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“We got ditched.” Nanami deadpans.
“By our children?”
Shoko looks at Gojo, disgusted. “You’re overestimating your value in their lives.”
The three of them stare back into the sea of people.
Then: “we got ditched." Nanami states, expression void of everything but remorse in an obvious act of self-reflection over every decision that's led him to this moment in life. In a Sparknotes summary: he looks like he wants to go home.
"By our children?" Gojo whines.
Shoko’s already lighting up another cigarette. "Stop calling them 'our' children. Kugisaki has parents. Besides. Why would they stick with us when Yaga only sent us to get us out of the school?" She cracks her hands over her head. "They’re teenagers, they wouldn't want to hang out with adults.” She exclaims.
“Kugisaki’s going to get scammed,” Gojo automatically estimates. "They can't be alone- someone like Maki isn't there to stop her."
"They have Fushiguro," Nanami counters.
"Fushiguro would just let it happen!" Gojo stresses, gesturing wildly. "And then Yaga-sensei's going to get mad at me for not stopping them."
"You're underestimating Kugisaki's violent tendencies," she reassures. "Even if she does get scammed, she'll be fine.” Shoko shrugs indifferently, ignoring Gojo's wheezy whines. “Well." She bows to Nanami. "I'm off."
“Hey! You can’t leave just yet, we should at least all head back together.” Gojo gripes, clutching her arm. "Besides, aren't you curious?"
"What would I be curious about?" Shoko's tongue kisses the roof of her mouth in an act of aggression and repressed homicidal intent. "Let go."
"The mall! Aren't you curious as to what a mall's like?"
Shoko stares at him. Then: "Gojo, I've been to a mall before." She states impatiently.
"Oh. For real?" Gojo blinks, and he appears genuinely taken back. Even Nanami looks at him for a second longer. Gojo sounded less disappointed, and more shocked, as if such a possibility has never entered his mind before. Makes sense, given that Gojo Satoru's frame of reference for an average human being is based off of himself, as if his entire existence isn't invalidated by Mother Nature, satan, and human limitations. Because Gojo Satoru is a prototype of artificialised evolution, and Shoko bets that if gods were allowed to slip (and they definitely have, if they okay'd Gojo into interacting with the human race), then Gojo Satoru would be god's one and only mistake.
"Have you...never been to a mall?" She drawls out, partially judgmental, partially indifferent.
"Um. No?" Gojo answers with equal judgment, as if she's the odd one. "So we we should stay!" He says conclusively, based off of his situation only, not taking into consideration that Shoko would like to be drunk before four in the afternoon just to forget this entire interaction took place. "Besides, we should at least wait for the kids! The kids, Shoko!"
"Gojo, when you're bored, you sometimes refer to Itadori in past-tense as if he's as good as dead, just to fuck with him." She deadpans. "Don't label your selfish search for entertainment as 'sympathy.' You care for the kids the same way you kids care for their favourite video game." She deadpans. Not exactly. Gojo cares for the children in a certain way- she can also see the way he looks at them conflictingly, with almost uncharacteristic desperation. The only other time she's seen such an expression cross his face was when it came to Getou.
“First off, Gojo, why would you do that?" Nanami addresses pointedly.
"I'm legally not allowed to answer that question." Gojo responds.
And Shoko has noticed that Nanami, in spite of his outwards insouciance, has definitely grown fond of Itadori's presence. That, and also any decent human being would probably start questioning if Gojo has a criminal background just based off of whatever first impression they've had with him.
Nanami, seemingly accepting of Gojo's implications that he's a shit human being, drops the topic. "Secondly, I also agree with Gojo for once. It’d be irresponsible of us to leave them behind. They’re still children,” Nanami finishes sharply.
“Yeah,” and Shoko rounds to Nanami. “But I don’t want to babysit Gojo here. The kids are more capable of independence without needing a bailout from being a public disturbance than Gojo is.”
They look around at the shopping center.
“...So, food court?” Gojo suggests.
"I'm not staying." Shoko refutes.
"Shoko, please."
"Shoko," Nanami sighs. "As a fellow coworker of Gojo Satoru-"
"Stop talking about me like I'm not here."
"You understand." She does. She understands the pain of being in a five-mile radius of Gojo Satoru quite well, in fact. She sometimes seriously contemplates for hours over whether or not her honed apathy was conditioned out of sleeping in the same workspace that she'd wheel in dead acquaintances into (and it's amusing, to think about how she's never slept in the same room with a living person to this day- she thinks doing so will jinx something), or from a decade of having Gojo Satoru as constant company during a crucial period of a person's character development. "Do not leave me alone with this man."
"You guys get along well enough alone," Shoko retaliates, thinking to every single day when she woke up and is genuinely shocked to see Gojo Satoru alive with all his fingers, as that means Nanami has yet to finish him off with a rock dug up from their backyard. Surprising, given that their interactions consist of Gojo forcing Nanami to eat toothpaste every once in a while, and Nanami looking like he's going to kill someone, with no one knowing if it's going to be Gojo or himself.
And because Gojo wakes up every day and chooses violence, he looks Nanami directly in the eyes and says: "yeah, we're like. Best buds!" A cattish grin curls across his sharp features.
Nanami's glasses only magnifies the unspoken prayer of shift-changes and death in his eyes.
Shoko looks at them once more, and sighs. "Fine. Food court." She bites back a swear, teeth clamping around her thumbnail instead as there's nothing else between her lips.
Gojo Satoru, a certified grown leash-child who as a kid definitely wore a backpack with those clip buckles and a leash attached to it, is a problem.
She saw it the moment he started looping his arms around Nanami’s stiff one, as if Limitless isn’t activated and his smile isn’t expectant (and he wants something but Shoko knows it's not fair of him to ask for it).
He wants something from Nanami that Nanami can’t give.
She scowls.
