Toaru Majutsu no Index:Railgun Chapter4
Status: Incomplete
4/20 parts completed
Chapter 4: Misaka Mikoto and the Death of Class
Part 1
This was supposed to be Tokiwadai Middle School.
It was the most prestigious of the five fancy schools in the School Garden.
But Misaka Mikoto looked grim as she spied on the schoolyard from behind cover.
She had lost track of how many times she had repeated the same phrase today.
“Well, this sucks.”
“How about we take a vote? Who thinks Akazame-sensei is guilty?”
“Guilty!!” “Guilty!!” “Guilty!!” “Guilty!!” “Guilty!!” “Guilty!!”
The stadium-level roar was horrifying.
Those were cheers. All those voices were joined in anticipation and celebration.
The person using the megaphone used an old-fashioned dialect, but she was in fact a young girl. And the person about to be physically yanked from the ground by the neck was a female teacher.
No men were allowed in the School Garden, so the angry mob surrounding them was also entirely female.
“Do they really expect us to accept these new school rule proposals!? What right do they have to ban us from wearing silk or synthetic underwear!? What right do they have to demand we only wear cotton underwearrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!?”
Shouts of support.
“What right do they have to ban the use of deodorant spray!? What right do they have to insist we only use certain brands of soap or shampoo!? There’s no rhyme or reason to it, so I can only imagine it’s based on some sick desires held by one of the grownups!! Find the sicko dictating our private lives while hiding behind the rest of the faculty!! Drag them out here so we can string them uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuup!!”
More shouts of support.
“They claim to have created the perfect environment to prepare us for life, but that was nothing but a lie! They don’t even see us as human! This place is a love doll factory where they transform us to cater to all their perverted ideals!! Death to all the teachers using the rules as an excuse to sexually harass us alllllllllllllllllllllllllllll!!”
Thunderous shouts of support.
The shouting group was not some mob that had broken in. It was made of all the same girls who normally lived such pleasant lives in the School Garden.
Mikoto couldn’t bear to watch.
She agreed the new school rule proposals were awful, but they were just that: proposals. They would probably be rejected even if the students didn’t lift a finger.
“Yet they’re doing all this.”
Mikoto’s gaze focused on something that was perfectly innocent. You could find one at most any school. She didn’t know the technical term for it, but it was the metal pole used when raising a flag. It even had a device at the bottom that let you turn a crank to raise the flag.
But no one gathered around it had a flag with them.
The end of the thick wire was tied into a loop.
It went without saying that was meant to go around someone’s neck.
The meaning was clear. That shape itself was a well-known symbol.
(We haven’t even had dinner since that happened, and they’re already doing this? A sanitized upbringing is a scary thing.)
It was absurd to think the upper classes never caused trouble. Did they never explode no matter what happened to them? Quite the opposite. Just look at all the wars and revolutions that had been fought around the world. No matter how graceful, refined, and ladylike the girl, she would still shout “kill” if the conditions were right.
This kind of thing was common in the west and these girls did love copying western culture.
(It doesn’t help they never learned how to vent their anger.)
Maybe some blame lay with the teachers for raising them that way. The students at a school like this probably questioned things less often than average. They weren’t used to feeling malice and they were easily influenced, so when it started to set in, it spread shockingly fast.
The girls raised here according to the adults’ wishes had completely derailed from those wishes and started rioting. It was like a failed attempt at winemaking that left the barrel full of mold.
People who tried to live pure lives without ever considering what that meant were easily shaken when the rules themselves came into question.
Pure crystals were fragile to external shocks.
Maybe Mikoto hadn’t been affected because she had exposed herself to enough impurities while wandering the streets on a daily basis.
(Even Shokuhou’s brainwashed world is better than this. In fact, where is that she-fox right now? That schemer must have taken in far more impurities than me.)
The megaphone voice continued to agitate the mob of girls.
If Mikoto didn’t intervene soon, the teacher standing up on the “gallows” would end up dangling from her neck like a mascot phone strap, but if she rushed in without a plan, she would end up like that as well. She was at the top of the ranks when it came to her power as an individual, but a battle against hundreds of high-level espers at once was something else entirely. Plus, even Academy City’s #3 had to worry about compatibility issues with a potential opponent.
Not to mention that she had to worry about keeping her friends Shirai, Uiharu, and Saten safe.
