A/N: The first half of this chapter is like 100% info dump, so please read carefully!
Chapter Fourteen.
Seeing the Light.
"You ready?"
Asami nods, watching Suguru summon one of his grade three curses for her to practice with, the progression of learning about and mastering her innate techniques coming along quite nicely. Through the use of Satoru's six eyes, over the last three weeks she's been able to work on her cursed techniques, finding that in total she had four.
"The first one is what we've decided to call her dream technique," Satoru sits alongside Masamichi, explaining to his sensei what they'd learned in the last two weeks, "Have you ever had a dream where you want to run as fast as you can but your legs just won't move like how you want them to, especially in nightmares where you feel like you're in a life or death situation..."
Masamichi nods, understanding what Satoru was referring to.
"If Asami manages to place her hands to the side of your head and imbue just a tiny fraction of her own cursed energy within you, then you enter a state that resembles what I just described to you," he says, watching the grade three curse in front of them begin to panic, its movements becoming lagged and sluggish, "To us it's moving normally, but inside the curse's mind everything is moving as if its in a drunken state. The more it panics, the worse it gets."
Frowning, Masamichi continues to observe, "Do we know for how long it lasts?"
"After trial and error, we've established a standard time of about six to eight seconds," Satoru says, watching the curse get brutally exorcised, Suguru immediately summoning another one for the next demonstration, "My six eyes allow me to identify the basis of her innate techniques, but that's only until I see them first hand, just like I did in the abandoned warehouse. As to knowing exact details…"
"Not even you can predict that," Masamichi says for him, understanding that even the Six Eyes had its own set of limitations, not exactly infallible.
He nods, "It's almost like a growing tree. I can see what's at its roots, but as to predicting how big it grows, well that all depends on the tree…"
"Means for all we know, this cursed technique can sprout into something stronger…" Masamichi sighs, knowing the higher ups weren't going to be fans of this. And to think this was only one of her techniques...
Satoru, unaware of his sensei's predicament, shrugs, "Eh, I wouldn't worry too much. This is her only technique that doesn't have a massive repercussion to it."
Masamichi raises a brow, awaiting an explanation, but Satoru only points forward. Allowing the curse to strike at her, Asami places her hands on the sides of it's supposed head, forcefully pushing it away in the process. Creating a triangle symbol with her hand, she points her symbol at the arms of the curse, effectively making its arms go numb.
Watching the curse fall, Masamichi furrows his brows, "Sense Deprivation?" he asks, unable to believe that such a technique could exist.
Satoru looks hesitant to completely agree, "Something along those lines," he says, "Asami can't exactly remove senses, but she can taint with them."
Struggling to get off the ground, Masamichi sees Asami pull out a throwing knife, fully preparing to exorcise the curse. Stumbling with her footing, Asami finds her vision blurring, struggling to get a clear aim of the curse.
"In exchange for tainting with an opponent's sense, one of her own must also be affected," Satoru hears the sound of her knife hitting the ground, Asami completely missing the curse that is directly in front of her, "Touch affects her sight; Sight affects her touch; Hearing affects her smell; Smell affects her taste; and taste affects her hearing."
This of course meant that Asami would have to start working on her senses if she really wanted to make use of the technique because in all honesty, all her technique was giving her was a window of opportunity to strike for a kill, everything else relied on her.
"How long does the effect last for?"
"10 solid seconds," Satoru answers, "And as of now, she can only do it on one thing or person, she can't do the technique to a group of people," he adds.
"And how do you know that?" Masamichi raises a brow, surprised that the boy knew so much. With the number of punishments he was still receiving for the drunken incident, Masamichi didn't expect Satoru to have so much information prepared for him today.
Satoru shrugs, "She tried it on Suguru and I," he casually says, yelping when he feels himself get smacked to the head, "Hey! What was that for, old man!"
"For not informing me beforehand, you know things like that need to be supervised!" he scolds him, watching Asami as she finally begins to stand straight, the curse also seemingly regaining its sense of touch. Quickly throwing a knife to the curse, this time she doesn't miss, easily exorcising the curse.
Rubbing his throbbing head, Satoru childishly pouts, "We thought it was cool…" he recalls how Asami took away his sense of touch, the boy idiotically grinning as he wondered if that's what being high felt like.
"Back to my questions, Asami can only taint with one?" Masamichi asks.
"One what?"
"One sense."
Satoru shrugs, "That I don't know," he truthfully answers, "I think if she had a massive amount of cursed energy then maybe she could increase it to two, but if she were to have boundless cursed energy then it's possible she could affect all five in one go, maybe even remove them…." he theorizes, quickly shaking his head.
"Asami doesn't have endless cursed energy, she has eerie cursed energy," Masamichi says, Satoru nodding in agreement.
"Not only that, but Asami would have to master all of her senses..." Satoru taps his foot, thinking about how long that would take, "Anyways, speaking about her cursed energy, that leads me to her third technique. Wanna guess what it issss?" he pokes at his teacher, purposely annoying him.
Rolling his eyes, Masamichi glares at the boy, not a fan of being toyed with, "Spit it out already," he mutters.
"You're no fun sensei," Satoru dramatically pouts, never failing to get on the buff man's nerves. Nevertheless, he gives his sensei an answer, "She can recharge her cursed energy in the matter of a few seconds."
Masamichi raises a brow, focusing his attention on an exhausted Asami, sensing that her cursed energy levels were at an extreme low.
Cracking her neck from side to side, Asami makes a triangle formation with her fingers like she had before, this time placing said triangle over her left eye.
"Cursed Technique: Replenish," she whispers, feeling a massive surge of energy flow through her veins. Writhing in pain, she places a hand to her head, feeling as if it was going to explode at any given moment.
"As you know, most shamans need a good night's rest in order to recharge after exhausting all of their cursed energy," Satoru begins to explain the technique to his sensei, "and as you can see, all of Asami's techniques can be traced back to the idea that they revolve around human nightmares. From the ability to make things appear as if they're slowly moving to tainting with our senses, everything comes back to the concept of nightmares."
"So this technique of hers compresses 8 hours of sleep into a mere several seconds?" Masamichi asks for confirmation, sensing the massive surge of cursed energy coming from the young girl.
Satoru nods, "Asami describes it as being repeatedly kicked to the head for several hours, those couple of seconds that we see are in fact a complete eight hours in her mind. Not only that, but there's a one time use to the technique, she can't do it more than once within the same twenty four hours. She also mentioned something about seeing an image of grilled eel, but I told her that she was just hungry," he chuckles, recalling the girl's embarrassed face.
Biting on her lip, Asami anxiously looks around, now feeling tense. Gulping, she glances at Satoru and Masamichi, the two clearly engaged in their conversation with each other. Running a hand through her hair, she tries not to dwell on her thoughts.
"You okay?" A voice from behind catches her by surprise, Asami completely forgetting that Suguru was here. He was the one in charge of the curses after all.
"O-Oh, um yeah," she nervously laughs, feigning a confident grin.
Noticing her weird behavior, Suguru stares at her suspiciously, sensing that the girl was extremely tense, "You sure? You know you can tell me anything…" he gives her a small reassuring smile, the boy truly a kind person at heart.
Having an internal debate with herself, Asami hesitates before continuing, "Remember how last time I saw the image of grilled eel when doing my replenish technique…"
Suguru nonchalantly nods, hands in his pockets.
Comedically looking around as if she was about to tell him some top exclusive secret, she motions to him to come closer to her, "Well this time I saw the image of Matcha green tea," she whispers to him, making him softly chuckle.
"Green tea?"
She eagerly nods, childishly wondering if this was her mind's way of telling her that she needed to go on a diet.
"Maybe it's just something you've been craving," he shrugs, "At the end of the day, dreams and nightmares are nothing but desires, both wanted and unwanted," he says, making Asami frown.
