Chapter Text
If he had never known anything about Yuta Okkotsu, he would have been knocked off by the amount of pure concentrated cursed energy that flooded the room as soon as the boy swung his legs across the window. It was hard to feel changes in energy flows when he was operating Mechamaru since it wasn’t his actual physical body, but now Kokichi felt goosebumps cover his skin – Yuta was the strongest sorcerer he had encountered since coming back alive and it was almost terrifying. He looked around, trying to see if anyone else felt like a prey being hunted for sport, but everyone else didn’t seem to mind. Noritoshi shook hands with Okkotsu, Aoi gave him a pat on the back strong enough to make poor boy fold in half. Everyone kept talking how he changed a lot, Momo even compared heights with him and get out of this competition obviously defeated. It was… weird. Something felt wrong with this guy, badly-badly wrong, but he couldn’t bring up any theories.
It took Kokichi a good moment to realise Miwa was tugging on his sleeve.
“Everything’s fine?” she asked.
He put a friendly smile back and tried his best not to make it feel forced. “Of course it is.”
“Miwa, this show-off brough back presents!” Momo made Kasumi turn her way. Before letting go of his sleeve, Miwa locked eyes with him once again. Was it his mind acting out or did she look… worried?
On the carpet Yuta’s bag was being taken apart. Almost half of it was different local snacks and sweets he brought back from overseas. He simply dumped all of them in front of his friends and let them pick anything they wanted and it got everyone quite busy for a second. Everyone but Okkotsu himself.
“Is it a guy you wrote me about?” he asked simply, almost like Muta wasn’t two meters away from him. Miwa nodded. She found more interest in just sitting next to Yuta’s side than in snacks he brought. Without getting up, Okkotsu extended a hand to Muta. “My name is Okkotsu Yuta, I don’t think we have met before.”
Kokichi didn’t want to shake his hand, but he knew Kasumi was monitoring his every move. So he did. He came closer and accepted a handshake, making it look so-so easy, so-so not nauseating. As soon as their hands connected, he felt his insides throbbing with sudden feel of deep-rooted anguish.
“I heard a lot about you.” Yuta smiled, but there was nothing good behind this gesture. “Have been out and about, hah?” the handshake tightened and it made obvious that, oh shit, he knew. Yuta Okkotsu knew what he had done. It wasn’t a friendly interaction, it wasn’t him trying to establish a connection with one of Miwa’s friends, no, no-no-no-no.
It was a threat.
Yuta could have killed him again with such ease it wouldn’t even considered a fight. It was a clear threat, it was a message – mind your steps, mind your decisions, mind who are associating yourself with. There was so many things behind dark blue eyes, but even with this abundance of worries it was impossible to miss the greatest one, the one that was trying to tie her hair back together in the background. Okkotsu was clear with all his intentions, but the clearest one was focused on Miwa.
“Hurt her,” he said without saying a word, “and I will find you. I will track you down anywhere in the world and I will make you pray to gods you never knew existed. You will be begging for this badly sewn parody on a human to come kill you again. Being good is a choice and I can easily decide not to make it.”
“I’ll be keeping an eye on you, Kokichi Muta.” He said out loud and let go of his hand.
Kokichi didn’t notice that he stepped several good steps back, it was Mai who quite literally caught him stumbling down. She wrapped her hand around his arm, making it look casual, and helped him over to an armchair. “First time, hah?”
“He’s cursed.” Kokichi whispered to her. “He’s… He can’t be human. He’s cursed.”
“Well, I guess you can put it out like this.” Mai waved at Yuta and Yuta waved back at her with a smile. He gestured to snacks left on the carpet and she just shook her head in return. “Thank you, loverboy, but you can’t buy me. I don’t have a sweet tooth for men.”
“How he even knows all of you?”
Zenin shrugged. “Been studying with us here and there before going away. He’s a nice guy, really, only awkward at times. He grew a lot since we last saw him. Can’t tell it’s a surprise though, he is a protégé in the end, he can do anything he puts his mind to.”
Kokichi couldn’t find an answer to that. He sat down, still feeling his heart racing an invisible race, and tried to focus on his friends. It was easy in the beginning – they all were hilarious, sharing sweets with each other – but as soon as his eyes found Miwa he couldn’t take them away anymore. His heart, his poor heart that only started to calm down slowly, suddenly rushed back again, this time with a completely different emotion.
Yuta was talking quietly to Kasumi. He smiled and took a hair tie from her hands, gesturing for Miwa to turn to the side. They kept talking friendly as Okkotsu run his finders through unbraided part of long blue hair, brushing it thought. Kokichi felt last traces of fear starting to disintegrate, leaving his system filled with something raging inside, something uncomfortable, something driving him deeply-deeply mad. Yuta Okkotsu was sitting there, peacefully braiding Miwa’s hair, and Kokichi was meters apart, feeling his hands close into fists. Oh sweet god,
was he jealous?
“You’re staring.” Mai said.
“I’m not.”
“Oh, sorry, of course you are not.” She prepped herself on the armrest. “It’s just your usual face.”
It felt almost painful to take his eyes away from the scene. “What’s wrong with my face?”
