Murakawa Torako

Carefully she put up the poster, making sure it wasn't skewed. The President tends to go berserk if anything goes wrong, or if things doesn't match up to his tastes. They say he's reasonable enough in the Student Council, but she can't see that at all, especially when his dark gloomy face was in any state of a serious expression. Feeling a chill down her neck, she hastily looked up and down the corridor, half expecting the president to be half hidden somewhere. Nothing... But still, when the building was empty of students, it certainly carries a certain scary atmosphere.

"Hmm... seems the chess club is recruiting again..."

Putting up the last poster on the wall, she nodded and walked off. One of her friend was awaiting her help, though with what exactly she didn't know. Sure do keep themselves cooped up in that clubroom of theirs though.

---

Uiharu Kazari

"Eh?"

She stared blankly at Saten. "But I..." Kazari stopped, looking at the girl. She was kinda feeling conflicted about this whole thing, but for now, she should just roll with it.

"..ah.. Y-yeah, that's right. That's right, isn't it? Ahaha...ha.."

Kyouma massaged his forehead as he watched Torako walk away in a fit. That definitely could have gone much better, but... At least it didn't escalate any further. As Misaka and her friend left the scene, Kyouma was left at the site alone, trying to think of a way to smooth things over.

Well, it was either that or go back home to eat some steak, and that wasn't particularly high on his to-do list anyhow. Rather than that, wasn't it better to go and solve the current issue before moving on to more trivial things?
...
At least, that's what he thought, anyways. This, of course, meant that confronting Torako before she could get any moodier was of his utmost concern. With that, he temporarily activated his ability and searched around the area to find wherever his underclassman went.
Aaand she was at school. Well, that certainly made things convenient. Letting his eyes return to their default state, Kyouma began moving towards the school to try and at least TALK to the girl.

-------
The school gates being open were a bit of an abnormality to him, but seeing as he knew next to nothing about the student council or how the place worked when school wasn't in session Kyouma didn't mind it too much. Slipping inside the school building, Kyouma quickly swapped shoes (because, well, he'd at least be a rule-abiding student for the moment) and walked further in. The school without the regular hustle and bustle, though, was... Strange, to say the least.

"Oi! Torako! You in here?" he shouted down the hallways, hoping for a response. Well, hopefully there would be one so he didn't look like a complete idiot.

Annette stepped down the street with a smooth step, avoiding any unpleasant collisions, hitting walk signs in manners that should have been incredibly lucky so as to not hinder her walking along as she headed for the nearest store. This was the fastest way to get clothes for the ball she had to go to later, and so it was the route that she took. At the same time she imagined the things she could do to her roommate, which would never see the light of day, if she could help it.

She had all the cash she needed for it, and she was looking forward to spending the time shopping. Of course, by the same account she carried herself as someone in the public eye, not acting in a way that would reflect negatively upon her and her position. In a city like this, one never knew when a camera or news agency might be watching, and she would prefer to not feed the rumor mills.

As a result, she was somewhat (thanks to her ability) surprised to find two familiar faces approaching from the opposite direction as her, engaged in their own conversation. She was quickly able to identify who they were, though she noted the hoodie being worn as opposed to the traditional uniform. But that didn't seem like a good thing to ask about right now. Who was she to judge Kuroko's tastes in clothing?

So she stopped for a moment in the process of her walk, waving to the two of them. "Hello Misaka, Kuroko," she said warmly. "Lovely day, isn't it?" Not the best opener, but it would serve.

Adjusting the horrific outfit so that the hood was both sensibly down and well outside of her vision, the teleporter considered the bag that currently contained her unfortunately soiled outfit. It was indeed a practical idea to get it cleaned as soon as possible, and dropping it off would take barely any time at all with her ability. That would mean leaving the older student's sight and adoring gaze, however. That the look was due to the abomination made it no less flattering to get that sort of appreciative attention from her onee-sama...

