Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Rumor has it that Inumaki Toge lives in his own world. A world different from the one everyone else lives in. Rumor has it that he can see spirits, cursed ones, and that he has the ability to fight them.
It’s just… no one believes him.

Fighting cursed spirits to save the world with your own power.

If you ask Inumaki Toge it’s one of the most badass ways to live. When he was younger he would dream about it, and now that he’s seventeen years old, he lives the dream.

He is actually one of the few people who can see curses. Someone who can use cursed techniques too; it sadly keeps him from talking normally, but the people around him must get that if he were to talk to them with words other than rice ball ingredients, they could get badly hurt.

He doesn’t mind not being able to talk normally as a seventeen-year-old, though. In return he has been granted the ability to potentially save the world. This, along with his friends who can also use cursed energy; nothing’s better.

That’s why he gets up every morning, pepped up and ready to do his job of the day. The task at hand for this day is going to school to learn things, but just after noon, first he has to beat some curses.

Toge has only just woken up when, suddenly, the window to his room opens. It startles him just so slightly and he almost falls out of bed as he jolts away from the sound and the dark figure behind the glass. It wouldn’t be the first time a curse sneaks into his bedroom through the window.

He gets on his feet, one hand already wrapped around his night-scarf; he’s ready to attack.

The window opens just a little further and the dark, hairy shadow moves closer.

No matter how likely it is to be a cursed spirit, Toge doesn’t feel intimidated by it at all. Maybe it’s because he’s used to fighting curses, maybe it’s because the shadow is strange enough shaped a lot like a cuddly teddy bear, just like Toge’s best friend.

When he realizes this, that the figure looks an awful lot like Panda, Toge allows himself to lower his guard. Because in the end, curses most often take the shapes of goopy-creatures, not a panda bear.

“Kelp,” Toge says, while slowly making his way to the window.

He opens the window a little further, with caution of course since it could still be a cursed spirit after all. And once the reflection of the bright morning sunlight has disappeared from the thin glass, Toge sees him standing there; Panda. There’s a big smile on Panda’s face when he says, “Good morning, Toge!” Panda crawls inside through the small window, he’s almost too big to fit through it. Once he’s standing inside of Toge’s room he adds, “Ready to kick some curses’ ass today?”

Toge smiles lightly. “Salmon,” he says agreeing.

“That’s what I thought!” Panda gives him a soft pat on the shoulder.

Panda is one of the few people who really understands Toge, which makes Toge feel less bad about “snake and fangs” – the cursed speech techniques Toge has been given. Since most of his friends don’t understand him, or at least they don’t seem to do so all the time, Toge feels best around Panda. It’s just a shame he doesn’t go to school like Toge does.

Panda says it’s because people would only tease him for being a panda, but Toge doesn’t think that’s a good reason; Toge’s bullied for speaking in rice ball ingredients all the time, even though it’s literally to safe his classmates.

“Let’s go outside then!” Panda suggests. He seems in a hurry to leave Toge’s house, even when Toge himself hasn’t even changed into proper clothes; he’s just wearing the same old t-shirt, scarf and shorts he always wears at night. But instead of coming with Panda right away, Toge puts up his hand as a sign that Panda should way a second, before turning to the door.

When he turns around, he gets startled by the fact that the door is opened. And someone’s standing in the doorway; his mother, with her hands on her hips and a concerned expression on her face.

“Kelp,” Toge whispered, looking down at his bare feet.

“Who were you talking to, Toge?” she asks, ignoring Toge’s greeting. When he doesn’t reply she takes a deep breath and tries, “You can tell me.” While she knows dead-well Toge can’t.

Toge swallows, shrugging. Because while everyone seems to somewhat understand that he can’t talk for other people’s safety, his mother hasn’t come to terms with it. As an Inumaki she should know that snake and fangs is one of the more dangerous cursed techniques, but apparently, she just wants her son to speak to her. No matter the consequences.

But Toge can’t so this; he cannot talk to her normally, since he doesn’t want to hurt her. She may be quite annoying, worrying about him all the time and such, but she’s still his mom.

So instead of saying anything, he just shrugs.

“Come on, Toge.” She lays her hands on his shoulders and smiles weakly. “You can talk to me. If it were the- you know—” She averts her glance. “—those things, again. You can talk to me about it.”

“Bonito flakes.” He shakes his head. He can’t talk to her about it. What even is there to talk about? Those things she’s talking about must be the curses Toge fights with, right? There’s not much to say about them; they exist, and they need to stop doing that exact thing, which Toge is taking care of.

Her expression saddens, when she leaves it at that.

When Toge notices this, he whispers, “Mustard leaf.” Toge smiles reassuringly; it’s going to be fine.

She smiles back, not as determined, but it’s a smile. And she doesn’t let it falter as she carefully lets go of Toge’s shoulders. Before she leaves she asks, “Can you at least tell me where you’re heading.”

He glances at Panda, who’s waiting in the middle of the room. When Panda sees Toge looking, asking him for help in silence, Panda tells him that they’re heading to the forest; apparently there’s a special grade curse spotted there, which means they need to exorcise it right away.

In a sudden hurry, Toge pushes past his mother.

“T-Toge!” she shouts after him. “Where are you going?”

He’s too far away to reply, and what is he going to tell her? He doesn’t have a word for forest, and he’s not sure what it would do with her if he said that to her. She must’ve heard Panda, right?  So even though she wants to hear it from Toge, she knows that he has to exorcise this cursed spirit.

Toge’s running over the streets, still in his pajamas after all.

He just really has to get to the forest as quick as possible.

~~~~~

It’s not every day that Toge gets to fight against a special grade curse. It’s not his job after all; he’s here for the normal cursed spirits. That’s why, in all honesty, he got very hyped up when Panda told him about the special grade in the forest.

Now, after fighting the tree-like creature with such strong powers, Toge’s not so sure it was a good plan. It became pretty clear that his cursed technique wasn’t strong enough to go in against the curse’s will; it listened to Toge’s commands a little bit, but not enough for Toge and Panda to win.

They had to run after fighting the creature for almost an entire hour.

Panda wasn’t as hurt as Toge, since he has a thicker skin and fur to cover it up.

But Toge… his clothes are ripped, he’s lost his favorite scarf somewhere, his voice is hoarse and so painful from talking too much. And on top of that, there are bloody scrapes and cuts in places he didn’t even know you could get wounded and more.

It hurt, so he isn’t very happy with it.

His mother isn’t very happy with it either. She had bought him the scarf as a birthday present some time ago, and its softness and good quality made it clear that it wasn’t cheap. But mainly she’s not happy about the fact that Toge returned beaten and broken.

She has such a worried look on her face when she opened the door and found Toge collapsed in the driveway. And there are tears in her eyes when she helps Toge up the stairs.

With a twisted and swollen ankle, and the knowledge that he let a special grade curse slip out of his grasp, Toge makes his way up the stairs and to his room. All with his mother’s help.

He needs her support more than anything; both physically as mentally.

It’s clear that, once he’s seated on his bed and his mother is examining the damage done to his body, physical support is all he’s going to get. Her fury is sprinkled in between the fear and worry in her eyes, and in the end that’s all that leaves her mouth.

“What on Earth have you done to get yourself this hurt?” she asks while taking her fingers past Toge’s bruised ankle. It’s blue and green and maybe even a little red in between the bruised and swollen skin. And if anything, it hurts an awful lot when she presses down on it. “Jesus, Toge.”

Toge glances away, because he doesn’t want to see the pain in her eyes as she examines the rest of his leg; he already knows that he’s bruised and full of scrapes and cuts, and so are his arms.

After she has mumbled a couple of curse-words Toge’s mother lays her hand on Toge’s cheek. When their eyes meet, she looks worried to death; her skin pale and her eyes red. She’s just seconds away from crying when she states that she needs to take Toge to go see a doctor. “This isn’t normal.”

Toge shakes his head once. He would rather not admit it, so he’s glad he hasn’t found any words for it just yet, but he’s terrified of going there for some reason. He doesn’t remember a particularly bad moment at the doctor’s office, but still, he would rather not end up there.

“Toge—“ She looks sad, or maybe even a little disappointed. “We need to go to the hospital.” She gestures at his ankle, which is getting more swollen with the second, stating it’s probably fractured.

Before Toge can make it clear to her that he’s not going to go to the hospital, she gets on her feet and mutters, “I’m going to get you an ice pack and then we’ll get you to the car right away.”

He stares down at his lap, shaking his head weakly. “Boni—“

“No,” his mom says, her voice louder than before. “No complaints! I’m taking you to the hospital.”

~~~~~

Toge doesn’t quite know what about hospitals it is that he hates so much.

He has no clue whether it has to do with the terrible smell of sanitizer, or the awfully clean, white walls. He doesn’t know. It’s just a feeling deep down, like each time he gets there something bad is going to happen to him. Like the nurses at the hospital aren’t really trying to help him. Instead they look at him, in a way like he’s supposed to be stuck there, but he’s still roaming free.

As he’s being wheeled to the radiology department of the hospital to get his ankle and ribs checked, he feels that same feeling again. Eyes watching him and voices whispering about him.

Yet, there’s no one nearby enough. Except for his mom that is, and she’s not gossiping about him. Instead, she’s too busy asking him what happened over and over again.

He doesn’t answer though. There’s no answer he can give her, because of his cursed speech. It’s moments like these, when he would love to tell his mother about the special grade curse roaming free outside. But his speech is just getting in the way; he physically cannot explain what happened.

