and happy. But as Saten has seen Mikoto with the real emotions for that a lot of times, she was quite certain that the current face she was was just a facade.

Uiharu didn't seem to notice though, and just answered the question.

"Hi Misaka-san, we both are fine. We were worried after we heard from Kuroko that she met you in the hospital, but it seems you are healthy again, right?"

"Yeah, I got in a bit of a fight, but everything worked out fine."

She gave Kuroko a small zap to the back, which woke her up.

"Onee-sama, finally we are reunited again. Oh how I missed you. We might have missed our chance for a romantic Christmas, but we still have some days until the new year starts, so lets go to our dorm room, light some candles, and see where ..."

Another, now a bit lighter chop stopped Kuroko from talking.

"Kuroko, I can't deal with your antics right now. If you don't want to get knocked out for a longer time and having to ask Uiharu-san and Saten-san about everything later, you better behave now! Do you understand?"

"Y-Yes, onee-sama."

"Good, lets take a walk, I don't want to stay in one place for too long right now. A lot of reporters are looking for me right now, so if someone posts a picture of me and I stay in the spot it was taken right now, things could get ugly."

Saten decided that she could speak for the group this time, as Kuroko was still trying her best to behave herself and Uiharu seemed a bit saddened by the predicament her friend was in.

"Oh no, I didn't know it is that bad. I think we are all okay with a bit of a walk."

They walked along a path towards a certain park.

(Gah, I gave myself three hours to think about what to say and I came up with NOTHING. You just have to wing it Mikoto. Maybe start with something 'small')

Mikoto finally found the courage to start speaking.

"So, as you might have guessed already, I knew about the existence of the clones beforehand. The code name for the project was 'sisters', and while the project itself was barbaric, I still use that term to refer to them, as they are my little sisters!"

"You say that the experiment was barbaric, but why did you then give your precious DNA-Map to enable them to start it, onee-sama?"

Mikoto's gaze saddened.

"I didn't give it away for that. As a small kid, not too long after my powers appeared, I was asked by scientists if I wanted to help people with muscular dystrophy. They thought that my ability could help them find a cure for it. And so I gave away my DNA-Map with a smile."

Speaking the last sentence, Mikoto frowned.

Noticing this, Saten tried to reason with her guilt.

"But you gave it away for a noble cause. You couldn't expect that someone would misuse your trust and clone you."

"As a small kid I might have not been able expect that, but after becoming a Level 5 I should have at least got vigilant enough to at least look into what came out of that project and how my DNA-Map got handled. But I was ignorant, and that killed more than 10000 human beings."

The three others looked a bit shocked by that reasoning, but were unable to refute it on the spot. So Mikoto continued.

"But still my sisters came out of the project, so not everything was completely bad. I hope that you can meet them one day. But you have to promise me to see them ab being unique humans, and not weird copies of me."

She spoke the last sentence while facing Kuroko who had a lustful expression in her eyes, probably thinking about multiple Mikotos in front of her at the same time.

"As they are at most Level 3, they can't defend themselves as well using electricity as I can against you Kuroko, but they all received military training, so if you molest even one, you might wake up with a thousand gun barrels pointed at you. So you better learn to behave yourself."

"Y-Yes, onee-sama"

Kuroko's face dropped notably after hearing the nonchalant way Mikoto talked about guns and her being shot at. She had tried to push down all the death she saw during 'Operation Handcuffs' but hearing about a storm of bullets coming her way, with no way of knowing if a teleportation would bring her right into the path of another bullet and onto her own demise frightened her.

(I think I really need psychological counseling for this, it was a miracle that I didn't crack in the hospital after all that happened. I wonder if Shokuhou did something to my brain at that time to help me. Even now the events feel more like I watched them in a film than living through them.)

Finally Uiharu found the courage to speak too.

"So you say that almost 10000 of your 'sisters' survived. How did that happen? Did Accelerator grew a conscience after half of the experiment was over? I remember that he once saved me from being attacked by the second ranked. He seemed not so evil back then. And what did he mean in the court room when he claimed that he wanted to get stronger by killing them?"