"But I don't even like green tea…" she mumbles, but before she can say anything else, Satoru was calling out to her.
"Asami!" he waves his hand in the air, attempting to hide his annoyance by avoiding Suguru's teasing stare.
'Jealous of his own best friend…' Suguru laughs, making his way back to his original spot, waiting for the next set of instructions. Walking over to Masamichi and Satoru, Asami plasters a fake smile onto her face, pushing off any worries she has.
"Yes?" she politely asks, awkwardly standing in front of them.
"You think you can show Masamichi-sensei your fourth and final technique?" Satoru nervously grins at her, knowing the girl didn't particularly like the technique. Not like he could blame her, for her technique was quite … invasive.
Face paling, her lips part in unease as her fingers begin to get clammy, "I-I don't think I can…" she stutters, remembering just how demanding this final technique of hers was. Not only did it expect a certain degree of heartlessness out of her, but it subjected people to a cruelty she just couldn't find herself to be comfortable with. Her parents had always taught her to be kind and empathetic, so to have a technique that was so … inhumane… was almost ironic in a sense.
It's for that reason that she declared to herself to never use the technique unless she found it to be completely necessary, not willing to subject any thing or being to such a technique unless it was some kind of last resort. And though she knew detaching herself from such strings of compassion was a necessity for the job of being a jujutsu sorcerer, she just couldn't.
"Asami, to be a jujutsu sorcerer means you sometimes have to make certain sacrifices, even if they can seem cruel and inhumane," is what Satoru told her during practice a week ago, "At the end of the day you have to be selfish in order to be strong."
"Don't listen to him Asami," Suguru had butted in, not a fan of what his best friend was trying to instill into the girl, "As jujutsu sorcerers our jobs are to protect those who aren't jujutsu-users by exorcising curses, that much is true, but losing our sympathy and compassion isn't. Subjecting anything or anyone, especially curse-users, to any of our techniques is cruel and hardly ever deserved."
Satoru rolls his eyes, "Tch, always spewing that self-righteous bullshit," he mutters, making Suguru frown in annoyance.
"So you're telling me you'd have no problem killing a curse-user?" Suguru asks, feeling as if Satoru was only putting up a front.
"Nope," the white haired boy pops the "p", acting smug, "Wouldn't even hesitate," he adds, making Suguru shake his head in disappointment.
"Curse-users are humans too…" Suguru says.
And this time, Satoru remains silent.
"Why not?" Masamichi's voice brings her back to reality, a stern look now on his face. It wasn't that he didn't sympathize with the girl's hesitance, but the higher ups weren't going to take a stuttered "I can't" as an answer, nor could he. In the end, demonstrating and mastering her technique would convince the higher ups to spare her while also proving to them that she was fully capable of being a proper jujutsu sorcerer and that she wouldn't be a potential problem in the future.
"Because I'm scared…" she whispers to herself, picking at her nails out of nervousness.
Sighing, Masamichi pinches the bridge of his nose. Frowning, Satoru wonders why the man looked more stressed out than usual, making a mental note to ask him about it later. Getting up from the bench they were sitting on, Satoru signals to Masamichi that he would need just a small moment, gently tugging at Asami's hand and leading her to the side.
"I'm not doing it Satoru," Asami is quick to say, pouting like a child.
"Asami…"
"I'm not," she repeats, this time putting her foot down, "It's too much and you know how I feel about it," she shakes her head, beginning to get anxious again, "I can't—"
Boop!
She scrunches her nose, effectively silenced by the tall boy in front of her.
"Hey," she frowns, growing accustomed to the boy's new habit of touching her nose, something he started comfortably doing since their first tutoring session. Most of the time he'd do it as his own way of telling her to calm down and shut up, just like how he was doing now, while other times it was done out of complete randomness.
"You talk too much sometimes," he teases her, chuckling at her annoyed expression. Maybe she was unaware of it, but whenever she'd glare at him or anyone for that matter, her left eyebrow would do this small twitchy thing that would never fail to make him laugh.
Flicking him off, she stubbornly tries to hide the forming smile on her face, no genuine ill intent behind the motion.
"I only pulled you to the side to make it believable to Masamichi that I'm actually trying to convince you," he says, making her head tilt in question.
"Huh?"
He shrugs, "If you don't want to do the technique, then it's not like he can force you," he nonchalantly states, glancing back at a stressed out Masamichi, who was currently lost in his own thoughts.
"Besides, it's not like you'll ever need the technique," Satoru adds, unaware of the girl's potential looming doom.
"What do you mean?" she asks, genuinely confused by his statement.
"Haven't I told you already? I'm the strongest! As long as I'm around, you, Shoko, and Suguru won't ever have to worry about a thing!" he enthusiastically says, giving her a thumbs up.
She playfully rolls her eyes, "Ah, still the same old self-absorbed idiot," she laughs, not actually meaning her words (for the most part), "You know, as much as I would love to, I can't just rely on you to come swooping in and saving the day all the time."
"But you should," he winks at her, his natural flirtatious side beginning to make an appearance.
Feeling her cheeks get hot, she stares at him in flustered silence, unsure of what to say. These days, this blushing reaction of hers wasn't exactly something uncommon, in fact, it was something that happened quite often around him.
Whether he knew it or not, Satoru had a naturally flirty personality, something Asami had taken note of in the last couple of weeks. But just because she was aware of it, didn't mean she was immune to its effects, a prime example being her current timid state.
Yelping in pain, Satoru scowls at her, confused as to why he had just gotten punched in the shoulder, "What the hell was that for?!"
Returning to her usual stubborn and brash attitude, she actively avoids eye contact with him, knowing her face was still red, "Just felt like doing it," she tries to say in an uncaring way, crossing her arms in the process.
"I still don't get—"
"Are we done for today?" Suguru interrupts Satoru, now walking towards his classmates, a tired look on his face. Though he'd only summoned two grade three curses for today, he for some odd reason, still felt drained. It was probably because he had stayed up the night before, cramming for a math exam he had taken earlier today.
"Yeah, I'll just tell Masamichi he'll have to wait for some other time," Satoru refers to Asami's fourth technique, Suguru nodding as a way to say he understands.
"Well I'll see you two tomorrow night," Suguru yawns, stretching his arms above his head, "I'm going to go take a nap in my dorm," he informs them before walking away, too tired to tease the two.
"Tomorrow night?" Satoru thinks out loud, placing a finger to his chin while trying to remember what plans they had made.
Placing her hands to her hips, Asami sighs, "Tokyo's Carnival Celebration," she reminds him, everything then beginning to click in his mind.
"Ohhhh," he laughs, "I completely forgot about that!"
"Yeah, I think you guys are meeting up like at 7," she says, catching him by surprise.
"You guys?" he asks, confused as to why she didn't say "we".
Nervously scratching the back of her neck, a faint pink blush appears on her cheeks, "Remember, I'm going with the guy from the cafe to the carnival," she says, his mouth slightly gaping open in disbelief.
"Wait what?" he furrows his brows, the nasty twisty feeling he felt in his stomach two weeks ago beginning to make its return. 'I'm not jealous, I'm not jealous, I'm not jealous,' he repeats to himself, desperately trying to ignore the heavy feeling in his chest. He just couldn't believe that she was choosing some random boy she'd just met over him her group of friends.
"Don't tell me you weren't listening? That's all I kept talking about last week!" she shakes her head, the expression on his face acting as his answer.
One Week Before.
Munching on his mango flavored mochi, Satoru leans his head against his closed fist, watching Asami talk about God knows what, with Shoko and Suguru. It was as if her lips were moving, but absolutely no sound was coming out, the boy too wrapped up in thinking about where his relationship with Asami stood.
