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Nagisa walked down the courtyard. He was unafraid of the various threats the other classes posed or used to pose. After the two isolated incidents with the class 3-E students, the main bullies from class 3-B stayed far away.
So there was no threat from them at all.
Even then, Nagisa was walking down an isolated stretch. The wind blew russet leaves into the air and they crunched under Nagsa’s feet. The grass was green and full, unlike the dead patches of brown and uncovered dirt that would appear occasionally, a clear indicator of too many feet on it in too short of a period of time.
So Nagisa was naturally unafraid of being disturbed.
His blue hair, still uncut, though he doubted that would be the case for long, fluttered in their signature blue pigtails.
It was calm.
So when Karma came striding up to him on his long legs that Nagisa just knew he was flaunting on purpose, he sighed.
There goes any attempt he had at peace.
He told Karma so, and the redhead laughed. “Me? Ruining peace? Never.”
Nagisa rolled his eyes as karma grabbed him in a semi-chokehold, bringing him a little lower so that he could run his knuckles over Nagisa’s hair. It completely ruined his hairstyle.
Nagisa scowled at Karma, though they both knew it was halfhearted at best, and gently reached up to fix his hair, ignoring Karma’s raucous laughter.
“So Karma, what brought your attention onto me today?”
Karma’s signature smirk faltered, just for a second. But Nagisa’s assassin training instantly picked it up. The use of body language and expressions a way for them to study their targets to find lapses in judgement and use those to bring their hits down.
Not that he would need it anymore.
Either way, learning how to read behaviours was like learning how to ride a bike. At this point it was almost instinctive.
And although Karma only usually displayed, like two emotions he switched between at any given time, they made no move to hide theirs.
And Nagisa suspected that whatever Karma wanted to talk to him about was something that Karma took very seriously.
Nagisa swallowed a bit as Karma’s golden eyes rested upon Nagisa’s blue ones. He knew how unsettling his eyes were to other people, Karasuma-sensei had offhandedly mentioned their quality. Karma’s eyes were the same.
Karma held eye contact for a long second before Nagisa broke the connection.
“”Karma?”
Karma tilted his head. “Yes?”
“What is it?”
Karma was silent for a second, careful with his words in a way Nagisa knew he rarely ever was.
Finally he sighed and seemingly decided to ‘bite the bullet’.
“Nagisa, I wasn’t there on the first few days of classes. Don’t ask me how many, even though you would probably know, because I don’t care to remember.”
Nagisa stayed silent for a few seconds, racking his brain for anything that Karma would deem important enough to ask Nagisa about. Especially with that look in his eyes. The look that wasn’t murderous yet wasn’t neutral. That look that wasn’t happy and wasn’t angry.
It was sad, but not in the normal way, because Karma always had to defy expectations. But in that questioning, anticipating way. That look in your eyes when you’re asking a question that you already know the answer to and expecting the answer to change.
And it just didn’t compute in Nagisa’s head. Because this was Karma, unshakeable and smug in a way that only Karma knew how to be.
Karma, who had been silent while Nagisa was thinking, sighed and barrelled on. “Nagisa, did you try to suicide bomb Korosensei?”
Nagisa stood still for a second, his mouth opening and closing and gaping. Like a goldfish. And if they had been in any other situation, Karma likely would have laughed about it. But this was a topic that Nagisa had never expected, and Karma was looking so forlorn again and…
“It didn’t succeed anyway Karma I-”
Karma cut him off with a snap. “I know you’re alive and that it didn’t succeed. I wouldn’t be having this conversation with you if it had. My problem is that you attempted it in the first place”
“You jumped off a cliff to shoot at Korosensei Karma! I don’t see how what I did is any different.”
Karma pulled his lips back in an imitation of a snarl, though no sound came out of his mouth. “There was a high chance I could’ve survived that with a few injuries-”
“-No there wasn’t the cliff was way to high, even for you Karma-”
“Who ever survived a suicide bombing? Even if it was only the anti-teacher bomb, you had the grenade around your neck! Was it even the anti-teacher bomb?”
They were both getting worked up now, exchanging dredged up pieces of information about past exploits with each other as their voices got louder and louder.
“I’m worried about you Nagisa! Since before class 3-E, I noticed. I noticed the days when you would grab and pull at your hair and I had to watch my comments to you in case you stopped responding!”
That look was back in Karma’s eye, and Nagisa stopped speaking for just a second, he wanted to open his mouth to speak, but nothing came out and Karma kept talking.
“I noticed the days when you would go up to the roof and stand up there a little to long. I had to go up there and almost drag you off for fucks sake.”
Karma swore, Karma swore. Nagisa was stock still. Sure, Karma often said hell or damn, but fuck? Almost never.
Karma was calm, he was aggressive but in a condescending way. He jabbed at a person’s defenses and always made them get physical first.
(Unless he was assassinating a teacher)
So hearing him swear that viscerally, to hear the emotions in his voice get clearer and clearer, to hear him lose his cool? It felt like a punch to the gut.
So when his voice lowered and words that were barely a whisper forced themself out into the crisp air, Nagisa barely heard them.
He couldn’t have heard them right. He couldn’t have.
“What did you say??”
“I said I love you!”
Karma clasped a hand over his mouth at the words and something told Nagisa that he hadn’t expected them to come out in the first place.
Karma sighed and swept a hand through his hair. “Nagisa, promise me, don’t suicide bomb. Please. Don’t throw your life away. Class 3-E cares. I care.”
“I promise to do so only if you promise the same.”
“I promise.”
They would get back to the confession later, when all was said and done and both had processed the words spoken. But for now they would make do, guiding each other back to Karma’s house with whispered words and secrets only friends (and maybe more, later down the track) could share.