Before she could actually bring herself to leave, the dreaded happened: someone that the the two of them knew approached the other girls. Worse, someone that had yet to learn of the Railgun's inappropriate obsession with a children's franchise, and would thus think that the monstrosity was the teleporter's decision rather than putting the blame exactly where it belonged.

"Could you please not address me so informally?" Kuroko asked, irritation seeping through. Why was onee-sama 'Misaka', but she wasn't 'Shirai'? They were hardly well acquainted enough for any such choices.

Oh shoot. Not good, at all. In hindsight, perhaps using some foresight or tact in the conversation would have been a good idea, but it was a bit late for that now. Well, the situation wasn't totally unsalvageable, and it wasn't as if this would torpedo anything otherwise important. Annette could manage, such as she always did.

So, option 1. That being, simply laugh it off, or something similar to that. So she bowed, respectfully, as she answered. "My apologies Shirai," she said. Then a moment between that before going on. "For the time that I've lived in Japan, and the fact that I speak the language, somehow that hasn't gotten easier," she sighed. That and the trouble with her roommate, but they didn't need to know about that. Hopefully that would do to patch things over.

Murakawa Torako

"Thank you..." said the rather creepy looking girl, peeking from behind the door. Her name was Tsukigami Fukuro, with perpetually messy bed hair and shadows under her eyes. Tora and her friends had no idea what it was she was actually working on, but it sounded important and stuff.

"Ah no no, I should be thanking you, for agreeing to make those things I wanted and all." Tora gave a laugh at that.

"..uhn.." With simply that, Tsukigami closed the door.

Such an odd girl, Tora thought. Not that it really mattered to her, but she acted very out of sync from what was considered polite.

"Oi! Torako! You in here?"

She perked up immediately at the sound of that voice, and started sprinting down the hallways. The clubrooms weren't that too far away from the entrance, and within just a few seconds, she could already see Kyouma still blissfully unaware of his impending doom.

Like some sort of human missile, she jumped to tackle him down, much like the time she met him on the streets. "Sen~pai~!!"

When she heard someone approach and greet them, Mikoto managed to slowly tear her shining eyes away from the cuteness of the Gekota hoodie and face whoever it was. Upon recognizing the brown-haired French girl, Mikoto realized that it was Anette, from the day before, the new member of the local Judgement branch. She gave the other girl a smile and waved to her as she approached, banishing memories of the embarrassing circumstances that had surrounded the meeting and trying not to make her occasional glances towards the hoodie too noticeable.

"Oh, hi," Mikoto said, after Kuroko asserted that she should only be referred to by her surname, "Delauney-san, isn't it?"

She had to make it look like she didn't care about the hoodie in front of other people...



"After all, Uiharu here needs her onee-san, right?" continued Ruiko cheerfully. Uiharu was just trying to play along... that meant the best course of action was just to keep pushing it further. Teasing Uiharu was far, far too much fun, after all. She was just so adorable when she made all those reactions! It was yet another reason she kept flipping up the other girl's skirt, after all. It was just too cute when she got all flustered.

"She might look like a middle schooler, but Uiharu is really only ten years old!" declared Ruiko dramatically! This girl, who looked pretty young herself, would be easy to trick into making teasing Uiharu even easier. It wasn't often that the black-haired girl got the option to do this kind of thing. "She got moved ahead because she's so smart."

The immediate reaction from Torako, albeit expected, still took Kyouma off guard for a moment. After all, she had pulled the same stunt on him yesterday, and though he had a feeling something like this was coming from a mile away he still had to deal with the pain afterwards if he didn't deal with it carefully. Taking a deep breath, he turned towards the direction Torako's voice was coming from and, as she came into contact with his body, took a few steps backwards to minimize the impact. It... Didn't work; in the end, after staggering a few steps more than the last time, Kyouma fell to the ground. Well, that was to be expected; a girl on the track team running into a bookworm like him was like running a truck into a wall of clay.

"He- Whoa there, not gonna fall for that a second time." he said as he pushed himself off the ground and dragged Torako to her feet. Damn, that hurt. "Alright, I'd rather not be knocked down like that every time I see you, but... That aside..."

