2

Their meeting time was one PM.

“It’s already one thirty! What the heck happened?!” echoed the shout of Mikoto Misaka, who stood all by herself in front of the concert hall, which was a fairly prominent location in the Seventh School District.

Kamijou put his hands together and bowed in a gesture of apology as he dashed over to her. “Hey, I’m really sorry!!”

He’d actually been late because their food problems with Motoharu Tsuchimikado had evolved into a minor fistfight, but Kamijou knew it would be better for him not to make any lame excuses and just apologize.

Mikoto, for her part, folded her arms while tapping her foot on the ground and letting bluish-white sparks crackle and spark from her bangs. “I’m the one who won the bet for the punishment game, so why am I being made subject to your circumstances? Do you have any idea what it feels like to be embarrassed and standing by myself doing nothing for a whole hour? Weird, stupid boys came up trying to talk to me while I was waiting, and it was a huge pain in the butt to drive them all away with lightning lances, you know.”

“Okay, okay! I’m really sorry!” Kamijou said, attempting to continue their exchange by saying nothing of substance whatsoever, before suddenly noticing something odd in what Mikoto said. “Wait, what? The meeting time was at one, right?”

“…Don’t tell me you even ignored that part.”

“No, not that. If you’ve been waiting here for an hour, then you got here a half hour early, right? That’s…well, sorry about that.”

Mikoto’s shoulders gave a jerk, and her eyes widened. She unfolded her arms and started waving her hands in front of her. “No…Y-you’re an idiot. That’s just a manner of speaking. It’s not like I’ve been here exactly sixty minutes now or anything. Wh-why do I have to wait for you when I’m the one who won the bet, anyway? I wish you’d wipe that dumb smirk off your face. It looks like you’re imagining something strange.”

“You know…,” said Kamijou without thinking, looking straight at the middle school girl’s face as she wavered. “…You enjoy watching me suffer through this punishment game that much? I mean, I thought this already, but you’re actually pretty underhanded, aren’t—?”

Before he could finish, a lance of lightning leaped from Mikoto’s bangs.

Kamijou immediately swung his hand up to block the attack. Zztchhh!! From what he could tell by the intense bursting noise, the voltage was in the hundred million range.

In his right hand was a power called Imagine Breaker, which had a nullifying effect on any strange powers, whether magical or supernatural, with a single touch.

It was still scary.

As he trembled, he said this: “…I was right?”

Another lightning lance shot at him.

Everyone gathered in front of the concert hall shouted, “Whoa!!” at the huge ka-bang!! and ran away. Kamijou, who just barely managed to stop it in time again, was a little teary-eyed.

“What is it?! Miss Misaka, I don’t know which words are the ones you want to hear!!”

“It doesn’t matter. Just come on,” said Mikoto, the corners of her lips twitching, her head slowly tilting. In a low voice, she continued, “…You’re the one who lost, so quit fighting against the winner, you stupid piece of trash.”

“This proper Tokiwadai lady is acting a little weird right now!!” cried Kamijou, but Mikoto, extremely unhappy for some reason, didn’t give him much of a reaction.

He scratched his head. The situation was not going in a good direction. “Anyway, Misaka, what exactly should I do for the punishment game? You said ‘Come on,’ so are we going somewhere else?”

The moment she heard that…

Mikoto grunted, looking somewhat surprised.

She looked at him.

Kamijou was fed up. “…Don’t tell me you didn’t think of anything…”

“I—I’m thinking right now! Um, well, er, yeah! You’re gonna pay me back for all the effort I put in to win the Daihasei Festival!!”

“So, you weren’t thinking anything specific.”

“Would you just listen?!”

“You’re the one who suggested this, so you’re the one who has to think of a plan. I mean, you knew from the start that I wouldn’t be the one making plans, right? I’m the one who lost. Sheesh, what an idiot.”

“…” Mikoto fell silent for a moment. Then she looked at Kamijou again.