But more than any of that, no one won if a deadly fight broke out within Tokiwadai or the School Garden. They would only be pitting allies against each other.
Mikoto’s only enemy here was the agitator using the abnormal situation to transform the crowd of girls into an angry mob.
(On the other hand…)
She looked to the side.
When things got this bad, it was probably best to call in Anti-Skill from outside the School Garden, but that wasn’t an option this time and the reason why was right in front of her.
It was only three steps away.
The megafloat lightweight aluminum alloy used to build floating airports had been used to swiftly and secretly fortify the ground, but it hadn’t been perfect. Some squares of ground several meters long were just missing.
Yes.
The blue of the open sky spread out before her.
The School Garden was currently floating at an altitude of 5000m.
She heard a deep thrumming.
The sound was even heavier than a chainsaw’s roar. It reminded her of a military transport plane’s engine, but the principle behind it probably wasn’t related to aircraft.
It was more like a flying car.
Or the coaxial rotors used for aerial photography drones.
(Geez. If all these cubes of earth crumbled, how many rotors the size of circular fields would we find inside? I’m sure they’re linked in parallel using a grid pattern, so shutting down individual ones would only imbalance the entire structure and send us crashing to the surface.)
That was why the ordinary laws and Academy City’s unique rules did not apply here.
She had a very physical reason she could not expect support from the adults. The entire area had been cut away before declaring its independence. No one could escape the aerial cage. Anyone who carelessly let it slip that they disagreed with the central agitator would be snitched on and end up like that.
Misaka Mikoto’s exhalations were white.
How had this even happened?
She once repeated the same phrase she had used so many times today she had lost count.
“Well, this sucks.”
Part 2
The School Garden had not, of course, always been airborne.
It had been attached to the ground like normal until earlier that day.
Part 3
“Oh, wow. We’re actually inside the School Garden,” said Saten Ruiko.
She looked around the Western-style street, spread her arms horizontally like airplane wings, and flapped them up and own.
“Is it true Tokiwadai sometimes has real princesses come for the entrance exam? And they ignore all the diplomatic pressure, so they fail the princess if she isn’t up to snuff? Coming here just for fun makes me feel like a socialite☆”
She was even more excited than if she were going on a European vacation. Her step was so light it felt like someone needed to grab a hold of her before she floated away like a balloon.
Mikoto, who had come to meet her, smiled bitterly.
“You’ve been here before, remember? And there really isn’t anything here worth all the fuss. Right, Uiharu-sa-”
“Dwo ho ho ho!! Since they’re banning all photography to help protect their secrets, we have only once choice here: deep breaths! Take deep breaths, Saten-san! Inhale as many high society particles as you can so we can smuggle them home with us in our lungs and upgrade the rank of our souls!! Ohhhh ho ho ho ho! I-it actually came out right? The legendary ‘oh ho ho’ laugh comes so naturally to me here, Saten-san! I feel just like Cinderella. My soul has shed the dried husk of its skin to reveal its shining true form!! Now I can boldly use the all-purpose incantation that works for everything from ‘good morning’ to ‘goodbye’: good day to you alllll!!!! Yahoo!!”
(O-oh, no. Her dopamine levels are higher than Kuroko’s right now.)
Mikoto gulped and took a step back.
She always forgot how Uiharu Kazari was normally shy and sensible but had a weird obsession with high society girls. Make the wrong move with her and you could find yourself faced with a worldview disturbing for reasons entirely different from Shirai Kuroko’s. It was like seeing someone in a cult.
But Uiharu’s ‘oh ho ho’ laughter was not cult brainwashing. It was the same principle as the Osaka dialect imprinting on the language center of the brain after only about three days in Kansai.
In fact…
“Ohhhh ho ho ho!! Once I start assisting father in managing Kongou Airlines, we will build up a global flight network and even expand into the civilian spaceflight industry!!”
“My, that sounds wonderful, Kongou-san. It is always good to have realistic dreams.”
“The final frontiers are space, the deep sea, and I suppose the human mind. With your spirit, Kongou-sama, I imagine you will conquer all three. Hee hee.”
Yeah, most of the girls walking around here talked like they were at an opera or a masquerade, so it wasn’t surprising people who hadn’t built up a tolerance would be influenced. Just like people taking a Kansai vacation, they would probably go back to their usual way of talking after returning to their normal Academy City lives.