With that, Kyouma looked at Torako, unsure about how to go about this. Well... If anything... He could try that.
"...Look. I came to talk to you about what just happened earlier; between you, the Number 3, and that twin-tailed girl..." he began to say before stopping for a moment. "I hate to say this, but... I can't agree with your actions just now. There's no reason to act so... Irrationally like that, especially given the events leading up to that verbal spat."

Beatrix silently watched the two girl's exchange for a while, a slight frown on her face. The taller of the girls was affirming that Flowerhead was most definitely a child, which Beatrix was willing to believe. There was surely no reason for a commoner to lie about such a thing, after all! Still, being only ten years old was most surprising. The blonde stepped towards Uiharu, her heterochromatic eyes narrowed as she stared intensely at the supposed kid.

"...Hmph. As if this kid would be smarter than the likes of me," Beatrix finally concluded smugly, folding her arms and raising her chin, "you can skip all the years you want, but you'll never match my smartness!"

With the older student's constant focus on her outfit abating, Kuroko felt that it was a good time to take the clothing away, especially as she could be relatively certain that her friend wouldn't have moved far by the time she returned. Lifting the bag that held her uniform, she said, "My apologies, Delauney-san, but today hasn't gone as well as hoped."

"Onee-sama, I will be back after arranging for these to be washed."

With that, the teleporter was off, unlikely to return before some the two girls with nothing in common had to find some new topic of conversation, such as what lead to clothing that had to be washed, the small girl's choice in clothing, or the perennial standby: the weather.

Annette shook her head as Kuroko apologized for the terseness of her statement based on how bad her day had been. While that might have been true, she could not help but feel that it was misapplied, and she herself did not feel offended by it. It was only reasonable that the Judgment member would insist the holding of cultural and societal norms and mores, and given that Annette had been chiding herself over it already, it was just that much extra.

"It's alright," she replied calmly. "It was my mistake, and you were only right in correcting me." She would leave unsaid the hostility, since it didn't seem a very tactful thing to bring up. She had more sense then that.

In mere moments Kuroko had vanished, making it more than obvious that she was a teleporter of some kind, and otherwise leaving Annette and Misaka to themselves. She nodded then, addressing the question posed to her just before. "Yes, that's correct," she confirmed. "But you can call me Annette." Such formalities weren't suited for an occasion like this.

Murakawa Torako

This time it seems, Kyouma seemed to have managed to catch her, though they still ended up toppling over.

"He- Whoa there, not gonna fall for that a second time." he said as he pushed himself off the ground and dragged Torako to her feet. "Alright, I'd rather not be knocked down like that every time I see you, but... That aside..."

"That aside?" She tilted her head slightly, looking at him quizzically.
"...Look. I came to talk to you about what just happened earlier; between you, the Number 3, and that twin-tailed girl... I hate to say this, but... I can't agree with your actions just now. There's no reason to act so... Irrationally like that, especially given the events leading up to that verbal spat."

Number 3? What was he talking about?

"Uhn, I understand." A baldfaced lie, with her quick response and no change in demeanour. "But more importantly Senpai, why are you here? The Pres will freak if he sees you here. You don't have anything to do here right? C'mon, lets go."

So Kyouma went all the way here just to say some cryptic thing? Whats up with that? However, that was the least of her concerns right now; if the Pres shows up right now she will be in a world of hurt. She could almost see his gloomy face darken under those long limp bangs he had. His pale face distorting as his thin mouth stretched into a grimace, exposing those unnatural looking perfect teeth underneath.

Just thinking about it gave her chills. Torako grabbed Kyouma's hand and started tugging on it. "C'mon? Before the Pres shows up."

---

Uiharu Kazari

"Sa...Saten!"

That was a bit much, she wanted to say, but the girl Saten was addressing promptly approached her, and of all things started staring unabashedly at her.

"Wha...what is it?"

"...Hmph. As if this kid would be smarter than the likes of me," Beatrix finally concluded smugly, folding her arms and raising her chin, "you can skip all the years you want, but you'll never match my smartness!"
"Is..is that so?"

