Project: Karma

39 | Stripped Away

<Nagisa>
It's just been so awkward coming back to work and seeing Karma. Some place in my heart, it restricts me from being comfortable around him. I'm still hung over the fact that he didn't want his memories returned. Might as well not ask him. There is no point right? Right?

"Nagisa, I've done the scan and everything already. Just do the reports okay?" Shi met me in the Project: Karma department, just outside the lab door on her way out.

"Yeah, I got it." I looked over her shoulder and into the lab windows. I really didn't want to go in there alone.

"Where are you heading?" I pulled on her sleeve.

The ambivalence of it was that I'd rather follow her, then to go inside. Shi raised a brow and slightly coughed.

"Um, just to the Project: Itona, really quick. Why?" She stared off into the anomaly she found in my glance.

"Don't worry about it. I'll go in." I shook my head. "I'll see you later."

"You're not going anywhere."

I glanced over to see three men behind Shi. Two of them, faced their loaded guns at us. At me. The man in the middle was Karasuma, the inspector.

"What's the meaning of this?" Shi placed her hands on her hips and questioned. "Why are you aiming those at us?"

"Nagisa Shiota, by orders of the MD committee, you're under arrest for engaging in clandestine labs." Karasuma announced.

"Huh?! What?!" Shi clocked her head at me, turned back and looked at them.

"Arrested?" I repeated.

He nodded his head.
"That can't be right sir." I disagreed.

"You must be mistaken." Shi tried to save me.
I always knew that they would catch on, but not this quick. Not specifically by the MD themselves.

"Come quietly." One of them gripped tightly onto my left arm.

"Release me now!" I swiped away my arm, but he caught it again and then twisted it behind my back. Taking me down.

"Hey!-" Shi tried to intervene but the other man in black had the gun to her head.

Karasuma stood above me.
"I don't want to turn this into more of a conundrum. Please reframe yourself from resisting Shiota." Then Karasuma walked over to Shi and placed his hand on her delicate shoulder. "Unless you also want to be interrogated for federal offense?"

"You've gone mad! How dare you?!" Shi was flabbergasted from his words.

Karasuma gestured his hand and the man ceased, lowering his gun at Shi.

"We're on a tight schedule. Handcuff her and let's get going." Karasuma demanded.

I ended up not screaming for my rights. They all got up and ran off long time ago. I knew this was going to happen. Just why?
The man took out the dangling silver handcuffs and rendered my hands useless. Shi had a disconcerting expression as they took me out of the Project: Karma Dep. and down the halls to the lobby. Everyone stopped and stared.

"Aren't you going a little too far Tadaomi?" Koro-sensei laid his hand on Karasuma's shoulder, with a slight joke in his voice.

"Then you shouldn't have hinted at all. In the end, you asked for it, didn't you?"

"What?" I couldn't comprehend it. Koro-sensei ratted me out? This is why I'm getting arrested?

I looked at him directly and he slowly faced me. That grin on his face. What's he trying to do? Does he hate my labs and alterations that badly that he got the government involved?!
I thought he was a better man than this! I thought he was on my side!

"Koro-sensei!" I called his name as I felt disfranchised from everything.

He came closed to my ear and whispered.
"Nagisa dear, you must disseminate your goals clearly. That way, no one can come between you and Karma. Like sales pitching. You must wow them." He leaned away and chuckled. "That's if you can." He scoffed at practically all my hard work towards Project: Karma.

Is he analyzing how I would come out of the MD unscathed? He finds this amusing?
So this is me and Karma, against the world?
••••••
<Karma>
Huh? I wonder where they went all of a sudden? I watched as Shizuka entered the lab with a despondent and anxious facial expression. She started to waltz up and down the room talking to herself.

"Where's Nagisa? I was just there." I asked.
Shizuka halted and froze her movements.

"She's been arrested." She confessed.

"What? Arrested for what?" I questioned.

"Misuse of labs." Shizuka replied. "If anything, I should of been arrested too-"

"And you just let them take her like that?!" I rammed my fist against the wall.

With everything that was happening, she was quite startled by my aggression. She fell to her knees and started to sob.

"What could I do, when a gun was aimed at my head?" Shizuka crouched over, trying to hide her guilt. "Nagisa's signed up for this didn't she? What could I do?"

Her pitiful cries reminded me of Nagisa's painful weeps. All I could think about was Nagisa and how frightened she must be! For me to blame Shizuka is blaming the entire world. I know for sure, that she wasn't against us.

"She'll come back." I assured. Even if I tried to comfort her, I was trying to save myself.
"We will wait for her arrival." I added.

"I'm sorry Karma." She raised her head. "I should of done something more-"

I shook my head and slightly smiled.
"It's quite alright, you tried didn't you?" I could see through her soul that she did put up some type of fight for her. For me, that is all enough. "Nagisa's a strong woman. Let's not fret over this."

Shizuka nodded her head and wiped away her tears.

"You need to know that the MD didn't just suddenly arrest without a basis of justice, Koro-sensei was the one who called them."

"What? He did?" My hands heated up and I clobbered the dome wall. The cracks deepening.

"I don't know why he would."  Shizuka sniffled. "I thought he was on our side."

Suddenly a tight clenching hand laid upon my heart. A realization that didn't come to mind.
The MD is a respected organization, if brought to court and tried guilty. Nagisa would face death sentence.

"Shizuka-"

When I called her name she had the look in her eye. She knew what I was about to say. Shizuka was biting down from wailing anymore. She and I both knew what might become of her. Death.