Here we are again! We're getting closer to the climax everyone is waiting for. For now, lets take another step closer to that climax. The arc only picks up from here. Not much to say. Let's just get the Q&A done so you can all get to the chapter itself.

ahsoei: Glad the twist and end scene are acceptable. To be fair, Touma's playing the role of a private investigator right now. A more passive, investigative role is natural for the progression of the story.

Kim454: Don't entirely see the Enkidu/Gilgamesh connection, but whatever. I'm sure the added soundtrack will be an entertaining addition.

ArmoredCoreNineBall: Sad the King of Trolls has been put to rest. Glad to know the few changes I was able to make were satisfying. Let's see how good your predictions are.

Majin Othinus: Bit of a self-centered guess don't you think. Keep guessing.

TeotakuFantasia: I wanted Touma to be more active, but given the current situation, I could only really give him a passive investigator role. No, the Railgang doesn't get too involved in Angel Fall, but someone else does.

mohamadstar94: Touma will get more involved, in a sense.

awardedall: That's the thing, pain and suffering are not synonymous with character growth. It just seems like that because it is easiest to relate to someone who does suffer. That's kind of how chaos theory works, everything bad that can happen has happened to someone. Plus, having Touma suffer greatly an collapse form the suffering just isn't in character for him. He's the kind of person who complains about misfortune but takes it in stride an moves forward. It took Othinus an innumerable number of worlds and deaths before she got Touma to break and give up. He is just that persistent.

RedSS: You had to play the technicality card, didn't you? Sorry for the apparent laziness. There just wasn't a lot to change or could change. Hey, that crossover is still a long way away. I don't even have a complete plan in place yet.

OnePunchPlayer: To be fair, its not that Touma doesn't find it unbelievable, its just he can't say anything concrete without sufficient evidence.

Kami (Guest): I just made changes that were appropriate for the earlier changes to the story. I might add in some Index/Saten/Uiharu scenes, but I don't want to break the flow to much. Yeah, I'm thinking I'm going to combine the two episodes that the battle takes place over, so the climax will be an appropriately longer chapter.

Chroma (Guest): Thanks!

Guest (1): Hey, we all make mistakes. Plus, the Nasuverse is not something that's easy to get introduced to, what with all the extremely expansive lore you need to research. The man has been working on his world since high school. I don't really know anything about Bleach, so not likely to appear. I will have you know that of the three, Bleach has the most likeliness of being a part of the greater crossover due to it's modern day setting. Naruto & One Piece are just too drastic of worlds to be part of an interconnected universe.

guest (Guest): General plot stays the same, it's how that plot is executed that is different.

Guest (2): The thing to remember about Mikoto is that, despite being the third most powerful Esper in the city, she is only human. She is the most grounded out of all the Level 5s, and by a rather large margin as well. She is prone to selfishness and emotional turmoil, just like everyone else, so these reactions from her are expected.

fencer29: Well, childhood is the base of any person. It's not a surprise he tried the same trick again with Mikoto. It will be as expected, just the gang going through the motions with a few subtle changes in how events play out due to a much more connected cast of characters.

Generation Zero: Well, the confrontations between Touma and Mikoto will definitely have some changes to it. What those changes are will sure to be a surprise. I'm not too sure about how I want the Misaki's interactions with Touma to be. I'm leaning towards a slight change in backstory, but I honestly know very little about her from personal experience since I don't have easy access to the novels and her backstory isn't examined until much later in NT. I have until the Daihasei to make a decision. I'm glad you like the additions to Accelerator's past. Of course, the whole thing is based on my own interpretation with a sprinkle of fan theory. Character growth and exploration was the main purpose of the story. A "what if" scenario of if the characters had a fuller view of their world.

RPGPersona: Huh, I guess I can see that. I'm definitely a bit more of a "here are your answers" kind of writer. I can't blame you for missing the Fate reference. Nasuverse lore is expansive and confusing as hell. I'm glad you liked the little changes. There was very little I could really do, but I'm glad there was at least something to work with. Sorry, off the mark with that guess. You can keep trying until that story comes out, where the reveal is planned to happen much later into it.

