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"Just fucking great," says Nobara when she opens her eyes and sees a pair of glasses and a tie. "Do I know you?"
"Nanami."
"Oh," she says. "You're the one that Itadori can't stop yammering about." She frowns. "Wait. Nanami? Not Nanamin?"
The man's face contorts.
"No," he says. "My name is Nanami Kento. Gojo Satoru is simply a bad influence."
"A-fucking-men," Nobara mutters. "Kugisaki Nobara."
"I know," says Nanami. "The boys talk about you."
Nobara's eyes narrow. "If Itadori or Fushiguro said anything weird I'll murder them."
Nanami snorts. "No," he says. "They adore you."
Oh.
"As they should."
Nanami cracks into a small smile.
"So," she says after a while of sitting in the entirely empty space. "We're dead huh."
Nanami looks over at her, his head tilted and his eyes visible behind the refraction of his glasses.
"It would seem so," he says.
"Ah fuck," says Nobara. "My family graveyard is four fucking hours away from Morioka. By like three buses."
"They'll drive it over."
"It's still like a three hour drive. Or like, eight from Tokyo or something. I don't know." She pauses. "Huh. Do you think they'll ship me by shinkansen to Morioka first and then drive? Do they ship dead bodies by train?"
Nanami looks at her like he has never seen her before. It makes her uncomfortable and Nobara does not like that. Also he probably actually hasn't seen her before this so it really isn't that weird.
"What?"
"You're not upset?"
"You want me to cry on that Givenchy blazer? Hell no," says Nobara. "Besides it's not like that'll bring me back, right?"
Nanami blinks a few times.
"I'm pissed," she mutters. "Real fucking pissed sure. But it was my fault."
"I don't think anyone could have done anything differently."
Nobara snorts. "He literally said that he couldn't kill you in one shot but did me in with a hand so you might wanna keep your patronizing shit to yourself, old man."
"You fought well."
"I said stop," she hisses. "Just- you're not fucking making this easier, holy shit. Fucking hell man. You're almost as bad as Gojo-sensei. Can't believe he stole my fucking skirt. Like what in the goddamn hell was that about? Sexual harassment, I swear. Besides, he's so rich, he can go buy his own fucking-"
A hand falls on her shoulder and Nobara stops mid sentence.
"Fuck," she says as her vision blurs. "Fuck, fuck, fuck. I didn't-"
Arms go around her and Nobara's fists are still clenched and she can almost still feel the handle of her hammer in her left and the cool metal of her nails in her right.
Almost, because she cannot. Because she is dead.
"So what do we do now?"
"I don't know," says Nanamin who has let her detach herself from him.
Nobara is sure her eyes are red and puffy and now no one will cast her.
"No one's come for us yet," says Nanamin. "But it also doesn't seem like there's anyone else here."
"If Itadori or Fushiguro show up I'll smack them back down to the land of the living myself," she mutters.
Wait.
"How'd you know I fought well?"
Nanamin gestures to a hole that has opened up in the floor.
"I'll kill you," Itadori says. "I don't care if you come back in another form. I'll kill you again and again and-"
What the fuck is that? That's- She peers closer. It's Itadori, alright, not Sukuna. But it doesn't sound like Itadori at all. The hole in the floor closes before she can get a better look.
Nanamin's frown is deep.
"That seems fucked up enough to not be my imagination," says Nobara. "Unless this is hell or some shit. Then maybe it's a lie."
Nanamin shakes his head. "It feels real."
"We're fucking dead," says Nobara. "None of this feels like anything at all."
He looks at her like he knows she's lying.
"Well," she says. "I'm guessing we can't do anything from here anyway, right?"
Nanamin nods.
"Cos I'd have been real fucking pissed you didn't give me a sign if you were watching."
Nanamin snorts.
Nobara rests her head on her knees. "I just wish," she mutters, "that he didn't have to see it. Feels a little like my fault."
Nanamin looks at her. He keeps doing that but Nobara has also been friends with Fushiguro for a while now and she's good at reading looks like that. Come to think of it, wasn't Fushiguro with Nanami at the start of the day? Hm.
"You like Itadori?"
Nobara chokes on air. "Hell no! Why the fuck does everyone think I have to be in love with one of those two idiots?"
"Idiots is right," Nanamin says. "Good fighters, but idiots."
He looks pointedly at her.
"Oh fuck off," she grumbles. "I just- Itadori's a good kid, you know. Like. He's a good person. He didn't do anything to deserve to see that."
"You are too."
"I'm an OK person," says Nobara. "Itadori is a good person. Oh, Fushiguro is also a good person."
"You're shaman kids," says Nanamin. "You're all good people. Maybe some a little meaner than others. But all good."
"I'm a shaman because it pays," says Nobara. Then it hits her.
"Fuck. Granny really was right."
Nanamin is nice in that he doesn't butt into her sentences the way Itadori does.
"I really did die young huh," she says. "I really am being sent back in a body bag. God fucking damn. I didn't even send her any cash yet. It's like in an envelope on my desk that I was gonna send to her at new year's. Pretty goddamn sure she hasn't gotten that new TV she wanted yet."
She exhales. Fuck. Why is she even being given so much time to think about all of this? Isn't reincarnation supposed to be like a snapping of the fingers and a wiping of the memories and voila she's like a cat or something?
"Isn't death supposed to be the end anyway? Why are we still here?"
Nanamin shrugs. "Maybe there's a purpose to us being here. Maybe it's just because too many people died and this is the waiting room."
