chapter 10: after sunset

cw: normal jjk violence/gore/minor character death, mentions of childhood trauma, torture, and adult sexual content.

To: Hummingbird

[07:13] Bring extra snacks today.

[07:16] Good morning to you, too.
[07:16] Please provide your own refreshments. You are already making quite a dent in my wallet.

[07:17] Satisfaction guaranteed.

[07:17] My (likely) cracked rib begs to differ.
[07:17] I like umeboshi.

[07:18] I didn't ask.

He doesn't bring snacks. Hummingbird does: three umeboshi onigiri, two packs of salted vinegar chips, and two bottles of water. She eats one onigiri. Toji devours the rest.

To: Hummingbird

[07:55] Edogawa has good Indian food.

[07:56] Are you buying me dinner?

[07:56] No, you brat. I'm just letting you know.
[07:57] Since your commute is long and you're probably tired of eating konbini food.

[09:14] Oi. What did I say about ignoring people.

[09:45] I'm in class right now.
[09:45] You also said nothing that warranted a reply.

[09:46] It's polite to thank someone when they give you advice.

[11:17] You did not give me any advice. You gave me tour booklet information.

A vein throbs in Toji's brain as he reads his phone with one hand while he bangs a Curse User's head into the wall. The man groans loudly on impact. In response, Toji lifts him off the ground and slams him harder against the brick. Warm blood seeps under his palm, but he ignores it and stares at the screen. He has seen Yuna interact with her peers—one tall, busty blue-haired lady, another with jet-black shoulder length hair who always wears priestess robes, sometimes even out in public like a lunatic. Yuna speaks little around them, mostly gives polite nods and hums. She has none of this…none of this sass.

The man groans again.

"Shut up," growls Toji, tossing the man hard against the opposite wall. Something that sounds like skull and brains squelches, then slides down to the ground. Toji should've been cleaner about this whole thing and just used a gun, but he'd been in a bad mood this morning for some reason.

(For being ignored by the woman he's squishing this guy's brains for).

He brings up his bloody hand so he can text with both thumbs.

[11:25] You mad I'm not taking you to dinner?

[11:27] No.

At their next training session, Toji (accidentally) punches Yuna too hard in the stomach and causes her to cough up blood and a surprising number of curse words. He takes her to get Indian food, (it's not an apology), he learns it's Yuna's first time, and she has a good stomach for spicy foods. They pay separately. He walks her to the train station. At a konbini on the way, Toji buys her a bag of sour plum hard candy. She unwraps one and offers it to him first, he takes it and makes a face when he remembers that he hates umeboshi. She sees him and laughs, that short quiet little thing that she never lets get too loud, as if she's been told before that she shouldn't. Toji does not think to himself that he may like the sound of it and does not wonder what it is about him that she finds so funny.

Mei Mei never ties up her hair when she fights. The sky-blue strands float like dandelion seeds at times, when she's at her highest point, or when she's making a particularly grateful sidestep, but most of the time, her long blue braids whip as fast as the axe she wields. The loose bangs must block her vision, but never has Yuna thought that Mei loses her target as a result.

Yuna blocks Mei's weapon as it comes crashing toward her side. Mei is brutally strong, even without Cursed Energy, but she is not Fushiguro Toji, however restrained he is in their sessions. Their training staffs collide, and in the brief instant, Yuna pivots on her right leg and kicks out her left toward Mei's stomach. Mei jolts back, but Yuna follows by whirling her staff backhanded, catching Mei's shoulder, but unable to complete the attack before Mei counters. Yuna skids to her left, favoring keeping Mei on her non-blind side.

"Wow," says Mei, surprised. "Your movements are really different, senpai. I don't think you've ever hit me before."

Yuna wipes her sweat on her sleeve. "It just shows how embarrassing I am, Mei-san."

"We're not fighting with Cursed Energy or Techniques." Mei props her staff against her shoulder; the tail sends up a billow of dust. "If you'd been able to Freeze me even for a second during that exchange, you could've landed a couple good blows. Have you been training?"

"Just with you, and sometimes with my students," she replies, though she has not genuinely trained with her students in months.

"It's working. You don't waste movements as much as you used to, and even your strength is different."

Satisfaction guaranteed, says Toji's smug voice that she ignores.

"Thank you as always, Mei-san." Yuna bows her head. "I appreciate your time."

"Done already?"

"Yes, I need to head off campus." Yaga had asked her to assign her students on another mission, some minor curse in an elementary school, but she can tell how the spring surge, with the end of the academic year and its accompanying exam-related curses, is starting to wear her students down. The work is not hard, but they have been deployed on back-to-back missions, and Yuna wants to give them some respite, so she will take care of the curse on her own.

"You've been off campus a lot recently," comments Mei. "Seeing someone?"

"No, nothing like that. Just a mission for Yaga-sensei."

"You sure?" Mei smirks. "I can keep a secret, you know."

"For a price, right, Mei?" says a voice behind them.

Yuna turns around to find Tsukumo Yuki wander onto the training grounds, her sandy hair lilting in some unfelt wind, a motorcycle helmet tucked under her arm. She pushes her sunglasses up to sit on the top of her head and grins widely at Yuna.

"Hi, Yuna-chan."

Yuna turns to Mei, who just raises up her hands.

