Chapter Text
Part 1: kids
It's a wet summer and Satoru is angry. A low simmering thing that won’t leave the center of his chest and spurs his ‘reckless’ behavior. He almost wishes he wasn’t angry but angry . The kind of anger that would make people shut the fuck up for three goddamned seconds and let Satoru figure out where he stands now as a sorcerer, and as a fucking human being. But he’s a simmering anger that makes him snappish and quick to pull up the new power he’s mastered. Shoko has started to avoid him at all costs if she notices he’s particularly assholery, and he supposes he doesn’t mind. Their little spats are getting exhausting. Satoru is vaguely annoyed at everything, especially, and most recently, children he cannot find and wet summers.
Thunder follows him back from the third elementary school he’d visited that week. He has a damp list he’s crossing prefectures and names from, tucked into his palm and with each school another layer of dread fills him. Satoru has been trying to track down Megumi Zen'in/Fushiguro for about two months at this point. It’s been a pain in his ass. No one takes too kindly to him requesting time off to try and find the child. It’s been a fight between going to all ends of the earth to fight curses and scouring Tokyo for a kid that he has no legal or familial right to approach. If anything Satoru has the complete opposite of legal or familial right to find the boy. He knows that he shouldn’t be annoyed that adults–adultier adults–are careful when he asks them, oh hey have you seen this child? Do I know more about him but his name? No! Is he missing? Not the slightest clue! Am I family? Hell no, me and his daddy played a sweet little game of mutual murder! Are the nightmares crippling? Hahaha. What nightmares? Sleep who?
Anyways. Did he mention how wet the summer has been?
Satoru ducks under an awning as thunder grumbles angrily from the sky. He stuffs the list into the pocket of his jeans and rubs at his eyes. He likes the rain. Or. Actually he liked the rain, but now the weather turns and Satoru’s body turns with it. Lights up with pain that he doesn’t want to remember. He aches down to his bones. The nerves in his arms flaring with agony like Toji is plunging a blade into Satoru again. His head throbs, but only on that one side, an ache that spreads down his brow to rest in his cheekbone. Satoru hasn’t mentioned it to anyone, even as the rainy weeks almost cripple him. He’s fine when it’s dry out, and he spent so long perfecting reversed cursed energy that to admit pain feels like personal betrayal. Besides, Shoko is busy half the time and annoyed with him the other half.
The pain he can ignore, or at least compartmentalize so he can move on to better things, but he needs help finding the kid and he can admit that to himself. Satoru flips his phone open and considers his options. He ponders the long list of cons and the single pro of calling up his family to see if he can use some of their stalker equipment. They probably know exactly where the boy is, what he’s doing and the last time he took a shit. Nevermind. No pros. Satoru would rather track the little ferret down the old fashion way. So his family connections put to the side, Satoru has an even smaller selection of people still in his contacts.
Kento. The last thing he did was hit Satoru across the face and declare he was leaving the school. Satoru was ready to fist fight him in that moment, wanting nothing more than to hit something. Someone. To have someone hit back just as hard. But all Kento had done was hit him, and hiss that everything was Satoru’s fault. Which. Satoru knows that. So he’d laughed in Kento’s face and hadn’t heard from him since. A part of him, a very deep part of him that’s buried beneath anger and something he doesn’t have a name for, regrets it. Satoru chews his lip, presses his palm into his eye socket to try and soothe the ache and types out a short message one handed.
Me: hey ned help u up 4 it???!?!?!
His other option. Shoko. Actually she doesn’t have a choice, and she’d already helped him in his initial insecurity of where to start by pointing out how much public information there actually is for Satoru to dig around in.
There’s Utahime. Hm. Satoru…isn’t sure. She might have been the only one to actually get tears out of him in a spine cringing lapse of self control. They’d been talking about some bullshit meeting, Satoru wearing a uniform crusted in a week's worth of curse slime, his blood, food and other things. Both leaning over a table looking at reports and out of nowhere Utahime asked Satoru if he was okay . Holy fuck. So maybe he cried. Just a little. A few tears out of wide eyes before he breathed a laugh and lied. But. She’s in Kyoto and Satoru has barely spent time in Kyoto looking for the kid. He doesn’t think Toji would be anywhere near Kyoto, much less keep his spawn there, but completely ignoring it is stupid.
Satoru rolls his neck, shoves his hand harder against his eye.
Me: need a favor kno u got the timE :>
Uta: what.
Me: u in??????
Uta: details first.
