Chapter Text
Everyone looked like ants from up there.
When the cirrus clouds didn’t veil the sight between the jet and the ground below enough, the American East Coast — splattering grey smears of cities and suburbs surrounded by the dark forests, itself stabbed by the light green of golf courses — was much like every other coastline in the world, too recognizable in their eyes: in two hours or so, they would land in New York.
Izuru considered all of this for one second or two before driving their attention back to what kept their hands busy: Yamamoto-san had handed them the ledgers with an embarrassed laugh as he talked about his charity foundation, something about healing kids with chronic diseases, he’d said. Spreading Hope, he’d joked, knowing full well Izuru didn’t draw any difference between that and cooking the books of a fake charity aimed at laundering money. They corrected, recalculated the numbers that would definitely cause an audit — eleven mistakes, — signed off, set the pen down, gathered the papers and extended it towards him, sitting diagonally opposite to them.
It took, Izuru waited, four seconds for Yamamoto to climb back from the thoughts he’d lost himself in, eyes unfocused somewhere, fingers tapping against the armrest. When he grabbed the papers, it was with this short smile he’d drawn simply for conventions, a muttered thank you and nothing else. The glass of cognac that laid on the table before him stayed untouched. Nobody really seemed in the mood for alcohol, all four of them looked pale and lightheaded and found pleasure in spreading that tension within the jet through their own silences. Watanabe, whose career at Hope’s Peak had earned him the title of Minister of Education, scrolled and scrolled on his phone to pretend being busy and pretend his thumb wasn’t trembling. Satō, Minister of Defense, paced and paced, sometimes to the bathrooms, sometimes to the cockpit, in some dance that stressed everyone more than anything.
Aoyama — Father, or so they called him, Prime Minister, — sitting across from Izuru, stared right at them. Izuru stared back. They counted two years, one hundred and sixty-two days since the last time they had gathered with the four members of the Steering Committee right after the completion of the project. None of them looked particularly thrilled about it.
“It’s a good idea,” Aoyama’s thumb brushed the hem of his sleeves, his stare never leaving Izuru’s. “The congress."
“We should’ve stayed classic,” Watanabe rubbed his face with a long sigh, “pay a newspaper to run a nice piece, have them say what we want them to say, put some journalists on a lifetime retainer, be done with it.”
“... and be outed for conspiracy. Do you sincerely believe it’d be a better alternative?”
Watanabe sighed. It wouldn’t, indeed, he knew and all of them knew they’d backed themselves in a corner with that strange god they created for themselves sitting idly before them. Aoyama raised his head and forced a smile Izuru could read too well. Self-reassurance. It wasn’t a good idea.
“Tell me, Izuru, about your work with Satō-san. You’ve undertaken negotiations abroad with France yesterday, haven’t you? Their defense minister is a stubborn man, truly, but our relations with them have been stable lately, more or less. No reason for it to go wrong. Especially when you oversaw the construction of the new aircrafts. Truly the most performant on the market, now.” His smile grew fonder, “Congratulations.”
“Thank you, Father. It will not be finalized.”
From Izuru’s peripheral vision, Satō turned towards them.
“Why is that?”
“Their body language.” Izuru looked away, “Satō-san assumed they were eager. They were only performing.”
They’d seen it within one word uttered by France: the delay in their smiles, something that could be counted in microseconds but something that Izuru, still, could discern. The dilated pupils of their economic advisor, the way he gulped when they reached the discussions of contracts, that tone of theirs when they said, we’ll get back to you. If Satō did not care for diplomacy, Izuru would’ve gladly informed him of the pointlessness of the meeting here and there so they’d go waste their time somewhere else, but Izuru had learned that these specific subtypes of parasites loved dragging people like them down to their level of mundane conversations and apathetic smiles. Much like that congress they mentioned.
Satō nodded slowly though his stare, attempting and failing to decipher the thing standing before him, completely betrayed this false warmth Father, on the other hand, wielded much more skillfully.
“And France can’t afford it,” Izuru continued.
“They certainly can,” Satō interjected.
“No. They’ve diverted their funds elsewhere.”
Everybody stared at them, now. Satō leaned in closer.
“To the same place every country diverts their Defense funds towards.” Izuru blinked, “their own Kamukura Project.”
Aoyama let out a short exhale. Nobody seemed particularly surprised by the conclusion. France had insisted on Izuru's presence just enough for it to feel suspicious, after all. Much like every other country close enough to Japan to know about the Kamukura Project, so much so that Izuru has found themselves to be quite a great tool for diplomacy just by their mere presence. Either way…
“It’ll fail.” Izuru looked away at the window, “like any other attempts at it. Because they lack the curated talent pool Hope's Peak Academy provided to begin with.”
Silence settled for a second or two before Aoyama took in that stillness and smiled, a real one this time, reaching out a hand to cup Izuru’s jaw and tilting it just so slightly to get them to look right back at him, at the admiration he’d plaster just for them.
