Nagisa's not one for conspiracy theories, exactly. Definitely when he was younger, he used to be interested by them here or there, but after some of the crazy things he found people on the internet saying about Korosensei and his friends, after everything got out to the public, he wanted no association with those kinds of people. He doesn't, then, buy into the theories about government surveillance over his web activities. Mostly because he's experienced what being important enough for that is like first hand, and it doesn't really describe him anymore.

But, hypothetically, if there is someone watching over his web searches… he feels bad for what they're being exposed to.

His web browser has pages and pages of articles about this new world he seems to have entered. Sure, Nagisa's always known that kink stuff can't be that uncommon, but he never realised how big it actually is. There are some people, judging from the forums he's found himself browsing, who dedicate their lives to it. Nagisa's already considered buying a second notebook.

He feels uncomfortable with any video examples, at least. Even now, with actual sexual experience under his belt, he still finds porn uncomfortable. Not that he has a reason to watch it, aside from research purposes. But the more extreme stuff… it's hard to imagine how anyone actually enjoys this sort of thing. At the same time, though, reading doesn't put him off as much. Nagisa knows, then, that he has to face the reality that if he's really against this, he wouldn't have spent so long researching.

Karma: Are you still in the middle of your research?

Nagisa: Shouldn't you be at work?

Karma: You know

Karma: We still get lunch breaks

Karma: Even at the government

Karma: Even if they're not at lunch time

Karma: Shouldn't YOU be nurturing the minds of today's youth?

Nagisa: PE class break.

Karma: I thought so

Karma:

Nagisa: Did you just send me an excel spreadsheet?

Admittedly, he's apprehensive about opening it up, but his students are in their PE lesson and there's nobody to see him do it. It's not like Karma would send him anything too bad, right? Sure enough, he's not affronted with anything graphic. It's… just a spreadsheet table? Except, it's actually pretty long. One side reads 'rank', and the other appears to be a list of… stuff

Nagisa: I don't really get it.

Karma: It's just a list of common fetishes

Karma: I have a copy too

Karma: It's so we're on the same page about the things we like

Karma: All you have to do is rank from one to five

Karma: One is something you'd never do, and five is something you really want to try

Nagisa's discovered contracts such as these during his research. Though, it seems like it's more associated with the hardcore stuff. Does Karma… mean he wants to do that? Scrolling through the list, Nagisa sees a mixture of things that seem pretty normal, stuff that almost makes his eyes pop out of his skull, and just… weird things.

Now that Nagisa understands what he's looking at, he feels a little more okay with it. Karma's probably experienced with this, since he has a whole document ready. From what Nagisa's already read, though, this kind of thing is often used to make sure the dominant isn't liable for any assault claims, if the submissive suddenly changes their mind after the fact. That, or just general consent. Nagisa's not sure how he feels about signing that away.

Nagisa: I'm not sure I should sign anything.

Karma: It's not legally binding

Karma: And it doesn't require a signature

Karma: Unless you'd rather just talk about it?

Nagisa: I don't mind filling it out. But, even if it's not anything official, this kind of thing should be done on neutral territory, right?

Karma: Let's meet up in one of the cafés near work

Karma: It's like a ghost town here on the weekends

At the sound of the school bell, he turns his phone to silent and tucks it away. It suits him, anyway, to take his mind of all of that stuff for a little bit. Work might be the least preferable option for a lot of people, but Nagisa's lucky enough to really enjoy his job. His students, on the other hand… They all look a little down as they walk into his classroom.

He's not that boring, is he?

"Okay," he says after he's taken absences. "What's wrong?"

They all look between each other.

"Look," he continues, "I know that it's hard to keep the momentum up so close to the end of the year, but it's still an important time. I might not be as important as third year, but you don't want to finish the year on a low, do you?"

"It's not that, Nagisa Sensei," Morimoto says. "It's… something was weird with Watanabe san."

He'd noticed that she didn't answer when he'd called her name. Unfortunately, though mysterious absences in the afternoon aren't exactly a new thing with her. "I'm sure she'll be fine," he says. "It's good that you're worrying about your classmate, but there's nothing you can do right now. I'll check in on her after class, okay?"

