Karma has always prided himself in his extraordinary memory, in the way his brain effortlessly sorted through information, stored it in the correct boxes and always knew which to open when. Already at an early age, he started to make sense of the things around him - not only the trivial matters like numbers but also words and the nuances behind them. He started to notice that when people said one thing, they could also mean another.
"You have your mother's eyes."
Karma hasn't heard those words since he was 3 years old, barely a preschooler.
The first time someone commented on his looks, he was being carried home by his mother after they had gone grocery shopping. The person who uttered that sentence was their neighbour, an elderly woman with a beautiful garden which she spent most of her time catering to. It was a particularly bright day and as they had just entered their yard, the neighbour called out to gift them some of her freshly cut flowers. Karma remembers burying his nose into the peony he had received, the lovely scent completely distracting him from whatever it was that the woman and his mother talked about. At some point though, the lady looked at him and cooed, complimenting his (back then) fair hair and big golden eyes.
He remembers the delight that bloomed in him. He remembers realizing that this particular comment wasn't just about the colour of his eyes, or about how much he resembled his mother. He didn't, really, now that he looks back at the photos. That delight stemmed from knowing even if others took a short glance at him, they could see traces of a person he thought the world of. That he was a part of something - a family - and he had proof of such.
He never told Gakushuu, but he felt slightly jealous back then that he didn't get their father's eyes too. Of course, his childish mind wouldn't accept the strict concept of genetics and the fact that heterochromia rarely occurs. Foolishly, he spent years wishing that one day, either of his eyes would turn violet so that he'd not only have part of his mother but also his father.
Yet when Karma was 5, his parents were on their way to get divorced.
He knew what it meant in words when Gakushuu explained but it took him a long time to truly let the implications sink in. Maybe it did when his mother turned colder, no longer spent the evenings playing with him and his brother, watching the TV or reading to them. Or when his father rarely stayed at home anymore and when he did, he wouldn't even look at them without sending chills down their spine.
It was probably their father who changed first. Karma found out years later about the death of Gakuho's first student and only then, when he managed to put things into perspective, did it start to make sense why he stopped being so soft-spoken and gentle with them, opting to rather drill harsh truths and principles into their heads.
Somehow, in the span of a few months, the family that he once so adored and felt safe in turned into a constant battlefield. He and Gakushuu were eventually separated too. His mother wouldn't tell him the details, probably deeming him too young to grasp the situation. She started to talk to him less and less, averted her gaze from his and at some point hired a nanny to take care of him every day while she worked. In hindsight, it wasn't like she was that busy with work. They were more than well off, job or not. She simply opted to not stay home.
So in the span of a few months, Karma has lost both his father and his mother.
He hated them both for it, for the longest time. In fact, he still did until recently - until Koro-sensei turned his world upside down and taught him that there's more to the world than his won wretched thoughts and beliefs. And that there is no way to change the past, only the future.
So now, Karma wouldn't go as far as to blame either side for the divorce anymore because, despite his mischievous and playful nature, he understands the intricacies of emotions and relationships. He understands that his father was stricken with grief and fear, that he was reminded of it with every glance at him and Gakushuu, at the possibility of his children meeting the same fate as his student Ikeda. He also recognizes that while his mother did leave him alone, essentially abandoned him, she probably did so because the separation had changed everything and she couldn't bring herself to face the damage she had a hand in.
Karma really tries to reframe his experiences and memories of her in order to find peace, maybe even forgive her.
Still, when he hears those words again, this time as a teenager, there is no joy anymore. There's no pride at being reminiscent of his mother. He can't help but feel his throat closing up and his heart sinking.
Although, that's probably for a different reason.
"I don't know how I haven't noticed before. Perhaps because you look so different from the last time I saw you?"
Karma feels the sweat running down his spine. He recognizes the voice but slowly turns towards the speaker to make sure his ears aren't playing games on him.
Unfortunately, they aren't.
"Principal Asano," the boy exhales, trying to keep his voice. "I don't know what you're talking about."
The man only smiles, tilting his head slightly to the right. Or left. Karma really doesn't know anymore. He's glad he at least still knows that down is the ground and the ground is where he's standing because it sure as hell doesn't feel like that.
"Your hair got darker. You also grew up quite tall. Are you Asano-kun's - no, Gakushuu's height already? Even though you're younger..." his father continues, not paying Karma's denial any mind.
He stays quiet.
Out of all the things he expected when he was walking home back from the 3-E campus, the Principal ambushing him and then curiously looking at the nameplate at the door was definitely not one of them.
"Three years," the man stepped towards him, making Karma almost jump in his own skin, "you managed to stay under my radar for three years. At my own school. Impressive. Though I suppose I never would have thought my other son would even be in the country, let alone the same city, since his mother moved to Singapore. Or was it Taiwan? She always loved travelling. How is she?"
Karma's heart pounds so hard he worries it might burst. How did Gakuho even know that?
Every fibre in his body screams run, tells him that this isn't his father anymore, it's not a human being even. This is a monster wearing a familiar face.
