Chapter Text
beginnings, innocence, spontaneity, a free spirit
“Okay. Ask your question.”
Todo studied the cards in front of him. “You haven’t given me my hand yet.”
“Idiot, I already told you!” Momo clicked her tongue with an exasperated sigh, tilting her head. They were cross legged across from each other in the tiled courtyard, the orange sun beginning to set behind them. “They’re tarot cards, we’re not playing a game!”
“Oh.” He scratched his chin. “Well, I’m not really sure what the point is, then.”
“Gah.” Momo looked over her shoulder. “Noritoshi, you were listening, right? Am I insane? This isn’t that hard!”
“I heard you,” The teenager fiddled with a braid, hardly looking up from the book he was studying at his place on the bench nearby, “I just agree with him. For once.”
“We’re gaining insight! ” Momo leaned her chin on her hand. “Todo, you’re supposed to ask a question, and the cards answer it for you.”
“Like what kind of question?”
“Well, I don’t know. You could, like, ask how to get rich, or how you’ll die, or how you’ll meet your soulmate-”
“I don’t need to ask that.” He answered flatly, perking up. “It’ll be at a meet-and-greet, and I’ll drop to one knee and present the largest ring Takada-chan has ever seen-”
“Oh my God, I can’t do this.” Momo brought a hand to her face and dragged it down in theatrical exasperation. “It’s late anyway. Let’s go inside, I’ll paint your toenails Takada red or whatever you called it-”
“Can’t.” Todo moved to his knees, beginning to help collect the cards before his hand was smacked away by their owner. “It’s chest day and I haven’t done my workout yet.”
“Ugh.” She pushed her cards into their velvet pouch. “Kamo? Do you wanna hang out? Watch a movie or something?”
“Can’t.” He flipped a page. “Studying.”
“For what? Sensei said we don’t have to worry about classes until the new first years show up-”
“‘If something is worth doing, do it wholeheartedly, Nishimiya. ” he interrupted, voice dripping with pomposity, “Buddha.”
“To know is to know that you know nothing.” She rose to her feet, hand on her hip. “Socrates, douchebag.”
He ignored her.
“Wow, I didn’t expect you to know a whole quote like that.” Todo admired from her side as they made their way over the stone bridge that led to the dormitories.
She scoffed, extending an arm to smack him, but the attempt was futile. She struck his stomach. “What, you think I’m stupid?”
“No. You just never actually pay attention in class. You’re always doing your makeup or something.”
She tilted her head back. “He’s getting on my nerves again.”
“He’s getting better. You know how he grew up.”
Momo scrunched her nose. “I don’t really care how he grew up, he’s an asshole. Everybody has problems, don’t make them mine. ”
“Ah, my favorite empath.” Momo and Todo froze in their tracks at the delicate voice, turning around to find their sensei behind them with a bag slung over her shoulder. “Momo, a word.”
Momo scoffed. “Word.”
“You know what I mean, smart mouth.” Utahime responded, fighting off a slight smirk, her finger crooking to beckon her forward.
Momo groaned, throwing her head back and begrudgingly (and rather dramatically) shuffling over to meet Utahime a few meters away. Todo chuckled, eager to watch the tongue lashing.
“You’re dismissed, Aoi.” Utahime cocked an eyebrow.
“But sensei-”
“Go.”
He sighed, turning around and throwing his hands behind his head. “Good luck, Mo.”
Momo huffed. “Okay, what did I do this time?”
“Walk with me to my car.” Utahime started on her feet, Momo trailing behind, mouth beginning to open in question. “No, you’re not leaving with me, I just want to go home already.”
“Yeah, yeah.” Momo clasped her hands to the side of her face, pouting her lips mockingly, pitching her voice. “‘Oh, Ieiri, I hate my students soooo much, kiss it better, mwah mwah mwah mwah-’”
“For the love of God, Momo, don’t-” She rubbed the bridge of her nose, barely concealing the blush that was beginning to form at the tips of her ears and under her scar. “Okay, look. We’re getting the first years tomorrow.”
“Fascinating.”
“There’s three.”
“Ground-breaking.”
“Two girls.”
“Ama-” Momo’s eyes widened, the sarcasm once dripping from her tone being sucked from her chest in an instant. “Girls? Here?”
“Yes.” Utahime adjusted her bag. “Two of them.”
“I heard you the first time.”
“I had to check, you usually don’t pay attention, so-”
“Hey, I pay attention to the stuff I want to pay attention to.” She defensively interrupted. “I don’t care about math or science or anything, that’s why I don’t bother.”
