Rainy Days: A Certain Magical Index Story

Chapter 4: Runaway

"What the hell? Why would she come here?"

He didn't waste time hanging around outside and followed her into the building, gritting his teeth with agitation as he yanked open the glass door.

"There better be a good explanation for all this."

Inside, the monstrous roar of the storm was muffled and only a few lights were scattered down every hall. Shops were sealed by hangar doors and metal gates, and though Misaka was nowhere in sight, her damp shoeprints led straight down the main drag. At least there was a trail to follow.

There was something undeniably eerie about a building so large being void of shoppers—or any kind of life, for that matter. Touma could imagine a serial killer chasing him through the halls in a game of cat and mouse, and of course there was always the real possibility of Index's magician friends popping out of thin air and burning him to a crisp. For an average high schooler, he certainly knew some bizarre and dangerous people.

Misaka's shoeprints led to the escalators, both of which were functioning.

"She must have turned them on," he said, eyes up. Four stories high and all the shops were closed, the lights off. "Could this get any creepier? Geez..."

Touma rode the escalator to the second floor, then another to the third.

Still no Misaka.

And at that point, her shoeprints had all but faded, leaving him with no way of knowing where she might have gone.

Naturally, he started to worry. Misaka left the apartment that night for a reason, and if she was upset about something, he had to be there to help. That's just friends did for each other.

"Misaka!" he called out. "I know you're here somewhere! Just talk to me!"

But there was no response. Yet upon turning a corner in front of a vacant café, Touma saw her further down the hall, staring into a shop window. She was soaking wet and obviously tired—just like the night she knocked on his apartment door. However, this time was different. This time, she was crying. The tears weren't flowing rapidly nor was she sobbing, but the whites of her eyes were tinted red, and ever few seconds she breathed in with a tired shiver. He approached her without speaking a word, only to press his back against the wall and hide in the shadows when two other sisters showed up.

"'Misaka thinks you are being selfish,' says Misaka, addressing the disheveled girl who gazes longingly into the window."

Touma squinted his eyes and watched them unnoticed. He couldn't be sure, but the other two Misakas seemed like the same ones who visited his apartment the other day. Were they still upset about her living situation? Or the thumb war?

"'All Misakas deserve a home. Why is it just you who gets one?' asks Misaka, questioning your understanding of how serious we are. 'If we cannot all be happy, then let us be equally sad. We are sisters, after all.'"

10032 faced them, her gaze sunken to the floor. "But Misaka does not want to be sad anymore. She wants to be happy."

The third sister piped up: "'All Misakas desire happiness,' says Misaka, taking a step forward in order to be more central to the conversation. 'But how can one Misaka live with the boy when the rest of us cannot? Perhaps it would be wise to ask the boy if all Misakas could find residence at his dwelling.'"

Like a lion had begun gnawing his right leg off, Touma's eyes widened with terror at the idea of living with nearly ten-thousand Misakas. Sure, their food bill wouldn't be half as much as Index's, but still...ten-thousand? That had to be a joke.

Please let it be a joke. Please, God.

10032 answered: "'But Misaka wants things to stay the way they are. She likes being with her roommates and staying up late with them. She even likes the nun. But..."

"'But what?' asks Misaka with a fiendish squint of her eyes."

"'Well,' says Misaka coyly, altering the tone of her voice to sound pitiful. 'Misaka is unsure if they feel the same way about her.'"

Touma had no idea what to call it, but an instinct kicked in. He didn't want Misaka to feel upset or like she wasn't needed, because she was. Life at the apartment was better with her around. He smiled more, had more fun, and even Index liked having another person to spend time with on a regular basis. They were all friends, and Misaka needed to understand that.

He stepped out from the shadows and into one of the nearby lights, making himself known. All three of them shifted toward him, and finally, he caught sight of what store Misaka had fled the apartment that night to see. It was a clothing store, and in its front window behind a metal gate was a family of mannequin's: one adult male, one adult female, and two small children. Their bodies were pasty white.

"Misaka," Touma stated firmly with a stern gaze. She met his eyes, stilling shivering with each breath. "I don't think you understand how Index and I feel about you. So c'mon, talk about it with me instead of running off again. But first..." He glanced to the mannequins. "...tell me what happened that night. Why'd you come to me in the first place?"