Several Skill-Out grunts fell down to the ground head first. A hand reached to the nape of the neck and held it tightly. A golden armored samurai, emitting grass green flame, was extracted from the fallen Skill-Out grunt.

The samurai was thrown away, landing on his back. He looked at a looming figure above him.

"I-I-I'm s-sorry!" He pleaded, fear overcame him as his body convulsed.

The figure raised a hand and conjured a small purple flame on middle finger.

"I thought you were better. You're just a weak, naive snake."

It flicked the flame square on the helmet of the samurai. A cracking sound of metal was heard.

["You were scary back there."]

"Really?"

Misaka Mikoto walked across the streets of District 7 on the way to School Garden. It was just her physical body, though. The one in control was actually Shirai Kuroko.

Three hours ago, 7:30 AM

Both Mikoto and Kyouko were done wearing their light brown Tokiwadai vest. They went to their respective desks to get their school bags.

But to Mikoto, she had to do something else.

Shirai was sitting on the chair, in a fetal position as she hugged her legs with her hands and her head resting on her knee. She was snoring, not bothered by the school bag behind her.

Ever since Mikoto woke up, she didn't bother waking up the youkai as she will disturb her sleep. After she had done preparing for school, or when Kyouko had took much of her time inside the bathroom, the youkai had not woke up from her slumber.

Wasting no time to wait for Shirai, Mikoto placed a finger to her arm. The latter's finger sparked as she gave the former a shock and forcefully woke her up.

"Ow!"

As a side-effect of being shocked, her movements were too sudden, she herself turned into her signature flame and dove into Mikoto without realizing it.

"Wai-"

Before Mikoto could react on what the youkai just did, her body was igniting, even though she didn't feel herself burning. She felt a tingling sensation in her body. Her sense of touch was slowly disappearing, she couldn't feel the moist on her lips nor taste the saliva in her mouth. Coldness started to invade her body; ignoring all the heat around her.

The flame, unseen by Kyouko, was absorbed into her body.

'So this is what they mean by possessed feels like?' she thought.

"Misaka-san?"

Thankfully, she could still hear and see her surroundings. Her head moved to the left and faced Kyouko on its own.

"Is something wrong?"

She wanted to answer Kyouko's question, but whatever word came out from her mouth, the recipient wouldn't hear her.

"Ah, no, nothing..."

Her mouth spoke and moved on its own; she didn't think her answer was something like that, and there was only one thing to consider, even if she didn't want to believe it,

Shirai was in control of her body.

Present, 7:55 AM

In their current situation, earlier, Mikoto had suggested to Shirai that they buy an earpiece to make their conversations less awkward for the civilian around them and avoid strange gazes every time they talk. After they had bought the earpiece and the youkai had placed it on Mikoto's ear, they were chased by possessed Skill-Out grunts; Shirai had beat all of them shortly and eliminated the naive snake youkai.

"I wasn't trying to be scary."

["That youkai almost fainted from your words."]

"I didn't expect some of them were cowards."

["You were cool back there. You only used your strength on disposing those Skill-Outs."]

Shirai blushed at the compliment. She didn't understand why that compliment made her heart beat faster. Mikoto was only her companion to help her in her situation, right?

"T-Those were n-nothing... My strength is natural since I'm a youkai..."

Shirai stuttered as she arrived at the gates of School Garden, pulling out Mikoto's card from the bag and scanned it at the scanner, used to let the students enrolled schools inside the Garden enter freely. There is also a counter for outsider students to enter the Garden, courtesy that they have been invited by one of the students enrolled in the area or need a permission.

["But, you have to leave my body soon, Kyouko will soon notice the change."] Mikoto said wearily.

Shirai put a hand on the earpiece in her ear, under the assumption she was talking to someone on her phone to the female students around her.

"That's what I would like to do, but I don't know how to do it."

Mikoto let out a sigh.

Soon, they arrived at Tokiwadai Middle School. Shirai felt nervous as this was her first time interacting with a lot of human beings, apart from Mikoto. She had seen most of Tokiwadai's students; most of them acted too highly and arrogant due to their rich status and matched their ego, while some acted "ojou-sama" but goodhearted.