Nagisa wishes that he could provide a better answer for them. Unfortunately, so he's learnt, you can't just solve an issue like this overnight. He is a little concerned, though. The end of the year is only a few months away, and although it's not like she'll be leaving the school, he won't be her homeroom teacher anymore and it'll pretty much be out of his hands.

He tries to get on with the lesson, and he almost misses the awkward sex education unit. At the very least, everyone was perked up and paying attention during those. Maths? Not so much. To be fair, the only reason Nagisa had paid attention to maths at their age was because Karma was so good at maths, and he'd both wanted to achieve his level… and also impress him just a little.

A knock comes to the door, though. "Shiota Sensei, I'm sorry to interrupt."

At the door is a very dejected looking Watanabe, and the headmaster right behind her, hand on her shoulder. "N-not at all," he bows lightly.

"Go on," he pushes Watanabe lightly, who crosses the room to her usual chair without taking her eyes off the floor. "Do you mind if we have a quick word?"

"Of course," he says, before turning to the rest of the class. "Keep working on your exercises quietly."

He can't help but feel his level of concern spike, as he steps out into the hallway. He may be aware that Watanabe has the habit of skipping on her own terms, or somehow getting the nurse to let her out of class, but he's never seen her be in actual trouble before. It's nothing he hasn't dealt with at all, a couple of the more rowdy students had a few slips up here and there, but Watanabe isn't like that.

"I would have sent you an email," the headmaster says, "but I didn't have time, I'm afraid. I'm sorry for just disturbing like this. There was quite a severe incident, during their PE class."

Suddenly the low mood makes sense. "Really?"

"She didn't just want to sit out, she started punching the wall until Inoue Sensei gave in. Not just… performatively. Like she was trying to hurt herself. One of the students from the other class tried to stop her when he saw the blood, but then she punched him. He's still with the nurse."

"Oh," Nagisa's face falls. "That's not like her at all."

"I believe she's going through some difficulties at home. Parents divorcing."

Nagisa nods sincerely. He's been there. "I've tried talking to her a few times, but I don't really get anywhere with it. This is more serious, though. I'll try again. Do I have to call her parents?"

"I already managed to leave a message with her mother," he says. "I didn't want to, but in a situation like this… Well, I'm just here to give you a heads up, mostly. And to deliver her back. I'm sure you can take it from here, Shiota Sensei," he bows, right there, before turning on his heel.

For a moment, Nagisa stands there and processes the information. Although he knows Watanabe did a very bad thing, all he can feel is sympathy for her. When his parents broke up for the first time, it had definitely altered his personality. For a girl so quiet already, this has to be a fresh blow. It must be really bad, if she's lashing out at herself. He'll definitely talk to her after the last bell.

When he steps back into the classroom, though, the hairs on the back of his neck stand up and he senses imminent danger. He manages to twist before it happens, catching the ruler that had just been thrown towards his face between his fingertips, which earned him a defeated groan. Although assassination is less of a novelty than it had been (giving a bunch of twelve year olds the permission to throw objects at him at will had been… a choice), they've developed the art of stealth nowadays. Not good enough though, of course.

"Nice try," he says, straightening himself out. "Whose ruler is this?"

Hanazawa stands up at his desk. "Damn, and I thought my aim was getting better, too!"

"It has!" Nagisa always makes sure to encourage them, too. "But rulers are too slow and noticeable. Try a pencil, next time."

Maths passes without much further incident, though Nagisa finds his eyes focusing more on Watanabe than anyone else. He can't bring himself to call on her, but he's still highly concerned. For once, he really starts to anticipate his lesson ending. If only he can somehow figure out the right words to say to her.

He's quick, when the bell actually does ring.

"Watanabe san," he tries to say quietly enough that it doesn't attract the attention of everyone else. "Do you mind staying behind today?" He looks over at his classroom. "Oeda san, Aohashi san- don't worry about the classroom cleaning duty today."

They shoot a look at each other. "Thanks, Nagisa Sensei!"

