They continued on for about 10 minutes.
Accelerator figured 10 minutes by vehicle would be a decent distance. However, that also meant it was only a "decent" distance. The odds were low, but their enemy might have free use of a satellite or some other method of tracking their escape route. If so, the enemy would catch up to them in no time at all.
The man Accelerator had stabbed through the back of the driver's seat trembled as he spoke in a quiet, scratchy voice.
"(Y-you want me to drive further? Ha ha. Don't joke. I'm really going to die at this-…)"
"(Quiet. Don't stop until I say to.)"
After whispering his reply, Accelerator lightly moved the makeshift steel weapon that was stabbed through the driver's seat. The man's body gave a large twitch and a groan reverberated through the vehicle.
Index looked up when she heard it.
"What is it?"
"Nothing. Isn't that right?"
Accelerator leaned in towards the driver's seat in front of him to hide the weapon from Index.
The man in the driver's seat sweated profusely and nodded repeatedly. Index frowned, but she did not catch on to what was happening.
"But…" said Accelerator without thinking.
With its backdoor missing, the van was practically shouting "This van is stolen. Sorry." Accelerator had assumed they would run into Anti-Skill if they drove that suspicious vehicle around, but there was no sign of them. He had hoped that would save him the bother of contacting Yomikawa, so he was a bit disappointed.
(Don't tell me this stillness is that bastard Kihara's doing, too…)
Accelerator had returned his choker-style electrode to normal mode.
This was simply to preserve power. The battery would not last past 15 minutes in powers mode. He had used up a good bit in his fight with Kihara, and it was worn down bit by bit during everyday life.
Given the amount of power left, he could not last even 7 minutes in an all-out fight.
Naturally, he was not even using the bare minimum of reflection right now. He needed to preserve his power to fight Kihara and the others. But that meant if a missile was fired at the van before Accelerator noticed it, he was done for.
For that reason, Accelerator was keeping his eye on the nighttime cityscape flowing by outside the entrance missing its door.
"Ah! I found The Ugly Duckling!"
The pure white nun whose view of the world did not quite match that of the other two in the vehicle was rummaging through the things in the back seat of the stolen van.
The original owner of the van must have had a child because Index pulled out a young child's picture book made of stiff cardboard. The duck drawn on the cover with a deformed art style must have stimulated the hunting instincts of the calico cat in her lap because it began calculating the distance between them.
(What is with this bookworm? Her eyes are sparkling like crazy…)
"You sure are carefree. Come to think of it, what the hell were you even doing back there?"
"Hm? I was trying to return what I borrowed." Index stuck a hand in the sleeve of her nun's habit and rummaged around. "Here is your cutting edge daily item! You can't leave something so important with a stranger! You must have been in trouble without it, but you'll be fine now!!"
"Are you some kind of idiot!? Having someone return some disposable tissues that've been wadded up in their pocket is nothing but a goddamn bother!!"
"Eh? Really?"
Index extended the small hand that held the pocket tissues inside their plastic package.
Accelerator decided it would never end if he did not take them, so he took the pocket tissues from Index's hand with an annoyed look on his face. He casually shoved them in his pants pocket.
"Come to think of it, are your wounds okay?"
"Ahn?"
"I mean, you were collapsed bef-…"
"That was nothing. And if you bring it up again, I might have to get violent again."
The driver began trembling, but Index did not notice.
Accelerator's impudent comments seemed to have relieved Index because she looked down to the picture book in her hands.
"Hm, hm. So this is how it's translated into Japanese."
Index must have already known the fairy tale because she flipped through the pages very quickly and read only the last page aloud.
" 'The ugly duckling who had been teased as hopeless was actually a super sexy badass of a swan. The end.' …What is a sexy badass?"
"Pretty much the exact opposite of you."
"Hmm." Index loudly shut the picture book. "So in the end, it's a story saying the swan's victory was decided from the moment it was born a swan."
"That isn't the point of The Ugly Duckling."
"Then what is the point? There are so many divergent means of interpreting fairy tales that deciphering it would be difficult."
