Project End

Chapter 11: A Time for Remembrance

She didn't feel safe until she entered her apartment. Nagisa had been silent as the dead the entire journey back, he asked no questions from the sea, all the way to Tokyo. That was okay because she wasn't sure what she would say.

She was too exhausted to even attempt her usual ritual of securing her home, searching and waiting for any sign of infiltration. If she could, she would crumble and sleep right there on the floor of the hallway. But she couldn't just stop her with her plus one still standing at her heels, instead she shepherded the timid Nagisa to her room.

"Here," she said, her eyes threatening to close midsentence. She pointed to the mattress on the floor and he didn't even complain. She wondered what "Jiang" slept on, if he was use to sleeping on flimsy mattresses on the ground and he thought this was normal. He took it as silently as he did the invitation into her house, with his head down and his movements robotic.

She closed the door behind him, she didn't consider that it was the wrong thing to do until the second it was shut, because she didn't want him to think this was a prison.

She was thinking too much. She wiped a tired hand over her face. And now she didn't have a bed. But she was so tired, and so relieved to finally feel safe that she quickly fell asleep next to the door, leaning her head against the wall. Tomorrow would bring the same anxieties and more dangers, but tonight- tonight sleep was king.

That night, her dreams were completely soundless, friends and family pantomimed like a street performance. She kept telling at everyone that she couldn't hear, that she couldn't understand, she was screaming at them until her throat ached. Korosensei stood in front of her smiling, enthusiastically waving his hands.

"I don't know what you're saying!"

Then the world in her dream just went on without her, and she was left confused and frustrated.

When she woke up, only feeling marginally better after a stilted rest, she sat completely still to take in all the sounds. The commotion of Tokyo streets, the freezing wind rattling against the window pane, and the even rhythm of her own breathing. She could hear it all, comprehend it all, but she still felt a little lost.

She blinked.

Oh man, she was foul, her hair was awash in grease and been tossed by sea wind, when she licked her lips she could still taste the salt from the ocean on her tongue.

In the background, she heard rustling from her room. Her body seized until she remembered Nagisa. She felt a little lost again.

She pushed away the effects of a terrible night's sleep and groggily stood up. She rolled her shoulders and mentally prepared herself for the worst, that maybe it was all a dream, or that Nagisa died while she was asleep, or they were all taken by Project End and this was the last of her freedom.

She opened the door and nearly jumped out of her skin when she immediately came face to face with Nagisa. Holy hell, was the boy quiet, not many people could get the jump on her. It was unnerving to see a dead boy stare back at her. Back at the island he always avoided her eyes with his gaze perpetually lowered to her feet, but now he was studying her.

"You know me," he said.

Her chest filled at his words. She grabbed at his hands but he flinched, so she dropped them. "You remember." Her smile was cautious but hopeful.

"No, you're wall..."

He pointed to the scattered clippings of news and leads pinned to her wall. Her heart dropped and the feeling of exhaustion overwhelmed again, it had completely slipped her mind when she gave him her room. There spelled out her entire life, her goals and her questions, the things that made who Kayano, Kayano.

It felt oddly vulnerable, almost embarrassing, like being caught naked in front of a crowd.

"I'm sorry," he trembled out, seeing the way Kayano reacted. She slipped back into actress mode, letting the emotions pass from her face.

"No, you didn't do anything wrong," she quickly said, lifting a hand to tell him to stop. "It's um. It's complicated. You must have seen the pictures." In every picture of Class E, she had blacked out Nagisa's face with a marker, but he could still see the telltale blue hair and the androgynous frame. "Yeah, I know you."

"The other people that were on the island, the boy I fought. He knows me too," he said in tentative curiosity.

Kayano's smile was halfhearted. "Yeah. He knew you too." She wandered towards her class photos, and suddenly felt regret that she had ruined them. All the happy memories now looked ominous with the black scribbles over a now faceless boy. She considered the picture with a gentle touch of her fingers as they traced in nostalgia. "How much," she swallowed hard. "How much do you remember?" She refused to look away from the photos.

