Chapter Text

AN: Special fangz (get it, coz Im goffik) 2 my gf (ew not in that way) nanami, bloodybread7:3 4 helpin me wif da story and spelling. MCR ROX!

Hi my name is Satoru Light’ness Dementia Raven Way and I have short ivory white hair (that’s how I got my name) with purple streaks and red tips that reaches my shoulder and icy blue eyes like limpid tears and a lot of people tell me I look like Anderson Cooper (AN: if u don’t know who he is get da hell out of here!). I’m not related to Gerard Way but I wish I was because he’s a major fucking hottie. I’m a vampire but my teeth are straight and white. I have pale white skin. I’m also a sorcerer, and I go to a magic school called Jujutsu High in Tokyo where I’m in the third year (I’m nineteen). I’m a goth (in case you couldn’t tell) and I wear mostly black (or like, a dark navy maybe? it’s kind of up to interpretation). I love Hot Topic and I buy all my clothes from there. For example today I was wearing a black corset with matching lace around it and a black leather miniskirt, pink fishnets and black combat boots. I was wearing black lipstick, white foundation, black eyeliner and red eyeshadow. I was walking outside Jujutsu High, it was snowing and raining so there was no sun, which I was very happy about. A lot of preps stared at me. I put up my middle finger at them.

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AN: IS it good? PLZ tell me fangz!

-:-

“Satoru?”

He remembers the white snow; cold and biting.

“Satoru?!”

He remembers the white sun; too dim and too low in the sky.

“Sato-”

He remembers -

Actually, not fucking much after that.

-:-

Satoru wakes to the soft rumble of jet engines and a splitting pain in his head. It’s a cacophonous duet; a silvery, scraping melody tarnished by rust. Like a - can we pretend that airplanes in the night sky are like shooting stars-

“Hey, easy-”

“Fuck-”

The world lurches and Satoru almost pukes. A sharp spear of pain rams through his temple, like B.o.B. coming in with the rap verse - yo, I could use a dream or a genie or a wish-

Satoru could use an icepick lobotomy. Or general anesthesia. Or at least an ibuprofen. He clutches his head, hoping that the pressure will do something, anything. But his hands fall on a soft, thick, cloth, and oh, yeah, it’s dark, it’s so dark-

“Satoru-”

He curses, he scrabbles at the cloth, he flinches as tougher hands grab his, pulling them down.

“Calm down.”

Yuki. She’s a quiet hum over the engines, slipping beneath the pain in his head. She’s close, but she sounds too far - echoey, almost. She sounds… wrong.

“You’re fine.”

Satoru doesn’t feel fine. He feels kind of like a shooting star. And Hayley Williams probably didn’t know - when she wrote those lyrics - that shooting stars are just meteors burning up in the atmosphere, and it’s kinda fucked to wish that on airplanes, especially if they’re carrying people.

“Yuki-” he tries. It’s too much, immediately. The throb in his head spikes back up into something sharp, something stabbing- “Fuck.”

“Don’t move around so much.” A weight on his chest - her hand - pushes him back down into a seat that’s a little too stiff and too straight-backed. “And don’t move your head.”

Right. His head.

Did he hit his head?

He hit his head, didn’t he?

“...Okay,” Satoru says dumbly, settling back into the uncomfortable seat.“Are we-” Satoru almost pukes as the world lurches forward. A strap around his waist saves him from lurching with it - a seatbelt.

Ok, so they’re definitely on the plane - Yuki’s jet. But he doesn’t feel like he’s stuck in a kaleidoscope. He doesn’t feel like-

“Oh, shit,” Satoru gasps.

The world only comes back to him in pieces. Shattered, the way he left it. Like a jigsaw puzzle dumped out onto the floor. And he’s missing pieces now - six of them, to be precise.

“We’re going home,” Yuki explains gently - it sounds like she’s whispering, but at the volume you might whisper to, like, a deaf person. “Back to Tokyo,” she’s screaming through a megaphone, but Satoru can barely parse her words. “Shoko said she’d take a look at you.”

Satoru struggles to speak; he struggles even more to think. It should be easier, since he’s not drowning in vibrations - a million energy packets bouncing around in this tiny metal tin. But even with the Six Eyes MIA, Satoru feels woozy. His brain is underwater, bobbing up and down on the waves like a buoy. Or maybe like a dead fish.

“If she can’t fix it,” Yuki says, “we’ll go to-”

“She will.”

“...Yeah. She will.”

Satoru swallows awkwardly around the lump in his throat, which is something Shoko couldn’t fix even if she wanted to. It’s gonna be shit to return to Tokyo Jujutsu High and face the storm that’s been brewing there over the past months. But it’d be even more shit to go Kyoto and face a whole fucking typhoon.

It’s a funny thing, coming home - when home is where everyone hates you.

Maybe that’s part of why Satoru feels like he might throw up.

If hate is what makes a home, though, then at least Gojo Satoru is a card-carrying, multiple-deed-having homeowner. He’s got a primary residence - Tokyo Jujutsu Tech - but then he’s also got vacation homes at all three major clan estates, plus a timeshare at the Kyoto college campus. Maybe he’s even got something in Canada now, since they had to endure him for months. Gojo Satoru is, like, the Mr. Worldwide of being hated. Maybe all landlords are.

“Here.” Yuki gently touches his wrist. She unfolds his hand, which has been clenched into a fist since the plane lurched - maybe since he woke up. Yuki places two tiny… things in his palm. They’re light, and they’re oval.

“Take these. I’ve got water too.” Pills. Okay, sure. “They’ll put you to sleep. Well-” Two more join the first two. “They’d put most people to sleep.”

Satoru’s always been tricky like that, courtesy of the Six Eyes. They don’t like impurities in his bloodstream. They don’t care for soporifics, either. Anything that dulls his senses just puts him on high alert.

“It should help, at least,” Yuki says.

But fuck the Six Eyes.

Satoru swallows them dry, all four in one go.

There’s no supernatural bullshit stopping him now. So Satoru will take the milk of the poppy, he’ll drive a knife right into his unarmored heel. Wherever the Six Eyes have gone, they can stay a little longer.

“I’ll… Shit, Satoru.” She curses again under her breath. Satoru can’t quite make it out. “Yeah. I’ll wake you up when we get there.” Yuki places a water bottle in his hand, wrapping his numb fingers around the crinkly plastic. “Drink something. You need fluids.”

“Yeah. ‘Kay.” Satoru gulps down as much water as he can manage. Which isn’t much. His throat is scratchy, sore from where the dry pills raked down his esophagus. The water helps, but it’s something in his stomach, and he still feels like he’s going to puke. He clutches the bottle too hard, and lukewarm water spills over his hand.