Uwaa...She's very full of herself it seems. Kazari sighed in resignation. Hopefully Saten does whatever she was hoping to accomplish so they could be done with this.

Kyouma stared at Torako momentarily before sighing; though the answer she gave him clearly had absolutely no meaning behind it, the fact that she was so worked up about someone probably meant that it was better to leave than not. Well, if it meant getting a more comprehensive answer, that would be fine by him. And with all the research he had done last night...

"...Alright. I guess if you're that worried about it, fine. I've needed to tell you the results of last night's research anyhow." he said, shaking his head before turning around and walking to the lockers, where he quickly swapped his shoes back out before walking out of the building.

"...You ARE done with whatever it is you needed to do here, correct? You were worked up about the President finding ME here, but what about you?"

Well, he was curious. It wasn't as if he spent much time after school anyhow...

Oh, the... the Gekota hoodie was gone... trying to hide her disappointment as best she could, Mikoto faced Anette and did her best to remain focused and not thinking of her friend clad into an outfit based on the amphibious mascot. She couldn't let it slip that she liked Gekota so much... unless... maybe this girl was another fan?! It was a slim hope, but perhaps... there was an easy way to check, of course, without outing herself!

"Ah, right," she said, simply. Well, she'd asked directly, so it wasn't really a problem to refer to her in such a way. It was a bit different then simply referring to Saten or Uiharu by their surname without an honorfic, but it wasn't too big a deal for Mikoto. Then again, the only person she ever referred to by her given name like that was Kuroko... well... whatever. "... What did you think of the outfit Kuroko was wearing...?"

Certainly, it would be easy to interpret this as a question about Kuroko's dress sense, right?!



Ruiko grinned for a moment, tilting her head as she glanced towards Uiharu. She was really on a role today, and now it was growing close to the time to spring her trap. She didn't often do this to random people. She always teased Uiharu, and occasionally Misaka, but this was a new one for her. The girl's arrogant attitude, though, it had really gotten her going. She wanted to tease the gothloli, as if to counteract her demeanor just for a bit.

And so, now it was her chance.

"Eh? But aren't you younger than Uiharu...?"

"...H-huh?" Beatrix turned her head towards Uiharu with a look of confusion, "No! There's... there's no way I am! I look super mature!"

Beatrix was positive in her assessment; after all, this Uiharu girl was clearly childish in every aspect! No way was she allowed to look older than the dignified, beautiful daughter of the Avalon family!
With a frustrated pout, the haughty blonde continues her boasting, "I'll have you know that I'm thirteen, unlike that kiddy ten-year old! I could even be a..." Beatrix tried to remember the correct word, "A, uh... a gravy model! So there!"

Her smug gaze fell once more upon Uiharu, "so, try and beat that, kid!"

It was so good to be as mature as an adult.

Annette, totally unaware of the Gekota fixation that currently held sway over Misaka, took the question merely as it was, calm and courteous at the same time. Of course, a question like that took a moment of thought, but she would not keep her companion waiting for long, since it wasn't as if it was that major, nor was Shirai around to hear her opinion of what she had been wearing for the few moments that she had been there.

"It was...nice, I suppose," she said with a hint of indifference, perhaps disappointing but being honest at the same time. While she might have known who Gekota was, she didn't really have an opinion on it. Instead, she was a bit more curious about why she was wearing those clothes in the first place, a reasonable thought for someone in this situation.

That said, she moved on to the issue currently holding sway in her mind. "What happened to her uniform, if you don't mind my asking," she said, still keeping herself from relaxing as they stood near the middle of the sidewalk. A change of locale might be in order, but for the moment she held silent on that. Presumably Misaka would want Shirai to be able to find them easily. And she could live with that as she waited for an answer.

Murakawa Torako

"...Alright. I guess if you're that worried about it, fine. I've needed to tell you the results of last night's research anyhow."

"WHOAH! You found out how to get it right?" Tora shoved the school shoes into her locker, and took out her running shoes.