“Um, Misaka…Urgh?!”

Kamijou, about to talk to the girl who wouldn’t say anything, then unconsciously took a step back.

The reason was simple.

There was a glazed look in the proper young lady’s eyes.

Kamijou had a really bad feeling about this.

“You’ll do whatever I say for the punishment game, right?”

“Well, er…! By ‘anything,’ it’s anything I’m actually able to do, so…!!”

“Whatever I say?”

“…”

“Come with me.”

“Where?!” Kamijou shouted, but Mikoto grabbed his hand with a slap!! and wouldn’t let go. As she dragged him away, the concert hall began to grow distant behind them.

The girl spoke again. “I told you, just shut up and come with me! That’s your first punishment!!”

“The first one?! There’s more than one?!”

Touma Kamijou grew pale for some reason, and Mikoto Misaka’s face reddened in anger.

They walked down the street, hands firmly connected, but whether fortunate or unfortunate, neither of them noticed.

3

Accelerator was looking up at an apartment complex built for faculty.

Academy City’s residences were generally nothing but student dorms. Apartments like these were not something a student had much to do with.

From the building’s exterior, it didn’t look much different from a student dorm or any other apartment complex, but there were tiny differences in terms of service, and everything added up to give it individuality.

No matter how they were presented, student dorms were buildings meant to supervise children. Under the pretext of security, the dorms’ surveillance cameras were positioned without hold back in the slightest, which was characteristic of school-provided lodgings. In comparison, this apartment had a certain degree of consideration for the residents’ privacy.

“What floor?” asked Accelerator.

Aiho Yomikawa, who had guided them here, answered with a smile, “Thirteen. When the power goes out, I have to use the stairs. It’s a huge pain.”

“Wow!” breathed Last Order as she looked up at the tall building. She looked like she was trying to find the thirteenth floor, but now she was shaking her head, having accidentally looked directly at the sun.

Kikyou Yoshikawa supported the small girl’s shoulders from behind to keep her upright. “Well, compared to the first or second floor, I’d think there would be fewer chances to raid it.”

“…If they blew up the whole building, the people on the top floors would have way more casualties.” Nothing that major had happened to Accelerator while he lived in his dorm, but that didn’t mean for sure it would never happen.

As Yomikawa removed a laminated card, probably to use on the entrance’s auto-locking mechanism, she said, “Anyway. It’s a little late for lunch, but you still need to eat, so let’s get ourselves up there, ’kay?”

At first glance, the complex’s entrance looked like a normal, automatically opened glass door, but it showed signs of being blast-proof. The lock that only needed a card swipe also appeared to actually be reading additional data, such as fingerprints from the fingers holding the card and patterns in bioelectric signals.

It was what you would perhaps call a high-class apartment building. Accelerator glanced at Yomikawa suspiciously. “And here I thought public workers’ salaries were going down.”

“You can still get by on a pretty low salary. Plus, this place is a facility, or rather a field test for architectural design, so some of the rent is paid by the universities. In exchange, they switch up security methods on us every once in a while.

“Plus,” she added, “Anti-Skill officers are generally volunteers, so we don’t get paid for those services. But people here and there do us surprising favors, like meat at the supermarket being cheaper for us.”

“…Treating apartment rent the same as sales at the store?”

All told, the group of four—Accelerator, Last Order, Yomikawa, and Yoshikawa—entered the complex. As an aside, Komoe had other errands to attend to, so she wasn’t here right now.

They took a low-vibration elevator that imparted no floating feeling—probably another trial product—to the thirteenth floor. Yomikawa’s room was the door right outside when they stepped out.

“Come on in,” said Yomikawa, opening the front door, revealing a large apartment with a living room, dining room, kitchen, and four other rooms. It was, by all accounts, made for a family and big enough for one to spend their entire life paying it off. Although the universities exempted her from a certain portion of the cost since she was helping with experiments, could a public worker’s low salary really “get by”?