Right before they reach the radiology department, though, she kneels down in front of Toge.

“I get it, you don’t want to tell me,“ she begins. “but, Toge, at least tell the doctor what happened.”

He knows he can’t. So he may give her an apologetic glance, because he can see the motherly fear in her eyes. But in the end, there’s nothing he can tell her to stop worrying about him.

Right after that, even before Toge can really respond, she wheels him into the waiting room. There are numerous of pamphlets about fractures, and looking at the covers, Toge has had about all by now. This isn’t the first time he’s at this hospital with a possibly fractured ankle and bruised ribs.

So when a doctor Toge knows from previous visits, walks into the room, he immediately recognizes Toge. He looks disappointed, since last time, he made Toge promise not to get hurt anymore.

“Inumaki Toge,” he says, shaking his head lightly as he calls them over to his office. As soon as the door shuts behind Toge and his mother, he asks, “May I know what has happened to you?”

Toge looks down at his lap, shaking his head lightly. “Bonito flakes.”

Seemingly taking “no” as an answer once again, he starts taking an x-ray of Toge’s body. And after a kind of long wait, he returns with the results. Apparently, Toge managed to get out of that gruesome fight with just one broken rib and a sprained ankle. Which is light damage considering he broke his arm so badly just two or three years ago that he was unable to move it for quite a while.

Yet, when Toge sighs in relief, the doctor makes it very clear he has nothing to be relieved about.

“Inumaki,” he begins. “You’ll have to rest and wear soft ankle braces for at least three weeks.”

Toge looks down at the desk, knowing this means he cannot beat the special grade anytime soon. This is a problem on itself. Still, it’s not the problem the doctor is implying.

“I really need you to speak to me.” The doctor sits down, shaking his head. “I can’t help you this way. I have to know what you do to yourself to get this hurt time and time again.”

It’s not a doctor’s job to force him to speak. Somehow Toge knows this better than most things. But when his mother’s hand rests on his shoulder, Toge wishes he could just explain; not that any normal human like this doctor would understand that curses, which he cannot see, are the cause of Toge’s injuries. He just wishes he had a way to get them to understand him.

Instead, he has to keep shaking his head. The silence making it clear that he cannot tell them.

The doctor disappointedly shakes his head before getting up. Excusing himself for a second, he takes Toge’s mother to the hallway. Toge can see them talking when he turns to the window, but he can’t hear what they’re saying until the door silently clicks out of the lock.

They apparently didn’t notice that the door sliding open just a little bit, because they keep on talking.

“He won’t speak to me either,” his mother says in a whisper-like tone. “Only in—“

The doctor stops her from finishing the sentence, but Toge already knows that she was going to mention the rice ball ingredient language Toge had made for himself. It isn’t that, what causes his stomach to turn, it’s rather when the doctor suggests the most absurd thing ever.

“I think we should take him to see a psychiatrist.”

When he sees his mother agree without any doubt, Toge turns away. Hurt, and with more than just a few tears stinging behind his eyes.

Why a psychologist? He asks himself while trying to understand why everyone is always acting like he’s crazy, while he clearly isn’t. He’s the world’s savior. Someone who exorcises curses.

He lives the most badass live ever.

Why does that make him crazy?

Before the door can open, before they can make the choice for him, Toge limps to the door. Once he reaches it, he opens it and runs past his mother and the doctor. It hurts, more than anything; the aching of his only slightly supported ankle along with the awareness that tears are running down his cheeks. But what hurts the most is that everyone thinks he’s crazy.

The second he gets outside, he collapses on the side walk; heart beating rapidly and throbbing legs.

He lets out a cry and in silence he screams; he’s not crazy!

To be continued…

Chapter Text

Rumor has it that whenever Inumaki Toge sneaks out in the middle of the night, he returns home beaten, bruised and broken. Rumor has it he gets hurt because he fights cursed spirits all on his own.
It’s up to him to beat them, because the others can’t see them.

~~~~~

Everyone knows it; Inumaki tends to sneak out at night.

It happens more than once in a while, often even each night of the week. This has been one of those nights again, where Inumaki sneaks out and eventually is found collapsed on his bedroom floor.

Most times, he doesn’t show up at school the next morning or the days after.

He stays home until the aches of his muscles have gone away, but he often has some scrapes or bruises left on his arms and knees.

Yuuji knows this, because he often sees Inumaki heading into the building around noon. Sometimes his mother is by his side, sometimes he’s on his own, limping towards the main entrance.

Yuuji knows little about Inumaki other than that. He knows that he’s a second year student here and that he apparently started saying nonsense about four or five years ago for no reason. That’s what the other second year student, Maki, told Yuuji when they still had track and field together.

She used to be friends with him, but now she has become Nobara, Yuuji and Megumi friend; she can’t take being around Inumaki anymore. Not after he literally started talking gibberish a while ago; he speaks in rice ball ingredients. So, no matter how amazing the stories Maki tells them about Inumaki believing that he lives in a world where he fights some kind of demon-like-curses, Yuuji can’t blame her for being a little freaked out by the change in her old friend’s personality.

Anyway, this time Yuuji spots Inumaki walking into the school earlier than usual. While he misses the first four classes and lunch break on most days, he’s walking in during fourth period today.

Yuuji leans closer to the window to make sure his eyes aren’t deceiving him.

But it’s really him; the legendary Inumaki Toge. The only student who’s in more than just one rumor.

Yuuji grins at the window, and almost immediately gets all excited at the idea of Inumaki eating lunch with them for the first time. Normally, Maki’s the only second year at their table, but maybe there’ll be a school-legend sitting at their table this lunch break.

“What are you looking at?” a voice behind Yuuji whispers. Next is the back of a pen, carefully poking him in the side. Yuuji cowers by the tickling of the object in his side, causing him to accidently giggle.

Nanami, who was previously standing with his back turned towards the class to write a math-problem on the whiteboard, is now turned towards Yuuji. His face is stern when he asks, “Itadori, could you explain to me which digit is equal to x?”

Yuuji glares from his teacher to the whiteboard, where a problem with too many digits has been written down in black ink, and back at Nanami. “No, sir—“ He glances away.

“Then please, pay attention from now,” Nanami says before passing the question to Megumi, who’s sitting right behind Yuuji. He must have been paying closer attention, because even though he poked Yuuji with a pen just now, he can say the answer right away so Nanami can continue class.

Once Nanami’s not paying attention to them anymore, or at least not fulltime, Yuuji turns around in his chair. He faces Megumi, who’s got an empty notebook lying in front of him.

Maybe he wasn’t paying as much attention as he let Nanami believe. Yuuji thinks, before reminding himself as to why he turned to Megumi. His expression grows more intimidating, or so he’d like to think, when he whispers, “What did you poke me for?”

Megumi looks up at Yuuji and shrugs. “You weren’t replying, so.”

“So?” Yuuji’s eyes get a little bigger. “You can just poke me then?” But before Megumi can even answer, he realizes he would probably do the exact same if he was sitting behind Megumi in class. “Never mind.”

“So, why were you grinning at the window?” Megumi asks after a very short silence. The expression on his face is somewhere between judging and actually pretty curious.

Yuuji glances behind him to see if Nanami has spotted him sitting backwards on his chair. But Nanami’s too busy scribbling down the next problem, so Yuuji turns back to Megumi. He leans just a tad bit closer before whispering, “It’s Inumaki.”

Megumi frowns lightly. “Huh?”

“He’s at school already,” Yuuji explains. “We can ask him to sit with us and Maki too, right?”

Megumi takes a moment to think. Yuuji doesn’t quite know why, though, who would pass the chance at sitting with a high school legend? Okay, maybe a little bit of an oddball, but still; a total legend.

He takes so long, almost an entire minute, that by the time he looks like he’s finally about to reply, the bell rings. The sound of the noisy ringing is soon followed by chairs scraping over the floor and paper being carelessly shoved into backpacks; the sounds so loud that Yuuji can’t even hear Megumi.

“What were you two whispering about?” Nobara asks once she and the two boys have reached the, much calmer, and less loud, hallway. She must’ve seen Yuuji sit on his chair backwards.

“Well—“ Yuuji immediately replies, ready to tell her the news about the mystery being present again.

“Inumaki Toge’s at school.” Megumi’s first. Megumi’s always first, to the point that it’s unfair.

“Yeah,” Yuuji says, finding himself pout a little about his annoying friend spoiling the fun of saying what Yuuji wanted to tell Nobara himself. “We can ask him to sit with us during lunch, right?”

Before answering to Yuuji’s question, Nobara’s already getting out her phone, dialing Maki’s number.

“Is that a yes?” Yuuji asks. First he glances at Megumi, who clearly doesn’t know either, and when he turns to Nobara her face is clearly suppressing an excited smile. Still, she says, “Only if Maki doesn’t mind, you know how she feels about being around Inumaki.” before pressing the “call” button.

~~~~~

Yuuji sits down at their usual table, all excited. He seems to be the only one who’s not low on energy today, and he’s somehow very much convinced it’s because he’ll be meeting Inumaki for the first time. For half a year, he’s only heard Maki’s stories about him; how he used to be such a cool guy in elementary school, kind of cheeky and stuff, but how he became silent once he started seeing things.

Still, no matter how absurd it sounds, Yuuji would love believing that this teenager can actually see things they can’t. That he can fight cursed spirits like they do in the movies.

That’s why he’s excited, because maybe, just maybe, life isn’t as boring as he always thought it to be.

