Oh, she had him. He already knew what she wanted to address but he followed her in. "Great, sharing a bathroom with my beloved Aguri," he teased as he shut the door. "I try. She's not the same as other students, or any of the kids at Sanctuary." He looked at his hands. "Nothing feels the same."
"There's some part of you that won't accept her, even as a student," Aguri said as she moved closer. "There is something different when you are the unkillable teacher, than when you are in this form." She gestured toward him. "I know that smile that hides so much behind it. I see it in Emiko too, but it doesn't make me angry. It's just another part of you, and if you forgot?" Clever Aguri. She had taken his tie when he wasn't looking and showed it to him. "I made friends with that form, before the other existed."
"I don't." How could he explain. "Nothing good ever happened in this form. Nothing memorable. Nothing but you, and even you didn't fill me with all the goodness in the world." Oh, he really wished they could just zap back almost seven years ago again. He never wanted to talk about this, but here he was, the serious side they both never wanted to touch.
And that's what it would lead to. Something they both didn't like. "You're sweet, Aguri, and the most amazing person to ever befriend someone like me. A person like that though, is too sweet. Too sweet for this world, and it's that sweetness that essentially killed the Aguri you were."
Yeah, of course she didn't like that. "I'm still me. I'm still this form."
"This is hiding your true form, and you know that. You hardly changed into your octopus form, only when you had to, or when you got stressed and it just happened." So? "You were the opposite of me."
"I don't mind the octopus form," Aguri said. "Really, I don't."
"But it's different. You are different in each form, aren't you?" He pointed out. "As Korosensei, I am full of weakness. So full of nothing but weaknesses, and I liked that. Are you any different?"
Oh, he was really making her spiral. "I don't think so, I just, this is the form I was born in, and so, I guess, I just like it better. This is me before." Yeah. Yeah, serious city, here they come. "Before I was given a second life."
"Yeah, not left for dead."
"I never said that."
Yep, now it started. "You didn't need to. You change, you become different when you turn from the anti-matter. Everyone did," he reminded her. "You ignore it like everything is fine. You don't explore any power of the tentacles, just transformation."
"I don't see a change in me in either form," she said. "I'm still . . . an average woman who just wanted to teach but I got mixed up in family business and . . ." She closed her eyes.
"Great thing about almost dying off, never had to marry him," he came back with. "Yanagisawa hurt you repeatedly, and he didn't care if anyone even saw him doing that. He belittled you, and that part of you that will still let him do that, is on this side." He gestured to her.
"It's on both sides, I don't get weak and stay human, I change first," she reminded him. "That accident took away a lot, and changed my life in radical ways." She haphazardly gestured to the door behind her. "Two of the biggest being out this door. I don't . . . ever stand out. I don't stand up. I don't do anything. I never made any waves, I never became a prodigy like Akari, I had the simplest life of just being a teacher." She shook her head instead of wiping her eyes which were becoming wet. "How am I going to protect the new Yukimura's, when I will crouch with a simple flinch?" She stuck some of her hair behind her ear.
Yeah, she wasn't clueless. "Not much better than me." He shrugged. "I can't even get crayons without breaking them because of Emiko's look. That was passed from me. Etsuko will probably have that same look too. Talk about hating on yourself." He stared at his hands once again. "There was nothing remarkable that I liked about having this form. Not one good moment, except you, but even then I was changing a lot." All the constant tests. Yeah. Had she known him at his worst, she'd be dead.
"I have to have Akari's help, in the end." It wasn't a question, it was a statement.
"We have a ways to go until then. Right now, Yukimura Aguri is known as a human traitor siding with Korosensei."
"It's worse than that," she said softly. "I am sorry for your student."
Yeah. Yanagisawa could pretend all he wanted, none of his students would ever believe it because he still couldn't hide his obsession with Aguri, merely transfixed it onto Chou Chou. "Like the real Aguri would ever want to be more than a friend. I am lucky to be friend. I will kill him with indirect shots that will leave him in days of pain." His words were harsh, but as much as he hated his look as a human, that same smile just remained on his face. "I would if he were a normal human. I'll find a way to make him suffer and then kill him." He needed more than suffering this time, he had to make sure that nail pressed into that coffin.