Everyone clears out, and that leaves just him and Watanabe, who's remained at her desk. And still refuses to look him in the eye.

"I've been punished already," she mutters. "Why are you doing it again?"

"Is talking to me that bad?" He tries to joke.

She just frowns, though.

Nagisa sighs. "I'm not going to interrogate you. I won't ask any questions about your home life at all, if you don't want me to. But, I've been told I'm a pretty good listener.

Watanabe scoffs. "Yeah right. You have to report everything I say to the headmaster. Or my parents."

"No," he shifts. "Not unless I think you're in danger for any reason. Or maybe if you told me you murdered someone or something."

"Why is everything about murder with you, Nagisa Sensei?"

"I-"

She leans forward. "Is there something you're not telling us?" Then she sighs. "Ito san thought you were just here undercover and your teaching qualifications were fake, but then you turned out to be a pretty great teacher, so we figured that can't be it."

He's only mildly offended. "I studied years for those qualifications."

"Sounds hard."

"It was," he agrees. "But it's worth it." That's enough stalling. "Do you mind if I take a look at your hand?"

She looks surprised, but she presents it over. The nurse hasn't wrapped it terribly well, so the small bandage comes loose with just that amount of movement. Watanabe sighs, before tugging it off almost completely. Immediately, he winces, because he knows personally how much it must have hurt to get to that state. She's not actively bleeding anymore, but she definitely has been. She's also going to have some really nasty bruising for a while. Ouch.

"You're not punching very well," he admires the placement of the wound on her fist. "You should keep your hand straighter, and a good tip is to squeeze your middle finger with your thumb."

"I don't exactly punch people a lot," she mutters.

"I hear you did a number on some kid from Class 1C," he thinks aloud. "So maybe it's a good thing, that you didn't do it properly. But, you know, to lessen the chance of injuries on yourself. Unless that's what you were trying to do?"

She looks down. "I thought you weren't asking questions."

"I'm sorry," he swallows. "I know you might not believe me, Watanabe san, but I really do care about you. If something helps you cope, I'm not going to yell or punish you. I'd just… rather you chose something that didn't end with hurting yourself or others."

"Inoue Sensei said I couldn't sit out," she admits. "He let me every other week."

Nagisa nods. "Is there a reason you didn't want to do PE specifically?"

She shrugs.

"I know it's not everyone's favourite lesson," he decides to continue, "but it's still important. You can't learn very well, if you're not keeping up a healthy amount of exercise too. But," he swallows, "if you really don't want to do it, I don't mind if you want to sit in here and read or do homework whilst everyone else does PE."

Her eyes widen. "You'd let me do that?"

"If it saves a repeat of this incident, yes. But, you would be missing out on another important part of your education, especially getting to play games with your friends-"

"What friends?" She scoffs again. "Nobody wants to be friends with me."

He frowns. "We both know that's not true. I'm not saying it's that easy to become best friends with everyone over night, but trust me, there are plenty of nice people in this class too. You do need to put in the effort as well, though."

"That requires people actually liking you."

"I like you," Nagisa points out. "I'm not just saying that. And I'm definitely not the only one. Now come on, do you want to help me clean the classroom?"

She nods coyly, and stands up. Actually, it's pretty peaceful between the two of them. Watanabe is a diligent worker, at least, and they manage to get quite a good pace going. Although Nagisa's technically beyond the years of classroom cleaning, and it was never the highlight of his school life to begin with, it's nice to be able to straighten things up himself.

"Do you want the papers over here, Sensei?"

He looks over her shoulder. "You can just leave them on the desk for now. I'll take them home with me."

She stares at the floor again. "Do I have to go now?"

He really wishes that she wouldn't have to. But he really is stripped for power in a situation like this. He doesn't know any details about her situation at all, and he knows that he wants to wait for her to tell him herself, if she ever feels ready. So Nagisa's not sure if it's super bad at home or not, whether her parents are still even living together. He does remember how bad it had been at the start for him, though, even if he'd been a little younger at the time.

"I'm afraid so," he says. "But, it's better you don't put it off."

"Okay," her voice is small.

"You can talk to me anytime you want, okay? I-I'll make sure I'll check my email, even outside school times."