“There he is,” he cooed, “my boy.”
Izuru leaned mechanically into the touch. Father's thumb brushed their cheek before moving higher, letting his fingers thread through their hair, grabbing some strands here and there as if he, with every gentle interaction, examined his little prized possession. Presentable.
“Thank you, Father.”
“Nothing to worry about,” he whispered to himself.
Izuru hummed quietly and laid their head against the wall of the jet. Outside, the Atlantic Sea stretched in an infinite blue beneath them. They would’ve appreciated resting a bit, but from their right, Yamamoto, who could barely hide the shaking in his arms, finally leaned over.
“And what do you make of the bioethics congress?”
It only took this word for everyone to turn around and stare at Izuru like a messiah about to deliver the gospel. That was the question all along, wasn’t it? The ghost haunting every single one of their forced smiles or pacing or nervous stares or trembling limbs.
You could only hide a superhuman from the general public for so long. After two years, they had, of course, expected rumors and leaks, but they could only make so many whistleblowers die of sudden, mysterious cancers as well. Now journalists and ethicists were pulling out obviously-fake, obviously-hyperbolic fantaisies of Hope’s Peak kidnapping and experimenting on underage students and giving them lobotomies, which was obviously fake as proven by the forged photographs and documents attesting of Izuru’s biological origins, Izuru Kamukura the First’s great-grandson, prodigy since birth.
They had to face this, sooner or later, they knew that. The more time went on without Izuru’s name uttered, the more the world screamed.
“For my first public appearance,” Izuru began, “the best course of action is to clear the air with our biggest detractors first. The bioethicists themselves won’t believe a single word we say, their careers would become even more useless if they agreed with the truth you will give them, but the global media will believe what I say, because we will provide facts. You will just need to use this exchange to then depict the opponents as self-righteous parasites feeding off controversies.”
They didn’t seem impressed by the gospel.
“... They’ll be ruthless, Izuru.” Yamamoto said, quietly.
“I will be flawless.” Izuru ignored the sigh coming in Watanabe’s direction. “I am talented in debate and-”
“No, you don’t understand.”
Watanabe’s hand shakily grabbed his own glasses to wipe them off with a small tissue. Something, Izuru knew, he would do only to keep his trembling hands busy.
“I trust you, Kamukura-san,” he sighed, “and I know you have the arguments. But it won’t be a trial, it will feel like one, but it’s not your logic they’ll be evaluating, but you. Your tone, your apathy… do you understand?”
“Yes.”
Aoyama’s stare, when they looked at him, had shifted to something cold. Next to them, Yamamoto shoved his face in his own hands and let out a long, deep sigh. Satō found something better to do in the cockpit, and Watanabe remained there, visibly stunned, wondering whether they were doing it on purpose. There was a vein appearing on his temple Izuru had only seen whenever the man got angry. Or stressed out, judging by the second shaky sigh that came out of his mouth.
“No you don’t,” he got to his feet to stand right in front of Izuru. “If you did, you would’ve let us cut this months ago.” His fingers passed through their hair — untamed thing that fell around their own frame, covered their face, — firmly, as if believing he could flatten it easily this way. “Look at yourself. You’re supposed to be intelligent, Kamukura, what about this makes you sincerely believe this is an appropriate haircut for a congress?”
Izuru looked down, mostly because they found their lap to be a better sight than Watanabe’s sweaty face. They looked down in a display that would make anyone looking at the scene, right now, laugh if you’d tell them it was, indeed, the Ultimate Hope, culmination of the potential of humanity sitting there, being scolded like a problem dog. They found no use answering, though. That had been a topic for three years, the hair will stay untouched.
“We’re asking you to be human, Izuru.” Yamamoto leaned in, “the Ultimate Human. That was the whole goal of the project, can you do that?”
His arm reached out to Izuru’s wrist who immediately yanked their arm back. Instead, they raised their fist in self-defense and would have easily struck if Aoyama didn’t half-rise from his seat. Yamamoto didn’t back away, but his pupils sure as hell widened enough to swallow all the brown hues of his irises.
Slowly, Izuru eased. They lowered their hands and, their eyes still fixed on the Minister, placed their arm back in his grasp, letting him pull back their sleeve and examine what hid underneath. There, on their wrist was etched a constellation of deep, bite marks. Some old, some fresh leaving the otherwise perfect, porcelain skin bruised in blue-purplish spots. They had taken to biting himself without really understanding why, a habit the scientists working on the project had documented ever since the beginning without anyone finding a way to stop this, nor without any of them able to find an explanation to their behavior. All Izuru knew was that amongst the infinite abyss of boredom they drowned in, the pain of desecrating their own body felt like everything.
“They say you’re a god,” his voice dropped to a whisper, “yet you act like a sick dog. Can you tell me why?”
