Chapter Text
She met him on Monday, during her second week as a Hope's Peak Academy student. He entered their classroom without addressing them, not even a hint of a smile on his face as if he was entering his house and they were his rather annoying guests.
He was tall yet unassuming and wore a well-tailored black suit with a white shirt so impeccable that it contrasted bizarrely against his unkempt long hair.
“Yukizome, do you have any time to spare?” the young man asked oddly, calling their teacher by name alone without any honorifics.
He supported his whole weight on the wall beside the blackboard as if the mere act of standing up bothered him.
Kamukura, the teacher called him, admonishing him for not showing up to school as much as he should; said student dismissed the critiques -claiming that he only came to inform her that Nidai destroyed the gym’s bathroom again- and left immediately.
Professor Yukizome excused herself before she bolted out of class, giving Kaede time to learn from Ouma -and later verify with Saihara and Amami- about Kamukura’s multiple talents.
However, none of her classmates could confirm or deny if the origins of those talents were as terrifying as Ouma claimed them to be before he was thrown head-first to the floor for trying to superglue Yumeno’s hair to her hat as he spoke.
Kaede had a heated argument with Chabashira, and the ultimate conspiracy faded into the background for a while.
She didn't even get to visit the liar in the infirmary; before she met with the Ultimate Hope once again.
Monday afternoon and Kamukura was standing inside her lab, looking at the piano chair as if it had personally offended him. The whole situation was so reminiscent of some of Kaede’s piano instructors that she couldn't help but snicker a little.
He turned to face her with a blank -yet somehow critical- stare, sending chills down her spine.
“You know exactly what you are doing.” He said, his voice more solemn than she remembered a few hours ago.
She laughed out of nervousness this time.
“It was custom made for my comfort and…well … it is an old Steinway model, it kind of called for a matching chair.” She explained, putting on the most cordial smile she could muster, hoping he would not argue with her about this because she would have to fight him otherwise.
Needless to say, that wouldn't end up well.
"You are short," he stated so matter-of-factly that Kaede couldn't even take offense. "Can you keep a good posture when you play?"
"Of course, I can!" She replied, more excited due to the potential challenge than upset.
If he happened to be perfect from head to toe, there was no way the Ultimate Pianist could fall short in front of him, much less if Kamukura decided to judge her technique before he even heard her play. The butterflies in her stomach soon became bees, and Kaede was ready to deliver the performance of a lifetime as soon as he said:
“Go ahead and prove it.”
She practically flew to the center of the room and sat on her piano chair.
Raising the fallboard on the Grand Piano, she leaned in and whispered directly to the keyboard:
“Hello again, Hildegard. Let’s have fun today.”
Kaede would never say she wasn’t petty when she made a whole show getting into position as she decided what to play. She could almost feel him roll his eyes at her back when it struck her like lightning.
She started playing the third movement of Sonata quasi una Fantasia by Beethoven. Better known as Moonlight Sonata, but Kaede never thought that name suited the last movement as well as it did with the first.
This piece, as a whole, was not painting a singular picture in its audience's head; Kaede didn't know one person that could still see that soft melancholic glow of the moon by the end. It became clear that the poet that described the first movement only described said movement. Truly, the landscape in which this composition took place kept changing. It was meant to have the pianist run from one scenario to the other, the last one less challenging than the next.
Beethoven was right, Almost Fantasy was a good descriptor.
For Kaede, it represented the hero’s journey, and the third movement was as scary as it was exciting, from the tentative start to the wild end full of possibilities. She fell off balance and rose to her feet. Gone were the days of reminiscing in a lake under the moon, she left to conquer her fears and came back victorious. Granted, the battle had more setbacks than Kaito’s tall tales usually had, but this only enriched the experience as she bounced from one note to the next.
They were having fun, indeed.
The end reached her with a big “hurrah!” and Kaede lamented, for a second, not having started with the first movement instead -as the character progression was more apparent from there- but she knew that her uneasy heart would only calm down if she made it dance like that from the beginning. The pianist came back on earth, feeling the stretch of her smile and the tiredness of someone who just ran a full marathon.
Kamukura was looming over her shoulder to inspect her hands with unnerving attention -much like Gonta would with his bug friends- and Kaede had to rejoice in the ache of her own senses to avoid giving away any sign of discomfort.
Not like she thought that her upper-classman was about to pounce at her or anything. Kamukura looked rather clinical, seemingly confident in his ability to figure her out in a matter of seconds.
“You are overcoming bad habits, aren't you?”
There it was.
“Maybe, but I kept a good position the whole time,” replied Kaede as she closed the fallboard.
“You were catching yourself,” he sighed. “As an ultimate, you should be mindful of these things. A muscular injury could cut your career short.”
She took a deep breath to hold herself back from screaming.
It wasn't the first time she heard someone say this, but it usually came from a place of concern and if this guy felt like that, he was not very good showing it.
“I know. But even if I am just overcoming these habits, that doesn't take away from the fact that I AM doing it.” She turned around to meet his eyes. “Trust me, I am not going to hinder my abilities, not when the job of my dreams is at risk.”
“It's that so.” He quipped, without an ounce of humor in his voice, seemingly done with the conversation but leaning toward her fulminating stare regardless.
He looked down at her, his eyes fueled with profound apathy; she could be an ad in the middle of a football game or an ant on the sidewalk and his expression wouldn't be any different. The Ultimate Pianist felt the rise of something dark and familiar squirming from the bottom of her stomach. The black goo -they dubbed it in her family- a symptom of crushing defeat after she tasted glory.