“Shit…” he mumbles. The water bottle is taken from his hand, delicately. He can’t hear where it goes. A coaster somewhere, maybe. Or in one of those dumb, way-too-tight little basket nets on the side of his seat.

“I’ll get you some electrolytes,” Yuki says, slightly muffled. Maybe over her shoulder, maybe as she walks away. Satoru doesn’t know why she gets quieter, only that she does.

It’s weird, not being able to see her. Even if Satoru’s pretty sure he can picture the look on her face - lips curled down, eyebrows scrunched together, and her eyes - supernaturally calm, dusty rose spinning out around a bottomless black hole.

That look is burned into his memory now, like a dead pixel on a screen. It’s a tiny black dot, a little scar that ruins the rest of the movie if you look too close. It’s a void, a black sink, a gravity well - pulling pulling pulling - at his mind, at his memories, at his peripheral vision.

It’s the look she gave him in Montreal.

-:-

It was in that weird time between late fall and early winter. Warm enough that Suguru hadn’t piled extra blankets over the bed yet, and there was still sunlight trickling in through the window well into the afternoon. It was a Saturday - Satoru remembers that, because his body was still sore from Friday missions, and because he’d slept in until almost eight. It was one of those days when Suguru stayed in bed past lunch. when Satoru bullied his way in, promising not to be too loud or too funny or too irresistible. It was one of those times when Suguru let him in.

So Satoru sits up against the headrest with his book, and Suguru lies down on his side with his earbuds in, and they manage to fit in the too-small space. Suguru’s back presses up against the wall so he can keep a centimeter or two between his face and Satoru’s awkwardly-folded legs. But every time he breathes, the distance oscillates. He gets a few millimeters closer, and then a few millimeters further away again. Not that Satoru’s thinking about that, not even in the back of his mind.

Satoru reads his favorite book, while Suguru listens to his favorite music. Well, Satoru doesn’t know if it’s his favorite - just that it’s his patent-pending Emo Pop Sadboy Shit. And it’s muffled through his earbuds, so Satoru can hear the punchy, slide-y guitar, but he can’t make out the words. He’s not doing great with words tight now. He tries to read, but the letters just swim in front of his eyes, because there’s TV snow pulling at the Six Eyes, saying ‘hey, look at me stare at me watch me until the colors repeat until they all turn white until you figure out a pattern-’

And he never does. Suguru’s cursed energy never looks quite the same. It’s a whirlpool, spinning and spinning with turbulent colors. It never repeats itself, it never settles into a pattern. Bright streaks pop up, surfacing like fish jumping out of the water, and then they dive back in, splashing back through Suguru’s sea of soft, white cursed energy. It’s infinite, and random - truly random, if the Six Eyes has never managed to figure out its sequence. But it wants to try, even if it’s futile. That’s why he can’t look away.

So Satoru stares, leaving the book forgotten in his lap - sepia tossed aside for the rainbow swirl of colors ebbing in Suguru’s chest. Satoru sticks his bookmark between the pages, somewhere left of center. He stares as the energy ebbs and blooms. He stares as colors swim up to the surface, blue and red and green and pink. He stares as Suguru’s chest rises, and all the curses within do too, rocking back and forth to Suguru’s soft, slumbering breaths.

And Satoru wonders what it might be like several worlds away.

He wonders what it might be like in Suguru’s dreams.

If it’s scary, or if it’s just strange. If they’re in sepia, or if they’re in full color. If he’s a main character, or a guest star, or if he’s even there at all.

If they’re anything like Satoru’s own.

-:-

His head’s not right when he wakes up.

Not that it ever really is, but normally that’s just ‘cause of the trauma and shit. Normally he’s perfectly fine, like, cognitively and shit. His morality’s fucked, but he’s good to go, like, capacity wise. But right now, Satoru can’t even think straight. He also can’t see.

“What happened?”

“We - he tried using reverse cursed technique, and-”

“It’s always fucking-”

“It blew back on him.”

“Why is it always fucking RCT with you?””

“Oh, shit. His eyes-”

“Can’t you just leave that to me?”

Sit up, sit up - Shoko says something like that. Satoru doesn’t really hear it - at least, not as real words. His whole body convulses, rejecting this sudden coup against gravity and its established rule over his body. Stronger, rougher hands than his pull him up off of the hard cot. Yuki.

Easy, easy - Yuki says something like that - breathe, breathe. Satoru doesn’t have a choice but to tilt upright. The world doesn’t feel right this way. But it hasn’t, not for a while. He heaves out shuddering breaths - Yuki’s hands on his back, Shoko’s hands on his chest.

His head spins.

“Easy.”

His chest shakes.

“His jujutsu is all fucked, his-it’s-”

His stomach turns over.

“-I can barely feel his cursed energy.”

His head still hurts a little.

“What? That can’t - I mean this is Satoru.”

“Yeah. I know. But it’s like…”

“...Like he’s not-?”

“No-”

“There’s something. He’s not… I don’t think it’s gone. He’s still a sorcerer. He still has the… the parts.”

And his heart still hurts a lot.

“But, it’s like…”

“It’s like he’s empty.”

“Burned out.”

Still works, though - see, that’s the thing.

“It’ll come back.”

Satoru kinda wishes it didn’t work.

“I think.”

‘Cause maybe it’d stop hurting, if he broke it for real.

-:-

So then Suguru’s eyes slide open, as soft as crushed velvet. And it’s all violet petals, light and sweet over Satoru’s brittle porcelain. Suguru’s gaze drags over him, slipping and catching in all his hairline cracks. Suguru measures the expanse of him, limitless - directionless as he spins out. And Satoru’s hands shake badly enough that he almost drops the book he hasn’t even been pretending to read.

Doesn’t matter anymore. He’s been caught red-handed. Whatever plausible deniability the book might’ve given him - it’s not enough to explain the way he’s been staring, greedy and unblinking and shameless and entitled and completely fucking gross.

Satoru’s breathing goes shallow, frantic-

And then Suguru smiles.

And then Satoru’s breathing stops.

Suguru’s lips curl at the edges, and he slowly meets Satoru’s trespassing eyes. Satoru’s dumb lips fall open into some dumb gape that might have been a precursor to talking - like, saying actual words. Ideally in a coherent sentence. It’s the first term in an undefined series, a math problem he hasn’t solved yet: how to sound like a real human being when he talks to Suguru. But right now, Satoru doesn’t even remember how to talk at all. He just uselessly coughs up air.

Suguru snorts.

“You’re such a fucking freak...”

