Work Text:
“How did you get in here.”
“Uh,” Itadori, intelligent as ever, finally says something when no one else does. “Your window’s open.”
Gojo stares at him as if he isn’t physically blinded. “I live on the third floor.”
“Someone like you shouldn’t be speaking like there’s something unnatural here,” Kugisaki grumbles from somewhere.
However, the moment her voice oozes into nonsensical letters, Gojo’s grip on his doorknob slips, and at this, he staggers, knees buckling as his body decides to reject its own bone structure.
He flops onto the floor with the delicacy of a TI-84 CE calculator.
It takes Gojo a moment to realise that the whining in the background doesn’t sound like any three of his students, rather, some internal ringing of his discombobulated equilibrium.
Huh.
He doesn’t even know if that’s bad or good, because for someone like Gojo, any experiences categorised underneath either label are definitely ones located in the extreme.
Given how he’s not bleeding out of anywhere, his heartbeat isn’t stuttering another pulse every two minutes, and that he’s pretty sure he isn't cursed, he supposes this is one of those ‘good’ days (and there are very few experiences that Gojo would call ‘bad’. One being when his head was obliterated because of a certain asshole and the other being “at least curse me a little at the very e-).
Then again, good ranged from when nobody died, or when one of them did die but the casualties were low in relation to the problem at hand.
“Uh. Gojo-san.” Kugisaki asks from nearby, and surprisingly, he can’t locate her presence. Is she hovering over him? And he sees everything, his gaze invading every corner of the earth, even into the unconscious (and it’s like his skin and the world around him is nothing more than cellophane and filtered colours. Without his eyes he’d be invisible- not bad, he supposes).
Even if he wanted to stop seeing (wanted to close his eyes), his vision absorbs every stimulus, every frame he’s forced to witness.
At that rather morbidly amusing thought, he wants to laugh, feeling a bit incredulous, a bit unreal.
“Yes?” He acknowledges sloppily after realising there’s this bout of unwarranted silence amongst his students.
“What are you doing?”
“Dying,” he blurts without forethought.
And now, the background noise isn’t in his head, since it’s not one constant ring, rather, the noise had poorly mitosised into three disjointed and unharmonious voices. Itadori’s voice is especially arrhythmic: a thunderous, waxy purple.
“Gojo-san, you can’t die.” Megumi’s voice comes, words distinct in the midst of scribbles. He sounds rather unimpressed from above, his voice swirling in mellow yellows that pinch Gojo’s neurons, makes his fingers twitch like he wants to make a grab for them.
“Awe, is that concern?” He teases slyly. His students are funny. ‘Specially Megumi! What an interesting boy, an interesting demeanor, humans are so individualised and the funnest part of life- and when is Yuta coming back-
“No. That was a fact.” If possible, Megumi sounds even more disgusted by this scenario.
Cute. And maybe he really is dying, because he suddenly channels his inner Shoko, with the thought that he’s going to crochet Megumi’s vocal cords into a scarf to strangle him with.
Or himself. Maybe it’d stop the voices.
“Um. Gojo-san, the floor is dirty,” Kugisaki informs rather helpfully.
“Gojo-san, you’re. You’re sweating. Like. I can see where your eyes are supposed to be because of the wet patches on your sleeping mask,” Itadori observes, sounding rather amused.
And at that moment, Gojo makes the executive decision to make a sweater out of Itadori, too.
However, he doesn’t know why he’s sweating. For the most part, even during fights, he doesn’t feel a suffocating sense of heat engulfing his intestines, broiling his bloodstream. Everything’s always felt cold, ranging from his empathy to his anger.
He closes his eyes underneath the damp cloth as if that does anything, and suddenly, the dizziness intensifies, and he feels like the temperature will scramble the proteins of his eyes.
Scrambled eyes. Scrambled eggs.
An off-kilter giggle bubbles from his unconsciously parted lips. Gojo clicks his tongue, the lack of moisture dulling the snap. He begins to waver onto his feet, oblivious to how Kugisaki had stopped strangling Itadori and Itadori had stopped being strangled, both still in their positions of Kugisaki clutching his collar, yet their bulged eyes are now fixed on their stumbling teacher.
He’ll deal with them after.
He lazily slouches over to his own couch out of muscle memory, something rattling his sense of balance, tipping the environments’ sounds out of his ears in drips of lavender and cloudy blues- shades too foggy for him to read.
“Gojo-san...” and that’s his sweet student! Megumi’s voice, dripping like acid and feeding into the weird throb pulsating the back of his brain.
Maybe he’s been cursed.
But he’s also Gojo, so that’s already not even an option.
God, he should’ve just cursed Suguru. He’s always been selfish, anyways, and Getou used to go along with his every whim (did he ever stop? No. He's pretty sure the other day Getou even let him drag him to the outskirts of town to visit a farmer's market even though they were supposed to report straight back-).
Absent-mindedly (and everything feels absent-minded these days, out-of-grasp and faint, and he wonders when’s the last time he cradled a memory in his hands and thought they held substance, that they held a component of him-), he thinks with a touch of hysteria, that Megumi almost sounds concerned.
Really, it’s really cute. People are always concerned, as if Gojo ever cared.
Except he thinks he can’t even spit right now, much less throw Megumi’s words back at him.
“Gojo-san. How did you not sense us here in the first place?” Megumi’s stern, almost scolding voice ricochets a bit in the rotten cavity of Gojo’s skull, before Gojo’s uncooperative neurons finally get enough of their shit together to procure a spark that can register what he’s even saying. “Gojo-san?”
“Geez. Getou, always mothering me,” Gojo abruptly gripes, scowling. “If you’re going to…” his train of thought speeds away, the engine’s clouds of exhaustion dissipating alongside his lack of energy. “Go away,” he finally gripes, knowing that Suguru’s main line of defense against Gojo’s bullshit in the first place is completely erasing him from his existence.
And before Suguru can get on his crappy attitude (and he kind of wishes he does. He doesn’t know why- he suddenly feels nostalgic for such a common, daily, thing), he buries his face into the pillow of the couch, his mind winking out in its own haze of Nevada blue and desert skies.
Kugisaki stares. “Who the fuck is a Getou?” She makes a face.
“I want to go home,” Fushiguro deadpans.
“NO GOJO-SAN!” Itadori squawks, because not only is it seriously concerning that it’s Gojo-san who just collapsed onto the floor and then on his couch, but he’s also worried because he didn’t sound okay . “Guys we have to-” he pauses, glancing down to see Kugisaki prodding Gojo in the shin.
“He’s not moving.” Kugisaki muses casually, and Itadori nearly piggybacks her to get her away from the body. Then, “oh is he dead?” She says, sounding mildly startled, as if this thought has never procured to her.
“God I hope.” Says a forgotten third-party.
Itadori claps a hand over his cheek.
“Can you tell him to go away?” Fushiguro scowls.
“You think I want to be in the center of teenage drama?” Sukuna drawls, and Itadori shudders at the feeling of his skin peeling apart, sensing an intrusive organ hollow out the other side of his cheek. “You’d think I’d be free of babysitting duty, but no, I’m here thirdwheeling this kid everywhere he goes. You think I want to be here-”
“If I put a fork in his mouth, do you think he could eat it?” Kugisaki suddenly asks. “Where does it go?” She questions, her curiosity earnest and eyes murderous.
Sukuna falls quiet.
Itadori feels the ravine in his skin stitch back up real quick.
He turns to Kugisaki, who appears mildly disappointed her test subject has retreated, and he grasps her shoulders, ignoring the way she reflexively recoils, face screwing up. “Don’t ever go anywhere again,” he gasps, and she scowls, shaking herself free.
“Should we call Shoko-san?” Fushiguro asks, drawing their attention back to the problem at hand, and recalling the severity of this situation, the concern and awkward and familiar sensation of fear sloshes in his stomach.