“So, what do you think he’ll be like?” he asks, leaning his elbows on the round table.

Nobara suggests he’s probably just like any other teen. But going by all the stories Maki has told them about Inumaki sneaking out at night to fight curses, he doesn’t seem normal at all.
Megumi just shrugs, he seems much less exciting than Yuuji, but maybe that’s because he’s okay with living a more boring life. Unlike Yuuji, his two friends seem to be quite basic in that matter; they go to school, learn stuff and know exactly what they want to be later. That’s enough excitement for them.

Yuuji on the other hand, needs that small bit of abnormality; having been on all sport teams at the end of his high school career isn’t exciting enough. Instead he would love to have the abilities Inumaki claims to have; he wants to fight curses and be the talk of the town.

“Hi, guys,” Maki’s voice breaks through the chatting of many other groups of people.

Yuuji looks away from his two friends to see Maki standing there. Beside her, a shorter and skinnier, white-haired guy. He’s wearing a huge turtle neck underneath his school uniform, one that reaches all the way over his mouth in a slightly awkward-looking way. It causes his voice to sound slightly muffled when he quietly says, “Kelp.”

Kelp? Yuuji frowns just so slightly; even though Maki told them about Inumaki’s difficulties before, he never expected the rumor about him talking in literal food-language to be true.

When Inumaki doesn’t say any more, Maki steps forward. “Uhm, this is Inumaki Toge, he—“ Maki’s expression grows a little darker when she gives a small sigh. “—speaks in rice ball ingredients.”

Inumaki closes his eyes, almost as if smiling, before telling Maki, “Salmon.”

Yuuji finds himself staring as the two of them sit down at the table. He kind of gets now, why Maki told them she thinks it’s freaky that since a year or so Inumaki stopped talking normally and started speaking like this; there’s no way to make sense of it, Yuuji has to agree.

But when he sees Inumaki silently staring down at his plate with rice balls, he realizes that everyone staring at him like he’s crazy, probably makes the poor guy feel pretty uncomfortable. So instead of gaping at Inumaki like he’s an extinct species, Yuuji leans back in his chair and grins.

“You’re pretty badass,” Yuuji admits. “You know that?”

Inumaki looks up, his eyes surprised when he realizes that Yuuji is talking to him.

“You know, fighting curses, and such. Pretty cool.” Yuuji takes a bite of his lunch and after he almost has finished swallowing it, he adds, “Maki here told us you have some ability, with your voice.”

“Itadori.” Nobara gives Yuuji a stern glance. When their eyes meet she shakes her head, gesturing at Maki, who’s slowly sacking away in her chair. She looks embarrassed and her eyes are looking gloomy.

Yuuji knows he can’t take back what he just said, though. And he’s not going to, because when he looks back at Inumaki, he sees he made the school-legend way happier than he thought he would.

“Salmon, Salmon!” Inumaki replies cheerfully, nodding at what Yuuji just said.

Yuuji has no idea what he means by it, but he decides to ask on about the subject. Since it’s making Inumaki, who must partially skip so often school because he’s being stared at and teased, so happy.

Sorry, Maki. He thinks to himself, feeling slightly guilty, before asking, “Can you explain to me how it works? Your cursed speech or how is it called?”

Inumaki’s expression turns serious right away. “Bonito flakes,” he replies, shaking his head furiously.

Okay, so that subject’s off limit. Yuuji notes for himself before asking, “Uhm, what about show me?” Yuuji thinks about it shortly, how cool it would be if Inumaki could show him that curses really exist like in the type of supernatural shows and movies Yuuji likes to watch. “How you fight curses, I mean.”

Two big eyes stare back at Yuuji just over the edge of the black turtle neck.

He nods twice, seeming even happier than before. “Salmon!”

A hand firmly grabs Yuuji’s arm, though. And before he can even ask Inumaki when they can meet up for this special curse hunt, Yuuji’s being dragged to the hall by Maki. Her grip’s too strong to escape from, no matter how hard Yuuji tries; it’s clear she’s been to the gym more than just once.

Once reached the hallway, she pushes Yuuji against the wall. Her hand is still firmly clenching the fabric of his sleeve so he can’t walk away if he would try.

“Listen, first-year.” Her expression is less soft than usual and her voice an angry type of deep. “I get it, you’re all wowed by how Toge is, but—“ She takes a deep, shaky breath. Her eyes close shortly and when she opens them again her grip around Yuuji’s arm loosens. “Just stop encouraging his delusions, okay?” Her eyes meet Yuuji’s one more time, and instead of furious, they look vulnerable.

She waits a while, but before he can say anything, she storms off in the opposite direction of where the cafeteria is. Leaving Yuuji all alone and wondering why what he did was so wrong in the first place.

~~~~~

Once midnight has come, Yuuji arrives at the edge of one of Tokyo’s woods.

He starts to feel a little bit nervous. Unlike he thought he would, his hands are sweaty and his legs shaky. Because what if Inumaki’s not at all that crazy? What if there actually are curses, but “normal” people just aren’t able to see them. It would be cool, of course, but terrifying as well.

Yuuji swiftly rubs the palms of his hands against his jeans in an attempt to dry them off. But they’re all sweaty all over again when he spots a dark figure standing in the shadows of some tall trees.

“I-Inumaki?” Yuuji hesitantly asks, approaching the human-looking thing which could either be the person he promised to meet here or something entirely else; what if this is a curse? “Is that you?”

He takes another step closer, not sure if he should proceed for retreat.

Then the shadowy figure waves at him, the gesture telling him to come over. “Salmon roe!”

That’s enough for Yuuji to know that it’s Inumaki, unless curses only speak in rice ball ingredients as well. He doubts it, so he starts jogging in Inumaki’s direction. Once he reaches the guy, he greets him.

“Kelp.” Is all he gets in response, so it must mean something in the direction of “hi”.

Next Inumaki makes a gesture with his hand and starts walking.

Yuuji takes that Inumaki wants him to follow to where ever the curse should be. At least, that’s what Yuuji thinks; Inumaki left him a note telling Yuuji to meet him here and he isn’t one to pull a prank.

“So, where are we heading?” Yuuji asks when they’ve walked so far into the pitch black forest that Yuuji can’t even see any streets or houses behind them anymore.

Inumaki doesn’t turn around, his guard is up as he points at something in the distance. “Tuna Tuna.”

Yuuji follows Inumaki’s gaze and there it is. He’s eye in eye with—

“A dead tree trunk?” he asks, rather underwhelmed. “Really?”

Inumaki doesn’t give up, though. He came here to show Yuuji that cursed spirits were real after all.

So, he runs at the tree with full speed. For a second, Yuuji is convinced Inumaki’s going to run against it, but then he stomps it so hard that it leaves a mark. There’s a crack too, probably Inumaki’s ankle.

“Uh—“ Yuuji swallows, reaching out at Inumaki worriedly. “Inumaki, you’re hurt yourself!”

“Mustard leaf,” Inumaki replies. Next he goes from stomping the tree trunk to punching it. And stops only once the skin on his knuckles is scraped away.

And Yuuji? All he can do is stand there and watch as Inumaki hurts himself over and over again.

He’s frozen. Speechless.

Of course, Maki had told him that Inumaki was anything but normal, that he’d gone somewhat crazy years ago. But this? Yuuji hadn’t picked him for the type of guy that would willingly harm himself, multiple times, to proof that his hallucinations are indeed real.

“L-Let’s just go—“ Yuuji tries. He takes a few steps towards Inumaki, praying that this didn’t trigger something in Inumaki and that he’ll come flying at Yuuji like he did with the tree.

But instead of listening to Yuuji, Inumaki shields Yuuji from the tree. He throws his entire body between Yuuji and the log. He gives Yuuji a reassuring glance before removing the turtle neck.

“Don’t move!” His voice is loud, powerful and could probably wake an entire neighborhood. If anything, it quite startles Yuuji; such a silent guy, who doesn’t really speak, spoke in front of him. Yuuji doesn’t know whether to feel honored or freaked out. About what he just saw.

But before he can think, Inumaki takes hold of his hand and drags him away from the tree. He runs away faster than Yuuji has seen many people run, even at track and field. Yuuji has to fight to keep up.

They don’t stop running until they reach the edge of the forest, where they met up only half an hour or so ago. Both of them are completely out of breath, but Inumaki’s not tired enough to drop his act. He looks into the forest, to see whether the dead tree trunk has followed them, before looking Yuuji.

“Mustard leaf?” he carefully asks, resting his hands on his knees as he pants.

Yuuji doesn’t know what to say, or even what to think. He doesn’t know if he should trust his hopes and tell himself that Inumaki’s just into role-playing. Just next level obsessed with role-playing.

Or if he, deep down, believes Maki; that Inumaki’s batshit bonkers indeed. It sure appears that way.

But when Yuuji looks up at Inumaki, he notices something that makes all of his confused thoughts fade; Inumaki’s eyes are filled with fear. He’s actually terrified, and there’s no faking such terror.

It proofs to Yuuji that, no matter how much of a freak Inumaki may seem to the world around him, he actually believes that he’s living the life of some sort of curse hunter. In Inumaki’s reality he does have cursed speech and he just actually fought with some cursed spirit instead of a dead tree.

In his reality, he’s the savior of the world who has to beat curses all on his own.

Because to him, the normal teenagers like Yuuji are the abnormal ones. In his mind, he’s not the crazy person who sees things that aren’t there; the others are just too weak to see what’s real.

To be continued…

Chapter Text

Rumor has it that Inumaki Toge can find cursed spirits where ever they are. Rumor has it there are many of them wide in the open, and they’re not easy to beat, especially when near a crowd.
Yet, Toge is left to fight against them on his own.