Izuru pulled their sleeves down and chose not to answer, only stared as Yamamoto covered his face with his hands which, in turn, made Watanabe sigh a third time. A shitshow, that congress, even a day before it actually starts. They still made a mental note of biting on easier-to-hide places next time.
“When we get out of this plane,” Aoyama breathed in, “the media will be present on the tarmac. Every journalist all around the world will want a shot of you, Izuru. I want you to get down those steps and smile and be human.”
“Human,” Izuru repeated blankly, the same thing they’re asking them to be over and over again.
“Yes. Smile.”
Izuru blinked.
“Smile, Izuru.”
“It will look fake.”
Aoyama stilled. He breathed in, “you’re going to look at me, and you’re going to smile.”
“Father, I am unable to-”
The slap echoed in the room and snapped their head to the sides. Izuru had seen it coming since the pause Aoyama marked, but they took the hit anyway. They turned their head back, stared at Aoyama in the eyes, and smiled.
Or attempted to. Rather, they stretched their mouth wide, like a child attempting a grimace to ruin a photo for the sake of it, a grimace that could very well ruin the carefully-constructed plans the Steering Committee had made up for the past two years. So much worse than their blank face, devoid of any life. That, according to Aoyama, very well earned a second, harder slap. Izuru’s head bowed, letting their hair hide their face.
On their right, Watanabe muttered. “He can predict the outcome of diplomatic negotiations, he could destroy this whole plane in a heartbeat, but he is unable to smile. We’ve truly created a monster, haven’t we?”
But it was Father Izuru looked at when they raised their head. He rubbed his face with one hand, let out a long sigh, and gestured dismissively towards the bathroom.
“Out.”
Izuru walked to the bathrooms and locked the door behind them.
They found that enclosed, narrow spaces and white cold lights eased them down, reminding them of the first days of their own existence with padded rooms, the comfort of the restraints, the daze of the sedation. Here, they couldn’t hear the minister’s voices anymore, only the hum of the jet. They stood before the mirror and stared at whatever stared back, the Ultimate Hope, with a red mark on their cheek and bite marks on their wrist. What a joke.
Izuru, though, wasn’t really angry. Rather, they noted too well that specific dissonance between the teachings of the Steering Committee and the reality of the situation: parasites ganging up to bring down talented people to their own pathetic level. How could they not think about these simple, predictable creatures that dared to slap and insult them? They’d call this unfair if they deeply didn’t care about it. They thought, dully, that the Steering Committee had done that job well, at least, stripping them of any wish for anything better. A stupid dog, Izuru thought... What a joke.
For now, all that mattered was that the plane would land soon and Aoyama had told them to act human.
They reached for the hairbrush beside the sink and brushed their hair in long, steady strokes that meant to detangle less than soothe. They felt as the brush scratched gently against their scalp, tugged just slightly their hair strands, watched as each stroke parted their hair into several thin ink cascades. After a while, they lost track of how long they’d stayed here, like that, studying the movement of their own hair at the brush disrupted its perfect flow, how silky and soft the strands felt beneath their fingers, before they gathered it into a bun they secured with a hairpin.
The makeup came next. Izuru spread the concealer over the spot where Aoyama slapped them, added another layer of foundation to uniformize their complexion as best as they could and, when they’d judged it okay enough, stepped back to stare at themselves.
My boy, they mouthed. Their jaw tensed.
They attempted a smile, this time they could see themselves as they did it: focusing on the specific muscles on their faces, they knew it all, obviously. A flexion on their zygomaticus major to open their mouth wide and show their teeth. A tension applied to their orbicularis oculi to spread that smile to their eyes. A kind smile, a real one. The face in the mirror looked back at them with the disgusting snarl of a cornered dog. They couldn’t even fool themselves.
By the time Izuru reached the front of the cabin, the Steering Committee had already gathered near the exit. Through the oval windows, the runway stretched beneath the sunset and, on the tarmac, crowds had already begun to gather. They could feel the collective tension even through the door: the faint noise of camera shutters and raised voices even through the sound of the engine. The last-minute changes in the rules, when they’d instructed Izuru, were simple: no interviews, no press conferences, not when Izuru couldn’t even be trusted with smiling properly, they would simply walk down the stairs to the convoy. You can do something as simple as that, right? Watanabe had said, almost hopeful.
Satō, when Izuru came to stand next to their handlers, stepped forwards to make some adjustments. His fingers straightened their collar, a hand placed underneath their chin raised their head up, if you look down, you’ll look guilty, he muttered. Another hand settled on their shoulder to get them to straighten up, tugged at their sleeves to hide the bite marks. When he stepped back, he stared for a moment silently, imagining what the cameras would see. There. All good.
The Prime Minister, when Izuru glanced toward him, made it a point to stare at the aircraft door instead. The smile really upsetted him, did it?
Yamamoto breathed in, “remember the-”
“- training. Yes.” Izuru kept their attention on the door. Yamamoto brought his hands over his face.