"Sorry, senpai," the third-year smiles. "Yuki-senpai paid me a thousand yen."

"That's quite cheap, Mei-san," says Yuna coolly.

"It all adds up, okay? She said you'd been ignoring her calls. I figured it wouldn't hurt for you guys to work things out."

"Mei-san, we have already established the limitations of your judgment for what is and isn't harmful."

"Senpai!"

"Don't bully her, Yuna." Yuki brings an arm around Yuna's shoulders. "She was doing me a favor. Thanks, Mei. Let's catch up later?"

"Certainly," says Mei pleasantly. "Great work today, senpai."

Yuna waits for Mei to leave her line of vision before pushing Yuki off of her.

"What are you doing back, Yuki-san?" she says coldly.

"Hey, don't be like that," Yuki taps her forehead. "You're the one ignoring my texts."

Yuna slaps her hand away, to which Yuki raises her eyebrows.

"Really, Yuna?"

Yuna's expression remains stony, but her heart-rate skyrockets. The slightest action makes Yuki appear threatening, a reminder that she is still a Special-Grade, that no matter if they are friends, a certain degree of decorum is expected of Yuna.

Yuki sighs and runs a hand through her hair. Her sunglasses tumble off her head. Reflexively, Yuna catches them, and because Yuki is still Yuki, she returns them to her instead of breaking them in half.

"Thanks," Yuki takes them back. Her fingers grace unnecessarily over Yuna's pulse. "Can we talk in your room?"

"Why?"

Yuki surreptitiously points at her left. Yuna follows its direction and glimpses a crow perched on the armory's roof, peering at them.

Yuki knows to hold Mei at an arm's length, too.

"Fine." Yuna checks her watch. She had wanted to shower, but will just make do with changing clothes. "You have thirty minutes."

They walk to the dormitories, Yuki chatting animatedly all the while about her travels, how Japan is small but she still doesn't think she's seen everything, how the third-grader she'd picked up is a funny kid, strong as all hell, says his type is now tall girls with big butts like Yuki, how she ate the best abalone and saw the most gorgeous sunsets in this tiny fishing village half an hour outside Kyoto. Yuna lets her talk, as she always does, but the moment the door shuts behind them, she cuts Yuki off.

"You didn't come back."

Yuki doesn't look taken back with Yuna's iciness, but she doesn't look apologetic either.

"You promised you would." Yuna grips her elbows tightly. "You said if they did anything to me, you'd come back. I met with Fushiguro Toji because you asked me to, Yuki-san, you know I would've never done that on my own. He blinded in me in one eye, nearly sold me, the Jujutsu Higher-Ups threw me in a cell, and you didn't come back."

Yuki lets out a breath and sets down her helmet near the exit before she sits down on Yuna's bed.

"Don't just come in and make yourself comfortable." Yuna wants to yank Yuki off her bed, but doesn't. "You ignored Yaga-sensei for weeks. They were going to execute me. And you still didn't come back."

"I was in the middle of something, and I couldn't just leave. I knew the Gojou kid would protect you," says Yuki.

"Protect—he owns me!"

The sun is about to set, and it floods the Yuna's bedroom in a beautiful, wild orange. Yuki tosses her hair over her shoulder, and the sunlight clings to the strands in warm embrace. Her steel dragon curls over her head like a silver halo bathed in sun-kissed shards. Yuki just looks at her, eyes aglow, like a fire goddess who cannot be bothered by her worshipper.

"What's the difference?"

Yuna's mouth has gone dry. "You can't be serious."

"Be realistic. If you're so weak you need someone else's protection, don't they effectively own you? All they have to do is threaten to take that protection away, and you have to do what they want, right? It's the same thing." Yuki scratches her head. "I mean, sure, I didn't think he was going to make you a fucking Cursed Object, but the whole point is the Gojou clan has now staked their claim on you, and no one else will touch you. I figured it'd be better than me doing that—I don't have a family backing, and I'm, you know, here and there—"

"You're nowhere."

Yuki glances up at her. "Careful, Yuna-chan."

Yuna lets out a strangled sound and runs a hand through her hair. "Why are you even here, Yuki-san? You clearly have nothing to say to me, which means you're here to see someone else."

"I did want to see you."

Yuna finally snaps. "Why are you fucking here, Yuki-san?"

Yuki's dragon hisses, spewing a wave of Cursed Energy. Yuna's own Cursed Energy surfaces to her skin almost instantly, guarding her so that the blow does not cut skin, but she winces none the less.

"Sorry," says Yuki after a slight pause. "I didn't mean to do that."

Yuna doesn't believe that, but she holds her tongue.

"I wanted to talk with you. And see if we're cool."

"We're not. What else?"

"Yuna-chan, I'm sorry I didn't come back."

Yuna knows she isn't, because Yuki wouldn't have done anything differently even knowing the outcome. She knows a sincere apology is futile, like trying to catch the sun's rays in her palms, no matter how worthless it makes her feel.

"What else?" Yuna presses.

Yuki finally gives up and tells her what she really wanted to know. "I wanted to see why you didn't mention Zen'in Toji in your trial."

Yuna's eyes narrow. "I had no evidence except for you, and Yaga-sensei couldn't find you. No one would have believed me. The Zen'ins would have made sure of that."

"Why would the Zen'ins cover for him? He's been self-exiled for years."