The living room had a floor that was polished to a shine and, unlike the stereotypical mess expected when hearing one person lived here alone, was neatly organized. Bottles of alcohol and glasses decorated the shelving, while magazines and newspapers had their own racks. Remote controls for the TV, the air conditioner, the stereo, and the video recorder were all lined up on a table corner. Each of the sofa cushions were precisely placed in their proper positions.

Last Order’s eyes went wide. “Amazing, I don’t think there’s a single speck of dust in here, says Misaka says Misaka with praise as she leaps onto the couch.”

In contrast to Last Order’s cheerful voice as she sank into the couch, Yoshikawa sighed. “…They made you file another written apology at your job, didn’t they?”

Yomikawa gulped, her tracksuit-clad body wavering. “Ah, ah-ha-ha. What’re ya talkin’ about?”

“What do you mean? asks Misaka asks Misaka, lying around confused.”

“I’m just saying she’s always had a habit of cleaning her place whenever problems crop up. She doesn’t think about the future when she’s doing it, either, so later on she has trouble finding things like her room key. I want you to be careful, all right?”

“Is that any way to talk to the person doing you a favor by helping you look for your next job?”

Accelerator noted to himself that Yomikawa and Yoshikawa got a lot more childish in their word choice and behavior when they talked to each other. Or maybe it showed how long they’d been friends. If Yoshikawa was the caring class president type, Yomikawa was the consistently late problem child.

Yoshikawa glanced toward the kitchen, which connected to the living room. “If you haven’t grown out of that habit yet, then you must still have the same kitchen manners.”

“Hey, heeey! I’ll admit I have bad habits when keeping things clean, but it’s annoying when you mention that! Kikyou, you’ve gobbled down my cooking without a second thought, haven’t you?”

“Only when I don’t know how you made it.”

Accelerator and Last Order exchanged confused glances. Yomikawa led Yoshikawa into the kitchen, claiming she was “getting better every day, and I’ll show you!” They followed.

Yomikawa’s kitchen was filled with all sorts of cooking equipment, under the pretext of “assisting in experiments.” It was a conglomeration of super high-tech stuff, from a steam microwave that used water vapor to things like an AI-controlled high-frequency fully automatic dishwasher.

She didn’t seem to use any much, though.

What stood out a lot more than those appliances, which had an air of disuse that screamed they were just abandoned like that all the time, were the four or five electric rice cookers laid out. Given the steam wisping from them, they all seemed to be on.

Accelerator gave her an exasperated look. “…One for each of us? Is this some kind of joke? Do you have a fetish for white rice?”

“No, no, that’s not it!” Yomikawa pointed to each of the rice cookers in turn. “You know, rice cookers can do anything—cook rice, boil things, steam things, and bake things…That one’s baking bread, that one’s cooking stew, and that one’s steaming whitefish.”

“…” Accelerator thought he knew what Yoshikawa was trying to say now.

Yoshikawa, who already knew about all this, sighed at how little had changed and said, “Lazy bum.”

“I’d like it if you stopped with the brief commentary like I’m a strange animal. Is it really that bad? All I have to do is set them up, press one button, and they’ll cook things for me. They don’t use gas, either, so I can feel free to take a nap while it’s happening with no problem at all. They’re amazing, really…”

“You used to say you could make okonomiyaki out of whatever leftovers you had as long as you had flour, and you bought a giant hot plate for it. And you would complain that as long as you had a pressure cooker, you’d be set for cooking for the rest of your life and didn’t need anything else…You go too far with everything. You’re so extreme that if you split the distance there’d be an antimatter reaction.”

“I’m getting all the flavor, nutrition, and satisfaction I need, so what’s the problem? Stockpots, frying pans…It’s a pain to get all those things together. Wouldn’t you want a miracle tool that could do everything?”

Yoshikawa sighed. “For once in your life you should feel how enjoyable it is to put actual effort into cooking,” she admonished, but in the same way, her field of specialty was genetics. On further consideration, she felt her comment held less weight, considering what she had made was twenty thousand cloned humans.

