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By the time Gojo returns from wherever he takes Geto, the sun has sunken beneath the horizon, and an inky blackness swallows the mountainside. Shoko finds him alone on the rooftop of the school, bandages still wrapped tightly around his eyes and his hands caked in blood. By the way it has long since coagulated, and with its brownish, matted colour, Shoko can tell it has been several hours since Gojo last made contact with Geto. Contact. Gojo must have released his barrier when he laid Geto to rest.
She walks up to him, cigerrette in hand, and leans against the guardrail. They stand in silence; there is a grief that consumes the air around them that neither decides to comment on. Gojo hardly acknowledges Shoko's presence, but she can tell how he arches an eyebrow beneath the blindfold when he sees her smoking. He doesn't comment on it, however, and instead gestures for her to hand him one too.
It's not unlike Gojo to suffer in silence; despite how long they've known each other, Shoko always knew that there was an inpenetrable gulf between her and Gojo—a distance she knows only Geto has ever been able to cross.
Gojo exhales a large plume of smoke, and it's the first time Shoko has seen him smoke since they were in grade school. They both can immediately heal their lungs, making them both immune to the negative effects of smoking. And although Shoko has been trying to quit, she still sneaks in a butt or two when she gets stressed; Satoru can't stand the stench and always makes a point to let her know. That's why she usually sneaks up here whenever she needs to smoke privately. She used to do the same almost a decade ago. Whenever Geto and Gojo got into a fight and she didn't want any part of it, she could be alone up here with only the odd crow or so for company. And maybe she ponders as she chews on her cigarette; that's how Gojo finds out about her hiding spot.
"Did you burn the body?" It's quite the sardonic thing to say to someone who just killed his best friend, but Shoko doesn't know how to bridge the emotional distance between them, so she just gets to the point. After all, she will have to forge medical records for Gojo anyway.
He takes a while to answer, enigmatic as always. The tip of the cigarette glows a brilliant orange as he takes a long, steady drag. Shoko studies Gojo's face, but he is an expert in masking his feelings, and his expression gives almost nothing away; he has a psyche forged from steel, and it doesn't help that he hides underneath his blindfolds and parka.
"Do you remember when I tried to levitate off here and fell unto Suguru? I don't think I'd ever seen Yaga-sensei that pissed off before," Gojo says softly, a cloud of smoke dissipating before him.
No, I did not, is what Shoko hears. But she can't fault him entirely. As for the memory, she recalls it, though not quite as fondly as Gojo. Yaga-sensei had decided that that would be a learning opportunity for the three of them. And as for Shoko, she was made to mend the two boys. They were first years, then, and Shoko had scarcely any experience healing anything worse than a laceration. She was drained after, and Suguru's collarbone never quite healed the right way. There was a scar there that only the three of them knew about, but Shoko didn't notice until Gojo mentioned it to her months later.
She sighs, "You two were always inseparable." Beneath them, the lights of Tokyo flicker in the distance, blissfully unaware of the averted calamity; life around them, it seems, continues to prattle on despite the fracture in their own.
"But I was there, too," Shoko says, sighing deeply. "I'm still here."
Gojo shifts where he stands, the first significant movement he's made since he helped himself to Shoko's stash.
"I know he was special to you, and I don't care about what your true feelings towards him were. Or whatever happened tonight. I trust your judgment." She continues, Gojo's gaze heavy on her. "Just know: I'm still here."
Shoko watches Gojo as her words wash over him; he doesn't move at all, and Shoko wonders if he hears her at all. His attention is on his hands, and she too notices how the blood has caked his hands and has begun to crack. He rubs his fingers together, and she watches as the dried blood starts to flake off.
"I always expected him to be around." When Gojo finally speaks again, his voice is strained, and if Shoko did not know any better, she would think he was about to cry. "I love him," Gojo confesses.
I know, Shoko doesn't say. She reaches a hand out to him, placing it where his would be, but she's met with the invisible resistance of Gojo's Infinity Barrier. She furrows her brow, but the expression only lasts a millisecond. She hopes that Gojo doesn't notice, but despite her disappointment, she hopes that he will let her in just this one time.
