Author's Note: Please note that while the Shibuya incident is canon to the "first timeline" for this fic, everything immediately after Shibuya is not. I follow the English manga release in the graphic novel format, and it hadn't gotten that far at the time this was written.
Yuji Itadori
March 2019
Grand Cinema Sunshine, Ikebukuro, Tokyo
Yuji had lost track of how many people were gone. The months since Shibuya had all been foggy. The Jujutsu world had been in disarray since Gojo's disappearance in the prison realm. Despite that feeling that everything should have stopped when Gojo was captured, there wasn't time to stop.
No matter how many people Yuji saw die, or how often he wondered why he was still here, in the end, there was only one thing Yuji could tell himself. No matter what, Yuji had to keep going. He had to be normal. Positive. Okay.
It had been easier when that list of the dead was as short as his grandfather's name. Every day, there was another person on the list, another friend gone.
'Be normal,' Yuji repeated, a mantra in his head, 'Keep going. They'll be mad if you mope around.'
As far as Yuji knew, no one was trying to kill him that day, so Yuji had asked an old friend to hang out. His old classmate, Ozawa, had been happy to meet up with him.
First—with some persuasion on his part—Yuji and Ozawa snuck into a pachinko parlor. Then, they'd grabbed some grub at a diner. Now, they'd made it to the movies. As far as descriptions went, it was exactly the kind of day Yuji had been looking for.
A few bags of prizes rest under the seats. A bucket of popcorn was nestled between their arm rests. Spider man was moving across the screen, chasing villains through the animated streets of New York.
Yuji peeked across the popcorn, away from the screen, to Ozawa. What he expected was to see her watching the movie. Instead, she turned to him. When she caught his eye, her expression shifted from pleasantly happy to concerned.
Suddenly embarrassed, Yuji started to pull back in his seat. He could only hope his nervous laugh sounded like a regular one.
Despite his attempt to shrink away, Ozawa leaned towards Yuji. "Do you not like the movie…?"
"Yeah–" Yuji had started to answer, only to realize what he'd said. He pointed up towards the screen. "I mean, no, no, it's awesome."
"You're sure?," Ozawa whispered. "You look upset."
"No, it's really cool, I swear," Yuji forced his smile just a little bit wider, as if that would prove he meant it. "Do you like it?"
Ozawa bobbed her head. They both went quiet. They turned to the screen.
The colors from the projector cast over their faces in the dark room. Yuji reached his hand back down, to grab a handful from the popcorn bucket. Ozawa did, too. He felt their hands brush under the surface of the popcorn.
Just as Yuji was finally settled in his seat, a tingle burned beneath his right eye. A set of teeth forged out of nothing as a second mouth sprouted over his cheek to mock him. "Your friends deserved to die."
Yuji snapped his hand out of the bucket. The pull was so quick that it sent popcorn flying into his face. His palm smacked over his cheek to block Sukuna.
Ozawa turned in her seat, again, towards Yuji. Her hand, too, pulled away from the popcorn. She reached towards him. "Itadori–"
Yuji turned into the headrest, facing away from Ozawa.
"It's nothing…!" Yuji tried to insist. "I– ow–" The feeling of very sharp teeth sinking into his hand made him wince. Still, he kept his palm pressed over Sukuna's mouth.
The tingling feeling shifted. The dorsal side of Yuji's hand started to burn as a pair of lips began to form there, next.
Yuji stood up. The bags of prizes crumpled as he almost tripped over them. In the end, the only excuse he could come up with was "bathroom–"
When Yuji looked back, he saw Ozawa start to stand, too. "I'll come–"
"No! No, it's–" Yuji grabbed his right hand with his left, covering Sukuna's new mouth. Though he could muffle any physical sound, that didn't stop the words in his head.
"You brat, do you still not understand? All you've done is find new victims. If not for me, then for the curses you fight."
"You've gotta tell me what I miss, okay?" Yuji whispered between the taunts, more strained than before. "Be right back…!"
With that, Yuji ducked his head down. There was no time to think. The best he could do was run.