He feels sick.
“I didn’t know Gojo-san could just. Be injured.” Kugisaki ponders, almost fascinated by this turn of events.
Then again, who wouldn’t? Gojo kind of just. Rejected. The laws of physics, so why not life and death? Itadori’s pretty sure the only person of authority Gojo follows is himself, and to him, laws are simply guidelines around society, a society that he already sees himself as above. He gapes, that line of thought successfully distracting him from the rest of the panicking miniature counsel of Itadoris in his head. “Whoa, I just realised something,” he announces redundantly.
“What?” Fushiguro inquires dryly.
“Gojo-san’s kind of an asshole.” He says admirably.
Oh. I bet he’s sick.” Kugisaki concludes, snapping her fingers.
“What?” Itadori snorts, smothering a choked laugh of mild hysteria.
“Gojo-san can’t even die on command, and you think he gets sick?” Fushiguro challenges uneasily.
“Gojo-san, you can’t die yet,” Kugisaki presses. “We didn’t even get to go to harajaku yet.”
“As if Gojo-san can die,” Fushiguro replies disdainfully.
Kugisaki fixes him with a dead gaze. “Sound less disappointed, won’t you?”
He has the power of a cartoon villain and what? Gets headshot by a fever out of everything? Echoes a voice in the back of Itadori’s mind. However, Itadori, having mastered the art of winking out any coherent braincell he could possibly have, has no trouble of completely emptying out any remnants of Sukuna’s complaints.
“He can’t die, he’s Gojo-san,” Itadori reiterates Fushiguro's words (and when has Fushiguro ever led him wrong?). Though, unease pinches his spine and twists his stomach. "Yeah. Gojo-san dying is like. Maki being nice."
“Duh. He’s breathing, Stupid, keep up,” Kugisaki snorts, lightly kicking Gojo’s dangling leg with a socked foot. "If it's just being sick, he'll probably be fine," she reassures dryly.
Suddenly, a particularly large hack from the pathetic bundle on the couch startles Itadori, and he nearly staggers into Fushiguro who catches him, before dropping him and letting him fall to the floor. Itadori however, is simply relieved even if his tailbone isn't.
“He’s not dead!” Itadori states the obvious, the painful grip on his lungs laxing. He jerks upright on the hard floor. “Maybe he really is sick. He didn’t sense us when we came into his apartment, didn’t even notice us, and I think we can all agree that we just saw him open the door and nearly collapse on his kitchen floor! Oh my god, he must be dying right?” And maybe Kugisaki, despite being kind of a nutjob at times, is onto something. Because he’s Gojo-san . “Dude. What if he’s like.” He doesn’t really know what would even be an appropriate word for someone like Gojo Satoru. “Dude.” he finally repeats, with more emphasis to convey what he’s trying to say.
“I thought that was just Gojo-san being Gojo-san.” Kugisaki shrugs flippantly. And fair enough, being the most powerful shaman typically means you can do whatever you want.
Itadori guesses Gojo is kinda cool, in that sense.
But he doesn’t know if being practically lawless is an unchallenged and unspoken benefit to being powerful, or if that’s only applicable to someone with a personality like Gojo.
He thinks about it some more, and has a sudden and dramatic anime flashback to every single head injury and Gojo-initiated activity that had seriously challenged Itadori’s mental stability and resolve against sudden homicidal urges for Gojo-san himself.
So. Upon that conclusion, Itadori pulls out Newton’s Fourth and Fifth theories.
- Thinking was mankind’s mistake, Itadori is never doing it again.
- Individualised anarchy is only applicable to someone specifically like Gojo-san.
“I mean. Almost anything is in the realm of possibility when it comes to Gojo-san,” Itadori points out. “Why not something as common as a cold?”
“But why would Gojo-san even have a cold?” Fushiguro mumbles to no one in particular.
“Yeah, I thought idiots don’t catch colds,” Kugisaki agrees contemplatively.
His two friends look at her.
“What?” She snaps, eyes drawn into a tight glare at their expressions.
Fushiguro and Itadori quickly look away.
“I mean. Let’s just check, right? Like. A thermometer. Does...does he have a thermometer?” Fushiguro suggests.
“I mean. He has nothing,” Itadori comments rather dryly. For such a wild person whose political compass hits all the extremes ranging from ‘evil’ to ‘objectively moral with an undertone of psychopathy,’ his apartment is rather boring. Everything’s spacious and unpersonable. But rather than appearing chic or minimalistic as IKEA articles would tell them, it just feels-
Well, empty.
Then again, Itadori guesses Gojo-san doesn’t feel the need to decorate it- he’s probably never at home anyways due to his profession. He doesn’t look like the type to have guests over, either, as Itadori’s at least 98% sure that Gojo would rather break into someone’s building if he feels the need to bother them.
However, this time they did the breaking in.
They came here in the first place to find Gojo, running out on high-alert, because Nanami asked for him. Apparently, Gojo-san, for reasons that only god knows (so read: only Gojo-san), decided to peel twenty-eight sticks of string cheese and leave them lying around in Nanami’s office.
All three of them would rather take on the world’s arguably most powerful shaman than an overworked Nanami.
Itadori looks at the man splayed out on the couch, whose current status of mortality will be TBD. Rather disgruntledly and fascinatingly, Itadori's realises that for such an all-knowing guy, Gojo-san’s extremely oblivious to the fact that his existence itself is the common denominator for every stressful event that has left blunt-force trauma onto all of his students’ emotional wellbeing.
Packing up that thought because Itadori likes to dwell on happy things, he turns to the fact that they at least successfully found Gojo-san, and therefore Nanami won’t skin them alive with his office desk pencil sharpener.
“Gojo-san probably never needed a thermometer before, there’s no way he’ll have one.” Kugasaki reasons. “I’ll call Maki, she can probably get in contact with someone who can help back at the school."
"You know, I thought Gojo-san lived at school with us," Itadori adds. "I didn't know he had...his own place."
Fushiguro opens his mouth, hesitating. "He had this place when I was younger. Because he didn't want me to stay at the school, so he rented this place for me and my sister." And at that confession, Itadori's reminded with the disconcerting fact that he really doesn't know anything about Fushiguro. "I think he stays here when he's avoiding Nanami, now."
At that admission, Itadori pivots on his heel, looking around once more. “I see. It’s so...dry. There’s nothing here. Thought that his room would be covered in paint splatters. Or like. I don’t know. Wrappers.” He mumbles. Or at least something, if children were once living here. Then again, they probably haven't been living here in years.
“Well. If Gojo-san’s physically blinded, it’s probably easier to walk without things around,” Fushiguro comments, before pausing. “Not like the clutter would matter to him.”
Itadori nods slowly. Gojo-san seems just as capable of flinging himself around in cramped and mobile areas either way. But what does he know?
Whatever.
He peers through another doorframe. A kitchen.
Curiously and guiltily, he begins to root through the area. Does Gojo-san even cook?
He pauses at that thought. If anything, Itadori’s pretty sure he’s only ever seen Gojo-san eat candy, rather than real food.
But he has a kitchen .
He opens the fridge.
A kitchen whose fridge holds only eight, half-guzzled Monster cans and one plate of a whole-ass roasted Rotisserie chicken.
He shuts the door, realising he’s probably stumbled upon the dark secret as to why Gojo-san’s personality is as eccentric as it is.
Boredly, he begins to open and close the cabinets, feeling mildly bad as he’s technically touching stuff that’s not his.
One spoon, one fork, one pair of chopsticks. A tube of dried glue. Western candy that he doesn’t recognise. A picture of him and a bunch of other adults, some that Itadori even recognises himself, such as Nanami and Yaga. Granules of rice. A pair of reading glasses (Itodari squinted at that, before slowly sliding the drawer shut). Another picture, smaller like a Polaroid, of Gojo and just one guy this time- he was in the previous picture, too, his black bangs and bun being distinctive, even if Itadori didn’t focus on him as much as he did on seeing a younger version of Nanami. Itadori frowns. He looks...eerily familiar, but he doesn’t dwell on it. He takes another look at the picture, and huffs out a smile. Nice glasses, Gojo-san. A crumpled but clean napkin. A meat thermometer.