Gojo doesn't notice—or ignores—her before he continues. "You already knew that, though." Despite the gentleness in his voice, Shoko senses a tinge of accusation in his tone.
Yes, she knew. She knew by the way the two boys always sneaked into each other's dorms; she knew when they came back "late" from missions, giggling and blushing red; she knew when it was always them two and her walking behind them; she knew it when Geto ran and killed those innocent people and Gojo just let him go.
"I loved him too," Shoko says, but it's not the same kind of love that Gojo felt towards him, and Shoko knows this. He looks down at her, and she looks at where his eyes should be. His hair glows a brilliant silver in the evening. A faint smile forms on his face.
"I love you." She says, and she knows it's the second time that evening that those words have been said.
Gojo's expression falters for a second, and beneath that mask he wears—a tempory mask of a diety that he is burdened with—Shoko searches for Satoru. See seeks a fleeting glance that, for once, will declare his humanity. "You don't have to be here alone," she reminds him again.
"He was the only one who could..." His voice trails away, and he looks at the blood on his hands. The cigarette is not much more than a stub now.
Understand me. It's nauseating.
"Don't say stupid shit like that." She tries again to put a hand on him, this time on his shoulder, but once again is met with the resitance of his Infinity Barrier. It pisses her off slightly, and she starts to realise just how cold it is—or maybe it's Gojo's words that chill her to the bone. The realisation that he is right. She doesn't understand him, nor did she understand Geto. But the thought that only the two of them could ever understand each other just makes her feel like background noise. The burden of being the Strongest, Yage-sensei told her once, referring to both Gojo and Geto, because at least he would listen to her.
It's a burden that she was never forced to shoulder, but at the end of it all, when there were no missions to carry out alone or demons to battle in the middle of the night, they were all just children. It was unfair, Shoko thinks, that she was allowed to watch her friends destroy themselves.
"Let me in," she says, pushing her hand against his barrier. "Please." It's futile, she knows.
"Shoko." It's that soft, detached voice that she hates so much. "I'm sorry."
Shoko watches her hand struggle fruitlessly against his barrier. When she gives up, her arm falls limp against her side. "Geto talked to me, too. He told me that when he thought you died, a part of him died, too. He must have told you that, though."
She glances at him, and by the way he fails to react, she knows her assumption is right.
"Shoko. What do you think happens to us when we die?" Asks the man who came back from the dead.
Gojo is an expert at dodging the topic at hand, but the question still catches her off guard.
"I dunno. Reincarnation. Heaven. Worm food. Whichever option helps you sleep at night."
At this, Gojo chuckles candidly for the first time that evening.
"Suguru was into that Buddhism stuff," he says, "at least when we were in high school together. He always said that our souls would be split and recycled again and again until we reach Nirvanna. It's the same kind of shit they taught us growing up, except Suguru really believed in it." He pauses, and it's almost as if the entire world around them has also decided to stop to hear him speak. His voice is shaking slightly when he starts again. "I think he still believed that tonight. He wasn't afraid to die, but I don't think he saw it coming. Not like this, at least."
Shoko waits for more, but it doesn't come. Whatever Gojo thinks awaits Geto in the next life, he doesn't share with her that night. But she can't help but notice how he relaxes at whatever delusion he has chosen to feed himself that night. No, it's not a delusion. She whisks that thought away as she averts her gaze towards the twinkling metropolis in the distance. It's something worse, at least in their line of work. Hope.
"You shouldn't really worry about that."
Gojo looks at her; she clarifies, "About dying, I mean. Maybe it's all nonsense. Souls and everything. I've never seen one, at least. And Geto... I think he lost the plot a long time ago."
At this, Gojo really laughs, and the sound is unsettling. It rattles the darkness around them and disquiets that feeling of grief that Shoko thinks she had become accustomed to.
"Souls are as real as Cursed Energy," he flicks the long-burnt-out cigarette, and Shoko watches as the ashen tip crumbles and falls gently to the ground. "Maybe not quite the same. Geto... I think he believed they were incongruent or something like that. No Cursed Energy equating to not having a soul,"- and it sounds like he's trying to rationalise it to himself - "Or some garbage like that. Anyway, it's a nonsensical idea. The Soul is the essence of humanity. Happiness, envy. Rage, love. The source of Cursed Spirts, and we are all capable of feeling those things. So it reasons we all have souls, yeah?