With Yuji's speed, it was barely a second for him to reach the exit. In that second, he had already felt the tingling shift. His game of whack-a-curse on his own face ended with a miss as Sukuna's voice sounded right beside Yuji's ear.
"When she dies, maybe this one can scream."
Yuji didn't answer. He just shoved his way into the hall.
The light of the theater lobby washed over his face. The faces of wandering theatergoers blurred together in a mass. Those normal, wandering people, having their normal lives, couldn't be Yuji's concern anymore. All he could do was avoid them in his sprint out.
The men's bathroom had been close enough so that he managed to make it without hitting anyone. Yuji let out a breath as he locked himself in a stall.
His reflection shone off the metal doors. The look on his face was one he would have rather not seen. Despite the fact they'd been nowhere near a battle, or anything truly strenuous at all, a layer of sweat had formed over his forehead. Sukuna's mouth had receded. Still, Yuji heard him cackle.
"I thought the girl had more spunk. I should know better. In the end, they're all pathetic, those jujutsu sorcerers."
"Shut up," Yuji mumbled to the reflection.
The laugh spiked in his head. "Why would I?"
Yuji's hand balled into a fist. He smashed the metal door. The force of his hand left an indent, distorting the reflection of his face into a crumpled smudge. He looked down at the toilet.
Well. He was in here. He might as well go.
With another breath, Yuji unbuckled his pants. He situated himself above the standing toilet. For all the other torment he'd been put through, at least even Sukuna had the decency to shut up when Yuji was taking a crap.
He was pulling his boxers back into place when he heard something on the other side. A faucet turned on. Another toilet flushed. At first listen, it was all just part of the stunning ambiance that was a public toilet. Between all the other sounds, Yuji almost didn't notice the last one.
A pointed whisper, not quite masculine or feminine, trickled between the pulses of water from the sink. "Emerge from the darkness, blacker than darkness. Purify that which is impure."
Yuji wasn't sure if Sukuna had spoken, or if Yuji had imagined it. He only heard the words in his head. "It's all your fault."
The sound of the water flowing started to slow. A flicker passed across the overhead lights, the whites and grays of the bathroom tinted with splotches of green, then a rich purple, so pure and deep that it was almost black. In the time it took for Yuji to process what he was seeing, the smallest curtain he had ever seen encircled the bathroom.
The fluorescent lights overhead struggled against the forced darkness. A strobe effect cast across the space. A few round spheres with wings that ended in talons crawled across the top of the stall, watching Yuji.
As soon as Yuji spotted one of the curses, it scurried to the other side of the wall. He could hear the metal of the adjacent stall start rattling. Not only were there curses, but they were hiding.
Yuji leaned against the stall door. Both eyes on the right side of his face stared through the crevice between the door and the wall, looking for something.
Before Yuji could process that there was a light charging towards him, a translucent blue glow pierced through that crevice, straight into his eye. The blue flashed across his vision as he flinched back. The burst of cursed energy had sunk into his eye.
Light spots started to form his eye. Still, sight or not, Yuji only saw one option. He shoved through the door.
"Hey!" Yuji tried to open his eyes in a squint. The blue light of the blast was still warping his sight. "I'm a sorcerer, too! Don't–"
Whatever it was Yuji expected to see between the blurry spots, it wasn't what was there.
A pair of scarlet martial arts slippers curled over the ledge of the sink. One foot tapped across the edge. He looked up.
The figure before Yuji stood tall in a long Tang suit, a deep scarlet with ivory trim. Long black hair, tied in a loop, draped over their right shoulder. Their eyebrows had a peculiar notch, one that made them look almost like how a child would draw a bird in the distance. On each side, the back of their hands bore a tattoo of an eye.
And none of that mattered, because from what Yuji could see, they were holding Ozawa by the neck, strangling her.
A flare of cursed energy balled in Yuji's hand. He leapt forward, first first, and jumped the distance from the floor to the counter to slug the stranger in the face. In the time it took to blink, Yuji's fist plunged into the surface of what should have been skin.
What should have been. It wasn't.
