Chapter Text
The Jujutsu world does not know when the third major shift of fate happens.
The first shift, naturally, is the birth of one Satoru Gojo. A living god incarnates among men, and the world has to balance itself to accommodate for the power he wields. Sorcerers around the world have to fight to keep up, or fall and get left behind - there is no undoing what has been done.
The second revolves around the first, because Satoru Gojo is a natural disaster more than a man. Toji Fushiguro’s assassination of the Plasma Star Vessel kickstarts a chain of events that spirals far beyond any sorcerer’s grasp, snowballing to an unstoppable avalanche of change that none could dream of stopping single-handedly. They may not know the full extent of it at the time, but the sorcerers feel the shockwaves. Their society is shaken again.
The third event is not one that is so grand, nor immediately felt. It is not Sukuna finding his vessel - not for another year - or any of the events that follow, all caught up in the orbit of that living god. It is innocuous and mundane, jarring only to those who witness it and the aftermath. Naoya Zen’in, notable not for his grand effect on history, in the midst of a training-bout-turned-argument - hits his head on a jutting corner and falls unconscious for an hour and thirteen minutes.
There is no shift in the air, no immediate ripple. There’s only the awkward shock and embarrassment of those present, and the mild concern of those they answer to, because a bit of sudden head trauma is the sort of thing that takes out schoolchildren and Naoya is frankly too old for such incidents. Nobody sees fate shift for a third time before their very eyes as Naoya Zen’in’s snap shut and his head crunches against a sharp corner.
He will never be the one to open them again. Somebody else does. Fate twists, and the world changes once more.
Sensations creep into his awareness before full consciousness does. The first thing he becomes aware of is a sharp, splitting headache, radiating from a knot in the back of his skull. He lifts one hand clumsily to feel for the bump, only to cringe as he feels it. Thirst follows - he’s suddenly painfully aware that his skin is uncomfortably sticky, and his lips feel closer to dry paper, and he groggily thinks he should shower before he even opens his eyes.
When he eventually convinces his lids apart to stare at the room he’s in, it’s … half-familiar. The sort of nagging sense he should recognize it, specifically, rather than blearily piecing together recognition from the sort of thing you see on television. Has he ever been in a clinic like this? Hospital seems too grand a word for the shoji-screen windows and traditional, out-of-place furniture. It’s not a large room, but he’s clearly not in a bedroom. His hand rises to brush the knot at the back of his head again absentmindedly as he drinks in his unfamiliar surroundings.
Even less familiar are the two other people in the clinic. He gets the vague sense that he should know who the taller one is, a large old man with a thin moustache and large hair. He’s talking sternly to the second, a smaller tired-faced younger man in plain clothes. Both are half out of view from a privacy screen pulled up at his side, too absorbed in a one-sided-argument to take note of him. Neither of them look anything like a doctor, and he tiredly thinks to himself that the old man shouldn’t be drinking inside if this is a clinic. It’s a fire hazard, or something. And just rude.
… and none of it makes any sense, because he most definitely has never been here, or met these people before. Muscle memory sends him reaching for his phone, fumbling a bit with his unfamiliar clothing before finding it. His own face … his own face? stares back at him in the reflection of the dark screen, confirming the sudden mad fancy that he isn’t himself. It’s mad, and yet here he finds himself, staring at a stranger’s face. He’s something like pretty, at least, broad shouldered and sporting sharp, elegant features that don’t seem to suit his wide-eyed look of confusion.
Right, okay. So he’s a complete stranger. He tunes back into the old man’s conversation in search of clues, while idly looking around for a glass of water. Argument. Whatever.
“- damned fools get such an idea, hm? To believe such mediocre sorcerers could rise above their station. Tch! Ought to execute him for the audacity alone. Why did Naoya even indulge such a pitiful farce?” Sorcerers? Execution? Is this the 1800’s? Some fucked up fantasy isekai? He glances down at the phone in his hands, finally clicking the home button and clumsily seeking out the date.
It’s 2017 . What. What?