Ice lances through Satoru’s chest. But then Suguru yawns, and his pretty lips close back into a real smile, bigger and warmer than before. And the ice melts a little. Just a little.

Suguru lifts himself up on his elbows. His bare torso rises up from the sheets, catching all the golden, afternoon sun in its creases. Long black hair swirls down around his shoulders, tangling over his triceps. Suguru leans towards him, and Satoru chokes on whatever air is left in his lungs. Suguru’s cursed energy billows out, warm and white as steam, tickling over Satoru’s trembling throat. He chokes on that too.

“Were you just… watching me? For, like,” he glances at the clock on his bedside table, “an hour?”

It is freaky. Satoru is a freak. But he’s trying not to be. He’s learning - he can figure it out, he just needs time -

“Sorry-” Satoru manages to gasp, despite the vacuum in his lungs. “I’m sorry.”

Lessons in Normal: you’re not supposed to just sit and watch people sleep. That is certified freak shit. And Satoru knows that it’s certified freak shit. It’s just - it’s easy to forget, because Suguru is so easy to get sucked into. His cursed energy swirls like a galaxy, sparkling and spinning for a million million years, endless and infinite. He’d blame the Six Eyes, but he knows that the real offender is trapped somewhere in his ribcage. And arresting it won’t do anyone any favors, unless Shoko wants to learn how to do an EKG.

“I wasn’t, uh-” Satoru stutters, “Well, I was watching you sleep. But not, like. Not because-” he chokes, “Not like that, I promise. I wasn’t like, y’know-”

“Hey, chill.”

“Your cursed energy is just-” Satoru rambles, pushing out as many words as he can before his throat collapses in on itself. “It’s just really pretty. Um-” he chokes, “Like, pretty interesting - I meant interesting. Especially when you’re asleep, because you don’t control it as well, and, uh-” he coughs, “And it’s really colorful, unlike mine, ‘cause-”

“Satoru,” Suguru interrupts. He puts his hand on Satoru’s thigh, squeezing gently. “I don’t give a shit if you watch me, okay?”

“Oh.” Satoru gulps. “...Okay?” The pressure on his throat lessens, just a little. It’s easier to speak. It’s not any easier to find the words. “Then…”

“It just…” Suguru shrugs, “Seems boring, that’s all.”

“You’re not boring,” Satoru says a little too quickly.

“You know uh,” Suguru scratches the back of his neck. His jaw flexes awkwardly, chewing on the words like taffy - sticky and lemony. “You know you really don’t have to stay, right? I don’t-”

“I don’t mind staying.”

“-mind if you leave.”

“...I wanna be here with you,” Satoru says, “Whenever you need me, I’m - I’m right here, okay?”

Suguru’s smile twists into something complicated, something unreadable. His cursed energy shifts, green and blue trickling out from his wrist.

“You don’t have to babysit me, Satoru. Seriously, I promise I’m not gonna-” he shakes his head, “I’ll be fine.”

“I know, I know,” Satoru insists, “It’s not that, Suguru. I know - I wasn’t saying-” Satoru blindly fumbles for better words. He comes up with a mismatched set. “I just like - with you - um, being-”

“...What?” Amusement flickers over Suguru’s lips. And he leans in, close, too close- “Was that actually Japanese or just gibberish?”

Satoru feels Suguru’s body heat ping against his skin, wild and buzzing and alive.

“I just-” Satoru stammers. Suddenly, the neck of his t-shirt feels so tight it may as well be a turtleneck. “I like-”

-watching you sleeping and watching you breathing and watching how your cursed energy changes colors when you’re dreaming about something you’ll never remember and I’ll never know-

“I-I-”

-and fuck he can’t say that-

“I like being in the same room as you,” Satoru blurts.

-and FUCK he is bad at this-

Suguru laughs.

“...Okay,” he shakes his head. “Yeah, sure.” His voice is rough, still a little raspy from sleep, but his smile shines like smooth, polished sea glass.

“I mean, you can stay, obviously.” Suguru dips, moving like silk - silent and graceful. He lays his head in Satoru’s lap, rolling over so he can look up into Satoru’s dumb, gaping face.

“As long as you’re good with being a pillow.”

-:-

“Hey.”

Suguru.

It’s Suguru’s voice.

Maybe his real one, maybe just the one in Satoru’s dreams. He’s not sure, and he’s not sure that he cares. Satoru rolls over onto his side, vaguely pointing his face in the direction of the door. His ribs scream like they’re gonna give out, but Satoru’s mattress isn’t nearly firm enough for that. It’s barely firm enough for him to sleep on.

“...It’s me,” Suguru says.

Like Satoru wouldn’t recognize his voice from a single syllable.

“Shoko… said I should come see you,” he continues, soft and… and strange. “She said you’d, uh… probably be lucid."

But every sound is echoey now, bouncing around inside his head. And now there’s no supernatural detector to capture the signal. He doesn’t have half the coordinates he’d need to triangulate Suguru’s location, and he feels so far away.

“I... Uh, I hope I didn’t wake you up.”

“No, I-” Satoru weakly pushes himself up, and fuck, his head still hurts.

“It’s ok,” Satoru says through gritted teeth. He takes it one elbow at a time, fumbling for the headboard. “It’s fine,” he says, hauling himself upright. “I was awake.”

It’s half lie, half truth. Satoru’s not sure if he’s sleeping, or just super fucking out of it. He doesn’t feel particularly rested. He feels kind of like he got hit by a car, or maybe by a fucking sleigh. Trampled by a herd of reindeer, left for dead in a snowdrift two meters deep. And now that his pummeled body is thawed, it’s starting to rot. Merry Christmas, kids.

“I uh - Shoko sent me with stuff. For you-” Suguru trips over his words - “For uh - the Six Eyes shit.”

“Oh, yeah, uh… Okay.”

“Can I-” Suguru hesitates, “Is it alright if I come in?”

Can he-

When’s the last time-

He never had to ask.

“Yeah…” Satoru mumbles, his voice hums a little, like he’s vibrating in resonance - like his chest is as hollow as it suddenly feels. “Of course,” Satoru adds, and: “Duh.”

“Well,” Footsteps - blurry and light and barely loud enough to hear. If he had the Six Eyes…

Well, he fucking doesn’t.

“I didn’t wanna assume…” Suguru says, soft and stilted and… empty.

“...Anything, I guess.” Like he might be hollow too.

There’s a weight, and the far end of the mattress dips down. Satoru straightens - as much as he can. He turns vaguely towards the spot where Suguru must be sitting.

“How long have I been…” Satoru falters.

How long has he been what, exactly? Asleep? In Tokyo? Blind?