“And for fuck’s sake… Just act human.”
Izuru hummed.
“And don’t smile.”
Izuru looked away. Yamamoto’s face collapsed, but through the window, from outside, a member of the airport staff signaled and they didn’t have the time to argue about it any further.
The door opened.
The noise reached them immediately. Their own name echoed from every direction at once, swallowed beneath the pouring of camera shutters. The flashes hit Izuru before they could even remember what to do, then thousands of white bursts, it seemed, erupting against the orange glow of the late afternoon sun.
At the same time, the cold, the wind, the humidity, the pressure, all different from the airplane, all of it collided into a single assault that made Izuru forget to breathe.
Forget to walk. For a few seconds, Izuru simply stood there like a feral animal scared of human contact. They might as well be: their entire existence from birth could’ve been summarized to padded rooms and laboratories, silent, structured meeting rooms and negotiation chambers. They thought, fleetingly, that a public setting would’ve been a nice change of pace, he couldn’t fully predict chaos. Instead, Izuru faced a thousand stimuli at once they could process too perfectly, discern too perfectly, predict too perfectly, so much so that they couldn’t do much else except standing there and taking it. The security personnel before them crowding around the Ministers, the journalists shoving one another, fighting for the first row, the screams overlapping. The guards of honor lined up near the plane to greet them, the American and Japanese flags set up.
Before them, the Steering Committee moved naturally towards the airport officials who’d come to greet them, as if this cacophony only meant routine to them. The voices shouting Izuru’s names multiplied and it’s when Father walked back and extended his hand for Izuru to grab that they understood it’s them they wanted. The moment they stepped onto the stairway, the shutters, the shouts, the noises all surged in intensity. Soon, every single flash engraved itself in their vision until they weren’t really sure what they were looking at, no matter how much they attempted to focus. Soon, they drowned all of Izuru’s senses until they fell in this limbo just above consciousness where nothing really felt like anything. They looked down to their own hand grabbing Father’s, clutching so hard his fingertips colored itself purple with the lack of oxygen and couldn’t unclench it. For a few beats, they had forgotten where they were and knew that feeling too well.
“Father,”
“It’s Minister in public, Kamukura-san.”
“Minister. Seizure.” Izuru warned.
“No,” he pulled — gently enough to not warn the journalists — Izuru by his side so he could force his hand out of their grasp and place onto their upper back before nodding at the security agents to step closer. They attempted to form a wall between the Steering Committee and the media, but it only made the journalists fight back harder for their photos. When Izuru glanced over, they watched the way those leeches raised their cameras above their heads to try and get the perfect angle, how some of them tried to lean over to find that perfect shot, perfect timing in-between two security agents. How all of them shouted and hoped it would get Izuru’s attention.
“Kamukura-san, over here!”
“Can we get a statement, Kamukura-san?”
“What do you expect of tomorrow’s congress?”
“What does hope mean to you?”
Nothing, Izuru would’ve said if the flashes didn’t keep them from moving. Leave me alone.
“Keep walking,” Aoyama ordered through his clenched smile. But even as he gave them the command, the body beside him changed, all tension coiling in their body immediately vanishing and bringing their attention with it. Aoyama looked down and eyed their pace, walking still but slowing, or attempting to. Fuck. He knew those too well. Absence seizures, big enough to be a pain in the ass, but he thanked whatever God he believed in that it wasn't the kind of seizures that would've sent the damn thing convulsing on the ground in front of the media. Aoyama tightened his grip on the back of their costume and pushed them forwards, forcing them to walk at his pace. He couldn’t stop. Could not, for the love of god, have any of those cameras record the ultimate proof that they’d ruin the brains of a random kid just one day before the congress.
The other members of the Steering Committee had noticed. Satō drifted closer without being asked, positioning himself on Izuru's right. Watanabe and Yamamoto joined them as well, instinctively forming a barrier between Izuru and the cameras. To the journalists, this whole thing, or so Aoyama hoped, had simply looked like officials and security escorting a nervous young man through an overwhelming crowd that would’ve made everyone their age nervous.
“Kamukura-san, do you consider yourself human?”
“Kamukura-san is exhausted after the long negotiations in Paris,” he said. “He won’t take any questions. Everything will be answered tomorrow at the Bioethics Congress.”
They reached the car. The chauffeur opened the door and Aoyama hurled Izuru inside and stood as he watched, blankly, that little tantrum of theirs. Their breathing, shallow, irregular, eased as they brought their hands to their head and blinked, slowly, once, twice. Does he consider him as human? Aoyama’s not even sure what even was the nature of the thing before him, all he knows is that he would’ve never become the Prime Minister without it.
“We should ask for accommodations for the congress.” Yamamoto sighed. “Dim lights. Make sure we avoid this mess.”
“And have them ask why? Izuru will be normal tomorrow.”
