Shibuya, late afternoon, looked like it was trying to sell itself to someone.
Neon not quite awake yet. Sunlight sliding off glass towers like it had somewhere better to be. The crosswalk gathered a small crowd—people with headphones, shopping bags, tired eyes, and the universal urban belief that the world would politely wait its turn.
Satoru Gojo stood at the curb like traffic laws were a cute local custom.
He had a convenience-store sweet in one hand. Blindfold in place. Posture loose enough to be insulting. He wasn't leaning on anything, but it felt like he could be leaning on the entire city if he wanted to.
The light changed.
The crowd stepped forward.
And the city's noise—every car, every footfall, every distant train—thinned.
Not stopped.
Just… dimmed. Like somebody lowered the volume on reality by two clicks and waited to see if anyone noticed.
Gojo did.
He paused mid-bite.
"Hmm," he said, not concerned. Mildly entertained. "That's new."
Above the crossing, the air made a decision it wasn't supposed to be able to make.
A seam appeared. Not a crack with lightning. Not a dramatic sky-wound. Just a clean, narrow wrongness hanging there like a thread pulled too tight.
Pedestrians looked up and blinked, then looked away.
Their eyes slid off it. Their minds politely refused to process it.
Gojo tilted his head, listening like the world was a math problem and he was grading it.
"That's not a curse…" he murmured. Then smiled, as if the lie itself was cute. "…but it's pretending."
The seam trembled.
Somewhere else, in a world with a darker sky and louder death, Kakashi Hatake was already moving.
A scorched battlefield stretched out under a gray lid of clouds, distant explosions punching the horizon. The air tasted like smoke, iron, and the kind of chakra that came from people who had accepted they might not see tomorrow.
Kakashi's breathing stayed steady anyway.
His visible eye tracked the problem in front of him with the bored focus of a man who had survived too many impossible days to waste energy on dramatics. His other eye—hidden under his forehead protector—pulled at the world like a hook sinking into cloth.
Kamui.
Space warped.
Something big and lethal began to fold inward like it had offended the laws of physics and physics was finally taking revenge.
Then the warp… bit back.
Not a backlash, exactly. More like a resonance—like his technique brushed against something that answered from far away. A vibration that didn't belong to this battlefield, didn't belong to his world, and absolutely did not belong in his day.
Kakashi's balance shifted.
For half a second, his feet lost their loyalty to the ground.
"That's…" he said, voice flat, because flat was all he had time for. "…not good."
The spiral in his eye tightened.
The air snapped.
And the battlefield disappeared.
—
Kakashi dropped out of the seam into Tokyo like he'd been delivered by a bad joke.
He landed on a side street near Shibuya with the quiet precision of habit: light feet, soft knees, no wasted movement. No stumble. No audible panic.
He looked up.
Skyscrapers.
He looked down.
Sandals.
He stared at them both for a beat like the universe had set him up.
"…Hm."
He reached into his pouch and pulled out his little orange book anyway, because if reality wanted to play games, he could at least pretend he was still on break.
"I'm going to pretend this is normal," he told the page.
He sent his senses out on instinct—chakra scanning the way it always did.
Then paused.
The air was full of… something.
Not chakra. Not nature energy. Not the familiar living hum of a village, a forest, a battlefield full of breathing people.
This was structured. Rule-bound. Dense in places, thin in others.
It felt like chakra's cousin who grew up in a different country and came back with a different accent.
Not chakra, his mind noted, calm as a report. Similar. Heavier. Like it wants to be counted.
He didn't like that.
He kept reading anyway.
Above him, on the edge of a rooftop, someone appeared without announcing himself.
No footstep. No wind shift. No warning for anyone who couldn't see the math.
Gojo looked down at Kakashi like he'd found a rare animal in the city and didn't want to scare it off.
"Hi," he said brightly.
Kakashi lifted his gaze.
One eye visible, relaxed. The other still hidden.
He clocked blindfold. He clocked posture. He clocked the calm that didn't belong to civilians.
Danger, the kind that didn't need to prove itself.
He turned one page.
"Hello," Kakashi replied, as if this happened to him weekly.
Gojo's smile widened, delighted by the lack of fear.
"Nice mask."
"Nice blindfold."
Gojo leaned forward a fraction, like he was tasting the vibe. "Wanna compare?"
"No."
Gojo's grin sharpened. "So that's a yes later."
Kakashi didn't dignify that with a response.
He didn't have to.
Because the seam overhead spasmed.
Something dropped out of it—not a person, not a simple curse, not anything that belonged in a normal street.
It hit the pavement without sound.
A shape made of torn cloth and negative space, edges flickering as if the world couldn't render it properly. It looked like a silhouette that kept missing frames—present, absent, present, absent—like reality was stuttering.
The air around it pulsed.
Space felt… unreliable.
The crowd near the crossing slowed. People started drifting toward it, faces blank, curiosity soft and hypnotized.
Gojo exhaled, cheerful and annoyed in the same breath.
"Ugh."
Kakashi glanced up at him.