"Hah? Let's see, what was it again? I think that brat said the point was that the swan wanted to get along with the ducklings but found true happiness when it learned it could never join their group."
Accelerator clicked his tongue.
There was no dealing with brats because they would sometimes come up with those interpretations that lacked any hint of cuteness.
He heard a depressed groan coming from the driver, so he arbitrarily moved the impromptu steel weapon back and forth in the seat to silence him.
Index still did not appear to have noticed.
She looked up from the picture book and asked, "Is this 'brat' you mentioned the person you were searching for?"
"Yes. But technically I'm still looking for her."
"You got separated again?"
"…Yes, I did," confirmed Accelerator after a short pause. "I need to search out that brat now. The real problem is that she won't be able to get home on her own. That's why I need to part ways with you here."
"I can help you search," replied Index immediately. She did not look away from Accelerator's red eyes for even a second. "After all, I can tell you're in some kind of trouble. If Touma was here, I know he would say the same thing."
"Hmph." Accelerator looked away in disinterest and spoke to the driver. "Stop around here."
The man parked the van on the shoulder of the road as per the instructions of the boy who literally held his life in his hands.
Accelerator looked back at Index.
"Then help me."
"Okay. What should I do?"
"There is a large hospital near here. It should take 5 to 10 minutes to get there on foot. Head there and find a doctor whose face looks a hell of a lot like a frog. Once you do…" Accelerator paused there to tap at his neck. "Ask him to prepare a battery for the electrode I use to connect to the Misaka Network. That will get across what I need. This battery is important. I can't continue the search without it. So once you get the battery, rush back here. Understand?"
"Got it. It's 'the battery for the electrode you use to connect to the Misaka Network', right?"
She recited it perfectly.
Of course, she likely had no idea what the Misaka Network was or what it meant to connect to it with an electrode, but Accelerator decided she might have been a quicker thinker than he had thought. And before he had finished thinking that, Index unhesitatingly headed out onto the rainy road while holding the calico cat.
"Wait here for me."
"Ah?"
"You have to wait until I get back."
"…Fine. Just get going," replied Accelerator.
Index turned back two or three times in the process, but she eventually ran off while splashing through the puddles. Her small back disappeared into the darkness.
"Fucking hell," he swore before leaning back into his seat.
There was no replacement battery in the hospital. The electrode itself was only a prototype. The battery needed was a specialized for it, so it had not been mass produced. And if it was, Accelerator would have kept tons of spares in his pockets in the first place.
It had been a simple lie.
Everything other than wanting her to go to the frog-faced doctor had been a lie.
The danger would be the same no matter where she went, but the worst option was for that nun to be alone. The best means of upping her odds of survival even if slightly was to send her to an area filled with people. Accelerator doubted how much the frog-faced doctor's hospital would help, but it was better than nothing.
Simply put, a fight for Last Order was beginning between Accelerator and Kihara Amata's Hound Dog. He already lacked strength due to only having battery power for less than 7 minutes of all-out combat, so the idea of fighting an enemy like that while also protecting Index was laughable. And so he had gotten rid of her here. She would have been in the way, so he had sent her elsewhere.
That was all there was to it.
And that was all there needed to be.
"…"
Accelerator gave a light sigh and switched his train of thought.
"Start driving."
"Y-you're still not releasing me…gah!?"
"Do you want to live or die? It's your choice."
He lightly nudged the steel blade stabbing through the back of the driver's seat and the van quietly began moving once more.
Accelerator had him drive for about 5 more minutes before telling him to stop in front of a small park.
They seemed to be near the edge of District 7.
The street sign for the neighboring District 5 could be seen not far ahead.
Accelerator grabbed a large bag lying in front of the backseat and placed it on the seat next to him. It likely held spares of Hound Dog's equipment. The bag was over a meter long and resembled a body bag made of synthetic leather.
He opened the zipper and found tons of deadly weapons inside.
He found a handgun small enough to fit in his palm, a submachine gun that could probably be hidden in an encyclopedia case, and something as long as a mop that might have been a shotgun meant for indoor use. Other items he found stuffed inside were clay-like explosives, fuses, radios, and masks that covered the face.
