Melzabeth Grocery

Melzabeth Grocery (メルザベス＝グローサリー) is a character introduced in Souyaku Toaru Majutsu no Index.

Appearance
Melzabeth has short white hair and blue eyes. She wears a blue head band, a blue scarf white shirt and brown pants.

Background
In the past, Melzabeth and her husband shared a dream for their daughter Helcalia to have a wedding in space. Following the of her husband in the launch failure of the Uranus III, a multi-stage rocket of a state-run program, Melzabeth founded the start-up company Space Engage with the aim of developing a safe and effective alternative to older forms of space travel, to accomplish the dream she shared with her late husband for their daughter's space wedding (hence the company's name).

She played a key role in Space Engage's development of the Logistic Hornets, airborne mass driver launch platforms, including the unique solution to the aerodynamic problems posed by the aircraft's immense size, an automatic system based on the unconscious reflexes of human skin and using data obtained from Melzabeth herself while hang gliding.

However in December of the story's first year, R&C Occultics gained control over the company in order to acquire the Logistic Hornets as the cornerstone of their worldwide drone-based delivery system and meteorological weapon, not interested in space travel or the company's original intentions. Melzabeth was unable to stop this usurption, but while many of the original start-up employees left the company, she remained in order to be in a position to secretly work to undermine R&C Occultics and ultimately prevent their technology for being misused, though she was worn down from the futile struggle and suffered agony, regret and humiliation from the corrupt corporation's trampling and abuse of their dream.

Los Angeles Arc
By December 26th, Melzabeth had developed malware to disable the Logistic Hornets and had been cooperating with people from Academy City, however as Anglican and Academy City forces launched Operation Overlord Revenge to destroy R&C Occultics HQ in Los Angeles, the Logistic Hornets were used to manipulate meteorological conditions and enable Citrinitas's sand to swallow up the city's population, Melzabeth among them. However, she had ensured her daughter's safety and had managed to leave a few clues behind.

Although Melzabeth's rebellion failed, she had caught the interest of Anna Sprengel, with Citrinitas using her image in the events which followed in an attempt to frame her for the mass disappearance, so that she would be broken back into their service and left with no place other than R&C Occultics. At the same time, having met Helcalia, Kamijou Touma followed Melzabeth's trail and fought to prevent their family bond and dream from being trampled further. Although the virus was never used, the Logistic Hornets would ultimately reject commands based on what they had learned from Melzabeth.

With the defeat of Citrinitas, Melzabeth was freed from the sand and reunited with her daughter.

Post-Handcuffs Arc
On December 29th, during the battle with the ghost of Kihara Hasuu in the Vanishing Tunnel to save Risako, a heavily injured Touma encountered Ladybird's broken remains and contacted Melzabeth for help in wiring the android back up. With Melzabeth's help, Ladybird was fixed and reactivated, being wirelessly connected to the Logistic Hornet's unused autonomous optical neurocomputer in place of her original cellulose nanofiber brain, freeing her from the cruel need to consume the brains of others. When Hasuu voiced confusion as to how Ladybird was functioning so well in their subsequent fight, Melzabeth spoke through Ladybird, telling him about the non-cruel solution that had not occured to him and, being a mother and having learned of Hasuu's abuse towards his adoring creation, scornfully told him that he wasn't as smart as he thought he was, angering the Kihara.

Abilities
An aerospace genius, Melzabeth played a key role in Space Engage's development of the Logistic Hornets, including the unique solution to the aerodynamical problem tied to the immense size of the aircraft, known as the Melzabeth Method (メルザベス・メソッド), utilizing an automatic system of receptors and armor scales, derived from the unconscious reflexes of the human skin and using data obtained from Melzabeth herself for aerial attitude control.

Melzabeth was also capable of devising malware designed to infect and disable the Logistic Hornet via injection into the control server, hang gliding (from which her data was taken for the Logistic Hornets), and knows multiple languages (English, Russian and Japanese, but not German).