"The aim of the experiment was to shift accelerator to Level 6. The scientists calculated that he would reach that level after killing Railgun 128 times. But as I don't exist 128 times, they found that apparently using 20000 clones would achieve the same."

The other three gasped, being shocked about the fact that scientists even run simulations in which a person, especially one of the Level 5s gets killed. Knowing that the hardest news for her friends was still to come, Mikoto continued.

"When I found out about the experiment and saw a sister getting murdered in front of me, I set my mind on saving them. Therefore, I hacked into the central database and accessed the information on every lab involved. After achieving that, I attacked every lab I could over the internet, destroying all their fancy toys. When they shut that avenue down, I outright attacked them physically. Lucky for them, I didn't step down to their level and only destroyed the facilities, never harming anyone."

"Was that what you meant with your question if I would arrest you with bringing chaos over the city onee-sama? Why didn't you come to me with your worries. Judgement and Anti-Skill would have been able to shut that project down in an instant!"

"Do you really think that? I'm sorry Kuroko, but now that you know how large the dark side of this city actually was, and that the board chairman was in possession of a list denouncing them all, do you really think that such an experiment went on without approval of the board? My status as a Level 5 protected me at least somewhat against retribution. But asking you would have just painted targets on your back, and I couldn't spare any strength protecting you guys AND my sisters."

"But Misaka-san, we fought side by side with you before. Why do you think that we couldn't handle ourselves?"

"Saten, there are beings on this planet that make me look like a normal middle school girl you can find anywhere. I had a small glimpse into this world. And while I appreciate your help, I have gotten quite good in judging what seems like a suicide mission and what doesn't. And I just care too much about you than to throw your life away."

"Stronger beings than you onee-sama? Is the first ranked really that much stronger than you?"

"Y-Yes, I meant Accelerator of course, he is just on another level than me. Uhm, anyways. To get back to my explanation: I noticed that attacking the facilities didn't lead to any result, as more and more got involved. And every day, my sisters were dying. I just felt completely powerless."

The four continued walking a bit in silence, until they went past some benches next to a vending machine. Mikoto felt an ache in her heart thinking about the fact that she saw the last sister to die in this experiment in this place. She beckoned the others to sit down. After they did so, she sat down next to Kuroko who herself was sitting on the left side of the group of three.

"We walked quite a bit and this place is deserted most of the time anyways, so I think it should be okay to sit here for a while. The next part might be hard for you to hear, but I want to get the worst parts over with today."

Uiharu looked questioning at Mikoto.

"What can be worse than hearing that you saw a person that looked like you dying before your very eyes Misaka-san?"

"Well, I knew that I had to stop the experiment, but everything I tried failed. I was distraught and started contemplating if there was even a way for me to stop it at all. But that was when it hit me: I just had to destroy the assumption that led to the experiment."

"What assumption are you talking about onee-sama? That accelerator is the strongest?"

Mikoto chuckled, knowing that she still had to think of a way to explain the real ending of the experiment, and how close Kuroko came to the idea behind it. But first of all, she had to get her whole suicide plot out of the way.

"Well, the scientists calculated that in a fight against Accelerator, if I did my very best, I would die in 185 moves. So the plan I came up with had the goal of convincing them that I am just not that strong. I planned to challenge Accelerator to a fight before the next experiment began, and just die on the first move. That way they would think I am worth only a tiny fraction of the experience they thought I would give. I hoped that either Accelerator or the scientists would stop the experiment afterwards, as they didn't want to spend decades doing nothing else than this."

The other three people on the bench were sitting there with their mouths agape. Finally, Saten managed to speak.

"You w-w-wanted to get yourself killed? We would have lost you without even having the chance to say goodbye. Misaka-san, that is absolutely horrible. Did you not even think about our feelings with the crusade you planned there?"

"Sorry, I though about you, but I thought myself as a villain back then, and thought that I deserved whatever came my way."

Kuroko suddenly jerked her head around, with tears in her eyes, and slapped Mikoto.

"Onee-sama, how dare you even having thought of doing this to us. I am happy that you are still here with us, but I am also deeply disappointed in you."