4

After leaving her violin at a coat check, Mikoto dragged Kamijou into the underground mall.

It had suffered considerable damage thanks to the sorcerer Sherry Cromwell and the golem she controlled, Ellis. They had arrived from England on September 1, but no traces of the destruction could be seen any longer. The smashed floors and support beams had been repaired, and things like café windows had been replaced with new ones. Without getting up close to look, it was probably impossible to see the difference.

The construction had proceeded at such a fever pitch because the Daihasei Festival had been fast approaching. Half the reason for the festival was propaganda meant to improve Academy City’s image, so leaving the city in tatters was out of the question. (Though it had been wrecked quite a bit the day of as well.)

Though it was underground, it didn’t feel dark; the floors and walls had been polished to a sparkle, illuminated by fluorescent lighting and LED bulbs, bundles of light-emitting diodes, as if by a summer sun. Hallway-facing shops, like cafés and western clothing stores, made abundant use of glass, granting them a sense of openness that exceeded their actual size.

Kamijou looked around and said, “Huh, looks like they turned down the air-conditioning.”

“They’ll probably switch to heating in another two weeks,” said Mikoto as she plodded ahead. “Oh, there it is! Over here.” She pointed to a store with a slender finger.

The mall fully utilized the fact that it was underground and was equipped with loud entertainment facilities such as arcades, karaoke boxes, and music venues. That’s why Kamijou was thinking she’d make him try to beat a superhard arcade game on a single credit or else have to grovel before her…But his prediction was way off.

It was a cell phone service store.

It was only about half the size of a convenience store. Through its big glass windows a line of counters and chairs could be seen, plus a catalog of cheap devices filling a magazine rack—that was all. In front of the entrance was a long, vertical banner for advertising, dividing big manufacturers’ products from ones only made in Academy City.

Academy City was said to be two or three decades ahead of the rest of the world in science and technology. Devices from both outside and inside had their own advantages and disadvantages, but some students worried about their decision for over a week for reasons like not knowing which would have access to service first in emergencies.

As Mikoto walked toward the service store, she asked, “Have you heard of the Handy Antenna Service?”

“Huh? It’s that, uh, service that makes your personal cell phone like an antenna station, right? So you can call people without having antenna stations nearby?”

Basically, it would make everyone walking through the city streets with a cell phone into a relay antenna. For example, even if Kamijou didn’t have an antenna station nearby, it would go through person one, then person two, and person three, through various relay antennas, to eventually call person X provided that person had a normal antenna station close to them. In practical terms, it created a network-like communication route through multiple other devices, which meant disconnections were rare. Apparently, it had originally been developed to maintain emergency aerial networks by attaching fixed antennas to a few airships, then sending them up in the air—all in case the relay stations on the ground had been wiped out in a disastrous earthquake. Because of that, he’d heard, people didn’t seem to care too much about sound quality.

On the plus side, he’d also heard that the universities would subsidize it all as a test, so the service fees were supposedly way cheaper.

“I was thinking of signing up for it.”

“Yeah? It seems like a really esoteric system to me. If everyone using it didn’t have their cell phones on constantly, you couldn’t hope for any of that relay antenna stuff to work. Wouldn’t your battery drain a lot more quickly that way? And besides, if not many people have signed up for the service, there isn’t much point in—”

“That’s why I’m signing up for it, dummy—to spread it around more. And apparently, if we sign up for a pair contract, the fees for other services go down, not just the Handy Antenna Service.”

“A pair contract…? You mean that thing where two people sign up and don’t have to pay to talk to each other or for packet fees and stuff?”

“Yeah, that. On top of that, if you sign up for a pair contract with the Handy Antenna Service, you get a Croaker cell phone strap from Lovely Mitten. It’s their frog mascot.”

“…Oi.”

“Right on the spot. So, you’re signing up with me.”