He turns it back off thoughtlessly before it can offer him more unpleasant information. The skinny guy is finally answering.
“I believe he sought to teach them a lesson about wasting his time, sir, it - seems to genuinely have been an accident.”
“Hmph. The fool wastes his time and ours indulging in pointless ‘training exercises’ with his lessers. And look where it’s gotten him! I had to send that half-baked brat off on a First-grade mission to -“ and the rest of the words are lost, as the blood rushes to his aching head and the details finally click.
Sorcerers, grades, execution. Right. Right. An impossibility peeled back into stark reality. He swallows past a sudden lump of panic, trying not to dwell on how terribly dangerous he knows this world is. 2017 - is Yuji even a student yet? When does Shibuya happen? He scans his environment and his reflection more urgently. And again, he grasps at nothing.
‘Oh, no,’ he thinks to himself, staring blankly at the unfamiliar face in his phone’s camera. ‘I could have at least been someone relevant to the plot, like Gojo or Sukuna. Instead I’m a background character .’ There’s no recognition for any of it but that old man, and he - Naoya? - doesn’t want to think too hard on it, because no old men are worth trusting in this new reality.
He can assume he’s maybe some extra in one of the big clans, right? The environment and attire seems right for that. He brushes his fingers through his hair, frowning harder as he tries to put his name and face to his spotty memories.
Recognition sinks him further into despair, when it finally creeps in and he puts a name to his own face.
‘Oh, no . I’m the sexist .’
The realization brings a new ache to his skull, and he tucks his phone back into his clothes thoughtlessly, unable to hide the grimace creeping over his expression. A … Zen’in, right? Naoya. They’d said his name a few times, assuming that’s *him.* The shithead who showed up to beat up on schoolchildren for his fragile ego, and became a fully sentient special-grade curse out of spite.
‘I could have been Gojo .’
If memory serves, he doesn’t even show up until the Culling Game arc. Fuck, the Culling Game, Shibuya - have they happened? Not yet, right? Should he … tell someone? No, he’d sound entirely insane. Naoya draws a hand to his chin, frowning down at the bedsheets and turning the matter over. He should do something, though. The mere prospect is terrifying, frankly, but … thousands of people died, right? Thousands of people died, and poor sweet Itadori Yuji saddled more burdens than anyone else should have. That’s not fair.
Things should be fair . The position Naoya has been born into … none of this is fair, or will be fair. Can he change that?
“…ya. Naoya!” The old man shouts, suddenly, and Naoya jumps as he realizes he’s being spoken to. Both he and the younger man have joined his bedside, and he realizes with a panic that he should focus on the here and now and the fact he can’t name a single family member he supposedly has. “ Naoya !”
“Me?” he answers belatedly, voice cracking just a bit. Shit, don’t play that dumb.
“Do you see another -“ the old man’s tirade is paused as he seems to process Naoya’s response, and the younger takes the chance to speak. He seems largely … generic? Dark hair and eyes, nondescript clothing, nothing to place him as someone significant.
“It’s good to see you awake at last, Naoya, sir. How do you feel?” Nondescript seems nervous, not quite comfortable talking to him. It … may actually be prudent to play that dumb, largely because Naoya’s head still aches something fierce and he can’t quite muster the effort to be a dick to this man’s well-intentioned questioning.
“… bad headache,” he manages, grimacing a little more. “And I’m thirsty?”
“I’ll get you some water in just a moment,” Nondescript affirms, apparently ignoring his own unease and the way the old man’s eyebrows are slowly knitting together. He looks like he might explode if Naoya looks at him. Naoya doesn’t look at him, focusing on short guy. Maybe it’s mean to call him Nondescript, even in his head. “Do you know where you are?”
“… no. A clinic?” he answers honestly, once more flitting his eyes around the room. Both the men at his bedside look a little more uneasy.
“You’re in the healing wing within the Zen’in compound,” Nondescript confirms gently. “Can you tell me what date it is? Do you know who we are?”
Naoya didn’t even glance at the month, too engrossed in the year and all it implied. And try as he might, he never cared enough about the old man with a million death red flags - not enough to remember his name during the information onslaught that was reading Shibuya.