It was silent for a very long time, and Kayano wondered if she asked the wrong thing.

"I have… a lot of blank spots. I don't know a lot." His voice filtered in like a whisper. "I don't know you. I don't know these people in the pictures. Everything just starts a little while ago."

His voice started cracking just a bit, it was scared and breathey, as if she was pushing too far and she was watching him unravel. "Okay. Okay, if that's where it starts, that's where it starts." But there was one more she had to ask, even if it risked hurting him. Ask him, hissed Akari in her head.

"Do you know this man?" she asked, pointing to a photo of Yanagisawa, smiling like a serpent right at her.

Nagisa paled, whiter than bone. His pupils dilated and sweat collected on his brow.

His expression said it all.

"Did he hurt you?" she asked.

He shook, so fragile you wouldn't suspect he could kill her at this moment if he wanted to. That was a yes, too, she supposed, and hate and vile burned into her chest. She put her hand over Yanagisawa's picture, covering it from view.

"That's good enough. We don't have to talk about it anymore. Let's go." She wanted to put her hand on his shoulder to stop the trembling, but she got the distinct impression that physical contact was still taboo.

The silence was awkward and ungainly, she took them out of the bedroom into the living room, but there wasn't much to offer him there either. He took to a corner of the room, shrank himself into the corner as small as he could be, and let the tremors run its course, waiting for her commands or something for her to say.

She had nothing to say, and besides twiddling her fingers, there wasn't much to do. She didn't have a couch, just one lone chair and one small end table where her laptop rested, but she felt if she sat down there, it would be like denying Nagisa a seat. So she stood, staring clumsily at the spot next to his face.

Oh, maybe she should tell him something to get his mind off of Yanagisawa.

"Your real name is Nagisa. Did you know that?" she asked him, lingering on the wall opposite of him. The deliberate separation reminded her of their first conversation on that godforsaken island, and the comparison of her near empty apartment to that abandoned building was painfully accurate to the point of embarrassment.

"No," he replied, finally looking at her, his movements were hesitant.

"We were in the same class in our final year in middle school. You'll be turning seventeen this July," she continued, grateful for something to fill the silence. "Um, your favorite subject in school was English. Your best friend was named Sugino, you already met him at that place…" bad subject. She slapped her hand to her head. "You're really observant, back in class you use to take a lot of notes, not just for school but for Ku... well. You lived with your mother." Oh crap, she didn't even think about that, Nagisa was confirmed dead. He couldn't just waltz back into his family's life, not with Project E and Yanagisawa still around. But separating them for longer? That didn't feel right either.

What would Korosensei do? Korosensei.

"You wanted to become a teacher you know," she said wistfully. She remembered when he told her that, the amount of thought and implications this one revelation held was something she couldn't do justice in one sentence.

Nagisa was sitting down in a guarded position, his arms wrapped around his knees and his head lowered so she couldn't see his mouth. "You… knew me pretty well," he said behind his arms.

She crossed her own arms. It was weird when he said it like that. "Yeah, I guess I did." She paused to look at the floor before amending, "N-not like a stalker or anything." That just made it sound more suspicious; she exhaled loudly. "We were friends. I mean besides the whole, pretending to be- haa- nevermind. You must me hungry." This was too weird, she felt all stiff and gawky.

Food would make things better, her stomach rumbled in agreement. She hadn't eaten for more than twenty four hours, but nervousness had killed her appetite. She went to her pantry door and opened up the cupboard. The void stared back.

"I have… crackers." She shook her head miserably. "And water. From the sink, I mean. Where are my cups?" She began to dig around what could only be optimistically called a kitchen.

Her apartment was never equipped for any realistic live-in, not unless they were paranoid-obsessive assassins who lived off the grid. She needed to get more food. She looked back into the living room. And a couch. Maybe a book or two. And a proper bed, she couldn't just let Nagisa sleep on the floor.

"Here," she thrusted the crackers at him, and they crumbled a bit in his hand.