Losing just his limbs, Yanagisawa got off easy. He should have just gone after him once he was alive. He couldn't even move anymore, what could he do? That was his reasoning. The reasoning he wanted to follow since he hadn't killed anyone as Korosensei. He killed when he was transforming, but he didn't become 'Korosensei', until he came from the ground, and made plans to take over class 3E.
That's how it felt.
That romantic dreaming was over.
"We will both be terrible at this," she said to him, with a strange smile. "You'll give them evil stares, I'll curl up when something terrible happens, and Akari is too close to the situation to help us physically. Is it sad I keep thinking about a pet fish that I just couldn't feed the right amount as a kid and it died?"
He couldn't help a small laugh. "Nurufufufu. Yeah, we're morbid. I even tried to see Emiko as a student, but it didn't work."
Aguri stared at him. "No one had the right." She looked back down and away, covering her eyes. "I think the conversation is over." Her voice started to break. "You can leave now, I have to use the bathroom."
No, she didn't. He didn't go in there just to drag it all out, to end it there. No one had the right to turn us. No one had the right to make us parents. No one had the right to freeze us. No one had the right to hide an egg from us. No one had the right to anything! And. This won't end well. But it was life, and he had to.
He reached for her and hugged her close to him. "No one did."
"No. I don't need a hug," she insisted, but he could hear her voice breaking down more. "I don't like this. Not with you. Not that I mean it in a bad way. Screw it."
He already understood as he continued to hug her. "You brought real laughter into my life, let me bring you comfort. Let it go, Aguri."
Yeah, it was like a dam. Never had Aguri actually cried against him like that. They always kept things light and fun, no matter what. Real life was shit, it was better to enjoy themselves. They did that for as long as possible, longer than most would be able to take it. Before that, the last serious moment they had was when he was holding her almost dead body in his tentacles.
As brave and strong as he used to be though, it was just a shell. A shell of who he used to be, so he really tried to keep it together, but? The shell didn't change the Korosensei inside of him. He was full of weakness. He cried against her too. "Boy, it sucks, I'm trying to be strong for you, but I just can't-!"
"-find anything in the right size," she stopped him like she always did. She still clung to him, and he clung to her, as they both cried.
Well deserved, long awaiting crying, together. They didn't have hours, but they didn't need it. They just needed a few minutes to come to terms with their new world. Aguri wiped her tears first as she held him just a little longer. "It's okay, we'll get through it all Korosenpai."
"I'm not Korosenpai like this."
"Oh, I disagree with that. No one would be crying longer than me except Korosensei." She changed the name on him. "A shell doesn't change who you are underneath."
She was right. In that form, he never acted or did anything like that. "Just a shell." Just an image. He saw himself in the mirror. His eyes were red, his face looked terrible, and so did his hair. Someone with this face, can have emotion after all. For the first time, he saw something humane in that form.
"There you go," she comforted him longer, having gained control better of herself while he kept crying. "It's okay, let it all out."
He looked toward her. Her acceptance. Her hold on him, just like she would comfort anyone else she loved. He was so full of weakness.
Too full of weakness. Before he even knew it, his body reacted.
He gripped onto her shoulders, brought her close, and kissed her.
Weakness.
She'd want to kill him.
She'd hate him.
He messed it all up. She could stop him saying something by interrupting him, but he didn't say anything. He did something, and there was no changing that. In the end, knowing he couldn't change it, he just hung on. Just a few more seconds of . . . Aguri was kissing back?
Maybe she liked him, maybe she was lonely, didn't matter, he'd take it as they continued to make out. Then, when she backed away, she had her nice pleasant Aguri smile.
"Do you feel better now, Korosenpai?"
A thousand things were rushing through his head. What they could achieve in different forms, how much room they had, then why they were in the bathroom in the first place, to the obvious fact there were two kids on the outside waiting for them. "Is that love?" Oh no. "Kiss." Stop! He made a slight squeal. "I just remembered we left a six-year-old morphing kid in our hotel room for several minutes alone. Other than that, this has all been really good."
He got out of the bathroom at first. Yep, they would be terrible at this. He would be terrible at this, if he did it. I don't do this. I don't do this. It's short, it's sexy, it's not serious, that was it. This is not me, this is bad! He went out the door to see how things had been. And to think about what a gigantic mistake he made and how to save it.