“...It’s been a few days since you got here,” Suguru starts, gentle like he’s not sure if the words will break him. But a few days isn’t so bad. It’s not as bad as it could be. It doesn’t seem so bad at all, really. He figured he’d be hungrier. Satoru nods, instantly cringing as his head throbs.

“Hey,” Suguru scolds, “Careful.”

“I know, I just-” Satoru stops himself from shaking his head. He shrugs instead, which still hurts, but less. “Habit.”

“Bad habit,” Suguru huffs. A little smile tugs Satoru’s lips up.

“Yes, Geto-sensei.” He ducks his head in a tiny, slightly head-hurting bow. “Noted.”

“...How are you feeling?” Suguru asks, his voice still plagued by that strange note. Satoru gets the funny feeling that he’s not smiling too.

“I’m okay,” Satoru says, swallowing down the strangeness. “What about you?”

“I’m fine,” Suguru says.

And he usually says that, and usually it’s a lie, and usually Satoru can tell, because he can see Suguru’s face or how his body tenses up or if colors streaking through his cursed energy turn red-

“You cut your hair.”

“What?”

“It’s shorter now,” Suguru says simply. Like - like they’re just talking. About the weather - partially cloudy, maybe a bit of wind. “Just the bottom?” Suguru says, and he’s closer now - Satoru can hear it, even without the Six Eyes. And he leans in, and Satoru feels his body heat almost-

“...It’s so short.”

“Yeah” Satoru splutters, feeling his own skin heat up. “It’s-”

“Can I touch it?”

“-it’s better for hats.”

Satoru feels like he can’t breathe. He squeaks: “Yeah, sure, yeah.”

He tilts his head. Suguru’s fingers brush up against his undercut. It’s gentle, gentle, and-

And then it’s gone.

“It’s soft,” Suguru says, too quiet.

Satoru’s heart lurches into his stomach. What’s wrong, what’s wrong-

“It looks good,” Suguru murmurs.

“Thanks, I-”

“Um, I have-”

“Sorry,” Satoru mumbles. And-

And Satoru feels so fucking lost. He fucking hates it. Hates not being able to see Suguru, or anyone else. At the best of times, Satoru feels like an alien. He doesn’t speak the human language, and he’s not even great at mimicking the way it sounds. It’s so foreign he can barely understand it. And blind, he can’t even try to lip-read.

“No,” Suguru insists, “You go.”

“It wasn’t important.” Satoru says with a wince. It’s not like he “Just - just a dumb joke. It was stupid.”

Suguru snorts. “That’s never stopped you before.” And for the first time, he sounds... Almost normal.

Not quite, but close.

And Satoru can picture it - well, he can try: the small, lazy smile playing at the corner of Suguru’s lips. Maybe a little smaller than normal. The false annoyance in his eyes. Maybe a little less false than he’d like. The reluctant agreement to be the straight man. Maybe in more ways than one.

“I was gonna say-” Satoru tries to smile. He probably misses the mark. “I was gonna say, ‘Thanks, I grew it myself.’ But it’s funnier if you say that about, like, your dick.”

Satoru hears him chuckle, but it’s echoey, faraway. Like he’s standing at the end of an empty hallway. Like there’s meters between them, not centimeters. Like there’s something between them, something that’s somehow both heavy and hollow.

“Because you actually grow hair,” Satoru adds, just to fill the odd silence, “So like-”

There’s just -

“-that’d be funnier.”

Something wrong.

“I have pills,” Suguru says, before Satoru can ask what’s wrong. Before he can even figure out how to ask. “And water, too.” Suguru adds. “Doctor’s orders. And I have a sleep mask, if you want, instead of the bandages.”

Satoru nods dumbly. He immediately regrets it.

“Ow, fuck-”

“Hey,” Suguru’s hand lands on his shoulder - a soft, muted weight. Satoru doesn’t even flinch from the suddenness of it. He steadies Satoru, he sets him upright. “Don’t do that, dumbass,” he whispers, soft soft soft.

“Yeah, yeah,” Satoru mumbles. “I know.”

Suguru gently uncurls Satoru’s bony fingers and places a little pile of pills into his hand.

“These are-”

Satoru cups his hand, bringing the pills to his mouth, and swallows them all down dry.

“...sleeping pills,” he finishes. Suguru sighs. “Here,” he presses a light plastic bottle into Satoru’s hand. Water. “Shoko told me to make sure you finish the bottle, so. Drink up.”

“Okay, mom.” Satoru says. He attempts to roll his eyes, even though a.) Suguru couldn’t even see if he did, and b.) shit ow that fucking hurts. He takes a sip first. It’s sweet, probably laced with electrolytes. He can’t feel them going into his bloodstream like normal, but he can taste the fake mixed-berry flavor. Satoru chugs the bottle, crushing it with a mini Blue when it’s empty, like always, except fuck-

Satoru drops the bottle, clutching his left hand. It feels like fire racing up his veins, vaporizing his blood, leaving only ash in his hollowed-out flesh.

Why the fuck does everything hurt?

Satoru’s never been hurt by his own jujutsu - even heaven is turning against him now.

“Ow-”

“Woah,” Suguru says. “Hey-” He feels movement on the bed, Suguru shifts his weight, and -

Nothing.

Satoru’s not sure what he’s waiting for.

He just knows it doesn’t come.

“Um…” He feels Suguru’s weight shift again, farther away. “You probably shouldn’t be using jujutsu. Shoko said…” Suguru pauses. “Well, Shoko said she didn’t know if you’d be able to. But… I don’t think you should push it. It-” his voice goes stiff, odd, “You might - might not be… in control of it right now. You could - it could be dangerous.”

He knows that. Satoru knows that, obviously. When you make little black holes for a living, you get real familiar with ‘collateral damage’. And drywall repair.

But he’s not out of control. He needs to recalibrate, probably, but he’s not shooting from the hip here. Control is… Satoru’s good at control. With jujutsu, anyway.

“Here,” Suguru says, interrupting, “I have a sleep mask, if you want. I can - I thought the bandages might bother you.” Suguru passes a piece of cloth into his hands. His voice softens, smoothing down some of its sharp, odd edges. “I thought this might be softer.”

It’s satin - that’s Satoru’s guess. It feels soft and smooth, a little slippery. Without the Six Eyes, it’s hard to identify. There are no stray fibers tugging at his senses like thorns. It’s definitely softer than the bandages, though. And those are starting to get damp with sweat.

“Um, yeah,” Satoru murmurs, “Thanks.” He reaches blindly for the back of his head, trying to find where the bandage wrap starts or ends.

“Oh, I can - I can help take those off,” Suguru offers, “If you want.”