"Thank you for your kindness," he said politely, like he was addressing her superior.

"It's not like that," she blurted. Was he really thanking her for crackers and tap water? When she snacked on her own handful of crackers, he looked at her with mild surprise.

"What?"

"Are you eating… this too?" He looked abashed at the idea of eating the same meager scraps as she was. Was he not use to eating the same thing as others? She imagined Nagisa chained to a corner, forced to eat table scraps as men ate five course meals at their table.

"I'm not going to feed you anything worse than I would normally eat. You know that right?" She bit in her cracker, wiping off the crumbs. She knelt to eye level and this time she held Nagisa's stare, if nothing else, she wanted him to know this. "I'm not your master, Nagisa, nobody owns you anymore. This isn't a prison. There's no one who can force you, and no one to hurt you. I know I'm a stranger in your eyes, and there's not much you can trust, but at least I hope you realize that we're equals."

His face was a calculated calm. Then; "We were… good friends."

"Yes."

"Were you on the island to look for me?"

"No," she replied honestly. "That man I showed you." He flinched. "I went to make sure that he doesn't get to hurt people again." That was only half honest.

"Why?"

"Because he hurt too many people I care about."

Finally, very timidly, slowly, almost painfully, a softness blossomed in his eyes, and it was the sweetest thing she had ever seen in years.

"What happened to us?" he asked. To make us so broken, he didn't have to add.

"Something, something very bad," she said with a flinching smile. "Everyone thought you were dead."

"Oh," he said, not particularly affected. He glanced around the building.

"You only have one bedroom," he said out of nowhere.

"Yeah."

"…So you slept on the floor?"

"I'm thinking about a bed really soon. It's not much, but this place is safe."

"On your wall," he said. "There's a lot of names written on it."

"They're mine. All of them. It's hard to explain."

"So is your name Koroko-sama?"

"No sama," she replied. "It's not like that here. But I am not called Koroko, if that's what you're asking."

"Then what should I call you?"

She paused. "Kayano Kaede is fine."

"Kayano-sama."

"…"

"I mean Kayano-san. Is that your real name?"

"No. But it's the one that matters the most to me right now." She wished he would just remember, this entire exchange made her sound like a lunatic. Switching topics. "I need a shower." She walked briskly out of the room. Was talking with Nagisa always this hard?

Maybe- at least when she was talking about the things that really mattered, she ruminated in her purposefully cold shower. With him here, all the repressed memories had free reign; walking down the streets of a festival, rolling around in hospital beds after her fight with Korosensei, blushing while making him chocolate for Valentines day, but never being able to spit it out. Her cheeks heated up just remembering her failed confession attempt, and she notched the shower colder.

She would need another towel for Nagisa, she thought idly as she dried herself off.

When she came back, she saw Nagisa bugged eyed in absolute shock, more emotion in this one expression than the entire spectrum of the past couple of days.

"Kayano-san!" he said in awed bewilderment, voice raising in an octave.

Kayano readied a defensive position.

"Your computer is talking to me!"

"What?"

"I do more than talk, Nagisa-kun." Ritsu replied, the computer screen glowing. Nagisa backed away.

She had completely forgotten about her, and that she hadn't told Ritsu the details yet.

"She's one of your friends, Nagisa," Kayano replied.

"She is?" He looked at the screen. "Is she… using a program?"

"No, Nagisa. I am a program, not a human. It seems your memory banks are corrupted, so let me reintroduce myself. My full name is Autonomously Thinking Fixed Artillery. You may call me Ritsu."

Nagisa glanced at Kayano. "Artillery?"

Kayano sighed. "We had a weird class."

This one was going to take awhile.

Takebayashi remembered he used to be friendlier. Maybe friendlier was the wrong word, a lot less bitter and frustrated at the whole of humanity would be more accurate.

"Chiba, you moron, get off of her or you'll reopen her wounds," he bit out, grabbing the boy by the collar of his shirt and yanking him off his girlfriend.