Gojo pointed lazily with his snack. "It followed you."
Kakashi's page stopped turning.
"It what?"
The thing pulsed again.
More pedestrians leaned forward like sleepwalkers.
Gojo stepped off the rooftop and down into the street in a single smooth motion, landing between the entity and the civilians with the effortless confidence of someone who'd been doing this since he was too young.
Kakashi mirrored him from the other side, moving without thinking—herding people back with a light hand on shoulders, a quiet word, a subtle redirect of bodies that didn't even feel like a command.
Two teachers. Two protectors. Same instinct.
They both paused when they realized it at the same time.
Neither of them had chosen violence first.
Gojo's voice stayed light, but something in the air around him tightened—the way a room tightened when the strongest person in it stopped joking.
"You're not registered," he said.
Kakashi's gaze didn't leave the creature.
"I'm not… whatever that is."
Gojo's smile didn't move. "That's what unregistered people say."
Kakashi sighed once, like the universe was exhausting.
He flicked a kunai.
Not hard. Not lethal. A measure. A test.
The blade sailed up toward Gojo's chest.
And stopped.
A hand's breadth away, as if it had hit invisible glass.
Kakashi's visible eye narrowed.
Space distortion, his mind reported. The motion doesn't arrive.
Gojo leaned forward a fraction, intrigued like he'd just heard a familiar melody in a strange key.
"That's not cursed energy…" he said, and his tone turned almost fond. "…but it rhymes."
"Same," Kakashi replied.
Gojo stepped closer.
Not cautious.
Not defensive.
Personal-space disrespect on legs.
"Can I see your other eye?" Gojo asked, bright and casual, like he was requesting a menu item.
Kakashi sidestepped with lazy grace, never lowering his book.
"No."
Gojo reached out like he was about to flick Kakashi's mask.
Kakashi caught his wrist instantly.
Gentle.
Absolute.
"Don't."
Gojo's smile turned playful again, because of course it did. "So it's a touching problem."
Kakashi released him like he was releasing a student from a bad habit.
He didn't look up from his page.
Gojo flickered forward—fast enough that the crowd behind them didn't register movement so much as a change in where danger stood.
Kakashi substituted.
A puff of smoke. A log that wasn't there a second ago.
Kakashi reappeared behind Gojo close enough to feel the air shift around him.
Close enough to be rude.
"Your form's good," Kakashi said quietly, like he was grading a sparring drill.
Gojo's delighted hum came back just as quiet. "You too."
Then Kakashi decided to be serious for one second.
Lightning screamed into his hand.
Raikiri wasn't a technique so much as an argument. A clean line of lethal intent. It made the air smell like ozone and consequence.
Kakashi thrust forward.
The lightning hit the invisible barrier in front of Gojo and stalled.
Not blocked.
Not deflected.
Just… stopped. Like reality hit a buffering icon and asked it to wait.
Gojo laughed—genuinely, loudly, like Kakashi had just shown him a magic trick.
"Oh," Gojo said, delighted. "That's adorable."
Kakashi exhaled through his nose. "I hate you a little."
"You'll get over it."
"Unlikely."
Gojo lifted one finger.
Space pulled.
A parked car inched toward an invisible point, tires squealing like they were being dragged into a magnet. Loose trash lifted and slid. Dust spiraled inward in a tight, obedient curl.
Kakashi flickered sideways on instinct, out of the pull's path.
Attraction, his mind supplied. Spatial compression. He's doing it casually…
Gojo lifted his other hand.
A slight change in tone.
Space pushed.
A shockwave snapped outward—precise, controlled—shoving dust and leaves away without shattering windows. It was power with manners.
Kakashi planted his feet, jacket fluttering.
Gojo sounded almost proud.
"Red."
Kakashi stared at him for half a beat, unimpressed in the way only professionals could manage.
"Of course you named it Red."
Gojo's grin widened. "I named it Blue too."
"Of course you did."
They stood there, the creature pulsing between their shadows like a glitch waiting to become violent.
Gojo angled his head, as if he couldn't help himself.
"Your eye spins," he said.
Kakashi's gaze flicked up, sharp despite his lazy posture.
"Your eye doesn't blink."
A half-second of silence passed.
Not awkward.
Not empty.
Just… suddenly too intimate for the amount of violence happening in the street.
"…Interesting," Gojo said, voice a shade softer.
"…Interesting," Kakashi agreed, equally unwilling to give the moment any oxygen.
Gojo leaned in again, because boundaries were a myth to him.
"Show me yours."
Kakashi didn't blink. "Show me yours first."
Gojo tilted his head. "I already am."
Kakashi's visible eye narrowed. "…That's unfair."
He hooked two fingers under the edge of his forehead protector.
Lifted it just enough.
Red bloomed.
Sharingan rotation caught the light like a living warning sign—beautiful in a way that wasn't meant to be.
Gojo's smile softened. Not mocking now. Not teasing.
Appreciative.
"Wow," he said, almost reverent, like he was looking at art.
Kakashi lowered the protector again immediately, because that was enough of that.