His hand pauses on this drawer handle.
“Yeah, I’m not joking he’s actually sick- well, maybe -”
Fushiguro buzzes out Kugisaki’s argument with a disbelieving Maki, opting to glance at his teacher. And he’s still. Even with someone hovering over his body scrunched against the couch. Gojo-san so-
Quiet. Sure he’s sweating and there’s an unusual heat of red creeping out from underneath his sleeping mask, but he’s so still.
He frowns at this.
If he’s sweating, he’s probably overheating. At this, he begins to unzip his outer sports jacket, grimacing at the way his sleeves catch onto Gojo-san’s skin that’s clammy to the touch.
“Yeah, no, he collapsed. And then said he was ‘dying’ out of everything like?” Kugisaki groans. He hears a verbalised noise of confusion.
“Oi Fushiguro!” A heavy weight bounds onto his back, and Fushiguro automatically decides to cut off his shoulder the next time he leaves the house. “Look, I found a thermometer!”
Folding Gojo-san’s jacket, he looks over, and freezes.
“What the fuck.”
“It’s like those you know! Those things you stick into chickens when they’re cooking!”
“And where do you suggest we stick that in a human? ”
Itadori recoils. “Dunno. His mouth.” He pauses, eyes rolling up as if seriously musing this. He shrugs. “His butt.”
Fushiguro stares.
“Don’t make this weirder than it has to be.” Itadori recommends.
“It was weird from the start since you brought a thermometer longer than my neck.”
“Shut up! Fushiguro,” Itadori whines, and begins to coil his arms around him, and Fushiguro begins to mildly ponder the consequences throwing Itadori down onto the floor right now. “Why do you always hesitate with my decisions?” He groans into his shoulder.
“Because they’re stupid.” He replies instantly, ignoring the way that Itadori releases an utterly inhuman shriek due to his inability to conjure a single appropriate response fit for common societal interaction. “You know what, go for it.”
Itadori stares at him, lips thinning. “Stick it up his ass?” He says hesitantly.
“Wha- no . Just. Put it in his mouth.”
“Won’t it stab him? It’s so long.” Itadori asks, stroking the sharp, tapered tip of the thermometer.
“If you do he deserves it,” Fushiguro says quickly and remorselessly. Itadori makes a face of judgment, when Fushiguro thinks out of everyone on this earth, Itadori is the last one who should be allowed to.
“You’re really mean to your own teacher. And he calls you his precious student,” Itadori gripes.
“He’s just a benefactor who wouldn’t have cared if I died at the beginning,” he says truthfully. Though, by now he’s cultivated too far for Gojo-san to abandon him, and if anything, he’s pretty sure that Gojo-san is fond of his presence to some emotional extent.
Like a pet.
He thinks about each time Gojo called him cute and attempted to scruff him on the head.
A pet.
At the realisation that for the past decade, he’s been treated like a charity-case pet by someone as insufferably dense as Gojo-san , his blood pressure rises so fast that his vision starts blinking out with white lights.
“A benefactor,” he weakly echoes, disregarding the way his grip on Gojo-san’s jacket tightens to the point where he begins stretching out the material.
“A benefactor?” Itadori echoes curiously.
Well, there’s something too stiff in the term ‘benefactor’ to correctly define them.
But Fushiguro also doesn’t know what to call their relationship by this point, and quite frankly, whatever this is, that entails him waking up in his room at midnight and finding Gojo-san sitting in the corner, staring at him unblinkingly with absolutely nothing in his eyes, Fushiguro honestly doesn’t want to acknowledge it.
“...like a person who offers mone-” Fushiguro begins, giving up on trying to worm the jacket out from under Gojo-san.
“I know what a benefactor is!” Itadori grunts, rumpling his sleeve even more by shoving his face even farther into his jacket.
Fushiguro exhales longingly for the sweet release of death.
“I forgot you understood words that have more than three syllables.”
Itadori stares at him. “You were so nice to me when we first met.” He says solemnly.
“When we first met, you didn’t wake me up in the middle of the day to ask me to help you unclog the toilets every other hour.” He says, as if his belief that Itadori died that one time hadn't catalysed something aloof within him (and he's not dead anymore, but thinking the boy died, the boy he's responsible for because his own recklessness resulted in Itadori's impeding execution and involvement in the jujutsu world, had fundamentally corrupted something in him. The boy had died because Fushiguro wasn't strong enough to keep him out of their reality, and Fushiguro doesn't know how to close the distance between them knowing that was his fault).
“It’s not my fault they always clogged! Why doesn’t the school actually renovate the pipes and the water pressure? Besides, you’re the only one who’d be kind enough to help me without destroying the toilets themselves!” However, being Itadori, he pinballs off that topic without giving Fushiguro a chance to reply, as he’s already distracted from his indignation, “a benefactor? You guys go way back?” We’re still on this topic?
“You can say something like that.” Fushiguro finally decides, rather than telling him that Gojo-san basically illegally adopted him as a generous label for the act of ‘child kidnapping,’ because his own dad was a neglectful lunatic and probably would’ve fed him crayons as a kid.
Then again, a neglectful lunatic is probably better than a clingy one.
Not for the first time, Fushiguro inwardly curses his father. Because his father not only abandoned his mother and sister, but he basically abandoned them to someone like Gojo Satoru. Sure, Tsumiki finds him enjoyable and his step-mom finds him attractive (it’s weird, it’s weird and he rejects any other standpoint-), but Tsumiki likes everyone that’s seemingly nice.
“Huh. So. Gojo-san gave you money?” Itadori asks as he pats the said teacher on the jaw (and Fushiguro doesn’t know how to feel when he sees his teacher/really bad useless-uncle figure limply bat away his hand, mouthing something nonsensical). Itadori begins to slip the end of the thermometer between Gojo-san’s laxed mouth.
“Yeah. Like a place to live.” Fushiguro replies curtly, wondering if this conversation’s going to end. He’s also supporting a portion of Tsumiki’s hospital bills.
Itadori doesn’t reply for a second.
And maybe Itadori’s uncharacteristic silence is a sign of his first shred of social intelligence that must’ve been gifted to him out of pity from whatever questionably hungover god has realised how much they screwed up Itadori Yuuji’s life.
“Oh so he’s kind of like your sugar daddy?”
All of Fushiguro Megumi’s cognitive processing facilities combust on fire.
It takes him all of his self-restraint to convince his brain neurons to not commit apoptosis right then and there as a desperate act of forgetting.
He looks at Itadori’s blankly innocent expression, and something about his genuine countenance tames his flared indignation.
“You know. Out of everyone, I didn't think Gojo would be a good parental figure at all? Or sugar daddy? Because he's more like the child if anything-” Itadori continues with characteristic shamelessness.
And who cares if he’s being genuine? He’s going to square u-
Fushiguro exhales. Whatever. He’s literally Gojo-san’s own clean-up crew whenever it comes to any social situation- Itadori’s nothing in comparison.
“Itadori. If you ever say such a thing again-” Itadori flinches, and Fushiguro sees exactly when some primal fight or flight mechanism triggers, except Itadori doesn’t have a flight or fight measure, just fight or fight, and Itadori instantly drops into an offensive stance at Fushiguro’s challenging tone. “Do not ever say that again, do not think that again, and if I look into your hollow eyes with absolutely No Thoughts behind them and I even have the suspicion you are thinking such a thing again-”
“Hey guys- why are you guys trying to kill Gojo-san in his sleep.” Kugisaki yanks Itadori’s wrist slightly upwards. “Are you stupid what is this? A- isn’t this for cooking meat-”
“We don’t have a normal thermometer!” Itadori squawks, as always, easily riled up by Kugisaki. “Also I’d never kill Gojo-san!” And he’s technically right on both counts. If anything, Fushiguro’s willing to bet that he and Kugisaki would be cheerleaders at Gojo’s funeral.
