Yes, an update! Not too long after the last! I really wanted to get my ass in gear with this. I'm really into this story, and im glad so many others are too! Also, I realized I forgot something in the last chapter. When Izuku jumped up the cliff using One for All, I forgot to mention that his legs hurt afterward. It's been added now, but I wanted to mention it here so no one had to go dig around in the last chapter for it. Anyhow, let's move on with the chapter.
As mentioned previously, major spoilers for the following episodes: Karma Time/2nd Period, XX Time, Nagisa Time, Game Over, and All Might.
Disclaimer: I do not own BNHA or Assassination Classroom.
Midoriya crouched behind the curved wall of the scenic hallway, peering around just enough so he could keep track of what was happening while also remaining unnoticed by the assassin and the students. Korosensei's words had given him more hope for the red-head, but he was still prepared to jump at a moment's notice in case anything went south.
Karma and the assassin stared each other down before the red-head made a move, going to swipe at him with the plant. His opponent grabbed it and held it tightly. "Nice try, kid. But, as far as weapons go, hun, I'd have gone with harder." With a grunt, he snapped the plant in half.
"I guess I'll have to do without," Karma said as he dropped the plant.
The assassin let out a yell as he reached out for the red-head, who dodged and defended the quick grasps at his head with almost ease. Izuku gasped softly, his eyes riveted to the fight. He was dodging the attacks like a pro, ducking under and around his hands like they were moving in slow motion, using his hands to block or redirect the man's hands in another direction. He really wished he had his notebook right about now. Whatever technique he was using to defend looked useful.
"Those are your defensive moves, are they not, Mr. Karasuma?" Korosensei asked.
Mr. Karasuma didn't answer, but it was obvious to everyone that the answer was yes. The fight continued on for a few moments until the assassin suddenly stopped making moves. "Hm? What's the problem? Evasive maneuvers ain't gonna win this. You have'ta come in for an attack!" the assassin said, disgruntled by the lack of any real fight.
Karma lowered his arms. "Oh, you don't say? And what if all I'm really tryin' to do is keep you occupied? I mean, my buddies are kinda hopin' to sneak by, so, maybe I'm just bein' clever," he cast a glance at his peers behind him.
The man glared hard at the red-head, not even bothering to respond.
"Aw, relax. I'm pretty underhanded on the best of days. But this is one fight I want to win fair and square," he said, cracking his knuckles. Placing a foot behind him so that his body was facing sideways, he began hopping lighty from side to side, like he was ready to dodge and land hits back. "No tricks, no cheating, no holdin' out. Just you and me. Now, like men."
Midoriya's jaw almost dropped. "He can't be serious…!" he thought, looking on with disbelief. "Even if he can dodge, those attacks earlier were too quick. They left no opening for a counter. If he tries to dodge and attack at the same time, he's bound to be caught."
"Be my guest, hun. I like the cut of your jib," the assassin replied, impressed. "See, this is what I've been talkin' about!" he gestured to Karma. "Two equals, mano y mano." The assassin squared himself up, his hands ready. "A real battle to the death, hun."
To Izuku's surprise, Karma charged in, swinging a kick that was promptly blocked with the assassin's arms. He swung his arm, narrowly missing the man's head as he dodged. Karma threw an undercut that was swiftly dodged and then attempted to knee him, which was blocked yet again by his knee.
The assassin winced, grunting as he hopped to keep pressure off the leg Karma had hit, and lowered himself to ground. The red-head moved in quick to strike a good blow, but just as he got close, another purple cloud of gas was shot straight at his face. He groaned softly before going limp and being caught by his hair by the assassin. "Say goodnight, you little punk," he muttered, letting the empty canister clank to the ground.
Midoriya sucked in a quiet gasp that was cut short by his hand covering his mouth again as he looked on worriedly. "Should I try to save him? No, he's too fast. I'd have to use One for All to get to him before he could injure Karma. I'll just have to wait and see what he does."
"Sorry, kid. You're underhanded on the best'a days. I'm underhanded, like, every day," the man said as he lowered Karma down to the ground and grabbed Karma's head in his other hand, much to Izuku's horror.
"You son of a bitch!" Yoshida shouted. "He wanted to fight you like a man and this is how you respond?"
"Oh come on," the assassin complained. "This ain't the place for that, kid; get over it, hun." He lifted the red-head up. "Look, you can't get hung up on ethics. I'm an assassin. This biz don't reward folks who play by the rules." Midoriya's internal debate on intervening was cut short when he noticed Karma's arm reach into his pocket and begin to slowly lift out a canister like the one the assassin had used. "Hun, if you got a canister of gas? Use it. If he was all that, he'd have done the same-" He was cut short as he was hit point blank with purple gas.