Since she had been accompanying Mikoto for two weeks, she knew the direction of her companion's classroom.

She entered the said classroom and saw that there were students talking to each other in their own group of friends. Those students stopped talking as they noticed the presence of Mikoto, who only examined the room, waiting for their reaction.

"Good morning, Misaka-sama."

Letting her instincts guide her, Shirai replied back with a smile,

"Good morning."

The students continued their chattering after Tokiwadai's Ace greeted them back, albeit they didn't know it was someone else.

Shirai exhaled as she sat to Mikoto's designated seat, removing the earpiece from her ear and put it in her pocket in the meantime. She rested her head on her right arm, looking at the blue sky outside; white clouds moving in a very slow motion.

After class, Kyouko told Shirai that she had to attend Judgment duties with Uiharu. The Cryokinesist waved goodbye to Shirai as she walked away, the latter waving back in response.

["What do you want to do for today?"]

Mikoto asked as Shirai pulled out the earpiece and put it in her ear.

Shirai thought up for a moment before answering, "I don't know. But, I think I can find some entertainment as I walk."

She walked away from Tokiwadai Middle School to School Garden to exit. She looked at the shops as she passed by other stalls. Some of the stalls she saw were interesting, but she looked for the stall that interest her most.

Until she saw a game center.

Sadly, her feeling of interest broke down as she heard a melody of a croaking frog.

["Oh. Someone's calling you."]

Shirai fumed as she pulled the phone from the skirt's pocket and opened Mikoto's green Gekota flip phone. Both saw the screen and read it was Saten Ruiko calling.

["Saten-san? That's unusual."]

Shirai pressed the "answer" button and removed the earpiece, instead putting the flip phone to her ear.

"Hello? Misaka-san? Are you free for today?"

The youkai had to rely to Mikoto in delivering the right words to the other person she was talking to. They had been in the cycle for a while, since Shirai had no idea how to exit Mikoto's body since it was first time for her to do it, albeit it was an accident.

["Tell her I'm free and ask her why."]

"Yeah, I'm free. Why?"

"There's something I want to tell you, since I couldn't bother Uiharu and Ajime-san." Saten said.

Mikoto instructed Shirai to agree on accompanying Saten, much to Shirai's disappointment to entertain herself.

"I see. Let's meet at Seventh Mist." Saten said as she hung up.

Shirai arrived at Seventh Mist. She saw several unoccupied tables with umbrellas perched in the middle of each tables, shading it from the heat of the sun. There was a girl wearing Sakugawa Middle uniform occupying in one of the tables, possibly waiting for someone.

She recognized her as Saten Ruiko, one of Mikoto's close friends.

"Saten-san!"

The girl looked at the source of the voice to see Shirai approaching her and sat at the other chair of the same table.

"What is that you want to tell me?" Shirai asked.

"It's about the latest urban legend - beings you can't see!" Saten said with excitement.

For Shirai, she didn't know what kind of urban legend that the other was talking about, and best to keep quiet. Mikoto supplied her information about the urban legend's subject as being them, youkai.

Without waiting for Shirai's reaction, Saten continued, "There is an item called Spirit Meter! It's said it can detect the presence of spiritual beings in a certain radius!"

"And it comes in two forms: Glasses and Dowsing Rod!"

Shirai wasn't sure if she should be excited or deny the existence of the said item. After all, urban legends are just rumors from credible to exaggerated, according to Mikoto.

Noticing her unresponsive friend, Saten lost her excitement and looked at Shirai. "Misaka-san, is something wrong?"

"I'm fine..." Shirai said. "W-Well... Is it, uh, possible to detect those... spirits?"

As a youkai, it was very awkward to refer herself in third person. If such items exist, a lot of events circulated in her mind. From beating them to death to lighting up an essence to exorcism. From the documents she had read in her free time back then, said exorcism only happen if the human is possessed by an evil spirit; if it was a spirit with no evil intentions, it's out of the league.

"Hmm..." Saten curled up her index finger and placed it on her chin. "I guess so."

"Before I came here to Academy City, I had watched videos about supernatural beings. Like that movie The Exorcist; it was based on a real case. Apart from coming here to have an ability, I always wanted to see a spirit, from Academy City or not."

