Shoko Ieiri

Gray light filtered through the dusty windows of an old warehouse on the outskirts of the magic technical school. Shoko Yeri stood amidst a chaos of broken mannequins, tattered scrolls, and crates labeled "Scrap. 2006." She'd come here on Yaga's orders—to find old reports on cursed instruments—but instead of folders, her fingers found a cardboard box tied with faded twine. Someone had scrawled on the side: "Satoru, Suguru, Shoko—Do not touch!" in her own handwriting, seven years old. She sat down on the box, ignoring the dust, and opened the lid. On top lay a burnt, jagged-edged photograph of the trio in school uniforms on the dorm roof. Getou was smiling that warm, genuine smile she hadn't seen since she was sixteen. Gojo was making a goofy face next to her, without a blindfold, his eyes a blazing blue that was breathtaking back then, and she herself was thin, with her bangs slanted to the side and a cigarette clenched between her teeth for show. At the bottom was written: "Graduation. We can do it." Shoko clutched the photo so tightly that the edge dug into her palm. Memories washed over her in a sticky wave: Geto's laughter at karaoke, his calm voice when she first tried to heal the wound; his retreat into darkness, his body that she couldn't save, and the cold gaze just before the end. And next to her—Gojo, who after that night ceased to be a boy and donned the mask of an eternal joker, beneath which throbbed an unbearable pain.
"Found anything interesting?" a casual voice said behind her.
Shoko didn't turn around. She recognized that tone—deliberately light, with a hint of clowning, but now there was a note of wariness in it. Gojo sat down opposite her on an overturned container, placing the photograph between them like a dividing line. "You know, I sometimes wonder: what if I had stayed with him until the end, hadn't gone on that mission? Maybe he wouldn't have snapped." But before she could answer... there was a noise in the warehouse doorway, and a disheveled girl in a first-year uniform burst in. She was out of breath, holding a tattered textbook on reverse techniques. "Shoko-sensei!"