Project: Karma

38 | Temptation

<Kaede>
When I woke up for scene rehearsals, the first thing I did was check my emails. I took my cursor and clicked on the recents and skimmed over the junk. Huh? What's this? It was from the director and producer of the movie I was co-staring in.

"What's that?" Okuda shadowed behind me as I was sitting at the desk. She sipped away at her reddish yellow breakfast smoothie.

"Let me see." I brought the email to full size.

"Is it from Japan? Yukiko hung over with her black hair, slightly dripping onto my arm. She had just got out of the shower and had not dried off her hair yet.

I tilted my head and shook.

"No, just my boss." I said. "They're saying that everything is moving along ahead of schedule. If we keep up the good work, I'll be finished earlier than the deadline." I explained.

Okuda randomly grabbed both my hands and spun me with the chair to face her. The sparkles and cuteness she possesses in her eyes.

"Ah! That means you get to go back home early!" She pointed out. "2 years reduced to 5 months? What luck!"

"You're right!" I bolted from my seat and playfully hugged both of them.

"That's great Kaede!" Yukiko happily giggled. "Who knew that the duration would be cut!" She swung my arms and gleamed.

I nodded my head and partied along with them. I get to go home early! Is this a sign? Does the higher power somewhere in the heavens above, want me to go back home to Japan? To see Sugino?
•••••
<Irina>
Tadaomi's acrimonious facial expression kept me from finishing up my weekly reports, as he loomed over with impatience. The angst residing in my stomach.

"Can you give me some space, sweet heart?" I whirled around and raised a brow and waited for his reply. Ugh, his work total mode always turns me off.

"All you're doing is boondoggling, Irina. I'm a busy man. The reports on Project:Karma, now." He folded his arms and sighed.

"If people still agreed with Carte Blanche, I would have already slapped you for being so rude." I stuck out my tongue. "Here, take it." I shoved the folders in his arms and stood up from my desk.

"It's not like you to not be cloying." Tadaomi watched as I started walking away from the desk.

"Huh? Not cloying? Hmm, I wonder why." I twirled the locks of my hair around my index finger and pouted. "I'll play with you next time when you're not being so brusque." I brushed my hair out was sass and left the lab.

<Karasuma>
I placed the folder on the desk and made myself comfortable. I flipped it open and started with the first page. This may be considered ennui, but work is work. The ones who do find this a chore, shouldn't have the right to work here.

"Ahh, Karasuma. Fancy meeting you here." The nightmares of all my dreams, showed up with such a friendly cheeky face that it made me cringe and want to leave.

He came in for a hug from behind but I hammered my hand on his head.

"Don't touch me so freely." I warned.

"Ouch. So violent." He teared up with a puppy-like expression. "This is why you're still single."

"Maybe this is why you're not married yet." I countered. "Isn't it about time? Or is something in your way?" I questioned.

We both exchanged eyes for awhile and waited. He had something on his mind, so did I.

"Fastidious as always." Koro-sensei nodded his head in approval. "Anyway, you looking over document files on Project Karma?" He leaned over and peeked.

"Anything that caught your eye? Want me to explain anything?" He grinned with a joking gesture.

"Trying to finagle me, aren't you?" I rolled my eyes and realized that something was off. Like he had set me up in trap, in order to make me ask questions.

"Why is Project Karma diverging from his planned schedule?" I looked at him with a stern expression. Waiting for the glib he was about to tell me.

"He's a special case. I don't have the entire custody over him anymore, at least to such extent. I handed him over to my underlings for the time being." He replied.

"You're violating the contract." I said as he looked at me with a gregarious tease.

Koro-sensei pointed at the papers.

"You're mistaken. We're not violating or threatening the contract at all. Simply put, were doing want you want and what we want." I could sense the insanity in him. "Besides my good friend, no harm is there?" He chuckled.

"You'll ruin another good opportunity by proceeding carelessly again. Remember?"

"You're incorrect again. I bet you never heard that in awhile. Karasuma, Project: Death is nothing like Project: Karma. I think Project: Karma, as he's run by my own student will show greater potential than Death himself."

"And the bases of these assumptions are from what?" I stood in front of him, eyeing him to the core.

He smirked.

This chilling sensation that I knew. He couldn't have been so lenient would he? Just what had those scientists under his wing, have been doing to Karma?

"That idiosyncratic ways of yours is going to kill us all." I grabbed his collar. "You better know your place Grim Reaper, or I'm revoking the contract." I threatened.

"Hahaha, why so malaise? I can tell that your quite woke on the matter on hand. Project: Karma will surpass Death."

"How are you so sure?" I asked.

Koro-sensei took my hands and freed himself from my grasp.

"Unlike Death who could not maintain social nor emotional logics, Karma can. That is enough to create good and even wreak havoc. Lets sit back and relax, watch those two create something evolutionary!"

There. I knew it. This man had lost his mind.
••••••
<Karma>
Even after Nagisa had left, I couldn't shake off the feeling that she was internally hurt by my shallow words of rejection. My memories, in terms for me, were oblivion. I didn't really care to think about it, nor did I want to head down to memory lane.

I know that Nagisa has different opinions on that, despite the fact that I had said no. Why would I want my previous memories returned to me? Can it be true? That Nagisa and I met before I was subjected to experiments? Am I allowed to immerse myself into those old recollections of my life?

If that's so, I would want to remember my life when I knew Nagisa. For her, it must of been heartbreaking for me to say no. I never thought in this kind of cruel world that it was actually such a small world.
It digs into my soul. Painful and caustic. That I made my dear Nagisa, cry for me like that.

I'm a monster. I don't deserve a selfless woman like her. It will only lead to destruction. I'm sorry Nagisa, that I burdened you so much.