“And that’s a conversation for another time.” She pursed her lips, slowing down to allow her student to remain by her side. “Momo, I’d really like to see you step up with these girls. Well, all of the first years, but the girls in particular, because you and I both know the reality of being a woman in this profession.”
As if the universe had been eavesdropping, some of the final stray beams of golden sunset struck the teacher’s cheek, caressing the imposing strike that had scorched its way across her skin long ago, long before Momo had ever made her acquaintance. Utahime-sensei was pretty- so pretty- but she was a teacher for a reason, wasn’t she?
Women never did serve much else of a purpose in sorcery other than being eye candy for their male counterparts. The teenager had learned that quickly.
“I…I know.” Momo sighed. “I can help. I will help.”
“Good.”
“But I don’t think I’d do much of a good job.” Momo watched Utahime remove her keys from her satchel and unlock the lone sedan parked outside of the school. “I’m not really like, a powerful sorcerer or anything, and I’m not really that nice- ”
Her sensei couldn’t hide an amused chuckle. “No, no you’re not that nice.”
“Hey, I was fishing!”
“Well, fish somewhere else, you’re not gonna catch anything here.”
“Sensei, I don’t think I’m a good role model.” Finally, the words came to her, and they stung leaving her lips. She wasn’t one for self-deprecation, but those butterflies in her stomach were distracting, and perhaps if she acknowledged them, they might disappear. “I think…I might mess them up.”
Utahime paused at the door of her car, a slight shimmer in her eye suggesting that she was perhaps taken aback by the confession. “Momo, do you remember when we met?”
“Well-”
“Because I do. I remember being on a flight to Germany with Principal Gakuganji- who, by the way, is the absolute worst person to be on a twelve hour flight with- confused and worried about who the hell this strange little American military brat was.”
Momo smirked, crossing her arms over her chest. “This sounds like a good story.”
“Oh, it gets even better, trust me.” Utahime tossed her bag in the backseat. “After finding my way to a middle school filled with other little miscreants like yourself, all snot-nosed and stupid and gawking at us when they heard Japanese, we’re led to a conference room and we sit. We sit and wait. And you know who’s brought in?”
“Oh, this is gonna be such a twist, isn’t it?”
“A freaking character from The Craft.” Utahime declares.
“How do you know that movie?” Momo smiled. “Oh my God, are you actually cool?”
“My God, I had never seen so much black clothing on one person in my life, and here you are, looking like you’re about to summon Satan.”
“Ugh, that was such an embarrassing phase.”
“I was positive you’d be ready to defy absolutely anything we told you, or take out a knife and start threatening us, but no. You nodded like it was just a matter of time before your were told you were a sorcerer.
“So you know what, you surprised me. And every day, you surprise me, again and again. I want to see you grow and become the sorcerer the world needs. That…that other female sorcerers need.” Utahime tilted her chin down. “Can you do that for me?”
Momo’s chest bloomed, a strange blossom of pride swelling in her ribcage and spreading through her limbs, all the way down to the tips of her toes. “I can do that, sensei.”
“Good.” Utahime smiled, a rare expression considering her students often drove her to the brink of insanity. “Now go paint Todo’s nails and be at the steps at eight tomorrow morning, okay?”
Momo nodded dutifully as her teacher stepped into the car.
“And get off your phone at a reasonable time, too. I don’t want you cranky and annoyed when you meet them.”
“Hey! Everyone I love is in a different time zone, you know!”
She did not, in fact, get off her phone at a reasonable time. Thank God for the coffee maker in the common area.
The first to arrive that morning was not a girl. It was a goddamn robot.
“Hi, nice to meet you,” the mannequin greeted, not at all acknowledging the surprise that Momo knew was written all across her face, “I’m Muta Kokichi, but you can call me Mechamaru.”
“Uh.” Momo accepted his handshake. “Hi. Nishimiya Momo.”
He tilted his head with a little click, and the girl realized she was literally hearing the gears turn in his head. “Oh. I’m not actually a puppet. It’s…complicated.”
Momo understood complicated well enough. Jujutsu was complicated. Learning Japanese was complicated. Hell, her whole life was a series of complicated events strung together haphazardly.
“I feel that.” She chuckled. She lazily rolled her hand in the direction of his luggage, and his expressionless eyes followed the bags as they gently left the stone tile and hovered to her side, thinly coated in swirls of blue cursed energy. “But we’re all kind of weird here. So- wait, I wasn’t calling you weird. I’m sorry, shit.”