'She's just a friend,' is what he'd been telling himself for the past week, adamant on denying any feelings of jealousy that he not only felt, but had been made blatantly obvious from the week prior. The only reason he was peeved was because of that smug look the piss-yellow haired boy had on his face. The exact smug look Satoru would walk around with whenever girls with boyfriends would fawn over him in the street.
Sassily chewing, he tries to tune back into the conversation.
"I need to go shopping for a new outfit!" Asami bites her lip, wondering what she could possibly wear for Saturday night. With the weekly allowance the school gave her, she could probably buy a new top along with a couple of new accessories, itching to get her hands on some new different colored headbands.
"I can go with you if you'd like," Shoko says, Asami quickly nodding, an innocent smile appearing on her face.
"I'd love that! I definitely need a second opinion with me, and well I was thinking a dress might be too much for such a—"
Satoru observes Asami's way of speaking, unaware of the small smile that was beginning to form on his face as he carefully studies her, amused by the way she liked to talk with her hands. Not only that, but whenever she was really invested in the topic of a conversation, there was this unique glint that would appear in her eyes, the girl always making sure to maintain eye contact with whoever she was speaking to, almost as if she wanted to make sure they knew she was paying attention and actively engaged.
Softly chuckling to himself, he notices that her headband doesn't match her flats today. He then remembers how she walked into class all late today, rambling about how she had overslept. Luckily, because she was a teacher's favorite, she wasn't punished with the task of banging the powder off the chalkboard erasers after class.
'She usually likes to coordinate the two,' he thinks to himself, beginning to wonder how many different colors she had in her collection, his personal favorite being this turquoise-blue color she brought one time that really complimented her hair color, almost reminding the boy of Princess Ariel. Of course, at the time he didn't tell her that, for the two had still been adamant on their disdain for each other.
That of course led him to the question of … would he tell her now? Pouting his lips in concentration, he wonders what giving her a compliment like that would mean. Would she say thank you? Or would she think he was weird? They were friends after all, and it wasn't like friends couldn't give each other compliments….
Then again, when does he ever give Suguru a compliment like that? Hell, when does he give anyone a compliment? Continuing to stare at her, he knows something about the way he sees her has changed, convincing himself that it had something to do with their new forming friendship.
"Satoru," Asami calls out to him, interrupting his current train of thought.
Blinking slowly, he looks around the table they were sitting at, Suguru and Shoko now throwing their trays of food away while Asami was now standing not too far from him, deciding that it'd be rude to leave him behind. Face flushing, he realizes that he must've been so caught up in thinking about the red head, that he completely didn't notice his friends preparing to leave.
"Come on, let's go," she softly smiles at him, patiently waiting for him to get up.
Gulping his nerves down, he stands up and makes his way towards her.
Silently walking alongside each other, he glances at her, realizing just how short she was when compared to him. He also notices how she struggles to carry her book bag, light faint groans escaping her lips as she tugs her bag back onto her shoulder every couple of seconds.
"Need help?"
Asami seems surprised at his offer, originally believing herself to be hearing stuff. Remaining silent, she stares at him in disbelief, truly at a loss for words.
Patience running thin, he frowns, "Well do you?" he asks, feeling his cheeks getting red. Not often was it that he'd lend a helping hand, especially for trivial things like this, but clearly the girl was struggling to carry her bag, and he wasn't planning on dealing with her complaints for the whole trip back!
Continuing to stare at him, Asami finds herself unsure of what to say, knowing that Satoru wasn't usually one to offer help like this. If anything, he usually had to be forced, which is how she knew that he must've put his pride aside to offer his assistance.
Hesitantly removing her bag, she hands him the heavy item while giving him a toothy grin, the kind action having made her day.
"Thank you Satoru," she continues to walk alongside him, the boy pretending to be nonchalant by shrugging and mumbling a small "No problem".
Looking down at her once more, he senses her change in energy, the girl now walking much more happily and excited. Smiling to himself, he feels his heart warm, thinking that maybe it wouldn't hurt to help around more often.
Present day.
"That's what you were talking about?" Satoru frowns, beginning to regret not listening in. Maybe if he had, he could've prevented this date of hers...
'Wait what am I thinking,' he scolds himself, reminding himself that Asami was free to do whatever she likes. Not like he was her boyfriend or anything, so why should he care?
Appearing offended, she scoffs, "Yeah, it's nice to know you're not listening!" she rolls her eyes, "Anyways, you think I can go already? Shoko and I have plans to go to the mall in a bit," she says, wanting to look her best for tomorrow night.
Feeling the urge to say no, a part of Satoru wants nothing more than to grab her and hide her somewhere where no one could find her, or more specifically, that horrendous looking ogre she was calling her date for Saturday night.
"Yeah I guess so," he manages to huff out, having to bite his tongue.
Childishly grinning, she claps her hands in excitement, "Great! I'll see you tomorrow then Satoru," she returns back to her usual cheerful self, waving goodbye to him before leaving.
Begrudgingly waving back, he kicks a rock beside him once she's out of sight, sulking to himself before making his way back to Masamichi, and grouchily sitting beside his sensei. Expecting Masamichi to tell him something about his rude reappearance, he's surprised to see the man not even bat an eye, clearly still stressed with whatever he was thinking about.
"Something wrong sensei?" Satoru asks, wondering what could be on the man's mind.
Sighing, Masamichi shakes his head, "Everything," he responds with, too tired to even bother beating around the bush. What was he going to do? At this point, even if Asami mastered her cursed techniques, the higher ups were still going to deem her as someone who was too much of a threat to society, especially because the girl had no kind of historical lineage in the jujutsu world, something Masamichi found extremely weird for someone with an ability like her own.
Even Suguru, who had two non-jujutsu using parents, had some faint history of sorcery in his family, enough to prove to the higher ups that they could trust him with his technique. But in Asami's case, it was as if she and her parents appeared out of nowhere, making her case that much harder to fight.
"Well, what is it?" Satoru frowns, a gut feeling telling him it had to do with Asami.
"The higher ups are planning on executing Asami," Masamichi states, his face void of any emotion.
"Wait … WHAT?" Satoru quickly stands up in anger, "But she hasn't done anything wrong!" he yells at Masamichi, feeling his blood beginning to boil as the word "execute" repeats in his mind.
"You think I don't know that?" Masamichi stares at the ground, not taking offense to the boy's erratic behavior, if anything, completely understanding why he was acting the way he was.
"Why? If this has to do with her techniques then I don't get—"
"She's too dangerous," Masamichi interrupts him, needing the boy to see both sides so that he starts thinking rationally rather than with his own personal feelings.
"No, her techniques are, not her. Not Asami," he growls, unable to understand why those old farts couldn't just leave him and his friends alone. At this point, he was convinced those pruning raisins had made it their remaining life's mission to try and look for ways to kill them, always itching to find an excuse to declare execution orders.
"I know Satoru—"
"No you don't, because if you did, you wouldn't be sitting here trying to convince me otherwise! This is Asami we're talking about! I mean, you're the one who brought her to this school to begin with! You should be fighting tooth and nail for her!" he reminds his sensei of his recruitment of the young girl, unintentionally striking a nerve.
Looking up, Masamichi glares at him, "You think I'm not trying? You think I want to lie to that girl's parents and tell them she died in some tragic accident, when in reality she was executed by some old folks who can't seem to get their heads out of their asses? I think you're forgetting that I'm not exactly the one in charge around here," his voice wavers just a bit, enough to prove to Satoru that the man was feeling just as emotional as he was.
Remaining silent, Satoru sits back down, now in the same slumped position as Masamichi.
"So what are we going to do?" he asks Masamichi, having calmed down.
Rubbing his forehead, Masamichi makes it clear that he's worn down, "I…" he pauses, not exactly having a clear answer for the boy, "I don't know Satoru," he truthfully admits, feeling as if he was in a deadlock position.