Guest (3): Here you go!

And that's all the Q&A. You know the drill. Disclaimer, story, end card.

Disclaimer: All characters and plotlines of the "A Certain" franchise are credited to Kazuma Kamachi.

Chapter 34: Damning Evidence

As Mikoto walked away from the Tree Diagram Data Center, should hardly believe the irony of the situation. She came to District 23 to manipulate and destroy Tree Diagram to put in end to Project Level 6 Shift. However, upon arriving, she learned she already destroyed it. Nearly a month ago on July 28, she, Touma, and all of their friends saved Index from permanent memory erasure. However, saving one brain came at the cost of two others. Touma was left with total amnesia and Academy City's brain, Tree Diagram, was accidentally destroyed in the crossfire of the fight.

The worst part about the whole situation was the fact that Academy City seemed to be functioning completely normally without Tree Diagram in orbit, and most of the populace was blissfully unaware of it. In hindsight, it should have been obvious that something was amiss. Weather hadn't been as nearly as accurately predicted in since the supercomputer was destroyed when it used to be possible to know the exact time it would stop raining on any given day.

However, the most damning part of the situation was the fact that Project Level 6 Shift had been playing out on schedule despite all the wrenches Mikoto threw in, both intentionally and accidentally. Tree Diagram was destroyed, but the project proceeded based on it original calculations. She destroyed over thirty research facilities, but they all just transferred the research material she was unable to destroy to even more facilities. Now it was August 21, and she was completely out of cards to play.

As she walked down the streets of District 23, Mikoto realized that one of the facilities to receive transfers from Project Level 6 Shift was on the same block she was. This gave Mikoto an idea. Maybe she still had moves to make. Even if Plan B failed, she could always go back to Plan A.

"Thanks for waiting," Touma greeted as he exited the bookstore.

Unfortunately, he quickly realized that no one else was there. Mikoto's sister had apparently disappeared. The only trace of her was her cat and a loaf of sweet bread she left for him.

"Hey, On Hold," Touma greeted as he picked the kitten off the ground, "You're still here, so where did she go?"

Cradling the kitten in his arms, Touma scanned the street before noticing an alley way just across from the bookstore. Despite the unlikelihood, Touma's instincts told him to investigate. Crossing the street, he walked in front of the alley with a bit of skepticism in his step.

"Hey, Misaka's sister!" Touma called into the alley.

When he didn't get an immediate response, Touma couldn't help but chuckle over his strange instincts.

"Don't know why she would be in here anyway," he mused, turning to leave.

"H-help," a weak, masculine voice called out from inside the dark alley.

Turning back towards the tight space, Touma pulled out his ODD and shifted it into its recently added flashlight mode. Illuminating the alley way, Touma saw a group of four collapsed high school students on the ground. One of them, the one who called for help, seemed to be extremely shaken up. The other three were knocked out and injured, two of them heavily so, with one of them having two pieces of scrap metal driven through his hand. It was not a pretty sight to see.

Putting his stuff and the kitten down to the side, Touma quickly rushed over to the only student who was able to speak. Kneeling down next to him, Touma slipped on his armband as he tried to council the shaken student.

"Hey, I'm with Judgement," Touma said, presenting his armband, "Are you alright? What happened here?"

"P-please, d-don't hurt me," the student stuttered helplessly, "J-just don't hurt me."

"This is Touma Kamijou of Judgement Branch 177," Touma reported through the communicator in his ODD bracelet, "I have four victims of an unknown crime, one shaken, three knocked out an injured, two of them heavily so. Requesting Anti-Skill medical assistance to my location."

Standing back up, Touma swept his ODD's flashlight across the alley to make sure he didn't miss any victims. However, what he found was much more disturbing. In the middle of the asphalt ground was a small crater, created through the use of extremely localized blunt force. This and the victim's injuries could only be explained by two things, an extremely powerful Esper, or a rogue magician.