Chiba looked at him, he suspected, it was hard to tell under the fringe. Every freaking time Takebayashi came into the room, they were all over each other despite multiple warnings. Most times they were just sleeping next to each other, but a few times their hands had disappeared under clothing, working heavily in ways they really shouldn't in a hospital.

"Doing that crap when she's still this injured is going to kill her, and then I'm going to make sure it's recorded as 'death by being disgusting'."

He sat down next to Hayami. He wasn't her doctor, he wasn't a doctor at all if he was being precise, but Project E had full intentions of training him to the point of nauseam. It was certainly a better deal than some of his friends got, he thought of Yada and Kurahashi in particular, but he rarely had more than four hours of sleep and he was always being called on to sit on his friend's examinations for a more hands on learning.

And his friends were, in no uncertain terms, the worst. Most of them insane, all of them were probably out to drive him to the brink of it too, with their constant death defying attitude and their secret desire to get in as much pain as possible.

He managed to save Hayami, thank god, and she'll stay alive so long as he can strangle Chiba away. Which was turning out to be a lot harder than keeping a teenage gunshot victim alive.

"You look like shit," he said professionally. "But you're not dead."

Hayami nodded, still a little flushed from the petting. Ugh. If the whole, murdering Korosensei and being forced to work under corrupt agencies hadn't destroyed his faith in society, this would have done the deed surely.

He flipped through Hayami's chart and snorted. They managed to explain her injuries away as a fall and accidental impalement on a broken pipe. Stupid, anyone worth their weight would know it was bullshit. But that was why Project E invested so much in him, because what they really wanted was the hospital. As the hospital's dean's son, he had a lot of access to power that normal children shouldn't have. It was annoying, humiliating even, to be used like this. But it was better than his friends not being treated.

He slid on medical gloves and carefully raised her up a bit.

"How's the pain?" he asked as he redid her dressing. He pulled the cloth and the fluff away, discarding the soiled bandages in the biohazard waste. Hayami hummed in response which he interpreted as, "I'm fine, if a little stupid." If there was one thing about these two, they never complained. Which, as their doctor, was infuriating.

He replaced her dressings and saw her IV drip was looking a little low, but he could let a nurse deal with that. Nothing else required much attention.

"I'll check up on you soon." Then he glared at Chiba, pointing for emphasis. "You. Stop being gross. Let her rest."

He nodded which he assumed meant, I will not listen to you ever, because no one ever listens to Takebayashi.

His examination finished earlier than expected, he finally had some of that rare down time that often eluded him. The new Miku Hatsune game was released last week, and he hadn't gotten a chance to play.

He decided "screw his workload," he would finally take a bit of time for himself, rounded the corner, and felt himself hate the world even more.

"No," he said.

"Hey Takebayashi," Kayano replied, waving.

He pinched the bridge of his nose and quickly surrendered. "Come on, Project E thinks I'm still checking up with Hayami and Chiba. I got some time, you leech." He hurried to the stairs. One of the private practitioners that worked through their hospital was on vacation, like the lazy bums they were, and their office was vacant. "I figured you would come by sooner or later. What's it this time? Did you get thrown out of a bus? Go on another infiltration mission on a random island."

"If I recall you were on that island too," she replied, jogging down the stairs after him. "But it's not for me."

"Then-"

He glanced back, and he had to reach the stair rail to not trip over his feet. He breathed deeply.

"Nagisa." He gave himself a moment.

It wasn't as if he forgot him, or that he didn't think Kayano would bring him back here. But you think someone is dead for two years and now he's standing there just like you remembered him. He and Nagisa weren't particularly close, not as close as some of the other people in Class E. But him dying was such a monumental moment in his life, it changed the way he lived and what he believed. It made him who he was now, for better or for worse.

"C'mon then," he said, leading him into a room, he was as professional as he could be. "Wait there." He closed the door leaving Nagisa alone and turned to Kayano. "Any specific reason you want me to see him?"

Kayano nervously picked at the lint of her sweater. "He doesn't remember us. Or his life as Nagisa."