“Yeah,” Satoru agrees, “That would, uh, that would be nice.”

He ducks his head so that Suguru can find wherever Shoko neatly tucked in the end. He finds it pretty quickly, and Satoru feels the bindings loosen. It comes off in long strips. Bit by bit, the pressure on his eyes lessens, until he feels weightless. Satoru tenses, prepared to be assaulted by the dull bedroom light. He takes a breath, and then he slowly opens his eyes. And…

There’s nothing.

“...Oh,” Suguru whispers.

Nothing at all.

Just blackness.

Blackness, not darkness. It’s not the absence of light, but the absence of any signal at all. The connection is severed, or at least blocked.

“...Huh,” Satoru murmurs, “Cool… That’s, uh… That’s cool.”

“You can’t see, can you?”

“Nope,” Satoru says, popping the P. Which is impressive, given how badly his lips are wobbling.

“It’ll come back,” Suguru says. “If your jujutsu is back, it’s all gonna come back. That’s what Shoko said. Or - something like that. I don’t know. But you can’t push it, okay? You need to take it slow.” He squeezes Satoru’s shoulders, his touch muted through whatever cotton t-shirt Satoru’s been sweating through for days.

“Okay,” Satoru mumbles dumbly.

“Promise me you won’t push yourself?” Suguru asks. And for a moment, all the strangeness is stripped away, and his voice is just - worry, worry and - and something else beneath that. A fire - one that doesn’t burn.

“Yeah,” Satoru says, barely catching himself before he fucks up and nods again. “I promise.”

“Good,” Suguru says, relieved. He pulls away. The little fire goes out.

“How, uh…” Satoru chokes back a stupid little sob. His lips still wobble. “So, h-how do I look?”

Suguru snorts. “Don’t worry, you’re still pretty.”

Pretty… He doesn’t mean it. He can’t mean it. He doesn’t even sound like he means it, not really - he sounds sarcastic, more than anything - but-

But Satoru feels his heart skip a beat anyway.

“Your eyes are…different.”

“Oh.” Satoru bites his lip. “Are they-”

“I’m sure they’ll go back,” Suguru says quickly. “It’s just-”

“Are they like, fucked up?”

“No,” Suguru says, “No. I mean, kind of, but not like - scarred or anything. They’re just… not blue anymore. They’re grey. Or - silver, I guess.”

“Oh,” he says again. It makes sense. He doesn’t have the Six Eyes, so he doesn’t have their pretty magical glow anymore either. Without his jujutsu, he’s just… colorless.

“I should-

“Do you-” Satoru stops, “Sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Suguru says.

“I’m sorry. I just - I can’t see you, so,” Satoru blubbers, “I keep interrupting-”

“Satoru.” Suguru says gently, “Seriously, it’s fine. Do I what?”

Satoru takes a deep breath, and it feels too big to hold. Like a gust of wind, rushing through some shrine in the mountains; one that’s been abandoned, one where the stone paths are blotted out by mildew and moss, one where the wooden gate has rotted through.

“...Do you hate me now?” Satoru asks, too small to hold the gale in his chest. Maybe as small as he’s ever been in his whole life.

Suguru doesn’t answer, not for a long, long moment. Long enough that Satoru feels even smaller. Any smaller, and he’d be sub-atomic.

It’s okay if he does.

Hate him, Satoru means. It’s okay if Suguru hates him. It’d be understandable. Satoru wouldn’t hold it against him.

Maybe Satoru should tell him it’s okay. Maybe-

“...I’ll never hate you, Satoru. You know that.”

But he should. He really should. Satoru knows that. And maybe Suguru knows it too, now.

“Oh, don’t cry, Satoru,” Suguru whispers.

S-stupid-

“I’m not-” Satoru protests. It’s not until he feels Suguru’s thumb brush the tears away that he accepts that he’s crying. Small tears, silent tears. He can barely feel them on his face. His eyes burn, but they’ve been burning for a week at least; now it’s basically just embers left in his eye sockets.

“Hey, it’s okay,” Suguru says, and - and oh-

Suguru’s hand cups his cheek, so gentle with him even when he’s horrible and stupid and weak. It’s nothing but soft warmth and sturdy mass, like a weighted blanket, like Shelly curling up for a nap on his chest. There’s no cursed energy, no frenetic ions, no jagged, rough edges scraping at his skin. There’s no burning, no freezing, no static, no stinging, just-

Just touch.

Just normal, human touch.

This is what normal feels like, isn’t it? Simple, uncomplicated, warm.

This is what normal people have. This is what they get all the time. If they want. If Satoru was normal, he’s not sure if he’d ever want anything else. He’s not sure if he’d ever be able to stop touching Suguru - if Suguru let him. He’s not normal, though, so he can’t have this, and that only makes him want it so, so much more. He wants simple, even if it’s a lie. He wants uncomplicated, even if it’s impossible. And he wants warmth, even if he doesn’t deserve it, even if it burns him, as long as it doesn’t burn Suguru too.

He wants-

“Can you-”

Would you kiss me? Just once.

Even if you hate me

Just so I can feel what it’s like. For normal people. For you.

I know I don’t deserve it.

But please?

Please, please-

I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m-

“I should go.”

His hand draws back, and all his warmth along with it.

“W-wait-”

Satoru shoves his own hand on top of Suguru’s, clumsily pinning it in place, back to his cheek. It’s rough and warm, more calloused than he remembers. And there’s nothing he remembers better - or more often, at least - than the feel of Suguru’s hands on his bare skin.

But Suguru won’t love him under duress. Satoru knows that, somewhere in the back of his mind. Suguru’s hand slips out from under his own, like sand through the neck of an hourglass. And it feels like the very last grains, seconds before his world flips upside down.

“You need to rest, Satoru.”

Suguru delicately slips the mask over the crown of Satoru’s head, then fixes it so it isn’t crooked over his eyes. The weak elastic band hugs his head, not too tight. The satin is soft. Not irritating, not scratchy, and not luxuriously silky either. Just. Soft. Normal soft. Satoru feels the mattress shift as Suguru dips back into his space, silent the whole time.

“I should - I’ll go.”

“Suguru-” his voice trembles.

Suguru’s ruffles through the shaggy hair on the top of his head, the part he didn’t trim down to fit under a double-layered winter beanie.

“Get some sleep, Satoru.”

“...Okay.”

Satoru drops back into the pillows, letting the sleep mask soak up his tears.

“I’ll, uh…”

Suguru’s already halfway to the door or so. It’s hard to tell. His footsteps are too soft. He knows how to be silent when he wants to - for missions and stuff. It’s just that that stuff doesn’t work on the Six Eyes. But it works on Just Satoru, apparently, when he’s blind and deaf and colorless.