The blue spots in Yuji's eyes warped. The overhead lights flickered. A shower of glass burst out from the bathroom mirror, leaving fragments where his fist plunged through. Specs of drywall fluttered into the still running water in the spot where Yuji now stood, alone, with one foot on either side of the sink.
The other person wasn't there. Yuji couldn't see them or Ozawa in the shattered reflection. He clenched his fist and turned into the darkness.
"Ozawa!" Yuji shouted. Nothing answered.
The stream of running water spilled over the edge of the sink, dripping like a small waterfall. Yuji stepped off the edge of the counter, landing on the floor. Glass shards crunched under his feet.
"Ozawa!"
The metal hinge squeaked on a door. The sound came from the same stall Yuji had been in.
Yuji pivoted towards the noise. The lights flickered back on just in time to see both Ozawa and the stranger between the walls of an open stall. Ozawa's body lay limp in the stranger's arms. The tattoo on the back of the stranger's hand seemed to glow green from the glove of cursed energy surrounding it.
"You may want to spare the shouting," the stranger spoke. "It's kinder she's asleep."
Yuji didn't let them finish the thought. Instead, Yuji rushed them. He kicked low to hook his leg around the stranger's feet and knock them over from behind.
The momentum of Yuji's kick should have hit. Yuji never saw the stranger move. Yet, somehow, at the second when Yuji should have hit a leg, his kick kept going. Yuji's leg smashed into the tile. He caught his balance on the back of the toilet.
Yuji snapped his head from side to side, looking for the target. Again, he saw spots of blue in his eyes. He blinked past them and squinted towards the wreckage. Though he couldn't find a specific point to focus on, he shouted into the room anyway. "You're not going to hurt Ozawa!"
"I have no intention of hurting Ozawa-san," the stranger answered. "I have no intention to harm anyone who does not themselves cause harm."
As striking as those words could have been, it wasn't just the tone of voice Yuji picked up on. It was the direction. That sorcerer was on the other side of the wall.
On instinct, Yuji jumped. He grabbed the top of the wall on the stall he was on, angled himself, and vaulted to the other side. As soon as he'd crashed into the space, he aimed a kick in mid-air, angling his heel into the stranger's head. The tattooed sorcerer slipped aside. Their back pressed against the stall door.
It wasn't until Yuji landed that he spotted not just what he'd missed hitting, but what was missing completely. Ozawa wasn't in the stall.
Yuji's eyes sharpened to a glare. "Where's Ozawa?"
The curved eyebrows of the stranger's face lay flat, in flawless composure. "Perfectly safe, so long as you remain calm." The strange sorcerer's eyes slanted down so far that they nearly closed. Under this light, their eyes looked green, but a sickly reflection of the shade that made it clear that wasn't their true color. "Itadori Yuji. Vessel of Sukuna. I regret to inform you that the stay on your execution has been rescinded."
"My– what–" Yuji's words and his fury paused, if only out of confusion. "What does that have to do with Ozawa?"
"For Ozawa, it means nothing." The strange sorcerer in front of Yuji raised their hand. The same thin glove of cursed energy rippled across their fingers as their hand reached for his shoulder. "For you, Itadori, it means this is where you die."
"No." Yuji stepped back. His hands raised again, bracing to fight. "We're not done. I'm not done. We haven't gotten all the fingers. Sukuna can come back."
The other sorcerer stepped forward, matching Yuji's pace. "Your continued existence is a far greater threat than the remaining appendages, Itadori-san."
"No–" Yuji stuttered, scrambling to catch up with himself. "Fushiguro. Okkotsu. Everyone. They wouldn't agr–"
Whatever words Yuji meant to voice next turned to a wheeze. In the time Yuji spent trying to talk his way out, a knife pierced through his back.
Yuji's posture collapsed. His eyes snapped shut. There was no cursed energy in this wound. The impact made him stumble, nearly crashing to the floor.
The stranger's voice still sounded. Each word still rang with a chill of conviction. "The wills of stray children have no sway on me."