Well, Gojo was always cruel and selfish, no matter who he was with. Not like those are his main characteristics- he's capable of empathy (it's just to what extent, when his domain of source material is the world. And Shoko thinks it's not anyone's place to judge when someone's being selfish, especially when selflessness was the one-way ticket down a rabbit hole of hopelessness and despair. Getou was a manifestation of delusions from a valid and understandable point of view. It's just safer to be selfish).
But sometimes, Gojo Satoru really is the most insensitive prick in the most oblivious ways, even when he isn't inherently mean.
“Hey, you can’t smoke here!” A voice warns from behind her, and without looking back, she grinds the cigarette against the food court’s trashcan lid, and tosses it in.
She glances at the two men. She squints, realising there's a gaggle of young adults and teenagers crowding around.
Ah shit. Shoko hasn't visited the public with Gojo for years, so she's forgotten the Gojo Satoru Effect. Said effect is currently amplified by the fact that he doesn't look like a ripoff HunterxHunter villain with his bandana and hair pushed back.
Gojo ditched his eye mask out of Kugisaki’s request, and so Shoko simply retrieved the smoky pair of glasses that collected dust in the drawer of her infirmary. Gojo looked mildly ticked, mildly grateful, that she never threw the glasses out in the the dusty storage with the rest of the things.
That was a mistake- she should've just had Gojo walking around like a customized Mii character. People would still stare, but at least they wouldn't approach Gojo.
In Shoko's honest opinion, the glasses only highlight Gojo's sketchy vibes, his suspicious impression of an unreadable conman, but according to society, they think he's somehow hot with them.
Maybe evolution does have its limits, if this is peak attractiveness.
She should just leave. Sorry Nanami, but she has no will of getting swamped in by the consequences of Gojo's pretty-boy SFX. She shoulders up her purse, and begins to leave.
“Shoko!” A cold hand quickly grasps her shoulder.
Shit. The Leash-Child noticed.
“Where are you going?”
“Away.”
“Shut up!” Gojo chirrups, humming with something lounging against her shoulder, as if she doesn’t know the weight isn't really his hand, and is instead pressure from him purposefully densifying the air around her to mimic the sensation of an arm around her.
She doesn't know what Gojo Satoru feels like, and back then she felt more disconcerted about it with complicated, misdirected, and spiteful feelings that she now suppresses with the grace of a veteran. But now, if she ever realised she physically came in contact with Gojo, she'd have to disinfect herself by swallowing hand sanitizer.
“Nanami promised to buy us fried squid!”
"Mm. What about for you?"
"Huh? Obviously fried squid."
Shoko looks up, gaze blurring the shrouding crowd of Gojo's sudden and spontaneous fan club as her eyes skirts past the stands offering candy and pastries. She arches an eyebrow. Does Gojo like savoury foods? It'd be less confusing if she didn't know Gojo was shameless when it came to getting what he wants, and given that he always seemed to have a preference for sweets, she's surprised he didn't ask for a dessert of some sort.
"Do you like savoury foods?" She asks testily. And she's realising that for one of the only people she's known for most of her life (really just one of the people who's lasted the longest in her life- and isn't that terrifying? Gojo, the type of person to tax the living hell out of the concept of 'death', is inevitably going to be one of the individuals who she'll know for as long as she lives)-
She knows nothing about Gojo.
"Hm? Savoury foods? I don't know. Depends on when I eat it and what I feel at that moment, and only for then," he answers honestly.
“Do you like fried squid?” She specifies.
“I don’t know.” He echoes lacklusterly, inclining his head to the point where the end of his hair nearly brushes the top of her head.
She exhales tiredly, avoiding the stares of others surrounding them, clearly captured by Gojo’s stupidly eccentric attitude and eccentrically stupid face.
“You never had fried squid?”
“No, I did.”
“And you don’t know if you like it or not?”
“Mm.” And he’s doing that thing where he’s clearly taking her question seriously without the usual pretense of nonchalance, except it’s always over small things rather than important things. “I don’t really think I like anything or not.” He finally answers with genuine indifference.
And what about me?
He likes Getou enough-
He must’ve, if he’s pulling all his cards he did with Getou with Nanami, bickering with him and sounding almost put-off when Nanami responds in a manner he wasn't expecting (though, Shoko guesses the silver-lining is that he never sounds disappointed).
Well, Gojo was always cruel and selfish, no matter who he was with.
She doesn’t even know if he’s aware of it.
She misses Getou- of course she does, even if she doesn’t reminisce on the past (because her own amiability with Getou doesn’t validate what he’s done. It’s just what it is- no point in dwelling on it). But she’s not the one expecting Nanami to fulfill some empty space.
She doesn’t want to be here. She doesn’t want to see what happens next.
“Let’s find a seat.” Gojo offers, gesturing for her to follow, thankfully distancing himself from her.
She twists her lips into a distasteful scowl, pity and resentment for Gojo Satoru staining her expression, unable to be ironed out by her usual state of impassiveness. Whatever . Does Gojo grieve? Does he-
Well, it’s not like she cares. If he doesn’t, then who is she to judge that stance? And who is she to impose some sort of moral standing onto Gojo, especially when it comes to something so complicated like emotions, something that can’t necessarily be forced? Maybe he’s incapable, maybe he just isn’t aware. Maybe he just doesn't want to, and she's not in any place to judge that.
At that unsavoury thought (and it’s the only thing preventing her from just leaving), she follows after Gojo.
“Here.”
Gojo quickly snatches one of the sticks aside, and holds it out to Shoko, who looks at the squid, then at Gojo. She doesn't make a move for it. “I bought enough for the three of us.” Nanami states, and Gojo shrugs, and bites into his own.
“Thank you,” he hears Shoko say as she accepts one of the sticks.
Nanami seats himself between them, and Gojo glances at Nanami. He’s eating one, too.
At that confirmation, he finishes his easily.
It’s buttery, it’s good, and it tastes like the ocean and the colour pink.
He hums. At the shores of a beach, if they swam out far enough, would they be able to catch squid?
