Toaru Jihanki no Fanfare

Toaru Jihanki no Fanfare (とある自販機の) is a Toaru Kagaku no Railgun mini-novel by the author of the  and  series,. The cover and illustration is illustrated by Takumi na Muchi. It was included with the special edition of the Toaru Kagaku no Railgun Manga Volume 05 as part of Pseudepigrapha Railgun.

Misaka Mikoto finds herself fighting against the Rank 7 Level 5 of Academy City, Sogiita Gunha. However, a young girl turns out to be the culprit behind their unprepared display of abilities: a primary school student named Kihara Nayuta.

Synopsis
The story is set before the Child Errors from the Crystallized Esper Essence case woke up, and opens on Kihara Nayuta fighting Mikoto. Nayuta is the result of a series of experiments directly after the ones that sent Edasaki Banri (who she was friends with before her coma) and the others into a coma. Like Therestina, she asked to be experimented on from an early age, and is now a cyborg with over 70% of her body made of artificial parts after one experiment went wrong, and is only alive due to Heaven Canceler’s intervention. Due to her cyborg parts, she has super strength and super speed compared to a normal human. As a Kihara, Kihara Gensei is her grandfather, and Kihara Amata is her uncle.

Nayuta’s ability is being able to read the flow of AIM fields and manipulate the ability of any esper who has gone berserk. It could be said that she’s a ‘kouhai’ of Takitsubo Rikou, as she herself says she’s not yet on her level. Nayuta also knows the full potential of Takitsubo, and knows there’s a difference between them when she said though she can force people to go berserk with their ability she’s not as proficient as Takitsubo. Though Nayuta is superior to Takitsubo in the sense she doesn’t need the ‘crystallized esper essence’ for her ability to work.

Mikoto almost lost control of her power when they fought due to Nayata's ability interfering. Nayuta on the other hand is capable of predicting where Mikoto’s lightning will hit, and can react in the 0.5 second gap to counter attack. Though Nayuta can’t see the paths for the Iron sand blades Mikoto brought out, and almost lost. Due to her mechanical parts acting as a lightning rod, Nayuta wasn’t as hurt as she should be, but is still paralysed. Mikoto then confined Nayuta in a cage made from lightning and iron sand. Nayuta charged towards Mikoto and in the result burning off the skin on her hand, showing Mikoto that she’s a cyborg. Though Nayuta can make people’s ability go berserk she can’t “Stop” the ability, that’s how she’s stuck in the cage. In theory, Nayuta can even defeat Accelerator (before he gained black wings and lost half his calculating abilities) if she trained enough according to Kihara Amata.

Nayuta caught Mikoto red-handed kicking that vending machine in the 7th district, and used this chance to fight Mikoto as she’s part of Judgment. Nayuta picked a fight with Mikoto partly due to a grudge that Mikoto took down Harumi, and partly because she wanted to fight a real Level 5 to test her skills that she acquired from Kihara Gensei. Mikoto replied she understands at least part of Nayuta’s motives, as she herself sometimes goes after people older than her, i.e. "that idiot" (Touma). Also, this isn’t the first time Mikoto had to deal with espers younger than her challenging her.

Kuroko, on the other hand, saw the No.7 (Sogiita Gunha) dueling another guy and thought it was a case of bullying. Kuroko tried to apprehend Gunha but failed. Then, they saw Mikoto’s lightning from that park, and they all went to investigate. Gunha is capable of pseudo teleport, as shown when he fought Kuroko. Also, the ‘wavelengths’ around him are not AIM of any kind, and any AIM that comes near him gets distorted. He can also move at the speed of sound. He’s one of the very few ‘Black Boxes’ of Academy City in that almost nothing is known about his ability.

Here is revealed the ones responsible for developing Gunha’s ability is none other than the ‘Kihara Research Institute’. Mikoto is known to many people in the 7th district as “That crazy bitch from Tokiwadai” since she keeps frying everyone’s electric equipment when she starts fighting. As soon as they saw lightning, everybody started to turn off their equipment and went into ‘anti-disaster’ mode.

Nayuta then tried to make Mikoto and Gunha fight each other by making Mikoto shoot bolts of lightning at Gunha. Gunha was unharmed and then accidently hit Mikoto’s berserk buttons (i.e. being stronger than her and calling her a child) by calling Mikoto’s attack something he doesn’t even need to try and block “if it’s only something at that level”. Mikoto then decided to use Gunha, who's practically unharmed by her attacks, as a practice run for when she has to go after Touma. She even asked if Gunha knows ‘that idiot’ due to them both capable of being unharmed by her attacks. Gunha has no idea who Mikoto is talking about.

There ends up being a duel between the No.3 and No.7 Level 5s, with Gunha’s loss if he attacks back or is knocked unconscious. These conditions lead to Mikoto getting even more furious because she thinks this means he doesn’t have to fight back against her. Mikoto shoots a strong lightning bolt at him (fatal to any normal human being), but he is only numbed slightly. She then tries to use her Railgun on him (at 30% output), but Gunha is unharmed because he catches the coin Mikoto fired with his teeth. Then, he remarked it’s illegal to take game tokens out of those places, which lead to others saying he’s a idiot for caring about that at a time like this. Mikoto came to the conclusion Gunha’s not like Touma since he doesn’t negate the attacks. Mikoto then brought out two giant black swords made of iron sand and did a nitouryuu (two swords style) stance with them. For the residents of 7th district, getting caught up in disasters like this are something they all got used to by now as Mikoto’s rampage continued.