Only now, when Yuji's eyes were closed and the room had gone dark, could he see what had happened from the beginning. The cursed energy of this stranger wasn't standing near him at all. The stranger's energy was at the other side of the room, at a distance. Each time Yuji failed to land a blow, it was because he'd watched where to move instead of trying to sense it. That blue flash must have been a cursed technique.
The knife lay still in Yuji's back. There was still weight on it. A new, jabbing pain pressed in as the blade twisted. Someone's hand was at his back. The stranger had finally moved to stand behind Yuji.
And that meant, for the first time in this whole fight, Yuji knew where to aim.
As the knife twisted, Yuji twisted, too. His left leg hooked below, entwining himself around the stranger. His foot smashed into their ankle with as much force as he could muster, knocking them off balance.
The stranger's hand tightened around the knife, extracting it. The air hitting the open wound, and the blood that followed, was a different kind of pain. Yuji was bleeding. He didn't care.
While the stranger's hands were occupied, and more importantly, raised, Yuji had an open shot. He let himself start to fall, adjusting the angle he was standing at to a crouch. His other leg launched up while his hands pressed against the ground, giving Yuji just enough momentum to smash the stranger in the side of the chest.
That first hit could, and even should, have sent the stranger flying. Before that could happen, Yuji grabbed them with his other hand. He didn't open his eyes to punch. All he did was aim. Yuji's fist connected, and then, a fraction of a second later, his cursed energy did the same. The rip of a black flash's impact was enough to knock the stranger straight into the back wall.
Only after the hit had landed did Yuji feel the glass still embedded in his fist. He pressed his other hand over the top, brushing shards and debris from the back of his hand.
Even with his eyes closed, Yuji could see the light stop flickering. The curtain gave way, the unnatural but stable, fluorescent lights of the bathroom pushing through Yuji's eyelids. Something else was coming in.
A new burst of cursed energy reinforced Yuji's hands. He raised his fists and slid into a stance to parry. Whoever this new sorcerer running in was, Yuji wouldn't let them take him by surprise.
Except he was surprised. That burst of cursed energy didn't run at him at all. They sprinted straight past him to the other side.
"Yun!" It was a girl's voice. Not a woman, even. A girl.
Yuji opened his eyes.
The stranger in scarlet was sprawled across the floor. What state they were in was mostly obscured by the girl kneeling next to them. The new arrival had long, wildly curly brown pigtails, and bandages wrapping her legs. The coverings were spotted with blood. Not only was her back turned, she was trembling.
"Yun. Stay conscious. Yun," The girls' hand reached towards the crumpled figure of that other sorcerer, brushing their hair from their face with care. "I'm here, Yun. I'm right here. Please…"
Yuji raised a foot over the rubble. What little he could have seen of himself in the mirror was an obvious mess, but he was alive. No one was attacking him. This should have been over. It was over… except for the part where he could still hear the pleading on the other side of the bathroom.
A faint glow reflected in the mirror from the back of the room. The sorcerer who had attacked Yuji was writhing on the floor. They were trying to apply cursed energy to something. It looked like some attempt at a reverse curse technique. It wasn't working.
The sorcerer who had attacked Yuji bobbed their head through the strain. The girl shook hers, the wild curls of her hair scattering.
"No… no," she whimpered, wiping the side of their face with a gloved hand. "Grandfather will understand. The important thing is that you come home."
"Remember your duty, Riku. All clouds fade," the stranger–Yun–groaned, forcing the words despite their weakness. "All rain falls. We do as we are called."
"Then you're called to stay. You stay." The girl's voice cracked, growing weaker, softer. "Don't do this, Yun." She bowed into Yun's form, her hair draping across them. The brown of her curls stained red with Yun's blood.
There shouldn't have been a reason to feel guilty about this. Yuji had been the one attacked out of nowhere. He had every reason to leave.
Yuji stifled a groan of his own as he stopped at the door. Despite himself, he did exactly the thing he knew better than to do. He looked over his shoulder to the girl.
"Sorry."