“Is it good?” He hears a voice ask from beside him, and he falters, startled, glancing to his side at Nanami.
And he must have a weird expression on his face, because Nanami looks particularly taken back, as well.
“Hm?” Gojo blinks. “Yes.”
“Do you like it?” He hears a more pressuring tone from across of him.
Shoko’s eyes are flitting up at him, from where she’s slowly finishing off the middle of the squid.
“I don’t dislike it,” he admits.
“Dramatic.” He hears Nanami mumble.
“Wrong!” Gojo rebukes. “I truly don’t dislike it.” Does he like it? He doesn’t know.
“What do you like, then?” Nanami inquires. “Sugar?”
Gojo pauses at that. “I don’t dislike that, either.”
He likes the friendliness of sugar, though.
It's familiar and comfortable.
Even if it wasn't, he probably wouldn't dislike it. After all, he’s found things annoying, inconvenient, irritating-
But he’s never dwelled on them long enough for it to become disliked. If it becomes too big of a problem, he has two instinctive responses:
1. ignore it
2. if option number one is unavailable, beat it up until option one can be applicable
“Anyways, thanks Nanami!”
“You’re welcome.” Nanami says pleasantly. I’m not getting paid enough for this.”
“I know, right?” Gojo stands up, and from this distance, flings the stick across the court and watches as it lands in the trashcan.
“Please stop attracting attention. Now not only will companies looking for models will approach you, but so will Disney when they realise you have the personality of twenty-thirteen Miley Cyrus.” Shoko sighs with the misery of a woman who’s lost meaning in life.
Gojo pauses, nearly stabbing himself in the back of his throat as he attempts to get more of the squid in his mouth. “There are people approaching me?” He speaks while swallowing at the same time, nearly dying on the spot as god probably intended.
Nanami and Shoko blink, Nanami wearing the expression he always does whenever he encounters Gojo but only when Gojo says something without explanation, and Shoko-
He doesn’t really get why she looks unnerved. If anything, he’s resigned to the fact that she’s the hardest to reel a reaction out of, so he simply bothers other people first.
Shoko and Nanami looks at each other.
“I hate him.” Shoko suddenly says.
Gojo digests who she’s directing that statement to, and after processing it and dissecting every reason as to why she would suddenly voice her internal thoughts as if they don’t know she’s already thinking them, he can only determine he feels mildly offended.
“I don't believe this.” Nanami adds with a huff of agreement, agreement to something that Gojo can’t understand. "There's no way."
Which is bullshit , because Gojo has six eyes. He’s not so much of a fool anymore to make the same mistake of assuming he can cheat his way out of understanding others using them-
But this feels targeted, like they’re specifically hiding underneath his blindspot of reading between the lines, something his eyes can’t particularly do.
Especially since this is Shoko in question, who abuses any method of tripping Gojo up.
“Imagine that your entire character is stemmed from being self-centered, and yet you’re utterly oblivious to how everyone sees you.” Shoko drones dryly with a tone of usual disgust.
“Terrifying.” Nanami says.
“Guys, don’t leave me out -”
“Look at him.” Shoko clicks her tongue, fingers tugging at strands of her hair, probably to drain out the need to find another cigarette, which is her usual response to whenever she encounters Gojo's bullshit. “Acting all innocent. Maybe it makes sense- too self-centered to realise how others see him.”
“As annoying?” Gojo answers quickly, excited at the prospect of being correct.
Shoko looks unimpressed.
“Guys, tell me!” Gojo gripes, standing up so fast, his chair nearly topples over as he slams his open palms against the surface of the table.
“Suddenly, I can see why Getou was always worried about him in public spaces past his penchant for property damage,” Nanami mutters, standing up, wrapping up his wooden stick in a napkin. "He's worried about Kugisaki? Worry about himself."
“His stupidity knows no bounds.”
“I’d like you to know I’m rather insightful.” Gojo sniffs. And because he has no schema of fear past the blurry shape of animatronics and the hypothetical conclusion of losing everyone around him, he reaches over to poke Shoko's beauty mark. She instantly jumps backat the approach of his finger, which (1), is rude, and (2), impressive that she has honed reflexes against his existence.
She glowers at him, the expression of a person who has speedrun the seven circles of hell and knows exactly which ring she wants to pound him to.
“Being prodigiously insightful about someone’s character means nothing when you have no experience to back that up on.” Shoko expounds flatly, and he feels disappointed that she doesn't even sound bothered despite recoiling so far that she took a leap back.
“Gojo." She sighs.
"Will you stop sighing?” Gojo flops over the table, resting his cheek against the cold surface. His eyes flutter at the sensation. It feels nice.
"You have terrifying intuition, but it’s hard to be afraid of a perceptive person who sees everything and doesn’t know how to interpret it." Shoko begins. "You might be quick-witted and capable of seeing everything, but being a fast learner means nothing if you literally don’t know what you’re looking at.” His eyeballs roll upwards behind the pink filter of his lids, and he sees that she's nearly done with her squid. “This is what you get for interacting with only the same group of people for years, and not having any friends.”
“Gojo interacts like an isolated homeschooled student who was suddenly introduced into public school in their late high school years.” Nanami mutters, having returned to the table.
“Hey!” Gojo mutters, before standing up as Shoko's already leaving the table without warning. “People love me!”
“No shit,” Shoko scoffs. “Look at everyone who’s taking a picture of you.” He blinks. And he’s noticed that, but he hasn’t actually processed it- it didn’t seem important or harmful, after all. “But that’s because they don’t hear you talk. Pretty face, but ugly words.”
Gojo’s tempo falters, a sly grin cracks his jaw. “You think I’m pretty?”
“I’m not blind, Gojo. Though looking at you, I wish I was.”
“Nanami! Shoko just called me pretty!” Gojo smirks, while Shoko slowly lowers her brows into a glare, looking like she's going to trim his eyelashes with nailclippers while he's asleep.