She bows her head, before taking her bag. "Thank you, Nagisa Sensei."

Nagisa's glad that he managed to raise her spirits a bit, but he can't help but feel like he failed. All he wants is for her to open up to him. They have PE lessons twice a week, so there's some opportunity there, but not much. He wasn't kidding when he said they're close to the end of the year. Unfortunately, this isn't an issue he can just fix.

For once, he actually pokes his head into the staff room. Nagisa doesn't have a problem with his co-workers in the slightest, nor does he have a problem with the desk he was provided with. He just prefers to take his lunch breaks in the classroom, in case his students have any questions for him. Sure, they could ask him if he was in the staff room, but Nagisa feels like the classroom is far more approachable. The only reason he finds himself in the staff room, then, is running paperwork back and forth.

As it turns out, though, everyone seems to have packed up for the day. Nagisa had been hoping to talk to the headmaster a little more, and maybe let Inoue know that Watanabe's going to be skipping her lessons a bit. But he figures it's not an issue he needs to solve right here and now. Sometimes, it's better to let things come at their own pace.

It's hard not to feel a little down, though, as he goes through his normal routine of taking the train, grabbing a meal for himself, and making the sad climb up the stairs to his apartment. Nagisa's been half tempted, recently, to attempt to actually cook something. But, as much as he's fallen in love with Karma's cooking, he doesn't have much confidence to recreate it himself. Maybe that can be their next lessons.

It's also much nicer to not eat alone.

Nagisa manages it, though, working on his grading at the same time. He makes great care, of course, to not spill any of his meal on the pages. As much as he'd been worried about his class being down, earlier, judging from their homework they're doing just fine. He's not worried about how they'll do next year, when the work gets more serious and challenging.

After he's done with that, he pulls out his laptop, worrying his lip before opening up the spreadsheet Karma set him. Time for his own homework. Though, when he sees the first thing is 'public sex', he immediately feels out of depth. Karma's not into that, is he? Then again… Karma did say that he was going to fill out a version of this too, so maybe it's a general list he found somewhere, not a curation of his own kinks.

Not that Nagisa's in the right to judge him, even if he does like that kind of thing. One of the things he's read online is that some people have crazy fetishes, but even if he thinks they're kind of weird, it's not his place to judge them. In fact, one of the most important parts of a discussion like the one they're apparently going to have is to have no judgement at all. According to Google. He figures as long as Karma's fetishes don't involve murdering puppies or something

He's also not so sure about Karma's ranking system. In fact, he even opens up their chat again and rereads what Karma said. If one is something he'd absolutely never do, and five is maybe something that turns him on, then what are two, three, and four? Maybe three is something he doesn't mind either way about? That feels okay, but then where does he put something like 'public sex'?

It depends?! Nagisa gets out his notebook, and aggressively dots a bullet point. If it means doing it for the view of others, he's definitely not into it. On the other hand, if he means sneaking off to a bathroom for a quickie or something… that's not as bad. Not that Nagisa's done that, or even considered doing that, but he knows it's a thing. Nakamura once told him in more detail than he wanted about the stuff that went on in the nightclubs she frequented during her study abroad. That's England, though. Maybe they're just like that. Regardless, though, Nagisa decides to write a two in the empty box.

Some of the next 'suggestions' make him wince. And he never wants to google 'pet play' again. The list of sex toys forces him to do a lot of searching. He hadn't realised how many different varieties there are. He winces at the word 'fisting', not wanting to even look it up, and when he gets to 'cross dressing' he straight up marks it as a zero. Worse still is 'lactation', to which he doesn't even assign a numerical value, and just writes 'what'.

The list gets a little better after that, when he gets to the sadism, masochism, and bondage parts. He figures those might be more important, anyway, since they're a part of the acronym and everything. Strangely, he doesn't feel put off by much of it at all. His eyes flit up and down the list. Gagging? Does that mean the chance to get Karma to shut up? He puts it at number five.