Gojo, in an act of pure spiteful symmetry, raised his blindfold just a sliver.
Blue eyes, too bright and too aware—like the sky decided to focus on one person and never let go.
Kakashi's breath paused for a single beat.
Ridiculous, his mind noted. Pretty. Dangerous.
Then the monster punished them for noticing each other.
It pulsed.
Space stuttered.
Gojo's Infinity hiccuped for the briefest blink—so brief most people wouldn't catch it. Kakashi did.
His Kamui tugged wrong, like the technique slipped on ice.
The entity lunged at the civilians.
Gojo's voice snapped sharp for the first time.
"Hey."
Kakashi was already moving. "I see it."
Gojo stepped in, arm out, body between civilians and wrongness.
Blue flared—not loud, not showy—just efficient. The creature yanked backward like it had been snagged by a hook in the air.
Gojo glanced over his shoulder, smiling even now, because he was infuriating.
"Try not to let it touch you," he said. "It's messing with the interval."
"It cancels space tricks," Kakashi replied, already reading the pattern.
Gojo's smile turned sharp. "Yeah. Rude."
Kakashi flicked a kunai with a paper tag—not an explosion, not flashy. Just a marker.
The kunai kissed the creature's edge.
And the thing split.
Two halves peeled away from each other like it was trying to become untouchable by becoming two problems.
One half pulled—Blue. Attraction. A hungry drag.
One half pushed—Red. Repulsion. A shove that wanted to fling bodies into walls.
Kakashi's visible eye narrowed. "It's separating."
Gojo's grin returned, pleased like the enemy had finally started being interesting. "Like it wants us to chase it."
Gojo lifted his hand.
"On my mark."
Kakashi's tone stayed dry. "You giving orders?"
Gojo glanced at him, smirking. "Only if you like it."
Kakashi didn't even look offended. That was the worst part.
"Don't make it weird."
Gojo's smile widened. "You started it with the eye thing."
"I did not."
"You absolutely did."
The two halves surged—pulling and pushing, trying to fling civilians into danger like they were pieces on a board.
Gojo moved first.
Blue pulled both halves inward.
Then Red checked the snap-back—precise, controlled—like clapping space shut before it could recoil.
The entity shrieked.
Not sound.
Pressure.
Gojo's voice dropped. "Now."
Kakashi's Mangekyō focused.
Space twisted in his eye like a drill bit.
He didn't aim at the whole monster.
He aimed at the seam between the halves—the core mismatch, the missing frame, the place where the creature had to be real.
The Null-Interval pulsed again, trying to cancel him.
Kakashi pushed through anyway with sheer precision and the kind of grim experience that didn't care if the universe was cooperative.
"Got you," he said quietly.
The core folded inward.
Kamui swallowed the missing frame.
The halves collapsed like costumes losing their actor.
The street went still.
Dust settled.
Civilians blinked like waking from a dream, looked around in confusion, then hurried away with the instinctive denial of people who would rather not know how close they'd been to becoming collateral.
Gojo straightened his blindfold with exaggerated casualness, like he'd just finished a light workout.
Kakashi lowered his forehead protector again like nothing had happened.
They faced each other across a few feet of wrecked air.
Gojo's tone returned to light.
"You're annoyingly competent."
"You're annoyingly loud."
Gojo smiled. "You noticed."
Kakashi sighed like he'd just been assigned paperwork. "Unfortunately."
Gojo stepped closer—because of course he did—hands in his pockets like he was strolling through a park.
"So…" he said, drawing the word out. "Dinner?"
Kakashi didn't move. "I don't know you."
Gojo's smile turned sharp. "Liar."
Kakashi's book flipped shut with one thumb.
"I'm a professional."
Gojo nodded, as if this confirmed something important. "Professionals eat."
Kakashi stared at him for a long, flat beat.
Then—because maybe Tokyo air made people make bad decisions—Kakashi flipped his battered little orange book once, hesitated, and held it out.
"Here."
Gojo froze, like this was the most sincere thing anyone had ever offered him.
Then his grin returned, bright and delighted and absolutely unbearable.
"Is this… your phone number?"
"It's a book."
Gojo took it like it was a trophy. "Even better."
The air behind Kakashi tore again.
Smaller this time. Tighter. Like an impatient reminder. Like the universe had returned to drag him back by the collar.
Kakashi glanced at it, then at Gojo.
Gojo tilted his head. "Leaving already?"
"Duty," Kakashi said simply.
Gojo lifted his blindfold a hair again—just enough to flash those eyes.
"One second," he said. "Fair trade."
Kakashi didn't blink. "No."
Gojo's smile sharpened. "Coward."
Kakashi stepped toward the seam.
"Professional."
He vanished.
The seam snapped shut like a mouth closing.
Gojo stood alone in Shibuya holding the orange book like it had personally flirted with him.
He turned it over in his hands, amused.
Then he smiled to himself, delighted in a way that had nothing to do with winning and everything to do with the promise of future trouble.
"Oh," Gojo murmured. "I'm definitely seeing him again."