Aoyama came to sit next to Izuru. By then, they propped themselves up by laying their head against the cold glass, bringing their two hands over their eyes to block out as much of the sunlight as they could. They trembled, still, but were conscious enough for Aoyama to be angry.
“You embarrassed me, Izuru,” he said. “I asked for two minutes of self-control, and you couldn’t even do that. You’re smart enough, aren’t you? So why can’t you follow basic instructions?”
Izuru breathed in.
And their lungs locked. The second they turned to eye Aoyama, their gaze lost focus once more. Their pupils dilated until it swallowed the crimson all around, and all that managed to come out of their mouth was a long, involuntary sigh.
“Izuru?”
Yamamoto, next to him, swore under his breath. Nothing, no answer. Izuru was gone again as quickly as they had crawled back to consciousness: their body stiffened abruptly, sliding off the seat until it landed in Aoyama's grasp and, as he laid them down, the shaking soon began in a series of small jerks travelling through their arms at first, then their legs, then their entire body.
“Easy,” Aoyama guiding Izuru’s head to settle it on his lap. “There we go. Let it pass. It’s okay.”
He looked down at them, stroking their hair in a slow, rhythmic motion until the seizure quickly faded from a violent tremor to the shy quiver brought by the aftershock. He grimaced seeing the saliva that had escaped Izuru’s mouth soiling his expensive suit, but Izuru had noticed it first and slowly brought their hand wiping it away.
Could he blame them for those? The convulsions, albeit inconvenient, had nothing to do with Izuru after all, simply the work of a stupid scientist who accidentally took more part of Izuru’s frontal lobe than he had been instructed to. Well, instead, he preferred seeing this as a side-effect: letting their emotions intact would’ve made Izuru too human, too unpredictable. Dully so, Father found they looked perfect, laying limp like this.
“You’re lucky I’m here. What would you do without me, Izuru? You’d be rotting away somewhere in a straitjacket, pumped full of medications until you couldn’t think anymore, wouldn’t you?”
Izuru didn’t answer, but slowly sat up to loll their head back against the backrest. They half-hid their face beneath their hands, but Aoyama could see their face contorted in pain, eyebrows knitted together, his mouth half-open gathering deep breaths in hopes of dulling that headache. That was perhaps the only other natural expression in Izuru’s register, apart from that blankness constantly engraved on there.
“The panel will be a disaster,” Satō climbed in the car, attempting his best to pretend he didn’t care one bit about the scene that had unfolded just before. “Noriko will destroy all of us.”
And none of them could deny it.
“We are here today for what I hope will be a cordial,” the moderator stressed on those words specifically which, paired with the way the entire panel looked like they readied themselves to pounce at each other’s throat, earned a few chuckles in the room, “-and productive conversation about human enhancement and its ethical implications. Our panelists today represent the former Steering Committee of Hope's Peak Academy, and joining them is Mr. Izuru Kamukura himself. Our respondent will be Dr. Yū Noriko, professor of bioethics at the MIT, former chair at the UNESCO IBC.”
“- And former Ultimate Bioethicist of Hope’s Peak’s Class 44th.” She turned to the Steering Committee with a smile. “Talk about a school reunion.”
That tone of hers held absolutely no kindness, none for the so-called prestigious school that had, to her, lost all credibility.
The organizers knew exactly what they were doing by placing Izuru right in the middle of the panel, perfectly in front of the camera, right in-between Aoyama to their left and Noriko to their right, didn’t they? On the scene, Izuru attempted to brush off that lingering headache that still subsisted after one day and eyed the feedback screen staring back, relaying the wide screen right before them, focusing solely on them.
The conference room, immense in itself, didn’t have enough seats to accommodate the crowd and half of them resigned to staying up, standing at the far end of the room. As if every single scientist and media around the world had come to New York for them specifically. Izuru’s stare brushed the front rows, focusing on some of those bioethicists seemingly playing this little game of glaring at Izuru as hard as they could as if it would destabilize them. All low insects, the lots of them, them and the journalists behind scrawling essays on their notebooks whenever Izuru would blink, and everyone else in this room.
Izuru readjusted their hairpin. The Izuru on the screen mimicked their movements with a quarter-second delay. Next to them, the Steering Committee sat relaxed, confident. Good for them, the bioethicist on their right looked very much confident as well. Nobody there, sorry to that moderator, would play pretend.
“Before we start delving into the methodology of our project, I wish to first off address the accusations that had been thrown against the project. The rumors that Izuru Kamukura was an ordinary person we’ve picked off the street to forcibly lobotomize into a god, or a monster, or every ridiculous word I have seen thrown are all science fiction fantaisies which I’m sure respectable members of the scientific community would agree with me, but we have provided the documentations to support our claims nonetheless… I suppose I should let the main concerned speak for himself, though.”
Aoyama turned to Izuru. Everyone did, nobody wished to miss Izuru’s first words. Izuru felt like a little baby-god.