Anyway.
“This place isn’t as great as you think it is.” Mikoto had to smile bitterly since she knew the truth. “The teachers are always busy tacking on more incomprehensible rules. That hasn’t developed into a major issue yet since the student councils of the five schools always reject them, but it sounds like the teachers are even trying to determine what material of underwear we can wear.”
“But we’re barely ever allowed in here. What was it Tokiwadai is doing again? An interview entrance exam for recommended applicants? Whatever it was, I love that they’ve opened the place up for it.”
“It isn’t that simple,” sighed Shirai Kuroko who was feeling blue.
Since she had her armband on her right shoulder, her Judgment side was showing more than her Tokiwadai student side.
“When they open up the School Garden, people who normally can’t get in will sneak inside. We have to be ready for problems. Agh, needing to suspect anyone and everyone you see is so stressful. Just let me trust in the goodness of humanity!”
“Why would anyone cause trouble? The people coming in from outside are taking their entrance exam. And these are the ones who have a recommendation vouching for them, so I can’t imagine why they would cause trouble at the school they’re trying to get into.”
Saten wasn’t convinced, but Shirai shrugged.
“If any of them compare their academic abilities, academic record, and esper level to their rivals and conclude they can’t win, they might skip out on the interview and try to memorize as much as they can about Tokiwadai’s secret esper development tech. The past records show several cases of weirdly pessimistic yet optimistic people who are so convinced they’re going to fail they focus on gathering up as many ‘souvenirs’ as they can find.”
“Eh? But Tokiwadai is a middle school, so aren’t we talking about elementary schoolers? A-are there really people so jaded at that age that they’ll give up on getting into their dream school and work as an industrial spy for some bad grownups?”
“Sateeen. When you see those child actors turning on the waterworks in front of the camera, it isn’t because something sad happened to them. And I’m sorry to say there will always be a segment of the population who are talented but refuse to use that talent responsibly.”
Saten Ruiko herself had been in elementary school less than a year ago. And her skill at deception and cunning hadn’t popped into her head the instant she moved up to middle school.
The belief that all children were pure and innocent never survived long while working in law enforcement.
If it was true that no one could change who they were deep down, then the villains were already villains as children.
A thought that did the opposite of relieve the stress of Shirai’s job here.
“Fortunately, the struggle for one of the recommended spots has nothing at all to do with extreme commoners like us. Being heiress to a giant IT company or princess to an entire country isn’t enough to get through those super strict interviews, right? I’m never going to be a part of that world, so let’s go make the most of this School Garden visit in our own commoner way!!”
“(My point was to watch out for people resorting to crime because their ‘super strict interview; didn’t go so hot.)”
Mikoto and Shirai were out and about on a weekday morning because their classes were canceled for the day thanks to the entrance exam interviews. It seemed unlikely Uiharu and Saten’s school would be out too, so Mikoto was honestly worried they were skipping class for this.
“Please follow me, everyone. My name is Akazame-sensei. Now, when we turn this corner here, you will see the next landmark: Tokiwadai Middle School’s School Garden Dorm.”
“It’s called a crepe. You can eat one for a snack or as a meal. For a meal, you can put tuna, lettuce, and crushed-up potatoes inside. I personally recommend adding some homemade mayonnaise to make it extra delicious.”
“Onee-chaaan, where are youuu?”
There was a lot of chatter.
Supposedly, the crowds during this event were large enough to cause nearby seismographs to malfunction. That apparently caused disaster warning apps to send unnecessary alerts.
Maybe it was practice for the open campus being held later on or maybe it was meant to help the applicants judge what life here would be like, but a teacher was waving a small flag like a tour guide. A lot of food trucks were parked alongside the sidewalks and streets. And on closer inspection, there were a lot of small children not wearing uniforms. There was even a sparkly new flying car being shown off as a demonstration for something or other. It was basically just a bigger version of an aerial photography drone.
Mikoto stared off into the distance.
It wasn’t often you got to see Tokiwadai’s Ace indulge in schadenfreude.
“Poor Shokuhou. People come gawk at her dorm as a landmark now. Heh heh heh.”
