Episode 07 - Auribus oculi fideliores sunt (The Eyes Are More Trustworthy Than the Ears)
By the time Mikoto reaches Baba's van, he's managed to flee. There's no useful information left inside, so she heads off to try and trace its origin by checking street surveillance cameras.
At the hospital, Shokuhou's followers regroup and make plans to try and track Mikoto down. Saten hears them mention Shokuhou, and recalls that she supposedly has the power to manipulate memories. As she ponders this, Wannai joins them and says Kongou is expected to make a full recovery, adding that the nanodevice is being sent away for analysis.
They take Misaka 10032's cat to Wannai's psychometrist friend, who reads its sensory memories from the day before. She sees glimpses of Mikoto's "sister", with a tall man talking to a girl nearby. One of them says something about "Auribus oculi fideliores sunt". When the psychometrist reports this, Saten says she recognizes that phrase, which is Latin for "the eyes are more trustworthy than the ears". Wannai asks Saten to relay this information to Mikoto while she and Awatsuki go back to stay with Kongou. Saten, wondering how to do this, is surprised to find Mikoto's contact information on her phone.
Walking around the city, Mikoto's mother runs into Uiharu, who is helping a lost child. Uiharu tells her that visitors to Academy City have GPS transmitters embedded in their guest passes, which makes her job easy. From close by, the girl with the skull pendant is watching the two of them, and thinks to herself that it makes her job easy, too.
Saten meets up with Kuroko and fills her in on what's happened. Still wondering about her phone, she asks if it's possible that Mikoto is their friend and they've somehow forgotten — or had their memories modified. Kuroko asks why she isn't including Uiharu in this discussion, but Saten says she thinks that might not be a good idea. She somewhat nervously phones Mikoto, telling her what they learned from the cat, and asking if they can meet to discuss things. Mikoto agrees, and is just telling the two of them where to find her when someone addresses her from behind. She turns around to see the girl with the skull pendant, her face hidden under a hood... and Uiharu sitting unconscious on a bench behind her. The girl points a knife at Uiharu's throat and orders Mikoto to end the phone call.
The girl says Mikoto should already know who she works for, and accuses her of interfering with them. Brushing off Mikoto's confused reaction, the girl goes on to ask where the Misaka Sisters currently in Academy City are being kept. Mikoto demands to know why she'd threaten an innocent person for such information, to which the girl scoffs that Mikoto knows perfectly well how the dark side of Academy City works. Mikoto cuts off an angry response, then orders the girl to release Uiharu at once. The girl points to a plaza located down a level from the one they're on; there, an identical hooded figure is standing next to Mikoto's unconscious mother. She threatens to kill both hostages if Mikoto doesn't tell her how to find the Sisters. Mikoto refuses, then quickly uses her powers to pull the bench with Uiharu out of the way before charging forward and blasting the hooded girl at close range.
Down below, the girl's apparent duplicate pulls out a knife and goes to stab Misuzu, but Kuroko suddenly appears and throws a wheelchair at her. Dropping her cloak as she dodges, the girl hurls her knife at Kuroko, who easily avoids it. Kuroko grabs Misuzu and teleports her to a nearby rooftop; by the time she looks back down at the scene, the girl has vanished.
Teleporting to Mikoto's location, Kuroko goes to investigate the first hooded figure, which is lying motionless. A long metallic spike suddenly shoots out of its fingertip, narrowly missing her. The figure stands up, and the cloak falls away together with a wig, to reveal a creepy-looking metal humanoid. It approaches Mikoto and raises a hand... then dissolves into a puddle of silver liquid. Mikoto speculates that whoever was controlling it has fled out of range.
The girl in question, who has escaped into the sewers, mutters that Mikoto is difficult to negotiate with. She also notes that, judging by her confused reaction, Mikoto isn't the one who's been interfering with their operations.
Mikoto and Kuroko meet up with Saten at the Judgement office. Saten tells them that "Auribus oculi fideliores sunt" is the name of an urban legends website she knows. However, the site doesn't merely collect urban legends: it actively attempts to investigate and validate them. Uiharu had been trying to investigate that site while Saten was searching for Shadow Metal yesterday — but she couldn't find it. When Saten tried again today, she found that the Internet is being flooded with dummy data that throws off anyone who searches for it. The logical conclusion is that the website contains something that somebody is determined to keep hidden.
Kuroko points out that Uiharu is smart enough to have realized that, and certainly wouldn't have given up until she solved the mystery — and yet she claimed to have found nothing of interest. Mikoto theorizes that Shokuhou somehow discovered Uiharu's investigation, paid her a visit, and modified her memory. She uses her ability to search through Uiharu's computer, and finds a deleted file containing information Uiharu reconstructed from the missing website. In it, there is an article mentioning a "DNA Computer" — and, next to it, a covert photograph of someone who is clearly Misaki Shokuhou.
Tropes
- Absurdly Spacious Sewer: Kouzaku hides in one. This is an important bit of Foreshadowing.
- Chekhov's Gun: Kouzaku's hood and cloak are knocked off when she dodges Kuroko's wheelchair. While not remarked on, it does give Kuroko a brief glimpse of her face, which will come in handy later.
- Flashback-Montage Realization: Mikoto's conclusion that Shokuhou had Uiharu under Mind Control during much of episode 4 plays out this way.
- Hidden Depths: Saten makes some remarkably astute deductions from the limited pieces of information she picks up; see Spotting the Thread, below.
- Improvised Weapon: Kuroko repurposes her wheelchair as an impromptu club and attempts to whack Kouzaku with it.
- Not Herself: The other girls belatedly realize this about Uiharu claiming not to have found the urban legends website.
- Spotting the Thread: Saten does this with several disparate clues, which lead her to suspect that their memories have been tampered with:
- Mikoto acts highly familiar with Kuroko, although Kuroko claims they don't know each other.
- Wannai and Awatsuki apparently thought it was easier for Saten to contact Mikoto than themselves, even though they go to the same school and Saten doesn't.
- Saten inexplicably has Mikoto's contact information in her phone, despite having no memory of being acquainted with her.
- Uiharu is acting strangely out of character: either failing to realize something that she should, or else is concealing information.
- Members of Shokuhou's clique are keeping tabs on Mikoto for unknown reasons.
- And, finally: Shokuhou's ability allows her to Mind Control people and alter memories.
- The Reveal: Uiharu was being manipulated by Shokuhou as far back as episode 4.