~~~~~

Toge fights cursed spirits.

Sounds absurd, right? That’s what Maki thought at least, when a couple of years ago Toge started talking to her about the dreams he’d been having. In his dreams he was fighting against cursed spirits along a talking panda and Maki herself. They basically were saving the world in his dreams.

Back then, in middle school, she still thought this to be entertaining; she had a best friend with badass and very vivid dreams, ones he remembered the day after.

But during their last year of middle school it stopped being fun.

This was because Maki had to witness her best friend living one of his dreams in real life. He nearly got run over by a truck when he decided to carelessly sprint onto a freeway, because of what he claimed to be a grade one cursed spirit.

Maki still remembers that to this day; how she, with her small fourteen-year-old body had just barely been able to pull him out of a truck in time. Sure, she practically leaped him up against a four-person car, and had to spend multiple days in the hospital, but he wouldn’t even be alive if she wouldn’t have been strong enough to pull him away.

She thought for all that time that this would be Toge’s wakeup call; he nearly died.

But it wasn’t.

Instead, he only started hallucinating more and more. His personality become less and less like the guy he used to be when they’d just started middle school. And his sanity slowly started slipping away.

In the middle of summer, Toge showed up at Maki’s house in the middle of the night; he was hurt and weakened and refused to speak in normal words. He was having a massive hallucination or delusion; one in which he had been fighting a cursed spirit all night. One where he broke his arm in so many places that the doctors weren’t even sure that they would move it again.

Maki called an ambulance and Toge’s mother, and after that she didn’t hear from his for four weeks. She thought she wouldn’t ever hear from him again, until he suddenly showed up in her class. He wasn’t anything like himself and he showed up to school bruised and bloody more than once a while.

But at least he was speaking normally, until he relapsed badly again at the start of this year and started talking gibberish again. That’s when Maki decided to back away from her former friend; she couldn’t stand being around him.

Now, after keeping that up for almost an entire year, her new friends suddenly asked Toge to sit with them on the Friday before this weekend. All because he showed up on time for lunch for the first time this school year, which is, believe it or not, already almost over.

Maki still feels the pain and anger of when Yuuji started feeding and encouraging his delusions. It made her more than a little mad. Her other friends must’ve noticed, because after lunch Nobara texted her to apologize for Yuuji’s behavior.

Maki told her she didn’t mind, not even a bit, but she also knew she did mind.

Nobara knew this too, probably, because she didn’t take it as an answer and told Maki she wanted to make it up to her. That’s why today, on Sunday afternoon, they’re walking in one of the biggest shopping streets; or at least, the biggest within a walking distance from their homes.

“I saw this amazing tank top online,” Nobara says, even though she’s already gotten herself four bags filled with clothes within just half an hour. “I think they have it in the store too, can we go there?”

“Sure,” Maki replies with a smile.

She knows deep down she normally wouldn’t like doing girly stuff like this; she’s been befriended with men her entire youth, other than her twin sister who wasn’t as feminine as Nobara either. But today, she feels like shopping for clothes with Nobara is the biggest relief ever. Just being able to take a few steps away from her thoughts. It feels nice.

But all of that relief and happiness seems to slip away when Maki spots a head with white hair in the distance. It’s heading in their direction, causing Maki’s stress to return. She wraps her arm around Nobara’s and drags her into one of the less crowded alleyways, hoping Toge didn’t spot them.

“Uh, Maki?” Nobara looks a little confused as she releases her arm from Maki’s grip. “The shop is that way.” She points at the big, crowded street they just came from; the one where Toge is.

Maki chuckles uncomfortably. “I-I know!” She scratches the back of her head, pretending that she just made a mistake. Like she thought it was here, while in reality she’s trying to avoid her formerly best friend. She wonders if there’s even something more wrong-sounding than that.

“Okay?” Nobara raises her eyebrow at Maki and chuckles. “Well, let’s turn back then.”

Maki wants to stop Nobara, but it’s already too late; the second Nobara leaves the shelter of the quiet and narrow alley, she bumps right into Toge. Hard.

Both she and Toge fall after she run into each other. Toge because his ankle is probably sprained once again, judging from the bandage. And Nobara because she’s thrown out of balance by all her bags, which in the end all land on the dirty floor.

“Can’t you just watch where you a—“ Nobara stops shouting when she sees who she just ran into. She glances over at Maki, who stands there awkwardly wishing she’d just disappear. When Nobara looks back at Toge, she just simply mutters, “Ow.”

Toge looks up. First at Nobara, but then he also lays eyes on Maki.

Maki feels herself shrink away when Toge greets them in his own little way. She wish he’s just say “hey” or something like that, but instead he greets them with an awkward wave and a soft “kelp”.

And it doesn’t make it more fun that, once everyone got to their feet again, Toge seems to be planning to stick with them. He walks just a couple of steps behind Maki and Nobara as they make their way from the narrow alley to the big street.

It’s getting on Maki’s nerves, to the point that she eventually tells him to either come walk beside them or go away entirely; stalking behind them is only annoying both the girls even more. So Toge walks to the shop with them. He waits outside as Maki and Nobara go inside to look for clothes.

And when they come outside again, with another bag filled to the brim with clothes for just Nobara, he’s not there anymore.

“We lost him,” Nobara says, her voice sounding unsure as to whether that’s a good or a bad thing.

“Yeah,” Maki mutters. She, too, has no clue whether she should be enjoying the fact that they’re alone again or worried about where Toge’s gone to. Every time he disappears without a warning something bad ends up happening, which causes her to be slightly on edge as they walk away from the place where they last saw him; what if he returns and they’re not there anymore?

~~~~~

For almost an entire hour, they don’t see Toge anywhere. Suggesting that he’s probably gone home, or something, the girls continue shopping. But even though they both act like nothing’s out of the ordinary, Maki can tell that Nobara’s also slightly on edge because of what’s going on.

They’re just pushing through a crowd when Maki realizes that everyone in the mass has their phones out. They’re holding them in the air while whispering things to the people around them.

“What is happening over there?” some voice asks.

Soon followed by someone gasping before saying, “That kid is attacking the poor dog!”

Attacking—Maki lowers her head in embarrassment as she pushes through the crowd. She only knows one person who would attack something that doesn’t deserve attacking, and let that be the same guy that just miraculously disappeared into thin air about an hour ago.

And yes, there he is. Maki can see it clearly; Toge running full speed at a big black dog.

There might not be an owner around and he’s not on a leash, while dogs are not allowed to walk freely here. But still, the poor creature seems terrified of Toge, who could probably hurt the dog badly without even knowing that it was a normal pet-dog instead of some goopy cursed spirit.

Nobara gasps. “Is that—“

“Yes.” Maki closes her eyes sadly.

Next time she opens them, she finds herself pushing through the crowd, towards where Toge is not-so-slowly and very-surely closing in on the hurt animal. She’s using all her power to push people out of her way, going faster and faster, until she finally reaches them.

As soon as Toge sees she’s reached them, he gives her a reassuring smile.

When she doesn’t do anything but call his name, he turns around to her. Before she knows it, her bag is in his hands, and he’s rapidly searching through it. Once he has found it, her glasses apparently, he drops the bag on the floor and presses her glasses in her hands.

He turns back to the creature, ready to attack.

“Toge?” Maki shakes her head at Toge when he makes a gesture telling her to put them on.

He seems desperate about it, and Maki knows exactly why he wants her to put on these glasses; he’s explained it all to her when he still could separate reality from dream, how according to his hallucinations she could see curses too when she wore her glasses.

Now, here in public, there’s nothing more embarrassing than having him include her in his madness.

“Toge!” She tries, but when he doesn’t show any response she knows he’s too much in a trance to even hear her properly. She grabs Toge’s arm, which he tries to pull away from her grip at first.

He scowls something at her, but she doesn’t let that scare her off.

“Toge!” She gives his arm a yank. “Snap out of it, Toge!”

Toge rapid breathing becomes slower and it seems like he’s slowly coming back to his senses. When he turns around to her with big and fearful eyes, Maki can’t stand looking at him; that fear is real, very real fear of a poor street dog, while previously Toge used to love the cuddly creatures.

So, she turns away.

She wishes she hadn’t, because what she sees behind her is even worse than looking at Toge.

A massive crowd has their phones pointed at the two of them. They’re staring at them, thinking that she actually is still befriended with this butcher.

She swallows, feeling her body as it starts to shake of anger, or embarrassment, or maybe fear too.

She storms off, dragging Toge behind her as she heads into one of the narrow side alleys. Once reached the calm and less crowded place, she pins Toge up against the wall. Her hand is tightly wrapped around his wrist so he can’t walk off as she releases the pain she’s been keeping inside.

In her other hand, she’s clenching her glasses.

“These—“ She gestures at the pair of glasses. “—are normal glasses, Toge! I have bad eyesight, so I need them to see from nearby.” She scoffs. “Not to see cursed spirits or whatever!” She waves with the glasses furiously, telling Toge that these curses are hallucinations, not in any way real. So that he should stop dragging her down with him.

Telling him to stop acting like that; in public and not in public as well.

Toge’s staring at her with big, fearful eyes.

“Stop acting crazy!”

His mouth falls open. Tears well up in his eyes.

Maybe, just maybe, she went a little bit too far. Maybe she was too harsh on him. But Maki just cannot show him sympathy after what he has been putting her through for years.

So, with tears in her eyes as well, she lets go of his arm. There are red marks where her fingers grabbed him tight, but she’s not sorry.

She just storms off, leaving Toge behind to deal with this all on his own.