He fumbles for an answer and finds none that won’t dig this hole deeper. He may as well give up on that idea and grab a shovel. “I … no. None of that sounds familiar to me.” He shrugs awkwardly. “Sorry.”
“Sorry? Sorry ?” Old man repeats incredulously, brushing a hand through his hair and leaning in, gearing up for what might be more shouting. Despite himself, Naoya feels a twinge of guilt, misplaced and pointless but stinging the hollow of his chest all the same. Maybe the man he replaced was important to people outside of the main cast … but there’s hardly any point dwelling on it. He winces a little when the geezer grabs his shoulders. “No … no. You won’t - you don’t apologize.” Naoya isn’t sure if that’s a command or an observation. “This must have been intentional! An attempt on his life! Ha! Those fools think robbing me of my heir will weaken my clan? Will weaken me ? I don’t need him. We’ll pay this back tenfold, you hear me?”
“I think it was an accident?” Naoya offers awkwardly, failing to follow whatever strange conclusions the old man (his father?) just drew. He’s maybe a little offended by some of that, but he really has no idea how he got from head injury to assassination attempt. Maybe to do with this heir position - but didn’t that go to Megumi? “It didn’t even bleed. I don’t -”
His father isn’t paying him attention, whirling on the small plain man instead.
“Yuzuki, gather the Hei. My brother will take command of them until Naoya recovers. If you can’t fix him,” Nondescript, apparently Yuzuki (entirely unfamiliar, still), winces, and the old man ignores that, too, “then send word to someone who can. We can’t waste any more time with my son stuck as some bumbling invalid!” He brandishes his gourd that smells like too-strong-booze, and stalks out of the room, shouting more names Naoya doesn’t recognize.
Yuzuki offers Naoya a thin half-smile. “Can I … get you anything?”
Naoya licks his lips. “Water. Maybe a notebook?”
“Right. I’ll send that with one of the servants.” Yuzuki dips into a bow that makes Naoya prickle uncomfortably, and turns to follow the old man. Shit. Naoya forgot to ask for his name.
The door slides shut and the clinic falls into eerie silence. The old man has apparently written him off until he regains his memories, and there’s likely no chance of that happening. He’s going to have to keep playing the amnesia card, it looks like, and hope there’s some people here with a shred of mercy to spare for his situation. It’s not like they can ‘fix’ this. On the bright side, nobody in their right mind would guess some sort of body snatching scenario. Which … really, they should. Kenjaku is running around somewhere out there. Bigger things than playing house with the Zen’ins demand his attention right now, right? He can figure out whether or not the old man offended him when he has more free time. For now, he needs to focus on the game plan.
It shouldn’t be hard. He just needs to worry about hitting the important beats, and everything should call into place.
- Do something about the Prison Realm.
- Don’t die.
… the game plan could use work. His father and Yuzuki don’t seem to be coming back anytime soon. He’s got all the time in the world.
Naoya must have dozed off, because it’s darker inside when his eyes open again, the walls stained with the last dying reds of a sunset creeping in. There’s a pitcher of water weeping condensation by his bedside, ice long-melted, water threatening the edges of a notebook set beside it. He reaches for the water first, downing three glasses before finally feeling some semblance of normal again. The headache’s faded, and he slowly slides to his feet, taking stock of himself and his surroundings.
He doesn’t have much on his person. A plain wallet and a modern smartphone, both tucked out of sight within his clothing. A katana in a scabbard that feels right at home at his hip. A sheathed knife hidden away by his ribs. The notebook joins his meager possessions, tucked into the crook of one arm with the pen finding itself behind his ear for lack of a better place.
The clinic itself doesn’t offer much else. Cabinets of medicines he doesn’t know the uses for, drawers of equipment. The clan must not have someone like Shoko, who can heal with her Cursed Technique.