He let out a tinny laugh, and she was relieved to know she hadn’t already failed her sensei and insulted the new student within mere moments. “No, I am weird. Say, are you comfortable speaking Japanese? If you prefer, we can switch to-”
“Is my Japanese that bad?” Momo felt herself blush as he followed her inside.
“No, no, it’s good. You just have an accent and, well…” He trailed off.
“I’m white.”
“No! No, I-”
“Seriously, it’s okay.” She looked over her shoulder, one hand on the railing as they approached the second floor. “I’m American. But I’d prefer to speak Japanese. Thanks anyway.”
The interaction was still lingering in her mind by the time the second car arrived. It shouldn’t have upset her- nothing the robot had said even hinted at malice- but she still found herself clenching her jaw. Sixteen years of bouncing between countries, and she had always been too American for the locals, too foreign for the Americans. She wished she could say she experienced that gratefulness everyone on social media was always talking about- the pride taken in being biracial, blessed with more than just a single heritage- but she found it impossible to take pride in a history she was never really included in.
Instead, she was really good at saying goodbye, packing bags, and moving through TSA. How’s that for culture?
The next student was a girl, so there was that, at least. She was practically beaming when Momo approached her.
“Hi, I’m Kasumi Miwa, I am a user of the New Shadow Style, it’s nice to meet you.” Her hands went to her sides after she recited her introduction- Momo couldn’t help but wonder how many times she practiced that in front of a mirror- and she actually bowed.
“Girl, you don’t have to do all of that.” Momo cocked an eyebrow. “Nishiyama Momo. Where are your bags?”
“Oh.” She looked taken aback, eyes betraying her in surprise. “I have three. In the backseat. But I can get it!”
Shit. Momo was totally being a bitch right now. Her interaction with Utahime flashed before her, and she rubbed her forehead in protest.
Let’s try again. “I really like your hair.”
“Oh, really?” Miwa’s big eyes beamed and a smile stretched across her face. “I- oh, my mom always makes me dye it black so I’ll look a little more normal, but this is my actual hair color, and I’m really glad you like it! Your hair is so pretty, you’re so lucky you’re blonde!”
Ah, there it is again.
She swallowed down her misplaced hurt upon opening the door. “Thanks.”
The girl was staring once her bag left the back without any contact, both her and her belongings following Momo inside like two dogs at her heels. “You can move stuff? Like, with your mind? Like a superhero?”
Momo chuckled. “It’s my technique. You have one, too, right? You just said something about shadows.”
Miwa hummed from behind her. “My family actually doesn’t have any sorcerers in it, I kind of got…discovered? I guess?” She tapped her chin, looking for the right words. “I had a grandmaster in kendo who t- ah, what am I saying, this is too much for our first interaction…”
Oh, God.
“Kasumi, you’re nice, so I’m gonna let you in on a secret.” Momo let out a sigh, flicking her wrist at the dormitory's handle, and the door propped open in a breeze.
“Oh, okay!”
“Don’t do that.” The bags gently swayed down to meet the tile floor, and Momo looked up with the intention of meeting her gaze, but the new student was suddenly very distracted. “Don’t-”
“This whole room is ours?!” Miwa stepped in a daze, eyeing the outdated twin bed and matching desk as though it were the ceiling of the Sistene Chapel. Her eyebrows perked when she caught sight of the bathroom, and she darted to it with glee. “Like, we don’t have to share it with anyone?”
“What? Gross. No.” Momo scrunched her nose. “Why would you share it?”
The younger girl looked to Momo, her face suddenly flat and voice sincere. “I’ve never had my own.”
“Like, your own bathroom?”
“My own bed.” She answered plainly.
“Oh.” Momo suddenly felt a pang of guilt.
“This is so cool.” She fell into her bed with a little giggle. She propped herself onto her elbows, looking to Momo. “I can’t wait to tell my brothers, they’re gonna be so jealous. Now what were you going to tell me?”
Momo leaned against the doorway, chewing on the inside of her cheek, arms crossed once again. “I was gonna say don’t…let anyone ruin your vibe, you know?”
Miwa’s smile somehow began to occupy even more of her face. “I won’t, Nishimiya-senpai!”
“Good. Class is at nine-“
“Oh, one more thing,” Miwa interrupted. “Your accent is so cool-“
Momo tries to listen, she really does.
She just can’t hear anything over the grating of her teeth.
There’s still one more to go.
It’s well past lunch before her final kohai manages to arrive. Momo’s stomach is grumbling, the caffeine is wearing off, and she’s starting to sweat as the sun mercilessly beams down from directly above her.