“Thank you, Minister,” Izuru sat up, “I can't say it's a pleasure for me to sit here as the object of this panel,” they marked a pause, yes, everyone, I’m making a joke aimed at lowering the tension, they would've attempted a short smile here if they knew it wouldn't have scared everyone off but some people in the audience got the intent and snorted a bit, “- but I'm very interested to participate in this discussion.”
They marked a pause.
“I am Izuru Kamukura. I owe my name to my great-grandfather, founder of Hope’s Peak Academy whose vocation through the construction of the school had been the cultivation of human potential. From an early age, my parents and teachers had identified in my genes a high intellectual potential and provided me with an intensive education designed to enhance that potential. I was then proposed to participate in a new, experimental program involving cognitive and physical enhancement, which has, after its success, been re-named after me.”
“Today,” Aoyama took over with a nod, you did well, “Izuru Kamukura is extremely proud of working as a special counsellor for the Japanese Government at only twenty-one years-old and has shown himself to be an excellent asset. After the success of the project, we are also planning on catering this experience to future willing students who wouldn’t have been able to integrate to the Main Course otherwise, of course at a more accessible level.”
It all went back to this, didn’t it? Using Izuru, now developing their now-public image for false advertisements in hopes of getting more popularity, more money. They’d heard about the Steering Committee wishing to extend Hope’s Peak globally, one school in the United States, one in Germany, with each year an even more absurd tuition fees cost under the pretense that they offered, in addition to the already-prestigious Main Course, the, quote-unquote same course Izuru Kamukura had taken.
Noriko nodded mechanically. A former Main Course Student could sense it very well, that complete bullshit. But, and this was what the Steering Committee had bet on; without any proof to back her claims, she couldn’t do much except let that pass.
“Alright,” she said, opening a file that had been handed to her to browse through the documents inside, all fake, all forged. “To be frank with you, the main concern isn't the enhancement itself, though, according to some whistleblowers -” she met Aoyama's stare, already getting himself ready to retort that argument “- the procedures used to achieve it were unethical, but I won't discuss the veracity of those claims, since, according to you, they've already been disproven. What I wish to tackle is the whole methodology surrounding the project. For example, according to several former scientists who had worked for the Project, Kamukura-san was never in a position to provide proper consent.”
“I did consent,” Izuru said, “I was nineteen when I did. I was given a thorough explanation of what the program entailed, including its risks, its projected outcomes, and its long-term possible consequences for my cognitive and physical function. I accepted because I found the project's goals to be compelling, both for my own goals and for the scientific progress it represented."
“You do understand, Kamukura-san,” Noriko threaded carefully, “that as much as I wish to believe you, you’re drawing the portrait of a conditioned, isolated child who was never given the choice to refuse?”
“I was neither conditioned nor isolated.”
Noriko hummed. In her stare, only a strange pity. “I’m sure. I’ll get back to this later.” She then turned towards the Steering Committee and, with a smile and gesture directed at the files, “first of all, shall we discuss the details of the Project?”
It didn't take much more for Izuru to completely lose all interest in the conversation. The dances, once settled, repeated themselves almost instantly: claim the ethicist’s proofs as fabrication by detractors or disgruntled scientists who are simply mad they've been kicked out of the project — all of their deaths were, of course, accidental — and claim the Committee’s own proofs as completely real and verified by an exterior, independent council. The bioethicist had grown bored of their stupid games too, Izuru could see it etched on her face. As long as the talk revolved around the methodology, Izuru would gladly look down at his shoes and wait it out, though.
That, however, was until…
“Kamukura-san, if that's okay with you, could I ask you some questions directly?”
Noriko deliberately turned towards him, as if that, and that sweet tone of hers would make them mistake that ugly manipulation for bonding. For someone so opposed to unethical human experimentation, she had her ways of making them feel like an animal. The crowd leaned in. Aoyama, with a short nod through the monitor only Izuru could’ve deciphered, had allowed it.
“That's what I'm here for.”
She breathed in.
“Let us accept for a moment that your identity is exactly as you claim. The great-grandson of Kamukura Izuru, founder of Hope's Peak Academy, raised from birth to uphold the family name and become a symbol of hope through,” her tone switched there, almost mocking, “extensive education, rigorous training, and a series of technological and surgical enhancements designed to maximize your physical and intellectual abilities."
She paused and furrowed her brows. "That must’ve been a lot to carry."
"It is." Izuru marked a pause, one second exactly, enough to make their speech flow naturally. "I prefer to see it as an opportunity. I do not regret any of it."
When they reminded themselves to look her in the eyes — sign of sincerity, or so they’ve been told, — they crossed her smile, empty. “Yes. I’m sure. Between you and me, I think we’ve heard enough about the project in itself. I want, Kamukura, to focus more on who you are as a person… Outside of the project, you see?”