Nanami looks at him straight in the face. “Stop cherrypicking her words. She called your personality ugly.”
“Yeah, yeah,” he waves flippantly. And before he can continue dangling Shoko’s admission for another good ten minutes before he suspects he’ll get bored (because by that point, it’d be safe to assume it wouldn’t draw any new responses from the pair), his focus is automatically captured by the flickering lights from across the floor. “Hey, yo, look." He gapes, pointing. "What is that?"
“An arcade?” Nanami answers.
“Center Disease Control.” Shoko says.
“Let’s go!”
“No thanks,” Nanami automatically rejects. “We’ll probably have to pay for tickets, and our line of work doesn’t pay.”
“Minimum wage,” Shoko hums. "Also, it probably smells like vomit."
“It's a small price to pay when the price is our dignity." Gojo argues. "C'mon. Trust, arcades are so fun!"
"You've went to one before?" Shoko asks, skeptical.
"Yeah! When I had a mission in America, it was in this arcade."
"Was it fun?" Shoko questions in disbelief.
"Yeah. I thought I was going to die." His life flashed before his eyes in snapshots of animatronic mice and the wrangling of children who nearly suffocated in a ballpit. His shades slip down a little, revealing the vortexing blackholes of his pupils, swallowing any semblance of life at the recollection of when he nearly got tuberculosis from the air of the arcade. Shoko must've seen something on his expression, because her face scrunches up even more.
"...what arcades are you going to?" Nanami asks.
"Chuck E. Cheese." Gojo answers with a thumbs-up.
"Did you complete the mission?" Nanami stresses, browline furrowing downwards.
"Yeah. It gave Getou a curse in the shape of a rat fursona and me a gag reflex against the smell of microwaved slices of cheese."
Nanami looks at him as if he doesn't quite know how to reply to that.
"Hey. Gojo," Shoko suddenly addresses, and he rounds to her. "I just realised that if you have dandruff, we would never know."
Gojo, not one to be at a loss for words, yet, most definitely unsure how to reply to that or her domineeringly empty gaze, turns to Nanami. Nanami, without hesitation, looks away.
"Also, I've told you before, I don't want to hear your stories or adventures." She says, stricter this time, as if she didn't say an observation that'll keep him up at night. "I always break out in hives once you say them."
"Just for that comment, I'm making you play Dance Dance Revolution with me." He grabs her wrist, and yanks her forward.
When she only grumbles, but staggers forward without uppercutting him with an elbow, he smiles to himself.
An odd trio. It’s not like they didn’t grow up together in a disjointed, arrhythmic way, but the three of them were always more independent than most. Isolated. Then again, most sorcerers are of this caliber, but Gojo still never knows what Nanami’s truly thinking.
And even if he and Shoko are childhood-somethings, they aren't harmonious or confidential in any way, even if they preferred each others' company (and it's back to the idea of familiarity- Gojo likes familiarity, even if he sometimes wonders if he actually truly likes whatever's providing him with that sense of comfort. He's pretty sure he likes Shoko, though). Shoko always unwillingly listened, but she never disclosed; and Gojo himself did neither.
Essentially, the three of them aren’t meant for company; aren’t wired for intimacy the way most are.
Gojo’s fine with that.
It means everything can be lighthearted and fun, with no loose-ends when things come to an individual end. They’re three separate wicks all lit on fire, eaten alive at various paces, but they’re not entwined in a way (he once was- and it ended poorly and he only has himself to blame). Meaning they’ll never get close to each other- they’ll never drag another down with them once they go.
Gojo likes this. He prefers this. It means all fun and no strings attached.
"I'm done." Nanami states, as if he didn't just stand there for two whole minutes letting his avatar get shot fifty times.
"I- what." Gojo gasps. "Where's the fun if you don't try? Where's your sense of challenge, to show-off and test yourself?"
Nanami looks him directly in the eye, and places the plastic gun back into its holster. "I'm not putting in effort for something I'm not getting paid for."
"This is the third time he made a business anology to a game we played." Gojo mutters.
"It's funny." Shoko shrugs, unbothered.
"He called the lottery game a pyramid scheme and psychological warfare." Gojo scowls.
"No he didn't. He was saying that about you," she says with a tone that's telling him he's stupid. "What's your point?" Shoko questions as she continues gnawing on the ice cream stick of a bar the secretary gave to him 'on the house' (after that, Shoko brought him to every snack stall in the arcade, and Gojo supposes there must be an event going on because all those people simply gave them free samples). He and Nanami ended up giving Shoko all the bars and lollipops after her fifth attempt of trying to break down the fifth floor window just so she can get a smoke in.
"I just want to challenge someone. And he gave in so easily.” Gojo groans, now bored, bored enough to slip laxatives into a random stranger's coffee.
Shoko gives him an unimpressed side glance. “Yeah.” And she sounds almost annoyed- irritated. He smirks at that, bounding forward, wondering exactly what ticked her off. “It’s almost like everyone has different responses.” She follows him up to the counter as he unfolds his wallet to buy more tickets.
“I mean. Well of course,” Gojo scoffs, as he waves bye to the the person behind the counter. The said worker flushes a strange shade, and the employee beside him nearly drops her boxes. “That’s human nature.”
“Then treat others like people, Gojo.”
“I am.” He replies liltingly, though, something sounds accusatory and misinterpreted in her tone (and was the hostility always there? Even earlier? And he doesn't know if he's perplexed or enticed by it). However, he senses himself growing reflexively defensive, as he's unsure as to why he’s sensing malice, but feeling as if it’s undeserved until he knows more. “Nanami’s fun, and he has a talent for claw machines.” He points to the small charms the three of them were able to snatch due to his raw talent, all three of them from certain cartoons that he doesn’t recognise. He thinks they're fun, though. An interesting character- green and a troll (ogre?) of some sort.
“Then stop expecting him to react like Getou.”
He pauses, stunned.