"Well we have to do something…" Satoru stares at the view in front of them, the sun slowly beginning to set.
"I know Satoru, I know…"
"How would this look?" Asami pulls out a striped top from the clothing rack she was currently looking at, displaying it to her classmate. Shoko immediately shakes her head in dismissal, not a fan of thick stripes.
"This one is pretty cute," Shoko pulls out a baby-turquoise top with a square neckline, which also had flowy long sleeves, something Asami found extremely cute.
"Oh it is!" Asami eagerly grabs it, quickly placing it over her torso and checking herself out in the mirror, "And I think I have a matching headband to go with it!" she excitedly jumps, making Shoko laugh.
"Great! That means we can also start looking for ball gowns," Shoko randomly throws in, catching Asami by complete surprise.
"Ball gowns?" she tilts her head in confusion, wondering what exactly Shoko meant by that.
Nodding, Shoko continues to look through the racks of clothing, "You know, for the Annual Ball the higher ups throw? It's to celebrate the founding of the school and whatnot," she pulls out a purple blouse, making an "ew" face.
"Oh…" Asami awkwardly says, unaware that such an event existed, "When is it?"
"Next week."
"Next week?!"
Shoko nods, "Yup," she pops the "p".
"How come no one told me?!"
Shoko laughs, "Masamichi has been mentioning it for like the last two weeks. It's just that you and Satoru are always too busy fawning over each other to actually pay attention to the poor man," she says, Asami quickly getting defensive.
"Hey! We don't fawn over each other! I know you're not used to seeing us talk like regular people, but Satoru and I—"
"Ha! Since when do you call him Satoru?" Shoko raises a brow, a teasing smile now on her face.
Asami stammers with her words, "For like…" she pauses, debating whether she should lie or not, "Forever!" she angrily pouts, turning around and pretending to look for more clothes.
"Hmm I don't think so," Shoko chuckles, "From what I remember, you used to be quite adamant about calling him Gojou-san," she says, not having to see Asami's face in order to know that she was red.
"Yeah well, things change," she mutters.
"I can tell," Shoko finally sees something she likes, immediately pulling it out of its rack to observe it, "Anyways, Masamichi says it's not a requirement to bring a date, but the older folks will give you weird stares if you're without one. Why? I don't know. They're weird," she says.
"Hm I see," Asami hums, "Do you have a date?" she asks Shoko out of genuine curiosity, the two beginning to walk to the cashier register.
"Suguru and I agreed to go with each other, not because we like eachother or anything, but it saves us the hassle of looking for a date," she truthfully states, the two having a completely platonic relationship.
Asami nods, wondering if she should ask Ren, the boy from the cafe, to go with her, "Are non-jujutsu users allowed to go?"
Shoko shrugs, "That I don't know," she responds, "You'd have to ask Masamichi, but I'm pretty sure you can. If not you can always go with Satoru," she teasingly sings, purposely nudging the red head.
Ignoring her banter, Asami raises a brow, "Satoru's not going with anyone?"
"Wellll," Shoko debates telling Asami the truth, not sure if it'd backfire on her or not. Deciding to tell her anyway, she continues, "Suguru has been pressuring him to take the girl from the cafe. You remember her right? She was our server. Dirty blonde hair," Shoko begins to describe the girl, unaware that her words had acted like a catalyst in Asami's heart, almost as if causing a small tear, triggering the floodgates of an intense emotion.
'This is weird…' Asami maintains the kind smile on her face, even though on the inside it felt like someone was threatening to prickle her heart with glass shards, aggravating her to an extent that she was sure she'd never felt before in her life.
"You sure you aren't jealous?" is what Shoko had asked her almost two months ago, at the time the answer being a clear cut no. But now...
"Earth to Asami?" Shoko moves her hand from side to side, the twitching smile on Asami's face beginning to worry her.
Shaking her head, Asami snaps out of whatever state she was in while slam shutting the prison gates to her heart, "Oh I see…" she gives Shoko a close-eyed smile, continuing to creep her friend out.
Quietly snickering to herself, Shoko knows her little last minute plan has worked when she sees Asami practically throw her money to the cashier, clearly peeved at something. Quickly pulling out her phone, Shoko sends a text to Suguru, eager for tomorrow night.
Saturday Night.
Standing next to the ticketbooth, Satoru waits for Shoko and Suguru to finish ordering their roll of tickets, wondering what was taking them so long. Sucking on his strawberry flavored lollipop, he observes the carnival that's going on around him, the sound of kids running around filling his ears as they foolishly run around.
"Tch," he pouts, realizing he was going to have to be partnered up with random people in the single rider lines all night long. That's because knowing Shoko and Suguru, those two would partner up just to spite his arms, Satoru continues to sulk, 'I wouldn't even be in this mess if Asami didn't decide to go on that stupid—'
"Satoru!" he hears her voice, turning around to see the red headed girl standing a couple of feet away from him. Waving at him from afar, he sees the childish grin on her face, the girl truly glowing tonight.
And despite him preparing to badmouth her only a couple of seconds ago, the boy awkwardly waves to her like a fool in return, feeling his heart thump out his chest. Wondering why she was by herself, he begins to think that maybe her date had stood her up. That is until he sees the ugly idiot make his way right next to her, two small bags of popcorn in his hands.
Lowering his hand, Satoru tries not to roll his eyes, instead choosing to turn around and act like someone was calling to him, despite there being no one around him.
"100 tickets—Oh look it's Asami!" Suguru, who along with Shoko had just returned from buying tickets, loudly calls out to her, "Asami, over here!" he motions to her to come, only further aggravating his best friend.
Feeling his left eye twitch, Satoru purposely tunes out their greetings to each other, instead choosing to focus on which ride he was going to get on first. The UFO ride was currently the one grabbing most of his attention, especially right now that he hasn't eaten, meaning it'd be the perfect time to ride it. Then again, he could always ride the swinging pirate ship, always a big fan of those kinds of rides.
"Satoru," he hears Suguru say his name, bringing him back to reality.
"What?" he scowls, noticing that Asami and her date were still here. At this point, he was tempted to grab a megaphone, and yell "Shoo!" to the two of them.
Rolling his eyes, Suguru repeats his question, "I said, what time is your date coming?"
Satoru immediately furrows his brows.
"Huh?!" he and Asami both say, the question most definitely being accidental on her part.
"You know, Suki…"
"Suki?" Satoru prepares to ask more questions, but before he can, the group of friends are already being greeted by the said girl.
"There you all are," she giggles, looking as if she was out of breath, "I was completely lost for a second, but I'm here now!" she nervously grins, unaware that she hadn't exactly been asked out by Satoru himself, but by Suguru who was posing as Satoru.
That's because Satoru, who likes to frequently nap in the dorm lounge, never fails to keep his flip phone on the table beside him rather than in his pocket. It was for that reason that Suguru was able to secretly invite the girl, his best friend's phone not exactly being password protected.
Making an odd face, Satoru stares at the girl, unsure if he should feel bad for her or not. If he didn't call her right after he met her, what made her think he wanted to go on a date with her months later? Opening his mouth, he prepares to say something to her, Suguru quickly interrupting him before he could get a single word in.
Yanking him by his jacket, Suguru gives everyone a closed eyed smile, "We'll be right back," he tells them before harshly pulling Satoru away from them, leaving everyone else weirdly stunned.
Pushing his best friend's hand off of him, Satoru glares at Suguru, awaiting an explanation.
"Look, I know you're mad," Suguru begins, raising his hands in an effort to show that he knew he was in the wrong.
"Livid," Satoru corrects him, wondering what the hell his friend could've possibly been thinking when inviting the waitress.
"But, you need a date for the ball next week, and Shoko and I—"
"She's in on it too?!" Satoru looks back to glare at her, the girl currently engaged in a conversation with his so-called "date".