“Come on, Nitta…” She sighs to herself from her place on the top step, checking her phone clock. A text from her dad asked how her day was going.
sucks. miss scubaing with you. next summer?
If im still on the island you got it sweet pea
If. Ha.
Finally, the tinted black hatchback she had been longing for crept over the horizon and into view. Momo stood up, tilting her chin as though there was any chance she could possibly get a better view. She should have brought her damn broom down.
When Nitta stepped out, she made eye contact with Momo and perked her eyebrows.
Something was up.
“English,” Akari directed in kind, “she doesn’t speak it, switch.”
“Oh, scandalous.” Momo couldn’t resist the mischievous grin that stretched across her face as she jogged up to the significantly taller woman. English, while studying abroad, was acceptable for a few reasons, gossip being the most valuable of these. “What’s up?”
“She’s weird. Like, not sorcerer weird, like ‘comes from a cult’ weird.”
“Wait, seriously?” Momo glanced at the new student from the corner of her eye. She was looking down at her feet. Normal haircut. Grey hoodie and jeans. She didn’t seem weird, maybe…shy?
“Zenin.” Nitta lowered her voice- that was a title undoubtedly recognizable to the new student, regardless of language barrier. “There’s so much drama, girl. Like, I guess her sister- you know what? Just talk to Utahime, but don’t tell her I told you-”
“No, tell me now!”
“It’s too much.”
“Text me?”
“I’m like, eight years older than you. I’m not texting you.”
“Drag.” Momo sighed. “And here I was thinking you were the cool auxiliary.”
Akari pointed a stern finger at her. “I am.” With a sudden snap, she returned to her professional persona, polite grin and straight posture resuming. “Okay, Nishimiya, this is Zenin Mai. Zenin, this is Nishimiya Momo, second year. She’ll help you up.”
Momo looked up at the girl. She had a single duffle bag over her shoulder. “Hey, is that all you have?”
“Um. Yes.”
Silence. Momo tilted her head. “Uh, okay. I can get it-”
“No. No, um. That’s okay. Thank you.”
“No, like, I can literally just-”
“Please, senpai. I don’t wish to trouble you.” She bowed her head.
Momo had seen her fair share of weird for the day. This somehow took the cake.
“Uh, alright.” Momo spun on her heels, Mai stiffly following. “So there’s only three of us girls so we basically have a whole floor to ourselves, and there’s a common area- you can’t miss it. Anyway, what’s your cursed technique?”
“My…my cursed technique?”
“Yeah, goofy.” Momo joked as they approached the rooms. “I kinda know about your clan, you guys have some of the really cool ones, right?”
“I suppose.” A pause. “Um. Construction.”
“Oh, seriously? That’s actually like, really useful.” Momo doesn’t have to try here. “You’re so lucky, you probably never even have to go shopping or get food or anything. What’s the coolest thing you’ve ever made?”
Another pause. Momo turns over her shoulder. The girl looks downright confused. “I’ve made tea.”
Momo snorts. “That’s hilarious.”
“What?”
“Okay, your room is right here. You have the class schedule, right? Just be in your seat by nine and you’re good to go. Any questions?”
“I…no.” Mai shuffles awkwardly. She’s almost an entire foot taller than her, Momo realizes at this moment, but she looks like she’d rather be six feet under. “Thank you, Nishimiya-senpai.”
“Ugh, I don’t know why Nitta-san told you to call me that.” Momo huffed. “Just Momo is fine.”
Mai tilted her head. “You…don’t want me to call you by your family name?”
“Seriously, just call me Momo.”
“Okay, Momo-senpai.”
“Much better. I like you the best already.” Momo smiled.
And damn, if this girl doesn’t smile back, creases forming at the corners of her eyes, which she now had no trouble meeting Momo’s with. Gold like the sun, casting just as much warmth on Momo in welcome streams like the first clear day following Winter.
As Momo turns around, feeling perhaps what was an undeserved sense of pride for making the stiff cult girl break character, an unexpected itch at the back of her mind appeared.
Mai had no questions.
She had spent all morning dodging observations about her heritage and her family. How her blue eyes complimented her blonde hair, how she dragged the dipthongs of her words, how she habitually spoke with her hands. She wanted nothing more than to be just another upperclassman to these kids, not some particularly interesting spectacle to study.
So why did it bother her that she wasn’t particularly interesting to Mai?
ƃuᴉʞɐʇ-ʞsᴉɹ 'ssǝussǝlʞɔǝɹ 'ʞɔɐq ƃuᴉploH