Tetsujo Aki-Chan

Tetsujo Akiko-Chan (Iron Girl Akiko) is a fictional manga series set within the Kogaru Diaries universe. Created by alcoholic reprobate veteran cartoonist Garry Marsden, it is chronologically the fourth of GM's retro-media pastiches and the fifth dealing specifically with classic Japanese media. It is depicted as a prototypical action girl manga, featuring a detailed faux history and a cast of supporting characters.

Premise
Aki-12 is a prototype combat-droid with superhuman powers and shape-shifting abilities. In the "far-off year of 2001," robots and androids are common-place within human society, but Aki is the first of her kind equipped with fully functional AI (Artificial Intelligence).

Due to a highly improbable bureaucratic error, the droid is delivered to Miyamae Elementary School, where she is activated by a little girl named Keiko Misawa. The drone shape-shifts to become Keiko's exact double, leading to a severe case of mistaken identity when the MIBs (Men In Black; government agents) turn up looking for the misplaced robot.

By this time, Aki has formed a unique bond with Keiko, and swings into action to protect her "twin sister." Switching into combat mode, she rescues Keiko from the MIBs, laying waste to half the city in the process. Realizing that the military wants to use Aki as a weapon, Keiko takes her robotic doppelganger home for safe keeping.

Dominant themes

 * Due to their identical appearance, Keiko is often blamed for Aki's mistakes (usually under the most embarrassing of circumstances). As Aki experiences neither pain nor embarrassment, she has difficulty understanding what Keiko is complaining about.
 * In full combat mode, Aki can fly, generate force-fields, fire laser-beams from her hands and level entire buildings by brute force. Powered by a miniature "neutron reactor," she is fully capable of taking down opponents many times her size. Needless to say, all of this comes in handy whenever the Monster of the Week invades Tokyo.
 * In common with old-school characters like Astroboy or Gigantor, Aki-12 spends most of her free time battling alien menaces. The rest of the time, she trades places with Keiko, attending elementary school and learning human behavior from the other children. The pretense is necessary, as her original creators - a sinister military agency known as Armaco - want their technology back at any cost.