What he wanted first and foremost was…
(A replacement for my cane.)
He had left his usual cane behind during his fight with Kihara. At all times except while in powers mode, he needed a cane to support his body. No matter what he planned to do, he needed that first.
Accelerator glanced through the contents of the bag and…
"I guess it has to be this shotgun."
He arbitrarily pulled a shotgun from within.
It was a semi-auto shotgun made of a glossy black metal. Everything from the underside of the barrel to 10 centimeters in front of the trigger seemed to be sideways magazine. It probably held about 30 shots. Accelerator was fairly certain some sort of submachine gun used the same structure for loading.
The main body of the shotgun was about a meter in length and the stock on the back could be extended to the desired length. It had something like a scope on top, but it provided no magnification and a red dot appeared in the center when a switch was flipped. It appeared to be a dot sight. It depended on personal preferences, but it had probably been added for increased accuracy over a normal sight.
(Is there any point in a precise targeting device like this on a shotgun that sprays bullets everywhere?)
Accelerator tapped the dot sight in surprise, but it was not actually a problem.
If he grabbed the shotgun's grip and held the stock under his arm, it almost looked like a crutch.
(My weight might bend the barrel, but I'm not planning to actually fire it. All it has to do is help me walk.)
As Accelerator thought that, he heard the driver's voice.
"It's no use," said the scratchy voice.
The man's strength had dried up so much one would have thought it had been days since he had any water.
"You met him directly, so you should know. Kihara-san is absolute. He is not someone who a boy with a brain injury who has been dulled by peace can hope to defeat with methods he thinks up on the fly."
"Do you want me to flick you?"
"Th-that might be for the best." That was not the response Accelerator had expected. "I do not want to die. B-but I know how frightening Kihara-san is. I wish I didn't know. I…will not see the next morning. He shows no mercy. And I mean absolutely none. There is no saving me. And if I'm unlucky, h-he might not even kill me. K-Kihara-san is the type of person who can easily break Guinness World Records or make the world's three great scandals into the four great scandals…"
"Do you ever shut up?" spat out Accelerator to silence the man.
He grabbed the piece of steel stabbing into the driver's seat.
"What a pain in the ass. Just asking me to kill you is too vague. I'll move this thing around to tear your insides to pieces! I'll have you spewing up your lunch along with a bunch of blood, you piece of shit!!"
"E-eeeee!!"
Simply shouting in the man's ear was enough to easily break through his bluff.
When people had never actually felt "death", their words were worth no more than that.
The driver's eyeballs rolled around in his head as he shouted, "Dammit! Goddammit!! Give it a rest! I don't want to die here!! Both of you are monsters! I don't want to have anything to do with either of you!! I want to go home, take a shower, drink some alcohol, and watch all the shows I've recorded!"
All that remained was ugly hopes.
It turned out he had stuck his head into a conflict between big-shots without knowing his place
Accelerator spoke quietly from behind the driver's seat to the trembling Hound Dog man.
"You don't want to die?"
"N-no."
"You want to live?"
"Yes!! What's wrong with that!? I want to live! And I don't want to live in some way that makes death look nice! I want to live a proper life!! I'm such an idiot! I'm the biggest idiot here! What am I talking about!? I know that's impossible!!"
The man must have felt truly cornered.
Otherwise he would not be speaking so rapidly.
"So you do understand."
A smile appeared on Accelerator's face as if his mouth had been sliced wider.
When the driver saw it in the rearview mirror, his breath caught in his throat.
"Do you really think there is any path left that will save you? After living in this world, trampling on so many people, and making enemies of me and that bastard Kihara, do you really think you can still live a happy life? That's bullshit and you know it."
"A-aahh…"
"You're utter trash. How many people have you killed?"
"…F-fourteen."
It sounded like he had to squeeze out the voice.
But Accelerator felt a bit let down when he heard it.
Was that all?
If that was all, he was a much more peaceful person than Accelerator.
And Accelerator was quite a monster indeed to view someone like that as a "peaceful person".
