A Shadow of you

[ACSRT: Lab Rats]

"Who's this?" The young woman asked as she, Misaka and Misaki's proxy arrived at the park.

GV shrugged "Just something of an observer, for now at least. I'm trying to stop someone from going over the top in respects to all of this."

"Oh I wonder who that could be?" Misaki's proxy commented in an up-beat tone.

Shokuhou herself had ducked behind a tree again, clearly she didn't want to be paid that much attention.

Misaka stepped away from the young woman, putting her on her own when the proxy followed her lead. It was now the three of them facing her. Their posture wasn't accusatory though, merely questioning.

Finally the woman began to speak.

"I assume you're not here from the research lab, right?"

"Right." The proxy confirmed "I just happened to find your name while I was investigating Indian Poker."

"Yeah..." Misaka noted "And for the record, I was roped into this by her. But after seeing what I saw, I do want some answers myself."

GV felt no need to expand on his earlier thoughts at that moment.

The young woman looked over "What did you see?"

Misaka answered in a relaxed sort of way to not spark worry "Just your cyborg breaking out of the facility. It was a little while ago."

The woman looked up with worry though "Breaking out?"

Misaka's attempt to speak without sparking worry had failed at the first jump.

"Finally, it happened." The woman remarked, glancing away.

Misaka pushed a bit and the woman expanded.

"The chief and the other researchers called her Doppelganger. I saw her on the monitor right after my surgery. A mechanical puppet that identifies herself as a human. As me."

GV held up a hand "I've missed part of this story, can we step back a bit?"

With a sigh, Shokuhou's proxy went into it. This girl, who was roughly their age and not a young woman. Oops. GV had misread that a bit. She'd been part of an experiment with cybernetics.

"And when they put all the pieces back together, they created it- her." Kuriba Ryouko explained "Everyone at the facility was ecstatic. They created a soul, they said it was uncharted territory."

"So it's true?" Misaka asked "There is a soul inside that machine."

The proxy shook her head "Based on the information from Joule, that shouldn't be possible."

Sure, remind GV that you got Joule involved. That did nothing to help his mood. That said, he hadn't forgotten it either so it wasn't really a reminder.

"To tell the truth, even after seeing it I wasn't totally convinced." Kuriba noted "Still not, really. But I was also worried about what would happen if it was true. It would logically create some serious problems."

"Why serious?" The proxy asked "I mean, I understand that she'll be a bit sturdier than a flesh and blood person but she's just for medical use, no? It's not like she'd been built for combat. Is it really a threat when there's only one of her running around?"

"Maybe." Kuriba tilted her face down a bit "I told them that someday, she'd realise that she isn't human. But then they said that it would just give them more data if that happened. And the lower levels of the building have many layers of security, plus she had a shutdown trigger inside of her so it would be fine. That was the kind of thing they said."

She closed her eyes "Idiots. They refused to listen to me about the dangers of that thing."

Misaka focused on that "Tell me, what are the dangers it poses."

Kuriba looked up "Okay, but to be more fair its the danger her soul poses that is worrying."

"What about it?" Misaka pressed.

The proxy placed a hand on her cheek "Really? I've had some feedback from some people on the magic side of the equation and they don't seem that worried, do you- a scientist- think you know better than them?"

"Magic?" Kuriba blinked "What are you talking about?"

...

"Magic is real." GV decided to speak up "And it's used by factions that oppose academy city, luckily there are people who know about it that are friendly enough that we can get pieces from them. A friend of mine asked an expert in magical theory when she heard about what happened with your double. The expert wasn't too worried."

Kuriba blinked a few more times then spoke "Well, my worldview has already been disrupted once today, what's a few more. Fine, okay. Anyway."

She took a breath "Regardless of my own thoughts on... magic... it's thought that what we call the soul is attached to the body, when the body ceases to function, the soul vanishes with it. But if a soul is inside the mechanical body of the Doppelganger, it was only placed there, and temporarily at that. Even if the vessel is broken, it doesn't go away, it would just become untethered. I believe that this untethered soul would spread out from its broken vessel into the surroundings. This ordinarily impossible free soul could then possess any material and control it as its new body. In the worst case, I worry that it might be able to swallow up academy city itself, and take control of everything."

"I... have trouble even imagining what that would be like." Misaka admitted.

"That is also likely wrong." The proxy spoke up "It isn't anything like what the expert I called in thought would happen."

"Oh and you trust some mysterious mage instead of a scientist?" There was a note of anger in Kuriba's voice as she snapped back.

GV pointed out the problem though "You have a hypothesis, but without any form of evidence, that's just a thought in your head. It's less reliable than a source that has spent time studying this kind of thing."

That didn't make Kuriba any happier, but she acknowledged the statement with a grunt.

End of chapter

...I think emails might be working again. Not sure. FF hasn't complained about it not working for a while. Maybe not though. I'll need to look into it.