“I’ll see you around.”

“Yeah,” Satoru mumbles, “See ya.”

Satoru smushes his face into the pillows until he hears the door slide open. Seconds later, he hears it slide shut.

-:-

“Read to me.”

Satoru’s not sure if he can read anymore.

He probably can’t even see straight.

Because Geto Suguru, sleepy, smiling, splayed over his lap - that feels like it must be a hallucination.

It feels unreal, like a dream you don’t want to wake up from. It feels… hazardous, like carrying in all the groceries in one go, your hands so full of soda bottles and paper towels that something’s bound to drop. It feels delicate, fragile, breakable, like a nervous animal that you don’t want to spook. Like a rabbit, or a squirrel, or a baby deer - breathing hard and fast and watching you with sideways-pointed eyes, and the second you move, it just bolts.

Except Suguru’s breathing is slow and happy, and his eyes are pointed right into Satoru’s, like he’s the only thing in Suguru’s entire field of view.

But just in case, Satoru doesn’t make any sudden moves.

“...What?” he says, slowly (intentionally) and dumbly (unintentionally - he’s just like that).

Suguru sighs and grabs his book from where Satoru buried it in the comforter - an unmarked grave. It’s thick (or as Satoru would say, “thiccc with three Cs”), because it's a small format paperback, so they need a lot more width, y’know? And hardcovers are unwieldy, and Satoru doesn’t need his words printed in a huge font with ridiculous margins, and Satoru has a lot of books, and not a lot of space.

“Read to me,” Suguru pushes the book into his useless, numb fingers. “Unless you don’t want to.”

“I thought - but you - you like listening to music, right? When you’re - on bad days, I mean.”

And Satoru’s voice isn’t particularly musical. It’s a little - it’s been called grating, by some. Sometimes. Some have called it that. (Shoko. Who isn’t exactly charitable, but she is honest)

“Sometimes,” Suguru says, shrugging in a way that moves his perfect, bronzed shoulders over Satoru’s thighs. His hair spills out over Satoru’s legs in dark, inky tendrils. Shiny, polished onyx against Satoru’s cloudy quartz skin. “Not always,” he says. “Figured I’d change it up.”

“...You don’t even like fantasy,” Satoru mumbles.

“I like listening to you, though.”

He-

“Well…” Suguru purses his lips.

He likes-

“Sometimes,” he caveats, rolling his eyes.

And Satoru’s just supposed to pretend like his heart isn’t trying to leap out of his throat?

“Satoru? Are you still in there?”

Because it is. In fact, Satoru’s heart is going for Olympic gold in gymnastics. It gets a running start, pounding out of his chest. And then it vaults all the way up into his mouth. And his brain, it seems, is trying to medal in diving.

“I’m in your mom,” Satoru blurts out.

Yep. That’s it. That’s what comes out. Which is marginally better than if he choked to death on his own tongue. It’s a shitty joke, and probably distasteful because Suguru hasn’t seen his mom in three years (at least three, probably more). But Satoru’s mom is dead, so it’d be even more fucked up the other way around.

Satoru starts: “I mean-”

“Were you, like, actually dropped on your head as a kid?” Suguru laughs.

And it’s okay, it’s okay, because for some reason, Suguru always gives him a 10 - even if he doesn’t stick the landing. Maybe because he’s doping with the Six Eyes, or maybe because the judging committee has been paid off.

“I mean, yeah, I’ll - I’ll read to you,” Satoru says, “If you want me to. But you can’t laugh. Like-” he blushes, “Like, even if you don’t like it. Because - I mean, I know you don’t really like fantasy, but… This one’s good. It’s um…”

“It’s your favorite,” Suguru lets out an amused little snort. “I know.”

Wait-

Why does he know that; how does he know that-

“I won’t laugh, promise.”

“Wait, but-” Satoru huffs, “Why do you think it’s my favorite?”

“Apart from-” he gestures at Satoru’s entirety, “-all that?” Suguru shrugs. “I’ve seen you read it, like, at least three times.”

Six times, actually. This is his seventh. He’s reread the sequel, too - but only four times. And the third one hasn’t come out yet.

But Suguru doesn’t know that.

And Suguru shouldn’t know any of that because Suguru doesn’t read at all so it’s weird that he’s paid attention to what Satoru is reading or what he’s holding or that he recognizes the cover or even the name-

“Maybe I just-” Satoru splutters, “Maybe I never finished it. ‘Cause I hated it so much. I had to like, stop and start a ton.”

“You never quit a book. You always finish reading them, even if you hate them.”

Satoru stares down at him, picking apart his words and his face and looking for any hint that Suguru might actually laugh, even if he says he won’t - and… Suguru doesn’t even squirm under his gaze.

“And you don’t reread a lot of books,” Suguru adds, softer.

“...Yeah,” Satoru mumbles. “I mean, you’re right. It’s my favorite.”

Because it’s fantasy - it’s good fantasy - and Satoru loves fantasy. He loves the worldbuilding - how in fantasy, he can spend a little time in a universe totally unlike their own. And he loves magic, especially when it’s different from his own sorcery.

Satoru loves it most when magic doesn’t look anything like jujutsu at all.

When it’s pretty, and intuitive, and the rules are actually consistent.

When you can understand anything - and control it - as long as you know its name.

“I-I have to start from the beginning, though,” Satoru says, sucking in a nervous breath. “Um. Otherwise you’re not gonna understand anything.”

Suguru chuckles. “You know I’m probably gonna fall asleep, right?”

It’s also his favorite ‘cause like, the protagonist is sort of… different. He’s not big and strong, he doesn’t have a magic greatsword or magic armor or a dead wife. He’s kind of just… a guy. He’s a bard - a storyteller - just some kid with a lute. He’s not a child of prophecy, or the defiant son of a king, or a girl with a bow (which is fine, there’s just a lot of girls with bows in fantasy). He’s just a kid who sees a lot, and thinks a lot, and that’s all he needs to know magic; to control it.

He hasn’t done it all yet. He hasn’t gotten the girl, and he hasn’t learned the name of everything. But he will, Satoru bets, in book three. And maybe - in his own life - Satoru’s still in book two. Maybe he’s still in the prologue.

“Well,” Satoru reasons, “You’re definitely going to fall asleep if you don’t know what’s going on. So…”

Suguru smiles, slow as honey, and Satoru’s heart gets stuck in it - sticky, sweet, and warm. “Whatever,” he sighs, “Knock yourself out.”