“I actually don’t think he’s asleep, so really, Itadori would be killing him while he’s awake.” Fushiguro counters informatively, and Kugisaki just looks at him in disdain. “Also, do these things actually work on humans?”
“I mean. They’re meat thermometers, right?” Kugasaki begins uneasily. “And like. I mean. We’re made out of meat?”
“So by transitive property you’re saying this should work on our bodies perfectly fine?” Fushiguro says doubtfully. “We can always Google it.”
And Kugasaki is already tapping away on her phone.
“Because if this is accurate, it says he’s fifty degrees celsius. Is that bad?” Itadori asks.
“I mean. No. Humans usually die once you hit like forty-two degrees.” Fushiguro reasons, and he sees Itadori jerk so hard that he nearly holepunches the back of their teacher’s throat with the thermometer.
“Great, okay, trigger-fingers,” Kugisaki snarks, “Nanami-san will actually get mad at us if we cause more paperwork for him. Don’t accidentally kill Gojo-san.”
“You just said people died like eight degrees lower than Gojo-san’s current tempe-”
“Yeah. And people die when they get stabbed eight times but here’s Gojo-san,” Kugisaki snarls.
“Can Gojo-san even get stabbed eight times?” Itadori asks in awe.
Fushiguro stays quiet on that. He can’t visualise it, but he certainly has seen certain scars on Gojo-san that felt so misplaced on someone like him.
“Ah geez well if he dies, he dies!” Itadori growls.
“I’m texting Maki that.” Kugosaki informs, tapping away at her phone. “Also, Google says yeah. He’s supposed to be dead.” The three of them nod in agreement at that. So he’s fine is what they’re all hearing. “Also meat thermometers actually work just as well on humans! Who knew?” Kugisaki adds.
“If you think about it, this opens up the possibility that human thermometers can work in cooking, just less efficiently or conveniently,” Fushiguro theorises. “Unless if this is a ‘square can be a rectangle but a rectangle can’t be a square’ situation.”
“Ew, geometry.” Itadori pouts.
“Also,” Kugisaki is still scrolling on her phone. “Wikihow suggests acetaminophen.”
“Why the heck are you using a site like WikiHow?” Itadori makes a face. And Fushiguro doesn’t know what Wikihow is, but it sounds foreign. Perhaps a medical page?
“Yeah, in the pictures this person is drawn without eyebr- oh, Maki’s calling,” Kagisaki hums, drawing the phone up to her ear. “Hel-”
“FIFTY DEGREES CELSIUS? WHAT DO YOU MEAN GOJO-SAN OUT OF EVERYONE IS AT FIFTY-DEGREES CELSIUS -”
Fushiguro and Itadori watch as Kugisaki slowly lowers her phone, face passive and unchanging, and hangs up on Maki shouting through her line. “Okay. Help is on the way.”
“He can get sick?”
“Well. He’s Gojo.” Shoko says, as if that’s all that’s necessary for an explanation, even though all three of them watched her drop her clipboard less than ten minutes ago when she was told Gojo is in for an unexpected fever . “Knowing Gojo, you could honestly leave him to rest and he’ll recover on his own.”
“Living cheat code.” Fushiguro mumbles, sounding simultaneously impressed and envious.
“Great. Let’s just leave him.” Maki states flatly.
“This feels like a prank. Are we on a prankshow right now?” Panda asks with dubious confidence.
“You watch prankshows?”
“Wait yeah. Is this one of Gojo-san’s tests?” Maki asks suspiciously.
And yeah, Gojo is essentially a crackhead in a sobered population, but Kugisaki can’t see him even doing this. “Nah.” She says conclusively at the end of her doubts. “If Gojo-san wanted to test us, he’d do something that’d put the world at risk.” Because Gojo is probably the only person in the world with that privilege, and as far as she’s concerned, he’s the only one with a bad enough personality to exploit that for entertainment.
“Don’t worry, him getting a fever will send Gakuganji into a cardiac arrest just as well.” Shoko shrugs.
“Is it that shocking? Why didn’t he. I don’t know. Take an ibuprofen?” Panda asks, crowding around the creaky hospital bed, watching it like Gojo-san is a particularly exotic animal. Or the aftermath of a carcrash. Both feel appropriate.
“Salmon,” Inumaki states.
“Probably because he didn’t know he had a fever.” Shoko says.
They all look at Shoko-san, who’s still scribbling away at her report.
“What.” Maki finally musters a response while everybody else can’t.
“I can’t see a dumbass like Gojo ever having to concern himself with diseases or sicknesses, so while he’d be able to easily recognise it on others just through common knowledge, he probably wouldn’t know what it’s like to have a fever.” Shoko elaborates.
Kugisaki suddenly wants to punch someone. Preferably Gojo-san.
However, even she’s somewhat above punching sick people.
Therefore, she decks Itadori in the stomach, disregarding the way he begins barking a retaliation from where he buckles onto the floor. “Gojo-san...he’s. He’s special, isn’t he?” Kugisaki grunts.
“It’s okay, you can say dumb.” Shoko consoles almost sympathetically.
Kugisaki spares another concerned glance at Gojo-san, his form curled underneath the wool blanket Shoko-san provided after lowering his temperature.
He looks really young.
It unnerves her. The unusual flush of colour on his milky skin, skin that she thought of nothing more than opaque and cold. The visibility of his shut eyes (and it felt wrong, felt intrusive, when they removed his sleeping mask), the way they can see even his eyelids and his translucent, almost smoggy lashes-
It unnerves her, that despite everything, he’s still mortal.
She constantly has a thought that she buries in the back of her mind, almost shamefully, as if it’s blasphemy. Because sometimes, she believes that Gojo-san is proof that mortals should be capable of limits, that anomalies and exceptions shouldn’t be capable of existing.
She wonders if Gojo-san would agree if she said that. Not like she’ll ever tell him that.
“He’s faking it.”
“Shoko-san said he wasn’t.” Fushiguro replies patiently.
And Nanami trusts that boy. Fushiguro is serious, reserved, and above-all, efficient. His personality isn’t bothersome, and it isn’t loud , out of all things.
However, he doesn’t trust his teacher, much less Shoko. He exhales.
A fever . A fever out of everything. And certainly, it’s odd- odd to the point where he was shocked out of this domain’s space and time for a nonexistent second, an imaginary second that nearly convinced him that it was true, that Gojo was sick.
Then again, that sounds exactly like what Gojo would do : fake an illness.
He inhales sharply, irritated. Gojo’s behaviour is erratic and only predictable at being unpredictable. He knots his lips into a firm grimace. “I’ll go visit him in the infirmary, then,” he threatens no one but the atmosphere, yet, he notes the way Itadori ducks behind Fushiguro at his declaration.
He’s not particularly angry. There’s no point in being angry at a character like Gojo, who can’t be physically pushed by anyone, and is mentally impenetrable.
He raps sharply on the infirmary office’s door.
“Come in.”
He creaks open the door upon Shoko’s voice, “if you’re here to see Gojo then I have to say he has to res- oh.” She looks up from her documents. “It’s just you.”
“Hello.” He greets politely, stiff from the smell of smoke that stings his nose. He wrinkles it as if that could dismiss the smoggy air of what’s meant to be an infirmary. “Sorry to disappoint, but I actually am here to see Gojo.”
“No, it’s fine. You’re his friend.”
He doesn’t even know how to rebuke that other than: “Gojo is capable of friendship?”
