Was… Was this real life? Was this actually happening? Kuroko had been in such a compromising position with the person she cared so very much about, her heart aching as she heard the self-loathing words pouring out of the other girls mouth. She had just acted on instinct and let her own thoughts spill from her own lips. At this point, she could barely remember what she'd said to Mikoto, all she could think about, with her eyes as wide as saucers…

Was how soft Mikoto's lips were.

She didn't want to force herself on Mikoto, she wanted it to be her choice, she didn't… expect her to… actually… accept...

Kuroko felt her eyes drift closed, Mikoto's own eyes squeezed as tightly shut as she could make them. Kuroko sank down against Mikoto, unable to support herself with just her legs any longer, the girl beneath her sinking down onto the warm bathroom floor herself. Kuroko had no idea how long this kiss lasted, it felt like an eternity and it still wasn't long enough.

She wasn't sure when their lips had parted, for she was broken from her reverie as her name was called.

"K-Kuroko…"

Kuroko blinked her eyes open, her face burning red and lips still partly hanging open. Mikoto had a similar expression, though it was filled with intensely flustered embarrassment and panic.

"Um, I… I… I don't… Uh…" Mikoto had no idea what to say. That much was obvious to Kuroko. It was very cute. Kuroko wasn't sure what to tell her. How do you tell someone that they'd just made you feel like the luckiest person alive?

"I'm… I'm s-" Nope. Kuroko wasn't listening to another apology. She pushed her lips against Mikoto's again and cut the attempted sorry right off with a happy quivering trill, though controlled herself after she felt Mikoto tense up in shock and give out her own surprised squeak, pulling back and smiling down at the other girl. Mikoto's mouth hung open, her face as red as brick and as frozen in place as stone.

"Apologize, and I kiss you again." Kuroko explained, smiling at her with her own red face. "So, please… apologize as much as you like." This statement got Mikoto to close her mouth and shrink in raw embarrassment. Kuroko leaned down and nuzzled her face into the crook of Mikoto's neck, ignoring the minor aches she was feeling underneath the sleeves around her stumps. Nothing could take away from this moment.

Mikoto was in a state of pure, complete, utter panic. Her heart was beating so hard in her chest she thought it might explode. She had acted on pure impulse, feeling like an opportunity that she may never have again was slipping away, irrational fear flooding her mind, and now… Now... A billion emotions tossed and turned inside of her head, and the one that confused her more than anything else, the one that fluttered and soared through her that she was trying so hard not to acknowledge, but failing so spectacularly, was…

...Just how happy it made her feel. The elation of joy that had leaped from her heart when their lips met was eclipsing everything, even as that joy was thrown about in a sea of tempestuous anxiety and confusion.

"Onee-sama… You're zapping me." She heard Kuroko say from the crook of her neck. Indeed, in her excited emotional state, she was letting out little electric jolts.

"S-sor-!" She began, and Kuroko immediately began to move from her neck with the most devious grin on her face, prompting Mikoto to stop and seal her lips shut with intense embarrassment. Kuroko had a mix of satisfaction and disappointment at the success of her teasing, though it began to slide off her face slowly as she shifted her shoulder a bit.

"...ow." She winced, rotating her shoulder as she tried to shake off a little pain. "...Ow. OW OW OW!" She got up on her knees quickly, scrambling off of Mikoto as she tried to move over to the bath, Mikoto getting to her feet as she helped Kuroko try to get to her goal of the bath, shoving her arm into the bath water with a crying wince.

Kuroko let out a muffled scream of pain through clenched teeth as she shoved first one stump followed quickly by the other into the water, her body clearly being wracked by pain. Mikoto was panicked, didn't know what to do, didn't know what was happening.

"What… What is going on?"

Indigo looked up from his chair in his subterranean laboratory, eye snapping open, as his seemingly endless smile finally slid off his face as stark pure horror gripped him. He slowly stood from his chair as his gaze fell from Academy City, inch by inch, no matter how tight his grip squeezed.

"That's… But she's… Oh, NO…"

"It hurts, it hurts, it hurts so much! Why… why do my arms hurt?" Kuroko cried out as she tried to restrain her tears, her body wracked with constant waves of pain. "H-help… P-please help..." She whimpered out to the girl pressed against her. Mikoto didn't know what to do. Kuroko's arms no longer had nerves for her to soothe, how was she supposed to relieve arms that no longer existed?

She was certainly going to fucking try. Mikoto hugged Kuroko from behind, placing her chin on top of Kuroko's head, her hands moving to Kuroko's core, her palms pressing firmly against it. If she couldn't directly touch the arms, maybe she could help her whole body? She heard Kuroko hyperventilating in front of her, felt her trembling. Mikoto focused on the electrical impulses firing through Kuroko's body, sending surges of her own into her muscles, finding every little ache and pain that might be causing her even the slightest bit of discomfort, real or imagined.