It's okay. Aguri's loose, she's fine. Shoot, she'd marry me if Akari said so, that wasn't a lie. This is okay. She won't take it as anything big. Okay, time to concentrate.
Etsuko had left the endtable where they had put her. She was just relaxing on the ground, and had rolled over closer to Emiko. That was 'Egg', she never liked being alone and unmoving for long.
As for Emiko?
He went over toward Emiko and saw she almost finished coloring a butterfly. "You've just been coloring this whole time?"
Emiko was laying on the ground, kicking her feet back and forth in the air as she looked up at him. She had a strange look on her face. "Crying, huh? You're all red."
A strange look. Maybe the unemotional thing he saw was in his head? Or maybe, like him, it could be changed. "Thanks for being good while we were in there."
"Just remember I am a good girl that listens next time you are out. I rescued Egg as she started to move around."
"Ah, she can't hurt herself," he told her. "She'd just bounce."
"Yeah, but I still helped. Remember that. When do I get my dresses back? I practice a lot for my future career."
Future career? "What do you want to be?"
"Oh, I want to be the first monster of the week actress!" she said excitedly. She swished from one side. "See? Hot actress." Then she swished to the other. "Then cool monster!" She moved back and forth over and over. "Hot. Monster. Hot. Monster. I'm going to be the first to play both parts."
That was absolutely impooooosssible, but he couldn't help himself as he chuckled.
"Hey, it wasn't laughable. I'm going to become it, even if Aunt Akari says it's impossible."
"Oh, I bet you'll be something." That kid was filled with ambition. Probably not going to end up being a monster of the week actress, but she would definitely make something of herself. And that emotion he saw in her face as she flipped through each form on the ground? She wasn't unemotional, just hard to reach.
Because that definitely fired up a real smile.
"Hey, Grumpy guy finally smiles for real at me," she said to him. "You've been all fake from the start. Careful if I'm growing on you, I am high maintenance."
Heh. "What?"
"I don't know, I've heard it from Aunt Akari on the phone with dates and stuff. It's something actresses say," Emiko said. "It's like artist sickness. Aunt Akari likes artist sickness."
He laughed again. She was trying to say artisticness. "You'll be an interesting one." He looked beside him and saw Aguri. "She's gonna be a monster of the week actress when she grows up, she's high maintenance, I really liked that kissing even though it's a bad idea, but it wasn't bad, but the idea was bad, and can I get more?" Aaaaah! She let me just ramble! She never lets me just ramble!
She just smiled at him. "I know. You're dying soon, but that was fun."
"Fun for me, fun for you, or both, or was that just comfort, and can we have more because I really-"
"It's okay," she answered, stopping him this time. She just kissed him on the cheek. "I knew for a long time nothing could ever be. You'll leave soon." She held his hand playfully. "Can't seal it back up though, so even if it's bad, why not?"
Holy. Shit.
She bent down to look at Emiko's coloring. "That's pretty."
"Is it dark yet?" He went to check the windows. Damn, several more hours of light still. Okay, cool it. Aguri actually adores you and wants to curl up with you, and she gets it's a bad idea, but it's that passion thing and nothing lasts forever and screw it, I want her! Tonight. All that time they had been alone, and now they wanted that alone time, and they had two kids in the way. Well, tonight. Tonight, tonight, tonight. "Can I be the other way?"
Emiko just watched Aguri nod.
"Can you be the other way?" Luna asked her.
"I don't mind, as long as Akari isn't around," she admitted. "That was very awkward with the immense sensations of all that. Just rubbing across each other slightly was intense." She looked back down at Emiko. "You didn't understand any of that grown up language, did you?"
Emiko looked at her. "You are talking about romantic mumbo jumbo like Aunt Akari on the telephone with her boyfriends. I don't get anything."
"Just making sure," Aguri addressed her. "Did your Aunt Akari ever color or draw with you?"
"Yeah," Emiko admitted as Etsuko went rolling across the floor. "Maybe her name really should stay Egg."
"She likes movement," Aguri said as she watched Etsuko move closer to her. She was in her octopus form. "Are there other things your Aunt Akari did with you?"
"We mostly slept." Emiko started a new page of butterflies, this one had three of them with a kitty trying to bat them playfully. "She had me at six, so I usually got supper when I got there. Then I'd stay up until nine and then bed. I'd be up by six to go back to Aunt C."