Noriko marked a pause, lowering her microphone for a beat to shift in her seat. “What,” she pretended to think, raising her eyes to the ceiling for one second or two, “are your hobbies, for example?”
Izuru hasn’t been given hobbies. They and the Steering Committee had found no use in hobbies as there were no more skills they could perfect. Hobbies were unproductive. Izuru’s hobbies, if you could call that, were helping out the Steering Committee, and when they couldn’t do that, they’d usually sit still until there was something they could do.
They tilted their head. “I read. Philosophy essays, scientific journals. Novels, too. I practice musical instruments, the piano, mostly, the violin. I like exercising, running, too.”
“A lot of solitary activities.”
“Yes. I’m introverted.”
From the audience, some people scoffed. Izuru didn’t know why.
“Tell me about your friends.”
From the corner of Izuru’s eyes, Aoyama shifted uncomfortably in his seat. During the training, he told them it was very, very important for them to say that, yes, they had many friends, even though they had never seen the purpose of friendships, equally as boring, equally as unproductive.
It dawned however, dully so, in Izuru’s mind that they’ve never had a proper conversation with anyone without a member of the Steering Committee by their side.
“Friends,” Izuru reminded themselves to answer, “yes. I have several close friendships.”
She lowered her microphone and waited for more. They recognized the psychological attempt, destabilizing them, wielding the silence as a weapon to get them to say more.
“We run a debate club.” Izuru clarified.
“Could you name them?”
A name that would prompt investigations. Izuru turned to the public, then back to her.
“I don’t see the purpose in listing them individually in front of such a large crowd.”
A smile, where they would’ve expected frustration. They guessed social conventions wouldn't have been keen on someone listing loved ones like you would list groceries.
“You're right. Excuse me,” Noriko smiled. “Let me ask you something simpler. Have you ever been in love, Izuru?”
The moderator brought his mic to his lips but did not say anything. Noriko seemed to take pleasure basking in the limits between what's bioethics and what's not. Izuru lowered their mic. “Love.”
“Yes. I'm not talking about pursuing it, but… Have you ever felt it?”
Yes, they thought. Probably. The bond between them and the Steering Committee has to be love in some way, maybe? Though they don’t quite reciprocate anything, they guessed Father did love them because he said so. Izuru wasn’t sure they reciprocated on the same level. Love, after all, was simply a set of chemicals with no actual value.
“You can say no,” Noriko said in a mimicry of gentleness.
Izuru looked at the feedback screen through which the Steering Committee stared back. They could very perfectly guess the arguments that will happen after that panel. Boring, they thought. Utterly boring.
“Romantic love.” Izuru said a bit too bluntly, “no, I have not experienced romantic love.”
A nod.
“Another question, then,” she tilted her head, “what do you want?”
To get away from there. For people to stop asking me unnecessary, futile questions.
“You’ve said,” Noriko clarified, “you consider working in this special program an opportunity. With your abilities, you could achieve anything. So what do you want to achieve? What's your wildest dream, something that goes beyond the wishes of your teachers and your great-grandfather's legacy?"
“I think,” Izuru started, then paused.
An awful game she played, that bioethicist. They could see it all already, the Steering Committee giving them shit for not winning that debate. You should've given me talents in being human, they guessed dully.
But Izuru finds that if there's one thing they don't want, it's punishment. So they looked at the public; leeches believing black suits and white blouses turn them into something important. They're all parasites, after all, aren't they? Stupid, believing in the most vapid stuff someone grand like the Ultimate Hope would tell them.
“I want to use my talents to make the world a better place. That's why I chose to participate in the project.”
Nobody moved. Izuru guessed they should find something even more vapid.
“Thanks to the Steering Committee, I can speak over 250 languages all around the world. My dream would be to use these talents to tour the world by myself, not just to visit famous landmarks but to meet people from all around the world and learn about them. I would find that really interesting.”
The idea of travelling to the Himalaya gives them as much joy as visiting Rome, which gives them as much joy as pacing in their own room, and all of this gives them much less joy than the thought, right now, of biting their own wrist.
Noriko let silence pass. Then,
“Could you tell me about a happy memory?”
Izuru nodded automatically. This was an easy question, they knew what happiness was: their talents in philosophy spoke of Epicurus, of Aristotle, of Bentham and Nietzsche and everything. Aoyama even looked relieved for a second or two, there, crossing their legs, fully lowering his microphone, waiting. They could provide a great answer and if they couldn't, then they could provide a great lie, is what he must've thought at this moment.
Izuru, however, couldn't pinpoint a single moment in their short existence where they stopped and thought to themselves, there, I am happy.
What made them happy? Purpose, maybe, but this wasn't the answer Noriko was looking for, was it? They weren't conceived for such things, much like love, much like friends, much like hobbies and, and anything, truthfully. Not even serving the Committee, since they've been sitting there for more than ten seconds, silently ruining every single one of their plans because they couldn’t find what made them happy, because they didn’t know what made people happy, truly so. Izuru couldn't even live.