And suddenly, he feels hurt (and it feels absolutely unwarranted given that this feeling spiked seconds after digesting her demand). Inexplicably so. And he doesn’t know why but he knows that whatever emotion is broiling his brain and bubbling in his veins is painful and irksome and he wants to just-
Ignore it but something (is it pride? Hurt? Indignation?) knits his throat and captures whatever nonchalant and empty words were about to pass through his mouth.
“I wasn’t .” He finally settles on, scrapping whatever explanation, whatever tone of betrayal (and it’s not even betrayal he should be feeling, because isn’t that what he wanted? No intimate understanding of each other? So of course she wouldn't get it-) coils hot and angry in his ribcage. He turns away, teeth sore and plastic smile unwavering, as he turns around to avoid looking her in the eye and to locate Nanami. And he wants to repeat it, to let it rattle in her head, but he doesn’t, and before she can say anything, he quickly walks over to the third member of their little dysfunctional party.
He wasn’t treating Nanami like Getou.
Well.
At least he wasn’t doing so consciously.
He hums to disguise a rattling exhale, as he leans into Nanami's view.
Getou and Nanami overlap in a certain sense, but they can never be the same.
“What’s wrong?”
“Huh?”
Nanami sighs, glancing at his watch while using his free hand to accept the tickets Gojo just bought. “Something’s bothering you. Also, I’m not playing anymore of this.” He points to the claw machine, and then to the plushies set on the floor next to his feet while an employee looks distressed by Nanami's eight consecutive wins.
“Ah, Nanami, you’re hoarding.”
“I’m not.”
“Right, other people just suck too much to get their own.”
“You’re ‘other people’.” Gojo narrows his eyes at that, eyes crinkling at the familiarity of banter (and that’s always the best type of conversation, in his opinion. People always react in a multitude of ways all at once when it comes to these). “You’re sulking.”
He rescinds back to a normal standing position.
“Yeah, because I wasn’t able to win once at the claw machine.”
“Or at the lottery.” Nanami glances at him, deadpanned. “You have the worst luck, and it’s wholly justified.” He glances back forward, eyes skirting the dim room that’s only luminiscient from neon signs and pixelated screens. “Where’s Shoko?”
“I made her mad.” He chuckles.
“You always do.” Nanami replies with the functionality and sentiency of an anchovy.
“Nanami,” and he asks him directly, curious, “do you think I don’t see you as human?”
Nanami looks at him very a Very Long Second. He then squints, indicating his first sign of life after the beat of judgmental silence. “What were you two talking about?” He scowls. “We are most definitely human, even you, though I'm sure you could sue me for slander for saying that and still win in court."
“Awe, thanks.”
“Does Shoko think otherwise?”
He doesn’t answer at this, the tightening of his chest fuzzying his brain and preventing him from getting his shit together to form a coherent sentence. Then again, this is a common feeling whenever Mei Mei starts talking and verbalising emoticons, so there's that.
“You know. Shoko’s smart and she’s definitely more aware than you-”
“Incorrect!"
“Gojo.” He sticks his tongue out. “It’s really not a feat to be more aware than you.” He rolls his eyes. “But since she either doesn’t know where she stands with you, or she has an idea and it mirrors the idea that you see her as I guess…a toy? She probably assumes that’s how you operate.”
“Wow. You’ve been thinking about this a lot if you have such a distinct perspective." Gojo comments, sounding flattered and almost amused by this, as he kneels down. "Is this...a platypus?" He picks up one of the stuffed animals. It's definitely a unique shade of teal.
“Not really." Nanami replies casually. "Not really in terms of whether I thought about this a lot. I just thought of it on the spot, since all this is just based off of my own personal beliefs, too. I often think the world is your playground, and on most days you stomp through it like woodchips."
Gojo tilts his head at that. "Maybe if the world was more fun, I wouldn't make a mess." And while he doesn't really blame Shoko or Nanami for thinking he thinks this way (because he himself doesn't have a clear thought on it, either), “also, I take care of my toys.”
“Mm. You take care of them but do you care for them?”
Gojo’s now ripping the button off of one of the animal's eyes, hearing the threads snap. ASMR. “Those two acts overlap. Maybe the overlap is slim, but it’s there ,” Gojo refutes easily. “Besides. Toys aren’t fun if they break. You gotta take cherish them. And I wouldn’t cherish the toys I didn’t like.”
"Do you like things that you care for?"
Gojo hesitates, and his next stab into the plushie is a bit more vicious from the intensity of his thoughts. "I don't dislike them." He pauses. "No. I like them."
“Somehow, I’m feeling more vaguely insulted the longer this conversation goes on." Nanami then directs a finger at him. "I think a lot of this stems from your inability to define the term 'like' in the first place. 'Not dislike' isn't good enough- figure it out yourself."
“Okay, hey! I said I liked you guys, and I mean it! Besides, you guys are obviously different from toys!” Gojo gripes. "Toys have no value once they break, but people still do,” he grumbles. If they didn’t, then he wouldn’t think about Getou after everything. “And people can’t be the same. You can argue they’re replaceable, but individual characters will never be the same, so of course you guys are different." And isn't that just the obvious?
Just because Megumi claims his common sense has the frequency and accuracy of a disposable, one-use plastic FujiFilm camera from Walmart, doesn't mean he can't logically deduce his way through ethics (no, Gojo will not explain, and Megumi should seriously stop asking. If he's that worried that Gojo is on the brink of psychopathy, he can find a ten minute Google quiz and fill it out for him).
Nanami doesn’t reply as quickly this time, and Gojo looks up, humming from where he has already pulled out clumps of stuffing from a split in the little doll, needing something to do with his hands as he talks.
“...I really don’t know if I feel insulted or not.”
“That’s really a you issue.”
“But I feel a bit more enlightened.” Gojo snaps his head up. Nanami glares. “Don’t let it get to your head.”
“Ah , but you just admitted you learned something from me!” Gojo stands up, toy forgotten in his grasp and he flings stuffing from its insides.