Yuna looks Yuki straight in the eyes and lies. "How would I know what the Zen'ins want?"

She can tell Yuki is annoyed with her attitude, but in the interest of not souring their discussion even further, doesn't act on it.

"I was just asking, Yuna-chan. You've just always been good at this kind of thing, finding things out, understanding the details."

Doing your paperwork, thinks Yuna, but she knows better than to not accept whatever pitiful olive branch Yuki has offered.

"I thought you might have found something about the Zen'in family and Zen'in Toji when you were preparing to meet him," continues Yuki. "Guess not, though. I'm impressed you got away from him." She gives her a smile that is supposed to be encouraging, but just comes out as crooked. "Good job. Even in that fight with Mei earlier, I can tell you've gotten stronger."

"Do you need anything else, Yuki-san?"

"Well, your first year as a teacher is ending in a couple months. There's a couple stops I still want to make in Japan, but I might go abroad soon. I wanted to see if you'd want to come with me."

"No, I don't."

Yuki doesn't seem surprised. "All right. Well, the offer's always there, y'know. No matter how mad you are at me." She stands up from Yuna's bed and stretches. "I guess I'll head out. I should go check on Aoi-kun."

Yuna blinks. "Are you…taking care of him on your own?"

"Yeah! Well, he mostly takes care of himself."

"Isn't he in the third-grade?"

"Yeah, super self-sufficient. I never have to teach him anything twice."

Neither of these sentences appropriately addresses Yuna's concern.

"Who is taking care of Aoi-kun at this moment?" she asks, bracing herself for the answer.

"Oh, he's fine!" says Yuki brightly. "I tossed him on a mountainside full of curses and told him to survive for a week." Yuki taps her chin in thought. "Has it been a week already? It might be two now…"

"Yuki-san!"

"Oh, relax, I don't need to baby him the way you baby your kids. Speaking of…" She points a finger at Yuna. "I was hoping to talk with Gojou-kun. He around?"

"No."

Yuki's finger wags. "You know I hate it when you give me these one-word answers that normal people would add more context to. When's he getting back?"

Satoru meeting Yuki would be like a supernova colliding with the sun. Yuna does not want to be incinerated in the aftermath.

"Tomorrow morning."

Yuki seems to know that Yuna is lying, but doesn't push it. "Fine, I'll get him the next time I'm back." She leans close abruptly and presses a quick kiss to Yuna's cheek. "Bye, Yuna-chan. Don't stay too mad at me, all right? Be happy I told you to take this job! Look at you now!" Yuki beams. "You've changed so much, you're even talking back to me. I was right, this job at least gave you more self-confidence! You can thank me later. Bye now!"

The door slides closed after her. Yuna doesn't know how long she stands there, just watching the plain shoji screen like a rejected lover. The warmth from the day fades into the pale silver of twilight tinged by moonlight, and all it leaves behind is a cold vacuum.

Satoru patrols the campus grounds impatiently. Suguru and he had been sent on a day mission in Hiroshima and thankfully had returned before the cafeteria closed. After grabbing a quick bite, then forcing Suguru to see Shouko, Satoru had set out in the star-studded night in irritated pursuit of their teacher, only to learn that she was also on a mission.

The kitchens are long closed by the time Yuna returns to campus. Satoru finds her sitting at the pagoda overlooking the koi pond. The sound of water rippling matches early cricket chirps. The moonlight bathes Yuna's face in soft white light.

(Ten years from now, Satoru will find her in this same place, with the same expression of pensive melancholy, and the thought will cross his mind that she is rather beautiful in sadness. He will reach for her, thinking that maybe he can comfort her too, when he has never done such a thing before, because he has never wanted to).

Now, though, he is sixteen and he thinks of nothing but himself and by extension Suguru, because Suguru, whether Satoru likes it or not, has wound his way into Satoru's sense of self, and Satoru does not think he can be happy unless Suguru is. Since talking with Yuna, Suguru is most definitively unhappy.

Satoru strides over to Yuna and looms over her like a thundercloud. She bows her head in acknowledgment, not meeting his naked eyes.

"Gojou-kun."

They haven't talked alone since the trial.

"You can't say shit like that to Suguru," he says with no other preamble. "What the fuck is wrong with you?"

She blinks slowly. "What did I say to Getou-kun in particular that upset you?"

"That he's changed. He hasn't. He's nothing like me other than we're both fucking strong and that's it." Suguru hadn't told him the full conversation, but Satoru can put together the pieces—nothing bothers Suguru more than having his intentions challenged, especially when he is so thoughtful about his motives. "He's still the same. He's the…he's the fucking best person here out of all of us."

"A low bar."

"He is good. Just because you aren't happy with what we did or because you're…" Satoru hisses through his teeth. "Because you're scared of me doesn't mean you should lash out at him."

"Is that what Getou-kun said?" A frog ribbits. "That I'm scared of you?"

"He didn't need to. I know you are. You've been since day one. And I don't really give a shit because that's normal but I don't need you giving Suguru ideas."

Yuna's eyes shimmer like the pond, where moonlight dances on its ripples. "Ideas like how he should be scared of you too?"

Satoru's eyes burn. "Ideas like he should be scared of himself."

Understanding crosses Yuna's face, and then it smooths out like a blip of a shadow. She knows.