Karma could fight. Or maybe he couldn't. There were people walking around, bystanders, who could help him or at least distract the chairman while he ran away. He could easily cause a commotion and make it more difficult for the man to try anything. Yet even that plan doesn't guarantee success, not with how friendly the smile on Gakuho's face shines and not with how privately located the Akabane house is.
"You must be mistaking me for someone, sir," the boy states firmly, refusing to move despite how close they are standing now. "I lost my mother from an early age and only have my grandparents."
The man chuckles, taking another step forward: "Indeed, according to the school database, your legal guardians are an elderly couple with the surname Akabane. Are they the family of the man your mother remarried? They must be quite kind, taking in a child they have no relations with."
At those words, Karma unwillingly winces. The elderly couple never truly took him in, he hadn't met them more than a couple of times in fact. Just as his father says, they share no relations with him. And thus, he is nothing.
With the chairman hovering over him like a tower, Karma feels like the five-year-old boy he once was. Used to unconditional and warm love, only to one day wake up and find out the very same hand that caressed him had now mercilessly thrown him to a pack of wolves to be eaten alive.
Karma is rarely ever scared of people but this time is different. He doesn't know what he means to this man by now, if he even considers him anything at all but a pawn, a thorn in his side. After all, Karma has no place in the Asano household. Gakushuu is the one and only perfect son their father brought up. Gakushuu was the embodiment of his ideals, of his efforts and principles... that is, until Karma came along and changed him. Made him weak, he can imagine the chairman scoffing.
"Excuse me, that was a bit insensitive of me to say. Surely it must have been hard, growing up alone. Had I known you were still here, I would have continued my role as a parent and raised you myself."
Fuck, Karma curses. No matter how hard he thinks, he can't come up with any way to change Gakuho's mind. All his attempts at denying it have been promptly brushed aside. So Karma clenches his teeth, dropping the act.
"What do you want from me?" he hisses, not breaking the eye contact. "Why are you here?"
Gakuho raises his eyebrows at the abrupt switch but maintains perfectly even tone: "Is it so strange for a father to simply want to see his son after a decade of being separated?"
Karma rolls his eyes at that.
Right. As if.
"I don't believe a word you say. You're barely a father to Gakushuu. You don't see me as your son," he venomously snaps.
The chairman sighs, slowly shaking his head: "How sad. If only you knew just how wrong you are in that."
Then, his face morphs into something akin to solemn honesty, except there is no god, human or devil on this Earth that would ever be able to convince Karma of this man having the capacity to be honest.
"I only wish the best for you two. I want to lead you on the winning path," he starts and Karma has to hold back a gag. "Class E is not somewhere you belong. Admittedly, your habit of picking a fight anywhere you go is somewhat undesired but you have the brains, the spirit and most importantly the ego of a ruler. You're not one of those failures. You're not a mere pawn either. You're a born leader."
Huh… that's not what Karma was bracing himself to hear.
"Don't you want to come back to class A and stand side by side with Gakushuu? The two of you at the top, at last together, dominating the school. Isn't that what you want too?"
Karma's too stunned to even notice the man reaching out his hand, only realizing so when there's a squeeze on his shoulder. He flinches at the touch as if there were needles impaling him.
"I have thought of you often, even though we parted ways under unfavourable circumstances."
Gakuho's eyes soften around the corners.
"I always hoped I would get to see you again, that I could be there for you to teach you about life."
The needles keep Karma rooted in place, the pain almost paralyzing.
"I have missed you, son."
He should have been happy to hear those words.
Behind all the mischief and roughness, Karma still feels like a child. As embarrassing as it is for him to admit, at nights, when he turns the lights off and hears nothing except for his own breath, he finds himself longing for love. He's always longed for someone to care for him, to want to be with him, to miss him. His brother, for one, but also his mother. His father. He realized soon enough that it was too much to ask so he never did, he gave up the thought and berated himself for even coming to such ideas.
The whole reason he and Gakushuu kept this a secret and hid from the chairman was that they didn't believe he'd accept a disruptive element in this game he called life. Karma was too much of a wildcard. They expected the chairman to threaten them to stay away from each other, to try to get rid of Karma even, because by some abstract definition he "belonged" to the ex-wife Gakuho was no longer on speaking terms with. And if that wasn't a problem anymore, then later because Karma would be a "distraction" to Gakushuu's academic and personal growth. Then because he would be labelled a "disgrace" for falling to class B, C, D and at last class E.
And yet here Karma stands, aged 14, being told by the very same Asano Gakuho that he was missed. That he has a place in that world.
It almost brings him to tears.
Sometimes, Karma wishes he was oblivious. He wonders how happier he could have been if he wasn't so sharp, so good at picking up even the slightest of cues instead of blindly trusting in people's best intentions as so many do. Maybe he would have gotten hurt somewhere along the way but maybe, he would have also been able to make and keep more friends, to sleep soundly instead of contemplating his nights away about why humans always need to lie and deceive each other. If he wasn't aware of such a depressing reality, maybe he would have been able to lead a normal carefree life. And in this case, believe his father's words.
But he can't. He hears the manipulation immediately because it's second nature to him, because he's familiar with it more than love or honesty or anything else. If he wasn't, he wouldn't have survived alone for long.