“There's a difference between learning something about you, and learning from you." Nanami refutes. "Meanwhile, did you learn anything about me and Shoko?"
“Hm.” He pauses. “Yes.” He just doesn’t know what to do with this information. “But I don’t know why Shoko thinks I find people replaceable.” It makes him feel sick. Offended, even though Gojo doesn’t know if he has the right to, because he’s well aware he often portrays himself as the kind of person to do that. If anything, he actually doubts if his denial to her claim is unshakeable. Well, there's probably a fraction of truth in it.
“I don’t know why Shoko would care, actually," Nanami confides. "Maybe I’m wrong, but I always assumed she never judged this type of behaviour.”
And that's what Gojo always thought, too. He sets down the plushie, deciding to not rip off his hat. He reaches for another one, the one of a black cat with a closed-eye smile.
Gojo’s hand freezes from where he has reached to the next stuffed animal in line. “It was about Getou. She brought up Getou.” And that feels important.
The mood instantly changes.
“And there’s your answer.” Nanami says reasonably. “As much as Shoko acts like it, she can’t distance herself from her feelings about Getou. No wonder she strayed from her usual rational.”
“I should talk to her, right?” Gojo says without actually looking for confirmation, shoving the stuffed animals into Getou’s hands.
“Yes, and stop murdering my prizes. In total, these costed four tickets.”
“Shut up, I’m thinking!” He grabs another one of the smaller stuffed animals. It’s a defaced cow.
“No you’re not.” Gojo whips to face him, eyes narrowing. “I can see it. There’s nothing going on behind your glasses. Nanami deadpans.
Gojo sticks out his tongue once more. “Bring her back. I refuse to stay in a mall with just you.” Nanami scowls. “If you’re not back in ten minutes, I’m assuming you got lost and I’ll go to the front desk to have them make a lost child announcement.”
Gojo flips him off, and shoving his hands into his sweater pocket, his hand closes around the small keychain plushie Nanami snagged for him, and the cow in the other.
He releases his grip on the keychain, and absent-mindedly, picks at the seams of the cow, until they break.
He finds Shoko seated at a table right next to one with a loud group clambering over greasy and probably reheated pizza.
“Shoko! Yo!”
“Gojo.” She’s sipping her coke, looking like she wished it was bourbon. Edgy. “Hey. Sorry about earlier.” Her sipping falters. "Is that a cow?"
"It's ugly, ain't it?"
"It looks like you." And he hums, considering whether or not it'd be considered sorcerer-on-sorcerer crime if he decked her hard enough in the face till she mirrored the cow he's mutilating.
He decides that if he did that, Shoko would probably place a pillow over his head while he slept, and that even if the chances of him dying were low, they're never zero. "Awe. In that case I'm gifting it to you." Gojo slides the cow across the table.
She gently picks it up, observing it. "Why...why are the sutures all torn?"
"Came like that." Gojo answers flippantly. “Also, don't apologise,” he waves it off, as if the candidness in her tone didn’t do something funny and ticklish to the bottom of his lungs. He swallows the feeling and the weight on his shoulders, finding it a nuisance. “I'm sorry if it came off that I was trying to replace our dynamic. With Getou.” His fingers play a piece of heaviness and isolation against the side of his thighs. And he wants to bite his nails into the ugly green doll in his pocket, but he refrains. He likes that one, after all.
“Shitty apology, but given that it came from you and I think I’m having a stroke from hearing you say the words ‘sorry’, it’s pretty decent.” She compliments. He opens his mouth either to spit on her or verbally retaliate, but before he can decide which option would result in a lesser physical beating, she continues, “it's a shitty apology because you don’t even owe me one in the first place, especially when it was me accusing you off of a really mean assumption I had.”
His fingers settle softly against his jeans. "Oh. Okay." He finally says lamely.
"That's a really awful response. Guess it's deserved, though."
"Yeah." He says, because he doesn't know what else would be appropriate (or is 'yeah' not really appropriate either? He's never really bothered himself with caring, given that the people he's surrounded by have adapted to his personality, has never really shown actual distaste for it. This is new. This entire thing, this feeling of caution and attention is new.
It's kind of exciting).
He gives a breathy laugh, and slides into the booth opposite of hers, laxing against its hard back. His legs immediately knock against hers as he slides down into a slouch. She glowers from over the table. “It was a valid assumption." Gojo shrugs. "Like of me. I can see where you come from. And honestly, I think you’re partially right.” In retrospect, he prodded and poked Nanami the same way he did with someone else- pushed for a certain response he wanted.
“The only reason why I’m partially right is because you miss Getou. That’s all to it. And then I took that genuine craving and then made false assumptions off of it,” she deadpans, never one to let a problem get off easily, even if on her own behalf.
"Geez," he huffs."Stop saying things like that. I don't crave for anything." For what he had with Suguru. And he had thought these words with such strong conviction, but the moment they left his mouth they felt disrespectful and nasty and Gojo- Gojo he feels-
He feels gross.
“I-” she blows hard into her plastic straw, making bubbles from her carbonated drink, looking like she wants to shatter the thick glass. “You know what. Never mind." And he snickers, knowing she simply can't be bothered with conversations like these. "Just know I was in the wrong- I lashed out at you.”
“I mean. You miss Getou, too.”
“Yeah, but what can you do about it?” Shoko shrugs. "You miss him, but you weren't the one having paranoid thoughts about it."
He laughs. Sure he wasn't.
They fall quiet, but it’s not an uncomfortable one. It’s one that they’d have when they were teenagers and waiting outside of the Seven-Eleven for Getou to come out with their pops and ice creams, while complaining about the dust and debris clinging onto their uniforms.
It’s the silence they have while they talk it out at a booth before returning to Nanami, underneath the bright neon signs of an arcade that smells like grease, iron, and the faintest scent of mold.