"I got that with the whole, try to murder us on sight." Takebayashi ruffled his hair in irritation. "Do you know what he does remember?"

"He has a little memory of Japan, I think. So it doesn't start at the island but just barely before," she said biting her lip. "But he doesn't tell me much." Her voice lowered, like she was scared the walls were listening. "He knows Yanagisawa. And he's scared of him."

Takebayashi exhaled, his body felt heavy. "Crap."

"Before everything… happened at the island, my guide said Yanagisawa called him a failure."

There was a lot what that could mean, but none of it good. No point in speculating without evidence. "Got it." He entered the room again.

"Hello Nagisa. I'm Takebayashi. I'm," he sighed. "I'm not a doctor. But I sometimes do doctor- like stuff for people with too many secrets." Nagisa nodded lightly.

Takebayashi couldn't help but observe him as they went through the normal procedures.

He still had the effeminate features, sharp eyes, and long blue hair, but there was an offness of him. Nagisa was always docile, but there was a resoluteness about him that this one didn't have. This Nagisa was subservient, passive in ways Nagisa never was.

"No fever, blood pressure at 120/80." He turned and scowled at Kayano. "Do you mind?"

She was leering over them, staring intently like she was about to strike. She spared him a glance. "What?"

"Get out. It's distracting when you hoover."

"I'm not hoovering," she said indignantly, as she began to circle Nagisa, staring at all the notes Takebayashi was scribbling down.

"Like a helicopter." He pushed her out of the room. "It's annoying."

"But-"

"Nothing is going to happen. Just wait out there. Keep watch, or find a corner to brood in." Before she could say anything else he closed the door in her face and sighed.

Nagisa watched the entire exchange with cautious bemusement. "You… were at the island too."

"Yeah."

Remorse and fear flared up. "I'm sorry for attacking you and your friends."

"I don't care. We won anyway." Takebayashi didn't like what he was seeing, the shaking, the shrinking, the expectation of retribution. Naigsa was definitely abused, and Takebayashi was no psychiatrist. "I'm going to need you to remove your shirt."

Nagisa for a second looked like a deer caught in the headlights. Then his eyes glassed over and he mutely did as he was told. Mental tactics for coping. He's preparing himself in case I do something to him.

Takebayashi quickly clarified, "We're only doing an exam. I need to see if you are visibly injured anywhere."

Nagisa barely responded, still somewhere far away. When the shirt was completely off, Takebayashi didn't need to speculate on abuse, he could see it. His body was litany of scars, they crossed his entire body so that there were barely patches of untouched skin left. Many were deep and nasty- almost none of them had been properly treated from what he could see.

This wasn't a body, it was a canvas of torture.

Takebayashi rubbed his temples, not trusting words. He sharply inhaled through his nose. "Right then."

He pulled his chair closer to where Nagisa was sitting on the examination table. He peered over them, the scars were made by several different weapons. Judging by how they healed, his abuse had been constant. Some of them looked as if they came from in combat, which made sense. Some of the scars looked well into a year old, near fading away, and some couldn't have been made more than a week ago. One of them looked a bit infected, but nothing that wouldn't heal on its own.

The ones that worried him the most were the clean cuts, the one that didn't look like they came from abuse or war. It looked like surgery, all done with a level of skill, one such scar ran the entirety of back, paralleling his spine.

Yanagisawa. It must have been. There was no doubt about it, Nagisa was experimented on.

"Any pain?" he asked as he checked his arms, rotating the cuff. Nagisa shook his head timidly. "Have you gotten sick any time recently? Have you broken any bones? Did they make you take any drugs or medication?"

Nagisa shook his head again, but Takebayashi suspected that Nagisa wouldn't say yes even if he had. There was no trust there. This was the worst kind of patient, never said anything and was too broken to force answers.

"Okay then." He scratched his head, well shit, he was going to have to swipe some tools that were tricky to get. "I can't exactly let you wander the hospital with people always watching. You're going to have to get your blood drawn here. Wait, I'll be back."