“Misaka-san, your dorm has it way worse since it isn’t even inside the off-limits School Garden. People can stop by to take a look or even stake out the place any time of the year. Ah ha ha. Check the map on any urban legend site and your dorm’s location always has a pin in it. If anything, yours is the bigger landmark.”
Saten’s tone was light, but Mikoto was thoroughly petrified.
Meanwhile, Shirai’s focus was somewhere else entirely. She lightly tapped on Uiharu’s shoulder to gather the attention of the other girl wearing the same armband.
“That girl has called for her sister three times now. Outsiders aren’t allowed to take videos inside the School Garden, so I doubt this is a prank video meant to see how ordinary people react. It’s safe to assume she’s lost and I would put the risk level at low. Let’s go help her.”
“Fine, but…wait. Am I even allowed to do Judgment work in the School Garden?”
Technically speaking, all law enforcement work outdoors was Anti-Skill work.
But once those two switched to work mode, they were Judgment through and through. They eliminated their own inexperienced and unreliable side as soon as they spotted a small child crying on the side of the road. They were aware the best way to make someone feel safe was to avoid showing them the ordinary weakness everyone had.
The girl had shoulder length flaxen hair. Her bangs were cut along a perfect horizontal line, which added a touch of Japanese aesthetic. She was even shorter than relatively small Shirai, but she was wearing a suit. She may have been one of the applicants here for the entrance exam interview, but she looked more like she was dressed up for Shichi-Go-San.
“We are with Judgment. I am Shirai and this is Uiharu. Is something wrong, young lady?”
“Wow, look at Shirai-san. I never imagined that pervert could sound like the host of an educational program.”
Shirai felt like murdering Saten for that, but she did her best not to let it show on her face. They taught you how to speak to small children in Judgment, but of course an outsider wouldn’t know that.
“Be nice, Saten-san. She might be a pervert, but she’s the kind of pervert who can set her perversions aside when there’s work to be done.”
“Uiharu!? You’re not even an outsider, so maybe I really should murder you!”
She heard some quiet laughter.
It came from the girl. She had been tearfully calling for her sister before, but now she was laughing. Talk about a stroke of good luck. Shirai suddenly recalled a busty track suit teacher from some joint training they did with Anti-Skill saying you could help bridge the emotional gap between yourself and someone in need of help by acting silly and pretending to make harmless mistakes.
Whatever the case, the girl was willing to open up to them now.
“My sister isn’t here.”
“Oh, so you really are lost. What’s her name? Do you have a photo? In your phone’s photo album, maybe?”
“I don’t mean it like that.”
Uiharu was better at dealing with lost children than Shirai. She crouched down to the girl’s eye level and tried to get the information they needed to search out her sister, but the girl stopped her.
The record needle hit a small scratch and popped out of the expected groove.
It flew far off course.
“My sister has gone missing.”
Part 4
“Sigh. I haven’t been at this branch in forever.”
“But Branch 003 is the Tokiwadai branch, Shirai-san. It’s the one you actually belong to, for crying out loud. You shouldn’t spend so much time at Branch 177.”
“Come to think of it, doesn’t Shirai-san’s favorite teacup live over at Branch 177 nowadays?”
They complained while Shirai unlocked the door and they all walked in. The lost girl was among them.
The small girl’s name was Yugure Tsumebakei.
She wasn’t wearing a uniform and she was only 12. That meant she was in the 6th grade, which made it obvious what she was doing at the School Garden today. She was here for an exam interview at Tokiwadai.
Even though the School Garden was about the safest place someone could be, the children showing up for their crucial exam would normally be accompanied by a female family member like a mother or sister or some private bodyguards hired by their family. Bringing family was apparently popular because they were so rarely allowed inside Academy City. Tsumebakei was supposed to have had her sister Yugure Kanaria looking after her since she was a 2nd year at Tokiwadai.
“Oh, hey. So you’re Canary-chan’s sister, Yugure-san?”
Mikoto realized she recognized those flaxen bangs cut straight across like that. But Kanaria had long hair that fell to her hips.
“You are in the second year too, aren’t you, Misaka-san?” said Uiharu. “So is that sister a friend of yours?”
“A classmate. You do not want to mess with her.”
Her stupid mouth let that slip with a smile.
Just as the younger girl’s face had lit up at finding a friend of her lost family member – and one who knew her well enough to call her by a nickname – she was hit by that harsh comment. Clear drops were growing in the 12-year-old’s eyes.
