Eyes of Azure | Assassination Classroom

:: Attempt 24 | Treat You Better ::

"What do you mean she's gone?!? I can help her, I know I can!"

"Look, lad, you're better off not meddling in this business."

"I don't care what happens to me, as long as I can save her—save Abel!"

She's humming softly under her breath, and she barely looks up at me through unfocused eyes. Her head dips, occasionally tipping to one side, try as she might to hide her sleepiness. I try my best not to grin, but it overpowers my control as she finally surrenders, leaning her head against my shoulder.

If only she could be honest with her words as she does with her actions—it'd make communication between us two much easier. But then again, Aoi ain't an easy person to decipher, and it's what makes her, her.

All around us, our 'classmates' continue on with their chatter. It's as if they have worlds of their own, absorbed in their own little planets and talking to those who understand them best.

And if those worlds do exist... I lift a hand, careful not to disturb my parabatai, and slowly pry the book from her hands, setting it on my lap instead. Aoi shifts, just the slightest, and her hair brushes across my jaw.

Then we're in a world of our own, if only in this moment.

I lean my head back, looking to my right as I watch the scenery pass by through the windows. I can still hear the noise, but I don't pay attention.

After class a while back, the government official had pulled Aoi and I aside. He'd looked at us both, as if assessing our skill sets. Aoi didn't seem to mind, and neither did I—we were both used to being analyzed (or scanned like processed meat, as 'Seis' might've said) by the other members of the Sibyl when we were first promoted to become Elite Agents.

We were used to the criticism, the pointed comments, the insults and disbelief. They said we were too young, too naïve, too innocent. As if there was still any left of that after we'd joined the organization. We'd all but torn all that shit away and sent it ahead to the hell we knew we'd come to.

I'd remembered trying to pull my parabatai away from attempting to dismember somebody who'd gone too far. The others learned their lesson from sensing her immense blood lust at that moment.

(Sure, her huge vocabulary of curse words and death threats probably helped too.)

To get to where we were, we had to fight for it, had to prove ourselves. That small examination done by the government agent (Seriously, I probably still hafta figure out what his name is) wasn't something new.

We'd been briefed on the field trip-slash-assassination attempt—a three-day, two-night trip to Kyoto. The Class E students were split up into four groups, and planning their routes so that some sniper hired by the government could put an Anti-Sensei bullet through the target's head, but we weren't part of them. We were on our own, free to either observe the target or come up with an assassination plan of our own.

Aoi chose the former option—"We'll be better off seeing more of the target in question," were her exact words. "Observing his movement patterns and ways of dealing with the students and those around him may prove to give us a hint on how to get rid of it."

She'd narrowed her eyes, crossed her arms beneath her chest as she gave the agent her patented 'Don't mess with me,' look. "Besides, you wouldn't want two mercenaries interfering with the attempts of the assassin the government sent, would you?"

Sometimes, her logic scares me. Not that I'd admit it, 'course.

And so it was: Aoi and I made up Group Five, the additional group to the so-called End Class students, but we had our own things to deal with. We could still roam around Kyoto, but we were free to do whatever we wanted: either mess with the target in some way that won't interfere with the other groups' routes, or just plain observe what happens. But there was a catch: we were also required to give aid to the students if ever there was an unpredicted situation.