"But from what I've seen in this world, I'd argue that it's us Sorcerers who have no soul, but I don't think I want to believe in that either."
He pauses, and Shoko feels as if he expects her to agree. She isn't used to him talking like this; it's always childish, inappropriate jokes, and thinly veiled threats against the Higher Ups. Maybe it's just that they haven't talked like this in a while, not since Geto left and they were left splintered, leaving just Gojo, continuously training to become the strongest, and Shoko, struggling desperately to put the pieces back together.
And of course, it always has to do with Geto. No one could touch Gojo, but Geto's departure left a gaping wound in Gojo's heart that not even Shoko could heal. She was there, and she's still here, but she feels as if she's as far away as she's ever been. Now she stands in front of him, convinced he is in need of saving.
She's not angry when she says, "I won't pretend to understand what Geto believed in or what his plan was." I don't think you knew, either. "All I know is that he loved you very much, and he would've come back home if you'd gone and asked."
The corner of Gojo's mouth twitches, and Shoko notices, for the first time that evening, how uncharacteristically dry they are. She fully expects him to yell at her—or maybe she hopes he does, because then at least she will know that he knows she exists—but instead his mouth curls into a grin.
Before he can speak, she continues, "Whether Souls exist or not, it doesn't matter. If we get reborn in the next life, or if we just get eaten by the worms, it doesn't matter. But you were loved, Satoru. You're still loved now. If you die tomorrow, you'll still be loved. You will die knowing that you are loved." A lump swells in her throat as she chews on the corpse of her cigarette. It's rancid between her lips now, and the salt of her tears does little to disguise the awful taste. She hides her face, realising how weak she must look. "Knowing you, I'm sure Geto died knowing he was loved. If he's reborn, he'll carry that love with him, and he'll search for you again in that life. And maybe with all the evil shit he's done, he'll just go to Hell, but I bet he'll be burning for eternity, still waiting for you regardless.
"But me? If I died tomorrow, I would die alone, even if you were there and held me."
It hits harder than she meant it to. The grin is wiped off Gojo's face, and he stands up straight. She always forgets how tall he is, maybe because it's less menacing when he's smiling and acting like a grown child. He's reaching for the bandages wrapped around his head, and before she can tell him to stop, the white cloth is loose around his head.
Her hand twitches, and before she can change her mind, she reaches towards his face but is stopped by his barrier. The wrench in her gut tightens, and she wonders what made her think she could ever be allowed to touch him. So she starts to pull her hand away like last time, but the barrier disappears, and the feeling of his warm face underneath her hands draws a shiver down her spine. It's soft, like an infant's. And wet. Blue eyes peek at her from beneath the bandages, and she almost gasps because they are dull and empty, so unlike the last time she saw them, it's like a light in his soul has been extinguished.
There's so much Shoko's RCT can't fix, but even so, she knows she never has to worry about Gojo Satoru. It is an unspoken fact between them that he does not need her. She lives to save the people that Gojo Satoru cannot save—people with blown-up arms, lacerations, and stab wounds—but all of these are inconveniences to Gojo. She doesn't need to be there to heal his physical wounds.
"If you died tomorrow," Gojo says, wrapping his arms around her, "I think I'd be a little sad."
"You're an idiot." But she's leaning her head against his chest, crying into his parka. "I love you," she whispers again, but this time she really means it. She isn't sure if he hears her when he chuckles.
"Yeah, I know."
"I'll have to forge the medical records," Shoko says pushing herself away from him and digging into her pockets for a new aigrette. "To make it seem like you followed orders."
"Yeah." There's a silence that Shoko fills by lighting her cigarette. It's getting late know and they both have a lot of work to get done tomorrow. Shoko wonders how they'll move on from this; if this will be like last time.
"Did you mean when you said you love me?"
"Of course I did. Are you stupid?" The stench of nicotine fills the air.
"Nah. I am irresistible, after all."
Shoko wants to laugh, but her lungs already sting badly from the smoke and cold. Insufferable. "I hate you."
"You wound me."
It feels like the banter that made their high school days. When Shoko looks at the sky tonight, she's certain there's a new star.