"Then we'll just have to come up with some new activities," she insisted.
"Like you did with students?" Were these two going to be like teachers the whole time? "Are you going to give me grades?"
"No, no grades," Luna said as he came over too. "But all of life is about learning."
Yeah, Emiko kept on a fake smile. "Teachers. Yay. At least you have fresh fruit. Apples. You get apples?"
"We aren't teaching right now, but even then, I didn't get many of those," Korosensei admitted. "I bet Aguri got some."
"Uh huh."
"I would give you all the apples I have."
"You already gave me two eggs, I think it's bigger than apples," she teased back.
"You two are strange," Emiko said as she grabbed a purple and started to color the kitty. "Is this weird secret language between all adults? Aunt Akari spelled things out I wasn't supposed to know."
"All you have to do is learn to spell to learn that," Luna said as he came closer to her. "I've got a feeling that isn't too far off."
"I don't know, I can't read," she answered.
"You picked up math from a book because you were bored," he pointed out. "Trust me. It won't take long. In fact, you need to be in Kindergarten but that was too dangerous."
"You two are teachers. I'm probably covered." Emiko continued to color until he picked one up. A pretty color. She liked that color.
"What color is this?" he tested her.
"The color I want to use." She placed her current color down, now wanting the one he had.
He chuckled. "Nice, but not the answer. What color do you think this is? It's the same color as the sky. Do you know what that color is?" Ugh. "If you can learn math because you were bored, you can definitely master what they teach in kindergarten with just some help."
"It's whatever color you say it is Lord Reaper," she tried out, knowing that one would satisfy her Aunt C.
"Nope, I'm Luna, and that talk is dangerous. We don't want to get caught," he reminded her. "Try a guess. What are the colors you know?"
"I'm pink and red and jealous colors," she said. "That's not pink or red or jealous."
"Point to the color of jealous?" She switched back to human and pointed to her skin. Luna just made a funny chuckle again. "Well, some might be jealous, you do have a perfect tan color."
"Tan," she corrected herself. "Jealous tan."
"No, jealous isn't the color," Aguri corrected her. "Just, tan. Jealous is a feeling, probably from your Aunt Akari. You have pretty skin and she wished she had that color."
"Oh." Great, now I feel dumb. Jealous isn't even a color? She would have to learn those.
She watched as Luna colored on a piece of spare paper in front of her.
"This is blue," he said. "It's the color of the sky and water and blue berries. Do you eat blueberries?"
"I like fruit!" She was super excited. "I eat fruit, liquid, and sometimes candy."
They didn't look happy about that, but one of them tended to hide that more.
"You ate regular meals too," Aguri pointed out.
"Yeah, sometimes Aunt Akari would take me out," she said again.
"Vegetables?" Aguri asked. "Any meat?"
"I've eaten pizza, I like pizza," Emiko said. "Aunt Akari orders us pizza sometimes at the restaurants. That's a vegetable."
"That's stretching the definition really far," Luna complained. "Did Lola ever get you a lunch or breakfast?"
"Fruit. I eat apples, oranges, grapes, watermelon, melon, or whatever fruit she has. I don't like when it rots," she said casually. "She can handle the rotten ones, but I can't. Disgusting."
"Not even toast?" Luna asked.
"I toast my grape juice to Aunt Akari."
"You should be eating full meals, everyday," Aguri said for him. "Fruit is only a start, it isn't a meal. What did you eat for lunch the day before you met us?"
"The fruit was rotten, I took a bite out of stuff and tossed it."
"The day before that?"
"I had two apples."
"Before that?"
"Two apples."
"She is octopus," Luna said strangely, but he didn't look much better.
"I don't care if they are invincible." Aguri watched as Etsuko went laughing and rolling by. "They should be eating meals to grow healthy and strong. Why didn't Akari at least feed her more?"
Agreed. "Lola probably thought a goddess was invincible."
Emiko went back to coloring as Aguri went to her phone and started talking to her Aunt Akari. The conversation didn't take long.
"Okay. There is something different about them than us," Aguri said toward Luna. "Emiko can't control her changes when she eats too much of anything but fruit. Her ability to change colors or forms disappears and she stays an octopus. Akari gives something every once in awhile to try and keep her healthy, but more lenient amounts and never raw."
"Not raw," Luna said to her. "Baked, like in pizza. How long is she numbed from her abilities?"