~~~~~

The waiting room at the vet’s office has never seemed so empty. So dark.

Maybe it’s just Maki’s thoughts that make her feel this way. That’s probably it. The doubt and guilt haunting her ever since she left Toge all alone in that alley after yelling at him.

Anything can happen to him now, she doesn’t know what he will do now that she called him crazy. She has no clue whether she should’ve left him there alone.

If there hadn’t been a hurt dog behind that closed door, Maki would’ve turned back to look for him. To make sure he at least gets home safe and well. But there is a wounded dog in there, and the fact that the poor creature is hurt, is Toge’s fault. So Maki will just have to trust her gut.

Maybe not her gut, because that’s telling her to return, just like every other part of her body is. So she should trust her memories, the ones where she’s dragged down into his madness all because of him. The ones that show her over and over again how god-knows-how-many-people had their phones, with the camera rolling, pointed at her and Toge.

That, along with foresight that shows her shocked and embarrassed face all over social media within the next few hours, is what causes her to stay seated. That is why she ignores the guilt and doubt.

Or at least, that’s what she tries to do as she and Nobara sit silently in the vet’s waiting room.

With that, she manages to stay seated until the door to the vet’s office opens slowly.

She gets up right away, eager to know how the poor dog is doing after Toge attacked him.

Maki’s happy to see a smile on the vet’s face when he says, “Other than a slightly bruised foot, he’s okay.” And she’s even more relieved when she sees the dog carefully walking out of the office; there’s a small, white bandage around his right front foot, just like there are always bandages around Toge’s hands. Fortunately, unlike Toge most of the time, the dog’s walking just fine. He’s only limping just so slightly as he makes his way to Maki and Nobara.

“Hey, boy.” Maki sees in the corner of her eye how Nobara pats the dog on his fluffy head, allowing him to lay his head in her lap. “You’re such a good boy.”

Maki smiles lightly, but this smile falls when the vet says there was no chip; the dog’s homeless. “What are you planning to do with him?” the vet asks. “Is someone taking him in, or should we take him to a shelter and put him up for adoption?”

Nobara glances at Maki. Maki can see in her eyes that she doesn’t want this dog to go to a shelter and neither does Maki; who knows what they’ll do to an already starved stray like this one?

This is why Maki actually feels bad when she has to say she can’t take it in.

Nobara shakes her head. “No, me neither.” She pets the dog one more time with a sad look on her face. “No way my family will allow me to take in a stray.”

There’s a silence as both Maki and Nobara stare at the dog thoughtfully.

“Megumi.”

Maki frowns. “What about him?”

Nobara looks up. “Megumi’s an animal-lover.”

How could Maki have forgotten? Megumi’s parents own a farm with all kinds of animals, so he’s been living with a lot of animals since he was just a day old. If Maki remembers correctly, they have a big white dog, one that could very easily be the same kind as this sweet stray dog.

“He and his parents would totally take in this dog,” Nobara continues. Without even waiting for Maki to approve her idea, Nobara takes her phone from her bag. “I’ll call him right away.”

As soon as Nobara puts down her phone again, she announces that Megumi is going to come over here right away; he’ll want to see the dog first. “I’m sure he’ll adopt him, though!” Nobara smiles.

Not much later Megumi arrives and, indeed, is sold on the dog right away; talking to it, hugging it and playing with it just as roughly as they’ve seen him play with his other dog. It’s clear he’s going to take it in without the slightest of doubt.

“Score!” Nobara whispers, giving Maki an accomplished grin.

Maki smiles as well, at Nobara and at Megumi who’s tousling the dog’s black hair with the biggest grin on his face. But she mainly smiles because this dog, who’s been living on the streets for probably his entire life, has found a home now. She thinks about the person who was responsible for this dog being hurt, but also for finding him a home too in the end; Toge.

She wonders if he’s gotten home already, so as soon as Megumi and Nobara are both heading home, she jogs over to Toge’s place. It’s been months since last time she’s been over at his house. Unlike last time, it looks scary instead of an invitation to a fun afternoon with her best friend.

She rings the doorbell and takes a step back. Her heart is thumping loudly as she waits for the door to open, and when it finally does, it only starts beating more rapidly.

“Maki?” Toge’s mother asks when she opens the door. She looks much older than she used to do. It’s almost like the problems Toge’s mental state is causing them, is making her age twice as fast.

“Miss Inumaki, I ran into Toge this afternoon when I was shopping with Nobara and--” Maki glances away uncomfortably, since she knows that if Toge’s not yet returned home, she is the reason why. “Well, I was wondering if Toge has gotten home just yet?”

Toge’s mother’s smile falters, as if she’s realizing something just now. “Did something happen between you two by any chance?”

Maki stays silent, not knowing for sure what she should respond; should she tell her formerly best friend’s mother that she called him crazy? Not a great plan.

“That’s what I thought.” Toge’s mother nods once with a disappointed look on her face. It’s as if she can read Maki’s mind and now knows exactly what happened between the two of them. “Yes, he has come home.” She closes her eyes briefly. “I don’t know what happened between the two of you, but he was very upset when he got home. So, I doubt he wants to speak to you.”

Maki nods, because it’s fair if Toge doesn’t want to speak to her again. He has a right to.

“Thank you,” she whispers, staring down at her feet. “Just tell him that I’m sorry.”

Before Toge’s mother can reply, she turns away; knowing she messed up and actually ruined a previously amazing friendship by what she said today.

She walks away, not ready to show anyone the tears she sheds when coming to this realization.

To be continued…

Chapter Text

Rumor has it that Inumaki Toge has a strong cursed technique. Which is why he doesn’t speak in normal words. Rumor has it that he’s not the only one who has these curse techniques.
The others just don’t know about their own power yet.

~~~~~

Inumaki’s a student. He used to be one of the smartest of his entire class, and he still is, he just stopped showing up over fifty per cent of the time. When he does show up, Kento finds him sleeping in class, or too distracted by the bandages around his arms and legs to pay attention.

Today is another one of those days, where Inumaki does show up, but in the end doesn’t say a single word. Not that he speaks when he is paying attention; he just stopped doing that.

He’s just sitting in his seat, gaze lowered to the table. He may have his eyes directed to his mathematic homework, which he supposed to be making, but his eyes are closed and his hand isn’t moving.

His right hand, the one he usually writes with, is wrapped in thin bandage and the red visible through the fabric makes it clear that Inumaki’s knuckles are scraped once again.

Gojo had already warned Kento about it earlier this morning.

Apparently the evening before the weekend, Inumaki had returned home late. Yet again, he got home with scrapes on his arms. His mother called to let Gojo know Inumaki wouldn’t be joining PE today, since he once again had sprained the ankle which had just started to heal after three weeks.

But that isn’t why Gojo told Kento. He told Kento because one of Gojo’s hoomroom class’ students had gone with Inumaki that night; Itadori. He had seen, with his own eyes, how messed up Inumaki’s brain has gotten over time. He was there when Inumaki hurt himself once again.

“He was fighting a tree,” Gojo told Kento in the teacher’s lounge that morning. “A tree!”

Kento couldn’t believe his ears; he had had many thoughts about what it meant when Inumaki’s mother said he’d “harmed himself again”. Hell, he’d even considered contacting child support because he thought it might not be Inumaki doing this to himself. But now he knows that’s not the case, Itadori saw him do it; the last thing Kento expected. One of his, formerly best, students wounded himself by fighting against trees. What had happened to this kid that made him do that?

Apparently Itadori had also told Gojo that the teacher shouldn’t let Inumaki see a therapist because of what Itadori had said to them about the previous night; he wasn’t here to snitch on Inumaki.

Yet, when Kento looked at Inumaki sitting here in his class, he wondered if letting him go on like this was the right thing to do; Inumaki was exhausted, if the sleeping during class didn’t proof this enough, the bags under his eyes would. Other than that he came to school more hurt with the day.

If he kept letting Inumaki continue like this, he would eventually end up giving himself much more pain than that of a simple-to-heal sprained ankle.

~~~~~

It’s already dark outside when Kento leaves the school building. He has worked at least an hour longer than he actually had to, all because of Gojo wanting to have a last second meeting with him and the second-year’s homeroom teacher from right now.

It was about Kento taking over the second-year students as  once they are going to the third year of high school. Which means he would become Inumaki’s homeroom teacher as well; he would have a saying in what would be smart to do. They could either let him become a third-year-student under the vow that he will start seeing a psychologist again and show up to all classes unless he’s home sick. Or they could invite Inumaki’s mother over for a different kind of talk, where they will have to tell her that if Inumaki keeps skipping classes he will have to stay a second year or leave this school.

Kento voted the first, along with Gojo, but Inumaki’s old homeroom teacher wasn’t sure. He has seen first row what it did to Inumaki last time they put him on medication. He was hospitalized for a month at the beginning of this school year after overdosing on the given medicine, when they took him off them his hallucinations got worse and worse. And now here we are, with a delusional kid who hurts himself purposefully and does not show up to school nearly enough.

They eventually had to all leave the meeting without even coming to a proper conclusion.