That was the first time that Shirai heard that someone wanted to see such beings. Most people would just look at them ridiculously and saying: "That's a load crap." or "You believe in that?"

Saten's face suddenly brightened up, she seemed to have a good idea. "How about we look for those devices? After that, we can -"

The long haired girl was interrupted when they heard a male voice, whose tone sounded like he was searching for something.

"Where is it..."

The two girls looked at the high school student walking around in the distance. He was bending down and held two L-shaped metal wires, with the shorter leg as a handle in flesh colored thick plastic.

He approached the table that Saten and Shirai occupied absent-mindlessly. The only time he realized he was walking to an occupied table was when he bumped his head under the table.

He walked back, then stood firmly and saw two girls looking at him curiously.

"Umm... Have you seen this?" He pulled out a picture from his uniform's pocket and showed it to the girls.

The subject of the picture was a male adult dog of a Husky breed. He was sitting down, eating the dog food. He had a red leash around his neck, which had the word "GRAUL" imprinted on it.

"No... We didn't see a dog like that." Saten said as she examined the picture closer, then she looked at the student. "Why didn't you call Judgment to help you search for your lost dog?"

"Judgment? You mean those students wearing the green and white armband thing?" He said as he pointed his left upper arm.

"...Yeah." Saten was more dumbfounded that how come a student of Academy City never knew what Judgment was, and there was only one conclusion to it. "Are you a transfer student... uhh..."

"Call me Yoshiki." Yoshiki said as he felt rude for not introducing himself. "Yeah, I only transferred here yesterday. I've always wanted to have an ability, so I went here."

Saten looked at his dowsing rods. "Why are you using those to search for your dog?"

"Ah, these?" Yoshiki looked down at his rods. "It's said that I can find anything using this. I love reading those supernatural things in this world and can't wait to see an actual one."

Saten abruptly stood up from her seat. "Really!? Then, we can look for your dog then we look for a spirit!"

Yoshiki only smiled at her determination. "I would be glad if you help me."

Shirai examined Yoshiki as he kept conversing with Saten. While he looked gentle and human on the outside, he was a youkai, using his illusion ability. She didn't know if he noticed she was in the body of her companion. But that would be impossible for her pursuers to not know since Tora's attack.

The three left Seventh Mist and were currently walking across the streets of District 7, with Saten at the middle. To her left was Yoshiki and to her right was Shirai.

"Oh yeah, I haven't learned your names. It would be bad if we didn't know each others' names." Yoshiki said, looking at the two girls.

"Saten Ruiko."

"Misaka Mikoto."

"Those are nice names. Say, what do we look first after we find my dog?"

"Kyuubi!"

Shirai's heart skipped a beat at Saten's reply. She had expected this would happen. There were a lot of supernatural beings to search for, why something related to kitsune?

"Kyuubi, eh?" Yoshiki said with interest. "Be careful of them when you see one."

"Why?" Saten asked.

"They might bite you without notice." Yoshiki said as he spared a glance to Shirai behind Saten.

"Doesn't matter!" Saten exclaimed as pumped her fist to her shoulder level. "Misaka-san will fry that kyuubi in no time!" Then she turned to Shirai who was looking ahead, "Right, Misaka-san?"

Realizing that the sentence was meant for her, Shirai looked at Saten with a surprised expression. "Ah, yes, I-I'll fry that kyuubi."

"What's wrong, Misaka-san?" Saten asked with worry. "You've been down since we talked about the urban legend."

"W-Well... What would you do if you found that... kyuubi?"

"I will make that kyuubi my pet!" Saten said as she imagined with her own fantasy; which involved her petting the kyuubi, throwing a disc and let it chase the flying object, among many others that involved the kyuubi looked like a dog rather than a fox.

["Somehow... that sounds more like she's trying to take care a stray dog."]

Shirai nodded at Mikoto's statement.

"By the way Yoshiki-san, how did you lose your dog?" Saten asked.

"I usually leave him alone the dorm room whenever I go to school. Due to my carelessness, I left the window open and my dog probably escaped from there. He must be searching for me because he was lonely."

"Your dog must be really loyal to you." Saten said, trying to cheer up the mood.

