Meeting the Railgun

[[ACSR: Uiharu Kazari]]

A bell rang, classes were done for the day so Joule begin packing her bag to leave. They had been doing another ability test today that she had done without Lumen's help. Her level was still considered level 2 without Lumen so no big surprise there.

As she was leaving she met up with Uiharu and walked out with her while chatting about the tests.

When they were aproaching the gates the two girls heard someone calling out "Uuuuiiihaaaru!"

Suddenly there was a moment of shock, Saten had crept up and flipped Uiharu's skirt up. It would have been worrying if Joule hadn't once seen her do it to Uiharu before, regardless it was shocking.

Saten continued without care, she looked down and noted "I see you are wearing the pink polka dots today?"

As Uiharu let out a small scream she turned and began complaining "I can't believe you, what do you think you're doing Saten?"

"Oh come on relax, we are class mates aren't we. There is no reason to be so bashful about it. See let's try it on Joule, it'll make you feel better" Saten turned round to look at where Joule was standing to see here a few meters away looking at her in a way that said "Don't you dare."

Saten turned back to Uiharu "Well I'll just have to do it again then!" Uiharu started walking quickly to catch up with Joule, Saten caught back up to them but was given no opportunity to try again.

Eventually the three girls sat at a bench, the conversation restarted with Uiharu sighing "You're awful, you know that?"

When Saten offered to flip her skirt to make it even, Joule and Uiharu quickly refused. Saten then asked about how the system scan had gone and Uiharu became disheartened, Joule could see why but she was fine with a low ability level if it let her avoid notice. Uiharu proceeded to cheer her up by showing her that she had gotten a song before the CD had come out and offered that her friends could come with her as she went to buy the actual CD.

Uiharu looked sad "I can't I am meeting with Kuroko Shirai today." Saten and Joule looked at her and almost in harmony asked "Who?" after a second Saten thought and asked "Was that the girl who was in Judgement with you?"

"You're in Judgement?" asked Joule who had never heard that information before, Saten nodded to her and said "Uiharu has worked for Judgement for years but she never told me too much about it."

As they turned back to ask about the meeting they could see that Uiharu was suddenly looking quite excited and she spoke "My fondest wish is about to become true, today I'm going to meet Mikoto Misaka! She is one of the only 7 level 5s that live in academy city. Tokiwadai's Ace. I think she's amazing."

Joule wanted to note that most of that was basically exposition but it was helpful so she ignored it. before she could reply in any way, Saten spoke "A level 5 from Tokiwadai middle school? I bet she's just an arrogant jerk who flaunts her power while judging the rest of us." Uiharu softly said "No she's not..." before Saten continued "She is just the sort of person I expect to judge people based on their level. She'll be even worse if she is the darling of Tokiwadai."

"The darling, I get to meet someone called a darling" Uiharu was back to being excited as if everything Saten said was just random noise. As Saten noted that she was just being starry eyed for a celebrity, Joule thought about this Level 5. She didn't know much about how the rating system worked but she wondered if level 5 was similar to the 5th band of the life wave or the 7th, was she on GV's level or not that strong.

She couldn't make an accurate guess yet as while she knew Uiharu's level and her own, Joule had yet to learn what Uiharu's ability actually was.

Eventually Joule focused back on the conversation as Uiharu invited Saten and herself to come and meet this level 5 with her.

As Uiharu began to drag Saten with her, she glanced back and was pleased when Joule was coming too.

The girls were walking, looking for the cafe that Kuroko had apparently told Uiharu about. They stopped at what was likely the right cafe and glanced through the window, there appeared to be a pair of school girls embracing in one of the booths in the front.

A moment passed as Uiharu noted that the girl who was look the most "Passionate" was Kuroko.

A few minutes later they were all standing outside the cafe, Joule looked at the two girls that had come out of the cafe to meet them.

One of them, the girl with pigtails took a step so she could see all four other girls before holding out her hand and beginning introductions. While Uiharu stumbled over her words after Kuroko introduced her to Misaka. Saten was a little confrontational with her self-introduction, saying her level as if she expected the level 5 to insult her about it (Which she did not).

Finally Joule introduced herself "My name is Joule, I am another classmate of Uiharu, nice to meet you."

The girl, Misaka looked confused for a moment "Joule? As in the unit of energy?" Joule thought for a couple of seconds before nodding slowly.

Regardless the girl Misaka introduced herself, very politely too. Apparently this incredibly down to earth introduction shocked Uiharu and Saten for a moment.

Kuroko nodded to herself "Introductions are done then, the timetable got thrown off a bit but I made this for today and I think everyone would..." She was cut off mid-sentence as Misaka stuck her sharply on the head.

As Kuroko knelt down to nurse her bump on the head, Misaka said "Standing around here isn't very fun, let's go to the arcade."

Joule took a moment to note how different Misaka was from how Saten had thought.

Walking in front of her was a level 5 and her friend and Misaka was basically stating that she didn't like being 'Ladylike'.

"She doesn't act like a celebrity" Saten was saying something and Uiharu replied "She didn't judge us on our abilities either", Joule took a few steps to stand besides her friends before stating "People are people, you might think that a good school and an amazing ability might change someone but it doesn't have to."

Saten admitted that her judgement might have been cast too quickly before glancing down at a flyer that Uiharu had taken a few moments ago and asking "What is the flyer about?"

Uiharu read it quickly as Joule and Uiharu turned their heads to read it. Uiharu stated "It is advertising a new crepe stand, the first one-hundred customers get this small figure"

"What a cheesy looking figure, who would like something like that?" Saten asked as she walked into Misaka who had stopped while looking at another flyer.