He then heard a loud noise come from down the alley, echoing through its various twists and turns. It sounded like gunshots. Quickly collecting his things and tucking On Hold into his arms, Touma trekked further into the alley to investigate.

After walking a bit further in, Touma found an area of the alley completely destroyed. Bullet holes peppered the walls and a portion of the alley looked like a grenade had gone off in it, destroying an air conditioning unit and some gutters. At the end of the alley was a T-junction littered with broken glass shards from a crate's worth of bottles. In the middle of the pile of broken glass was a single brown shoe, the kind worn by Tokiwodai students.

"Is that… her shoe?" Touma mussed, shinning his ODD's flashlight at the item to investigate.

As he kneeled down to get a closer look, he heard even more gunfire coming from down the left corridor. A little further down the left path was the missing pair of the shoe abandoned in the pile of glass. Touma got back on his feet, eyeing the path in front of him. He took a slow step forward before quickly breaking into a sprint. Something terribly wrong was going on, and he had to figure out what it was before it was too late.

In the middle of District 23, Mikoto was once again doing everything in her power to destroy facilities affiliated with Project Level 6 Shift. However, she had dropped all forms of subtly at this point. She didn't go in disguised. She didn't attempt espionage. She didn't even try to hide herself from the researcher in the facility. She just rampaged. She blasted through the facility with everything she had. She was going to destroy all of it. Every single trace of Project Level 6 Shift until there was nothing left.

'It will take time, but some day…' Mikoto thought to herself in her killrage.

'Some day?' some other, nihilistic part of her mind questioned, 'Some day it will all be over, but how long until some day arrived? Until then, how many more Sisters are going to die?'

"Shut up!" Mikoto yelled in a fit of rage, releasing a massive surge of electricity that blew apart a majority of the room she was in, "What else do you want me to do?! End it all?! Right now?! This minute?! Please, tell me! How the hell am I supposed to do that?!"

Her nerves at the edge of their rope, Mikoto noticed something on playing on one of the monitors that miraculously managed to go unharmed in her rampage. It was a live feed from one of Academy City's many security cameras. On that feed was a Sister, collapsed on the ground with a bullet wound in her right shoulder. Slowly approaching the monitor, Mikoto watched in horror as the Sister attempted to you a weak electric shock, only to have it reflected back at her by Accelerator's automatic defenses.

"No," Mikoto begged as she watched Accelerator dip his fingers into his victim's bullet wound, "No. What are you doing? Please, sto-"

Her please were for naught. Accelerator couldn't here her as it was, of course, a one-way video feed. Suddenly, the feed was absurd by a large red stain. It was the Sister's blood, exploded from her body as a result of a sudden reversal in blood flow. Mikoto could only watch in complete horror as it all happened. It was all too much, what she just saw. All she could do at that point was collapse on the ground and cry, surrounded by the destruction she caused.

Having just finished trial number 10031 of Project Level 6 Shift, Accelerator exited the alley so the remaining Sisters could clean up the mess he made. He had some time before the next experiment was scheduled to begin, so he figured he would take the opportunity to stop by a restaurant and grab some dinner. As he walked, he thought back to when the experiments first started about a year ago, when he fought Misaka 1.

It seemed like a simple enough project when he first agreed. Fight a clone of the Level 5 Railgun, win, repeat the process another 19999 times and he would be a Level 6 with invincibility. However, something about the whole experiment was completely amiss. First, there was the fact that clone was using a firearm to fight rather than her ability, something that a Level 5 would most certainly not do, especially when their title was "Raigun". Then there was the clone's rather basic understanding of battle tactics. So basic that it was a piece of cake for Accelerator to get behind her and knock her off her feet with a single tap. She was a total joke.

