Chapter Text
Satoru stares, his lunch slowly turning cold the longer he spends watching the two new additions to their class.
“Satoru, finish your food before you start scaring the newcomers,” Suguru scolds, taking a sip from his tea. It’s the boring kind with no sugar or milk added to it. Just pure leaves and boiled water that makes the back of Satoru’s throat itch at the mere thought of drinking it, because eugh.
“But aren’t you curious why they haven’t tried to, I dunno, socialize with us for the past few days?” Satoru takes a bite out of his onigiri. The taste of tuna and mayonnaise fill his taste buds, made all the more sweeter by the fact that he would’ve never been allowed to have such a thing if he was still in the clan.
“Says the guy who couldn’t even hold a proper conversation for weeks back in first year,” Shoko pipes up, taking a drag from her cigarette that she’s most definitely not allowed to smoke within school grounds. But he supposes if anyone could get away with it, it’s the only person capable of using reverse cursed technique on others.
“That was different, Shoko!” Satoru turns, eyes wide behind his sunglasses. “Suguru, back me up!”
“I don’t know… you were totally acting like a stuck up clan kid back then.”
“Just because I—” A sudden movement by his periphery catches his attention. Satoru hones in on it like a shark that’s scented blood in the water. “Suguru, are you seeing what I’m seeing?”
He doesn’t need to turn his head to know that Suguru and Shoko are both watching the same scene. There, sitting at the table on the opposite side of the room, are their two new classmates, Okkotsu Yuuta and you. Grade Two sorcerers whose cursed energies tell a far different tale to Satoru’s eyes.
“So he’s hand-feeding her. Big deal.” Shoko puffs out a cloud of smoke, cigarette dangling by the corner of her lips.
“Shoko… they’re cousins,” Suguru says slowly.
“Huh.” She blinks. “I actually forgot about that.”
“See? I’m not the only one weirded out by this.” Satoru’s face scrunches as he watches you wipe Yuuta’s mouth with a tissue, one of your hands resting on his cheek. “You’d never catch me acting that way with my cousins.” He nearly shudders at the thought alone. Bad enough that he’s had to deal with the elders hounding him about betrothals and other political clan scheming that he wants no part of.
Satoru recalls Yaga’s brief explanation about yours and Yuuta’s background the day he introduced you to the class. You and Yuuta were from a minor sorcerer family overseas, obscure enough to have never had dealings with Jujutsu Headquarters in Japan. It’s all a little suspicious and convenient in Satoru’s opinion, but if the higher-ups saw no problem in it, it was probably best to leave it be.
Now, though, he’s beginning to think something’s up. Bad enough that they skipped first year lessons and went straight to the second years’ class.
“Do you think their parents are siblings?” Satoru muses. He’s heard that sort of thing was possible in Western countries, though not exactly legal.
The way Shoko’s looking at him makes him think she’s questioning his intelligence. “They’re cousins. What else would their parents be if not siblings?”
“I meant, her mom and dad, and his mom and dad might be… you know.”
Her face contorts with disgust. “Why is that the first thing that came to your mind?”
“No, no,” Suguru interjects, stroking his chin in contemplation. “Satoru’s got a point.”
“You’re both idiots. Do they look inbred to you?” Discarding all notions of subtlety, Shoko waves her hand in your direction, inhaling her cigarette until it’s nearly used up.
In unison, Satoru and Suguru turn and stare at your features. The two of you look normal enough, no additional joints or webbed fingers. The dark circles beneath Yuuta’s eyes makes it look like he needs some professional help, but other than that, Satoru doesn’t think there’s anything wrong with your appearances. He definitely wouldn’t think your parents were siblings from sight alone, but looks can be deceiving…
As if feeling the weight of three pairs of eyes on you, your gaze sweeps across the room and meets Satoru’s head on. He smiles and waves, acting like he hadn’t been caught staring. You don’t seem very impressed with him, but you do wave back. Yuuta follows your line of sight and seems surprised by the attention. He smiles back at Satoru, though it looks a little unsure.
You lean in to whisper something in Yuuta’s ear that makes the smile on his lips dissolve. And then, the two of you are gathering your empty lunch trays and standing from your seat without another glance back at your other classmates.
The silence after you leave is nothing short of awkward.
“Well, that was weird.”
“Definitely weird.”
Shoko lights another cigarette. “Sure, whatever.”
It always felt a bit overkill to send Satoru, Suguru, and Shoko out on a single mission. With the addition of you and Yuuta, it’s downright a waste of manpower to send out five students to exorcise a Semi-Grade One curse.
The mission was simple enough. The curse used the foundations of an abandoned warehouse as the structure for its incomplete domain. Usually, Shoko would remain outside, safe from the danger zone, while Satoru and Suguru did the work of beating the curse up so Suguru could absorb it into his arsenal.
Today, however, you and Yuuta rush off without another word, ignoring Satoru’s yelled warning about straying too far. As much as he thinks the two of you are weird, he doesn’t actually want to see you badly hurt. You’re just Grade Twos after all. Even if a Semi-Grade One curse is only slightly above your level, it’s still above your level.
He tracks your movements using his Six Eyes, whistling in appreciation at how precise you seem to control your cursed energy. Do they have some sort of training regime overseas, or is that simply talent on your part? Yuuta seems to have let loose a little. The massive amount of cursed energy he has explodes around himself when you come face to face with the curse.
“Ah, damn. Suguru, we gotta go help the newbies.” He tugs at Suguru’s arm, though there’s no real rush to his movements. He kind of wants to see how the two of you fare against this curse.
Satoru is very, very surprised to see the curse just—vanish, with a single touch from your hand. Yuuta didn’t even have to do anything. He simply stood by the side and let you approach the curse on your own, which Satoru thought was cowardice earlier, but boy is he surprised to be proven wrong.
What was it you said your cursed technique was? Body enhancement? Satoru watches the scattered remains of the curse’s cursed energy in the air after it was reduced to paste with a single gesture. Whatever that was, was not body enhancement.
“What’s with that smile on your face, Satoru?”
He slings one arm across Suguru’s shoulders, grin wide like he’s just been handed a brand new toy. “Our new classmates are keeping secrets from us.”
And Satoru is going to find out what it is.