Nayuta’s awed by the display of AIM field around Mikoto and Gunha, and these two are just playing around. To her who can see AIM fields it’s like the typhoon which sprouts up at apocalypse. She thought if Gunha didn’t step in, she might not have survived against Mikoto’s powers as her arms are already partially fried. She felt ashamed, but more anger at herself for not being as powerful as she wanted to be. She promised Banri and others to become a Level 5 and join Judgment as that was all their dreams, to show when they band together even those discarded by others can be powerful when they try. Nayuta then tried to jump into that maelstrom of AIM, just so she can get closer to the powers she has been seeking.

After trying many other things such as wide area electric storm attack or turning nearby steel cans into plasma, Mikoto then brought out one of her most powerful weapons: calling clouds into the area and bring down a powerful lightning strike from the heavens (i.e. the one that shot down onto Touma that other time). Gunha brought his defences up to the max and Nayuta’s senses overloaded from the stimulus. All the trees in the park are flattened by Mikoto’s blast. Earlier, Gunha said he brought up a part of the Earth’s electromagnetic field using telekinesis to act as a shield against Mikoto’s lightning (he calls it ‘Aurora Guard’), to which Gunha’s friend that Kuroko dragged along with her flat out states it’s physically impossible. It’s unknown how he really redirected lightning, but it’s not perfect – he still sustained light burns from Mikoto’s attacks.

Later, Kihara Gensei commented Nayuta’s not quite qualified of being a ‘Kihara’ yet – any Kihara would disregard all limits and destroy whatever experiment they are put into. Nayuta’s acting just like a lab rat who presses levers when given the right stimulus, and no matter how exceptional she is as a subject, to Gensei it just shows her uselessness. Still, Gensei and Amata are proud of her achievements and the information she has provided as a subject, though they would never say that in front of her.

While Mikoto and Gunha were huffing and puffing, someone else saw their disturbance and came to investigate – the Tokiwadai Dorm Manager. She told Mikoto Tokiwadai’s abuse of that vending machine is starting to become a problem, before taking down Mikoto easily with a Neck Snap. Nayuta was shocked that someone without abilities (below even a level 0 esper) can take down a Level 5 so easily, and then she fainted from exhaustion.

Nayuta was taken to a hospital by the Dorm manager, and it turns out the Dorm manager knows who Nayuta is and how she is related to the Kiharas due to the daycare centre she helps out in are sponsored by the Kiharas. With her resources the Dorm manager found out about how Banri and others are still in a coma, and that Nayuta isn't a bad person. Nayuta asked if the Dorm Manager is one of the Hound Dogs, and she replies she doesn’t know any group with that name. The Dorm manager warned Nayuta that the only time when she can treat Nayuta kindly is when she’s still a primary school student. If she comes into Tokiwadai Middle School with that behaviour she’ll “treat her just like any Tokiwadai student”, which lead to Nayuta getting a fright and almost seeing a demon behind the Dorm Manager’s smile – and she can’t tell whether it’s real or not even though she can see AIM fields.

Nayuta sustained damage to 47% of her body and can’t move for 10 days afterwards while her strengthening and fixing takes place. The researchers received valuable information from the sensors implanted in Nayuta and are even happy that Nayuta has gotten damaged to this extent, because they otherwise could not have gotten this information. Therestina seems to be Nayuta’s older sister, but Nayuta doesn’t know Therestina’s plans with Banri and the others. During the ten days that Nayuta is out of the way Therestina carried out her experiment on Banri, and eventually was brought down by Mikoto and co. Afterwards the talk switches to the Level 6 Shift involving Amai Ao's clones and Amata's son. The later being presumably a title given to Accelerator, as Kihara Amata was the one in charge of his power development.

Mikoto is a bit sad that she never got to hear Gunha’s name, and this is only because she now can’t go hunt him down and demand a rematch. Kuroko is jealous of the fact Mikoto can use her ability to give herself a electric massage to slowly recover from the Dorm Manager’s Neck Snap.

Gunha was pushed back by the Dorm Manager’s aura and agreed to stop the battle (Mentioned here the Dorm Manager seems to have Acqua-like techniques when it comes to moving around, she can slide across the ground like ice skating). Later, he goes to the vending machine Mikoto kicked and bought a drink, and is surprised the machine still works well after everything that has happened around them. Neither Mikoto nor Gunha were in trouble. Because the researchers spying on them gained valuable data from their clashes, they decided to just fix everything and wipe the trouble from the records. When the Anti-Skill first knew about Mikoto and Gunha's fight, the first person they sent for after panicking was Yomikawa, but it turned out the higher-ups said everything is under control and cancelled Anti-Skill's intervention.

In the epilogue, Mikoto, Hamazura and others around Academy City are listening to a pirated radio channel that’s talking about the strongest non-esper in Academy city, going through Komaba and Kurozuma before mentioning a woman even more powerful than them. Before they can reveal her identity the channel mysteriously gets cut off (the Dorm Manager most likely raided the place to preserve her secret). Kuroko tried to find info on Nayuta, but doesn’t have the clearance. Mikoto then went to bed, and as Kuroko tried to crawl in with her like it’s only natural Mikoto gave her a German Suplex for punishment. Later, that radio channel came back on air as if nothing has happened.

Characters

 * Hamazura Shiage
 * Misaka Mikoto
 * Shirai Kuroko
 * Tokiwadai Dorm Supervisor
 * Sogiita Gunha
 * Yokosuka
 * Yomikawa Aiho (referenced)
 * Kurozuma Wataru (referenced)
 * Komaba Ritoku (referenced)

New Characters

 * Pirate Radio DJ
 * Kihara Nayuta

Abilities

 * Railgun - Misaka Mikoto

New Abilities

 * Aurora Guard - Sogiita Gunha

Unanswered Questions

 * Who is Kihara Amata's son?
 * What happened to Kurozuma Wataru?