As it cleared, the assassin lowered Karma back to the floor and choked on a mouthful of the fumes. "You…" he attempted to speak only to choke further. He hand slipped off Akabane as he doubled over, leaning on his knees to stay standing.
"Guess great minds think alike," the red-head spoke smugly, holding a napkin over his mouth for safety. "Now what was it you were saying about me being 'all that?'"
"How di… How did you not… breathe it in? I-I sprayed you… at point blank range. You should be paralyzed, hun," the man managed to say, straightening his knees and reaching into his shirt for a knife.
Popping the blade out, he went for Karma only to have his attack dodge and his other arm grabbed tightly. Using his weight, the red-head shoved him down to the floor, pulling his arm back in the process and making the assassin groan. "C'mon, Terasaka! What're you waiting for? I'm gonna need duct tape and every free hand we got to hold this crazy bastard down!"
Terasaka sighed, reaching up to scratch his temple. "Yeah, all right. Fine." As he and several other boys ran forward, he continued, "You've been yanking this creep's chain all along, huh?" The group dog-piled the assassin, making him cry out. "Fair fight, my ass," Terasaka commented with a smirk while another boy got out some duct tape.
"Stay on guard while you're taping him up," Karasuma advised. "He's incapacitated, but he might be strong enough to spring back before too long."
"Yes, sir," the boys responded almost robotically.
In a matter of minutes, the assassin's arms were taped behind his back and his legs were folded and taped together. For extra measure, they had put more bindings around his shoulders to prevent him from reaching. He growled from his position on the floor, glaring up at Karma who was tossing the empty gas canister up and down in his hand.
"Handy, right? Lifted it off that Smog weirdo a while ago," he said. "Still, disappointing it's a 'one-time use' type-a deal."
"How did you see it comin'?" the assassin asked. Midoriya had been wondering that as well. "You must've held your breath when I sprayed you. How'd you know to do that when my hands were empty? No way you could've told I had anything on me!"
"That's the whole point. With you, I was on guard against everything but bare hands," the red-head explained.
The man glared harder at him, muttering a, "Hun."
"As far as I know, you probably were lookin' forward to an honest fight. But you're also on someone else's payroll, so you don't get to choose," Karma sat down in front of the assassin, cross-legged. "You'd've had to stop us by any means necessary. I would've done the exact same thing in your shoes. In a way, my mistrust was a compliment."
"The anguish of defeat had never darkened Karma's door. Finals provided our cocky comrade a much-needed reality check," Korosensei said softly. "Failure humanized the perspective of his former foes. He suddenly found himself among their number. His picture of the world altered drastically, leaving him with a healthy respect for those around him. He was able to foresee his adversary's moves because he didn't underestimate his abilities. Something he only learned through his previous failure. We must see our opponent, not as an obstacle, but as a person. Toiling in the shadow of defeat, we taste true victory. It is a pleasure to see you take this lesson to heart, Karma. I'm very excited about what your future holds in store."
The assassin hummed, "Hun, hats off to ya. You're nothin' to sneeze at. I may be beaten, but it was a pleasure to know that you-"
"Oh, we're not done," Karma interrupted, confusing the man. He held up two bottles, one of which was green and the other orange. "No, I'm just getting started."
The assassin's face went blank and he asked, "What in the hell are those s'posed to be?"
"Mustard and wasabi," he answered with a smile. "You never know when you're gonna need 'em to shove up a nose.
Midoriya's hand shot to his mouth to muffle his cry of surprise. Thankfully, any noise he did make was drowned out in the much louder cry from the rest of the students. "With the way Korosensei talked about him, I thought he was better than that!"
"Do what?" the assassin yelled, his face pulled into a grimace.
The red-head pulled something that looked like a strap with some hook out of his bag. "Part of keepin' my guard up meant I had to play nice. But, hey, now that we've got you all bound up, I can let loose," he said as he put the contraption around the man's head while the others looked on in disgust. "You'll want to hold still or that special clip's gonna rip your nostrils off," Karma advised after some resistance from him.
Once he was finished, he poured out the rest of his bag's contents onto the floor, showing a number of other items that appeared to be specifically for his own special brand of non-lethal toture. "Now let's see. You've got your jalapenos, your hatch chilies, your ghost peppers, those are a kick in the balls, right? And a pitch of garlic for heart-health."
"Is no one going to stop him?" Izuku thought as he watched on, both transfixed and horrified.
"Well, hun, what cha think?" the red-head asked deviously, leaning forward with the orange tube. "Show us that samurai willpower?" He stuck the tube into his nose and squeezed some of the contents into the man's nose, making him give a muffled scream that only seemed to increase Karma's amusement.
"So, uh. I notice Karma's still a sadist," Nagisa commented, just as horrified as the rest of his class.
"I'm very concerned about what his future holds in store," Korosensei spoke up, backtracking on his previous statement.