He left Nagisa still sitting blankly, like a doll, his eyes were dull and unfocused.

Takebayashi shuddered as he closed the door behind him. Outside of the room, Kayano was crouched next to the door, fidgeting nervously. She jumped to her feet when she saw Takebayashi, and without hiding her eagerness asked, "Well?"

"It's not pretty, but I don't think he's sick or in any medical danger," he replied, crossing his arms. "I haven't finished my exam, but I think I got everything I could with what little I have. I'd really like a psychological exam, but unfortunately, all of us in Class E aren't exactly the picture of mental health ourselves. The only thing really left to do is draw his blood and run some tests."

Kayano frowned. "Why do you need to do that? Can't they… trace it?"

"What... no. Shut up you have no idea what you are talking about," Takebayashi replied. "He spent at least a year in that country, we have to make sure he didn't catch anything like TB. And…" He hesitated, then eyed Kayano with a weary stare, "Check for any sexually transmitted diseases."

Kayano's face transformed into utter disgust and hate at the statement, her entire persona went dark. Takebayashi was afraid of this, that Kayano was too unstable to handle the reality of the situation, and her reaction would be dangerous.

"We killed them all," he reminded sternly. "The people who did this to him got what they deserved."

"Not all of them," she said in a low, shaky voice, "Not the one who deserved it the most."

He really couldn't argue with that. "Regardless, don't do anything stupid. Who am I kidding, of course you'll do something stupid- I mean make sure you take care of your guest first," he pointed a thumb in Nagisa's direction. "He doesn't need your instability right now."

Kayano shut her mouth, Nagisa was her weak point now.

"And Karma wants to see you," he said, walking again, hoping to get her mind off of her suicidal march towards revenge. Thankfully, she fell in line.

"What? How did he know you would see me?"

"Because it's Karma and he knows more than he should," Takebayashi shrugged. "He's got a favor to ask."

"A favor? From me?" She quirked a brow. "That's worrying."

"He might be trying to engage in light subversion of the PSIA."

"You're kidding me."

Takebayashi rolled his eyes. "This surprises you? I honestly think this is just ridiculous enough to fit in with the rest of our ideas."

"I'll see what I can do," Kayano mused, more confused than bothered by this new information. To be honest, the idea of Kayano and Karma colluding with each other brought a sour taste to Takebayashi's mouth. Nothing good comes from two mentally unhinged kids with killing experience going around trading favors. But they will, regardless of how he felt.

And begrudgingly, Takebayashi vowed to be there to fix them all up when they inevitably broke themselves.

Karma hated waiting. It wasn't in his nature to be passive, and had a remarkably low threshold for patience for an assassin in training. It didn't help that with a broken arm, they stopped his physical training and put him on social training.

He was okay with science, language, and math was especially entertaining, it all worked in a straight, linear logic that he could take apart and master, but socialization training often meant pretending to be nice and manipulating targets covertly. Blackmailing was always fun, but was less fun was the emphasis on schmoozing and catering to specific types of people.

It didn't help that Hiroshi was being a spectacularly annoying jackass. It was a relief when he crawled his way home at midnight, he'd like nothing more than to be left the hell alone.

So when he spotted them lingering in his room, he was conflicted. On one hand, he missed his privacy, on the other hand, things could get moving again.

"I see you make home visits," he snorted, throwing his bag on the floor next to his bed, not bothering to turn on the lights, the moon was especially bright tonight.

"So you ask me for a favor, then act like I'm nuisance. Cute," Kayano replied, sitting on his desk with her legs crossed.

"Just because it's necessary- doesn't mean it's pleasant," he shrugged. "And you're sitting on my homework."

"Right. You're upset about your homework," she said with painful sarcasm, but she hopped off anyway. She looked towards the to the corner of his room where the light from the window couldn't reach. Karma followed her gaze and saw something stirring, faint reflections barely showing a lean figure.

It was unsettling, how after all these years, Nagisa could still erase his presence. Karma always knew he was good, that even though he did his best never to be caught unaware again Nagisa could still get the best of him.