He later learned that the clones where unable to match the power of the actual Railgun, leaving them as Level 2 or 3 Electromasters at most. In addition, they were supposed to gain combat experience through their shared memory and the experiment itself, meaning Accelerator wasn't going to get a real challenging fight until he defeated a couple thousand of them. The whole situation was a rip off.

He tried to leave the facility shortly after that, thinking it was the end of the experiment. However, the researchers wouldn't let him, saying that the trial had yet to officially finish. Apparently, it wasn't going to end until the clone had been completely dispatched, eliminated at terminated. The researcher's exact language threw Accelerator for a loop, suggesting he was to kill them. However, before he could reach that conclusion, the clone continued the fight, following her orders, and attempted to fire at him.

The attack failed, ending with the bullet reflecting off him and lodging itself into the clone's torso. The girl quickly collapsed on to the floor, slowly bleeding out of her bullet wound. She laid there quietly, describing the experience of death to herself and the rest of the Misaka Network. She was dead within a minute of receiving the fatal wound.

That had been his first kill. That was the first time Accelerator took a life. The researchers reassured him that it was totally fine as they were not real people. After all, they were manufactured from chemicals and proteins, mass produced into the thousands. Either way, Accelerator had blood on his hands. There was not turning back now.

When Touma found at the end of the trail of destruction in the alley was too horrible for him to handle. There was only one thing that he could say at the sight of the mess in front of him.

"So much… blood," he whispered, tightening his grip on the kitten.

He momentarily lost his balance on his feet, nearly collapsing on the ground. He tried his best to suppress his gag reflex, desperately holding his hand over his mouth to keep his lunch down. Steeling himself the best he could, Touma connected his ODD's communicator to a direct line to the Anti-Skill headquarters in District 7.

"This is Touma Kamijou of Judgement Branch 177," he reported with a shaky voice, "I'm reporting the remains of a terrible murder."

A few minutes after finding the body of what appeared to be Mikoto's Sister, Anti-Skill arrived at the scene, tapping off access to the alley that Touma found her in. The four boys Touma ran into had also been taken into custody and transferred to a hospital to treat their wounds and interrogate them as to what exactly happened. That just left Touma to guide the Anti-Skill officers to the scene of the crime.

At the moment, Touma was seated just outside of the alley, trying to steady his nerves and process everything that happened. The sight of all that blood splattered along the ground and the walls would never leave him, but in this case that might have been a good thing. The shape of the splatter had a negative zone on its rim, creating a huge gap where there was no blood at all. Thus, Touma concluded that the person was able to manipulate matter in some fashion. There was also a lot of collateral damage to the area, but those could mostly be explained by the sounds of gunfire. However, that did leave the question of exactly who, or whom, armed. However, Touma was unable to come to a clear conclusion as he lacked evidence and two Anti-Skill officers requested he lead them to the body.

Agreeing to help, Touma got up from his seat and lead the Anti-Skill officers into the alley, the kitten still in his arms. The three Disciplinary Committee members treed through the alley at a steady pace, following Touma's lead. As the walked, Touma noted several bits of evidence of Misaka's death, such as the random bits of destruction like the bullet holes and explosion and her discarded shoes. However, when they finally reached the site, Touma was surprised to find that the body was gone.

"T-the body," Touma stuttered, "It was right there, just a few minutes ago."

"You sure, kid?" one of the Anti-Skill officers asked, "There doesn't seem to be a hit of a murder here."

"How the," Touma whispered, stepping closer to the site.

"Hey, kid," the other officer, "Our people just checked all the cameras in the area. There where no signs of anything suspicious."

"Impossible!" Touma yelled in disbelief.

Spotting a nearby security camera, Touma pulled out his ODD and aimed one end of it towards the camera. With a mental command, a cord fired from the device and attached itself to the camera's exterior. A holographic projection appeared over the screen of ODD's bracelet, displaying the video feed recovered from the camera. The feed revealed that no one had passed through area within the last couple of minutes.

"No way," Touma breathed in disbelief, "How could this camera not have picked up on the murder?"

