Chapter Text
Megumi wanted to die.
Shinjuku was in ruins. Dust and debris swirled through the alleyway, one of the last elements of the battle that stubbornly clung to existence. Although Sukuna hadn't been the only one responsible for the destruction, he'd certainly left his mark in every way that mattered. On the city, on Megumi's body, his soul. All he wanted was to lie down right in the middle of the street and simply allow his heart to stop beating, but there was one thing that mattered to him even more at that moment. Just one. The only thing that kept him moving forward.
“Sensei!”
The strain of his cries quickly proved to be too much, and he descended into a fit of coughing. Much like everything else, his own voice was lost to the oppressive ringing in his head and he curiously raised a hand to his ear, unsurprised when his fingertips came away red. It felt foolish to keep calling when there was no way of knowing if a response came, but it was all he knew how to do. He felt like a child, lost and fumbling in the dark. Frustration rumbled low in his throat. He didn't have time for this.
Neither did Gojo.
His sensei's name clawed its way out of him once more, his throat tunnel of fire. "Gojo! Where are you? Tell me where you are!”
The more he pressed forward, the more he was convinced he'd actually died and gone to hell. Smoke burned his eyes and invaded his lungs, it brought him to his knees where the concrete painted his palms bright red. His chest screamed, expelling globs of blackened phlegm onto the ground. As he worked to simply draw breath, something shifted suddenly on his right, because of course it did. Megumi exhaled, long and slow, accepting that this was almost certainly the end for him. Still, he found a small part of himself praying to whatever deity that bothered listening. Praying for strength, for a miracle, for a fucking break.
That prayer was answered in the form of Yuuta Okkotsu, standing there like a bloodstained messiah and looking on the verge of collapse himself.
The older boy was by his side in an instant and immediately the warm buzz of RCT began to flood his body, mending broken flesh and shredded organs. Megumi nearly sobbed with relief as the pain slowly began losing its edge. It occurred to him through the euphoria that Yuuta was saying something, his lips moving soundlessly, but Megumi shook his head.
“Can't hear,” he explained hoarsely, gesturing to the blood staining his ears. “Did you find him? Nod if you’ve found him. Please.”
Yuuta didn't need to ask to know who he was referring to. Something passed between them, a look Megumi didn't quite have the stomach to name. There was a beat of silence before Yuuta inhaled deeply, gesturing for him to follow, and a cold sweat broke out on Megumi's skin. Much of the battle had been lost to him, distorted like a bootleg film of a bootleg film, but the evidence of its brutality was still carved into his flesh. It wouldn't have surprised him to find out that Gojo had gone down swinging and taken the King of Curses with him. His mind flashed through a thousand scenarios. None of them were good, if his hazy memory held any degree of accuracy. He imagined Gojo lying in pieces, far beyond saving, the unnervingly bright light in his eyes gone forever.
No. He couldn't think like that.
This was Gojo.
Gojo always came back.
Megumi kept his eyes fixed on Yuuta's back, his posture tense and fatigued. Try as he might, he couldn’t stop the dread that was slowly tightening its grip on his chest, twisting his stomach into knots. Whatever Yuuta had seen, it clearly wasn't good. It showed in the stiffness of his movements, the lack of urgency as if there were lead weights in the soles of his shoes. Mostly, it showed in the ominous silence that had nothing to do with the fact that Megumi was effectively deaf.
He swallowed, his heart bulging in his throat.
“Okkotsu...”
The word hung suspended in space. He didn’t know what he wanted to say, didn’t know what he was asking for. Yuuta glanced over his shoulder, his expression unreadable. His lips parted as if he were about to speak, but then he closed his mouth, his jaw tightening, and offered a small nod. It was meant to be comforting, Megumi supposed, but it only made the sinking feeling in his gut worse.
Then, Yuuta stopped.
Megumi stiffened as Yuuta turned to face him, his expression grave. There was a long, agonizing pause before Yuuta gestured to his left, just around the corner and currently beyond Megumi's view. Bracing himself, he stepped forward, his eyes immediately landing on a bloodied figure lying amidst the rubble.
His vision tunneled.
There, not far from where they stood, was Gojo.
Megumi couldn’t process what he was seeing. His mind was incapable of it, refused to accept it. An obscene amount of blood stained the ground, pooling around his mentor's broken body. His eyes were half-lidded, unfocused, staring at the sky as if he were no longer present in his own body. Gojo looked far more like a cadaver than a living being, and Megumi thought he might vomit.
This wasn’t real. It couldn’t be real.
Except it was.
His feet moved on their own accord before Yuuta's hand fell heavy on his shoulder, holding him firmly back. Megumi pulled against him instinctively, nearly snarling in frustration, but Yuuta didn’t relent. Instead, he pressed a finger to his lips, signaling for silence before pointing back to the scene before them.
Gojo wasn't alone.
It was Shoko, utterly invisible to him until now, kneeling down beside him. Her brow was creased with concentration, sweat beading on her forehead. Her hands shook with effort as they moved over Gojo’s waist with the familiar ministrations of Reverse Cursed Technique, trying to knit his severed body back together. Utahime moved just beyond the pair, her movements fluid and purposeful.
It was the first time he had truly seen her technique with his own eyes.
The intensity of the her technique pressed against him like an invisible force. It wasn’t oppressive, but it was commanding, like an ocean current pulling him in and refusing to let go. The cursed energy surrounding them responded to her rhythm, growing more synchronized, weaving patterns that seemed to carve order out of misery. Nearby, Shoko’s breath hitched as her own cursed energy swelled in response, her hands steadying against the mess of Gojo's abdomen. It was as if Utahime’s dance was not only bolstering their efforts but binding them all together in this desperate attempt to win this fight.
