CHAPTER SEVEN

The smoke hadn’t even finished clearing.

The wreck—what was left of the gutted deathtrap—hissed and sparked where it laid, exhaling steam and oil from ruptured vents and cracked plating. Most of the cape’s gang had either bolted—the ones with working legs and working brains—or been rounded up by Velocity.

Squealer herself was being dragged toward an awaiting PRT van, her smudged makeup streaked with rage and fear. 

Only later did Gojo catch the name. It was oddly fitting. 

Velocity stood a few yards away, speaking with a pair of PRT agents and a uniformed cop. He didn’t approach. But he kept glancing at Gojo's way—brief, repeated. 

Gojo noticed. Of course he did.

He smiled, faintly. “So. You’ve been watching.”

No answer. But none was needed.

First Bakuda, now Squealer. Both were taken care of with minimal collateral. So he could feel it—not just Velocity’s eyes, but the city’s. The ones in masks. The ones behind desks. The ones underground, who whispered in code and watched through hacked satellites. The thinkers and planners and paranoiacs who’d just realized something new had entered their chessboard, and didn’t play by the rules.

They were paying attention now.

Gojo rolled his neck until it cracked. “Good. I was starting to feel underappreciated.”

Eventually, Velocity peeled off with the PRT team and its drones, vanishing in a blur—but not before casting one last glance his way. Not suspicion. Not respect, either.

Assessment.

Then, silence. Smoke curling in the wind. Sirens fading.

Behind him, a ruined deli’s door creaked open.

A man peered out; a heavyset figure in a stained apron, face flushed with fear, eyes scanning the street for any remaining danger. Behind him, others followed: mothers clutching soot-streaked children, teens gripping pipes or broken chair legs like they might still need them, a limping dog weaving between boots.

They’d been hiding.

Hoping.

“Is it over?” the deli owner asked. His voice cracked halfway through the question.

Gojo didn’t turn fully, just enough to be heard. “Depends. You got any more screaming metal boxes you want to throw at me?”

The man just stared, his words catching in his throat. A beat passed. Then, slowly, he set down a cleaver he had been holding behind the door and took an uncertain step forward.

“You… you saved us,” he said. His voice wavered—half awe, half disbelief. “You stopped her.”

Gojo blinked. “No I didn’t.”

“You—”

“She rammed into me,” Gojo interrupted, tone flat. “That’s all.”

Another voice, thinner and younger, from his left: “That thing would’ve crushed us all if you hadn’t been here.”

Gojo’s brow twitched under the blindfold.

A girl stepped forward—skinny, scabbed knees, eyes too wide for her face. Thirteen, maybe. “We saw it,” she said, quiet but clear. “You didn’t even flinch. You’re… you’re a hero, right?”

Gojo sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose, exasperation evident. 

The crowd pressed closer now. Tentative thank-yous. A few hands extended. Someone murmured about “PR coverage.” A toddler wandered up, solemnly holding out a cracked action figure—some obscure cape, one arm missing and face half melted.

Gojo stepped back like it burned.

“I didn’t do this for you,” he said simply.

“But you did something,” the girl insisted. “That makes you a hero, doesn’t it?”

Gojo looked down at her. She looked up at him like he was a comic book come to life. Like he could do no wrong.

And that, somehow, hit harder than Squealer’s car.

He didn’t show it. Just smiled the way he always did—like it was easy, like nothing touched him. But inside, something shifted.

She didn’t know what she was looking at. Not really.

He wasn’t a hero. He was a weapon with a conscience that didn’t always work. He’d watched friends die. Watched people fall apart. Made choices no kid should ever admire.

And still—

That look.

Like he could save everyone. Like he would.

He almost told her not to.

Not to look at him like that.

Not to believe in someone who didn’t believe in himself half the time.

Instead, he crouched. Leaned in just enough to make her flinch. And gave her the truth.

Because it was better than letting her lie to herself.

“I’m stronger than a hero,” he said.

She blinked.

“I don’t need a badge. Or a slogan. I don’t pretend to save everyone.” He rose again, winking. “I just win.”

Silence followed. Not the relieved kind. The other kind. The cold kind. The kind that always follows words no one wanted to hear.

Then:

“…Monster.”

It came from the crowd, soft but exceedingly sharp. 

Gojo stilled. A small tilt of the head to the side, like maybe he hadn’t heard right.

He turned.

An older woman stood at the edge of the group. She had one arm around a boy—maybe her son, maybe not. Her expression wasn’t angry. Just tired. Hollowed out in that quiet way people get when they’ve survived far too many bad days in a row.

She didn’t repeat herself. But she didn’t look away either.

“You didn’t try to protect us,” she said. “You just stood there, watching. Unimpressed.”

Gojo gave her a smile—thin, humorless. The kind that cut more than it comforted.

“If I were really a monster,” he said, “you wouldn’t be here to complain.”

She didn’t flinch.

Neither did he.

But something shifted in the space between them. Not the air. Something quieter.

An ugly thought, buried deep, surfaced.

Is this how they looked at Suguru?

He dismissed it. Instinct. But it lingered.

He turned before anyone else could speak. Before the thank-yous and the questions and the awe had a chance to return, or worse, turn to scorn.

The crowd parted.

Some called after him.

Most didn’t.

He walked down the ruined street alone, his steps crunching through broken glass and the cleanup crew at work.

A block away, out of sight, he stopped.

He stood in the shadow of a collapsed billboard—half-burnt, peeling, some forgotten ad for a brand that probably didn't matter anymore—and stared at nothing.

The wind tugged at the edges of his “borrowed” coat. Sirens wailed in the distance.

Gojo let out a breath.

“Monster, huh?” he murmured.

A smile tugged at his lips.

But this time, it didn’t reach his eyes.