In seriousness, though, he tries to read through it slowly, envisioning some of the situations. He knows he'd be willing to try most of these, at least once. That is to say, he doesn't recoil at the idea instantly. Though, when it comes to 'misc sadism/masochism' Nagisa can't in good conscience write more than a one, with the note that 'I've seen him with wasabi and mustard and I don't want that anywhere near me'.

He realises he's spending an awfully long time on the section, when he considers where to put 'choking'. On the one hand, he's not sure he'd like the feeling of it much, on the other… he imagines doing it to Karma, briefly. He'd probably have to be on top of him, maybe. Karma told him it was his favourite position, and whilst Nagisa hadn't hated it, it had made him feel more self conscious that usual. But somehow, it seems appealing in his mind right then. Pining Karma in place with his thighs, bending down to wrap a hand around his throat, danger in both of their eyes… Just thinking about it, Nagisa feels a very sharp stirring in his lower regions as his trousers become unmistakably tight.

What?

This doesn't… happen to him. Not frequently since he was a teenager, and even then he was pretty certain it was just a thing that happened, not a result of direct arousal. The point is, he doesn't just pop a boner at random, at least not… often. Not when he's actually thinking about it. And okay, this isn't that random. He can accept that he's pretty much fantasising about sex with Karma at this point. But it's weird for him to… get hard without him actually there.

He considers ignoring it, with the hopes it'll just go away, but given how uncomfortable he is, he doubts it'll happen. Especially with the list of further sex acts in front of him, when clearly his own imagination can't be trusted. Maybe he should turn the shower to cold and jump in it instead? Though, now it's December that really doesn't sound appealing.

Nagisa winces at himself for a moment, before his fingers work their way to his belt buckle. What he's doing isn't abnormal or wrong, he knows that. In fact, he's pretty sure guys do this once a week at minimum. He also knows he can't assume, but he figures Karma probably won't mind. In fact, knowing him, he'd be elated and tease Nagisa about it for weeks.

He's never been the best at relaxing, and he decides not to pull his trousers down further than he has to. He pulls himself out, though, relieved to be free of the fabric confines, though he's dry when he takes himself into his hand. For once in his life, Nagisa really wishes he had lube. Unfortunately, he needs to make do with his spit, though it's just as satisfying when he finally strokes himself properly. Perhaps, even, the added friction makes it feel even better.

A part of him tries not to for about half a second, but his thoughts end up with Karma. Of course they do. He's the one who got him to this state in the first place! Indirectly, at least. And, okay, it's much more fun to imagine that it's Karma's hand on him, even though the fantasy won't paint itself clearly. Karma behind him, above him, on top of him… it all works.

He even shudders, just at the thought of Karma's breath on his neck. He almost tries, purposely, to keep his fantasy more on the tame side of things. As though his ranking has some kind of integrity as it is. At least these days, he has a lot to go off. He leans back, then, hand speeding up as he remembers Karma rocking inside him, moaning into his mouth as they attempt to share a messy kiss…

"Karma," spills from his lips just as his release spills into his own hand.

Oh.

Nagisa remembers why tissues are usually involved at a time like this. Not wanting to do any further damage, he dashes to the bathroom, trying to clean himself off as efficiently as possible. Debating it for only a second, he throws his clothes into the washing basket and heads under the shower, as though scrubbing away the evidence is going to help him.

At least his head's a little clearer, when it comes to finishing off the rest of the table. He can't get it up again so soon, at least. But he feels weirdly fine about things, by the end. His spreadsheet feels fair to him, and he has quite a few points for discussion in his notebook. Despite all that, though, he doesn't want to keep staring at it, so he's glad to close it down.

He might have learnt to anticipate his sex lessons with Karma now, but somehow this makes him feel more nervous. Even if they're only going to get a coffee or something, it's weirdly intimidating. Nagisa's usual cure for that would have been more research, but he quickly finds that kink seems to be a never-ending rabbit hole, and he's probably better off waiting until they actually talk about it.

Until then, Nagisa manages not to think about the list too much, though there's bouts of sporadic research here and there. He wants to be as prepared for this as possible. Even if that means, to his largest amount of personal shame yet, using the printer in his classroom to get a hard copy of the spreadsheet. An act he feels such an immense amount of guilt for, he might take it with him to the grave.