So Satoru fumblingly flips to the first page. Not the real first page, because that’s book reviews, and then there’s acknowledgements after that. Satoru’s hands shake as he flips to the important first page - the first page of the story. His lips shake too - as he starts, as he stutters, as he says-

“I-it was n-night again. Um,” Satoru clears his throat. “The Waystone Inn l-lay in silence…”

Suguru’s eyes slip shut, and his cursed energy blooms into the space between them, mingling with Satoru’s own. It’s intoxicating. Potent fumes, frantic energy, and a thousand colors. And then, of course, there’s Suguru’s head in his lap - eyes closed, throat bared, showing all the sides of himself he’s hidden behind walls Satoru didn’t even know if he could peek through, let alone tear down.

But he’s gotten so far, and it’s just - it’s precious, it’s delicate, and Satoru doesn’t know how long he can hold this without breaking it. Because the thing is, he’s only ever been good at breaking things. Because his hands tend to shake sometimes, when he gets nervous. Not that that really explains why he’s so prone to breaking people. Or parts of people. But he is. At least, he must be, with his track record.

Satoru doesn’t want to break this. He doesn’t want Suguru to leave. So he holds his breath, and he tries to stay still, and he swallows it up. He swallows Suguru’s energy until it fills his lungs. He swallows until it starts to choke him. He swallows until he feels light headed.

He swallows until it’s nothing but silence and nothing but stillness. Because it seems like any sound might shatter them like glass, and any shift might send them tumbling down from their low earth orbit. So Satoru stays silent and he stays still, because maybe-

Maybe-

Maybe if he just stays still for the rest of his life then Suguru will stay still too.

“...Wow, is that the whole book?”

Suguru’s eyes slide open - violet, shimmery and soft. He’s brave enough to speak, and delicate enough to not break something like them without meaning to. Suguru stares up at him, and he smirks.

“Well, I can see why you’ve reread it so many times.”

“Shut up,” Satoru huffs, his chest still shaky and overfilled with helium. He flicks Suguru’s temple. “It’s just…” He feels the heat rise into his cheeks. And Suguru probably sees it, because his smile softens.

“Satoru,” Suguru says gently. “I’m not gonna laugh at you.” His cursed energy swirls pink, and it tastes like soapy lavender. “Except when you deserve it.”

And everything slows, everything stills. And everything goes silent, even the ringing in his ears, the buzzing on his skin.

But the silence doesn’t feel deafening.

With Suguru, it just feels like silence.

“Besides…” Suguru’s eyes crinkle at the edges as he grins at Satoru. “I’ll probably fall asleep first.”

“Shut up.” Satoru huffs. He sucks up Suguru’s cursed energy, and his smile, and the light in his eyes. And he swallows it.

And though it’s a little shallow, he starts to breathe.

And though it’s a little shaky, he starts to speak.

“The Waystone Inn lay in silence,” Satoru begins again, “and it was a silence of three parts.”

-:-

Satoru isn’t sure how long he sleeps for. It doesn’t feel like that long when he finally wakes up lucid enough to think about it. But his arms go wobbly when he tries to push himself up. His throat feels like the sandstorm-ravaged desert. And his eyes feel like they’re glued shut under the scratchy sleep mask.

The Six Eyes are back, though.

Ohhh yeah. They’re back alright, and they don’t seem particularly happy to be here. Satoru knows that as soon as he wakes up, because everywhere - everything that touches him feels like concrete scraping against his skin. He tears the sleep mask off, tossing it away from the bed. He instantly recoils. As uncomfortable as the rough satin was, it was his only shield, and now -

“Fuck-”

The light from the windows is bright enough to blind him, even though it can’t be past - he checks the clock - it’s only seven in the morning. The sunlight, blue-tinted and dim, is still cruel enough to sear the Six Eyes. He fumbles to close his blackout curtains - which - he thought he’d left them shut, before he left. He doesn’t remember, though. He remembers most of that night very fucking clearly. But everything after he decided to cut and run has turned to mush. He wasn’t thinking straight. He sure was thinking, though. Say one thing about Gojo Satoru, he’s always thinking. Not that it’s really helped him much.

He falls back into the sheets, blocking his burned eyes with his hands. He counts to six, then sixty, then six-hundred.

It’s tempting to just… stay in his bed until he rots. Satoru already feels like a dead man walking. Maybe he should just save them all the trouble and do some method acting. He’s sure Shoko wouldn’t be too upset. Suguru… Maybe, but he’d get over it, right?

…Nah

They deserve a punching bag, at least.

Satoru takes a deep breath, and pushes himself up again. His whole body aches. His atrophied muscles scream out, condemning him for his lethargy. It’s fine. He needed the rest. Three months in the great northern wilderness gave him enough muscle to lose. He hasn’t melted into goop yet. Well, not all of him. His heart’s been a little less than solid for a while now.

Slowly, painfully, Satoru rolls out of bed. He’s strong enough to stand, but his steps are clumsy. He ends up mostly dragging himself along the wall. He dresses, slowly, picking out a boring, stiff uniform from the hanging row of boring, stiff uniforms. He doesn’t hate the uniform, but it feels a little bit like putting on an old snakeskin; too dry and too tight. His button down closes over his torso, but it pulls a little bit at the top of his chest. And the shoulders feel too small. And Satoru feels-

He feels wrong.

Everything feels wrong.

It has since he woke up. The air feels wrong, like it’s too thick, even for Tokyo’s usual humidity. His room feels wrong, like it’s someone else’s. But it’s not like anyone’s dressed the place up; it’s not even like it looks any different. Satoru’s room looks like it belongs to a ghost - but it always has. Maybe it’s finally haunted for real.

Satoru finally emerges like a bear awakening from his long hibernation. Not a polar bear, though - apparently those don’t actually hibernate. Which makes sense, because - having been there himself - Satoru can attest that it’s kinda always winter up that far north. If you go to sleep and it’s cold, and then you wake up and it’s still cold - like, what’s the point?

So Satoru emerges like a brown or black or grizzly bear (which, by the way, don’t technically hibernate either - it’s torpor, which is similar but not technically-), shaking off what feels like months of sleep. The birds are chirping, and the air isn’t too cold. Slowly, the sunlight has turned from blue to pink to gold. His eyes still burn, but his tinted sunglasses are enough to keep them from disintegrating, so, that’s going to have to be good enough. It’s spring - all of the markers are there. But spring is supposed to feel bright and warm and lively. And all Satoru feels is dread.

Cold, heavy, creeping up his spine. Satoru feels dread crawling on his skin, a thousand spiderlike limbs skittering over his cursed senses. He feels too twitchy, too nervous, too alert-

It’s just - he’s probably just getting used to civilization again. There weren’t a lot of people in the arctic - not a lot of cursed energy, either. And beyond sorcery, the woods were quiet; blankets of snow deadened the sound. Even the sky was mostly blank - just white and grey, no color at all.