Kento has a bad feeling about it, as he wanders from the lit hallway onto the pitch black schoolyard. He just wish they’d been able to come to a conclusion.

He signs, taking off his tie in a smooth motion.

Something small and scrawny shoots out of the dark bushes just a few meters away from the school’s entrance. A person much shorter than Kento with pigmentless hair jumps in front of him.

“Wha—“ Kento mutters, taking back a step. When he realizes who this is, as if there were ever a doubt to begin with, he asks, “Inumaki, what are you doing at school this late?”

There’s no reaction, just a reassuring glance in Kento’s direction. It’s almost as if Inumaki’s saying that it’ll be okay, that he has everything under control; Kento just has no clue what.

Then, before Kento even has the slightest clue what’s going on, Inumaki charges at the wooden school bench with full speed. He’s getting ready to attack, knowing full well that this bench is dangerously splintery. That, and Inumaki’s ankle isn’t even healed properly.

Kento takes a short breath before shooting forward. His arm can just barely reach around Inumaki’s scrawny chest. He can feel the poor boy’s ribs pressing up against Kento’s lower arm as he pulls him away from the unstable bench.

Inumaki struggles against Kento’s grip and cries out in a certain ingredient as Kento holds Inumaki firmly against his chest. “I need you to calm down, Inumaki,” he says, letting his student know he’s not going to let go until he completely calm.

At first Inumaki refuses to listen, but after a while his breaths become slower and he allows himself to stop struggling. He drops himself to the floor when Kento carefully lets go of him.

With two big eyes he looks up at Kento. His expression is apologetic, but he doesn’t say a thing.

Kento swallows when he discovers blood dripping down Inumaki’s arm; there’s a deep, ragged splinter ripping the skin of Inumaki’s small arm. Which most certainly means he didn’t just start his “attack” when Kento arrived, he had already been at it before.

“We have to get this treated.” Kento touches the splinter, careful not to push it into Inumaki’s arm any deeper. It’s that the school has already been closed, he isn’t allowed to take a student inside after this time, otherwise he’s taken Inumaki back to the teacher’s lounge to remove the woodchip and treat his wound. Instead he takes off his tie and carefully binds it around where the splinter enters Inumaki’s arm. “That should keep it from bleeding too much,” he states before helping Inumaki on his feet.

Inumaki’s standing a little wobbly. His legs are shaky and his cheeks pale. In the end he’s lucky he didn’t accidently sever a bigger blood vessel, but nevertheless he’s already lost quite a big amount of blood; he needs to get home or to the hospital even, fast.

For once, Kento decides to ignore the school’s rules, and lifts Inumaki from the ground. Cradling the terrible light boy in his arms and against his chest, Kento carries him to his own car.

Once seated in the car, he quickly dials the number of Inumaki’s mother. With the phone on speaker, lying on top of the cars dashboard, Kento starts driving.

Inumaki groans as the belt presses up against his hurt body. “Mentaiko,” he says under his breath.

“It’s going to be okay,” Kento tells Inumaki when he sees the wounded kid wincing once more.

There’s a soft click of someone answering the phone. “Uh—you’re speaking with Inumaki—“

Before she can finish her sentence, Kento says, “Miss Inumaki, you’re speaking to Nanami Kento, your son’s teacher. I need you to stay calm and drive to Tokyo City Hospital as soon as possible.” He glances at Inumaki’s pained expression when they reach a traffic light. “It’s your son; he got hurt.”

~~~~~

Inumaki’s mother’s eyes are red, her cheeks even redder as she allows herself to cry. She wasn’t crying when she saw Kento carrying in a weakened Inumaki, nor was she crying when various doctors took him into a room to remove the splinter, clean and sew up the wound. She is crying now.

Kento knows she’s upset about her son being hurt and therefore is allowed to cry, but it does make him slightly uncomfortable. Maybe it’s because her whimpers get louder as if she’s ignoring that he, or the other patients waiting in the waiting room, are even there. Or maybe it’s because he has been suspecting her to be the cause of Inumaki’s suffering for the entire time he went to school there.

She seems to sense this, because when she finds Kento looking at her, she stops sobbing. She sits a little bit more upright and wipes away a tear. “You blame me.” Her voice is tiny, but stern. “Right?”

“What?” Kento asks, as he didn’t think she mistreated her child for forever.

“You blame me for Toge’s injuries.” Tears well up in her eyes again. “You think it’s me who drives him to do this to himself, who made him crazy in the first place. Am I right?”

Kento shakes his head once. “I don’t.”

“Of course you do—“

“No, I don’t.” Kento sits more upright, allowing himself to take a deep breath before saying, “Of course, I have considered it.” He’s honest enough to admit. “but I now know it’s not the case.”

Inumaki’s mother frowns lightly.

“One of my other students was with your son when he attacked a tree,” Kento explains carefully. “I saw him charge at a bench. A bench that had clearly already been kicked and beaten by him before.”

She lowers her gaze. “I knew it.” A tear falls onto her lap. “My son has lost it.”

Kento frowns, not sure if he should be confused, supporting or furious. “What did you say?”

“My son is going crazy.” She releases a nervous chuckle. “I’m losing my boy, and there’s nothing I can do about it.” More tears start dripping down from her face onto her black skirt.

“But there is,” Kento tells her calmly.

She looks up, her eyes red. “There isn’t.” She shakes her head lightly. “We already tried everything; meds, therapy sessions, everything to make him normal again. Mister, he has been on a psych ward for an entire month before he came to your school. There’s nothing I can do to save him anymore.”

She’s right, Kento knows that; they’ve put Inumaki through a lot already, so he doubts what he’s going to suggest will help one bit. “What about letting him see an old friend of mine,” Kento suggests, grabbing his phone to look up Shoko Ieiri’s phone number. “Shoko’s a great doctor and psychologist, one of the best out there. She can help him.” He writes down the phone number and hands Inumaki’s mother the piece of paper. “Just consider making an appointment for Inumaki.”

To be continued…

Chapter Text

Rumor has it that Inumaki Toge has a panda friend. Rumor has it he can talk. He can understand Toge, and he fights cursed spirits too.
Now, if only this was true.

~~~~~

Toge has been in a daze ever since they put him on painkillers.

They said they just put him on pain relieving medication, since he hurt his arm pretty badly once again, but somehow the aching pressure on Toge’s mind and thoughts tells him there’s more in those IV-meds they’re giving him throughout the day. It feels like his head is exploding, like he cannot think.

He’s been like that for the past days; feeling sick and weak. Most days he’s barely able to get out of bed, and if he’s not weakened enough to just stay seated, he needs to be escorted to the toilet.

He’s not quite sure why they won’t let him use the toilet or get food, or anything at all, on his own. Every time he gets out of bed either his mother or a nurse has to come with him.

They all look at him like he’s crazy too, or so it feels.

They have no clue what happened that night that Nanami brought him here.

Even though the memories are quite hazy for Toge as well, he still remembers how he was standing eye in eye with a human-like curse. Maybe it was a curse user just like him, he wasn’t quite sure, but it was mocking him. Besides its foul mouth, it was strong, so strong even that when its hand touched Toge’s arm it felt like his arm exploded right then and there.

He had to find shelter and keep himself from bleeding out.

Fortunately, Nanami came to the rescue in that exact moment; taking his tie off as he was going into overtime. Toge knew Nanami would start fighting against the cursed spirit, but he also felt deep down like he had to help his fellow curse user, that’s why he left his safe place.

Everything else is blurry, no matter how hard Toge tries to remember.

He just thinks they must’ve fought that curse together and either won or lost. Anyhow, Toge must’ve ended up badly wounded; why else would Nanami take him to a hospital? Why else would they be still giving him painkillers like he will die of pain when they don’t?

Toge wish they’d just take him off them, the painkillers that is; because of them, he’s been feeling so odd. It’s almost as if nothing is real, not even him. It feels as if he’s living a strange dream, while at the same time it makes everything he sees and even dreams at night more realistic than ever before.

That’s why, it seems to absurd when a talking panda walks into Toge’s room. He even finds himself wondering if he knows this panda, and well, what’s more crazy than thinking you know a panda.

“Toge—“ the panda says as it limbs towards Toge.

Toge frowns; the panda is speaking? The panda knows his name?

The panda is speaking!? Toge’s frown grows even more furrow.

The panda takes a step closer, calling Toge’s name again before collapsing onto the hospital floor.

Toge’s breath catches in his throat when he sees dark red blood seeping from underneath the panda’s hairy body. Tears well up in his eyes, but he’s still not sure why he’s crying.

That is, until a tear slips down his cheek and everything comes back to him; not just what happened after he left his safe shelter that evening with Nanami, but also who this panda is and what must’ve happened to him.

While Toge was lying here, drugged up, Panda was outside fighting for his life. Fighting the cursed spirit Nanami and Toge had let go that evening. And the curse was obviously stronger. And now, Panda was hurt, all because Toge was too weak to beat this cursed spirit in the first place.

He gasps, shooting out of the bed. He ignores the pain in his entire body as he rushes over to Panda’s side. Tears running down his cheeks as he crouches down beside Panda, pressing the bleeding wound in his side shut with his bare hands.

With his free hand, Toge picks at the plaster holding the bandage around his arm together. As soon as it comes loose, he presses it up against Panda’s side. Blood seeps into the bandage right away.

“Mustard leaf!” Toge tells Panda, because it’s going to be okay; it has to be!

