Chapter Text
today was a field day—a normal class for satoru, his class with the 2nd years were over. deciding to take a detour to principal yaga's office instead, hearing that one of his students was there. the new one that he hadn't seen, the one that he had dreaded meeting.
[name] inohara. konan inohara's younger sister—the same one that was left orphaned after he had to execute konan for conspiracy against the institution of sorcerers, for the genocide of the non-sorcerers, for the attempt of mass-cleansing the non-sorcerers.
he tapped his foot as suguru arrived, so did shoko. they made eyecontact with eachother, tension arose between them. these three were the ones stained with the blood of konan. the ones who carried out her execution, in her home, while her sister slept in the room next to where she had been justly slaughtered.
it's been nearly 5 years since then, konan was 25 and [name] was only 10 then. they could all remember the look of terror as she watched them de-limb her older sister, the only remaining immediate relative she had. the head of her clan. the one who took care of her. they remembered the thick pause when satoru had broken her head clean off her head with his cursed technique—the head rolled towards the feet of the young girl, who was terrified and stuck in place.
it was all so vivid.
he remembered rushing to her and holding her in his arms as she just stayed still, staring at the limbless body of her sister. "[name], baby, please don't be mad at us.. we had to—i—please, we had to, we had no choice—your sister was doing something bad, and we had to do something to stop her. okay? please—" satoru stumbles out with his words as he held onto her shoulders.
his hands were shaking, cold, and turning a pale hue at the sight of the girl who was trying so hard to pry her eyes off shoko and suguru, who cleaned up the parts as fast as they could, covering it with cloths to try and prevent the kid from seeing more.
the three of them had convinced konan that they had the same beliefs, and when she had her guard down, they took the chance and ended her right on the spot. the same girl that they laughed with, experienced the same life and death experiences with, the same girl who'd tease them to death about crying over her if she learned about it.
it left them all shaken up—shoko left sorcery to pursue a medical career to get away from the people who ordered her to commit the act to show that she was still in solidarity with konan without outwardly risking herself in regards of her loyalty to the jujutsu headquarters.
suguru and satoru stayed where they were. suguru stayed in honour of konan, who used to always talk about wanting to become a teacher in jujutsu tech. while satoru stayed out of guilt because he was the reason that she never got to experience the life she dreamt of.
satoru reached his hand out towards the doorknob, turning it slowly. his knees felt like giving out, believing that his eyes were playing games on him. there was konan, sat on the couch, infront of principal yaga. same uniform on, her trademark honey blonde hair that reached her waist, that gigantic metal folding fan that she had as her cursed weapon. it looked like she was back to 15, back to the first moment that they all met her. she was three days late because she had problems with convincing her father to let her go to tokyo instead.
his breath turned shallow as he stepped foot into the room. "kon?" he absent-mindedly calls out as the younger girl snaps her head towards the direction of where she heard her sister's name mentioned.
yaga-sensei cleared his throat, sensing the stressful tension in the room. "it's not konan, no." he says, "it's [name]." the young girl corrects but she didn't dare to look back again. satoru sat down on the opposite cushion from her.
"it's been a while." he says. "you never showed up when i visited or asked you to come have lunch with me." he added as she just shrugs.
"we both know why." she answers curtly.
"i know. i'm sorry." he mutters softly, feeling the shame burn through his throat.
"i understand. you don't need to apologize," she says with a deep breath, looking away from him as he stared right through her. "she had it coming." she says, taking a sharp inhale as yaga-sensei looked down onto his clenched fists that rested against his knees.
underneath his blindfold, he watched her face so closely. it was like looking straight at konan's face. the only difference was that this version looked like she had lost everything, compared to the first one he saw when they were all her age, he could say that the dark circles beneath her eyes were a testament on what she saw that night.
suguru and shoko sat around, looking at her deeply as shoko's lower lip trembled at the identical sight of their old friend. she blinked away the warm tears and took a deep breath, adjusting her position on the chair. for the first time in years, she felt everything again. she felt the guilt, the sickness, the nights of endless prayers in hopes that konan found peace.
it was like being shoved into that same moment when they all tried to save her, but failed again and again. their failure to save their friend, who was losing hold of herself, their failure of protecting her little sister, who they swore to protect when they asked for her last words. the buried grief, regret, guilt, and their heavy conscience coming back to light 5 years later.
her last words were; "look after [name]. remind her that just because i'm not around physically, it doesn't mean that i'm gone, to always look around for answers. to not go down the same path as me because i've wasted those years looking for a solution instead of an answer to my question."
yet they failed every single one. only satoru attempted to keep in touch and maintain their relationship. the other two stayed away, believing that it would be better if she was the one to reach out when she was ready. satoru never got a reply to his letters, calls, messages, or gifts. but he always knew what was happening to her life—maybe not how she felt, directly, but he had eyes on her. in and out of her home.
he knew what she was doing, day in and day out.