Before he even has a handle on what's happening, it's Saturday and he's on a train bound for Tokyo Station. As always, as massive travel hubs usually are, it's pretty busy inside. Nagisa tries his best to avoid all the people heading for the bullet train, finally figuring the way out and into the open space that is Chiyoda. At least they're not doing this whole meeting thing next week, when half the city will be trying to escape to the countryside.

Nagisa's not so familiar with this part of Tokyo. Mostly because he hasn't got much of a reason to go here. It's fairly quiet, he supposes, but it doesn't have much for him. Maybe if he'd followed the career path his mother originally wanted for him… He feels like he would have been miserable, in all honesty. The buildings lack the neon signs and chatter and life. No, instead they're clean and metallic monolith looking structures that make him feel smaller than usual. Instead of looking up, though, or accidentally venturing into the Imperial Gardens, at least Karma gave him some vague instructions.

He's pretty sure Tokyo Station isn't the closest metro to METI itself, but the walk there isn't unpleasant, even during winter. And even though he's never visited Karma at work before, he recognises the building he works in, and figures he's on the right track. Sure enough, just past a small looking Seven Eleven, is a clearly marked Starbucks at the base of a much taller building. And better still, Karma's standing outside it.

"You made it," Karma says. He's dressed mostly casually, though his black coat looks like it belongs in a nicer place than an average coffee shop.

Nagisa nods. "Just about."

"Let's go get a drink, then."

Karma goes ahead of him, and orders the special strawberries and cream Christmas frappucino. Nagisa's admittedly a little surprised, but he figures Karma's always been into strawberries. He decides to order a regular latte – mostly because he was too distracted by Karma's choice to think about it, and also he's a little cold from his walk.

"Isn't a little weird," Nagisa says once they're seated, "to talk about… stuff here."

Karma leans back casually. "Look around. This is corporate wilderness. Nobody would willingly be here on the weekend. Not this early, anyway."

They're not entirely alone in the shop, though. Granted, they're not Japanese, but still. "But they-"

"You know how Westerners are," Karma shrugs. "They hear the words 'palace' and 'government building', and they flock. I'd be disappointed, though, coming all this way."

Nagisa gets it. You can barely even see the palace, and the actual main government building is pretty small. It's not exactly the height of tourism in his opinion, given how big Tokyo is. Then again, he's lived here for a few years, and lived within an hour of it for all his life. Regardless of that, though, he's not sure if they should just assume all of these people don't understand Japanese. Or even if they don't, they still shouldn't blatantly talk about it in front of them. The café isn't crowded, though, so he figures it's not too bad.

"Okay," he nods, and then reaches for the bag he brought. "I made notes."

Karma grins. "I'd expect nothing less."

"Did you bring your copy?"

Karma did. He puts it on the table, face down, and for a moment there's silence between them. Nagisa hesitates for a moment, before reaching across, picking up Karma's table. Taking that as permission, Karma does the same. For just a moment, heat rises across Nagisa's cheeks, before he forces himself to swallow it down and actually get to reading.

It's not as bad as he thought it would be. Then again, Nagisa's not entirely sure what he was actually expecting. But most of this is fine, if he chooses to ignore the three written besides 'cross dressing'. Mostly, he's just relieved that Karma has no apparent desire to pee on him. A weird feeling sets in, at the idea that they're actually pretty compatible.

"I'm done," Nagisa says, before noticing a strange expression. "Is something wrong?"

Karma's face is a little pale. "Nothings wrong… you just… you know that four and five are things you really want to do, right?"

Did he fill it out wrong? "Yes?"

"It's just, you had most of them at four and five."

"You told me to be honest…"

Karma shifts. "You said you had notes?" He straightens again. "That's what we're doing here. Negotiation."

He tries to fall back into the situation. "I do." He clears his throat. "Public sex."

Karma raises an eyebrow. "Hm?"

"It depends on your definition of it. I'm not into anything that'll get me arrested."

Karma tilts his head. "So you're okay with it as long as it's away from people?"