"She said she gave her a piece of raw broccoli once and was stuck for four hours as a yellow octopus."
"Yellow?"
"Yeah."
The kitty in the coloring book was looking better, but it should still have that blue. She still wanted her blue back. Instead they were talking about food and colors. "I want the blue." There, maybe if she repeated it, they would give it to her. "Please."
Luna gave it to her. She took it and started to color, but he swiped another one of her colors. A pretty one, one of the prettiest. A red.
"What's this color? It's one of the colors you said you know," he pointed out.
"Red." She reached for it and he gave it to her. Now, she had to hold the blue and red closer to her as she continued to color the kitty.
"What about this color?" He held up the happy bright color like the sun. "It's also your color. Probably not preferred color, but part of your natural color."
Natural color?
"When you eat the wrong thing, you turn this color," he said.
Oh, that means it was the color they kept talking about. "Yellow."
"Yep." He didn't give her the crayon though. "Could you please turn that color?"
Ugh. These teachers were getting really annoying. She changed from jealous tan to yellow.
"I mean, as an octopus," he requested.
Right. She turned into an octopus. He moved closer toward her. It was the shade of yellow she had seen him in before, he must have been fascinated on it being on her. Well, if it made him less grumpy with her, it was fine.
He gave her the yellow crayon. "Can you turn blue?"
She turned blue.
"Can you turn red?"
She turned red.
"Pink?"
She turned pink.
"Back to yellow."
She turned back to yellow.
"For the last, tan."
She turned back into her usual tan self and flipped back to human form with it. Then she went back to coloring the kitty while the other two started to busy themselves noticing that Etsuko might knock something down like the telephone. They were pushing on things to see how much force it took to break.
She began coloring on another page. I'm being a very good girl. My flower moments are really adding up. They better deliver. She was being very nice. Aunt Akari told her to always be nice to people she was with, but these people were weird. Luna either treated her like a student, or he stared at her like she was pure evil.
She hadn't even done anything bad yet. Aguri? She seemed nice, but she didn't trust nice. Aunt Akari made it clear her mom was hurt and stuck by Yanagisawa, who was supposed to be her dad. No one had anything right.
She took nothing lightly. She would color. She would play nice. She would get a good eye on everything first before she trusted these people. In the end, she didn't know them. She had no reason to trust people that didn't even really know her.
There was a lot of evil in the world. Everything they say could be a lie. After all, she was never allowed to even leave two apartments her whole life without a lot of covering and stress.
So, she just smiled. She just kept earning flower moments. She would be a good girl, until she knew more.
"Good work, Aguri," Yanagisawa thanked his accomplice Aguri. Chou Chou had taken over Aguri's name years ago. "Did you know about it being there?"
"The other egg of theirs? Not really, no," Chou Chou said. "I guess it stayed with its Aunt. Anyhow, I'm sure I made a good enough impression that he'll start using those pills. He has to keep his family safe, and you completely took over his Korosensei appearance."
Yanagisawa still didn't seem pleased. "I want the rest of the plans. I need him to get over here and work for me. Taking this appearance and making him have to use the idenity he despises was good, but it's not enough. Plus, he has my real Aguri."
Real Aguri. Real Aguri. "She's a puny whimp that can't even fight, Yanagi. She was just a boring teacher, what do you want her for?" Plus, she was Aguri. She had her shells because he needed an Aguri beside him. If he gained the real one, what would become of her?
"I see things through," he lied. "She was my fiance before everything turned to hell. I gained my limbs and my reputation back with some of the scientific community. I should complete the whole puzzle and get her back."
"Screw her, I look like her, it's close enough," she insisted. He swung at her but she just caught him. "Don't. I'll try and kill you again or we'll end up in bed together, and I am not in the mood when you are talking about a stupid ex fiance."
He grumped but pulled back.
"Besides, you need me." She arched herself on her back along his desk as she tried to use her accent she used as a kid. "Only Chou Chou, the former student that Korosensei couldn't save could make him dumb enough to take those pills." The accent failed miserably, she hadn't spoken like that in many years. She was already in her twenties now. "You don't have long. You even have a tracer in it to find him each time. When you want to find him."
"L-lady Aguri?" The dumb Sanctuarian Digi interrupted them. "Sorry. You have mail?"