He has a sudden anime flashback to the age of eighteen, frazzled after shouting in broken English to a person to let them into the Chuck E. Cheese, and then having to come to terms with the fact that someone felt so strongly (and in what way, is the unnerving unknown) about Charles Entertainment Cheese the Mouse, that a tangible curse was molded by the soupy recesses of their feelings.
“To be honest," Shoko's the first to interrupt the background noise of low pop music and isolated laughter of kids. "I’m pissed at Getou. Fuck him.” She sighs, standing up, holding her empty cup to return to the front.
“Ah- why?” He asks out of genuine curiosity. If anything, he always thought she was more understanding of his reasons than Gojo could ever be- she sympathised with him first, while Gojo locked himself in his room upset and wallowing in self-pity.
“Figure it out, dumbass.”
Figure it out, dumbass .
It’s resentment. She resents Getou as much as she loved him.
Gojo always thought Getou left alone- but he didn’t. Shoko doesn’t feel abandoned, doesn’t feel betrayed.
Until she realised Getou left with a part of Gojo that she doesn’t know if she’ll ever see again. He left taking a part of Shoko. A part that she realised too late she can’t replicate (and she doesn’t know why. Maybe she’s blaming Getou too much- that he took nothing, and rather, they simply lost it alongside of him. That they should've been more careful).
But Shoko can't properly dissuade or convince herself of this relentless bitterness of Getou (of thinking he stole away some part of Gojo for himself, and Getou is the most selfless person she's known and Gojo the exact opposite- but this one blurry belief nearly flipped her perspective entirely). Rather than tainting all her memories of Getou (and Gojo, she supposes) with this jaundice, she simply suppresses both so that they'll never intersect.
She returns the glass, knowing already that Gojo, a certified Leash-Child who’s able of following her around even without a physical rope, is behind her.
However, as she turns around to ask her where Nanami is, she hears a peculiar shout from behind her. “SHOKO-SAN!”
Terrified by the prospect of sudden responsibility, she whirls around, and finds the table right next to them are a couple of familiar faces and a half eaten pizza.
“Oh. Megumi-kun!” Gojo leaps over, clearly happy at how they're reunited.
Megumi-kun does not appear to share the same sentiment.
“Wait. Where’s Kugisaki?” Shoko automatically gets to the point, realising there are only two of them at the table.
“Bathroom.” Fushiguro says.
“Hospital.” Itadori claims.
The two boys look at each other.
“Bathroom.” Itadori says.
Gojo and Shoko also glance at each other for a similar period of time, as if they can non-verbally communicate their mental alarm through persistent and unblinking staring.
“She’s at the hospital? Did her guts combust?” Gojo murmurs, and Shoko can’t help but agree, because as sorcerers, they simply are just better built against physical vulnerabilities. Even if she broke her arm, knowing the girl herself, she probably would just wait until they got back for Shoko to set it.
Fushiguro takes a long and raspy sip of his drink, while Itadori, having the honesty of a shounen protagonist, is staring very hard at his pizza with a constipated expression, looking like he wishes someone would snipe him dead right then and there.
“Oh. She's dying, isn’t she?” Shoko finally guesses.
“No!” Itadori squeaks suspiciously, and Shoko’s concern skyrockets because she threw that comment as a joke. “It. Just.”
“She’s not the one hospitalised.” Fushiguro mumbles around his perfect straw, while Itadori’s now gnawing on his.
“Shut up ,” Itadori hisses at his drink.
"Me?" Fushiguro snaps his head up, eyes wide.
"N-not you." Itadori automatically stammers, fidgeting and averting his eyes.
“Huh?” Shoko raises a brow, deterred by his whisper.
“Oh, is it Sukuna-kun?” Gojo hums, bowing down to Itadori’s eye-level. “Sukuna-kun, let’s hear what you gotta say?”
Itadori’s pupils dart so hard to the side that Shoko’s afraid it’s a symptom of brain damage.
And at Gojo’s obvious taunt, Itadori's skin caves in, splitting open out in public because Sukuna and Gojo have no concept of discrepancy or societal norms. “Satoru-”
“Ooh, first name bias already? Really, next we’ll be holding hands-”
“You and this twerp are of the same breed, I don’t know what’s emptier, my domain or your thoughts-”
“Kugisaki got into a fight with this guy.” Fushiguro interrupts from the side. “And without her, Sukuna’s been going off the rails.” Shoko’s eyebrows fly up into her bangs at that.
“Isn’t the fight more important like why is there a hospital involved?” Shoko mumbles, as everyone else appears unbothered by this side-plot.
Gojo is nodding. “Mm. Kugisaki’s a force to be reckoned with,” he says approvingly.
Shoko sighs.
“That girl?" Sukuna hisses. "All she confirms is that gingers are inherently evil and deserve termination-”
Shoko, realising she placed too much faith in all these kids’ ability to see the bigger problem at hand, sighs, fingers twitching by her hips where she knows her packet of cigarettes is in her pocket. “Let’s head to the hospital and clear her of a potential lawsuit.”
“Oh. Okay!” Itadori says cheerfully.
“I’d be surprised if she gets off easy. The guy’s jaw is fractured.” Fushiguro mumbles.
Shoko likes to believe she's a very rational person, especially under stress.
She's going to lose it. Is it a combination of her conversation with Gojo, Gojo's unintentional emotional vulnerability, Kugisaki's illegal existence on this earth, or Sukuna's death-defying arrogance that makes her want to go apeshit in the sense of helicoptering herself out the third floor window? She doesn't know, and quite frankly, she doesn't want to know.
“Why’d she attack him?” Gojo asks, clearly curious.
“Identity fraud. Probable involuntary manslaughter. And for trying to steal her tickets.”
The creases between Shoko’s eyebrows pinch tighter. “Identity fr-”
“I can’t tell who’s the victim anymore.” Gojo sighs.
“Clearly the boy,” Shoko rolls her eyes. However, since her belief in ‘talk shit, get hit’ is as strong as a white woman’s ideals in ‘Live, Love, Laugh,’ she adds, “he deserves to be a victim.”
