Karma ditched his classes again.
He didn't like to say it, but he was struggling. He was clawing at the wall of experience and skill in front of him.
Every fight against Karasuma was a time to experiment with something new on a skilled opponent. It was similar to his single fight with Gakushuu.
Straightforward. No holds barred.
It tested his judgment, skill and experience all at the same time. No tactic could be repeated a second time, and it had to be well thought and practiced the first time.
Karma was very well aware of how important being a good fighter was, maybe more than anyone else in his class. It made him respect Karasuma's skill even more.
Fighting had always been easy. He could see what people were doing, so he could beat them.
He had never seen a human arm blur the way Karasuma's did.
Human vision? What a joke.
Karasuma had superior physical specs in all aspects. He could see them in slow motion, coming at him like toy cars bumping against his toes.
Karma didn't like to admit, but he had to put in much more effort into it than he had probably put in anything else. He observed Karasuma's movements, the criteria for judgements, the decisions he chose to make and their whys.
Fighting had always been easy, but when Karasuma taught him, a different world opened up in front of his eyes, and he understood.
There was much more in the world of assassinations than Karma had expected. He had never actually dipped into the underworld, no matter how many chances he might have had. He wasn't going to take risks he wasn't sure he could handle.
It wasn't like he didn't know death , and death could come in so many different forms. But personally, he thought that Koro-sensei's death would probably end up hurting a lot.
It would be a death caused by his own hands.
Right then, a familiar sound of flesh hitting flesh reached his ears.
He paused, then turned to look into a nearby alley.
Deeper in, a girl wearing a two inch heel placed her foot in front of the beaten up person in front of her. She was blonde, tall, she flicked her painted nails towards the other person looking at her with shaky knees.
Karma couldn't hear what they were talking about, but when the person at the girl's feet got up, they both bowed and loudly called her name.
"-Chiho-sama!"
The girl who seemed extremely familiar, but also older than Karma, shooed them away. They ran.
Then she turned with a sigh and stiffened at the sight of him.
Did they know each other?
He assessed her from top to bottom.
She was a combination of purple and yellow. From her shoes to her clothes and even her hair. She was rich, pretty and confident.
He was pretty certain he didn't know anyone like her. But when she stepped into the light, he felt like he could almost tell. The name was almost at the tip of his tongue.
"Hi," she said to him, an oddly sweet smile on her lips. It was at a contrast with the two people she had just dealt with, it was a contrast to-
"Gakushuu?" He said uncertainly. He was mentally going through a deeper assessment of the two people, the girl in front of him and the boy he had known for over two years.
The shoulder, arm, legs were the same. They would have been the same height if not for the heels the girl was wearing. It was just slightly off- 1.75 inch instead of a solid 2 inch like he had initially assumed.
Their hair and eye color were different but just similar enough to make him want to take back his words. The smile was different.
But the way she was looking at him wasn't.
"Shuu?" He asked, more certain of his initial assessment but more startled as well. Even though they could be cousins or something, he was still pretty certain that the girl in front of him was actually Gakushuu.
…Right?
The girl smiled at him wryly, a familiar expression.
"That's right, Karma," but her voice when she spoke was different. He had the oddest moment of jamais vu.
Her tone was the same, her expression was the same, but the voice was feminine, and softer. She smiled easier than Gakushuu normally did.
"How did you recognise me so fast?" She asked, her resting pose of leaning on a single leg was also unfamiliar.
Karma spent half a moment blanking out, because he couldn't really say 'you're one of two people who look at me like that, and I know you're obviously not Koro-sensei'.
"Instinct," he excused instead. It was partially instinctive though. He had stopped and found something familiar in her, so he waited instead of walking on.
"And your measurements," he added.
Gakushuu blinked confusedly before looking down at her decidedly feminine chest.
"Not-not those ones," Karma choked out. "I meant the length of your arms and legs, your shoulders."
Then Karma felt surprised.
Gakushuu would have normally just shot back something teasing back at him but the way she reacted…
Then he did a back track.
Gakushuu was a girl .
There were two possibilities, cross dressing or…
"Say, are you a girl?" He asked abruptly. He was trying too hard to be nonchalant with the question.
"Well, for now I am," she linked her fingers together and stretched it forward. "Let's go shopping," she said suddenly.
"Hm?" He asked, surprised.
Shopping? With Gakushuu??
"... are you planning to change back?" Karma asked.
"Nope!" She popped her p and cheerily made her way to the shopping district.
"Was that from Hinata?" Karma tilted his head considering.
"That's right," Gakushuu shot him a familiar smirk. "The more time you spend with me pretending otherwise, the more you'd doubt yourself. I'm normally pretty good at this, trust me," she snickered.
"Did you pull that on your classmate?" He asked, amused. But privately, he felt far more surprised at that.
"No, other people I knew. It's a big city, you don't just bump into people you know all the time," Gakushuu shrugged.
"You bumped into me," Karma pointed out suspiciously, but Gakushuu waved it off.
"It was a coincidence, and we've never really stumbled across each other before this either," Gakushuu shot back. Karma mentally gave her a point for it.
"So? What are you shopping for?" Karma asked after they passed some clothes shops.
"Well," she shot him a teasing look, "you'll find out."
Karma raised an eyebrow but followed along agreeably.
Gakushuu led them to a corner shop with a wooden gloss, random accessories framing the entrance. Karma spotted various rings, necklaces, circlets, arm bands, chokers, anklets and that was only at the first glance.
Gakushuu passed over many of them without a second glance. Then she stopped in front of a bunch of chokers. Karma did a double take.
Gakushuu was wearing a choker actually. It just smoothed out over her throat so well that Karma's eyes had easily slid over it after acknowledging it once.
He was watching now.
Gakushuu opened up the one she was wearing, and seemingly randomly selected a seemingly black one and slid it on. She slid her golden blonde hair off her shoulder, baring her pale neck to Karma's eyes.
Her fingers smoothed over her jaw, and she slid the dark dark choker on. Karma took a half a step closer, his own fingers trailing up along with Gakushuu's as she latched it together behind her neck.
Their fingers brushed as Gakushuu lowered her hands.
"Is it pretty?" She asked, her eyes a slate gray, showing the hints of violet he was so familiar with. Karma's heart picked up a pace.
"Yeah," he got out through his dry throat, his fingers brushed over the choker. It was a red so deep it looked black.
But out in the sun, he would be able to see it.
He would see red staining over Gakushuu's neck in the sunlight.
He was pretty sure he knew what he was doing, but his mind felt completely blank. His body was hot.
He pressed his fingers to Gakushuu's skin, above the choker. It was hot too.
His thumb brushed over her jaw, and red was staining her cheeks. It was pouring over and onto her ears, a light pale pink that was slowly turning darker.
Gakushuu was staring at him.
Karma pulled away.
"Yeah, it's pretty," he croaked out.
He took a few more steps back.
Gakushuu kept staring at him.
Then a few moments later, she turned on her heel and walked away.
Karma walked out of the shop and into the sun, and wondered what the fuck he was doing.