Satoru does not care about what people think of him. He does not care if other people fear him, or despise him, he's known that since birth. Let them fawn or cower or hide or fight—the actions of others has so little bearing on him, he sometimes has to remind himself that the world exists because there are others besides him in it. Satoru feels a constant hunger inside of him, so raw and vicious that he'd consume his own soul if he knew it would satiate it, but that's the thing—he doesn't know what he wants or longs for, all he knows is that he wants and wants and wants and gains and gains but he does not get any fuller. An innate part of him knows it is wrong, or rather, unnatural, and that is what makes him spectacular, but he sometimes is so terribly lonely in this hunger that he thinks about consuming everything in sight, just to make it all end.

He doesn't want Suguru to feel it. He doesn't even want Suguru to know about it, because Suguru thinks about things like helping grandpas cross the street, telling civilians to pray to real gods and not sorcerers after an exorcism, about grand things like how to most effectively use his strength to protect the weak ("Don't you think it's ironic sometimes, Satoru, that I use the very curses humans birth to protect them? Kind of poetic, huh?"). So what if Suguru doesn't help the elderly as much anymore, or if Suguru doesn't want to keep eating those disgusting curses to protect the humans that birthed them. Suguru is still Suguru. Suguru doesn't need to feed this cataclysmic desire. He probably doesn't even have it.

"I am not scared of Getou-kun," says Yuna at last. Her mask is so smooth. Satoru gives her tremendous credit for being so insanely unflappable at times. "I apologize if I insinuated that. I did not mean to undermine his goodness, Gojou-kun. I know he is a good person. I'll talk to him again tomorrow."

Satoru feels like he's a train wreck racing down a hill, but all this momentum suddenly has nowhere to go, now that Yuna has effectively negated his destination.

"What about me?"

Yuna tilts her head to the side. "Don't you want me to be scared of you, Gojou-kun?"

I don't particularly care about you, thinks Satoru defensively, but then for once in his life, he holds his tongue and thinks.

"I…"

Yuna's head tilts further. "Would you like to sit while you sort out your thoughts, Gojou-kun? You are very tall, and looking up at you is quite uncomfortable."

For all this talk about being scared of him, Yuna sure doesn't act like it. Satoru obeys and sits down next to her, kicking off his sandals letting his feet dip into the pond. Yuna's legs are neatly crossed underneath her. Purple-gray Residuals that don't belong to her cling to her clothes, fading slowly as Yuna's carefully controlled marigold Cursed Energy cleanses the Residuals away.

"Did you have a mission?" he asks.

"Yes."

"I thought Yaga-sensei was limiting your missions. 'Cause of Bounty Hunters."

Yuna looks surprised that he knows, but that's only because she thinks so lowly of him. Satoru really is the biggest asshole, if she thinks he cares so little. "He is. This was something I could handle quickly though."

He guessed right. "We could've taken care of it, sensei."

Her eyes soften. "You sound like Getou-kun. It's okay. I try not to be useless, Gojou-kun."

"That's not…" Satoru blows out a breath and lies flat on his back. His vision bursts with the night sky, where he can count out each individual star and the rainbow that it radiates. "That's not what I meant. But thanks."

She notices his squint, pulls a handkerchief from her bag, and places it gently over his eyes. It helps with the starburst a little. "You and Getou-kun are good for each other. You must care for him a lot. The only times you seek me out are to talk about him."

It's one of those uncomfortable truths that Satoru doesn't know how to respond to, so he doesn't.

"I don't want you to be scared of me, sensei. I just want things to go back to normal. To how they were before. And I don't know how to make that happen."

"You can't," she says plainly. "You own me now, Gojou-kun. We can't go back to how we were before."

"But you get how I don't care about all that shit, right? I'm never going to use you or your Miracle, and I'm definitely not going to do anything insane like lending you to another Family."

Yuna is quiet for a long time, so Satoru peeks at her beneath the handkerchief. "Sensei?"

"You said before you'd never use one of my Miracles, and you did," she says. "It's stupid. I know. It was extenuating circumstances and you didn't mean anything by it, but it happened still, and it was out of my control. It was still use."

"I know, I swear that's the last time. You know I'm never going to hurt you, right?"

"No, Gojou-kun. I don't know that."

He sits up. The handkerchief falls off and floats into the pond. It has a lotus pattern, a flattened dimension of the real flowers curling open on the surface.

"Sensei, to be totally honest, I wouldn't ever hurt you because it wouldn't really be worth the effort. How can I convince you of that?" Satoru pauses and thinks. "Want me to swear a binding vow?"

Yuna gives him one of her, "You truly are a special child" looks which means he's said something insane, but it's not an infrequent look so he just stares beadily at her back. She realizes he's not joking.

"I must be a fool, to decline binding vows from two Special Grades."

"Huh?"

"Nothing. Yuki-san was here earlier today. I just sent her away." Yuna looks away from him and hums. "Gojou-kun, you should never offer that to anyone, okay?"

"Huh?"

"A binding vow. You should not offer that so casually to anyone, ever. Even to Getou-kun. You are a child, but the contract of a binding vow is permanent."

"Why's it such a big deal? I'd just be swearing never to harm you, which I'd never do."

Yuna gives him a small smile. "I know. Thank you for offering. I know you are being sincere. But I decline, and you shouldn't offer that to anyone unless you understand all the ways its consequences can manifest. All right?"