Panda’s blank eyes stare back at Toge. They look worn out and the light appears to be fading from them; if there aren’t any medics arriving, he will—Toge shakes his head, repeating that it’ll be okay.

~~~~~

Toge’s cheeks are wet and they feel all tingly and puffy each time he blinks.

He’s seated on the floor, besides Panda’s unconcious body. Toge’s hands are covered in blood. Dark, red or purple blood that wouldn’t have been on his hands and clothes if he wouldn’t have let that cursed spirit go in the first place. This, Panda’s terrible state, is Toge’s fault.

Toge’s breaths are shaky as a tear slips down his cheek, dripping on Panda’s chest. A watered down streak of blood traces along the white fur of Panda’s stomach. The pain Toge feels each time he just as much as looks at his best friend; it’s unbearable, almost so hurting that it causes the world to spin.

There’s a voice in the distance, far away yet so nearby, is calling Toge’s name.

He doesn’t reply.

Two hands wrap around his shoulders.

He doesn’t look up.

Someone shakes him.

And the world comes rushing back to Toge.

“Toge!” The voice is louder now, so loud even that it hurts Toge’s ears. “Toge, look at me!”

In a daze, Toge slowly follows up the voice’s orders. When he looks up, he looks straight into his mother’s eyes. They’re big and filled with fear and worry.

Her hand wraps around Toge’s arm quickly, and when a pain shoots through it, Toge pulls it away.

“Toge, you’re bleeding.” She looks down at her hand in terror.

Toge wants to tell her, it’s not his blood but Panda’s, but even if he wanted to speak to her, he can’t. His throat is blocked by fear and pain and everything other emotion that’s rushing through him.

“Talk to me; what happened?” his mother asks. “Why are you out of bed? Why are you crying?”

Toge looks down at Panda’s bleeding body; does his mother think he did this? That Panda’s bleeding out because of Toge. Toge shakes his head as another sob escapes his mouth; he didn’t do it.

But you did. A voice in his head tells him. You did this to Panda.

“Bonito flakes.” Toge shakes his head, closing his eyes.

The voice repeats it, again and again, as Toge tries to shut it out by pressing his hands over both his ears; he doesn’t want to hear this voice, which is starting to sound more and more like Panda blaming him. He doesn’t want to hear it! He didn’t do this.

Hands grab at his shoulders.

Everything goes silent.

“Toge.”

I didn’t do it! He shrinks further down to the ground.

Screeches fill up the silence, loud and deafening, only getting louder and louder.

I didn’t do it!

The screams and cries grow weaker and hoarser, as everything starts to hurt, especially his throat. And especially his knowledge and thoughts getting tangled up. They’re playing tuck of war; one half telling him that he did this to Panda, while the other can’t accept that.

They’re pulling harder. The voices louder and louder as the rope tenses.

The thread snaps.

His eyes shoot open when he feels his body being dragged away by a force.

Toge reaches out to Panda, knowing he needs to safe him. He has to; he hurt Panda, so it’s his job to keep his friend from bleeding out in the end. But the force pulling him away is stronger.

He turns around, stomping at whatever’s dragging him away. A choice he regrets when he sees his mom falling backwards to the floor with a pained expression on her face.

Tears well up in Toge’s eyes again, but he blinks them away; he has a life to worry about. He turns back to Panda, pressing the bandage onto the bleeding wound again.

Hands wrap around his shoulders, grabbing him tightly. “There is nothing there!”

Toge’s hands come to a jolting stop when the words sound.

Four words.

Just four.

And they’re enough to cause his world to shatter.

A sob escapes from his mouth when the panda’s body underneath his hands starts to fade away into nothingness. He’s not sure what he feels as he frantically searches for in on the ground; he’s scared and sad and—and-

The hands embrace him.

He struggles to get out of them, away from their grib. But he’s stuck.

He tries to push his mother away, but his body grows limp when she tells him what she really thinks.

“I’m bringing you to a psych ward, now.”

Toge shrinks back, sobbing and screaming and struggling to get away, against his mother’s will.

He can hear her crying too, as he tries to get away from her. But she keeps holding onto him tightly, keeping him in a tight hold as she cries that this is going too far.

To be continued…

Chapter Text

Rumor has it that Inumaki Toge has cursed speech. Rumor has it that cursed speech is dangerous and takes a big toll on his body. Which is why he doesn’t ever talk.
And just in case he does, he always keeps cough syrup nearby.

~~~~~

Inumaki was sitting in front of Shoko. She has had many patients in the past, people who looked and acted miserable in any possible way, but Inumaki is a totally new case. His eyes are bloodshot and had dark bags under them, as if he hasn’t slept for months, and if anything his bruised and scrawny body make it clear that he’s not treating himself well.

Other than that, it didn’t help that his mother made a sudden emergency appointment for a kid who refuses to talk to Shoko. She wonders what he’s doing here. Sure, she can see that he’s not in a healthy state of mind, but from just seeing this kid, she can’t diagnose and treat him like his mother is asking of her. She can make an assumption, like say he’s probably got some eating disorder or harms himself, but his mother was clear about the fact that he has hallucinations and delusions. Bad ones, that need to be treated as soon as possible.

Shoko can’t blame Inumaki’s mother for being worried; seeing as Inumaki had to be carried in my her. He was crying and apparantly he’d been sceaming because of his hallucinations to the point that his doctor decided he needed to see someone as sooner than later.

That’s where she came into the picture; Inumaki’s mother insisted on having Shoko treat her son.

“Inumaki, can you tell me something about yourself?” Shoko asks the teenager.

When he shakes his head once before averting his gaze to the table’s surface, Shoko decides that he’s probably a little anxious about talking to strangers. Which is fair, since he was probably forced to visit her and talk against his will.

That’s why she tries introducing herself first, so maybe that hurdle won’t be too big. This doesn’t help as much as she hoped it would though, and instead of talking Inumaki grows even more silent.

He lowers himself futher into his seat, cowering under the pressure of her asking him to talk.

“He doesn’t talk much,” Inumaki’s mother says, refering to her son.

Shoko shows her a glance and nods. She appreciates the help Inumaki’s mother gives her, but somehow she wishes his mother would just leave. Maybe the problems he has have to do with her, for all Shoko knows, she could be acting innocent while in reality she’s the one who injures her son like this. And even if this isn’t the case, she being in here could really influence his behaviour no matter what; Shoko has more than enough clients to know that they often don’t talk about the real things when loved ones are around. Or in Inumaki’s case, they don’t talk at all.

Shoko turns back to Inumaki. There’s a polite smile on her face when she asks, “Would you like to have some privacy?” She waits for an answer, expecting Inumaki to nod.

Eventually, she shakes his head. It’s slow and careful, but a defenite shake.

“Okay,” Shoko replies, leaning back into her seat. She will have to grant his request; his mother will be in there with them, even though Shoko knows both she and most of her clients defenitely don’t appreciate their parents or other close family nearby during such a personal talk. “Then, could you tell me a little bit about yourself? Your age for instance?” Shoko asks in her kindest voice.

“He’s seventeen,” Inumaki’s mother answers for him; typical mother’s instict, something Shoko finds utterly annoying since it doesn’t even give her client an opportunity to talk.

“Thank you, miss,” Shoko says, regardless of her irritated feelings. “Next time I would like your son to reply to me. If that doesn’t bother you.”

Inumaki’s mother’s face turns somewhat shocked, before changing into pure annoyance as well. “He doesn’t talk, okay.” She gestures at her son. “That’s one of our main problems here; he refuses to. You can sit here for hours, wait until he talks, but you’ll be waiting for a long time.”

“If that’s the case, I will note that down,” Shoko says, but quickly adds, “But only if I’m sure he doesn’t just stay silent because he knows you’ll answer for him.” She’s just speaking her mind, since she’s not someone to do it the polite way. Maybe it’s a questionable method, really, but it has always worked up to this point; her clients know what they can and can’t expect from her.

She turns back to Inumaki. “So, try talking.” She doesn’t say it in a begging tone, or stern, she’s just asking him, in hopes he’ll listen. “Try, for yourself, your mother and me.”

Inumaki lowers his gaze to the table’s surface and swallows audibly. It’s almost as if he’s afraid of something; but whether it’s Shoko, or having to talk or his mother, she doesn’t know.

Eventually he just shrugs. It’s not even somewhat of an answer, just a shrug and a pained expression as if he’s saying “I can’t, I’m sorry”.

“Don’t worry, kid,” Shoko says, smiling lightly. “You’ll get there.”

She takes a second to think about how she wants to approach this Inumaki Toge case; should she make scans to see if there’s nothing wrong with his brain or vocal cords that keep him from speaking, or should she just get him on meds and see what they’ll do? She doesn’t know.

“I know something,” she says after a while. “I do want to make some scans.” It seems the wisest, considering she barely knows anything about this kid. For all she knows he’s got an anurysem or tumor causing his strange behaviour, she just wants to make sure. “It’s nothing scary,” she quickly adds when she sees Inumaki’s shocked expression. “It’s just so I can see a little better what’s going on in your brain, get it?”