… oh, he probably has one of those. He racks his brain, trying to remember the details of the animation technique he knows he’s supposed to have. It’s there, on the tip of his tongue, right at the edges of his vision. He can almost grasp it, like a button that’s just out of reach, if he could just reach out and tap it -
“Naoya,” someone snaps from behind him, and he damn near jumps out of his skin. It’s his father, looking no different than before but reeking even worse of alcohol.
Naoya fights not to wrinkle his nose at the smell. “... mmm?”
“That’s you,” his father repeats unnecessarily, as if Naoya has become stupid. (Well … no. He knows more than this geezer about things that matter, doesn’t he?) “Zen’in Naoya. Can you tell me my name yet, boy?”
Naoya reaches for that, but unlike the cursed energy bubbling under his skin, the answer isn’t anywhere he can feel it. He hasn’t forgotten - he just never knew. Damn.
“Still no,” he admits, eyeing the old man warily. He did call him a bumbling invalid earlier, and Naoya’s decided he isn’t too inclined to forgive that.
“I’ve no use for a sorcerer who’s careless enough to forget decades of training,” the old man spits, reaching out and grabbing Naoya’s collar, tugging him along. “Your body should remember what your brain doesn’t. You won’t let me down, will you, Naoya? You won’t make a mockery of this family?”
Naoya idly thinks he could probably try to scramble free, but the Zen’in family are all lunatics, aren’t they? And he doesn’t know how to even leave this building, let alone where he’d run to. His spotty memory doesn’t offer up a map of Tokyo, or anything. So he keeps up, answering with a breathless, “no, sir.”
He doesn’t say ‘you’ve already made a mockery of it’, no matter how tempting it is. He just follows, wide eyes trained on the halls they pass, notebook clutched to his chest. Left, right, right, left. Maybe he can find his way back on his own.
They’re heading outside, he thinks, as they pass more and more windows. The landscape outside is lovely, from the glimpses he gets - broad ancient trees and silver moonlight. When they cross the threshold to the outdoors, he breathes in cool night air and the smell of something floral blooming. It’d be peaceful, and beautiful, if not for the old man actively wrangling him along the path.
He must be concussed, or maybe his father was right about him being stupid, because it isn’t until he’s in the backseat of a sleek black vehicle does he fully allow himself to question what they’re doing. The driver is wearing a black suit and smart glasses, but he doesn’t recognize her. Still, she’s dressed too modern to be a Zen’in, and if he squints at her hard enough he thinks she’s got cursed energy - an assistant? Is his father going to throw his newly-concussed amnesiac son at a cursed spirit?
Oh, he’s a Zen’in. Of course he is.
“-oya!” the shout drags him from his musing, and he jerks his eyes up to the mirror to catch the old man’s gaze.
“I’m right here,” he grumbles back. “You don’t have to shout.”
His father looks like he may burst a blood vessel. The old man takes a deep breath, visibly gritting his teeth. “No matter how scrambled that foolish brain of yours may be, your body should remember how to carry itself in a fight. If you can’t even handle a grade 2 curse, we’ll … need to reassess your position within the clan.”
Naoya quietly curses his assessment of this crazy old man for its accuracy, turning to stare out the window instead of answering. He’s pretty sure you aren’t meant to throw newly-concussed people at curses to test their mental well-being. He’s entirely sure he’s never swung a sword in his life, and a second grade is … a big deal, right? It’s a big deal to someone who’s practically a civilian.
He swallows back a sudden knot of anxiety in his throat, forcing his breaths to come slow and even. The future holds worse than that. The future holds teenagers dying to special grades, prefectures rent to ashen wastelands or bloodied war zones. Child soldiers. Naoya swallows again, breathes. Yuji is, what, fifteen? Fifteen, facing things worse than what he’s about to with his bare hands.
So, it’s simple. Game plan step 2, don’t die. He can live with being banished or whatever. Maki does it. Toji did it. He’s nowhere near as strong, he’s sure, but he can live with it. Maybe the old man’s right, and he’ll have the muscle memory for it. Naoya - original-Naoya, the man he’s not really, he must have been good. He turned into a hell of a curse. Fumbling for his wallet, he picks through it until he finds an ID.