Shirai Kuroko was in justice mode right now, so she shouted in a way that made one imagine a pair of horns growing from her forehead.
“Ugh, Onee-sama!!”
“Eh? Oh, I didn’t mean it like that! I meant you wouldn’t want to fight her because of her power, but she’s a nice person so it’s not like that would ever happen!!”
Mikoto quickly retracted her statement while pulling out her phone and trying to contact the girl in question. But she didn’t receive a response. Saying things looked bad would only have made the younger sister cry, so Mikoto made eye contact with Saten instead.
She couldn’t reach her classmate’s phone.
That meant it was either turned off or deep underground. But in Academy City, it was actually hard to find places that didn’t get a signal.
Saten took the hint and casually changed the subject.
“But you’re #3 in the entire city, Misaka-san. What kind of power makes you not want to fight her? Tokiwadai is crawling with monsters, isn’t it?”
“Micro Dying,” said Mikoto with a fair amount of exasperation in her voice. “Basically, Canary-chan’s power lets her kill all microscopic microbes with a touch. She’s ranked at Level 3, but she’s definitely stronger than that. You realllly don’t want to fight her.”
Yugure Tsumebakei fidgeted on the sofa, unsure how to react to this. She could tell this was meant as a compliment of her beloved big sister, but she clearly didn’t like how Mikoto’s compliments were so focused on fighting.
“Huh? But, Misaka-san, how is that any different from medicinal soap?”
Saten sounded confused by the explanation, so Mikoto smiled and clarified.
“Because she can rub her palm against your belly and wipe out all of your intestinal bacteria, both the good and the bad. We can only stay healthy because of the barrier of microbes protecting us. What do you think would happen to us if all of those microbes were suddenly taken from us? To be blunt, we would start growing mold inside our bodies and then it’s game over. We’d even have mold all over our skin and in our mouths.”
“Ew,” groaned Saten.
That girl could eliminate microbes at a touch, so she wouldn’t need a hazmat suit or a mask to protect against germs. She could even suicidally scatter all kinds of killer viruses around while remaining entirely unharmed herself. If she put her mind to it, she could become an assassin or cause devastation on an international scale. Mikoto honestly thought that power was more dangerous than her own Railgun if you looked just at how deadly it was.
Yugure Kanaria’s power could be unimaginably dangerous when combined with the right kind of cunning, but the girl herself was peaceful and afflicted with a super slow-motion curse, so none of those possibilities had ever occurred to her.
Saten tilted her head.
“So, um, Tsumebakei-san was it?” asked Shirai. “Do you have a similar power?”
“No.”
Yugure Tsumebakei wasn’t obligated to answer since it wouldn’t help find her sister, but she must have been the trusting type. She answered the casual question with a shake of her head and went on to explain.
“My power is Macro Dying. It’s very different from my sister’s.”
“Macro?”
“I can pull the data from the Bank.” Uiharu looked like she was unsure if she should, but she had already completed the search. “Macro Dying. Level 4. She can increase the size of and control the red blood cells, white blood cells, platelets, plasma, macrophages, cholesterol, amino acids, and other components in her blood. For example, she can cause a white blood cell to grow to 2m across and have it swallow and digest an attacker nearly instantly. Huh, that is an extremely rare type of power. Even more so than Shirai-san’s Teleportation.”
Even Mikoto couldn’t believe her ears.
How many of those components were in a single drop of blood? She was pretty sure there were 5 to 10 thousand of the white blood cells that fought foreign invaders. If that explanation was accurate, then she was the type of high-level esper who could basically command an army. That contrasted Mikoto or Shirai whose strengths were as an individual. It was certainly a different category from her sister Kanaria, but it was similarly difficult to rank on the Level scale. Mikoto could think of a number of clever ways to make use of that power. One idea even made her hold a hand to her forehead. If that power still applied with transfusions and dialysis, couldn’t that girl basically bring about the end of the world?
Saten, being Saten, was focused squarely on the Level system.
“So this cute little thing is secretly a monster on the inside? Ugh, and she’s a Level 4 at her age? It feels like I’m in a bicycle race and someone just passed me using a rocket engine. But I guess she is the kind of genius girl who gets recommended to apply to Tokiwadai.”
“I really don’t like my power.”