Satoru is irritated that his grand gesture has been so easily dismissed. "I just…look, I'm just tryna make you less scared."

"I'm not scared of you at this moment, at this point in time, Gojou-kun." Yuna sounds like she's speaking the truth. "I am merely scared of what you are capable of, which many people are. But what you've said has helped with the Cursed Object label. I trust what you've said. You will not ever use me like a Tool."

"No, sensei. I don't need to."

Yuna hums. "I know. Thank you for talking with me, Gojou-kun. I'll talk with Getou-kun tomorrow. I apologize for how I've treated you three recently. I know it's been hard. If things are a bit quieter this weekend, I'll take you all to go cherry blossom viewing. It'll be the tail end, but maybe we'll get lucky. How does that sound?"

Satoru knows he's being dismissed, but Yuna does not radiate any ill will and he recognizes the offer as an attempt to restore normality. She just seems very tired.

"Sure, sensei. I'll let the others know."

Yuna nods. "Gojou-kun, don't tell anyone about offering me a binding vow, all right?"

"Why?"

"You'll understand when you're older."

"You're like…not that old."

"Maybe when you're of age, we can talk about it again. Just for now," Yuna bares a little smile, "let's just keep it a secret, okay?"

Yuna treats him like the world's greatest nuclear bomb a hair's breadth from detonation at any moment and a child with a lost balloon she's replaced at the same time. Satoru, on later reflection, thinks it's accurate. At the moment, though, he's just annoyed, but thinking he's done enough damage (or repair?) for the night, leaves his teacher alone on the pagoda, suffused in silver rays.

From: Reason You're Blind

[23:56] You awake?
[23:56] I need you to meet me. Bring a first aid kit and whatever you need to seal a Cursed Object.

He sends a location.

[00:05] Hummingbird, it's a Friday, aren't you young, how are you asleep already?

[00:30] Fuck.

Yuna had always been a fairly good sleeper. No matter what her circumstances, whether she'd suffered some abuse by her husband or was chained in Jujutsu High's isolation chamber, she has always managed to grasp sleep when she can, knowing that the next opportunity is not guaranteed. It is therefore uncommon for her to toss and turn at night, mind racing about things she has no control over. With Yuki's visit and then Satoru's confrontation, though, Yuna is so overcome by a general sense of worthlessness that her body deems that the appropriate punishment is to take away the only escape she could count on. She rolls around her mattress listlessly, repeating pointless things like poems and prayers over in her head, but she can feel every thumping heartbeat in her chest like a drumbeat reminding her that she doesn't deserve its constancy.

Yuna reaches to her bed stand to find her phone. Recently, she's gotten in the bad habit of re-reading Toji and her text message thread. She knows it's ridiculous and she is acting like the schoolgirl he keeps claiming she is, but sometimes Toji says dry, dark things that make Yuna smile (or even laugh, one time she'd snorted tea up her nose). If she's going to be stewing in self-loathing all night anyway, her emotional conflict and aftermath of laughing at the Sorcerer Killer's jokes will only be the cherry on top.

Yuna flips open her phone, squinting at the light as her eyes adjust, then sees several new messages. She reads them, then sits up, turns on the light, and reads them again to make sure she's understanding correctly.

She looks at the time. It's been nearly two hours since Toji's last message.

Her fingers hover to reply, but she hesitates. Is this a trap? They have only met on neutral ground. The address he sent looks like an apartment.

It has already been two hours. He must have found someone else to help him with whatever predicament he was in. Toji is not without resources, after all, he would not be so stupid as to solely rely on a Grade Two Sorcerer (recently classified Special Grade Cursed Object) in a life-or-death situation.

To: Reason You're Blind

[02:13] Sorry, I was sleeping. Are you all right?

Yuna decides she will wait five minutes.

She calls him after three.

He doesn't pick up.

She gets out of bed and changes into a white blouse tucked into a long navy pleated skirt. She packs her bag quickly, throwing together gauze, antiseptic, several suture kits, and also shoulders her mission bag full of scrolls. Because she is vain, she also ensures she has a basic makeup compact and her favorite lipstick.

This is stupid. Yuna knows it is. She has encountered two Special Grade sorcerers today who already have told her in different ways that she is a weak, worthless thing who should be grateful for whatever protections they have to offer, so why would she walk into the jaws of a lion who promises nothing but danger?

But still, Yuna goes. No matter that it is two a.m. and there is no way in hell Toji would ever do this for her and there is a very good probability that this is a trap—

Except.

There isn't. Because Yuna made Toji swear a binding vow.

It is a deal with a demon, but it is one she bartered, wrangled with what little power she has, and so she clings to it like a moth to lamplight, defending it with all that she has, even though she knows she will regret it on her deathbed.

Three punches to his head. Toji writhes on the ground, tasting blood and bile, as his old man looms over him.

"Worthless," he spits. "How could she bear such a worthless son, no Cursed Energy, even! Can't see the damn things even when you're getting beaten to a pulp, huh? Useless piece of shit—"

Toji lunges at his father, ready to rip his throat out with his bare hands, but something invisible barrels into his chest and knocks him back onto the ground. A set of knives he can't see sinks into his stomach, and Toji screams as something fiery and acrid lights alive under his skin, threatening to tear each cell apart.