Naoya Zen’in. He’s 26 - impressive age for a job that tends to kill people before 30. Knowing what’s coming, he may not make it yet, but still, 26 is hardly anything to scoff at. Grade 1 puts him at … what, Nanami level? That’s even less to scoff at. He may have been a bastard, but he must have been a competent one.
Past tense, because now he’s a few hours old, feeling more like a kid playing dress-up than an experienced sorcerer.
The drive is long, winding through pretty forests and into the ever-lit nightlife of what must be somewhere in Tokyo. He ignores the looks through the rear-view mirror - curious, worried, irritated, scornful, he doesn’t care to discern the emotion behind them. He watches the streets, memorizes the landmarks and turns. Down, left, straight, straight. The smear of vibrantly-coloured lights gives way to dingy streets and yellowed lamps, and his mood plummets more and more as they pull away from the safety of civilization. Right, right, left. They squeak to a stop in front of a shopping mall, one bearing the shadow of what was once a sign above its doors, walls splattered with graffiti and windows boarded up.
It takes him a delayed moment to register the car’s pulled to a stop. End of the road, right? He tugs the door open numbly, holding his notebook to his chest. He should have written down what he could before his death, given it to the assistant to give to Gojo. He curses himself, the old man, himself, this horrible world, that one-eyed cat, himself.
He takes another deep, steeling breath as the other two climb out after him, tilting his head back to watch the curtain flicker into being above them.
“You know,” he manages in a conversational tone, walking forward with more confidence than he feels, “you didn’t even make sure I know what a cursed spirit is.”
He thinks the woman behind them makes a choking noise, and his father’s steps falter once, but the old man’s voice stays firm and steady.
“Does it matter? It’s going to try to kill you. You need to kill it first. The rest will come to you.”
“You’re trying to kill me, too,” Naoya answers blankly, pushing the door open. “Should I kill you, too?” He turns to the old man, throwing him a grin he doesn’t mean. “... kidding.”
Maybe he’ll die and become that horrible thing the first did. Maybe he’ll kill the old man and spare Yuji a fraction of his future opposition … or maybe wipe out all those innocent people he saw on the way here.
‘I can’t do that,’ he affirms to himself as he steps inside, leaving his father to lean on the wall and watch. The mall is dark and empty, the floor littered with broken glass from what was once a skylight now shattered at his feet. Dark shapes flicker in his periphery, the mutters and gleaming eyes of smaller curses winding around the abandoned building. He carries on, katana sheathed at his side, notebook clutched to his chest, eyes peeled for something bigger and uglier. It’s a curse - it’s going to get bigger, going to get uglier.
‘I can’t do that, because Yuji Itadori is like … a baby. And Mai and Maki are like my … cousins or something, now, right?’ He thinks of the stern, brave girl broken by her circumstances and reborn into something cold and cruel, of her sharp, bitter sister, dead as a teenager. A teenager. Thrown into a pit of monsters by the family that’s now his.
The ice in him is so cold it burns. He can’t let that happen, can he? The Zen’in sins are now his to carry, even the ones that have never happened. Especially the ones that have never happened.
Naoya’s insides have turned to a brittle glacier by the time his opponents make themselves known. Opponents, plural, a wall of gleaming eyes hidden within the darkness of an empty store, chattering garbled whispers and making the air feel fetid and heavy. He steps within their line of sight, and for a single moment, they stand. One man, pinned under a dozen eyes.
‘Oh,’ he thinks, faintly. ‘There’s more than one. He really is trying to kill me.’
The wall of darkness surges, interwoven slimy shapes clambering over each other, snapping jaws of too-human teeth gnashing for his delicate flesh. It’s like a tide of otter-shaped rotten carcasses, breaking free and lunging at him, too fast to outrun, too many for a single katana to carve through in the seconds he has to respond. Distantly, his father - cruel enough to bring him here, careless enough to let his son die unprepared - calls a warning, too late to do any good. The wave of accursed death rushes for him,
and he reaches out, fingers chilled, and presses the button. His cursed energy crackles under his skin, and the world freezes.