"That device," one of the Anti-Skill officers mused, "Hey, kid, you're that Certain Strange Addition to Judgement, aren't you? The one getting involved in all the heavy cases lately? Touma Kamijou, was it?"

"Uh, yeah, that's me," Touma replied, returing ODD to its standby form.

The two Anti-Skill officers gave each other a look before addressing Touma again.

"Listen, Kamijou," the other officer called back, "We're just going to call this a false alarm. We think you've been stressing yourself out way too much with all these big cases you've been involved in recently. Try to take it easy for a little bit. We can't have our rising star go paranoid on us."

"B-but," Touma stammered.

"Take it easy, kid," the Anti-Skill officers said with a wave as they left.

"What's… going on?" Touma asked himself, "What the hell is happening?!"

Touma was extremely confused. First, there was Mikoto's strange behavior over the last couple of days. All of that started shortly after they discussed the rumors surrounding Level 5 clones. Soon after that, he meets her supposed identical twin, someone he had no record of at all in his journal or his current memories. The day after meeting this twin, he finds her murdered in an alley, only to find all traces of the murder completely erased a few minutes later after calling the authorities. None of it made sense. How did it all connect? Did it all connect at all?

As Touma pondered these things, the kitten he was holding in his arms started meowing behind in the direction behind him. When he turned around to see what the kitten was so worked up about, he was both relieved and shocked by what he had saw. Mikoto's younger twin sister was standing behind him at the end of the ally with a large, black bag resting on her shoulder.

"Misaka…" Touma whispered.

"I am sorry about this," the girl said in her usual monotone, "It was my intention to meet back up with you once I completed the op, so, Misaka apologizes with complete sincerity."

"You're alive," Touma sighed in relief, laughing slightly, "Thank goodness, I thought you had died. Guess those Anti-Skill were right about me overworking myself."

'Considering all the crap I got put through over the last month alone, I guess it was a logical conclusion,' Touma thought to himself with levity.

"No, you were correct about Misaka's death, Misaka confirms your observation," the girl cut in.

"Huh?" Touma asked in complete and utter confusion.

That last statement didn't make any sense. She was standing right in front of him. How could he have been right about her death? People die when they are killed, so how could she be standing in front on him in that moment, alive?

Touma took a closer look at the girl in front of him, desperately trying to figure out what exactly she meant. He took notice of the bag she was carrying on her shoulder. It was the size of a person and of the type he had seen many times in Anti-Skill's inventory for the rare murder case.

"T-that's a body bag, isn't it," Touma noted, "Who is in there? Why do you have it?"

"Before saying more, I must verify your password, please, Misaka says as she was instructed. ZXC741-ESD852-WC963. Well? Asks Misaka, testing you."

"Uh, say what?" Touma asked in confusion.

"Given the fact you are unable to decode the password, you have obviously not been read into the experiment, so, Misaka cannot not say any more," the girl said calmly.

"That's enough!" Touma snapped, "I'll be honest, I've been suspicious about you since yesterday, but have been keeping quiet! You claim to be Misaka's sister, but this is the first time I've ever heard about you in the time I've know Misaka! Now I find you in an alley claiming that you died while carrying a body bag on your shoulder! What is in the bag?!"

"It contains Sisters," a familiar voice said behind Touma.

Turning around, Touma could hardly believe what he was seeing. Several more girls, all identical to the one he was currently speaking to, where walking down the alley towards him. They spoke in sync, completing each other's sentences as if they were all one mind.

"Misaka says calmly. I apologize for having to leave the cat with you…"

"… says Misaka…"

"… but I did not feel right bringing it."

"It seems like a violent battle between humans is not place for an innocent animal, Misaka says, justifying her actions."

"I appear to have caused undue concern. That is an unfortunate result of the experiment," another identical girl said as more girls joined the girl carrying the body bag.

"Misaka says apologizing again…"

"… but there was no real need to be worried."