Shoko looks at him, unimpressed, but it’s the fact that she doesn’t deny nor confirm that statement that tells him he has a point. “It’s just that the higher-ups heard the news, too, and many wanted to visit him.”
“To finish him off or to see for themselves if it’s true?” And he’s simultaneously both of those at once, but he’s already heading towards the one occupied bed, because really ? Gojo Satoru is sick from a fever? Nanami came here under the impression it was one of Gojo’s incomprehensibly irresponsible antics, so to hear otherwise is somewhat jarring.
“Both,” Shoko sighs. “Well, now that you’re here, I feel less concerned about having to bother myself with the possibility that the infirmary is going to end up with someone dying.”
And for such an unexpressive lady, he can sense her smugness over her joke, as this place anchors down as a morgue on more days than not.
“He can get sick? Gojo Satoru can get sick?” Nanami recants.
“Surprisingly. Let him rest.” Nanami normally wouldn’t care if someone takes a sickday. And if anything, he frankly wants nothing to do with Gojo.
Not like his personal wish has done anything- by this point, Nanami has somehow adapted to this anomaly of Mother Nature rather than avoided him. Gojo, an unexplainable product of natural selection built on severely lacking survival instincts that are only compensated by raw power, doesn’t interest him.
He looks at the blanket-covered lump, and begins to leave without investigating further, without seeing The Miracle himself pull another unspeakable impossible again. A sudden clatter behind him stops him in his track, and as he turns around, a hand shoots out from under the blanket and encircles his wrist.
“Gojo.” He breathes, exasperated, because his break is ending and he has to finish the rest of his documents.
The grip is hot and uncomfortably sweaty, and oh , Gojo Satoru is sick (and he knows and accepted this, yet, he can’t help but feel surprised by this revelation).
The blanket shuffles off on its own, and two crystalline eyes peer back at him.
With tacky bangs flushed against his greasy visage that’s holographic from the sheen of sweat, there’s nothing maniacal in his gaze for now. For the first time in a long time, Nanami feels something past indifference and distant companionship for Gojo.
Because Gojo never needed anything in the first place- he was the Achilles that the gods put on earth.
Right now, he looks like shit.
His tongue is tacky.
“‘An’mi?”
“Nanami,” he reflexively fixes.
“Oh? Is he awake?” Shoko calls from where she’s sitting. “Odd. He didn’t react when everyone else was here. Can you get him to drink water?”
And he doesn’t want to. This isn’t a part of his job description, and he’s certainly not getting paid for babysitting him. That was always Getou's job.
Yet, he reaches for the glass of water on the dresser beside the creaky metal bed. Nanami pauses, fascinated with how Gojo’s eyes lag behind his movements, as if desperately trying hard to focus, despite the haze filtering the clarity of his eyes.
“Where’s Suguru?”
His hand freezes around the lukewarm glass.
“Suguru?” He echoes cautiously (and every Achilles has his Patroclus). He hears Shoko’s scribbling in the back stop.
But Gojo doesn’t continue, as he stares at Nanami once more, and it has the same feeling as when they first met: dangerous. His gaze is unproportionally steady in comparison to the way his pupils, that are pinpricks of black, quiver in the whites of his eyes, like a physical manifestation of his instability.
But there’s a difference between that meeting and now. Back then, he simply accepted he’ll never understand why Gojo just watches, or what he’s thinking; right now, it looks like Gojo is the one trying to understand. Like he’s searching for something in Nanami’s gaze, something that Nanami doesn’t know he can give, because this is Satoru they’re talking about. Satoru takes whatever he needs, he never has to ask and never bothered to. If he hadn't stolen something from Nanami when they first met (past his patience), then Nanami must not have anything worthwhile to him in the first place.
“Something’s wrong. That bastard didn’t visit me once yet- even you did before ‘im.” Gojo grumbles.
“Gojo?” He addresses, but the man gives no indication that he’s heard him. “You have to drink water,” he commands.
The man’s eyes flit to the glass, landing on it for a period of time, but he makes no reach for it.
Then, “you’ll definitely be appreciated,” Gojo murmurs, and his mouth twitches, lips curling wainly, a pathetic shadow of his typical obnoxious smiles, “‘cuz we’re so understaffed.”
“Drink your water.”
“D’ya think we’re going to heaven one day?”
“Definitely not.” He responds, startled that Gojo would think about these things. “I don’t believe in an afterlife. I hope there isn’t one.” He doesn’t even know what’d he do if he found out even after the end of the shift of his own life , he had to exist overtime. Life is such a pyramid scam.
“Mm.” And Gojo’s never been so quiet before. And with a gentleness Nanami didn’t know he could spare for someone who couldn’t tell a punch from a fistbump, he shakes Gojo’s loosening grasp off his hand.
“Do you think of this often?” And he’s not curious about Gojo. Why be curious about something that never bothers to offer answers? But right now, he wonders how human Gojo is on a daily, and he thinks this is one thing he can afford to indulge in, knowing that Gojo’s response will imply one way or another.
Gojo looks at him again.
After a long minute, Nanami wonders if he miscalculated that maybe Gojo isn’t misunderstanding something, isn’t looking for something. That instead, Gojo is completely orientated, and knows more than he lets on even right now.
Then, slowly, “why? S’no point in complaining, anyways.” Gojo snorts, as if humoured by this.
Nanami doesn’t know how to answer that. “Drink it,” he holds the water close to Gojo’s face.
Gojo doesn’t even look at it this time.
“Nanami, are you going to leave again?”
“No. It’s too difficult to find another steady-paying job at my age.”
A raspy laugh.
“Are you going to leave me?”
“Are we tied by anything in the first place?”
Gojo’s lapse of silence unnerves him. Because in the end, Nanami always assumed Gojo thought similarly along those lines, even if he enjoyed his company. “I hate outliving people,” Gojo finally says.
And he doesn’t know what spurs him to say this, say something so random and possibly foreign to an easterner, but he says, “even Achilles died young.”
Gojo suddenly smiles widely, and it’s nothing like his previous one, rather, it’s big and wry and cocky . For a moment, he thinks Gojo is back to normal. “Don’t give me hope, Nanami.”
He stares at him, mildly stunned. “You really are perfect as a Jujutsu Sorcerer,” he finally says. After all, a qualification of being one is to be voluntarily suicidal for the most part. But Satoru, who holds little fear of death because he doesn’t have to fear it, thinks about death as well?
As far as Nanami’s concerned (and he’s not concerned at the slightest when it comes down to it), Gojo Satoru’s the only one with the world beneath his feet, and on most days, he looks like he wants to crush it underneath his heel.
Then, surprising himself again (and he doesn’t know what’s up with him), he reaches over, and awkwardly burrows his fingers into Gojo’s scalp, carding back the mussed strands of white. “Gojo, you have to drink the water.”
Gojo looks at him, dazed. “Okay.” He says, surprising Nanami by his sudden obedience, and out of experience, he suddenly feels suspicious, before reminding himself the man has a fever (Gojo Satoru, a fever . And somehow Golden Boy is still exceeding everyone’s expectations for him in the worst ways). “Really. I don’t know what you’re thinking,” Nanami mumbles, and feeling partially frustrated that he’s spoiling the man (but the man didn’t ask for this, either), he begins to ruffle his head.
And Gojo lets him, the weight of his head bobbling along with his actions, as if it’s too heavy for him to prop up.
“M’dunno. Usually I don’t think. Not worth it.”
Nanami inwardly agrees, too.
“Nothing good comes out of thinking.”
“I’m recording that and sending it to your students.” Shoko mumbles from the background, and Nanami sighs, exasperated.
“Students. Like us.” Gojo hums. “Suguru would find it funny.”
He pauses, frustration filtering away, and Shoko sets down her phone without even taking a video. And at that strangely sobering tone, he lifts his hand, but Gojo grasps his fingers like he did at the beginning, clutching his knuckles in a sweaty grip. But he doesn’t say anything.