Kaede thought about Prokofiev's Classical Symphony in the back of her mind.
“Yes, it is. But the point of this exercise was that you thought I couldn't play properly on this chair. Well, I did. Shouldn't you apologize for that… Sempai?”
“I didn't expect failure for a second. Having you struggle was the only slightly surprising element. However, that made my experience far more enjoyable than originally planned.”
After hearing that, Kaede decided to concentrate even harder on Classical, Prokofiev's Vivace was a delicacy; after all, it made people think about love and friendship instead of decking someone in the face.
Maybe it was pride talking, but she would much rather deal with anyone else in her class.
“Oh my~!” A feminine voice exclaimed from the entrance of the talent lab.
Their closeness only dawned on Kaede the moment she saw Shirogane standing there, wide-eyed, getting flustered. Kamukura had his forearms over the top rail of the chair where she was sitting, and they were staring into each other's eyes.
The pianist jumped from her seat and walked away from her upper-class man immediately, he sat on her chair and ignored them both.
“A-am I interrupting a r-romantic moment? I am so sorry!”
Kaede hoped her laughter sounded more casual than deranged to the other girl's ears as she strode toward her to do damage control. Shirogane took a few steps back.
“Oh, not at all! Kamukura-kun was just asking me to show him-”
“It's okay, this is the kind of high school star-crossed romance even someone p-p-plain as me can understand.” Shirogane's voice trembled as she reached and awkwardly patted her left shoulder. They were within a little less than an arm's length away, and Shirogane pointedly avoided looking at her.
Kaede brushed her hand off.
“NO, YOU GOT IT ALL WRO-”
“I plainly came to tell you that Ouma-kun is awake now b-but don't let that distract you. H-have fun! Please don't die like the other blonde pianist, Akamatsu-san!” Shirogane shouted as she ran away, faster than anyone without a sport-based talent should.
The pianist was about to chase after the elusive cosplayer when she heard him mumble:
“How annoying.”
The phrase alone was enough to stop Kaede in her tracks. She shut the door with a bang and spun on her heels.
“You don't get to call her that!” She yelled at him. “Shirogane-san might be a little passionate about her fantasies, but she is a delight to be around!”
Kamukura gave her a puzzling look, blinked once, then twice, and snorted. At least Kaede believed that was… the best way to describe the sound he emitted. That level of emotional expression on him seemed unnatural and, by the look on his face, it was unfamiliar as well.
With renewed interest in the conversation, he sauntered with effortless grace and planted himself in front of her.
“Why must you jump to conclusions and assume that I was calling your classmate annoying instead of the embarrassing circumstances that we were in?”
“Do you even care what other people think about you?”
“Are you answering a question with another question?”
“Yes, and so are you,” Kaede replied, crossing her arms over her chest. The banter seemed to dilute her irritation and his interest at the same time. “You didn't even try to correct her, that is why. Were you annoyed by the situation or-?”
“Both.” He cut in. “But why won't you spare this academy a couple of therapy sessions and tell me directly what you really want to complain about.”
“What do you even-!?”
“I do not have all day, Kouhai.”
The opaque red eyes of a man done with this world closed on her once again but, even if he was further away than before, it was the first time she noticed the specks of green surrounding the inner part of the iris. They weren't comparable to hazel eyes at all, it was as if someone repainted his eyes a different color from what they used to be, and the new painting was starting to crack.
It was ridiculous, but that discovery put the swerving goo in her belly at ease- enough for her to take a deep breath and concede.
“What did you think about my performance?”
“It was exquisite.” He answered readily, without giving away any physical indication of his honesty.
Such a pretty response and yet it failed to make her feel any better.
“Thank you.”
He clicked his tongue.
“Don't say that with such a displeased look in your eyes. You should already know what you are capable of.” Kamukura rose his arms -presumably to touch her shoulders- but thought better of it and let them fall to his sides again.
"I-I. Yes, I know." She admitted.
The black goo went higher, pressing itself against her diaphragm, going up until it was hard to breathe. When the tears started to prick her eyes, Kaede felt selfish, arrogant, childish, and, overall...
Pathetic.
He spoke again, with a softer tone of voice this time.
"I would take offense if this Academy chose to appoint an untalented student as an ultimate, but that clearly isn't your case. It is useless to concern yourself over others' opinions." He paused for a moment. "Unless they speak ill of your form, they might be right, in that regard."
Kamukura was wrong, he was (unconsciously) addressing the reason for the distress but not in a way that was useful for her. Despite of how awful he was just a few moments ago, it seemed like he wanted to help so bad; she felt the need to reassure him.
Kaede smiled tentatively at him, allowing her tears to trace her cheeks. If she thanked him again, he would know there was something off with her answer.
But if their messy conversation started after she played the last movement of a sonata, then maybe it should end from the beginning.
"Hello, my name is Kaede Akamatsu. I am the Ultimate Pianist. It is nice to meet you."
Her introduction sounded robotic but he seemed intrigued by it.
He offered her a fabricated smile that changed his entire demeanor from a broken man to a normal teenager.
"I gathered as much." He chuckled, using someone else's voice. It came out so natural for him that it wasn't until he shifted back to the usual tone and speech pattern that she noticed how relaxed he was when he spoke as himself.
"They call me Izuru Kamukura. The Academy also refers to me as the Ultimate Hope. Regarding your last statement, I must say, you are a terrible liar."