"You see, we are many."

"All of us are Misaka."

"The rumors," Touma breathed in shock, "the ones about Level 5 clones. They're all true, aren't they?"

"Correct. Up until now, you have been in contact with one MIsaka, serial number 10032," the Misaka holding the body bag explained, "You see, I am that Misaka. However, the Misaka who died today was serial number 10031, the same Misaka you ran into with big sister yesterday, Misaka explains to differentiate."

"All Misakas have the ability to control electricity…"

"… and our brainwaves are all connected to each other."

"Therefore, we all share a common memory, Misaka adds, explaining further."

"Does Mikoto know about all this?" Touma asked, using Mikoto's given name to differentiate.

"She does. However, she has no need to be concerned. We are simply cellular clones that have been mass produced for military purposes. The original donor is Mikoto MIsaka, one of only seven Level 5s in Academy City," the girl carrying the body bag explained as she lowered her goggles over her eyes, "We are her Sisters, says Misaka in conclusion."

"So, if the rumors about cloning her were all true, what is all this?" Touma asked, "Why are you all here?"

"We are performing an experiment, Misaka reiterates."

"The details are classified, so I cannot explain further…"

"… however, this is nothing to be concerned about, Misaka says reassuringly."

"Once again, I hope you will accept my sincere apologizes for involving you in this experiment, Misaka requests, bowing her head. Now then, if you will look after the cat."

Without another word, all of the Sisters left the alley, one after another. Touma could only watch in shock as the girls walked away as if nothing had happened. He stood there for a few solid minutes, barely able to process what he had just learned.

Eventually, Touma was able to leave the alley and start making his way to Saten's dorm. Of course, he still had to deliver the cat book Index needed. As he walked, all of the pieces of the puzzle started to fall into place. Mikoto's behavior seemed to stem from the knowledge of the Sisters and the experiment they were being killed in. Coupled with the destruction of research facilities related to biological and electromagnetic research and electric means that the damages where dealt, it was reasonable to conclude that Mikoto was attacking the facilities to put a stop to experiments. However, that still left the question of what kind of experiment they were doing in the first place. What could killing so many clones, over ten thousand of the, possibly accomplish in any scientific field?

Soon enough, Touma found himself at Saten's dorm. After knocking on the door, he was greeted by both Saten and Index, with Sphinx sitting comfortably on top of Index's head.

"He's that cat book you asked for," Touma said, handing the book over.

"Thanks, Kamijou," Saten replied, taking the package off his hands, "I'm sure this will be a great help for Index when it comes to raising Sphinx."

"Hey, Touma, why do you have a cat with you?" Index asked.

"I'm just watching him for a friend," Touma replied simply.

As much as he wanted to let his friends know what was happening, he figured it would be best to keep things on the down low. No need to needlessly involve everyone in a problem he didn't have all the details to. Until he had all the answers he needed, he would keep the Sisters a secret. No telling how everyone would react if they learned their friend had been cloned several thousand times and those clones were being killed. They would learn in good time.

"So, Kamijou, care to come in?" Saten offered, "We're about to have dinner now. I'm sure we can give your friend's cat a decent meal as well."

"I'll pass," Touma replied, "I actually have something else to attend to. I'll see you girls tomorrow."

"Alright then," Saten agreed.

"Bye Touma!" Index cheered as she closed the door.

Leaving the dorm, Touma made his way to the nearest bus stop. There was one more thing he needed to take care of, and that was Mikoto. One way or another, he was going to find out just what was going on with her.

Again, not a lot to change here. Just some more reveals, a slight change in Touma's relationship with Anti-Skill since he's a member of Judgement, and a little more exposure on ODD's functionality since its upgrade. Next chapter will be out soon enough, and man is that one going to be an emotional roller coaster to write. If you haven't found a way to listen to Stand Still by Yuka Iguchi, I suggest you find it before I update next.

Until then, leave a review and tell me what you thought. I'll see you all next time!