"So loyal he escaped to my dorm room." Yoshiki added, chuckling at the idea of a loyal dog.

"Any possible places?"

"I've checked Seventh Mist, playground, game center and artificial riverbank. I also checked on schools, but no luck."

"Have you asked people about it?"

"No. I don't want to bother people about it."

"Then, give me the picture then I'll ask if they saw your dog."

Yoshiki grabbed the picture from his white polo's pocket and gave it to Saten who immediately grabbed it and went for the nearest person she saw.

He sweatdropped at the act, and used this opportunity to talk to Shirai.

"How does it feel to be a human?"

"It was great, even I wished to be a human instead of being a successor."

"I wish I could say the same, but they are a lot easier to fool with illusions."

'As if you weren't one yourself.' Shirai thought as she found it funny how ironic his statement was. It was spilling all over and he didn't even realize it.

["Isn't he an illusion himself? Well, according to Tora, that is. Wait, why is he talking to us when he knew about you?"]

Shirai immediately realized what Mikoto meant and wanted to ask Yoshiki about it.

Sadly before she could even act Saten suddenly came back from her question spree from the civilian around them.

"I finally know where Yoshiki-san's dog is!"

At 177th Judgment Branch office, Kyouko, Uiharu and Konori were investigating about the latest case after all telepath espers were interrogated. They all had alibis to clear their name.

"When we will be ever to finish this case?" Kyouko asked as she stopped typing and stretched her arms upward.

"This is getting troublesome." Konori commented as she drank a pack of Musashino Milk.

"Even that Dummy Check user has her own alibi. Now I'm not even sure if we're looking at the right things."

"The attacks only occur in District 7 and the number of victims barely increased since yesterday."

"Eh? Only District 7? No wonder why the victims were only few and within our reach."

"We can use it to our advantage and narrow our search."

Shirai, Saten and Yoshiki were at the park where a certain vending machine resided.

It was devoid of any people. If there were any, they were just either a passer-by or unfortunate.

"So this is the place, huh." Yoshiki mused. "I've been here twice before."

"Alright! We'll search for this place and look for the dog!" Saten said.

They walked along the park as they looked around to search for the said dog. They went to different hiding places in case the dog was there, to no avail. Even ridiculous places such as trash can didn't help their search. They settled to search in the areas that had a lot of trees and plants, until Saten looked behind at a certain vending machine.

"Ah!"

There was a dog sitting very close to the machine and stared at Saten.

Shirai and Yoshiki approached Saten; they took a peek behind the machine and saw the dog that Yoshiki was looking for.

"Graul!" He called out and smiled at the dog.

"Woof!" The dog jumped onto Yoshiki and licked on his face, tickling him.

Saten and Shirai watched the heartwarming scene, they smiled as the dog finally reunited with his owner. But for Shirai, there were a lot of questions in her mind.

["That dog..."] Mikoto said as she half-cried at the scene.

Shirai took three steps backward and turned around.

"What's wrong, Onee-sama?" She asked in the lowest tone possible.

["Seeing the dog reunited with his owner is too cute... if only the owner wasn't a youkai..."]

"Is that it?"

["I also wanted to touch the dog, but the weak electricity emitting from my body... Oh yeah, is that dog any way a youkai?"]

Shirai turned her head to her left and glanced behind her, examining the dog with a piercing glare. After a few seconds, Shirai removed her glare and turned to face the horizon before her.

"It's only an illusion created by that Yoshiki. I don't know what he's trying to do with that dog, but I don't like it."

"It's about time I should take my leave." Yoshiki suddenly said.

Saten looked at him with a disappointing look while Shirai only looked at him.

"Why? I was so looking forward for our supernatural search."

Yoshiki chuckled. "We can try it tomorrow. Invite your friends if you want."

"Okay!"

The male student put his pet dog down and turned around, walking away.

Back in the Judgment office, the three members of 177th Branch continued their work after their short break.

"Everyone who had optical manipulation ability are also clear." Kyouko sighed.

"This is getting nowhere." Uiharu said.

"Is there anything we can do?"

"This is..." Konori gasped as she read through the article on her screen. "Ajime-san, Uiharu-san, I have something that may interest you two."