“He literally said ‘manslaughter’-” Sukuna begins, but Itadori simply tries to shove the straw of his Pepsi into Sukuna's mouth, and Sukuna automatically zips himself shut. Probably for the better. Sugar rots teeth, and she doesn't know if Itadori brushes Sukuna's mouth for him or whatever.
“Hm. Well, nice to hear that she’s safe.” Gojo says.
Shoko nods curtly at that, and digs into her purse to find her phone, when suddenly, a loud crackle from above obstructs the background pop music.
“Gojo Satoru ,” announces a pleasant voice, echoing and circulating throughout the room. “Please head to the front desk. Your guardian is waiting.”
Shoko rounds her head to Gojo, who waves his hand. “Nanami.”
“Nanami-san?” Fushiguro echoes, tone delirious.
“Nanami-san!” Itadori cheers.
Shoko looks at them, and sighs.
She turns around, back to the table, and smirks, her previous temper subsiding at the startling hilarity of Gojo Satoru. And she underestimated Gojo and Nanami’s friendship.
And maybe hers and Gojo’s, too.
Well.
She zips up her purse, giving up on her phone, tugging at the new duckie keychain attached to it. “Let’s go.” She addresses the others.
“...are those-”
“Gojo is rather rough with them.” Nanami answers the unspoken question, refusing to glance at the ripped stuffed animals underneath his arms.
“Ah. He must be a rather wild child!” The secretary laughs.
“Definitely.”
“Don’t worry sir,” he reassures, as if Nanami literally could not care less if he left right now and forgot Gojo in the mall for hours. “I’m sure he’ll be found!”
“That’s unfortunate.”
A beat of silence.
The secretary’s smile remains plastered on, but his next sentence sounds mildly strained: "pardon?"
“He’s very irresponsible. But he’s capable.” A monstrous ball of instincts, Gojo, despite having a personality that guarantees his social death in modern society (and honestly, probably physical death in the primate times), he defies Mother Nature by being strong.
It’s not even a cheat code, it’s literally just being ‘strong’ enough to not get one-shot by common sense even if his audacity warrants it.
Maybe it was natural selection, because Gojo’s so severely lacking in any other form of survival that it just overpiled his strength stats.
“Oh, sir!” The secretary clears his throat, the waver in his tone fading. “There’s a group heading this way, is one of them Gojo?”
He looks at them.
And squints.
They’ve…. mitosised .
“Yes, thank you,” he bows slightly to the secretary, as Itadori and Gojo run up first, the others walking behind them.
“Nanami-san! Heyo!”
“Oi, Nanami, missed me?” Gojo hums.
“Why did you ruin his face?” Itadori gasps, pointing at the stuffed animal in his arm.
"Why do you have so many of these?" Fushiguro frowns. "Are these from those claw machines? You can actually win stuff from those?"
“Kugisaki might have a lawsuit on her hands for assault." Shoko interrupts. "We have to go to the hospital.” Shoko says without even greeting him, and Nanami simply Looks At Her.
“That means working overtime,” he finally finds a formidable response, ignoring the way the secretary stares at him for that. “What are you even going to do there? Heal him?”
“Nah. We’ve discussed on the way here the most risk-proof response would be telling him if he sues Kugisaki, she’ll snap his tailbone this time.” Shoko says dryly. "Very effective, since he's already seen and felt what she can already do."
Fushiguro, who looks severely against that argument, simply rolls his eyes, resigned to everyone elses’ mildly psychopathic tendencies.
"That's very much not risk-free I don't really know why you think it's risk free-" Nanami begins, only to be overshadowed by Itadori's excited shouts.
“Anyways. We gotta go! Like! Quickly! And Ichiji isn’t here to drive us directly, so we gotta go before the public transport gets crowded!” Itadori barks.
“You guys best help me carry these.” Nanami points to the stuffed animals shrouding his feet, half of them shredded by Gojo’s inability to at least act like a normal human being.
“Mm!” Itadori’s already gathering many in his hands, stuffing multiple into Fushiguro’s arms.
Fushiguro limply accepts the bundle, having no fight left in him from spending an entire mall trip with Itadori and someone who’ll probably have an arrest warrant by the end of today.
“Have a good trip!” The secretary stammers from the side, a true professional given how he hasn’t called the police yet. “And,” he leans over the desk and smiles widely at Fushiguro, who looks back, blinks, looks at them, and then looks back at the secretary, before his eyes flit back at the rest of them with shrunken pupils like a particularly stressed cat. “Gojo, I’m happy you found your family!”
Shoko’s response is instantaneous- she chokes and nearly dies quietly on the spot.
“Oh. What? Thanks.” Gojo says from where he’s chewing on a stick of maple syrup that Nanami swears he wasn’t holding onto earlier.
The secretary's head snaps over to locate the source of his response.
He doesn't say anything for a Very long second, eyes fixed on Gojo's slouching figure, the only sound between them being the crunch of Gojo's candy.
The secretary's smile hasn't faltered once (really, Nanami is now simultaneously impressed and suspicious of possible drug use-), with his eyes shattered of any remaining life, mirroring Fushiguro who appears equally listless, the secretary’s sentence single-handedly crushing Fushiguro’s mental stability and concept of self.
“Family? Can't believe you responded to that.” Shoko stresses, glancing at Gojo skeptically.
Gojo shrugs. “Dunno. I’m not against it.” But he doesn’t sound actively for it, either. “Well. Family or not, we’re going to have to lie about that anyways when we see Kugisaki and talk to the passed boy-"
“He’s not dead.” Shoko intervenes.
“So I don’t see why not!”
And as they begin to corral out, with Nanami walking behind to gently push Fushiguro along because he has promptly lost all fine motor control from anaphylactic shock (Gojo Satoru being an allergy trigger has always been an unsolvable problem in their school), Nanami thinks it’s fine if he’s lost more money than earned, just for today.