The sound of Yuji's voice made Riku jolt upright. She pushed her hands against the floor, obviously startled. The same curse mark on Yun's hands was embedded on her forehead. Her silver eyes had reddened with tears.
Again. Someone was crying because of Yuji. Someone was dying because of him.
"He was going to hurt my friend," Yuji said. Whether he meant to convince Riku, or himself, he wasn't sure. "I can't die yet. When I do, I'm taking Sukuna with me. That's how I save people. So. I can't."
Riku had looked up towards Yuji, yet she didn't speak. All she did was stare in pain.
The body beside Riku continued to writhe. The last glow of Yun's trying to piece themselves together faded from their hand in favor of something else. They pushed a cube across the ground.
"Riku," they whispered. "Plan B."
With his head held low, and a new throb through the wound in his back, Yuji headed for the door. He wondered how he was supposed to explain this to Ozawa. If what that Yun person had made Yuji see was all a curse technique, then Ozawa was probably safe back in the theater.
Yuji's foot hit the border between the bathroom and the hall, where the curtain had once been. Just as he was going to step past it, he heard a voice. A voice he hadn't heard in a long time.
"Sheesh! Who knew a hellscape could be this boring?!"
There was no face, no blindfold, but Yuji knew who that voice was. He turned. "Gojo-sensei–?"
A part of Yuji expected to see the smiling face of his overconfident teacher right next to him. He wasn't. There was no other sign of Gojo.
What was in sight, instead, was the pigtailed brunette with blood stains in her hair. Riku was cradling a cursed cube in her gloved hand. The bare fingertip of her other hand brushed across the stitching on the side.
"That's… the thing Gojo-sensei's inside." Though Yuji didn't know the name, that didn't stop the flash of excitement from taking over his face. "Where did you get that? How–?"
Whatever the answer should have been, Yuji didn't get one. Instead, Riku looked down. She blinked the tears from her eyes, then set them firmly ahead.
"The back gate of the Prison Realm. If I ask, it will open for me."
"You– what–" Whatever pain Yuji was in was eclipsed by that sudden rush of surprise. "You can talk to it? Like it chats and stuff?"
"Not talk, no," Riku shook her head lightly, her eyes never leaving Yuji's as she did, "But I may disrupt its bindings to disable it."
"And…! And that'll let Gojo-sensei out, right? … But that cube thing was supposed to be locked without some cursed tool, or… something..."
"I'm a nullifier," though Riku's words were weighed with sadness, she sounded genuine. "My technique would break the seal."
"Wow!" Yuji exclaimed. "Wow, that would help so much! You've gotta do that—"
It was like seeing the answer to a question you didn't know you had. For months, the Jujutsu world had been in chaos. Most of that chaos could be connected to the disappearance of Satoru Gojo. The fact that chaos could end like this, between two bloodied sorcerers in a public men's toilet, didn't matter as long as it was true.
"Gojo-sama would be a great help to the community," Riku noted quietly, "To all non-sorcerers, as well."
"Yeah!" Yuji agreed, still in awe. "Obviously. So you should do it. I mean, even if you stole that box thing, no one's gonna care once he's back…!"
"Then you understand the value of this proposal?"
"Uh-huh," Yuji nodded. "Totally."
Yuji put a hand on Riku's shoulder. His thumb brushed bare skin on her neck. The cursed energy he'd been keeping ready at that hand extinguished at the touch. He closed his eyes. The feeling didn't change. This, unlike that fight, seemed real.
"Whoa–" Yuji took his hand back towards himself, and watched the inverse happen. His cursed energy welled right back up again, steady as ever. The blue glow of his energy bounced off the silver of her eyes.
Riku's bare hand extended, the way someone might offer a shake. "Then I offer a trade, Itadori-san. The life of the Sukuna vessel for the release of Satoru Gojo-sama."
And just like that, as quickly as the cursed energy had turned off at her touch, Yuji's excitement vanished, too.
"But," Yuji stepped back. He pointed to himself. " I'm the Sukuna vessel."
Riku nodded.
"You…" Yuji's face went blank. "You still want me to die?"
