Shoot him.
Kayano has her gun in the air, pointed straight at Karma. And although he's one lunge away from securing the flag, he doesn't move.
He can't move.
Not when she holds him at gunpoint and one pull of the trigger means his elimination.
So shoot him and win this.
But then Karma smiles, cold and bitter and piercing.
"Go on. Kill me right now."
And the feeling of the trigger under Kayano's finger is suddenly a bit too cold.
"Shooting me from that distance? That's perfect for you," Karma continues, in an airy, taunting drawl. "So high and mighty. So detached. After all, that's how it's always been with you and the rest of us."
Kayano realizes that Karma's taking slow steps towards her.
He's closing the gap on purpose.
Shoot him, that part of her mind whispers again, more desperately this time.
But she can't.
"You claim you're being sincere about saving Korosensei, about your feelings," Karma says. "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."
Not like this.
Kayano lowly lowers a hand from the grip of her gun to reach for her knife at her hip.
"So go ahead." Now Karma stands right in front of her. "Pull that trigger from far away and never face me directly."
Kayano's just about able to unsheathe her knife in time to block the sudden, swift slash of Karma's blade as he lunges forward.
~.~.~.~.~.~
Although the wooden platform is a bit far from the field, Nagisa can still make out the words that Karma says as he approaches Kayano.
Beside Nagisa, Sugino lets out a groan. "That's not fair! Karma can't just—just say that," he says. "He's only doing it because he knows she'll shoot him and win."
From behind Sugino, Nakamura sighs. "It feels dirty, I know." She has a small, wry smile. "But in this case, I think it counts as fair game. He's not... saying those things without a basis, you know."
A hush falls over the class and a familiar tension fills the air. Nagisa notices how a few people share apprehensive glances with each other.
Then Korosensei steps forward.
"I believe that something like this would've been inevitable." Korosensei's voice is calm and in startling contrast to the stress that Nagisa's feeling right now.
Sugino raises an eyebrow at him. "You think so?"
Korosensei nods. "This is a battle of resolve as much as it is a battle of deciding whether or not to kill me. I'd say that the most important thing for Kayano right now is to prove her sincerity to the class. And especially to Karma."
Nagisa blinks at him.
"So if Kayano wants to truly win this battle, then she has to find a way to beat Karma so that he'll accept it. And in this case, shooting at him from a distance isn't one of them."
That makes sense, Nagisa thinks, resigned. And there's nothing that I can really do about it.
But as he glances at the battle, at Karma's spiteful smirk and at Kayano's conflicted frown, he still can't help the uneasiness that fills him.
When he feels a soft pat on his head, he looks up at Korosensei.
"It's understandable for you to feel worried. Both of them are your close friends, after all," Korosensei says, his smile reassuring. "But I hope that you can put your trust in them and believe that they'll find a way to resolve things peacefully."
Nagisa takes in a deep breath to ease the nervous flutter inside him.
Then he nods at Korosensei with a smile. "Okay," he says, turning his attention back to the battle. "I'll trust them."
~.~.~.~.~.~
Kayano's arm shakes against Karma's as she pushes against his knife with her own.
As she catches movement from the bottom edge of her vision, she pushes off the ground, leaping back to avoid the kick aimed at her legs. They both skid to a stop a few meters away from each other.
"Nice reflexes," Karma says. "Those tentacles were pretty great, huh?"
Now Kayano feels the hesitation leave her face at that taunt, feels her expression harden.
He wants to keep it in close quarters?
She meets Karma's gaze.
Fine.
She raises her knife. "I would've been able to dodge that anyways."
Karma narrows his eyes.
And then Kayano lunges forward, gun clenched in one hand, jabbing her blade towards him with the other. Karma dodges the attack, and before she can move, he shoots his hand forward to seize her outstretched wrist.
In a jolt of alarm, she tries to pull away. But his grip is iron and it only tightens as he then swings with his own knife. She just manages to duck and dodge it by a hair. With her knife hand immobilized, Kayano raises her gun, straining against the position she's locked in, trying to get an angle at him from this tight distance.
Then Karma slams his shoulder into her, knocking her to the ground before she can take aim. She flips to face him right as he dives at her with his knife plunging downward. Just in time, she throws up her arms in a cross, the juncture of them catching and halting his knife by his wrist.
Pain burns in her muscles as she trembles against the weight of Karma's body. He continues pushing, the tip of his knife shaking closer and closer to her chest. Then Kayano slams her feet into his stomach, kicking him off before he can overpower her.
Kayano shoves herself to her feet, panting, ignoring the soreness in her arms.
Karma coughs as he lands on the ground. But then he's back on his feet in a blink, an eager smirk flickering across his face.
They rush towards each other again.
Swing, parry, jab, dodge.
In the resulting blitz of attacks and evasions, Kayano realizes that where Karma surpasses her in strength, she's just about able to surpass him in agility. They trade punches to the chests for kicks to the side, slams of the body for strikes of the elbow. Knives meet knives, and her gun never fires amidst of this endless storm of movement.
After a bit, Karma pauses, his chest slightly heaving.
Kayano rushes forward to seize the chance.