Me: lookin 4 a child
Uta: no
Satoru is about to type out something vaguely annoying when the pain in his face becomes blinding. His vision whites out for a moment, his head going so silent it rings. He chokes on a little gasp when his vision rights itself. That’s not normal. That goes beyond the ache, beyond the double ache that seems to be connected to the weather. Satoru rubs gently, but firmly against his eye. His phone had dipped dangerously in his hand, sagging towards the hard concrete below. Satoru grips it tighter, brings the screen up to his face. The little chat log with Utahime blurs for a moment before clearing.
Me: okey fine was gonna be fun
Satoru doesn’t wait for a response before he closes his phone and slides it back into his pocket. The pain has receded into a sharp hum that feels like it’s suctioned to the side of his face. If Satoru was none the wiser, he’d think he had a curse attached. Actually he might prefer that. He could kill it, be done with the pain and go on with his life. But no . That would be too damn easy. Instead he might be getting something like a head cold. Satoru stomps down the sidewalk in the vague direction of the train that’ll take him close(ish) to campus. He’s more so looking for something to eat. Something hot and hearty, maybe a quiet table to sit at in a dim corner.
The day is well and truly over by the time Satoru drags himself back to campus. It’s still rainy and the satisfaction of a hot meal had been wrung once again from Satoru as the muggy night slipped between his clothes and made him sweat. It’s a terrible feeling to be wet with sweat and also warm rain. Campus is pretty much deserted; if anyone is still here they’re taking shelter from the never ending rain. Satoru makes a straight line to the boys dormitory. All lights remain off except for the bathroom and Satoru’s room towards the middle of the hall. He goes through his nightly routine feeling annoyed and getting irrationally angry when little things go wrong. There are no texts to read and a missed call from Yaga, probably telling him he’s going somewhere ludicrous in the morning. Satoru lets out a long breath, tosses his phone onto his bedside table and goes to sleep.
In the interest of searching through as many schools as possible before a school break ruins all of Satoru’s work, he redoubles his efforts. For the most part that means hitting more schools in a short period of time, up to ten a day–he’s getting better at teleportation– or scouring public information about neighborhoods and urban sprawl. The thing that’s frustrating him, and every one he talks to, his how little information he has. If he knew what the kid looked like he could probably find him with the aid of Six Eyes. If he knew the kids' residuals that’d be even better. But Satoru is looking for a needle in a haystack, unsure how much of what Toji told him is true. He’s tried the surnames Zen'in and Fushiguro at every school, in every public information office, and there has yet to be a Megumi listed among them. He does find a Tsumiki Fushiguro registered to a school close to Sanya. He tucks that into the back of his head for little more than the proximity to Sanya. But other than that he’s gotten nowhere.
“You started too late,” Yaga tells Satoru.
He’s letting Satoru nap in his office, a weird little allowance that Satoru has been too grateful for to question much. He sleeps poorly alone in the dorms so the naps in Yaga’s doll infested office are appreciated. Satoru has just finished bitching about his non-luck, a little drowsy and napscarred.
“I didn’t have the time before now,” Satoru groans. “I know I should have gone immediately.”
Yaga pauses in his felting to look over at Satoru. He considers him silently;another slightly disturbing development. Yaga will just… look at Satoru for moments at a time, then look away and pretend he hadn’t been.
“Did you ever see Shoko after your fight with Fushiguro?”
Satoru blinks at the ceiling. “Uh. No? Why would I need to? And why is that relevant now ? That was like a lifetime ago.”
“Eighteen months is not a lifetime.”
Satoru flaps a hand at him. It feels like a lifetime. Like two or three, and Satoru is some wretched immortal thing slogging his way through them.
“I think you should ask Haruki.”
“Ugh. Nooo. I hate that guy.”
“He has information about both clans and acts as an unbiased party.”
“Bull shit . He always favored those Zen'in brats.”
Satoru rolls over on the couch, shoving his face into the cushions, putting his back to Yaga. He hears the man mutter something.
“I don’t want to go to my family,” Satoru says, quieter than he meant.
“Sometimes you have to do things you don’t want for the sake of others.”
Yeah.
“I don’t want them to know.”
“That is a valid concern,” Yaga says. “But time is running out.”
“What does that mean?” Satoru asks the couch cushions. “Toji only told me the kid was being sold off soon and the Zen'in would have boasted about it if they already had the kid.”
“Satoru.”