"You'll end up killing him," his uncle says from the sidelines. He smokes a pipe as he watches.

"So be it," snaps his father. "He's not even worth the food it takes to keep him alive. The curse gnawing on him now is worth more."

"You'll regret it the next time Naobito asks for a workhorse. Give it a rest. You torturing him again isn't going to make him magically manifest Cursed Energy. You should've learned that ten years ago."

"Tch. Trash."

His father kicks him one more time in the head. Toji's body is going to split into pieces. His father aims another, and Toji will not survive—

"Fushiguro-san!"

The hissed shout snaps Toji into reality. He is in his shitty apartment, on his shitty couch, sweating through the tattered throw even though his window is open and ushers in a healthy breeze. The punches to his head had been knocks.

They come again, quiet but firm.

"Fushiguro-san!"

Toji hobbles to his door and opens it without looking through the peephole. Only one person calls him so earnestly by his preferred surname, by such a polite honorific he doesn't deserve.

Yuna opens her mouth, as if to scold him for taking so long to respond, but she stops when she absorbs his appearance.

"I texted you," he says hoarsely, "three fucking hours ago."

A shadow crosses her face but does not linger. Emotions stick to Yuna's face like water to oil.

"I apologize. I was sleeping."

He looks her up and down, dressed like she could be going on a nice brunch, her lashes fluttering, her lips coated in a subtle mahogany sheen.

"You come from a date?"

She looks bemused. "No, obviously not."

He wants to ask why it's obvious, but Yuna is clearly more focused than he is.

"Didn't you call me for something important?"

Toji steps aside. Yuna enters his apartment and takes her shoes off while he locks the door behind her. He thinks he heard her murmur a quick prayer in gratitude for her entering the space; he doesn't mock her, even though he wants to.

"Are you all right?" Yuna looks out of place among his ratty things, her blouse pressed and ironed, smelling like something floral and citrus against his kitchen of dirty dishes stained with soy sauce. "You don't look well."

"No shit." Toji groans when he sits back down on his couch. Yuna follows him and perches on edge of his scratched coffee table so she can face him. "I got in a fight and got hit with a Cursed Object."

"You can't dispel it?" Yuna is asking out of genuine surprise, but it doesn't make Toji any happier to be reminded of his incompetence.

"You think you'd be here if I could?"

"No, I just...you can exorcise curses, so I just thought..."

Toji lifts up his shirt, where a dagger protrudes out of his lower right abdomen. Its hilt is entirely black, just like the blade buried in Toji, and spreading out from the wound is not just blood but a circular pattern of illegible black ink. At the end of the hilt dangles a beaded red thread, finished with a wooden sphere carved with the laughing face of a demon.

"Recognize this?" says Toji through gritted teeth.

Yuna shakes her head. Of course she wouldn't, she didn't grow up in the jujutsu world.

"It's a Grade Three Cursed Tool, Nightmare's Whim. It's a stupid little thing. If you're stabbed with it, it puts you in a stupid amount of pain and makes you hallucinate a bunch of stupid shit." Toji wipes the sweat of his forehead, but his hand is sweaty too, so nothing happens. Yuna pulls a cloth out of one of her two bags and dabs his forehead for him.

"I see. Why have you left it in?"

"Only way to release it is by pouring Cursed Energy into it. If a regular monkey gets hit with it, the hallucinations cause enough negative emotion that manifests as Cursed Energy, so it'll release once it has what it wants. If a sorcerer gets hit with it, they just input enough to force its release. For me..."

He doesn't need to finish his sentence.

"I see. What happens if it doesn't get enough Cursed Energy?"

"It really amps up the hallucinations." Toji looks in the corner of the room, where his mother is staring at him, her eyes gouged and her mouth pouring blood. "It's real fun."

Yuna follows Toji's line of vision but sees nothing.

"Okay. Do you know what will happen when it releases?"

Toji lies. "Nah." He can bear it, and Yuna will hesitate and prolong this already godforsaken night if she thinks it will cause him more agony.

"Okay."

Toji's living room is illuminated by nothing but moonlight, which pierces right through the open window and diffuses onto Yuna. In the silver light, Yuna's eyes sometimes ripple in reflection, and each of her movements is surrounded by a soft glow. Toji had thought little of her that first meeting in Akibahara, a petite, soft thing, like a stray cat. But swearing that binding vow opened up something new—he felt, rather than saw, something orange and marigold and bright, burning and yearning, only to be swallowed up by a silver husk in containment. She does not belong in his apartment, kneeling in front of him, her face pensive and gentle. He wonders if he's hallucinating her, too.

Yuna presses a cool palm to the wound, as if measuring the curse.

"I'm going to seal the Tool first, just in case," she says. "Sometimes Objects can rebound in odd ways, and I don't want to cause you more pain."

It's a simple statement, but Toji can count on one hand the number of people who have borne that kind of sentiment toward him.

"Just get it over with, hummingbird. I'm not delicate like you."

Yuna just looks up at him. He realizes he's starting to be able to read her expressions based on the most minute changes. She sort of squints when she's annoyed.

"You don't have many friends, do you, Fushiguro-san?"

"What?"

"Nothing. Just wondering why you'd call me for this very important task, when I've known you for such a short amount of time."

"My regular guy's out of town, otherwise there's no way I'd call a bitch like you."

