Episode 05 - Project Level 6 Shift
Mikoto stares at her lookalike, who is wearing a Tokiwadai school uniform and what look like military night-vision goggles. After a moment's shock, Mikoto demands to know who she is. Instead of answering, the other girl indicates a black kitten stuck in the nearby tree. Referring to herself as "Misaka" — and addressing Mikoto as "Big Sister" — the girl explains that she used her electrical powers to free a baby from a locked car, spooking the cat and causing to run up the tree. Getting no answers to her repeated questions, Mikoto reluctantly helps rescue the cat.
That done, Mikoto hesitantly asks if the self-identified Misaka is her clone — and is told simply, "yes". Taken aback, she asks if Project Radio Noise was revived, and what the clone's purpose is. Rather than answer, the latter recites a long sequence of numbers and letters and then pauses expectantly. When Mikoto's only response is confusion, the Misaka clone says that since Mikoto is clearly not involved with the experiment, she cannot answer any questions. Mikoto tries pressing her a while longer, but she refuses to divulge any information. Eventually Mikoto gives up and tells her clone to continue on to wherever she's going, saying she'll just follow her until she returns to her supervisor. The other Misaka obligingly turns and walks off, Mikoto following at a short distance.
Her clone wanders at a leisurely pace through the city, pausing to look at butterflies and things. Mikoto reflects that she wouldn't believe such an absurd thing could happen if the evidence wasn't right in front of her. Thinking back to what she read about Project Radio Noise, she suddenly remembers the document's subtitle: "Sisters" — plural. She asks this particular Sister if there are more clones out there, but gets no useful reply.
Mikoto gets annoyed and starts berating the other Misaka. The driver of a passing ice cream truck sees them and pulls over. He tells them that sisters and especially twins shouldn't fight. Mikoto retorts that they're not sisters, but the driver scolds her for saying so. Then he gives them each a free ice cream cone. The other Misaka eats hers rapidly, analyzes its ingredients, and compliments the man on his high-quality product. Thanking her, the driver tells the pair that couples may break up and become strangers, but siblings share the same blood for life. Watching him drive off, Mikoto is exasperated at being mistaken for sisters, but concedes that it's the obvious assumption. She goes to eat her own ice cream — only to discover that her clone has somehow stolen and eaten it behind her back. Mikoto gets annoyed again, but the other Misaka changes the subject and shamelessly asks for some tea.
Eventually the sun sets, and Mikoto is growing tired of following the other girl around. At this point, the latter admits that she won't actually be going home, but instead heading directly to an experiment. Mikoto can follow if she wants, she adds, but it won't help her find the people in charge. Exasperated, Mikoto decides to do some research on her own; she pulls her PDA out of her pocket, in the process accidentally dropping the Gekota badge she acquired earlier. Struck by an idea, she tells the other Misaka to stand still, then fastens the badge to the latter's uniform so she can see how it looks. Satisfied that it works as an accessory, she tries to take it back, but the Sister blocks her and says the badge belongs to her now. Mikoto tries to protest, but the other Misaka says this is the first present she's ever received from her big sister — although she adds somewhat snarkily that she regrets her sister's childish tastes. Mikoto gives up and takes her leave, wishing her erstwhile twin a good night. The other Misaka quietly says "Farewell, Big Sister", and watches Mikoto leave with an enigmatic look on her face.
Mikoto phones Uiharu and quotes the code sequence that her clone recited earlier, asking if she knows what it means. From its pattern, Uiharu recognizes it as a type of password used for Academy City's highest level of classified information. Mikoto thanks her and hangs up.
Meanwhile, the other Misaka retrieves a large guitar case from a storage locker, then makes her way to a nearby alleyway where someone is already waiting for her. She pulls a high-powered rifle out of the guitar case, and says that experiment number 9982 will start shortly. The other person, a high-school-aged boy with white hair, smiles nastily.
Plugging into a phone booth network terminal as before, Mikoto finds and decrypts several files corresponding to the mysterious password. And what she reads is more horrifying than anything she imagined...
According to calculations by Tree Diagram, there is exactly one esper in Academy City who is capable of reaching Level 6. Even so, a normal curriculum would take 250 years to bring him up to that level. However, Tree Diagram has calculated that using trial by combat could expand his abilities more rapidly. Specifically, he could reach Level 6 if he were to win 128 battles to the death against Railgun. Since there aren't 128 Railguns available, an alternative plan has been devised which repurposes the Railgun clones from the suspended Radio Noise project. By using the lower-level clones, the subject can reach Level 6 by killing 20,000 of the Sisters in single combat.