“All you wanted was the cell phone strap?! If you want me to change devices, then that’s not gonna happen! I still plan on using my old, beat-up cell phone for another six months at least!!” Then Kamijou pointed at the blazer-clad Mikoto’s schoolbag. He stared at a green frog mascot character hanging from it. “Besides, you already have a frog!”

“Don’t lump together Croaker with this one!!” Mikoto shouted angrily. “Croaker is the older man living next to this guy, and he’s bad with vehicles and starts croaking a lot when he’s in them, which is why they call him Croaker! Maybe you’re actually a really old man! I mean, you couldn’t even tell such a simple difference!!”

“…They made his character an old guy? And they call themselves lovely?” muttered Kamijou, disheartened.

Mikoto, though, just continued to look at him scornfully as though he were an elderly person who couldn’t keep up with the times. “Hmph. You don’t need to worry about changing devices. I hear you don’t have to switch them anyway for Handy Antenna. You just put an expansion chip in your phone and you’re good to go. And whatever service you have, they’ll deal with the pair contract, too, so I don’t think you have to switch devices. You shouldn’t have to mess with your phone at all.”

“What? Wait, so all I have to do is write my phone number and address on the form?”

“Well, yeah, but…” Mikoto absently fingered the small frog attached to her schoolbag. “I mean, we go together to the store, have to sign a lot of forms, and probably wait for hours. I have to get someone considerate to help me out or it’ll be hard to convince them. Anyway, it’s not like it’ll actually take half a day, so bear with it for a little bit.”

“Hmm.” Kamijou thought about it, glancing at the store’s banner. Did she bring him here because she had to be paired with a boy? That meant…

“? What’s wrong?”

“No, well, I don’t mind signing up with you, but…This pair contract thing. Isn’t it normally meant for couples? It says here it has to be one man and one woman.”

“…?!” Mikoto’s shoulders gave a jerk. Her hand squeezed the frog mascot on her bag. “N-no, no, don’t be stupid, what the heck are you talking about, you idiot?! I-it only says it has to be a girl and a boy, not that they have to be a couple or anything, so I mean, married people could do it, too, you know!!”

“Hello? Miss Misaka, that’s a little heavier than your average couple.”

All he wanted to do was make a calm rejoinder, but a moment later, a lightning lance flew at him. He hastily repelled the strike from Mikoto’s bangs with his right hand. “What the heck is up with you lately?!”

“Y-you’re the one not making any sense here! Could we just get this over with already?!”

“What? We’re actually doing this?!”

“Look, it’s your punishment game, so stop complaining and come with me!”

Mikoto grabbed Kamijou’s arm and dragged him inside the service store.

Compared to the underground mall’s passages, the air-conditioning inside the store was a little more polite. Kamijou knew that was a strange way of describing it, but they had it at just the right level—like they calculated all the ventilation routes or something, so even though he didn’t feel the chill on his skin, his sweat vanished.

The female employee sitting in front of one of the counters broke into a smile at seeing them come in, though Kamijou was being dragged and Mikoto was the one pulling him along, but she didn’t forget what it said in the manual about interacting with customers.

After a brief exchange in which Mikoto talked about wanting to sign up for a pair contract with the idiot accompanying her and wondering aloud whether they still had Croaker straps, the employee laid out many documents on the counter before them.

“We will need a photograph to complete the forms. Do you happen to have one on your person?”

“Huh?” grunted Mikoto, her eyes widening, then asked, “Will it need to be from a photo ID box? Also, is there a certain number of pictures or a specific size we need?”

“No, not at all. The rules aren’t that strict.” The employee smiled. “Since this is a pair contract, all we need is for you to prove that you two are the pair who signed up for it. As long as you’re both in the shot together, you can even use your cell phone camera. I’ll get a picture frame battery charger for your phone so you can use that. It’s made to fit any of the four major providers, so you needn’t worry about the model number.”

Mikoto almost sputtered. “…B-both of us in the shot?”