“Why not? It’s Level 4!”
“I don’t like needles, but I have to extract some of my blood every time I use my power.”
Come to think of it, she would need to do that, wouldn’t she?
In that sense, her power required a lot of setup in a way Mikoto’s didn’t.
Shirai Kuroko started to recommend the girl converted to the Church of Onee-sama so she could trigger a nosebleed at will using her fantasies, but Mikoto smiled and shut her up with a solid punch.
“So what makes you say Canary-chan has gone missing?”
It was finally time to get down to business.
When they had first approached Yugure Tsumebakei, she had said her sister had “gone missing”. It didn’t sound like she had just been waiting at the wrong time or location or they had gotten separated in a crowd.
“My sister is missing,” said Yugure Tsumebakei with her small fists clenched in her lap. “We were supposed to meet up right away, but she called to say she was searching for something. She said she couldn’t let someone find out she was searching for whatever it was, but she promised to come meet me as soon as she was done. I waited and waited, but she never showed up.”
That meant the girl was up to something during the entrance exams.
Mikoto and Shirai exchanged a glance and Shirai formed an X with her index fingers in front of her lips. The look in her eyes said, “I know, but don’t you dare say anything that would worry her.” Very forcefully said it, at that.
There were three general possibilities here.
1. Kanaria’s disappearance had nothing to do with the suspicious circumstances. For example, she had made a quick detour for a snack and forgotten all about her promise to meet with her sister, or she couldn’t answer her phone or meet her sister because a teacher was getting after her over some minor infraction. There were any number of peaceful possibilities like that.
2. Kanaria’s disappearance had everything to do with the suspicious circumstances. For example, she had tried to reveal some of the data theft common during entrance exam season and got herself into trouble.
3. Yugure Kanari herself was stealing secret information.
Mikoto sighed.
“It doesn’t prove much of anything, but Canary-chan is in the newspaper club. And for how easygoing she is, she’s a stickler for keeping promises and has a strong sense of justice.”
“Oh? If she has an overabundance of justice, she should come join us in Judgment.”
“She’s afflicted with a super slow-motion curse, so apparently she failed the physical exam when she tried to join.”
“She fai- she couldn’t get past that? I-I thought it was just for show. I mean, it’s so insultingly easy even Uiharu passed.”
“Shirai-san…” groaned Uiharu, but everyone ignored her.
Shirai had avoided using the word “fail” after remembering Yugure Tsumebakei was here for an exam.
Mikoto sighed.
“She apparently joined the newspaper club to help create a civilian group that could increase transparency by keeping an eye on both Anti-Skill and Judgement. So I’m guessing this is option number 2.”
But that wasn’t enough to put her sister at ease. Even if Kanaria was innocent of all wrongdoing, they still couldn’t get in touch with her. The presence of a separate villain removed all suspicion from her, but it did nothing to guarantee her safety.
What had she found and who had she been pursuing?
If she had been so busy she had left her little sister all alone, she must have been approaching the climax of whatever story she was pursuing for the newspaper. But then someone had gotten in her way and now she had gone missing.
Mikoto concluded that learning what story she was working on would be the fastest way to figure out how to help her.
“But, Misaka-san.”
They weren’t in the familiar Branch 177, but Saten had already figured out how to use the kitchenette and had made herself some cocoa with warm milk. But after some thought, she passed it to young Tsumebakei instead of drinking it herself.
“This is the School Garden. It’s the ultimate educational environment funded by Tokiwadai and four other fancy schools. Is there even crime here? And we’re talking about an entire person disappearing without a trace.”
Saten would be aware that, if you wanted to keep a worried witness’s trust, you could never bluntly reject what they told you, no matter how absurd it might sound.
So her question was meant to lead into a response from an expert.
She had stepped on the landmine herself by immediately rejecting the idea and saying it wasn’t possible because she hoped to ease some of lonely Yugure Tsumebakei’s worries.
So she started sweating when Mikoto didn’t immediately respond.
The look on her face said she really wanted someone to follow up on her question.
“Um, uh, Misaka-san? Shirai-san? Hello?”
She tried to get an answer out of them again, but both the Tokiwadai students were reluctant to speak.
Mikoto looked to Shirai.
“What do you think, Kuroko?”
“I have my doubts about those stories, but I suppose it is a possibility.”