"Yes, but as I was saying, you need a date for the ball next week and Suki is the perfect girl, don't you think? We were thinking that maybe you could ask her tonight, so that you wouldn't be by yourself next Saturday. That's unless you plan on asking someone else…" Suguru gives his friend a knowing look, purposely putting him in a position where he'd have to ponder on what he felt for Asami.
Staring at Suki, Satoru remembers their first encounter and how he thought she was cute, but just like that first time, his gaze can't help but wander onto Asami. She was wearing turquoise today, once again reminding him of the infamous Princess Ariel. But unlike Princess Ariel, Asami had a spunk to her that he often found himself smiling at, while also maintaining a sense of purity that not even the princess could compare with.
Frowning, Satoru stubbornly looks away, refusing to entertain the thoughts that were currently running through his mind. 'Asami is just a friend,' he tells himself, adamant on denying what his heart was telling him. And this was his chance to prove to himself that Asami was just that … a friend.
"I don't," Satoru finally responds, "I'll um," he pauses, as if struggling to continue, "I'll ask Suki later tonight," he says, not exactly sounding too excited.
"Great!" Suguru pats his back, leading him back to the group of four.
"Well I guess we should get going," Asami's date suddenly says, Satoru still unsure of what his name was, nor did he really care.
"O-Oh yeah," Asami bites her lip, completely forgetting that she didn't come here with her group of friends. Hesitantly leaving them, Asami finds herself glancing back at them, more specifically at a certain white haired idiot, wondering what the heavy feeling in her heart meant.
Beep beep! Beep beep!
Asami's date, Ren, looks at his phone for what feels like the hundredth time tonight, the two currently walking around the circus. To say the two had no chemistry would be an understatement, Asami in fact celebrating whenever his phone would go off, for that meant she wouldn't have to deal with another second of extreme awkward silence.
"Sorry 'bout that," Ren pops the gum in his mouth, "My friends keep bugging me, and well … you know how it is," he says, knowing he was lying through his teeth.
Subtly rolling her eyes, Asami shrugs, "It's fine," she says, wondering what time it is. Checking her phone, she sees that it's barely nine, time going as slow as ever.
"Oh look! We can go on this ride! It doesn't even drop from that high," he points at the ride called "Medusa's Drop of Doom".
Gulping, she shyly shakes her head no, feeling bad when she hears the boy loudly sigh.
"So you're really that afraid of heights?" he asks, Asami catching the rude attitude behind his tone, causing her to feel even worse than she already does. Sighing again, he walks ahead of her, making it clear that he was bored.
"We can always play the water gun game, you know, the one with the balloons and clowns," she brings up the game she'd been looking forward to all night, hoping they'd finally find some common ground.
"Those are booorinnng," he dramatically says, "Not only that, but they're for kids," he laughs, acting smug.
"Tch," she crosses her arms, forcing herself to catch up to him. If there's one thing she's learned about him tonight, it was that he loved showing off how "old" he was, the boy turning seventeen this year. Because of that, he felt this annoying need to constantly boast about his age, and how he had pushed several things off his supposedly "hectic" schedule to make time for this date.
"What to do, what to—"
Ring, Ring.
Ren pulls out his phone, motioning to Asami that he'd need just a moment.
Faking a smile, she gives him a thumbs up, her face immediately returning to its usual scowl once he's out of sight. Crossing her arms, she observes the different groups of people walking past her, the most pure smiles on their faces as they enjoy their night at the carnival. It was a sight she was used to seeing back at the circus, families and couples never failing to leave the red and white tent without a smile on their faces.
Hearing the sound of the circus music, she's not surprised to see the infamous tent not too far from her, wondering which company the city hired this year. Not that it really mattered, a circus was a circus. As long as people saw clowns and cool tricks, they'd be satisfied with anything. Feeling her mood sour, she looks away, preferably wanting to avoid remembering her days in the circus.
Sensing Ren's return, she sees that he has an "apologetic" look on his face, the girl able to predict what he was about to say.
"Hey, I think I'm going to have to get going… it's just that I have—"
"It's fine," she says for the hundredth time tonight, interrupting him before he got the chance to spew out some bullshit excuse.
Beep beep!
He slyly glances at his phone, the name "Hinata" appearing on the small box of his flip phone, "Yeah…" he fakes a frown, "I guess I should start walking you back home," he says, unaware that the girl didn't exactly live in a residential area.
"That's okay," she's quick to say, "I think I'm just gonna go with my friends," she tells him, for the first time tonight, actually looking forward to something.
"You sure?"
"Yeah," she fakes another smile.
"Well I'll see you next Saturday then, right?"
Furrowing her brows, Asami finds herself confused.
'Oh right..' she internally sighs, having forgotten that she had told him about the ball early on in their date.
"Mmhmm," she nods, completely regretting inviting him, but what the hell could she do now? Uninvite him? Technically speaking, she could, but she was too nice of a person to do that. Not only that, but she wasn't trying to be the only one without a date, assuming Satoru was taking miss …
'Damn it, I can't even think of an insult for her,' Asami quietly groans to herself, for Suki wasn't a mean girl at all, nor was she unattractive. Watching him walk away, Asami finally gets to slump down her shoulders, now on a mission to find her friends.
Meanwhile…
Biting into his blue cotton candy, Satoru stands in line with Suki, shiny sparkles in his eyes as he watches the zipper ride go up and down, eagerly waiting for his turn.
"So Satoru, what kind of things do you like to do in your free time?" Suki attempts to make conversation with him, the boy not really having talked to her since her arrival, instead choosing to converse with his friends. And the moments he would talk to her, it always came off a bit awkward on his part, not exactly having experience in the dating department.
With the two finally being left alone, Suki was hoping to use the opportunity to get to know him.
"Hmm," he tries to think of an answer, looking up at the sky while placing a finger to his chin. Considering she was a non-jujutsu user, he couldn't exactly talk to her about his wild adventures, nor could he talk about funny training stories. Not to mention, he didn't exactly have any "hobbies", unless occasionally annoying Asami counted.
"I like playing Digimon?" he brings up his most recent obsession while scooting up in line.
"Oh I see," she chuckles, not really sure what to say to that. The only person she knew who liked Digimon was her younger brother and even then … she often liked to teasingly pick at him for it.
Noticing her expression, he raises a brow, "Do you not like Digimon?"
Her face reddens, "N-No it's not that it's just—"
He suddenly begins to laugh, "Ha, I thought only Asami did that!"
She tilts her head, "Huh?"
"The thing with your ears getting red whenever you lie," he grins, observing her ears as if they were some kind of rare specimen.
"Whose Asami?" she asks, not at all mad, for this was the first time tonight that he actually seemed … eager … to talk about something.
"You know, the girl you met with the red hair. The one who came barging into.."
"... the cafe last time," Suki says for him, a dumbfounded look now on her face, recalling how she originally thought the two were a thing, but shrugged it off once she saw them bickering.
"Yeah, her!" he begins to ramble about her, stating that she often liked to lie to him whenever he'd start talking about Digimon during tutoring, claiming that she was indeed "listening" to him despite her half-open eyelids always saying otherwise.
Softly chuckling to herself, Suki begins to put the pieces to the puzzle together while also beginning to understand why the red headed girl was giving her a grimacing death stare earlier. Knowing there was only one way to confirm it, she remembers Suguru pulling her to the side earlier, telling her that Satoru was hoping to ask her to the ball next week, but was too much of a chicken to ask so he'd need a bit of a push to do it.
"Hey," she interrupts him, pretending to have received a message on her phone, "Since I open tomorrow, I think after this ride I'm gonna have to get going, but I was hoping we could go out sometime next week. I have next Saturday off and…"
He stares at her in mere silence, her voice getting tuned out in his head as he remembers the upcoming event that lands on that day.