"how have you been?" suguru asks, he looked almost disconnected. like he saw his reflection's guilt everytime he looked into her eyes.
"fine. how have you been?" she asks as suguru takes the initiative to sit a bit closer to her, eyes somewhat red from holding back. nobody truly got over konan. she was a reminder. a reminder to think everything through, to not bet everything on the line. because once you've lost everything, you'll recall all those that you've once had and lost in favour of getting what you wanted, wishing you had cherished everything when you still had it.
"i don't know." suguru says, "you've grown to look so much like konan." he mutters under his breath. "i've heard that a lot." she sarcastically says as yaga chuckles dryly and nods.
"you were given the choice to be in kyoto.. with your clan. why'd you choose tokyo?" yaga-sensei asks as the girl smiled, "i guess i wanted to understand what she meant whenever i'd ask her." she answers, like it was the only good thing in life.
"ask her what?" shoko asks, biting the dried skin of her lips off—leaving it raw.
"whenever i'd ask her about the best moments of her life, she'd tell me that her years here in this school were the best years of her life. that once i became her age—in this school, i would realise that there was more life outside the clan compound." she says as satoru nodded with a small smile.
"konan was like that." yaga-sensei mutters to himself reminiscently. "she was always so giddy to get out of your compound and see the world for herself. i'm glad that you share that trait with her. but, i can't say that i wasn't surprised to see you here. i thought you might've wished to be taught by your clan rather than be taught here." he says, smiling to himself because he knew it would be like teaching konan all over again.
but this time, all four of them would be there to make it right. to do what he couldn't do alone for konan.
"i was going to.. but a few nights ago, i went to her room for the first time since the incident." she says, looking down at her hands. "i saw the letters between her and my parents in 2004—when i was born.. and i saw that she wanted me to study in tokyo, so that she would also be there to teach me. i guess i felt that i needed to step out of my comfort zone to fulfill her wishes." she mutters as satoru nodded.
"it's just so weird. you've grown to look.. sound.. and act exactly like her at your age." satoru says, looking like he was still torn between acceptance and accusing her of being konan who took her little sister's body. which wasn't possible because he'd sealed her limbs, head, and torso in different parts of the world.
"i guess it's genetics." she says. her replies were always short when it came to satoru. maybe it was because he was the one who had finished the job. or maybe it was because the higher ups were bombaring the both of them with suggestions—more like pressuring them—of marriage to eachother. to unite the gojo clan and inohara clan.
originally, it was supposed to be konan who was engaged to satoru, but then again, she deflected and his clan immediately dropped the agreement in hopes that it wouldn't taint their legacy and name because of their wrong judgement on who he'd be married to.
"alright, enough talk. geto-sensei is your class teacher, he teaches more normal school-like lessons.. while gojo-sensei is the main teacher of your batch. he'll be your main teacher for 3 years, and will observe your and your classmates' progress. you'd see both of them daily, but you'd also see shoko from time to time for required check-ups and hopefully not injuries." yaga-sensei explains as they all just gawked at the kid.
she nodded as satoru got up. "get up—i'll show you around." he says, putting his hand out for her to take. "can't i explore by myself? without you?" she says. she wasn't trying to offend him, but she wasn't trying not to offend him either.
suguru chuckles, 'it's just like living the first day of freshman year all over again.' he thought to himself as he got up off his seat. "i'll head out, bye-bye!" he says, patting her head although she flinched away. she'd get used to it soon.
soon, they walked out of the office. "you wearin' her old uniform?" he suddenly asks. she contemplates just ignoring and sounding him out, but she didn't.
"yeah. i didn't have one sewn for me yet cause i decided to impulsively enroll here 3 days late." she answers truthfully. but she was rolling her eyes in annoyance as she stood behind him, he paused. it was silent for a few seconds, before he spoke up, his voice soft;
"are you still mad at me?" he asks all of a sudden.
"yeah." she bluntly says with a deadpan as he nods, "i wish i could've done something for you. that i could've fulfilled konan's wish." he mutters as she scratched her head. "it's not your fault that you couldn't have done so." she says with hints of bitterness in her tone, he nodded, fixing his blindfold and his uniform as he cleared his throat.
in that moment, neither of them thought that it wasn't his fault.