She pushes on the hilt of Nightmare's Whim, just a little bit, and Toji hisses and stops talking.

Toji lets her work uninterrupted. She pushes squares of blank washi paper over the curse markings and then wraps a long rectangle full of calligraphy around the dagger's hilt. Her fingernails are painted sheer pink. The hair normally tied back during their training sessions trails behind the tender curve of her ears. Her blouse does not hide the swell of her breasts, the outline and peaks of which are particularly prominent against the thin white fabric.

Toji tears his eyes away from her, feeling the weight of his active sins lusting for someone who so clearly does not belong in his presence. The illusion of his mother in the corner of the room is much more suited for someone as vile as he. It's the way he remembers her, eyes gouged, tongue cut so she'd stop screaming, though the garbled gurgle that replaced it was so much worse. She reaches for him, and she's saying something unintelligible but Toji knows it's his name, not in a plea, but in a curse. He remembers when they finally cut her throat and put her out of her misery. He wishes he could do that now.

"Fushiguro-san."

A cool palm touches his cheek, brushing aside a bead of sweat dripping down his chin. It jolts him out of his reverie. Yuna's large, dark eyes come in focus, and her face blocks his mother from view.

"Perhaps you can keep me company, so I don't fall asleep while I work," she says gently, even though her eyes are wide awake. "Tell me what happened."

Toji clears his throat. He is not used to being pitied.

"It was nothing. Just a fight."

Yuna hums as she resumes her position on the ground. "Must have been someone skilled, to land a blow on you."

"You nearly killed me, what are you saying about yourself?"

The corner of her mouth pulls upward. "Why, I must be the most skilled of them all."

He snorts, and Yuna briefly looks pleased that she has distracted him.

"Was it a Bounty Hunter?"

"Nah, nothin' to do with you. Zen'in business."

She glances up at him. "They found you?"

"I met with them."

"Why would you do that?"

"Sometimes I do it just to fuck with them. It's funny."

She looks pointedly at the dagger she is now wrapping with a second layer of talismans. "We are all laughing very hard, Fushiguro-san."

"You should see the other guy."

"Who was the other guy?"

Toji grins, even though he knows everything about the encounter was a giant mistake. Zen'in Naoya is the slimiest of snakes who unfortunately is fucking talented too—his control of his Projection Sorcery had jumped in leaps in bounds since the last time they'd fought. Toji had underestimated Naoya's speed, which had allowed Naoya to stab him with the stupid weapon used to torture Toji all throughout his childhood. Naoya was always one for dramatic flairs.

"Dumb cousin. Got him good in the face a couple times," Toji cackles. "He hates getting hit in the face. He thinks he's pretty."

"Was this Zen'in Naoya-san?"

"You don't need to honor him, he's a major dickwad."

"Has he been probing about your son, and that's why you went to beat him up?"

"I dunno. He did mention something like that."

"Your son is safe, Fushiguro-san. You don't need to put yourself at risk to send your family a message."

"You sound worried about me."

She removes a small needle from her purse and pricks her fingertip deeply. As she draws on the blank washi papers in blood, she says,

"You are an investment, Fushiguro-san. I'm allowed to be worried, especially when I find you to have such a profound lack of self-preservation."

"You're the one wandering into a single man's home in the dead of the night."

"A single man who has assured me he has no interest in me and my supposed youth." Yuna's tone is dry and flat.

Toji grimaces, hating himself more than normal, but he does not reply, lest he say something idiotic out of delirium. Yuna does not push him, concentrating and muttering spells under her breath, until she finishes writing on all the seals and wraps her palm around the dagger's hilt. The pressure in his abdomen suddenly increases—the Tool knows it's about to be released. The edges of Toji's vision blur. In between blinks, he is transported from his apartment to the dark cell he'd spend days on end as a child, surrounded by horrible images of mutilated bodies and corpses, waiting for this weapon to finally declare him useless and force him to go fully mad. White-hot pain sears through him. He closes his eyes, then remembers that's a bad idea, so then forces them open and is drawn back to the corner of the room, where his mother's body is now writhing like a decapitated chicken.

"Stay with me, Fushiguro-san," says Yuna's muffled voice, like he's underwater. His forehead is leaning against something bony and uncomfortable. It takes some time for him to realize that he's run from the hallucination by burying his nose in Yuna's neck. "Do you want a drink before I remove the blade? It will hurt."

"Nah," he rasps. "Shit doesn't work on me. Drugs don't either."

"Have you considered being a monk? It would be a simple path for you."

He can't believe she can still joke in this situation. He laughs into her skin. "Can't. I love fucking too much."

He hears her swallow. "I see."

He feels something flare under Yuna's arms and knows it's her Cursed Energy flowing into the dagger. He braces himself for the final rebound—when he was a child, the rebound alone would bring him to tears and knock him out for a week, though he expects he'll handle it better now.

Without any additional warning, Yuna pulls out the blade. Pain ripples up his abdomen, but it is not accompanied by an influx of awful memories. It feels as simple as pulling a normal blade out of him, no curses involved.

The constant pain licking under his skin dissipates, and when he finally raises his head, the image of his mother is gone. Yuna watches him, then turns to the corner of the room, as if confirming indeed that she could never see anything there all along, before turning back to him. Her hands press gauze tightly over his wound, but Nightmare's Whim, which now sits on a bed of seals next to her, is satiated by her Cursed Energy, not his blood.