Mikoto rubbed her cheek and came to a small realization:

(I kind of did act like the idiot does normally, and when he doesit, it leaves me feeling some of the worst feelings there are. Especially after I thought he died crashing into the ocean, I barely functioned. And I was about to give my three best friends the same feeling. With them just questioning afterwards what they could have done differently.)

"I can understand how you feel Kuroko, maybe better than you can imagine. And I am sorry, I was just not in a good state of mind back then."

Uiharu rubbed some tears from her eyes and started speaking.

"I think it will takes us some time, processing everything we hear today, but I think that we will forgive you for it, as you are our friend and we can support you that way at least. But now I am curious what happened that stopped the experiment without you having to lose your life? It sounded like you saw no other plan, so how did you come up with another one on the same day?"

Mikoto was relieved hearing that, but now had to think about what to say. She didn't want to place Touma in the spotlight, as she knew how he would hate it. He was lucky to have escaped the limelight with his recent trip to LA. She thought that a small lie which would protect him would be worth the cost of lying to her friends.

"Well, it wasn't my plan, but some person found me that night after they figured out what I wanted to do. They claimed that with our powers combined we could defeat accelerator, shattering the believe that he stands as the strongest by a wide margin. So we fought him together, with the other person doing most of the work. Luckily his ability enabled him to get past Accelerators' defense, but it was still quite the hard battle, with it looking for some time like we wouldn't be able to make it."

A mischievous grin appeared on Kuroko's face.

"Mhh, onee-sama, I wonder if we might have already met that person? Is it maybe someone you were quite eager to fight? To show your strength? But who you couldn't really beat?"

Mikoto coughed in surprise, cursing Kuroko's deductive ability. Her thoughts began to race.

(Shit shit shit shit. Did she figure it out? Have I roped him into it by accident now? Is there any way of talking myself out of it? Mhh, maybe I could claim that ...)

But Kuroko just continued without noticing Mikoto's behavior.

"Yeah, and this vending machine just makes it even clearer."

(SHIT SHIT SHIT)

"Yeah, the seventh ranked Level 5. You fought him here once, didn't you. And as the scientists can't really explain his power, it might be possible that he is effective against Accelerator."

The tension in Mikoto dropped immediately after hearing this wrong conclusion.

(Mhh, there are quite a few parallels between the idiot and the number 7. And they did help me both during my own Level 6 shift. So maybe I will just let Kuroko run with her thoughts, while neither confirming nor denying anything.)

Kuroko continued:

"Maybe my fears about you and that ape have been misplaced, and my true competitor is someone else. Even though I have to say that he at least seems to be an appropriate partner for you, seeing that he is a Level 5 himself. But still, I will not give up. Us living together still gives me the biggest trump card there is. Heheheh..."

Mikoto gave Kuroko a small shock to stop her perverted thoughts and her mind running away with the wrong conclusion.

"Kuroko, what did I tell you about your perversion regarding me just before? And t-that I-idiot is not more or less worthy than anyone. W-we are all h-human, so don't say anything like that. Or do you want to tell me that you think that my sisters are worth less than me just because I have a higher level?"

Mikoto had started to blush while defending Touma, but quickly tried to play it off as anger towards Kuroko. Then suddenly, a realization hit her.

(Oh no, I didn't tell Kuroko that I have dropped out of Tokiwadai and that we won't be roommates any longer. I hope she takes it well)

"A-and Kuroko, I h-have another thing I have to tell you. Please hold onto something, I think it will shock you quite a bit."

Kurokos cheeks blushed again, which might give a keen observer a hint what she expected Mikoto to tell her in her next sentence. But nothing in the world would have ever made her be ready for the words that actually followed.

"Kuroko, I left Tokiwadai and will not be your roommate any longer."

"Oh, okay."

Kuroko looked a bit disappointed, but not nearly as distraught as Mikoto expected.

(Mhh, maybe I worried about nothing. She seems to be able to take it quite well. Maybe she already realized that we can still meet up outside of school, like we do with Uiharu and Saten right now.)

But all that wishful thinking soon proofed to be futile, as Kuroko suddenly widened her eyes in shock.

"WHAT. DID I HEAR THAT CORRECTLY? NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"