He nods once, and next he follows her out of the tiny room in silence.

~~~~~

Shoko has taken scans, tests, everything to determine what’s wrong with Inumaki. Yet, everything seems off somehow; not in the way of his thoughts and behaviour are caused by something abnormal, but rather the opposite, there doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to why he’s acting like this. It’s not a tumor or anurysam, not a neurological disease, causing this sudden change.

Sure, it could be some mental disorder, it could be any even, but Shoko can’t properly find this out unless Inumaki talks to her. Shows her what she’s dealing with.

Normally her clients come to her because they want to relief their heart, talk about what exactly is bothering them, but in Inumaki’s case that’s not the the same. Which, though she is an expierenced psychologist, she’s not able to take a diagnosis from just this kid sitting in front of her, speechless.

“The results were clean,” she announces, knowing it’ll be a relief to Inumaki and his mother, but to her it isn’t. So the stern expression on her face shows. “Which is both good and bad news.”

Inumaki’s face barely changes, because he probably doesn’t realize what this means just yet, but his mother’s face falls in doom. “Does this mean—“

“I would suggest you let me keep him here just a couple of days.” Shoko turns to Inumaki, who is looking less than even a little amused now.

When he shakes his head once, Shoko knows she needs to convince him.

“Don’t worry,” she says. “It’ll only be a couple of days; you’ll be treated like you would have been if you stayed on a normal ward with your injured arm. You can have guests and such.” She doesn’t know if she’s saying it to convince him or rather to calm his nerves, because since he’s under eighteen it’s his mother’s say whether he stays or not, and she wants him to go into this least nervous as possible. “It won’t be as bad as it sounds.”

He shakes his head once more, glancing at his mother before mumbling something that sounds like “bonito flakes”, glaring up at her intensely as if begging her to tell Shoko no.

“He can stay,” his mother says, though. She turns to her terrified son, patting him on the head calmly before telling him he’ll be okay. “It’s just for a couple of days, right?”

Shoko nods once more, before turning to Inumaki as well. She looked at her young, new client, observing his expression as it goes from terrified to a little bit calmer.

He nods carefully, granting her permission to keep him here for a couple of days.

She thanks him in response, promising him and his mother, she’ll take good care of him.

Chapter Text

Rumor has it that Inumaki Toge lives in his own world. A world different from the one everyone else lives in. Rumor has it that he can see spirits, cursed ones, and that he has the ability to fight him.
But… rumor also has it that Inumaki Toge is absolutely crazy.

~~~~~

Emptiness.

They had Toge take pills, now all he felt was emptiness. The emptiness of not having control over his own thoughts. The emptiness of sometimes not even having any thoughts at all. The emptiness of his hospital room, the one where no one other than his mom ever visisted him.

He felt empty.

He felt empty as he sat across the desk, facing Ieiri.

She’s waiting for an answer to the question that’s been hanging between them for hours. She picks it back up every single day, asking Toge to talk about himself. About what happened to him.

Even if he wanted to tell her, he can’t; he’s got cursed speech, if that’s really true. He’s starting to doubt it though. He doesn’t know why, it’s just that after taking these pills Ieiri handed him, Toge has been feeling like his thoughts are off somehow. Even though this is how he lived for so long; he is a Jujutsu sorserer. He fights cursed spirits. Right?

“Please, Inumaki.” Ieiri’s calm voice pulls him out of his wirlwind of thoughts.

He looks up. He’s not sure what to tell her when she asks it again.

“Can you try explaining to me how you are feeling right now?” she asks him.

But he cannot answer the questions she begs him to answer to.

But how could it be that he couldn’t answer her because of his cursed speech? Why doesn’t it make sense at all, while previously it did? His powers, his life, didn’t make any sense so suddenly.

He just wants to go home, that’s all. He just wants his life to go back to normal as soon as possible.

“Inumaki, I really need you to speak,” she begs him once again.

He looks away. His eyes telling her he can’t; she should just give up on him, let him go.

“I know—” She gives him a pitying glance, as if he just told her that he just wants to be left alone; he didn’t, she can just tell, or so it seems. “—I know you want to go home. But I can’t let you go until you tell me what’s going on with you. After that, I’ll let you go; it’s up to you whether you decide to listen to me or not.”

Toge hates sentences like this. He hates Ieiri for putting them like the blame is on himself; he didn’t put himself in this psych ward, though. He didn’t even have a proper choice on the matter. So why is he to blame? Why is it his life being turned upside down all because his mom has decided it should?

It’s unfair.

“Bonito flakes,” he tells her, shaking his head at the offer of letting him go home once he speaks; the offer, firstly, doesn’t make sense, since she’ll want to diagnose him like all the psychologists have been wanting to do all this time. And he doesn’t want the offer; he just wants to go home. Now.

“Bonito flakes, huh?” Ieiri says, almost as if she understands what it means. “You use that often; could you explain to me what it means?” She doesn’t understand, though.

He shakes his head once more.

“Alright,” Ieiri mutters. It’s followed by her hand swiftly writing something down onto the paper.

Toge watches her as she takes a stack of cards out of her desk. She goes through them, sorting out a certain amount of cards; about five of them. Then she spreads them out on the table’s surface.

“Do any of these objects look familiar to you?” Ieiri asks, referring to the objects that are drawn on the cards. “Can you tell me what they are called, for instance?”

Toge takes a look at them; they’re cartoonish cards, simple drawings of objects. One’s of a flame, something that barely even does something to Toge. The others, though, do represent things that somehow really hit home for him; a tree, for instance, since it looks a lot like the special grade curse Toge fought against a while ago. And then there’s a drawing of a dog; the demon dog that attacked him when he was with Maki. He can still hear her voice calling him crazy; he still remembers the pain.

And then there’s the forth card, the one resembling a car; a car that hit him on the freeway some time ago. The car that pushed him into this trial of being hospitalized and seeing psychiatrists.

And lastly there’s the one she must’ve put there on purpose. It’s an evil trick.

Toge stares down at the chunky cartoonish panda that’s smiling up at him. Flashes of Toge’s best friend rush into his mind; of how he used to smile, followed by his bleeding body on the hospital floor.

“Which one speaks out to you?” Ieiri asks after a while.

Toge reaches out to the one with the panda drawn on it. His heart starts beating faster, his eyes open wider and his palms suddenly feel so sweaty.

“Does that one bring back some memories?” Ieiri’s voice sounds louder, now that Toge’s ears are also ringing; the fact that her voice is louder than the noisy beeps means she must be screaming.

Sure, it brings back memories. Terrible ones.

Toge nods once.

“Could you tell me what kind of memories it brings back?”

All Toge can think of is the pain. The terror that rushed through him as he shut the wound in his best friend’s side. The ringing in his ears when he realized he could lose him right then and there.

Toge can feel it, hear it, right now; the shallow breaths, the ringing, the rushing of his blood. The terror.

Toge stares down at the table, his eyes big with fear.

He folds his hands over his ears, so only muffled sounds remain.

And when everything is almost silent, Toge opens his mouth and whispers, “Stop.”

“Stop,” Toge whispers, talking to the ringing in his ears.

“Stop,” he whispers, to the pain reminding him of that day.

“Stop,” he whispers to Ieiri, who’s been begging him over and over again to talk.

Everything stops.

Is what Toge would like to say that happened; but in reality, his cursed speech had no effect on anything. His ears keep ringing, his eyes keep blurring, memories keep playing and Ieiri keeps asking him to continue talking to her. Nothing stops.

Toge looks up in terror, saying It louder this time. “Stop.”

“I won’t stop.” Ieiri looks at him, thought surprised, she’s shaking her head. “You can do this, you can talk to me.”

“Stop.” Toge shakes his head, confused as this should work; that’s his curse, his power, to command people. Why is it not working? “Stop. Stop. Stop!”

It hurts, his throat it hurting, his eyes are hurting, everything’s hurting. He just wants it to stop.

But nothing works.

It’s not real. The thought hits him like a train. So sudden, so fast, so hard.

Toge shakes his head, this thing that’s been going on with the cursed spirits can’t be fake; it has to be real. Right? It’s supposed to be real. It always has been. Right?

“Stop,” he whispers, his voice weakened by the lump in his throat and the tears streaming over his cheeks.

“Toge,” Ieiri’s voice is pitying, which hurts even more. “You can do this, you don’t need to stop. And I’m not stopping either.”

It’s not real, if it was she would stop; Toge knows that much. He wish he wouldn’t know, but he does.

He stares down at the table, thinking back to everything that has happened over the past years; was that all not real? Was it all fake? Is that why he’s here? Is he—

“Crazy.” The word leaves his mouth, followed by tears running down his cheeks at an inhuman pace. “I’m crazy—” He shakes his head is disbelief. “I’m crazy. I’m crazy. I’m crazy.”

Hands wrapping around his shoulders, make him notice how badly he’s shaking. He’s trembling, jolting as he screams the words over and over again. Words make him go in against Toge’s.

“You’re not crazy,” Ieiri’s voice whispers, her hands holding him to keep him from shaking.

“I-I am!” Toge yells back at her.

“You’re not.”

Toge collapses onto the table’s surface, crying worse than ever before.

“You’re healing.”

~~~~~

Rumor has it that Inumaki Toge lives in his own world. A world different from the one everyone else lives in. Rumor has it that he can see spirits, cursed ones, and that he has the ability to fight him.
But in reality Inumaki Toge is a normal teen.

Sure, he’s more silent than everyone else, and from time to time he sees spirits in the trees and some nights he feels like slipping out of his room in the middle of the night. But those are just minor habits that stuck with him from the life he used to live before they woke him up from his dreams.

There are nights and days where Toge misses his dreams, the ones he’s been living in for five years, but deep down he’s glad that he got his normal life back. That he can, now, meet up with his friends to go to the beach or even just head to school normally.

Yeah, he loved his dreamy life. It was the most badass way to live.

But in the end, not being crazy, living normally is the greatest way to live.