She moved to the arms that caused her such misery, pushing aside the self-pity and blame to focus on the task at hand, chasing the nerves to their end… their end… where…

Where was she?

She should have stopped short of Kuroko's upper arms, right where the arms had been amputated by her powers, but now she was… somewhere else. She didn't… she couldn't comprehend it. She tried to open her eyes, but couldn't. She could only feel her own body and Kuroko's, feel their electrical impulses mixing together, but no matter how much electricity she used to soothe Kuroko's arms, it vanished away into nothingness, into this ether she found herself in.

"-ama…" She heard Kuroko's voice calling out to her. It was so distant and weak. Mikoto focused harder, fighting through this bizarre void she found herself in toward the pain that was hurting Kuroko. As she follow Kuroko's nervous system, it was completely normal until it hit her arms, and then it went seemingly in… more directions than Mikoto could comprehend, it gave her a migraine. How… How did that even make a modicum of logic or sense?

"MIKOTO!"

Mikoto finally opened her eyes, gasping for a breath she didn't realize she was holding, taking fast, gasping breaths as if she had been suffocating, finding herself collapsed onto her back in the bathroom.

"MIKOTO, LET HER GO!" She heard the voice of Saten pierce through the fog of her oxygen deprived brain, and that was when she realized she was squeezing the life out of Kuroko. She released her quickly, Kuroko gasping for air as her torso was released for air, gasping in lungfuls of air. Uiharu and Maika rushed over to both of them with towels, helping them get some decency.

"W-What happened?" Mikoto wheezed out, Kuroko giving a wheezing attempt at agreeing, but only nodding as she struggled to agree with this sentiment.

"We thought you could tell us. The whole house began to flicker in power, so, you know, we went and found the most likely culprit and found you squeezing the life out of Shirai-san." Saten said as Uiharu knelt next to Kuroko who shook off any worries, mostly out of a need to shake off any concern that Mikoto did anything wrong.

"R-really, I'm fine, I was having a phantom pain episode, Onee-sama was helping relieve it was all." Kuroko said, attempting to sit up and slipping a bit, thrusting a stump out to catch herself against the edge of the bathtub.

DINK.

"Dink?" The five girls in the room said in unison as the metallic clink against stone resounded through the air. They all looked at Kuroko's stump, which for the most part was as it was before… with the exception of the cap of swirling night-black metal that most certainly had not been there before.

"What in the…" Kuroko gasped out, shifting slightly, her eyes twitching before rapidly switching to look at her other stump which had an identical, though mirrored, cap.

"...What." The five said in unison once more.

"I may have to revise my earlier assessment." Heaven Canceller said, examining the black metal caps that now adorned Kuroko's arm stumps. An inch and a half of close fit and hard metal, followed by swirling, criss-crossing vortex of metal that seemed to adhere to her skin.

"YA THINK!?" Kuroko gave a rather rare angry outburst at the elder man, which was matched in exact unison with Mikoto who had risen from her chair in the examination room. The doctor leveled them both with a calm stare and did not respond verbally, and after several long seconds of silence, both girls shrunk back into their seats, mollified by the stern, grandfatherly stare.

The four girls had all come to the hospital immediately after the entire incident, with Maika shooing them off, assuring them that the house would be in proper order when they returned.

Now, all four were mostly panicked because nothing made sense, and stability was something that were being consistently deprived of.

"Hm." The doctor stood up and moved over to one of his instruments and placed it against one of the caps. Mikoto immediately recognized it as an ammeter, or one of its variants, a tool used to measure electrical currents.

"Misaka-san, were you utilizing your therapy method you told me about?" He asked, not meeting her eyes. Misaka shifted a bit, feeling like a kid called into the principal's office.

"Y-yes…" She said quietly.

"I see. Shirai-san is very fortunate." He said, looking to Misaka, prompting a confused look from her. The man moved to her and showed her the meter, and the color drained from her face. Kuroko was lucky she hadn't exploded. Kuroko was lucky she wasn't exploding right now.

"I have no idea what that metal is, but that's just what's left over. Watch." He placed the meter on her cap again, showing the meter to the four of them, the meter rapidly descending in measurement.

"Where… Where is all that electricity going?" Uiharu asked softly.

"Excellent question. I have no idea." The doctor answered honestly. He put the meter away as he walked away from them, Kuroko shifting a bit on the patient table, before asking the pressing question.