That tone means, you’re smarter than that, you pig headed boy. Satoru closes his eyes. The Zen'in hadn’t bragged about it yet which means the kid is still out there which is good for Satoru, but probably not so good for the kid. Satoru knows that a mother is probably not in the picture, or if she is, she’s no better than Toji. What mother would sell their child to an incest ridden clan?
“I can arrange for a meeting with Haruki to happen on campus if that would make you feel better about talking with him.”
“ Fine ,” Satoru says. “See if he can come later this week.”
Satoru thinks he’s going to sleep again, the office is warm even as it storms outside, and Yaga is one of the more familiar things in Satoru’s life right now. A solid constant that makes Satoru feel almost normal. Yaga’s office is, admittedly, slightly creepy with a litany of half finished corpses, button eyes and glass eyes staring from all angles, but Panda is pretty much complete and he seems to enjoy Satoru’s company. The little creature is curled at the foot of the couch right now. Creepy, a smidge off normal, warm, inviting and with a blunt panda child to inform Satoru of all his flaws before demanding to be held. The perfect place for Satoru to bed down for a few precious hours.
“Are you in pain?”
Satoru opens his eyes.
“What?”
“Are you in pain?” Yaga is leaning over him, looking at Satoru with furrowed brows and something like disapproval.
“No?”
“No? Or No.”
Satoru sits up, squint-glares at his principal. “What makes you think I’m in pain?”
“You’re quiet. I’ve never seen you so quiet, and your residuals throb.”
“I’m achy,” Satoru says because lying to Yaga is a fool's errand. “When it rains I…hurt.”
More, he hurts more, in a less ignorable way.
Yaga frowns deeper. “Where?”
Satoru points to his chest and the points on his arms that burn with sensation and the part of his throat that feels like suffocation, and finally the ball of agony on his forehead.
“It comes and goes, and I’m not bleeding or anything.”
“Do you find it hard to function sometimes? Move your limbs and such.”
“Uh. Not really?” Satoru shifts on the couch. He’s not a fan of this interrogation and he’s feeling in every moment that passes that this was a cleverly devised plan to get Satoru talking about his weird pain.
Yaga moves back towards his desk. He digs through a drawer, withdraws an old paper, and flourishes it towards Satoru.
“Take this.”
“What is it?”
“A doctor in Tokyo. I want you to go and see him.”
Satoru laughs, then stops laughing when Yaga does nothing but furrow his brows at him.
“A normal doctor? What am I supposed to tell him?”
“Tell him what happened.”
“I got stabbed several times by a magical dagger and should be dead ten times over?” Satoru says in disbelief. “I’m sure that’ll go over well and not get me locked in the nearest psych ward.”
Yaga crosses his arms over his chest. “Tell him you were attacked, stabbed multiple times and experienced heart failure.”
“And a brain bleed.”
Yaga’s brows shoot up. “You had a brain bleed?”
“I fixed it.”
At least Satoru thinks he fixed it.
“Oh my fuc–okay. Yes, mention that, and tell him that you are experiencing residual pain that flares during storms.”
Satoru folds the paper and shoves it into a pocket. “Okay, I’ll do that in all my abundant free time.”
“I will make time.”
Yaga makes time. Satoru has an appointment set for the next day which is…unusual and so annoying that Satoru is pissed off the whole morning. He’d been out of the country for a few hours, over in some part of America that was so destitute Satoru doesn’t even know the name of the place. He’d teleported under the watchful eye of a supervisor who would then report back to the higher ups and inform them if Satoru was able to go the distance without vomiting. He does vomit upon reaching American soil but the supervisor wasn’t there to see it. Curse handled, a second grade in a town of conspiracy theorists– Suguru would have loved that–and Satoru is sitting in the waiting room of Tokyo general hospital.
He’s not nervous, at least he tells himself he isn’t, but Satoru has never been to a normal doctor ever. Any medical issues he had when he was a child–he had bad sensory issues for a while, and then couldn’t eat most things until he turned like ten–were handled by a clan healer. The healing was a mix of jujutsu, spiritual and medicinal. Satoru had a lot of hot spring visits and isolation treatments. He’s not dead so obviously they did something right. Shoko knows a lot about normal medicine, she’d more or less rewritten most of the textbooks on healing that are at the tech. Everything is outdated and Shoko loves her morphine.