"Yes, but as I was saying, you need a date for the ball next week and Suki is the perfect girl, don't you think? We were thinking that maybe you could ask her tonight, so that you wouldn't be by yourself next Saturday."
He remembers what his best friend had told him, realizing that this was the perfect opportunity to ask her, if not his only one. Feeling his fingers get clammy, he also remembers the sentence that followed after.
"That's unless you plan on asking someone else…"
Someone else. Someone freaking else…
Someone like Asami.
'Ask her Satoru, just ask her,' he tells himself, Suki now staring at him in silence, almost as if she was waiting for the invitation, which she in fact was.
"Actually there's this um…" he nervously looks around, trying to force the words to come out of his mouth, "There's this…"
But he just can't.
"How many?" the carnival employee interrupts their conversation, saving Satoru from the awkward situation he was in.
Smiling to herself, Suki gets the confirmation she needs, harboring no ill feelings towards him as they go on their final ride of the night.
Walking around the carnival, Asami silently curses her shitty phone service, none of her messages to Shoko going through. It was either that or there were just too many people competing for bandwidth in the area, most likely causing network traffic.
Preparing to take a break, she begins to look for an empty table, the sound of a certain someone's voice catching her attention.
"No fair! I know you cheated, you brat!"
She turns to find Satoru sitting at the stand for the water gun game, arguing with some kid who couldn't be no older than 10. Placing her hand over her mouth, she laughs when she sees the little kid stick out his tongue to Satoru, mocking his loss.
Clenching his jaw, Satoru glares at the boy, preparing to play a second round, not exactly taking his loss with dignity. But then again, that was Satoru for you, arguing with a kid wasn't exactly something he'd consider beneath him.
"Genji, it's time to go home!" an older woman calls out to the boy, presumably his mother.
"Aww, looks like mommy is calling to you," Satoru teases the kid, making a "Waah Waah" sound effect.
Narrowing his eyes, the younger boy begrudgingly gets up from his seat, "This isn't over," he says, making Satoru roll his eyes.
"Tch, like hell it is," he crosses his arms, the young boy then walking to his mom, leaving Satoru by himself.
Debating whether to go up to him or not, Asami feels as if her stomach is doing flips, actually feeling … nervous … to talk to him. Taking a step back, she considers leaving, not wanting to face the potential embarrassment of having his date return, thus leaving her in an awkward position.
Meanwhile, Satoru considers playing another round, looking beside him to see if there was anyone else who was planning on playing. Sadly, there seemed to be no one, everyone opting to get in line for rides than spend their time playing a, for the most part, rigged game. Preparing to leave, he sighs, failing to win the Agumon plush doll tonight.
Getting up from his seat, he frowns, "Maybe some other—"
"Wanna play a round?" he hears a voice next to him say, looking to see Asami sitting on the seat beside him, confused as to where the hell she came from. With a gentle smile on her face, she patiently waits for an answer, even though on the inside, she was completely freaking out.
Ready to say yes, he suddenly remembers that she wasn't here alone, a cold expression then appearing on his face, "Aren't you supposed to be on your date?" he asks a little too harshly, letting his jealousy get the better of him.
With her face falling, he immediately feels bad when realizing how mean he came off, "My bad I didn't—"
"Aren't you on a date as well?" she retorts, a grumpy pout now replacing the saddened look on her face, their brash attitudes truly going hand in hand with each other.
"She had to leave early, something about having the opening shift for tomorrow," he shrugs, not exactly sad about her departure. Curious to know why Asami was alone, he sits back down on his seat, "Your turn," he says.
"Oh right," she nervously chuckles, "Something came up and well … he also had to go," she answers, unaware that a chibi-Satoru was currently celebrating in his head, popping confetti and obnoxiously dancing, "He offered to walk me home, but I told him I was fine staying here. I'll just see him on Saturday I guess."
The imaginary confetti burns, Satoru feeling as if someone's punched him straight in the gut. Swearing that she saw flames appear in his eyes, she awkwardly stares at the boy, oblivious to the reasons for his odd behavior.
Remaining silent, he tries to remain calm and collected, taking a deep breath in while beginning to fake a smile, "Oh, so you're taking him to the ball?"
She sighs, "Yeah, sadly…"
His ears perk up.
"By the end of our date, I was completely regretting ever asking him," she laughs, trying to make light of the situation, "But what can I do? Uninvite him?"
'Yes, you can,' he responds to her rhetorical question in his mind, tempted to say it outloud. Instead he chooses to ask another question, one that he was sure would be an ego-booster for him.
"Why'd you regret asking?" he tries to hide the sly smirk on his face, ready to hear her endless complaints about him, the tiny voice in his head going, "BOOYAH!"
"Um…" she tries to think of a … polite … answer, "I guess you can say we just weren't compatible," she giggles, "Like for example, I personally didn't want to go on any rides, but he just kept on insisting every 5 minutes. Towards the end, he was making his annoyance very clear," she adds, recalling the peeved look on his face.
"Tch," Satoru scowls, "Stupid idiot…" he mutters under his breath, damning the boy to hell.
Not hearing his words, she continues to talk, "And then when I'd bring up playing carnival games like these, he'd just shrug me off, claiming they're for kids," she rolls her eyes, still annoyed at that statement of his.
"They're not for kids!" Satoru quickly gets defensive, making Asami laugh. After all, he was playing with a kid not too long ago, "I like getting on rides as well, but these games are just as fun!"
"I know," she throws her hands in the air, continuing to laugh, "At the end of the day I can't blame him though. If I wasn't so afraid of heights I probably would've—"
"Wait…" Satoru knits his brows together, "You're afraid of heights? But I thought you were a part of the circus, I mean didn't your act have to do with…" he notices her change in expression, the topic clearly being something she didn't like to talk about.
Shaking his head, he decides to drop the topic, instead grabbing his final roll of tickets from his pocket and slamming it on the table, "Hey, you!" he calls out the sleeping carnival employee, motioning to him that he was going to be paying for a game.
Glancing at Asami, he sees that she now has a childlike grin on her face, for this was her favorite carnival game. Making herself comfortable, she giddily jumps in her seat, her hands already tightly holding onto the sides of the water gun.
Grunting in annoyance, the employee snatches the tickets from his hands, "Whoever wins, gets to pick a plush doll of their choice," he informs them, pointing at the row of available options.
'Wait…' Satoru releases his grip on the gun, 'This is my chance to win the Agumon plush doll…' he thinks to himself, believing Asami to be easy competition, 'She wouldn't mind losing just once … right?' he looks at her once again, the pure excitement she exudes reminding him of just how competitive the girl could get.
"You ready?" the employee signals to them that he was about to start the game, soon becoming intimidated by the stern looks on their faces, the two clearly ready to put in their all for the game, "1...2…"
The water begins to spurt out of the gun nozzles, Satoru and Asami then focusing on keeping their aim precise as the balloons in front of them begin to get bigger and bigger. And despite Asami having an advantage through her accuracy training, Satoru's six eyes were a big help when it also came to keeping precision.
'Agumon, you're mine!' he sees that his balloon is becoming bigger than hers, already thinking about where he'd place the orange reptile-like Digimon character in his room. That is until he hears Asami nervously squirm, the girl beginning to realize that she was about to lose.
Quickly taking a look at her, he sees the intense look on her face, the tip of her tongue now even out due to how concentrated she is. Mentally sighing, he realizes that having her win would make her night, his heart and mind now fighting with each other.
'Agumon or Asami…' he bites his lip, his balloon ready to pop at any second. And without even thinking twice, he slightly tilts the aim of his gun, purposely missing the center of the clown's mouth.
POP!
Her balloon explodes, the girl jumping out of her seat in excitement, "Oh my God, I won!" she excitedly claps, the "You've won" music beginning to play as a small string of confetti pops into the air.