"You feel threatened," Karma says at last. He shoves the hand away and puts distance between them again, clearly rejecting the idea. "You're scared I'm going to place well in the final exams, too well for your teaching system to tolerate since I'm in class E and class E is supposed to stay at the bottom."
The principal's gaze turns cold and alarms ring in Karma's mind. Still, he continues, standing his ground: "You also know Gakushuu doesn't fully share your vision anymore and if made to choose, would stay by my side rather than yours. So you're trying to make him obedient by keeping me a hostage. You're scrambling to salvage whatever left there is of your teaching system."
Before his father can even oppose those claims, Karma quickly backs off, heading towards his house all the while not keeping his eyes off of the man. He doesn't trust himself to engage in this conversation any longer, there's a sharp pain in the back of his skull from the tension and anxiety. His fingers feel clammy and cold and all that he wants to do right now is collapse into a heap of exhaustion.
"What I told you is the truth, Karma-kun," the man interjects though thankfully he doesn't stop him.
Even if it was, it doesn't matter, Karma thinks. Maybe some parts of it were true, fuck if he knows, but it doesn't matter. This isn't what he wants anyway. Not anymore. He has friends he trusts, a teacher he can count on not only at school but also in life and a loving, caring, mother-hen of a brother. A brother who's finally capable of laughing wholeheartedly.
Karma would rather die than let anyone take that away.
"I do wish for us to rule togethe-"
"You know, if you told me this a few months ago, I might have taken you up on that offer," Karma cuts him off. He doesn't want to hear this. He doesn't want to be given this false hope when he knows its purpose is controlling them. "But I know what's real and what isn't anymore. And the family in class E that I have, Koro-sensei - those are real. They aren't worth risking just for a fickle promise from you."
And with that, he wishes the man a nice rest of the day and shuts the door close.
The moment he does, he leans his back on it and slowly slides down, feeling faint. The previous throbbing in his head develops into a full-blown migraine and if it was hard to breathe before, now he is suffocating.
What the hell happened?
How did the chairman find out?
Karma's thoughts are racing faster than his heart, they conjure hundreds of possible scenarios of what could have occurred as well as of what would occur from this point on. Did his father figure it out on his own? Did he see something? Did he hear something? What- when?
Then, something even more worrisome hits him.
What about Gakushuu?
What happened to him? Is he safe? Did their father punish him for going behind his back? No, probably not. He's never touched a hair on Gakushuu's head. He wouldn't do anything now either, would he?
Shit.
Now that Karma thinks about it, he hasn't heard from his brother since yesterday. He hasn't seen him since they took the final exam two days ago either. With all the studying and the stress from exams and assassination plans, he didn't register the fact that they hadn't actually made any contact in what was more than an ominously suspicious amount of time.
Fuck. Why didn't Karma notice sooner? Clumsily, he fishes out the phone from his pocket and starts typing a message to find out what situation they are in and what the plan is-
but then it dawns on him... are messages even safe at this point? Is that why Gakushuu hasn't contacted him since?
Karma groans into the palm of his hands. For all the tough talk about not caring whether their father finds out about them, the whole ordeal makes him tear up. After all, his safe, comforting life until now just crumbled 5 minutes ago at his front door and with it all prospects of carefree dinners, talks and trips. Right now, his entire relationship with his brother is on the line.
What is there to do? He needs to talk to Gakushuu but for all he knows, his phone might be hacked or the chairman himself could have it in his possession. Sneaking in to meet him at the Asano residence is something Karma doesn't want to risk either, no matter how good his stealth skills are.
At school? The principal stays in his office most of the time anyway, maybe Karma could find a window slot during the break where he could pull Gakushuu to the side. Sure, it would require him to actually come to the main building but as long as he kept his presence low, wore the same boring uniform like everyone else and maybe topped it with a hat or something... It worked before. Or maybe it didn't and that's how their father found out.
But he has to make it work. He would have a good cover, anyway. The results from the school's finals are going to be officially displayed on the main board by the entrance so he can just pretend to be checking them out just like everyone else. This idea gives Karma enough hope to let him gather himself up and actually move from the cold ground. He's exhausted from the class and mostly from the distasteful encounter earlier.
The bed is covered with numerous hardcover books and scattered paper sheets, still he collapses into it.
Tomorrow he'll see Gakushuu. Yeah, he might miss the announcement in his own class - he really wanted to be with them, to celebrate (or mourn) together and be engulfed with comfort in that warm supportive home - but his brother takes the priority.
Karma will go and see if Gakushuu's okay, ask him what he knows and then they'll figure out what to do next. If it's the two of them together, they will be alright, no matter what the chairman plots. Surely.
If it's the two of them, they'll find a way.
Alright loves :) There goes the first chapter in forever. I know it might be hard to orient yourself but I literally just picked off where I left it. But, if it isn't clear by now... most of you fell for my trap. "Unhuman teacher" didn't necessarily apply to Koro-sensei only ;)
Just a reminder, the plot isn't fully canon-compliant.
Next update: Hopefully next Sunday
Hope you liked this one and until then!