Satoru’s name is called. He shuffles to his feet and follows a woman with a clipboard back into the hospital. She directs him where to go and Satoru steps into a smallish office. The doctor–Ryuzaki Shirogane–middle aged but close to older, looks up from his chart when Satoru comes in. The man looks surprised to see him, put off by Satoru’s appearance, or maybe the sunglasses in a building.
“You’re younger than I anticipated,” the doctor says. He motions Satoru to sit on the bed.
“Yeah,” Satoru says.
“How old are you?”
“Eighteen. I’ll be nineteen in December.”
A note.
“Did your father make the appointment?”
Satoru barks a laugh. “Yeah. Something like that.”
“Okay…can you explain why you’ve come to see me?”
Satoru smiles with his teeth and explains, I was stabbed a bajillion times here, here, here, here. I died for like two seconds. Brain bleed, heart attack, all that jazz. Walked that off, but now it hurts off and on.
The doctor stares at him, somewhere during Satoru’s story he’d stopped taking notes.
“That’s impressive. I should feel honored talking to someone who survived such a violent ordeal.” He writes a few more notes. “You’re here only for lingering pain, correct?”
“Yeah,” Satoru says. “It comes in bouts, and the level is always different. I notice it more when it rains.”
“Yes, it isn’t rare for people who experience chronic pain will notice flare ups when the weather changes.”
“Chronic pain.”
“I would almost guarantee it. I’d like to run some tests, maybe get you a CT scan to check on your head.”
Satoru isn’t actually sure he has time for this, but he agrees and sits getting his blood drawn and answering questions about sensation. At the end of the appointment Satoru is told to come back at the end of the following month for a scan, is prescribed a medication for his migraines and the worse of the pain and sent off with a diagnosis of severe nerve damage, chronic pain, acute malnutrition ,and something with his heart that made the doctor breathe a little quick. His heart had only been nicked though, so it can’t be that bad.
The prescriptions procured, a sweet treat in hand, and a mood sour enough to curdle milk, Satoru wanders into the nearest elementary school. It's late enough that there aren’t many kids left behind but for clubs.
“Hiya,” Satoru says to the woman at the front desk. She observes him coolly. “I was wondering if you had any Fushiguro’s in attendance here? I’m a cousin to Toji Fushiguro who, well,” Satoru makes a drinking motion and then slices across his throat, “if you get my drift. I’m trying to make sure his kid is okay.”
The woman glares at him. “I’m not at liberty to hand out information about our students.”
“Sure,” Satoru says easily. “Is there anything I can do to prove my intentions?”
“I need written permission from the guardian.”
“Ma’am,” Satoru says, “he’s dead as hell.”
He is then escorted from the property.
That’s fine, Satoru thinks as he meanders school-ward, mouth full of crepe , that school was way too fancy for the Fushiguro whelp.
One terrible, terrible trip to Belovo, a day in the library in Tokyo and Shoko inviting Satoru out for drinks solely because he doesn’t, Haruki comes to campus.
Satoru watches him from the porch of the cafeteria. He stands with his hands in his pockets, feet spread wide.
“You look like you’ve smelt shit,” Yaga mutters to him. “Knock it off.”
Easy for him to say. Satoru can smell shit and it’s walking towards them in a three piece suit, bald head gleaming in the sun, briefcase in hand like the prick Haruki Gojo is.
“Little brother,” Haruki says after Yaga has tipped a bow to him. He steps up the stairs with his arms open like he expects Satoru to step into them.
They aren’t brothers. Not really, not in any way that matters. The truth that Satoru’s dad had fucked some other woman came out a month or so after Satoru turned twelve. The result was a much older boy, damn Haruki, who called Satoru Pink Eye and put fish eggs in his bed. It wasn’t at all excusable. Haruki has several years on Satoru; the guy had beef with a literal child. But it was a little funny, the drama that came out of it. If it could be called drama. Infidelity in the Gojo Clan is as normal as breathing, but Satoru’s father had been so proud that he’d sired the Six Eyes. Twelve years of bragging and pointing at Satoru while standing several feet away and it wasn’t his ball sludge after all but something in Satoru’s mother. May he roll in his fucking grave.
Haruki is painfully normal. As normal as a sorcerer can be. Short by Gojo standard, drab looking with hair brown enough that he prefers to be bald. He’d been put in charge of correspondence and records when his technique proved useful in gathering retained memory from objects. He’s also slimy and charming in an off putting way that makes people bend to his will. Satoru sees him like a traitor, he did favor the Zen'in children, offering them kindness that he actively refused to give the children of his clan. Politics be damned, it was shitty to grow up being escorted around by Haruki like a little prize or doll. A doll that gets thrown against walls and a prize that has never been dusted.