Hearing the sound of her laugh, he finds himself relishing how happy she looks, nothing but pure joy radiating off of her as she gives him a toothy grin. It's only in that moment that he realizes that he wouldn't have minded losing for another hundred times, if it meant he got to see that look on her face over and over again. The look of someone who was in a complete state of bliss.
"Okay, choose your prize," the employee once again points to the row of available plush dolls, reminding her of what her options were.
Expecting her to pick one of the cute plush dolls, Satoru's eyes widen when he sees her point at something he would've honestly never expected her to.
"That one!" she points directly at Agumon, the employee nodding and then bringing it down for her with his metal hook, "Thank you," she says, while giving them a small bow in gratitude.
"Here you go!" she hands the orange plush doll to Satoru, the boy currently at a complete loss for words.
"W-Wait, are you for real?"
"Well yeah," she chuckles, acting as if her choice wasn't some kind of surprise, "You're like obsessed with that character, aren't you?"
He shyly nods, the tip of his nose now a subtle pink color, "Thank you," he manages to say, his kind deed ultimately working in his favor.
She shrugs, "It's no big deal," she says before tugging on the sleeve of his sweater, "Come on! I have extra tickets and a whole bunch of other games I want to play!" she yanks him away from his seat, stomping her way to the next game, their night just getting started.
Breaking into a fit of laughter, Asami clutches onto her stomach, the caricature of Satoru and her making her crack up, "Look at how big he drew your ears!" she points at the said feature, making Satoru roll his eyes.
"Well look at how he… at how he …" he's unable to think of anything, for Asami's caricature actually came out pretty cute, the artist emphasizing her best features rather than her "worst".
"Haahaaaaa," she pokes fun at him, the two currently walking back to campus, exhausted from their night of fun. Shoko and Suguru had texted them over an hour ago that they had already left, also adding that they were too lazy to go look for them.
"I cannot believe you made me spend two thousand yen on this," he huffs, pretending to be annoyed.
"Oh come on, it's funny!" she grabs the drawing from his hands, "If you don't want it then I'm keeping it," she says, the portrait of them making her smile.
"Of course I want it, I'm the one who paid for it!" he scowls at her, snatching it back from her.
Knowing he was just being bitter, she ignores his rude action, instead yawning.
"Tired?"
"Just a bit," she says, the two luckily not too far from the dorm building. Honestly, if Satoru could, he'd teleport the two back, but recently his technique had been acting … funny … with him, teleporting him to places he didn't exactly have in mind. A prime example being Masamichi's office while the man was taking a nap, ultimately resulting in him being smacked upside the head.
"You think we can sit for a bit?" she asks him, spotting a swinging bench in the center of the campus garden, secretly wanting to enjoy the view for a bit.
"Oh … yeah, sure, why not?" he awkwardly says, following her as she leads them to the padded wooden bench, the sound of crickets filling their ears as they glance at their surroundings. Due to the upcoming winter season, the flowers were currently in the process of wilting, no longer as brightly colored as they were a couple of weeks ago. Despite that, there was still a serene kind of beauty to them, for flowers were always beautiful in any stage of their life.
"Meow."
Asami looks down, immediately fawning over the orange cat in front of her, "Oh my God," she begins to scratch its neck, "Such a cute little thing you are," her voice becomes high pitched as she speaks to the cat like it's a baby.
"Purrrr," the cat closes its eyes, clearly enjoying the free neck rubs.
"You like cats?" Satoru awkwardly stares at her as she continues to pet the feline, not much of a cat person himself.
"Love em!" Asami picks up the stray, squeezing it in a loving manner, "So cute," she squeals, moving its paws around like it was some kind of doll, "Say hi," she waves it's right arm at Satoru, the cat once again going "Meow."
Continuing to stare at it, Satoru finds himself unsure of what to do. Should he pet it? What if it scratched him? Now that he thinks about it, he wasn't much of a cat or dog person, pets in general always making him feel … weird.
"Here, try petting it," she scoots closer to him, motioning to him to touch the tabby cat.
Taking his arm out of his pocket, he hesitates in nearing his hand, feeling as if it was going to attack him at any moment. Hovering his fingers over it's head, he notices how it's facial expression changes, a faint growl coming out of its mouth. Getting closer and closer, he slowly prepares to pet it...
Hssss!
He quickly turns on his infinity, the cat not exactly lunging at him, but definitely making sure he knew it didn't like him. Frowning, Asami immediately "scolds" the cat.
"Bad kitty!" she scrunches her face, making the cat face her, "Very, very bad!"
Face twisting, Satoru glares at the cat, feeling completely embarrassed, "Tch, that's not a kitten, that's a freaking demon!" he watches Asami place it back onto the floor, the cat staring at him as
if it was wanting to mock him.
Quietly giggling, Asami covers her mouth with a hand, sensing that he was glaring at her.
"It's not funny," he mutters, face now reddening as a result of his humiliation, "Stupid old cat," he mumbles to himself, only making Asami laugh even more.
"Hey, no need to insult it now," she says, giving him a teasing look.
"Why shouldn't I? That ugly old thing tried attacking me for no reason!" he begins to get riled up, offended at the fact that she was coming to the cat's defense, basically choosing that thing over him.
"If a cat doesn't like you, then that means there must be something off about you," she says, knowing exactly what she was doing with her words.
Scoffing, Satoru crosses his arms, deciding to remain silent.
"Not everyone is going to like you Satoru," she teases him, trying her best not to laugh at the current face he was making, "Nor do they have to."
"Yeah they do," he eyes the orange cat, the grumpy thing currently self-bathing itself in front of them, completely unsuspecting of what he was about to do. Then, out of nowhere, Satoru gets up from the bench, snatching the feline by surprise, attempting to get it to like him.
Bringing her hands to her mouth, Asami watches the comedic scene in front of her with a giant grin on her face, Satoru and the cat literally going at it with each other as if they were on the same level.
"Come on! You know you want to love me!" he holds the cat away from his face, the vicious thing now trying to bite its way to freedom.
Swinging herself back and forth on the bench, she decides not to intervene between the two, wanting to see how things would play out.
'Satoru, Satoru, Satoru,' she chuckles while thinking about him, the boy never failing to make her laugh. Honestly, she wasn't sure if it was just naturally who he was, but she liked how he never took himself too seriously, always finding a way to make a joke out of everything. Of course, sometimes it could get annoying, but more often than not, it was something refreshing for her. To her, Satoru and his personality were like an escape from all the pressure she felt all the time, a reminder that at the end of the day, she was just a teenager.
And to think she originally "hated" him. How could she ever hate someone like him? Someone who she'd learn in the last three months, preferred horror movies over action. Someone who, despite being a part of a "supernatural" society, didn't believe in the possibility of aliens existing. Someone who likes to overspend on clothes more than her. And most importantly, someone who always made her feel so …
Special.
"Asami look!" Satoru calls out to her, the cat now "cuddling" with him in his arms, the two having gone from enemies to friends. Kneading its head on him, Asami can see the cat's mouth curl in satisfaction.
And it's once she looks at him, that she feels as if the fog in a tunnel has lifted, for her heart was now telling her that something was … different. Something has changed.
"Hey," he calls out to her again, the girl not realizing that she had only been staring at him in silence, "Are you even listening," he chuckles while sitting back next to her and placing the orange cat on his lap.
"Y-Yeah," she stutters, completely lying.
Noticing her ears were getting red, he gives her a knowing look, a playful smirk now on his face, "Then what was I talking about just now?"
This time her whole face reddens, "Um…" she bites her lip, not having heard a single word that came out of his mouth, too caught up in thinking about him to actually focus on him. But, knowing him he probably talked about…
"Digimon?" she nervously laughs.