Nanami frowns at this.
“I need to go. I’ve already went over my breaktime.”
“Just don’t do your work.”
“I’m not like you.”
“Be like me, then. For today.”
And nice to know that even while sick and looking like crap, Gojo is still constantly unfathomable.
“Nobody can be you.”
Gojo snorts. “Duh. I’m Gojo Sa’oru .” He pauses, eyes sliding past Nanami, glancing at something in the distance. “The only one in this world.” His line of sight returns onto Nanami. “Stay,” he asks, because he’s a petulant child and Nanami on good days wants to lock him in the bathroom with a baby fence.
“No, Gojo,” he states domineeringly, like he’s scorning a dog. “I have work.”
And sick Gojo is clearly more pliant than his typical self, because he actually does let go, but not without dramatically shoving his hand away. He should get sick more often. “Fine. Go to work, then,” and Nanami suddenly hates that, because he didn’t know Gojo could sound even more annoying than he does on most days.
He doesn’t know what to do about this. Clearly the man is emotionally vulnerable in some aspect if he can even call it vulnerability (it’s definitely...more cautious, more intimate than what he usually shows. And Nanami doesn’t want to scare this version off- it’s just. Nanami really can’t find it in himself to empathise . That requires taking time to understand Gojo, and Nanami finds his ability running thin these days. It’s...hard.
(He cares for Gojo, and is almost fond of him, the way coworkers are in a line of work where nobody else but each other can comprehend the burden of their job, but he doesn’t know if someone like him , can empathise with someone like Satoru . Then again, who can possibly understand the situation Gojo Satoru is in, when he’s so out of reach with the rest of the human race? The last person who probably could, just based on their personality that holds terrifyingly incomprehensible love for people, was Getou Suguru and what good did that do because all it did was ruin both of th-). “Do you not want me to go?” Nanami asks, stunting his thoughts short.
“I don’t care.”
And Nanami isn’t good with words, and isn’t good with niceties.
He reaches over to pet Gojo again, and Gojo this time, ducks, and slides back underneath his blanket.
“Ha.” A deadpanned laugh erupts from Shoko who’s watching them like a particularly interesting drama.
And frustration churns his stomach. Someone like Ichiji or Itadori is better off doing this. Meanwhile, Nanami himself isn’t built for these things, but right now, he’s responsible for how Gojo views others in response to his vulnerability- he hates having impact on other people.
“Gojo, I’m being cold. I know I am. It’s not because of you-”
“Yes it is.”
And is it? Nanami doesn’t know. “No it isn’t,” he says confidently.
“Liar.”
“You don’t deserve my attitude,” he says, genuine this time, and an eye peers out from under the blanket.
And Gojo has always known people better than they know themselves (and it's funny, because the exact opposite is also paradoxically true, because Gojo doesn't understand what it's like to be human in the first place), because he doesn’t call him a bluffer this time. "There may be some good people here, but there are never any morally good people in our line of work.” He sidles his gaze to Gojo, who’s staring at him unabashedly. He doesn’t know if this is just Gojo’s characteristic shamelessness that lets the manchild stare at him with something disturbingly gentle in his gaze, or if it’s the sickness that’s blurring his sentiments and reality. “But in my books, you’re a pretty good person.”
“You’re a shitty author, then.”
“Yeah, shitty people attract shitty people, there’s a reason why I think you’re good, too.”
Gojo looks at him for an unnervingly long time. Then, voice cracked and dry, he mumbles: “thanks.”
Nanami stares. “It’s now really hitting me that you’re sick.”
“I’m not .”
“‘Thanks’. You, Gojo Satoru, said thanks. ” He exhales a breathy laugh. Gojo Satoru, who thinks of no one in this world because he doesn’t have to, acknowledged him. Kind of.
Gojo Satoru, the one who holds the world in his palms, whether the world or Gojo liked it or not.
He thanked him.
“Sick. Can’t believe it. You’re actually sick,” and this time, when he reaches over to pet him on the head, he doesn’t duck away.
“Gross.” Shoko finally says, sounding mildly disappointed this didn’t end with Gojo crushing someone’s fingers.
“He’s sick.”
“And what about it?” Nanami answers, flipping to the next page of his book.
“You seem pretty calm given everything.”
“Sickness hits everyone.”
Itadori stares a bit longer at Nanami. “I meant the fact that you’re sitting in bed with him with him on your lap.”
Gojo-san, like a spoiled cat, has his head on Nanami’s lap, face buried into the crook of his leg.
“You think I can get out of this?” Nanami says, using that tone of voice he uses whenever Gojo ends up doing something particularly unpleasant, or roped him into a certain antic that always results in property damage or the randomised looting of plastic chairs and microwaves.
“He seems comfortable,” Kugisaki deadpans, and because Kugisaki fears no god other than herself, she pokes Gojo in the cheek.
Fushiguro and Itadori stare, eyes bulging, and Itadori, a monstrous ball of nerves and instincts, nearly throws up in self-defense like a creature that had survived natural selection but can’t adapt to the modern world.
Gojo-san squirms, lids flitting upwards, eyes hazy and struggling to focus on the source of the finger.
“Gojo-san.” Kugisaki calls.
“He’s like a pet.” Itadori says curiously.
“Yeah. Spoiled.” Fushiguro makes a face.
“Edible.” Says a new voice.
They fall quiet.
Then: “Itadori, tell Sukuna to shut up.”
Itadori’s face doesn’t even twitch at the new slit on his throat. “Sukuna, Nanami told me to tell you to ‘shut up’.”
“Tell Nanami that I’ll peel his bones like fibergl-”
“Sukuna says okay,” Itadori says, clasping a hand over his throat.
"The pros of strangling you would be that you'd never annoy again, and I get to suffocate Sukuna while at it," Kugisaki muses out loud, and Itadori looks over, mildly worried about his own survival.
She stands up from where she was crouching to look at Gojo, rounding to him, eyes unblinking. Itadori flinches.
Kugisaki crosses her arms. “Hey, Itadori. If Sukuna’s mouth leads to his domain, what if like. He makes his mouth wide enough for you to like, fit your whole body into it? Wouldn’t you basically disappear on your ownself.” She begins to theorise, and this time, Itadori does feel the tumor on his throat quickly flatten out.
“Can’t believe Kugisaki’s more effective than Gojo-san when it comes to Sukuna.” Fushiguro mutters.
“You know. Gojo-san is mad cool,” Itadori begins, steamrolling over Kugisaki’s mad scientist ramblings. “But now that you point it out, isn’t he kinda cute? He reminds me of my Grandpa's farm animals.” Itadori says, ignoring the way Nanami exhales sharply and Fushiguro whipped his head over so hard that there was an audible snap. Itadori reaches over in an attempt to pet Gojo, before he realises his teacher’s eye is now fixated on him, startling still despite the filter of fog. He lowers his hand, remembering that this is Gojo that he was about to pet. Gojo-san, who could shred his hand if he wanted to.
“A spoiled pet is essentially just a child, which is what Gojo-san is,” Kugisaki says, seemingly having returned from the dark recesses of her brain.
“You guys are rather cruel. A familiar temperament in this line of work,” Nanami states.
“Nanami-sensei,” Itadori begins.
“I’m not your sensei.”
“I’ve literally seen the picture of Gojo-san you taped up in your cubicle to use as a dart board.”
“Keep talking and I’ll use your esophagus like a blow dart tube.”
“Oh.” Itadori stays quiet for a second. Then, “I wanna hug Gojo-san, too.”
Fushiguro looks over in absolute disgust, and Nanami even appears offended for the lack of sympathy towards his situation.
“Hey! Look! He’s like a.” He glances at Gojo-san who's looking at him with startling condemning eyes. “Like those mountain goats. The ones that spit on you.” Itadori comments.