Still, Megumi bitterness rose in his chest like bile, a crushing tide of guilt and despair and helplessness.
It should have been an encouraging sight, but still something in his chest seized painfully. Even from afar, he knew it was a useless effort. This pale and bloody thing lying on the ground between them was too far fallen from the pinnacle of strength it once was, the one they all knew. To bring him back from this would be impossible. All of this effort, all of this energy, it was useless. Almost cruel.
And it was all his fault.
A hollow laugh threatened to escape his throat, but it died before it could surface.
A part of him was tempted to stop the ritual, to step forward and declare the futility of it all when no one else would. Why couldn’t they see it? Why couldn’t they accept that it was over? Gojo had lost. He was gone. An overwhelming sense of guilt and dread pulverized him from the inside. Sukuna had used his body like a puppet, violated his autonomy in every sense, but that didn’t absolve him of the responsibility.
It had been Megumi's hands, his own cursed techniques that had torn Gojo apart.
But then, something shifted. His limbs turned to ice as his eyes snapped onto Gojo’s chest. He stared, barely daring to breathe himself, convinced it was a trick of the shadows or his desperate, guilt-ridden mind grasping at illusions.
But there it was again. The faintest stutter of motion. A rise and fall so shallow it could’ve been mistaken for the breeze.
Megumi leaned closer, his hands trembling as he braced them on the blood-soaked ground. He strained to see it again, his breath hitching. Time seemed to slow to a crawl, the world around him fading into a blur of muted sound and color.
Please.
Please.
And then, it happened.
The rise. The fall. It was uneven, fragile, like the first gasp of air after being dragged from deep waters. But it was real.
Gojo was breathing.
He was alive.
The realization slammed into Megumi like a tidal wave, stealing the breath from his lungs and leaving him reeling. A sob clawed its way up his throat, raw and ragged as tears blurred his vision, spilling down his cheeks unchecked.
Then, as if to spite his despair even further, Gojo’s eyes opened. Truly opened.
It was insane. Impossible. And yet, here he was, clinging to life by some incomprehensible force of will. His gaze flitted around weakly, unfocused, as if he were searching for something to pull him back from the precipice of oblivion. Megumi didn’t move. He couldn’t. His heart pounded in his ears, drowning out the world as Gojo’s eyes roamed the space, dazed and lost.
Then, they landed on him.
The connection was instant, visceral, like a tether snapping taut between them. Those eyes, even half-lidded and filled with pain, saw him. They knew him.
Gojo blinked slowly, his brow furrowing slightly as if trying to convince himself that Megumi was real. Megumi found himself caught in the same disbelief. He couldn’t reconcile the man before him with the one who had towered over the world like an unshakable force. Gojo was untouchable, the strongest, the man who had always held them together even as everything else fell apart.
Now he was broken, barely clinging to life.
All because of Megumi.
Gojo’s gaze softened, as though reading the storm of emotions in his student's face. His lips parted, and for a moment, it seemed like he was trying to speak. But no words came, only a shallow, ragged exhale.
Then, as if summoning the last dregs of his strength, a soft, bloody smile touched his lips.
It wasn’t triumphant, nor was it comforting. It was knowing, laced with a foreboding sense of finality. Megumi froze, his heart lurching in his chest as that fragile smile flickered and faded. Gojo’s eyelids drooped, his gaze beginning to drift away, retreating from the world.
The realization struck Megumi like a bolt of ice through his veins.
“Don’t you dare,” he hissed, held in place by Yuuta's firm hands on his shoulders. “Don’t you dare.”
Gojo’s eyes fluttered weakly, his expression softening further. There was no resistance, no fight left in his body. If anything, there was peace, a quiet acceptance that hit Megumi harder than any battle ever could. He could see it in the way Gojo’s chest barely rose and fell, in the way his body slackened against the blood-streaked ground. He had made his decision.
“Stay awake!” Megumi demanded, yanking against the grip on his shoulders. “I don’t care how tired you are. You don't get to stop fighting now, you asshole! Stay awake!"
Tears streamed freely down his face, hot and unrelenting as Gojo’s expression settled, as though he had seen enough. As though this moment, seeing Megumi alive, was enough to give him peace. His eyes began to drift shut again, this time slower, more final. Fear gripped Megumi’s chest, a cold, suffocating terror that his sensei was slipping away for good. This couldn't be it. There was no way this could be the thing that took him out. Not him, not Gojo.
Gojo always came back.
Megumi choked on a sob, shaking his head violently when no more words would come.
Just as his dread reached its zenith, he felt it. A faint pulse of cursed energy - different than Shoko's, different than Utahime's, different than Yuuta's.
It was weak, barely there, but unmistakable.
It belonged to Gojo.
The truth became clear immediately. Gojo was helping her, clinging to life though everything in his eyes told Megumi he was ready to clock out.
The silence was punctuated only by the soft trickle of blood dripping onto the cracked concrete. Yuuta, without a word, began tending to Megumi’s own wounds once again. His presence was a silent promise that no matter how things played out, they would see it through. It should have been more of a comfort than it was, but in that moment, he didn't want comfort. All he wanted was his sensei to be whole again. He would have given anything for it, but he had nothing to give.
And so he watched, and waited.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity, Shoko sat back on her heels, wiping sweat from her brow. Her face was pale, her eyes heavy with exhaustion. Beside her, Gojo's eyes fluttered, his chest heaving with what sounded like his first solid breath in hours.
“Get him to the school,” she instructed, exhaling wearily. “Hopefully the idiot can manage to stay in one piece until then.”
Beside him, Yuuta nodded obediently and Megumi clung to her words like a lifeline, a fragile hope.
That would have to do for now.