"Better?"

Toji nods. Yuna looks relieved.

"I'm just going to hold pressure for a bit. You can relax. You're not…" She thinks about her words. "You're not seeing whatever you were seeing earlier anymore, right?"

He shakes his head, suddenly exhausted by the realization that his family had purposely made him experience the rebound of the Tool over and over again. He'd always thought it was a given, would've accepted the punishment as naturally as drinking water, but Yuna had just proven how simple it was to prevent it from happening. Though he's known it all his life, Toji is hit once again with just how eagerly his family wishes for his suffering.

"Fucking pieces of shit," he mutters.

Yuna's fingers tighten in the bandage. "This Tool is quite ineffective against Curses, isn't it?"

She can put the pieces together herself, what a worthless Tool this is against Curses, but perfect against monkeys, most perfect against Toji.

"Fushiguro-san, you can sleep. I brought some anesthetic and can finish stitching you up without you feeling much."

"You don't need to. The Tool cauterizes the wound on insertion. It doesn't want the person it hits to bleed out."

Yuna removes her gauze, which is barely stained with blood, confirming what Toji said.

"You know a lot about this weapon." She knows it's not the first time he's been hit by it.

She begins to pack up her things, first the roll of gauze after snipping off the contaminated end, then her seals, then finally the weapon itself. She holds it in her palm as her eyes keep flickering to the corner of the room, as if daring whatever Toji alone saw there to return.

"I'm sorry it took me so long to get here," she says for no reason. If Toji were a decent person, he'd be thanking her, and she wouldn't be apologizing. "Do you want me to leave the Cursed Tool with you?"

"Why the fuck would I want it?"

Yuna ignores his hostility. "So it can't be used against you again."

Toji just stares at her. He doesn't deserve this. Her.

He wants to fuck her.

"If not, I can take it back to the School and seal it permanently. It is pointless for exorcisms after all." She interprets his silence as assent and places the dagger carefully in her bag. "Very well."

She stands up and straightens out her skirt. She bends slightly and presses her lips to his cheek.

"I'm glad you texted, Fushiguro-san. Get some sleep."

Fucking minx.

Something about his expression makes her pause, and she steps back the limited amount his coffee table allows.

"Sorry. Yuki-san just…sometimes does that as a greeting. I—"

"If you're gonna kiss, do it properly."

Yuna's eyes widen very slightly. Toji does not make a move. This is a test, he tells himself, there's no way Yuna will actually do it and there's no way Toji will initiate. She will chicken out, he will mock her for it, teasing her for something she can't handle and doesn't really want—

Yuna leans back down and this time presses her lips to his. It's chaste, like she's kissing a statue, like she's afraid of retaliation. Her hair brushes his face. He inhales her perfume. He peeks down her blouse and sees she's not wearing a bra. Her breasts are round and modest but her nipples are perfectly brown and peaked. Fuck.

When Yuna pulls back this time, her cheeks match her nail color.

"Better?"

Fuck it.

He pulls her into his lap. Her bags thud when they hit the ground. Toji grabs her neck and kisses her properly, open-mouthed and heated, none of that shy schoolgirl bullshit—he likes to kiss with tongue and teeth, likes to kiss like he likes to fuck, knows how to make it the perfect amount of painful to bleed into overwhelming pleasure. His tongue enters her mouth and Yuna yields like a fucking natural, her arms grasp for his shoulders and her breasts press against his chest, and he can feel her hummingbird heart and he pulls her even closer because he wants to make it burst. He wants to feel her everywhere, wants his hands on her ass and his cock buried down her throat and in her wet heat, wants to debase and ruin this thing he should never have been allowed to touch.

Toji breaks the kiss and a string of saliva bridges their mouths. Yuna's face is fully flushed now, her pupils blown, her chest heaving. She looks thoroughly debauched, even though all they've done is kiss.

He flecks the spit off her lips.

"Consent." His voice comes out like gravel.

"What?"

"I'm gonna fuck you, hummingbird. I'm going to do what that husband of yours never did." Toji undoes the first two buttons of her blouse so his hand can slip over her left tit, and he palms it. Yuna arches into his touch with a soft gasp, her eyes never leaving his. "I'm gonna make you come, again and again. I'm a good fuck, hummingbird. Satisfaction guaranteed. But parts are gonna hurt, and because we swore that binding vow, I gotta be careful." He rolls her nipple in between his thumb and index finger and Yuna bucks toward him. "So, consent."

She looks like she can't make coherent words. He kisses her again, and this time she kisses him back for real, her hands burying themselves in his gritty, sweaty hair. Fast learner.

"Now or never, hummingbird. Time to back out now if you don't want it."

"You'll stop," she breathes as he finishes undoing her blouse, "if I tell you to?"

"Yeah." He hasn't prayed in years, but prays desperately now that she won't.

"I consent to this," she says, like it's the start of a training session, "even if it hurts."

There's a glint in her eyes that reminds Toji of the time she'd stabbed him in the heart. What had she said? I'll see you in hell, Fushiguro-san.

He's definitely going to hell, he's known that for a long time. He doesn't know why she thinks she's going to be there too, not when she looks like this and acts like a fucking saint baptized in moonlight, but he doesn't complain. He can regret it later.

He doesn't.