It takes a few more seconds of wide-eyed staring before Mr. Karasuma's words finally make sense to Kayano.

She lowers her gun and walks towards Karma. "What?"

He glances at her. "Hm?"

"You just—You just gave me the victory." Kayano frowns. "Why did you do that?"

"I didn't give it to you." He shrugs. "The moment you pulled off that cliff move, you already won."

"But I didn't! I missed the shot. You should've won from that."

At that, he turns to her fully. "But why did you miss?"

"My... My tears. But..."

"Not just that. Those tears were a result of your emotions. You missed from the sincerity of your own emotions." Karma gives her a wry smile. "And that's exactly what I used against you at the start of the fight."

At the start of the fight...

Then his words echo in her head, crystal-clear—You claim you're being sincere about saving Korosensei, about your feelings. But we all know that's fake. You just don't want to face the revelation of your own lies. You don't want to face me.

Even though she knew it was deliberate, an intentional attempt by Karma to stall and close the gap, she remembers the distress that still paralyzed her at those words.

So go ahead. Pull that trigger from far away and don't ever face me directly.

Those words. Ones that made the trigger ice-cold and impossible to press, because she couldn't shoot, not when everything about him in that moment dripped of spite and distrust and threatened to never forgive her if she pressed it. Not when his words, harsh as they were, carried such much weight behind them, not when she knew how much it all meant to him. To the both of them.

"You could've shot me back then, too. But you didn't, because I put you in a position that would've discredited your sincerity." He shrugs. "And when your own sincerity is the very thing that made you miss that second shot... It's only fair that I gave this shot to you, right?"

Kayano gazes at him. "Karma..."

Before she can say anything else, he points over his shoulder at the wooden platform. "Anyways, what do you say we get back to our class now?"

Kayano sees their classmates getting off the platform, eagerly jumping and dropping and climbing off of it, confusion and excitement and surprise all over their faces.

She smiles. "That's a good idea."

The two of them begin making their way over to meet their classmates.

"By the way," Karma says as they walk.

"Hm?"

"Jumping off a cliff as a surprise last-ditch resort? I approve of that."

"Huh? What does that—"

He lets out a laugh. "Don't worry about it."

~.~.~.~.~.~

When Kayano rejoins the class along with Karma, Nagisa's the first one to run up to them.

"You guys!" His expression is equal parts relieved and confused. "Was everything okay? I saw Kayano win but Karma, you—How did—"

Karma grins back. "She took a page out of my book."

Now Nagisa's face is just fully confused. "What?"

Before Karma can respond, all three of them are interrupted by the rest of the class rushing forward to greet them in an indiscernible combination of questions and yells, ranging from "What in the world happened in that forest?" to "Karma are your ribs okay?" to "FUCK YEAH BLUE TEAM WINS."

Kayano laughs as Karma begins responding to all of the questions. But as the class gets carried by the wave of excitement and confusion, she can't help but let herself slink out of the group. She might've won Karma's acceptance, but... she can't assume the same for everybody else.

When she exits the crowd, Korosensei walks up to her.

"I honestly couldn't predict the outcome of that battle myself," he says. "You did well to come out on top in the end."

His smile is the same as always, but it gives Kayano a feeling of bittersweet warmth that she doesn't expect.

"And," Korosensei continues before Kayano can say anything, "I understand if you're still a bit hesitant about rejoining the class. You must be aware that your own reveal isn't something that can be forgotten or shaken off easily."

Kayano nods, a twinge in her chest. "Yeah."

"But I hope you don't worry too much. As long as you're true to yourself, then your sincerity will make itself clear." Korosensei's gaze softens. "You were able to get through to Karma. I have no doubt that you'll be able to make your feelings clear to the rest of class as well."

Kayano glances back at her class. Karma's still in the thick of the crowd, laughing at all the confusion from the classmates around him. Maehara and Sugino are practically in his face, expressions wide-eyed and filled with confusion and excitement. Terasaka runs up to Karma with his arm in a motion that looks like he's about to poke him in the ribs, but then Isogai steps forward and begins trying to calm the class. Beside Karma stands Nagisa, who has a relieved smile on his face. Het lets out what looks like a resigned sigh before turning his head and catching Kayano's gaze.

He waves at her.

As Kayano waves back, she feels a soft pat on her head.

"So when you go back to address the class," Korosensei says from beside her, "hold your head up high, knowing that you won that battle. Both of them."

~.~.~.~.~.~

When Nagisa's the first person to run up to Karma and Kayano, Karma can't deny the amusement he feels from the utter astonishment on his friend's face. But turns out, it's not just him. It's nearly everyone, seeing as Sugino and Terasaka and Maehara all crowd around them in an unintelligible mess of yells and questions. Karma waits until they finish being all confused before inevitably crushing their hopes by just smugly sticking out his tongue without offering a single answer.

And then when Nakamura steps out from behind the crowd to raise an eyebrow at Karma, followed by Itona, who gazes at him with a mix of intrigue and knowingness, Karma feels just the slightest hint of resignation. Mainly because he knows that he at least won't be able to hide all the fun-to-hide details from some particularly perceptive members of the class.

Then, after a bit, Kayano steps forward to speak up.

"I know how much assassination means to everybody... And I'm not planning on giving it up completely," she says as she faces the class. Now there's not a detectable trace of hesitation on her face—only a smile filled with relief and eyes gleaming with determination. "But at least for now, as a class, is it okay for us to try and find a way to save Korosensei?"

And Karma smiles.

"Well, it's your win, Kayano."

He doesn't expect his own words to come out as warm as they do, but that only mildly surprises him more than anything.

"Tell us what you want us to do. Whatever it is, we'll listen to..."

And right now, he certainly doesn't mind them.

"...and I'll trust."

.

.

.

~end~

Annnd that's a wrap :')) thank you everyone! It's been a really wonderful past few weeks 3

To be honest, at first, I was pretty intimidated by the idea of writing this, since handling multi-chapter plots/developments is pretty far out of my comfort zone and I tend to overthink my plotting a lot. But now that it's over, I have to say that I'm pretty proud of how it all turned out, but I also want to express my appreciation for everybody who's been following this and giving me the support and motivation to see it through to the end. I hope you enjoyed witnessing the development of Karma and Kayano and following this story! And as always, thank you for reading 3