“A llama?”
He looks at his eyes. “No. A goat.” Motherfucking goats. He remembers when his grandpa took him to their neighbour's farm, and they left with a handful of childhood trauma, a half-eaten strawhat, and Itadori nearly missing a whole pinkie. “Like. Gojo-san is basically a goat: he looks pettable, and he gave me trauma.”
“That’s really specific. Are you okay?” Kugisaki inquires.
“No, not really.” Itadori, out of a sudden flood of unsourced courage, raises his hand. Gojo shifts his head as if attempting to raise it to meet the level of his hand, and he instantly retracts it.
“Do you want to switch spots?” Nanami says, voice hollow, and expression empty, and Itadori stares at Gojo suspiciously, whose heavy eyelids has closed back down. Not like he trusts it- if Gojo can see through his facemask, Itadori definitely thinks he can see through his eyelids, too. "We can switch spots, if you'd like," Nanami pressures.
He does want to take Nanami's place. He wants to pet Gojo-san and he likes touching people.
However, this feels like a trap, just looking at Nanami’s pained face.
Fushiguro, probably sensing Itadori’s lack of self-restraint about to come kicking in, places a hard hand onto his shoulder.
“I think it’s pretty funny.” Shoko comments from the corner, all of them avoiding her as if they still won’t end up with the potential for lung cancer just by being in the same room as her. “I took pictures.”
They watch as Nanami’s grip on his book tightens, veins bulging around his knuckles.
Kugisaki has returned to poking Gojo on the cheek again, and this time, his eyes fling wide open. Kugisaki makes direct eye contact with Gojo. Then: “it was Itadori.”
Itadori snaps his neck over so hard black spots started eating his vision.
“It WAS N-”
“Oi. Itadori come here.” Gojo demands, lifting his head from Nanami's thigh.
Itadori stares. Then squints skeptically at the way Gojo holds out his arms. “This is weird.” Kugisaki decides judgmentally.
“It’s like a child.” Nanami agrees.
“I don’t Like It.” Fushiguro states rather decisively.
Itadori leans forward, the railing of the bed digging uncomfortably into his stomach, and almost awkwardly, he lets Gojo wrap his arms around his shoulder, and bury his face into the crook of his neck.
Then, with the hesitation of dealing with a rabid dog, he stiffly pats Gojo on the back.
“This is weird.” Kugisaki echoes.
“It’s like a child,” Nanami repeats.
“I don’t Like It™,” Fushiguro says, somehow with even more judgment in his tone.
Slowly, Itadori melts more into Gojo-san’s hugs. He personally quite likes Gojo lack of personal space, mostly because Itadori himself is rather physically affectionate, even though he often finds himself on the receiving end of Maki’s affectionate smacks, Kugisaki’s body slams, and Fushiguro’s complaints when Itadori sneaks into his bed at night when he’s bored and can’t fall asleep.
There are a couple nice reciprocants, such as Panda’s literal bear hugs, Inumaki’s polite pats on the back, and Aoi’s terrifyingly persistent swings towards his heads during practice.
And of course, there’s Gojo. Except Gojo-san always drapes himself over their shoulders from their backs, digging his sharp chin into their skulls, or he’s dragging them over with an arm around their shoulder.
He doesn’t hug in the sense that he lets them hug him- it’s always him making sure he’s the one grabbing and invading others’ personal spaces.
This feels-
Itadori hums happily, and loops his arms around Gojo’s back. This feels like the first time he’s the one actually hugging Gojo-san rather than vice-versa.
“This is nice, actually,” Itadori comments, from this angle, being the one with his head above of Gojo-san’s. He makes eye contact with Shoko, who’s already pointing their camera in their direction. “It’s like. When a cat likes you. It’s that type of feeling.” He looks up at this, and with some difficulty due to his position, he looks over at Fushiguro. "It's like when I hug you."
Fushiguro squints at that, averting his scrutinising gaze, as if Itadori can't see embarrassment highlight the tips of his ears.
Itadori tightens his grip a bit more, and Gojo-san just squeezes farther in, and Itadori, feeling somewhat elated that clearly Gojo-san likes whatever’s happening, snickers. “Whooaaaa it’s like. A pillow. But hard.”
“If it’s hard then it’s not a pillow.” Kugisaki says dryly.
“Are you sure Gojo-san’s sick and not like. Replaced?” Fushiguro asks uneasily, and to Itadori’s despair, Gojo-san begins to untangle himself.
“Wait, no, c’mon!” He gripes, locking his arms tightly around his teacher who’s now shoving away. “What did I do wrong- ”
“Megumi. Get over here.” Gojo-san says almost threateningly.
Fushiguro freezes, hackles bristling.
“Gojo-san, you don’t need him, stay with me,” Itadori persists pleadingly.
“Yeah. Stay with him.” Fushiguro states.
“ Megumi .” Gojo's eyes flashes, and Fushiguro glowers in revulsion, as if understanding the spot he’s in.
To the side, Kugisaki rolls her eyes. “I’m just saying. I’m the prettiest out of all of us, I dunno know why he’d rather hug y’all than me.”
“Don’t group me with you guys.” Nanami deadpans, now completely ignoring Gojo-san who’s using his legs are free real estate, returning to his book.
“Wh-” Gojo pauses, slumped against Itadori’s chest, no longer fighting off his grip (and Itadori smiles, because they all know that even while sick if Gojo really hated it, he could've easily placed a hole in Itadori's head). “You,” he points to Fushiguro, who pointedly looks away. “Where’s Maki?”
“Actually doing things.” Fushiguro states.
“Being productive.” Nanami mumbles without looking up from his book.
At his voice, Gojo-san begins to shuffle once again, and Itadori reluctantly lets him go, as he twists his body over to face Nanami. “Oi, Sugu-” Gojo-san’s voice freezes, and he sees the way that Nanami’s eyes widen behind his spectacles, and they all look at the odd scene.
They hear Shoko hum, twisting in her chair away from them.
“Nice to know his fever’s lowering since he’s able to properly recognise you now,” Shoko says dryly, with the tone of someone who finds something entertaining.
Even Kugisaki doesn’t say anything snarky, the tension odd and uncomprehending for them. The three students make eye contact, and glance back at the two adults, Gojo-san still fixated on Nanami, who clears his throat. “Yes, Gojo?” Nanami finally replies as if nothing’s happened.
“I feel sick,” Gojo-san finally responds, smile curling up on his face, tone airy like laughing gas. “He’s gone, isn’t he?”
Itadori hears Sukuna’s laugh ricochet in the back of his cobwebbed brain, but in contrast, something about Gojo’s voice scares him. Makes him feel unsettled. Oh, brat, he hears Sukuna, and this time, he’s unable to purposefully blank out his thoughts, have you heard? Sukuna asks gleefully, the amusement of someone who likes to watch YouTube compilations of children falling. Of him and Getou Sugu-
Itadori finally shuts his thoughts out, goosebumps lining his shoulders.
“You feel sick because you are sick.” Shoko grunts from the opposite end of the room, looking very disgruntled by his presence, but she’s always like that around Gojo-san. So something feels normal.
“Is that why everyone’s giving into my whims today?” Gojo snorts, as if this realisation has just dawned onto him.
“As if any of us can do anything if you want something in the first place,” Nanami grumbles.
“No.” Itadori says earnestly. “We do it because you’re Gojo-san, obviously.”
Gojo looks at him, something unreadable in his expression, as if he doesn’t quite know what he’s looking at. Itadori has never seen this look on someone like Gojo before.
To the side, Fushiguro sighs. “Gojo-san,” he finally addresses reluctantly, countenance tight. “...Do you want a hug?”
Gojo looks at him, and for a moment, he doesn’t look sick despite his high flush and glassy eyes. He flippantly waves him off, snickering, “you’re such a precious lil’ student, if you beg, I might give you one.”