He looked away.

Not his business. Karma did his part and he didn't need some weird ass ghost lingering in his life. Besides, it might look and move like Nagisa, but this person in front of him was so vacant he was barely human. Nagisa died and this was an echo, so fuck it all.

"So what do you need," she asked, already tired of their banter. "Takebayashi made it sound like you were about to commit treason."

"He's being dramatic," Karma said smoothly. "Also it's only kinda treason if we do it wrong. I'm never wrong."

"So if it's not treason, what is it?"

"Our patriotic duty," Karma smirked. When Kayano didn't bite he added, "Someone's committing treason, if not us. I just need some help figuring out who it is, but it's hard to investigate the very same someone that has you under lock and key. Even for a man such as myself."

Kayano digested this information, and then exhaled slowly. "I'm not sure what I can do."

"Not you I need," Karma said and she tensed, shifting a quick glance at the boy still hidden in the dark. "And it's not him either. Let me borrow Ritsu."

She relaxed her posture, scooting off the desk and digging her phone out of her jean pocket. "That's not a decision I can make. Ritsu is her own person."

That was one way to put it.

She finished her text and frowned at the glow of the screen. "She'll probably say yes. But… just a warning. Ritsu isn't as… capable as she use to be."

That was certainly puzzling. He hadn't planned on Ritsu's abilities being stunted, he had assumed she was responsible for a number of things, like greasing the wheels to get Kayano on that island. But if she couldn't hack into the PSIA, it certainly put a damper on his plans.

"I need her to identify members of the PSIA and track their records for suspicious activity. See if there was a sudden influx of income or someone has been making shady calls outside of the country." He leaned back. "You think she can pull that off?"

"Right after she puts the finishing touches of Skynet, sure," Kayano shook her head. "I don't know much about cyber security, but breaking into Japanese intelligence and getting a list of all their employees and their activities is a pretty tall order. Even when she was in top shape."

"I can smuggle her into facilities she can take advantage of, and I'm working a way to shorten the list."

"How nice of you."

"I am the shining example of courtesy," he agreed. "Will she help me?"

Kayano crossed the room with a long stare and a longer stride. Then she tossed her phone to him with a deliberate ease that had to be fake. "Of course she will. Can you install her on your computer?"

"No, not a good idea," Karma said, flipping open her phone. A solemn "yes" was left next to a restricted number and he began to respond with a burner email. "My phone and computer are definitely tapped and I want to avoid even the appearance of impropriety until I am sure what's going on. My school computers though, well they're all just dandy, no security software that Ritsu can't easily override. And lucky for me, I happen to be friends with someone with influence in the school."

"You're bringing Asano into this?" She looked at him like he just cracked an especially bad joke. "Are you an idiot?"

"I'm a certified child genius, but I understand how you can get the two confused," Karma replied. "Asano is a risk, but not a big one if I play my cards right, the worst that happens is he thinks I'm crazy. I mean, it's not like the first time one of us fucked with him, it can't be anymore more elicit than when you-"

She stopped him from finishing with an annoyed shove against his chest, her teeth clenched and her ears turning slightly pink. Karma grinned smugly. "Shut the hell up, jackass. I get it." She quickly glanced at Nagisa's direction again and coughed.

"That it? If so I'm leaving," she said a bit huffily, and clearly still embarrassed about the incident.

"One more thing," he said. "Don't give me that look. You've been scavenging off the favors of all kinds of people in Class E since you ran and left us."

She threw her hands up in concession.

"I also want to look into Project End's dealings," he said. "But seeing I'm a little busy with this, you can work with Isogai."

She gave him a curious look. "What are you planning now?"

He walked to the open window, placing his hands on the sill and looking out into the night sky. The moon was still fractured, pieces of its dead body littered like stars trapped in its open wound. Even with the heaters full blast in the house, his room was as cold as the winter night.

What was he planning?

"About Project End? Nothing yet," he said staring out, gripping the house. "It's hard to propose strategies when you're blind."