Aoyama looked so pale his face blended with his hair. The entire first row had leaned in, their elbow on their lap, watching. Izuru had to answer.
“I,” and it was a disaster from the first syllable, “don't feel comfortable speaking about my private life.”
Nobody spoke. From the corner of their eyes, Aoyama's hands trembled. When they turned, Satō's gaze was lost somewhere in the void. Watanabe looked at them like he was about to cry. Yamamoto nodded mechanically as if that would've saved the situation.
“There’s a large audience here for me and this is my first time speaking publicly.” Izuru attempted. “I don’t feel comfortable sharing my private life.”
And Noriko’s eyes narrowed, an eagle’s eyes right on the prize. With a smile she hid with the mic she brought to her lips, she said:
“Kamukura,” she smiled sadly, “do you have any private life to discuss?”
The room was so silent her voice echoed on the walls of the wide room. Izuru, slowly so, turned their head to eye the feedback image displayed on the monitor to see what they'd expected, fully focused on them, waiting and waiting much like the entire crowd for an answer Izuru knew they couldn't give. What could they say, "Yes?" That leech would only retort by asking for more boring details about them. "No?" Aoyama would destroy them before that world could leave their mouth. From the corner or their eyes, Aoyama raised his mic to fill up that silence but Noriko raised a hand. No. No saving here. So Izuru breathed in.
“This has strayed away from the initial purpose of this panel. I will not respond to logical fallacies using ad-hominem rhetoric.”
And she stared.
And stared.
And stared.
Because you couldn't do much else when the enemy had dug their own grave. The public had all leaned back, now, finding their own questions answered. Journalists rose instead, bringing their cameras to their eyes, grabbing each one of them a little piece of the shot of their lifetime.
And Izuru looked at the back of the room where the neon-lit EXIT sign buzzed above the shutter of the cameras, louder than anything else in the hall.
Everyone looked like ants from up there.
Trembling footsteps parallel to the ledge, arms spread wide like a clumsy bird about to take flight. Beneath him, two hundred meters down, the city sprawled.
Trash like him dying wouldn’t be such a big loss. Nagito had felt important for graduating from Hope's Peak for a week or two until he understood he had no ambitions apart from rotting at his parent’s house, which was precisely what he had done for two years straight. It had stopped being funny when he found himself curled up in his parents bed at 4AM, scrolling through social media to learn everyone he knew went on with their amazing lives: a picture of Chiaki and her e-sport team winning yet another tournament. A picture of Mahiru’s new exhibition in Vienna. Ibuki’s world tour dates, everything pretty much sold out already. Kazuichi had joined the JAXA as their lead aerospace engineer. It had become even less funny when he’d come across Sonia and Gundham’s wedding pics and realized they hadn’t thought of inviting him, yes, even though the rest of the class was on the pics. He’d understood, he had spent one half of his Hope’s Peak years socially excluding himself and the other half being actually excluded from school.
They didn’t need him to be a stepping stool for Hope anymore, the Ultimates were fine spreading Hope on their own. So, after two and a half years, Nagito thought that if he was to be useless, then he might as well waste away his parent’s inheritance and be useless all around the world. Hopping from bus to bus through Europe or taking the Trans-Siberian, or a cruise through the Nile would’ve been a better experience if he wasn’t doing all of this living with himself and himself alone. This was meant to be the last destination before he, inevitably, would come back home and die there all alone, as trash like him was supposed to. All in all, a mindless world tour meant to take his mind away from how futile his existence had been.
He had tried looking for purpose: a new hope had bloomed with the rumors he had seen on forums he would lurk at online. An Ultimate Ultimate that Hope’s Peak Academy hid in its basement, something the forums had called a god of Hope, a being of absolute talent and power, something capable, if the whistleblowers were right, to change the world as he knew it. Nagito had devoured them, every single scrap of information released, be it true or false, the hundreds of posts he had come across of people and people and people claiming to be ex-scientists, too many to be true, but he would believe all of it either way. Because the Ultimate Hope would make everything right.
How lucky was it of Nagito to coïncidentally find himself at the same place, same time as Izuru Kamukura’s very first public appearance? How lucky was it of Nagito to find a lanyard pass on the ground belonging to a scientist who looked exactly like him on the very same day of the panel?
Nagito had seen the panel for himself: a disgusting dog on a leash. This was what he had wasted so many nights scrolling through conspiracy theories for.
Nagito stopped and turned to fully face the void, now. It was futile, he knew his luck would never allow him such an easy end, but he found he loved getting drunk on that feeling of freedom right before the jump. The shy, warm breeze of a New Yorker May night tugged at his coat, letting it float behind him; and footsteps paced, clicking behind him until it settled some 50-meters behind him. Nagito turned around, then smiled.
I’m truly lucky, aren’t I?