And whatever mood Gojo-san has carefully allowed themselves to create, has been broken so easily by the man himself.
Fushiguro looks at Gojo, irritation and poorly-concealed worry lining the creases of browline, hopelessness straining his mouth. Well, Itadori guesses it must be hard figuring out what to say. Nobody really knows how to deal with Gojo in the first place.
Then, a loud mocking groan from the side shatters the silence. “Jesus!” Kugisaki snaps scornfully. “Y’all are so USELESS-” Nanami looks offended. “C’mere!” She yells, leaning over the opposite edge of the bed, and before any of them can react, she’s already grasping Gojo by the shoulder, yanking him into her arm. “C’mon, boys are so stupid .” She hisses, and Fushiguro and Itadori share a gaze of confusion. But Itadori, never one to dwell too long on the cons, laughs. Before Shoko can tell him off or Nanami can get mad at him, he clambers onto the bed, smashing Nanami-san’s foot, and burrows himself underneath Kugisaki’s other outstretched arm. Normally he'd be afraid she'd flex her bicep to try and crush his respiratory system without hesitation, but the idea of being involved in a group hug outweighs the risks.
Once he settles in, he glances expectantly at Fushiguro.
Fushiguro’s face puckers.
Itadori stares harder and more expectantly.
He sees as Fushiguro slouches in defeat, and begins to crawl onto the bed as well, disregarding the way Nanami quickly yanks his feet out from underneath them, and begins to leave the bed, clearly done with this whole situation. "I'll leave him your care," Nanami states, slipping back on his shoes with the speed of a rogue Sim who discovered the way out of a simulation.
"Simp. Always a simp for Itadori," he hears Kugisaki taunt from above.
"A what?" Itadori blinks.
"I'm not," he hears Fushiguro retort defensively.
“See. You guys think too much about the unimportant stuff,” Kugisaki leers as Fushiguro sits himself next to Gojo, who has already clung onto one of Kugisaki’s arms.
“Yeah. But at least I think,” Fushiguro grunts dryly.
“Awe, cute,” Shoko mumbles from the corner, smiling sweetly at them. “It seems like Gojo, you’ve recovered quite well, underneath the care of your coworkers and students.”
“He’s still si-” Itadori begins, able to feel the heat radiating off the man even without touching him.
“He seems fine.” Shoko cuts him off abruptly.
Itadori stares. “Um. He’s really war-”
“He’s fine.” She says jerkily.
They look at her.
“In other words, Gojo, get out.” Shoko states with the pleasantness of a woman who’s been tested by god far too many times. “Gojo.” She smashes the nub of her cigarette against a plate on her table. “On god I’ve never had a more stressful day past any day that involves dealing with you. Get out of my room.”
"Shoko, cruel as ever," Gojo croaks, a lopsided smile crinkling his eyes. Gojo has always never put up pretenses under any normal conditions, but while sick, he feels less guarded in a way that Itadori can't explain. "Kicking out patients? Your practice is getting sloppy, ain't it-"
"And so was your mouth." Shoko rebukes without hesitation, spinning her chair to face her computer where they can clearly see her play a game.
"Hey. Wait. That's Poptropi-" Itadori realises, recognising the homepage.
"I don't want to hear Getou's name mentioned around here ever again," Shoko interrupts Itadori like he didn't say anything in the first place. "People get too emotional over him."
Itadori glances at Gojo, who's still smiling, still staring at Shoko, something thickening the air once more even if both of them look like they're just bantering. "Who's this 'people', you're mentioning?" He finally cracks out a response, and Gojo collapses against Kugisaki's shin, and Itadori feels her arms squeeze tighter around them.
"Whatever. I forgot how exhausting it was to talk to your usual self," Shoko mumbles, already tapping out another cigarette from a flimsy carton despite putting one out just seconds ago. She glances at them. "If you guys stay here," she begins reluctantly, "then promise to stay quiet." And maybe she feels bad or something. Itadori doesn't really get it, but he's willing to take it.
Itadori whoops loudly at that, ignoring Shoko's nasty gaze, and begins to make himself comfortable on the bed, ignoring the way Fushiguro groans as he and Gojo crush him against the mattress.
"Kugisaki get on!" Itadori yanks at her wrist, and she snorts.
"A hospital bed for four people?" Her tongue kisses the back of her front teeth. "Gojo's like. Long, we can't all fit-"
Five people, I'm fucking fifth wheeling- Itadori easily displaces Sukuna's voice into the background as white noise.
"If I'm here, you have to be here," Fushiguro hisses. "Kugisaki, get on the bed."
"Stop arguing." Shoko clucks from the front.
Itadori swivels his head over, looking at Kugisaki pleadingly, and her nose scrunches even farther upwards at that.
She sighs.
Gojo cackles and Itadori laughs cheerfully as Kugisaki, defeated, lifts herself onto the bed.
"So that's where they've been." Maki props her hands onto her hip. "They're going to ruin their sleeping schedules like this."
"They look comfortable, at least," Panda says uneasily.
"I'm not." Shoko dismantles the awkwardness with her blunt disgust for Gojo Satoru. "Take them out. They're your classmates and your manchild of a teacher."
"I don't want to wake them, though," Panda mumbles. And he doesn't know if it's heartwarming or disturbing to see the tangle of limbs, Itadori's drool on Kugisaki's arm, his teacher using Fushiguro's stomach as a pillow, and Fushiguro's legs doubling as a headrest for Kugisaki.
"Salmon," Inumaki states, now trying to slip off Itadori's sneakers.
"I don't care," Maki grits, words spoken with the gentleness of a girl contemplating first degree murder. "I'm waking them up. They skipped practice for this? Fine, Gojo-sensei's sick, there's nothing much we can do about this. But those three?"
"Let them rest," Panda speaks over her, gentle. "They're children, and so are you. Rest is good for everyone."
"Tell me why I haven't gotten any this day?" They hear Shoko's deprecating tone from the side once more.
However, his words must've had some influence on Maki, since she looks no longer ready to shovel dirt down Fushiguro's airway, and is instead, glancing at the pile almost thoughtfully. "Such slackers," she mutters, folding her arms disapprovingly. "Well. In the district over, a Family Mart opened. If they're going to slack, we deserve to, as well. We can drop by for ice cream, and I heard porridge is good for the sick."
Panda sighs, relieved. "Yeah, not like we can get much more done without Gojo-san's instructions."
"Salmon," Inumaki nods.
Maki smiles, pleased. "Cool, Panda, you stay here."
He pauses, surprised if anything, unsure why.
"You're a panda," she states shortly. Then, more sympathetically even though he's not that disappointed, she adds, "sorry. We'll bring something back for you."
"Salmon."
Maki's already unbuttoning her uniform, revealing a tanktop underneath. And he understands, when he was younger he never left his room, either. He never got lonely, it simply wasn't in his nature, but additionally, he always had Yaga and Gojo there who watched him grow up. It's just now, older and able to roam wherever, he's forgotten that normal society doesn't have talking pandas or sorcerers just walking around. She pauses. "You know, while we're gone. The bed looks cramped. And Panda, you're basically one giant beanbag," she suggests. She walks towards the door, Inumaki trailing after her. She pauses by the doorframe, smirking. "Just food for thought."
Shoko glances up from her screen once the shuffling and disgruntled moans from the side finally fallen quiet.
She squints in judgment.
Great. Now they're cluttering up her floor.
She rolls her eyes at the way the wheeled hospital bed lays knocked over, with Panda's curled form supporting three children and one deadweight.
And Panda might be one large Swiffer duster, but they're all messes. She flits her eyes over. One of them is a bigger mess than the rest.
Well.
She turns back to her game of solitaire, flicking her cigarette against the rim of the plate Utahime gifted her for making it past twenty.
It'd be way more trouble to wake them all up- might as well leave them be.