Nobara's grip tightens on her own sleeve.
"You mean being a shaman didn't give us a fast pass to the afterlife? I feel real fucking cheated."
Nanamin snorts. "I think I know why they like you so much."
"Fuck off."
"Hey, Nanamin."
Kento turns to her.
Kugisaki fiddles with her fingers, looks small. "Did you… Wait for a long time?"
He raises his eyebrows.
"Like," she says. "Before I showed up."
Kento shakes his head. "No. I opened my eyes and the hole let me watch your fight. Then you appeared almost immediately after."
He pauses.
"I would have recommended you for promotion to grade one," he says.
Her head jerks up, her eyes are alight and she really is still a child, isn't she? Like the others. Like Itadori and Fushiguro. Haibara. Ino.
"Thanks," she mutters.
Her hands go together and Kento can see the way she is itching for her tools. He knows the feeling, knows the desire to hold his weapon in his hand, knows the desire for the comfort that the slightest illusion of control could bring. The door behind him beckons but he sits there next to the first year student who still needs him.
"Nanamin," she says as she traces invisible patterns on the ground with a finger.
"Yes?"
"If-" her knees are already pulled to her chest "-if they like, appear and come for you, can you-" she swallows and a hole opens up in his chest as her voice falls "-can you wait for me?"
Appear… His eyes flick to the door behind them, the door that Kugisaki has made no mention of. Can she not see that door?
"It's real dumb," she says. "I know you can't promise me anything because who knows how this all works."
He watches the tension in her shoulders.
"And I know we're all alone when we die." She seems almost to shrink into herself. "But you're here right now and I-I really don't want to be alone."
"I'll wait," he says, shuffles a little closer.
Fingers take the edge of his sleeve, keep a firm but gentle tug.
"Thanks."
"What did they say about me?"
He looks at her.
"Itadori thinks you're really cool," she says. "There were a lot of kablams and kapows in his explanations. And he said that you're really strong."
Kento shakes his head.
"I'm good with what I have," he says. "But I'd never be as strong as Itadori or Fushiguro."
He pauses, looks at Kugisaki.
"I might not even have been stronger than you could have been."
Kugisaki shrugs. "I guess we'll never find out."
"We could spar," Kento says.
Kugisaki snorts. "You don't have your weapon and I don't have mine. I don't feel like being beaten up by a grown man. Didn't realize you were into stuff like that, my bad."
She smirks at him. Kento snorts.
"They trust you," he says.
Her eyes snap up to his.
"They trust you with their lives. Itadori says you understand his jokes. Fushiguro thinks you understand him."
"Itadori's jokes are dumb," she says, face turned away from him. "Everyone understands them. And Fushiguro's real easy to read. He's a total softie. They both are."
"You are too, aren't you?"
Kugisaki huffs and it is then that he realizes that the hand that is holding onto his sleeve doesn't seem to be there anymore.
His eyes grow wide and Kento swallows audibly.
"Nanamin?"
"Kugisaki," he says. "Don't panic-"
She whirls back to him. Panic flashes over her face. "No! Don't leave-"
"No," he says as he sees her forearm disappear in the corner of his eye, not wanting to look directly because if he looks then she'll see and that would be bad.
"I'm right here," he says, "but I think you're going somewhere. Somewhere else."
Her eyes grow wide. "I'm what?"
He reaches out for her shoulder and it is still solid beneath his hands. He doesn't dare move down to the disappearing arm.
"What the fuck," Kugisaki breathes when she realizes that one of her wrists isn't there anymore. "What the fuck is- You died first, you should be the one to go first- I- No! I'm not gonna leave you behind!"
"It's gonna be alright," says Kento. "You're a good person, Kugisaki. It's gonna-" he swallows as her knees disappear.
"Fuck," Kugisaki's tone holds only anger, "Fuck, fuck, fuck I'm fucking disappearing, what the fuck- Nanamin I-"
"Does it hurt?"
She freezes, looks up at him. His grip tightens on her shoulder anyway.
"No," she says with a frown. "It's weird. I can't describe it. Like a hug. But fuzzy. A little staticky. Maybe even warm. But no, it doesn't hurt at all."
"Then it's going to be fine. You're going to be fine."
"I'm literally disappearing," Kugisaki says though now the tinge of panic is gone from her voice and what is left sounds a lot more like the Kugisaki that made Itadori put his head in a picture frame for the deceased as punishment, "I can't believe you can say that this is fine. Itadori's right. You really are weird, Nanamin."
Kento shrugs.
"He said the same about you."
Kugisaki snorts but the edges of her lips are turned up in a small smile.
"Hey," she says.
"Hm?"
"Thanks."
He swallows, nods. "My pleasure."
Kugisaki smirks, her eyes laughing at him as her mouth fades out. She disappears entirely and all he is left with is the empty space and the door.
Kento gives himself seven seconds to miss her before he sighs and gets to his feet, heads over to the door that has always been behind them. It would have been interesting to go out in the field with Kugisaki, he thinks. Enough of these Sukuna vessel, overpowered family hand-me-down power nonsense. Give him some good old-fashioned tools, the smarts to use them well and the guts to use them right. Give him some boring old gnat curses or the small serpents that inhabit the rice fields.
He sighs again as he takes in the details of the door in front of him.
Well, got to get to it.
One.
Two.
Three.
Nanami Kento adjusts his tie for the last time, takes a deep breath then turns the doorknob. The door swings open.