Mai shrugged, casually opening one of the snacks she took from the pile. Muta looked back. Miwa was checking her reflection in her phone screen, being extremely happy with the hairstyle. Yuta was smiling all the time, and Kokichi felt the raging need of knocking this happy smile off of his face immediately. Overwhelmed with emotions, Kasumi reached out and pulled the boy close to herself, hugging him tightly. It was obviously an unexpected move, because Yuta lost his balance and they started falling backwards, still linked together, pushing Noritoshi with his book so hard he almost fell down himself.
“Oh my god, get a fucking room!” Momo raised her hands to Aoi’s face, covering his eyes shut.
It wasn’t friendly. There was no way in the whole world it was friendly. Yuta was holding himself up with one hand, and with another hand he was holding Miwa’s head close to his shoulder, so she wouldn’t hit it on the hard wooden flooring. Everything he did, every touch he gave her, it all was filled with a sickening amount of gentleness Kokichi had never seen anyone show so openly before. Okkotsu meanwhile threw a quick apology to Kamo, and propped himself up with Kasumi still in his hands.
“Are you hurt?” he asked, and Miwa just laughed back.
“No, I’m just really happy for you to be back.”
Kokichi couldn’t remember the last time he saw Kasumi laugh so much since he came back. She was occasionally happy, especially when surrounded with her friends, but she never was that happy. It was almost like she was glowing from head to toes with pure radiating happiness. They acted like a long-distance couple reuniting and nobody seemed to give a single fuck. What was wrong with all of them? Or was it just casual information that only Muta wasn’t aware of? Were they actually in love and he didn’t know? Before disappearing completely he sent a message to her, he told her to find someone who was going to protect her as hard and devoting as he did, he told her to do it, he himself told her to do it and he remembered it as vividly as he remembered dying. He told Miwa to do it himself, how could he even have a right to be upset now, when she actually went and followed his last wish? Oh.
Oh this one hit hard.
“Get up.” Mai said suddenly. He didn’t hear her, so she grabbed his shoulder and physically pulled him up. “We’re going to make some tea. Anyone wants some?”
After taking everyone’s orders, Mai stepped outside of the door and dragged Kokichi behind like a lifeless doll. He was hitting the corners and running into furniture, not being able to see anything, but lights, lights, lights. As soon as they got to the kitchen, she showed him hard inside and shut the door closed. He stumbled upon a counter, knocking off something, but he couldn’t put anything together. Sounds, pictures, Zenin’s face, her words, light around, sounds, sounds, sounds. He suddenly remembered Mahito. He heard his manic laugh ring in his ears. He saw his own blood on his hands. He felt the pain come back. There were flashes of light. There was Miwa’s smiling face. There was the smell of fresh grass mixed with dark drying blood. Noises. Lights. Mai’s hand, grabbing his arm. Sounds. Someone was screaming. The voice sounded familiar. Was it Miwa? Was she hurt? Was she crying? Was he late again, late for everything in his life, never on time?
“I don’t want to die,” Kokichi thought. “I don’t want to die again.”
The voice was so-so-so familiar. Screaming turned to whispers. He looked down on his hands and saw blood. He saw blood all around the floor he was sitting on. He saw blood on the wooden counter. He saw blood on Mai’s clothes. Who’s blood was it? He looked down to see a bleeding wound on his stomach. He could have seen his own insides if he looked long enough. It was his blood, wasn’t it? On the floor, on the counter, on his hands…
Was he too late to understand that he didn’t want to die?
Was he too late?
“Hold that.”
Muta felt his hand close on something cold. The feeling was so real and intense it pinched his skin painfully. He felt the same coldness in his other hand, he felt something freezing being pressed right into his chest. He couldn’t see straight, only lights, noises, whispers. The voice was familiar. The voice was familiar.
The voice was familiar because it was his.
Minutes flew and flew by, and at some point, he didn’t quite notice when, he suddenly found himself sitting down on the kitchen floor. His hands were holding onto melting pieces of ice, and he had a bag of frozen peas showed under his shirt. Kokichi blinked several times and finally saw Mai. She was putting teacups on a tray when she noticed he was staring at her.
“Oh, welcome back!” she kneeled down next to him. “All good? You scared the shit out of me, dude! When everything finally ends I’ll ask Utahime for a good fucking head doctor for you, my friend.”
“I don’t need any doctors, especially head.” Kokichi took the bag of peas from under his shirt and handed it to Mai. She put it back into freezer like nothing happened.
“Of course, mister my-jealousy-put-me-though-a-panic-attack.”
He frowned. “It wasn’t like this. I just… Got overwhelmed with everything, I guess? If she’s happy, I have no right to feel this way about her or Yuta or the whole situation in general. My feelings are both neither her burden nor her fault. Yuta seems like a good caring person who actually wants to protect Miwa.” Muta felt a sickening feeling inside of his stomach grow. “He is good for her.”
“Wow.” Mai breathed out. “You are actually godgamn blind.”
There was something unreadable in Zenin’s expression, but she didn’t say anything else at all. She got up, got the tray and gestured to a bowl of fruits on the counter. Muta took it and they both left the kitchen, acting like nothing happened. There was no blood on his hands anymore.
They were so clean and neat it made him question if there was any on them to begin with.