"Doctor… do I have my AIM field back? Am I an Esp-"

"No, Shirai-san." He said with a sigh. Kuroko visibly deflated. "You do not have an AIM field. Though I have no idea what that means anymore. I have no idea where that metal came from, I have no idea what either of you just endured, and I have no idea what any of this means."

He turned to face them. "I do know that I will find out." He said with a certain level of certainty. "Powers sometimes react when users go through extreme emotional or psychological changes or experiences. Did either of you experience something like that?"

There was a deafening, burning pause. It was burning because Kuroko and Mikoto's faces both turned a distinct shade of bright, glowing pink.

"N-n-n-no." Mikoto stuttered out quickly, looking away from everyone in the room. If she were looking, she'd be met with the most disbelieving looks in the world.

"I-I'm g-gonna go get a d-drink!" She said, sitting up quickly and just short of running out of the room.

"I should probably talk to her…" Kuroko sighed out, hopping off the bed, giving the doctor a bow. "Please let me know once you've found anything. My apologies for my outburst." She said honestly, turning toward the door. Uiharu hopped up, opening the door.

"Lemme help you." She said helping her through. Saten stood quickly to follow them, and jumped in surprise as the door suddenly slammed in her face by Uiharu, finding herself alone in the room with the doctor.

"Saten-san. I actually wanted to talk to you about those appointments you have been missing."

Damn.

"...Well played, Uiharu…"

"Oh my god…" Mikoto whisper to herself, holding a cold soda to her burning face as she looked out a window. The only thing that made her embarrassment worse, was the Misaka Network slipping itself open as it felt her strong emotions, and doing what sisters do best, and TEASING HER. THROUGH HER OWN MEMORIES. BY GIVING ANALYSIS ON HER KISSING TECHNIQUE. SCIENTIFICALLY. RIGHT. NOW.

"You guys suck…" Mikoto whined out pitifully as she buried her face into the cold soda more.

"Onee-sama."

Misaka twisted around quickly, finding that the out-of-ways hospital lounge she had hid herself in had been found by Kuroko and Uiharu, Uiharu giving her a smile before turning around and leaving them alone. Kuroko had her practically trapped against the corner window and pillar Misaka had been wallowing in embarrassment in.

"K-Kuroko, uh…" She wasn't sure what to really say, fiddling with the tab on the soda can. "S-so, maybe there's a chance your powers mi-" She began to say, grabbing at a topic that seemed neutral enough, but was quickly smacked down.

"You know that's not what we need to talk about." Kuroko said softly, taking a step forward so that they were firmly in each others personal space. Mikoto held the soda can against her chest like a shield, fidgeting with it.

"R-right." Mikoto said softly, fidgeting all the more. Kuroko stared up at her, before smiling softly.

"It doesn't have to be complicated, Onee-sama. I love you. I kissed you. You kissed me." She said, still smiling, bouncing on her heels a little, just a bit like schoolgirl with a crush.

"Do you love me?" Kuroko asked, with just a hint of fear in her voice as she looked up at Mikoto once more, meeting her eyes. "How I feel won't change no matter how you answer. I will accept whatever your feelings are." Kuroko said softly. There was a… maturity in Kuroko that humbled Mikoto as someone who was her senior.

Mikoto had spent a many-nights long violent tantrum destroying buildings and ripping apart that which disgusted her over a year ago. She wasn't sure if she'd really grown out of the childishness of that act. Kuroko had lost so much because of it all… And part of Mikoto wondered if she'd gained something Mikoto hadn't been giving her credit for. Did she really deserve to lov-

Mikoto dropped the empty can onto the ground with a tink as her eyes went wide. Kuroko tilted her head at Mikoto in some concern. Mikoto replayed that line of reasoning in her head again as she heard the monotonous-toned teasing and cajoling of her little sisters in her head.

"Onee-sama-?"

"Yes."

Kuroko froze, blinking, Mikoto face burning as her arms went rigid at her side, shaking in neurotic nervousness. An incredibly stubborn, frustrated, and determined part of Mikoto refused to just let herself fall to tiny pieces once she'd managed to get a degree of logic, and being teased telepathically by annoying little siblings were compelling her to want to not lose.

"Y-yes wha-?" Kuroko began to clarify, but Mikoto had mental and emotional momentum and by all that was scientific and divine, she was going to keep barreling down with it without a single care for caution.

"I love you, Kuroko." She said with nearly stuttering, jittery confidence to a suddenly stunned Kuroko. The next words out of her mouth spilled out as her arms and legs shook visibly in nervousness and anxiety, tiny arcs of electricity running up and down her body as her powers expressed her emotions aptly.

"W-will you… Will you be my girlfriend?"

A/N Hm, not sure how I feel about this chapter. Tell me what you think.