"Who walks around with this stuff in their bag? Ugh," Terasaka asked as he put the 'be prepared' bag back into the red-head's backpack. After a minute or two of torture, Terasaka spoke up again, "Can we keep movin' please? Someone'll spot us."
"'Cause you stick out like a sore thumb," Karma replied as he got up off the floor after having finished his fun, which elicited a sarcastic laugh from the other.
The group finally moved on. It felt like they had been in that scenic hallway for an eternity. It wasn't long before they got to the stairs, which the group began to climb, save for Izuku. He usually waited until most everyone was at the top.
"Attention. The terrace is just up these stairs," Ritsu informed from someone's phone.
"Might be tricky. This is the club floor," the girl with orange pigtails said.
"Correct. The Executive Floor can be accessed via the staircase just off the lounge air," Ritsu showed the map to them, indicating where they were and where the areas she spoke of were. "Unfortunately, the back entrance has a manual lock on it, so we'll need to detour around and through the bar to open it and let the others in."
"So we're flying by the seat of our pants," a girl with a short ponytail concluded.
"A bar's the last place we belong," the student supporting Karasuma said, glancing at the man who was clearly still not able to hold himself up.
"Korosensei and Mr. K, you hide here," the ponytail girl spoke up, referring to the staircase they were currently in. "Leave the tricky part to those best qualified. We'll unlock the door to the VIP stairs. You fellas might be out of your dept in a club, but us girls'll do just fine."
"Yeah we will!" the girl with the bob from earlier agreed excitedly.
"No way. I'm sorry, it's too dangerous," Karasuma declined quickly.
"Ah. Well, plan B?" Karma said, looking towards Nagisa. The rest of the students followed his gaze a tad confused until his idea dawned on them. The blunette glanced around, clearly a tad nervous from all the eyes on him.
The tall girl with the ponytail from before took Korosensei from him and said, "Alright, you're coming with us then."
"Huh?!" the boy gave a confused look, raising a brow.
"We need a boy to accompany us into the bar, so Karasuma won't worry," she began to explain as she handed Korosensei off to Karma. "You'll be easiest to pass off as a girl."
"What?!" the blunette exclaimed. "Why do I have to cross-dress?"
"You're more likely to stick out then," the purple bob girl pointed out. "We need you to look like part of the group!"
"But-" he started to protest but one of the other girls grabbed him by the hand and began dragging him ahead.
"We don't have time to argue, Nagisa," she said, the other girls following suit.
Izuku stared after the girls from his position hidden behind the corner at the very bottom of the staircase, feeling pity for the blunette. Was it bad he had thought the blunette was female the whole time?
The green-haired boy leaned back against the wall, letting out a soft sigh. He didn't like being in one spot for too long since it increased the risk of them getting spotted, but it would give him a few minutes to think about everything that had been on his mind.
"I knew they were trying to kill Korosensei, so it's not that much of a stretch for them to be taught by assassins. I mean, isn't it like U.A., where we're taught how to be heroes by pros? Except I don't know why they would be teaching a bunch of kids how to be assassins unless they had a good reason…" Midoriya turned his gaze up to the ceiling, hand good hand reaching up to rub his chin as he strained for any idea only to come up blank.
But there was something else that had been bothering him. "Korosensei's the only odd thing I've seen this whole time. Besides those assassin's from earlier, no one's been… weird. It's so uncommon to find places with a mostly quirkless population and even then, some of them would have some traits inherited from their parents. So what's with-"
"Hey you!" Izuku was startled out of his thoughts, his head snapping towards the voice to see a burly man dressed like the security guards he had seen before. "What're you doing in here?" he asked, beginning to jog over to Midoriya.
"Crap! What's he doing here?" He took a step back, his eyes widening as he realized the whole group could be caught. The guard would have to pass the entrance to the stairs and see them waiting. "There's no time for that. He's going to see the rest of the class!" There was only one thing to do. Clenching his fist, he activated his Quirk and let its energy course through his limb, now alight with the vein-like pattern of One for All. The guard didn't stop, but his face faltered a bit. Once he was close enough, Izuku threw a hard punch, nailing him square in the jaw and sending him to the floor with a thud.
The green-haired boy breathed a sigh of relief upon seeing that he was knocked out cold and released the energy. "Who's there? Show yourself!" Karasuma called out, sending Izuku right back on edge. What was he gonna do now?
Hmm, so, uh, I was going to make this just a two parter thing. Y'know, like it's split into two chapters, but after seeing that the word count of the currently unfinished chapter was ~5000, I decided I'd just split it into three parts. A good chunk of the next chapter's already been written up, but man, I did not think anyone would want to read a chapter that's upwards of 5000 words. Anyhow, I hope you enjoyed. Until the next chapter!