"Hmm," he stares at her suspiciously, for he in fact had been talking about Digimon just now. Deciding to let her off the hook just this once, he nods, "I was saying that if he doesn't already have a name, we should call Mr. Feisty here, Agumon."
Playfully rolling her eyes, she shakes her head in humored disbelief, "Really Satoru?"
"Yeah! He's orange and has green eyes just like Agumon! The two also have pretty sharp claws," he jokes around, referring to the cat attempting to scratch him earlier.
"Too bad we can't keep him in the dorms," she frowns, the school having a strict "no pet" policy.
Patting the cat's head, he shrugs, "I think Agumon here is pretty happy living in the garden, at least from what I see of him every morning," he reveals, surprising Asami.
"Wait, this isn't your first time seeing him?"
Satoru shakes his head, "Nope. Agumon here gets fed by Masamichi every morning, something I've seen with my own two eyes. That's why whenever I'm on my way to class in the morning and he tries pestering me for whatever food or snack I have in my hand, I don't give him anything," he explains, everything beginning to make sense. No wonder the cat didn't like him!
"Knowing you, you probably tease him as well, huh?" Asami narrows her eyes at him, the nervous look on his face giving her the answer she was looking for. Smacking him on the shoulder, she glares at him, able to picture Satoru dangling food over the cat's head.
Yelping in pain, he dramatically pouts, "Nuh uh!"
"Meow."
The cat "speaks", almost as if saying "Liar."
"Okay, okay," he raises his hands to his defense, "So maybe I do occasionally tease the cat, but as I was saying. Agumon has a home in the garden, he just needed a name," he says, scratching the cat below it's neck, soft purrs coming out its mouth.
A comfortable silence fills the air.
Slowly swinging back and forth on their bench, the two admire the view in front of them, the soft moonlight above them reminding the two that they weren't here alone, for the moon above them was also watching over their steady beating hearts.
What a beautiful night, they think to themselves. Never would they have imagined that they would've ended their night together, but here they were, silently embracing each other's presence, happy to be alongside each other.
"Satoru."
"Hm," he turns to her, wondering why Asami had said his name out of nowhere.
"...Thank you."
He raises a brow, "For?"
''Being you," is what she wants to say, the boy giving her a night she'd never forget.
Instead, she offers him a tiny smile, "Just … thank you," she repeats, leaning her head against the crook of his neck, the boy blinking in surprise. Feeling his heart warm, a soft smile begins to form onto his lips as he slowly leans his head against her own, the night finally coming to its end.
KNOCK. KNOCK. KNOCK.
Suguru hears the sound of someone pounding on his door. Mumbling incoherent things to himself, he groans as he checks the time on his alarm clock.
1:00 AM? Who the hell could be knocking at his door at this time? Scratching the back of his head, he begrudgingly gets up, still half-asleep. Feeling grouchy, he prepares to tell off whoever is behind his door, wondering what was so important that they needed to wake him up at this hour of night.
Sighing one last time, he harshly opens the door, frowning when he sees that it's Satoru.
"What do you want Sat—"
"I like her," he says out of nowhere, the look on his face telling Suguru that the boy seemed to be in some kind of state of shock.
"Huh?"
"You heard me," Satoru gulps, Suguru still unsure of what he was talking about, or more specifically, who.
"What are you talking about?" he asks, now rubbing his eyes.
"I like Asami."
.
.
.
.
.
.
Meanwhile somewhere in the shadows…
"Tsk, tsk, tsk," the sound of someone's heels click against the cement floor of the abandoned warehouse they were entering, "You know I have to say, when I received the invitation in the mail, I thought surely this must be a mistake," the unknown voice says, carrying an aura that one could describe as … lustful.
A man dressed in a suit then suddenly appears, a stoic look on his face as he tightly grips onto the suitcase in his hand.
"So tell me, was it a mistake?" the curvy figure begins to walk in circles around the man, purposely taunting him, almost like a snake waiting to pounce on its prey.
"It wasn't," he keeps a monotonous tone, his face void of any emotion.
The figure brings a hand to their mouth, revealing their extremely long nails while trying not to laugh, "Ah I see," they let out a faint chuckle, tapping their fingers against their full lips.
"They're offering you fifty five million yen to get the job done," the middleman says, keeping a careful eye on the person, knowing that there was a fifty/fifty chance they'd take the deal, their appearance not exactly guaranteeing their compliance.
The sound of a dripping water leak adds onto the tense atmosphere, a single drop of sweat rolling down the side of the man's forehead as he knows there's a potential chance that he might be fighting for his life in the next couple of seconds.
"This girl must be quite a threat if the higher ups are now sending criminals to do their dirty work," the middleman can hear the sly tone behind their voice, clearly entertained by the proposal.
"This one is a … special … case," the middleman says, "The higher ups want the job done in a way that makes it almost seem like an accident. To do that, they need a criminal who knows what they're doing, a criminal who isn't sloppy with their work, a criminal who can think quickly on their feet and calculate things so that things are executed…"
"Perfectly," the sultry voice says for him, sighing right after, "I don't know," they tap their foot, thinking about the pros and cons of the proposal, "Not only do you expect me to kill this young girl, but you also expect me to somehow face two other special grade sorcerers. Not to mention, one of them has the infamous Six Eyes."
"The higher ups have already prepared a plan to be set in motion the night of the ball, all you need to focus on is killing Asami Okada," he says, lifting his suitcase up and unclasping the locks, a golden light appearing out of the box, "They're even providing you with these…"
And slowly, the figure comes to the light, revealing a platinum-haired woman dressed in all white, a tattoo of a black heart under the corner of her right eye. Grabbing the item in the suitcase, a smile then appears on her face, observing the two golden sai knives in her hands.
"Anshin shite shineru" she reads the kanji that's engraved on the handles of the knives, "Meaning to die in peace…." she chuckles, a look of determination now on her face. Then out of nowhere, she throws one of the knives across the warehouse, making it perfectly land on the wing of a tiny fly.
Gulping, the man tries not to react, feeling a chill run down his spine, "So… do we have a deal?"
Licking her lips, she smiles at the man before bowing, "I am your humble servant."
A/N:
And that's all for this chapter folks!
Honestly, I had such a hard time writing the first half of this chapter (the explaining of techniques) just because I personally don't like writing about power structures and stuff, especially considering I'm more of an angst/romance writer than I am a fighting/action based one. But because the JJK universe revolves around abilities and innate techniques, I have to force myself to put my thinking cap on to try and create as well as mitigate the techniques I create.
Now that I've established ¾ of Asami's techniques, I'm going to try to stick to those rules I've written, but as Gojou said, her techniques can be developed into becoming "stronger", so just be aware of that. I say this for the readers who genuinely care about power systems and stuff in fanfiction, as I'm genuinely trying my best haha! I mean even now I'm iffy about the technique I'm about to give this mysterious villain, so we'll see how that goes.
But anyways, Gojo has finally come to realize his feelings! Yay! Asami is basically almost there as well, but trouble is now lingering in the air…. (Spoiler) I sort of hinted at what's going to happen in the next chapter, so if you caught onto it then you know angst is coming! Sorry, but we need to go through a bit of angst before we get to the land of sunshine and rainbows haha.
If you enjoyed this chapter then feel free to leave a review and let me know what your fave part of this chapter was! When writing all the fluff I personally kept listening to "I See The Light" from the movie Tangled as well as "Why isn't love always easy?" by Joy (a korean song that I really recommend reading the translated lyrics to! They're so cute and perfectly describe Asami and Gojou's relationship in this chapter)
Lastly, a big thank you to anyone who has left a review of the last chapter as your kind comments are definitely what motivated me to continue writing! It's always interesting to see what you guys think and like about the story! An even bigger shout-out to vain-glory whose never failed to leave a review since the start of this story, your thorough reviews have always motivated me to make this story even better !