Mail. "It better be good." She moved toward Digi and grabbed the box without a thank you. She went to Yanagi's desk and opened it up. "Oooh." She picked up the diamond bracelet. "Falling in love with me or just love the way I mess around, Yanagi?"
"I need you to help me with something. As always, you're easily boughten."
She didn't care, it was the truth. She closed the door on Digi who was still standing there. "He's getting nosier." She moved closer to the door and spoke louder. "If he pokes his tentacles any farther into anything, you might just have to kill him, God of Death." She felt better when she heard a quick shuffling to get away. There, prying ears were gone. "What do you need?"
"Korosensei is probably at a hotel right now. If not out shopping for a way to make Aguri look less like you," Yanagisawa answered. "I want you to get a small camera into the hotel room. I want to learn about his girls. I want to watch him walk around as the God of Death again."
"You want something you can sink your teeth into, to make him cave and help you," she said. "I doubt they are up and leaving wherever they are at easily. At least, not all at once."
"Then go visit him yourself. He'd be happy to see you," he said with a smirk.
"It'd be a real coincidence I happened to find his exact hotel room."
"Tell him that you found out that I put a tracer in the pills, and you came to get them away from him."
"So that you could find him when the moment is right?" Right. "You're a terrible person," she agreed. "He'd have to fall for that. Still, it feels stupid. He won't use them anymore."
"Give him a fresh box." Yanagisawa gave her another box. "Ensure him it's safe."
"He probably still wouldn't blindly trust them."
"He would have to. He can't show his face as well, me, anymore." Yanagisawa pointed to his smiling face. "Korosensei is me. His fun loving past with Aguri and the school is mine. He's nothing but the God of Death, an assassin who butchered many people."
Hmm. "He'd be conflicted, especially since he thinks I'm just trying my best to help him out." Interesting. "At the very least, it'd be entertaining. Sure," she agreed. "I'll go see my old teacher, warn him of everything, and find out his weaknesses."
"He has so many you can't name them all," Yanagisawa insisted. "He wanted weakness. No, I don't want you to study him. I want you to study his girls."
Hmph. "Why don't you just use the information you have, grab Aguri, make him give you what you want and kill him?"
"Because I may have the loyalty of his student, and I may be able to take him down, but it would be much more enriching if I turned one of his daughters against him too. It shouldn't be hard. He's not exactly dad of the year I'm sure, and his past history, I've got thousands of articles I could show the little tike."
Stupid. "Just kidnap Aguri, make him do what you want, and then kill them both." Screw this other Aguri too, this was her life now. Hers! She did everything for it. And she would never return back to that cephalapod look again.
Chou Chou was long since dead, died the day they changed her. This was her now, and this was her life. Accidents happen. He can't want her that much. "You know, you could kill him for good. If Aguri dies, he dies too. They are connected. Making him watch her die seems a way better idea than using some child that's too young to do anything."
"Aguri." His warning voice. "I warn you. Don't try to mess with the real Aguri."
"I'm just saying, if I, his beloved student, massacre her gruesomely in front of him, he'd either start to die, or want to fight his old student. You want that student vs. teacher showdown? That's how to make it happen."
"If he starts to fight you, he'll kill you," Yanagisawa warned her.
"Then I die. All I have is this shell of a body for a life," she insisted. "I'd rather die than give up my identity, this is me!"
"Would he really kill you? Would he put up the will to fight?" He seemed to be thinking about it. "I don't know. While it's nice revenge, It doesn't help me keep my reputation high with Sanctuary. Without them, I lose all connections to my current work, and then I lose the small amount of gain I've made across the scientific communities again."
Bull! He just wants the real Aguri to survive for him. That and he was almost intoxicated by the thought of not just a student, but Korosensei's own flesh and blood, betraying him. It was a bad idea though. Chou Chou was an older kid at the time but she was unpredictable. This girl that grew up without them? She was going to be like seven, a horrifying age to raise. She might be tricked into going against her old teacher, but she might not be. Kids were undefined. No one should suspect success or failure.
But the idea was so tempting to Yanagisawa, he didn't care. It was just stupid. Expecting kids to be in the plans would make it a massive failure. "I guess I better go visit then," she muttered. "While you think about what you want."
"Just report back to me what you get," he commanded.
She didn't answer as she opened the door and left.