Kuroko looked at Misaka and asked "Are you interested in the crepe stand?" her smile took on a tint that looked slightly evil from Joules perspective as she continued "Or... are you interested in the free gift?"

As Misaka denied her interest in the frog-like figure, the others all noticed a small figure of the same character that Misaka had attached to her bag.

There was silence for a few moments before everyone turned in the direction of the crepe stand. Lumen had woken from a nap and when Joule had told her what was going on she laughed quite hard for a butterfly.

Joule had just wanted a fairly standard crepe (just cream) so she had agreed to stand behind Misaka in the line. When Uiharu and Kuroko had gone to find a bench to sit on they had left their orders with Joule as she would remember better than Saten.

As Saten got the last of the free gifts and Misaka fell to the ground dejected, Lumen laughed all the harder. Everyone who could be heard was tactful however and Saten gave her gift to Misaka.

After meeting up with the other two girls and handing over the crepes for them, Joule, Uiharu and Saten sat at the bench as Misaka and Kuroko danced about, Kuroko apparently wanting to share her crepe with Misaka. The three on the bench agreed that Misaka was a lot nicer and less imposing than any of them had thought.

When Misaka approached them after a bit she asked a question that took Joule by surprise "Did any of you see who was laughing at me earlier?" by this point Lumen had hidden herself again but Joule was surprised that Misaka had heard her at all. She just played dumb and went with Saten's statement "I didn't hear anyone laughing at you earlier."

After a few more moments Uiharu turned to look at something, Saten and Joule followed her gaze to a bank with it's shutters down. As Uiharu wondered out loud why they were down in the middle of the day there was a loud noise.

[[ACSR: Battle Area]]

The shutters exploded outward in a burst of fire, as it did so Kuroko jumped over the bench that the others were sitting on while pulling her armband from a pocket, while she did that she asked Uiharu to call in back-up. Misaka stepped forward to join her before Kuroko insisted that public safety was left to Judgement.

As Uiharu called in the backup from Anti-skill, some people ran out of the bank carrying bags. Joule glanced at Kuroko only to see that she wasn't there anymore, she was on the other side of the street blocking the robber's escape.

After seeing Kuroko showing off some martial arts to disable the first robber, Joule turned her attention to Uiharu who was holding back a woman in who was trying to struggle. Misaka, Saten and Joule ran over to see what the problem was, apparently the woman was leading a tour and one of the children on the tour was missing.

Misaka and Joule searched the bus he said he'd been going to while Saten and Uiharu searched outside. When they couldn't find him Misaka poked her head out of the bus to see if the others had saw him, as Misaka and Joule turned too Saten they heard a commotion, Saten had found the boy but so had a bank robber.

Saten pulled at the boy before the attempted kidnapper kicked her away. Misaka ran out of the bus and onto the road to stare down the robber/kidnapper. As Kuroko prepared to attack him, Misaka stated simply "From here on out this fight is a personal one for me, I hate to do this but it's too late. I have to get involved now!"

As Joule also left the bus she saw something that surprised her, Blue lightning arced around Misaka. Was she another Azure Striker? At this Lumen appeared to look at the situation.

The attempted kidnapper had gotten in a car and turned it around, seemingly planning to run down Misaka. Misaka wasn't worried, she just took something out of her pocket.

It was around now that Joule made the connection, she remembered what Saten had said days ago when she had said "The third most powerful esper in the city is an Electromaster"

Oh dear, it seems like the attempted kidnapper doesn't quite understand who he's dealing with. As he accelerated, Misaka flipped the coin she held into the air.

Lumen could sense the electricity that Misaka was generating and understood quickly what she was doing, she was going to use her hand as a railgun to launch the coin. Before she told Joule to cover her ears the coin fell and was launched.

Something like a laser emerged from Misaka's hand, Lumen understood it the coin was magnetically spend up. It's mass might be small but at this sort of speed that didn't really matter. The "Bullet" impacted the speeding car, flipping it through the air to land upside down behind her.

Joule's ears hurt.

[[ACSR: Taisetsu na Tomodachi]]

Time passed and Anti-skill arrived to take away the bank robbers (Apparently Kuroko had defeated all of them while they were searching for the boy). Saten was being thanked by the tour guide, she deserved the praise so Joule herself went over to offer some.

After the excitement Misaka also came over to agree with how heroic Saten was. Getting this praise from the friendly level 5 was probably quite the moment for her.

Regardless, everyone swapped contact info and began to go their separate ways.

Joule talk 6: Shock Princess

[[ASG: Cyanotype]]

GV was at home when Joule arrived back, he had been looking up information about the powerful Electromaster he had heard of.

He was quite surprised when Joule told him that she had met the level 5 that day.

"She is a very nice person, my friends an I met her through a mutual acquaintance." Joule was happy, the smile on her face was large.

GV leaned back and tried to ask without prying "So how strong is she?"

Joule stopped for a moment to consider "Assuming I saw her best today?" Both of them knew that Adepts like to hold back their strongest until they became desperate.

"I would say her strongest attack, her 'Railgun' is about equal to one one your skills, maybe Astrasphere or Luxcalibur?" GV nodded, he had expected something like that.

He had wondered what the power scaling was in comparison and it seemed like level 5s were about as strong as septimal adepts like himself and Joule.

"Anyway, " Joule continued "I can't really think of any situation where you would have to target her, she really is nice"

Joule smiled and Gunvolt did too, who knew what the future held?

*You feel a little closer to Joule*

Chapter end!

You might notice this is basically Railgun season 1 episode 1 but with Joule,

When it comes to the actual events from the series I will keep them mostly the same, most of the "new content" will be present in the downtime between arcs where GV and Joule have their own mini arcs like REVEAL mini arc from chapter 4

Do remember if you have question's I am happy to answer.