"Maybe." He takes a sip of his coffee for reassurance. "I'll… try something. Maybe."

"Role play," Karma says, as if to just move things along. "You have it at two. Does that mean you're open to trying anything?"

He winces a little. "It depends what you mean by roleplay."

"Like…" Karma stretches back to think. "Teacher student."

Nagisa frowns. "Isn't that already our relationship?"

"Right," he says, "yeah. But… more literal. Maybe reversed. You know, with punishments and stuff. I could call you Sensei-"

"I'm changing it to one," Nagisa cuts him off. "Nope."

He presses his lips together. "Fine then. Sex toys?"

It feels concerningly easy to talk about this stuff. Perhaps because Nagisa's dissociating from the reality of his words quite a bit. After all, he has spent quite a bit of time researching everything. So maybe Karma's gleeful insistence that they'll definitely have to go buy some toys makes him a little nervous at first, but he also realises he's okay with this.

Karma grins. "You have lingerie at two."

"Maybe if it's for men," he looks down.

So maybe not entirely okay, but that's to be expected with Karma.

"You have titles at three," Karma says. "Are they important to you?"

Karma has them at two. "N-not really. It just seemed like an important part of all this, though. I'm not against using them. Not that I'd… know which ones to use."

He shrugs. "I've never found much appeal in the whole 'sir, master' thing. If you really wanted me to call you something-"

"Not really," Nagisa says, feeling relaxed.

"I'd prefer if you screamed my actual name," he states nonchalantly

Nagisa almost chokes on his latte.

All in all, things are going well though. They establish a list of further things they both might not be comfortable with, expanding on some of the points. Nagisa doesn't mind Karma insulting him, for example, but there's definitely some areas he's not okay with. They also agree that this will be a sex only thing, as opposed to a lifestyle thing. But overall, it feels good that they're discussing this. He was pretty secure before, but he's even more confident with trusting Karma like this.

"We should talk about safewords," Karma says. "Some of this stuff is pretty extreme, so I think it would be good to come up with one now."

Nagisa's read about those. "Can't we just say 'stop' or something?"

Karma tilts his head. "We could. But in some situations, stop doesn't always mean stop. I mean, it does usually, of course. It's better to have something you'd never accidentally say in sex, but also something you'll remember."

"Fish," Nagisa says too quickly.

Karma tilts his head. "Eh?"

"I won't forget it," he explains. "Trust me."

"Well, if you're sure."

Nagisa sits up a little better. "As long as you're okay with it."

"I am," Karma replies. "Then, I think we're done then."

"We are?" He's actually a little surprised, about how easy this was. "What do we do now, then?"

There's a hell of a look on Karma's face. "Well, we have a whole list to pick from."

He freezes up. "Right now-?"

"No take backs."

"I didn't sign anything!"

"You don't need to," Karma tucks his own sheet back into coat.

"But I didn't clean out or anything," he hisses.

Karma looks confused for a moment, before he bursts out laughing. "Wow, are you some kind of anal addict now? There's plenty of other things we can do."

Oh, right.

"I mean," Karma says, "if you're that desperate… let's leave it until next week."

"What?"

He leans back again. "Consider this your first lesson in edging. No sex until you're desperate enough to beg for it. And I don't mean just a 'please' either. Think you can do it?"

Nagisa almost forgets, for a moment, that they're in a public café still. "Fine."

Karma just smiles sweetly. "You know what we'll do? We'll go buy sex toys and rope next week."

"Huh?!"

"I don't own any," he explains. "And you ranked them all pretty high, so my hands are tied. Well, I guess it'll be your hands that get tied."

Again, he has to remember they're in a public café. It's the only thing keeping him from leaping across the table and physically attacking Karma. He's matured so well in some ways, but in others? He's still hopelessly irritating. Never mind that, deep down, that's one of the things Nagisa likes most about him.

"Next week," he breaths.

"Another field trip like this one?" Karma frowns for a second. "Unless you have plans already?"

"Nothing," he says. "I'm not doing anything."

Karma nods. "Let's do it, then. For now… feel like checking out the new arcade in Akihabara?"

"Sure."