“I’m not your brother,” Satoru says.
Haruki clicks his tongue and reaches forward to grab at Satoru’s earlobe. He’s always yanked on it, not a tug, a full on yank that would pull Satoru’s head sideways. His hand hits Infinity and for a moment his face goes a little slack. Satoru takes a step back.
“I need to ask for your assistance, which I am allowed to do without fearing any lingering debts, favors, ect., ect.”
Haruki recovers himself quickly, tucking the reaching hand into the pockets of his slacks. Expensive and a deep blue. At least he has taste in clothes.
“Now, now, I’d help you out anyways Sat-o-ru.”
“Stop,” Satoru snaps. “I’m Gojo to you.”
“Fine. Gojo. What do you want from me?”
They end up in the campus library, closed into a quiet corner. Haruki has pulled up a laptop, a worn composition notebook and a little case that contains an assortment of talismans that Satoru eyes wearily.
“Does the clan know you’re looking for one of their own?” Haruki asks as he types.
“Eh. No. I have no plan on telling them either.”
Haruki pauses and looks over at Satoru. “Kidnapping is a crime.”
“Oh no. And selling a child to an incest cult isn’t?” Satoru rolls his eyes to the ceiling. “What are you doing anyways?”
“Social forums.”
“Seriously?” Satoru cranes around to look at the screen. “Why?”
“Because that’s the easiest way to track someone down.”
“Fuck me,” Satoru groans. He smacks his forehead down on the table. “Is this what you do all day? Fuck around on social forums?”
“No,” Haruki says. “You said Fushiguro?”
“Mhm.”
“Okay well, does this look like anything?”
The laptop is turned towards Satoru. There’s an old posting, a grainy photo of, oh. Satoru feels his stomach turn uncomfortably. That's Toji Fushiguro. Dressed for a wedding, dwarfing the woman who clings to his arm smiling wide. It’s dated back to the late nineties. Right on the turn of the century. Toji is smiling, looking down at her, something kind, sweet. Satoru thinks he might vomit.
“Yeah. That’s uh. That’s him.”
“Great.” The laptop is pulled away again. “So from what I’m seeing here they had a kid in two thousand and two, at–give me a moment. Huh. Nevermind there are no records in hospitals.”
“I could have told you that,” Satoru mumbles. “I’m pretty sure he was a homebirth or something.”
“The mother died whatever it was. Here’s an obituary.”
[Redacted] Zen’in Born May 11th 1975 Died December 22nd 2002 Sanya Tokyo Parents…
Satoru nods and nods and nods again.
“There’s a Fushiguro in Sanya right now,” Satoru says.
“When does Fushiguro come into the picture here?” Haruki asks.
“I don’t know,” Satoru says, “that’s what you’re supposed to figure out.”
Haruki presses his lips together. “You’ve given me nothing to work with.”
“And look how well you’re doing. Want a pat on the head?”
“I can’t believe you’re still such a child. I have half a mind to spill this little secret mission you have going.”
“You do that and I’ll kill you,” Satoru says.
Dark eyes narrow. “I don’t take kindly to being threatened.”
“Neither do I,” Satoru says.
“Do you know why I agreed to come and help you?”
“Because I hold all the power over you?”
“No,” Haruki says through a scowl. “I agreed because I think you’re clever for grabbing this asset for our clan when the moment is opportune.”
Satoru frowns. “I’m not getting the kid for the clan. You’ll be lucky if I ever bring him to the compound. If he will ever know who you are.”
“You’re going to hoard power?” Said with disbelief but also the smug satisfaction of someone who thinks they caught a mouse in an open trap. “Don’t you have enough of that already?”
“Oh my god.” Satoru knocks his forehead against the table. “Why the hell would I need some brats power?”
“It's not about power?”
“I mean sure. Kid has a cool as hell technique and it better kick my ass one day.”
Haruki tilts his head, “that doesn’t make sense.”
Satoru shrugs, pulls out his phone and flutters his fingers at Haruki’s screen in a proceed motion. Haruki starts click clacks at his keys, and writes things down in his notebook. Satoru goes through his call log, scowling at the steadily rising number of missed calls. Yaga said he’d try to keep everyone off Satoru’s back today which appears to not be working at all. He’ll have to call some of these people back soon. He glances at Haruki.
“I need to go make some phone calls,” Satoru says as he gets up.