"...You ARE done with whatever it is you needed to do here, correct? You were worked up about the President finding ME here, but what about you?"

"Tch tch" She wagged a finger at him. "Despite my cute and frail looks, I'm quite good at what I do. That is to say, I'm done here, and the Pres wouldn't miss me." After all, as she had to do was put up posters on each floor of the building.

"So uh... the alleys right? There should be one over there!" With just that, she jogged past Kyouma, heading out of the premise and towards where she knew an alley was located. "Let's go, Senpai! Or I'll be a level 5 without you!"

---

Uiharu Kazari

"A, uh... a gravy model! So there!"

Having watched the entire exchange with a wry smile on her face, that last part understandably cracked her composure. Quickly she turned her head to the side and covered her mouth, though it didn't entirely stifle her laugh.

"D...Don't mind me."

Mikoto tried not to let her shoulders slump too much. Just for a moment she thought she might have had something, and then in a flash it was taken away!

Shrugging it off as quickly as she could, she paused for a moment when Anette asked about what happened to Kuroko's uniform. This of course brought memories to the accident with the girl exploding the crepe, and how she'd acted about it. It still made the third-ranked level five angry, thinking about how that girl had gone assuming she abused her powers and didn't care about anyone else's wellbeing after she was the one who instigated the matter in the first place. And how close she'd gotten to accidentally seriously injuring Kuroko... there was a big difference between a corrective shock and what would have happened if she'd gone through with it.

"Well... there was an accident with a crepe, and her uniform ended up being kind of a mess," Mikoto explained, plainly.



Ruiko couldn't help herself. She snickered, covering her mouth to muffle her laughter as the blonde girl tried to make an indignant comeback. And the best part is, she still though Uiharu was only ten years old! ... To be fair, that seemed to be a usual reaction to Uiharu, but this was still ridiculous. And... a 'gravy' model? Ruiko knew about 'gravure' idols, and about the English word 'gravy'. This was just silly.

One thing, however, snapped Ruiko out of her laughter and made her take note.

"... Wait, you're the same age as me?!"

The reaction was a shocked one. The little blonde girl was actually thirteen?! For a few moments, Ruiko realized that she wasn't that much less mature then Kuroko, but somehow she just seemed younger. Nine or ten, at the most.

"Uh... Huh." Kyouma said, nodding his head at Torako's antics. Her enthusiasm, though understandable, wanted to bring her as close to danger as possible. Though, admittedly, he himself was also quite curious...

But that might only lead to one of them getting hurt in the near future. That could be quite... Well, 'bad' was probably the easiest way of describing that hypothetical scenario, but probably wouldn't stop her since she had misinterpreted his words. Hm.

"Hold on, I'm coming, I'm coming." he said, calmly walking after his underclassman as she dashed on ahead. Well, he may as well humor her antics before telling her the truth; it wasn't as if he was losing anything by doing so.

Then he remembered the steak still sitting in his microwave, which elicited a growl from his stomach.
Right. Food. Resolving this thing came first, of course, but next was going back home to eat. Then studying.

"Ah," Annette replied with a nod, understanding fully. She could only imagine what had happened there, and most of the things she imagined weren't that pretty. It was just what came with being in a city of high powered individuals, as well as incredibly advanced technology. There were risks involved. At leas they seemed to have dealt with that issue quickly though, so it couldn't have been too bad.

At that point she glanced down at her own attire, remembering her own purpose for being here. "I'm actually shopping for clothes as well," she admitted calmly. "There was an....unfortunate accident with the laundry machine, ruining my dress clothes. And now I have to get something new before the gala later." She at least treated it as if it was no big deal, though she was annoyed at her roommate for it. Given a lack of options though, she would live with it.

...Come to think of it, she didn't know if Misaka went to that sort of thing anyway. Not that it mattered really, but she couldn't help her budding curiosity. And yet she held her tongue for now. letting the Electromaster respond as she wished, not wanting to make her feel awkward by further asking if she was attending too. She'd learn when she was there, so she left it be for now.