She realizes a second too late that it's a bait, because then he instantly sweeps his foot across the ground and sends a flurry of brown and orange flying up to fill her vision. Before Kayano has time to adjust, he spins, kicking through the leaves.
It connects with her hand and her knife flies out of her grip.
Panic jumps inside her as the feeling of the knife in her hand is replaced by sudden unfamiliar nothingness. But as Karma charges forward to aim another jab at her direction, she dodges it before using her free hand to grab his wrist.
She feels Karma stiffen in surprise. Before he can react, she jerks him towards her and drives her knee into his chest.
He staggers backwards with a sharp inhale. As he does, Kayano realizes that he's not holding his knife anymore, that it's on the ground beside her, dropped when she kneed him.
A chance—
Kayano raises her gun—
Stars flash in her vision and pain bursts from her forehead. When she skids to a stop away from him with a hand raised to her face, Karma smiles.
"Sorry," he says between light pants, "but that's payback for the knee. And for stealing my wrist-grabbing move."
Kayano shakes her head and refocuses her gaze.
"That's what you should've expected when you got rid of my knife," she shoots back, raising her gun again. "And now that I'm the only one with a weapon—"
But again, before she can take aim, a sharp impact strikes her across the side as Karma delivers a swift roundhouse kick.
"It's not going to be that easy," he says as she stumbles backwards. "Try to take aim, and that's just an opening for me to land a hit."
As Kayano regains her balance, she realizes dazedly, Without knives to watch out for, it's all just coming down to close combat.
And then Karma rushes at her again, a fist swinging.
Karma's specialty.
She blocks the swing with her arm, but the force of it still sends a shock of pain through her, and she staggers backwards from the blow. And as Karma continues sending out a merciless flurry of punches and kicks and jabs of the elbow, she gets pushed back further and further, unable to find even a second of an opening to take aim.
Her breaths are coming out as pants when she finally stumbles backwards into something hard, and she realizes that it's a tree—that she's been pushed to the edge of the field, to the line where the forest begins.
Kayano twists behind it. It shudders as a heavy strike hits the other side with a resounding thud.
"Come on, Kayano." Karma appears from around the tree. "Don't you think it's time you quit hiding? You hid your abilities, your true colours, and now this."
Kayano leaps back away from him. "I know that I hid a lot of things from you guys before." Despite everything, she manages to keep her voice steady. "But now, I'm being honest with my feelings and fighting for what I truly want."
"Which is to trample over everything we've built in this class." Karma charges forward again.
Kayano dodges the swing he takes at her. "I understand your feelings, Karma. But no. It's to save the teacher that I care about."
Karma only scoffs before resuming his relentless barrage of attacks. And although they've moved into the forest, he's unhindered by the change of terrain. Once again, Kayano finds herself stuck either blocking or dodging, with only windows to dish out quick punches in retaliation and never to fire her gun.
But as they move through the forest, she notices the familiarity of her surroundings. They're on the Blue Team's side of the forest, after all—but she realizes that she distinctly recognizes this arrangement of trees and bushes and the uneven pattern of the ground.
This is where I fought Okano earlier.
Which means that...
The high ledge flashes in the edge of her vision.
And it hits her like lightning.
I can still win this.
She tightens her grip on her gun and jumps away from Karma.
"Still not down?" He closes the distance in a heartbeat. "You have to be pretty tired by now."
"I'm not going down until I win this." She blocks his punch, then sends a kick towards him. "Didn't I tell you already? Once I set my mind to something, I don't stop."
"Oh, I know that." Karma dodges it. "You made it loud and clear when you tried to murder our teacher."
And even though by now she's brushed off countless taunts and jabs from Karma, something inside her heart twists at those words.
The hesitation must've been visible on her face, because then Karma's expression hardens.
"See? We both know how much you wanted him dead." He's in front of her again, fists swinging. "And now you want me to believe you truly want to save him."
This time, Kayano doesn't block his hits—instead, she lets herself get driven back by them, taking rapid steps and leaps.
The high ledge is visible from the corner of her vision now.
"You're right," Kayano says. "I did want Korosensei dead."
But not just dead.
With every one of Kayano's evasions, Karma follows closely after her, swift and unrelenting.
She wanted Korosensei killed by her own two hands.
Because she remembers the way everything went cold when she saw her sister's dead body.
She continues moving, ducking and dodging and darting away.
Because she remembers the way that pain still tore through her over and over again, even after countless nights of quiet sobs and unseen tears.
The ledge grows closer and closer.
Because she remembers the way the emptiness clung to her, merciless, endless, and how the only thing that could fill it was her own stifling, bitter hatred.
Kayano takes one final step back to dodge another punch, and Karma's expression turns triumphant as her foot stops right before the edge of the drop.
"But now," she says, loud and shaking, "I will defeat you and I will save Korosensei."
She jumps backwards off the ledge.
And in the air, with no way for him to stop her, Kayano finally raises her gun.
Karma's eyes widen, the triumph in his expression crumbling into realization.
"Because," Kayano yells, pressing down on the trigger, "I don't ever want to lose someone important to me again!"
It's in this moment when she realizes that her vision has blurred, that her aim is distorted.
Still, she fires.
And before she can see anything else, before she can watch the blue paint burst, everything rushes upwards out of her view as she falls down, down, down.