“If you aren’t going to help, I’m going to leave.”
Satoru points at his screen. “You see this number? That’s a first year student. She’s been here for a week and a half, this is her third curse. If they’re calling me, something went bad wrong.”
Haruki clenches his jaw but looks away.
Something did go bad wrong. They’re down an assistant and the little first year–who Satoru physically hauled from the wreckage of a bathhouse–is missing an ear. It was a big curse, too big for a newbie and assistant. Satoru is furious when he gets back. Haruki? Gone. Yaga? Standing between Satoru and murder. Satoru paces in the hallway that Yaga has more or less barricaded him in, as if Satoru couldn’t just blow a hole through the wall and run away. He isn’t going to and Yaga knows it as much as Satoru does. Yaga also strategically placed Panda in the hall with a ball and a stack of blocks. The cute little fuck toddles back and forth with Satoru trying to snag his pants before he realizes he can do that better if he stays in one place.
When Yaga returns, Satoru is laying on his back, arms spread, Panda curled in the center of his chest. Satoru frowns up at Yaga when he leans over his face.
“I’m stealing this.” He points at Panda.
Yaga almost smiles. “No.”
“You can’t stop me. I’m the strongest.”
“I’d be willing to fight you for him.”
“Really?!”
Yaga sighs, pinches his nose. “No. That. Came out wrong. My boy is not a prize won in a duel.”
Satoru blows a raspberry. “But look how much he likes me.”
Panda does like Satoru. He’s a shy little bear most of the time, but Satoru thinks maybe he gives off just enough weird vibes to be not quite human. They both hum with cursed energy, it runs in their blood and fluff in excess simply through the means of their creation and recreation.
“We’re buddies.”
“I'm glad he could keep you contained,” Yaga says.
“Oh. Right.” Satoru looks at Panda. “I forgot he’s used against me. Not cool, Yaga.”
“I can’t have you killing anyone, Satoru. No matter how angry you are.”
“They really, really deserve it.”
Yaga lifts Panda off Satoru’s chest, waking him in the process. “You aren’t the judge of that.”
Satoru sits up, rubs his forehead. Oh yeah. It’s raining. More. And he hasn’t taken his stupid pills today. Panda reaches for him, one tiny, grasping paw. It eases the pounding ache and anger, leaving Satoru weary. He sways to his feet.
“How’s the first year?”
Yaga shifts a squirming Panda in his grasp. Satoru holds out a finger for the kid to grab. Panda doesn’t chew but he absolutely grabs and holds and refuses to release until there is a new thing to grab or he falls asleep.
“She’ll be fine. Shoko says the blood loss wasn’t as severe as it appeared.”
Satoru nods jerkily. He’s watching Panda tug his finger. “Haruki was a bust.”
“He left me some papers for you before he left.”
“Really? Huh. So maybe not a bust. But, I don’t really trust him.”
Yaga hums. “Is there anyone you do trust?”
“Panda,” Satoru says.
Haruki tracked down where Fushiguro came into the story. A second marriage, one without pictures, nearly nonexistent, not of a clan, nor a sorcerer. There’s another obituary. A newer one from two thousand and eight. Satoru’s leg jumps. That proves it. Megumi Fushiguro is alone right now. Fuck. Maybe he’s dead . Satoru goes through the rest of the papers and decides that he needs to overturn Sanya. At the bottom of the pile is a page that looks like it was ripped straight out of Haruki’s notebook. It’s scrawled in his neat handwriting.
Satoru, I was doing some work for the Inumaki’s a year or so ago and I came across a few interesting things. First, if you’re really in the business of teaching like you claim, there is a new child in the Inumaki compound who could greatly benefit from attending the Tech. I can give you further information on that if you so desire. Second, I came across a long lost cousin along our line. Yuuta Okkotsu . I was curious and followed a few leads. He's living as a normal in the east of the city. I was unaware of an outsider, you best be wary of him. Unless he is a normal and then that is a break in our bloodline and should, as such, be reburied.
You and I are not so different, besides all the ways we are. We come from the same place. I am not as blind as you think I am. You need to open your eyes, Satoru. Isolation is how you–
Satoru folds the letter and sets it aside. He’s not taking advice from Haruki, but damn. He wishes he really wasn't much different from Haruki. Life would be so much easier. Satoru takes off his shades, digs his fingers harshly into his eye sockets. Thunder curls outside and catches along the inside of his face like a physical thing, a ringing that stays and stays and stays. It starts to rain.