"But you are going to make your move?"

"Maybe, not sure. I just want to know what their plans are for us. Besides, they spent a lot of money and time training me. Isn't it just… appropriate that eventually I would be used on them?" He considered the slight, thin streams of moon silver that shaped the outlines of his house. "I've got a thing for irony."

"Only second for you love of your own voice." She jerked her head towards the window, and Nagisa silently understood the command. He slipped from the darkness and out of the window in one fluid motion, neither of the boys sparing a glance at each other.

"You have to acknowledge his existence some time," she said when she thought he was gone.

"I'd love to do our friendship happy fun times, when I'm not actively trying to undermine a dangerous government organization."

"It's been hard on me too," she said a little harder than she probably meant to, but with Nagisa out of earshot, she allowed her composure to slip. She looked truly tired and frustrated. "There's just parts of him… gone. I don't know how to get him back. Sometimes we can't even look each other in the face. You were his rival, his other half. You can fill some of those gaps I can't."

"I wasn't his rival," Karma turned away, already bored. "I don't even know that kid there." He wasn't sure if he should be annoyed or amused that someone would turn to him, for some emotional bullshit handholding. "I kept him alive, I gave him to you, my part is done. I don't give a shit what happens next."

She took his words with a drawn out exhale. "Whatever you say, Karma." And she slipped through the window too.

He didn't close it, he stood there, listening to the wind filter in his room and the house settle in the dark. He breathed in the chill of the air around him, eyes closed. It was quiet for a moment.

He breathed out, his eyes opened. A smile grew on his face.

It was time to conquer.

AN: So, um, my computer crashinated and everything I wrote is gone. Which admittedly wasn't much, I had slowed down in writing and only wrote about a quarter of the next chapter, and may be for the best because I had moved up my pace for the story thus making me rethink what I wrote. But I had actually written down an entire outline with what goes in which chapter and while I do remember it mostly, I had most of what I wanted to planned neatly, something I rarely do. It's a bit frustrating.

It's just a shame it slows here because this is just another set up chapter, and the chapters where characters actually do shit was suppose to come, and those are always more fun to write. Ah well, that's what happens I suppose.

Autistic-Grizzly : TY for the review, you been keeping up with the story even after my long delays, I'm truly grateful! Chiba and Hatyami make it so easy to write with their chemistry.

TLGD:Yeah, Hayami and Chiba in this story are the kind of people that dig into each other deeper after trauma, some people survive hardships through relationships, and I feel like for as much dysfunction they have, they're dependency also helps them stay sane. I'm really glad you like my Karma, I found myself surprised with how fascinating Karma was to write. Unfortunately, this was another of the "Karma setting up plans" rather than Karma doing things, but when Karma gets to do things, it's not something taken lightly, at least, I always felt this is how he was suppose to be interpret him. Thank you for the thoughtful review,

TheRoseShadow21: I kept promising that otp scene for way too long, I really wanted to write it since the early chapters, they're so great together. It's nice to write them in a relief kind of scene after putting through that much stress. I like kicking the crap of my favorite characters and otps, but it also makes the resolution a lot sweeter too. From an OC point of view, I'm never sure how involved I want OCs in my story, but I think Hiroshi does a good job of bouncing off of Karma that I can't do with other characters. There's always an air of tension between the two, they don't so much have conversations as they do have verbal warfare, and Karma does best when he's on the attack. ty for the review.

kuroneko051: You, besides being a great person for reviewing, seem to have an excellent taste in otps, congratulations. It's nice to see someone who likes all my otps too. I'm glad you like my Karma, and how Manami push pulls on his sense of logic and emotional boundaries, watching him confront vulnerabilities is one of the things I enjoy writing about him. And Kayano and Nagisa's relationship is going to continue to evolve throughout the story.

wercrazybesties4lyf : Wow, thanks for all the reviews, seeing someone react the story as they go along really is something I appreciate, I'm really happy you are enjoying it so much. It's really encouraging, I hope it continues to entertain.