Each combat is carefully planned, scheduled, and carried out in one of 128 designated battlegrounds all over Academy City. According to the schedule, the next battle is experiment 9982, set to start at 9:00 pm tonight. Horrified, Mikoto checks the time and sees that it's already just past 9. She runs frantically back towards where she parted with her clone.
Misaka 9982 has begun her battle against the white-haired esper. She quickly confirms that shooting her rifle at him simply causes the bullets to richochet back. In the meantime, he seems to be able to turn anything around them, from rocks to buildings to pavement and even the air itself, into lethal projectiles which he hurls at her. Evading as best she can, the Sister slowly lures him into a nearby railway yard where she has planted a hidden landmine, theorizing that an attack from underneath might be effective. By the time they get there she is heavily injured, but she manages to trigger the mine with her powers when he steps over it. Unfortunately, he is completely unaffected, and moves in to deliver a No Holds Barred Beat Down.
Mikoto, who is frantically looking around nearby, notices the distant explosion and rushes towards the site. She reaches a bridge overlooking the railway yard just in time to see her Sister, crippled and grievously wounded, crawl over to where her Gekota badge has fallen on the ground. Misaka 9982 picks it up and smiles softly...
...and dies, as a train car is dropped on top of her.
Declaring tonight's experiment over, the white-haired esper is about leave when a powerful bolt of electricity bounces off him. Puzzled, he looks over to see Mikoto charge at him, screaming...
Tropes
- Big "NO!": Mikoto lets one out when she sees the train car falling onto Misaka 9982. Unfortunately, there's no time for her to do anything, and she's too far away in any case.
- Deadpan Snarker: Misaka 9982, very much so, at least while interacting with Mikoto.
- Doomed by Canon: A Certain Magical Index has already established that all of the Sisters prior to 10032 were killed by Accelerator. Anyone familiar with that work is therefore well aware that Misaka 9982 is going to die. Knowing this arguably makes her battle even more horrifying to watch.
- Foreshadowing: When Mikoto leaves Misaka 9982, the latter tells her 'farewell' note , which in Japanese is not normally used as a casual parting phrase. For anyone who isn't aware of what must be coming, this is a big hint. Mikoto misses the nuance, perhaps chalking it up to the Sister's idiosyncratic way of talking.
- Funny Background Event: When the ice cream truck driver is talking to Mikoto as he's about to drive off, Misaka 9982 can be seen glancing covertly at the ice cream in Mikoto's hand. A moment later, Mikoto discovers that (a) it's gone, and (b) her 'sister' has mint chocolate ice cream on her face.
- Gory Discretion Shot: After she sets off the landmine, Accelerator brutally rips off one of Misaka 9982's legs to prevent her from running away. We don't quite see it happen on screen, and subsequent shots of Misaka 9982 avoid showing the actual wound. It's still horrifying. Similarly, when she dies we only see the train falling onto her from overhead, and then a pool of blood slowly appearing underneath.
- Gut Punch: Up to this point, Railgun as a series has featured intense conflict and significant danger — but nobody has died, and the overall tone has been generally optimistic. This episode changes all that. Misaka 9982, a character we've spent two episodes getting to know and like, is brutally maimed and then killed, right before Mikoto's eyes.
- Mood Whiplash: The first two thirds of the episode are funny, light-hearted, and charming. The last third is one of the darkest and most horrifying parts of the series.
- Narrating the Present: Misaka 9982, like all the Sisters, tends to narrate her own actions — although she seems to do it slightly less often than some of the others.
- No Holds Barred Beat Down: Once Accelerator decides to stop playing around, the battle very quickly becomes one of these for Misaka 9982. Her subsequent injuries would probably have proved fatal even before he dropped the train on her — a fact he lampshades, possibly implying he sees it as a Mercy Kill.
- No-Sell: Nothing Misaka 9982 does against Accelerator even touches him. She only lasts as long as she does because he wants to see what her strategy is.
- Special Edition Title: The normal ending theme and animation are absent from this episode. Instead, the closing credits are shown in plain white text on black interspersed with flashes of electricity, while dramatic instrumental music plays. This is presumably because the usual upbeat ending would have undermined the episode's dark and horrifying conclusion.
- Wham Episode: One of the biggest in the whole series. Plot-wise, Mikoto learns about the Sisters, meets one and comes to see her as an actual person, learns about the Level 6 Shift Project and (by extension) gets her first true glimpse of Academy City's dark side, and finally sees her newly (if reluctantly) discovered sister get brutally killed before her eyes. Character-wise, this is the episode which marks the end of Mikoto's innocence.