“Oh, do you not take pictures of yourselves very often? Then why not use this chance to? You’ll just need to give me a photograph twenty minutes before the sign-up process is done, so please, use the time you’d be waiting to take a picture.”

And so, after jotting various details on the forms with a ballpoint pen, Kamijou and Mikoto left the service store for the time being to embark on the aforementioned picture taking.

Kamijou took out his cell phone, which was quite hardy considering he’d damaged it in battles with sorcerers and dropped it into the Adriatic Sea. “Finding a photo ID booth would be a pain, so let’s just use a cell phone camera and get this over with. You don’t have any other digital cameras or anything, right, Misaka?”

“Huh? Oh yeah, well, I left my phone with the lady at the counter, so…”

Mikoto sounded somehow absentminded, but Kamijou didn’t notice. He looked at his phone screen and pressed a couple buttons with his thumb, switching it into camera mode, then reached out to get the phone as far away from them as he could. Still looking at the screen, he said, “Okay, I’m taking it…Wait.”

“Wh-what?” asked Mikoto, confused.

Kamijou made a face. He hadn’t noticed, but Mikoto was pretty far away from him. She looked like she was waiting for him to switch into panorama mode and take the picture already because she was getting impatient.

She looked ready to run away. Kamijou’s shoulders drooped. “…You’re the one who suggested this. I’m just saying.”

“I…I know that!!” cried Mikoto, her face getting a little red as she waved her hands in the air before her along with her schoolbag. It didn’t look too friendly to Kamijou.

After Mikoto vacillated on whether to get closer to him or farther away, she finally groaned in resignation. “I’m coming for you, Croaker!!”

In one breath, she drew right up to Kamijou so their shoulders were touching, then bent her head a little to put it on his shoulder. Their faces were both right in the middle of the cell phone screen.

Meanwhile, Kamijou had begun to think she didn’t need to get this close to him and stiffened a little at the scent of her hair.

“O-okay, I’m taking it.”

“Got it! I’m ready!!”

Pchee!! sounded the camera shutter, a noise that sounded purposely electronic.

Kamijou brought his cell phone back toward him and checked the picture he’d just taken.

…

“You’re grimacing, Misaka.”

“Why are you looking away like you’re trying to get away from me?”

They exchanged glances.

“I don’t think this is a good pair picture.”

“L-let’s try taking another one.”

Pchee!! came the electronic sound again.

They peered at the cell phone screen.

“Why is your face so stiff again, Misaka?!”

“And why do you look like you’re trying to put more distance between us?!”

Grr!! They glared at each other, their faces so close their foreheads almost bumped. They wouldn’t get anywhere at this rate. In the worst-case scenario, they would need to apologize for not having a picture and cancel the sign-up process, and all their work thus far would be for nothing. Troubling for them but also a major hassle for the employee.

Kamijou gave up. “Anyway, we just have to make it look like we’re a couple for this, right?! Misaka, come here! This is what I’m gonna do!!”

“Huh? What? Kyaa!!”

He forcefully looped an arm around her slender shoulders as her face immediately went bright red. Kamijou didn’t notice; he was already in desperation mode.

“Smile, Misaka! I don’t want to have to take one like this again! It doesn’t matter what it is as long as we can put it on the form! There’s a clear reason, so there’s no problem doing this!!”

“Huh? W-well, I guess you’re right, ah-ha-ha! We’re just taking a picture that looks like that, right? Yeah, that’s right. Just taking a picture! Okay, let’s do this!!”

Slightly miffed by the bit about “clear reason,” Mikoto forced herself to be happy, not wanting her desperation—or rather, her blush—to be noticed. To match Kamijou’s closeness, she put her arm around his and drew in closer. A few passersby saw the two of them…no, Mikoto and some random boy. Those people stared at them with a little bit of envy. But the pair was too wound up to notice.

Kamijou brought his phone out in front of them. “I’m taking it!”