"What is it, Konori-senpai?" Kyouko asked as she and Uiharu walked behind and looked at their senpai's laptop screen.

"I'm not sure if I'm going to believe this, but this is the first time there's a case of 'spiritual possession'."

"That should be impossible, since this is Academy City." Kyouko said.

"You two should read this." Konori instructed.

Both Kyouko and Uiharu leaned closer to the screen and read the entire paragraph.

Location: A Certain Hospital

Time: 10:30

Title: Skill-Out member reports of spiritual possession

Article: Six Skill-Out members were hospitalized for receiving multiple injuries. 7:49 in the morning, they were roaming around District 7, where the nearest place they were was near School Garden. According to them, they felt strange sensations as they lose focus of themselves, as if they felt they were going to collapse - but they were wrong. They were half-conscious. Then, "they" approached a middle school student, whose appearance they cannot remember, and also the uniform. That student took down all of them in a few blows and they lost consciousness afterwards. They woke up in a certain hospital without memories of such ordeal except for a few details. Those Skill-Out members, even if they wanted to deny, had experienced spiritual possession, a first in Academy City!]

"A middle school student, taking Skill-Out members with no problem?" Kyouko said.

"But that sounds weird," Uiharu wondered. "why Skill-Out, of all people? And why would those, uh, spirits target that student?"

"Looks like we're finally getting a lead, even if it was a very little one." Kyouko said, her drive to continue the case returning.

"Eh? Ajime-san, you're considering it?"

"It doesn't matter if we believe it or not, as long we find the cause to all this."

"I've come back from my mission, my lord." A high school student knelt down on one knee.

"Welcome back, Yoshiki - or rather, Kamakiri."

Kamakiri shifted in his youkai form, donning his light green flame.

"How was the mission?" His lord inquired.

"Heiress was unfamiliar with her ability to possess a human. And the lesser soldiers were eliminated by her."

The lord smirked at Kamakiri's mission report. "It doesn't matter if they were eliminated or not. Just proceed to your next mission, or bring a friend if you prefer."

"If the traitor still retaliates, then I have no choice but to make things drastic."

At the mere mention of traitor felt like a stab in the heart for Kamakiri. His lord had always called her a traitor. He didn't even know why. He only knew that the massacre was caused by the Heiress. But this wasn't the time to mop around thinking about it.

"Kamakiri."

"Yes, my lord?"

"Don't make the same mistake as that liar Tora. Do you understand?"

Kamakiri bowed down and left.

The lord sighed.

"They really proved themselves to be useful at certain times."

"They think my purpose is to capture the traitor for their sake, but I have a far greater purpose..."

Time: 9:15

At Tokiwadai Girls' Dormitory, Room 208, Shirai currently sat on Mikoto's chair, staring at the empty desk in front of her. Kyouko was sleeping peacefully, as usual, after their work in Judgment.

"How do I get out of this body..."

At the end of the day, Shirai still didn't know how to exit the body. Then she thought of an idea. It must be the most ridiculous way she thought of, but it might be the only way to exit.

Mikoto had a bad feeling about this.

["Kuroko... What are you planning?"]

The last thing she saw was the desk became bigger in her eyes and heard a loud thud before a black out.

A/N: Cliché, cliché everywhere. Slice of life is my weakness. While this chapter only demonstrates part of Kuroko's ability, it still had the plot kicking. Now that I'm at the fifth chapter, I'll ask a question and I hope my readers/reviewers/whoever-you-are answer this either by PM or review. "Am I crossing the Out Of Character borderline?", with the exception of Kyouko and Kuroko, had I made the characters almost OOC? I want to avoid it as much as possible. And this is the first chapter that it took me almost six freaking days to complete due to how ordinary the day was.

Also, no betas in this chapter since I asked Cross if he could beta this chapter so I know whether I improved or not. I didn't receive a reply so I had to rely on my own skills. I hope I did better than the first three chapters.

P.S.: Railgun S Episode 1 was so awesome. Misaki, helicopter scene and the opening were the best parts of the episode. I watched it for like 10 times and I'm still not bored of it.

P.S.S.: Don't forget to review!