"Choose. Will you die of blood loss here or will Kihara Amata turn you into a truly hilarious corpse."
"N-no. I don't want to die. I don't want to die."
"Oh? Then you need a hospital," continued the Level 5 with a grin. "You won't die. Not easily anyway. I won't let it happen. You're the kind of bastard I could kill a 100 times and it would never get old. Do you really think I would let you get off that easily? I'll make sure your suffering lasts. Keep living on that hopeless path of life so I can relieve some stress."
"Dammit…" muttered the man through clenched teeth when he was told to receive medical care. "He'll kill me. Kihara-san will hunt me down to the other side of the globe. There's no saving me…"
"A shitty doctor I know seems to be the type of person who won't abandon a patient even when faced with the likes of him. Brings tears to your eyes, doesn't it? You should be able to live for a day at least."
"Th-that's no guarantee of anything."
"Is that so? I might tear out Kihara's heart during that day, you know?"
The man remained silent for a while. He was likely thinking about the fact that he might survive if Accelerator actually defeated Kihara.
He then said, "You are no match for Kihara-san."
"Maybe not. But I have a better chance than you."
Accelerator began rummaging through the synthetic leather bag once more in search of anything besides the shotgun he could use. He found a certain device.
It resembled a handgun with a silencer attached, but the end had a sponge-like sensor similar to a microphone. Also, the area just above the grip, where a handgun's hammer would be, had a small LCD monitor of about three inches.
"That's an olfactory sensor," replied the Hound Dog after checking via the rearview mirror. "It's a military version of the ones used by perfume and deodorant companies…"
"So it's basically a mechanical version of a police dog."
It was likely more effective than a dog. After the sensory information was converted into data, only the needed smells of all the complexly mixed smells detected would be recorded in memory.
Smells were divided into a few different classifications and each genre had a similar molecular structure. The device likely started from there.
"We always used that to track our target. It's quick and reliable. I've never seen someone escape once Kihara-san wants them found…"
"…"
A disinterested look appeared on Accelerator's face.
He had no objection to crushing Hound Dog, but he did not want to constantly worry about surprise attacks. It would be better if he set up a way of taking them by surprise.
"Just because we used a vehicle doesn't mean anything. They'll follow the scent of the tires to find the van. Then they just have to follow your scent. We keep tracking the target until we have stabbed them in the back. They will find this location right away."
As Accelerator listened to the man speak, he fiddled with the olfactory sensor.
"How do you use this? It might come in handy for finding that brat."
"…Give it up." The man gave a slight smile. It was a pale, dry smile. "Hound Dog has a cleaning agent for erasing scents. It messes with the very molecular structure of the scent. If they used that at the attack site, you won't find anything…"
According to the man, there were two types of cleaning agent: one for putting on the Hound Dog members' clothes and one for scattering across the site after the fact.
"Do you have that cleaning agent?"
"If I did, I would have already used it. I was part of the wrong group. One group tracks, the other covers our own tracks…"
Accelerator clicked his tongue.
But simply knowing a material existed to fool the olfactory sensor was still a plus.
Accelerator tossed the olfactory sensor aside and said, "I have nothing left to ask you. Don't you dare move."
"Ee!?"
The man cried out as he felt a writhing atmosphere from the backseat.
He was going to be killed after all.
Or so he thought. Instead, Accelerator moved towards the doorless opening. The boy was exiting the van.
"Wh-where are you going?"
"Ahn? To crush Kihara and rescue that brat."
The man was dumbfounded by that annoyed reply.
"Why aren't you giving up? No matter where you run, Kihara-san will come to crush you with a smile on his face. You don't have time to prepare for a fight. He has the upper hand in every way. Are you still going to do this?"
"Of course I am."
"How can you reply so readily? Surely someone as knowledgeable in the world as you knows just how bad your situation is here."
"No, I don't know," spat out Accelerator.
He brought a hand to the doorless exit from the backseat in order to contact the frog-faced doctor.
"Maybe I've been too dulled by peace. Or maybe it's the brain injury."