But the dread builds, and it builds, and it keeps building. It pricks at Satoru like little shocks of static. And it chokes him, like a cloud of cursed smog. It’s not - he can’t even - if it is a special grade curse or some shit, he’s probably gonna die. Satoru hasn’t tried using Limitless yet, but if it’s still busted, then he’s probably about to get rolled.

Eh.

Satoru’s never been particularly good with self-preservation. And right now, he can’t find a lot of himself that he’d like to preserve. So Satoru follows the prickly cursed energy, half-hoping it leads him right off a cliff. It does, sort of. It leads him down the hallway, past the kitchen, right to the training grounds. And there, perched on the railing, cradling a cigarette and a cup of black coffee - that’s where he finds it.

That’s where he finds Suguru.

That’s where he finds the wrong.

His cursed energy is fucked. Slimy, twisty tendrils of it swirl around him - curling, coiling, choking him out. They flash with static energy, crackling as they arc right into his skin. It’s crazy Suguru’s not screaming; it’s fucking insane he’s not even flinching.

And his energy, the pretty, shiny, milky opalescence he’s always carried in his chest - it’s just… black.

It’s all void now. Endlessly deep, not even a hint of color. It’s dangerous, prickly, and it pulls at Satoru in like a black hole, stringing him into mindless spaghetti. It’ll hurt if he touches it - Satoru knows that for sure, even without testing the theory. The way it looks - oily, electric - it makes the Six Eyes squeeze shut. But he forces them open, he forces them to look.

It’s hard, at first, to find Suguru under the miasma. He’s not the right shape - not the one Satoru expects. He’s smaller - is he smaller? Is it just his posture? Is it a trick of the light - or a trick of his cursed energy - or did Satoru actually not fucking remember him right?

Because he doesn’t look right. Suguru’s high-collared jacket swallows him whole. It’s more than a little loose - the shoulders are way too big on him now. They slump down at the edge, hollow where they used to be filled out perfectly. Even with the jacket hiding his shape, Satoru can tell that he looks thin. Suguru’s cheeks are sunken in, pale and dull under bruised, baggy eyes. And his lips, wrapped around a stub of a cigarette, are red and chapped. His hair is down - Suguru never fucking wears his hair down, not unless Satoru’s stolen all his hair ties. The inky, black strands fall well past his shoulders, dull and tangled. He doesn’t look anything like the Geto Suguru he left in December. But he does look like…

“Suguru…”

Like the Geto Suguru he met at 15.

Like the Geto Suguru suffocating in his own sorcery.

Like the Geto Suguru he was too clumsy to hold, too undesirable to keep, too fidgety to fuck, too defective to love, too slow to help, too fucking incompetent to save-

“Oh.”

Suguru turns. Sees him. Smiles - no - he doesn’t smile, his lips just twitch. And then, instantly, the void bursts. It feels like glass shards slicing his tongue open. It’s strong, so strong Satoru almost doubles over. It burns like liquor, and it tastes like ash, like smoke, like iron. Sharp little bolts of cursed energy arc off of him, spitting out like knives. And Suguru stares at him, into him - no trace of color in his eyes - no lilac petals, no syrupy violet, no glint of amethyst. Just black.

And hate hate hate-

“Hey, Satoru.”

Chapter Text

the angle of darkness
By: xXsix_eyesXx
Y/N has an awful day and is reduced by a mysterious angle from heaven…..
Rated: Fiction T - English - Hurt/Comfort/Romance - Satoru, Suguru - Words: 1877 - Reviews: 0 - Favs: 1 - Published: Never

A/N: omg teh heh Y/N is wearing dis!!!1!

Chapter 1: a mysterious stranger…

It was a bad day. Satoru Gojo knew it was a bad day because the second he woke up to his alarm blaring Sugar, We’re Goin Down (VEVO Release) he already had a headache.

Ugh.

Today was going to be a bad day because Satoru had a math test - which was fine because he was really smart and good at math. But because he was really smart and good at math (and pretty, but like, in a very plain and accessible way), all the jocks bullied him. They called him names like ‘nerd’ and ‘geek’ and they had even shoved him into his locker a few times (unsuccessfully, because at his school, lockers were only half-height. Satoru was already 6”, so that was never gonna work. But hey, it’s the thought that counts).

Satoru drowsily rubbed his eyes and tiredly rolled over in bed to shut off his phone alarm. He was so drowsy and tired that he fell back asleep! When he woke up again, he drowsily stretched and yawned, and he tiredly glanced at the clock on his phone. He was late!

“Oh carp, I’m late!” he said out loud.

Satoru leaped out of bed and through on some cloths. He wore a pair of old, light-wash denim jeans, a super comfy thrifted men’s flannel in size XL, and his favorite MCR t-shirt that he had gotten from Hot Topic instead of from direct band merchandise sales because they never passed through his small, suburban town, so he had never been able to see them live.

Satoru rushed out of his house and ran to the bus stop. It was cloudy, but not raining thank goodness. But Satoru almost wished it was raining, because that would make his bad day even worse, and if it was bad enough, then he could write some angsty ABAB rhyme scheme poetry about it in his composition notebook. Satoru made it to the bus stop just as the yellow school bus pulled up.

“I’m not too late!” Satoru exclaimed excitedly.

He got onto the bus and sat in the front row, quickly catching his breath. He could run super fast if he put his hands back by his side like a ninja from Naruto: Shippuden, which was only in its tenth season and not even close to finished. But he didn’t want to run cross-country, because that took a lot more time and commitment. Suddenly, Satoru heard snickering from the back of the bus, but he pretended not to hear it.

“Well would you look at that,” one of the jocks said, laughing very loudly and meanly, “The nerd can run! You should join the track team, four-eyes!”

Satoru didn’t care about the lame jocks. They were dumb and their opinions didn’t matter. And they spent way too much time training for cross-country. Satoru frowned and tried not to cry. But they were so mean that he could feel tears tearing up in his eyes. Whatever. Who cared what they thought? Satoru didn’t care!

“No thanks,” Satoru shot back, sounding very witty and clever, “I’m already in too many extracurriculars.”

xXx xXx xXx xXx xXx xXx

Satoru did really well on the math test. Obviously, he wouldn’t know until he actually got the grade back, but, like, he could tell. And so could all of the jocks that bullied him. They called him lame and stuff for being so good at math - which wasn’t his fault! He was like one of those kids in the YA novels that was Born Special™. But instead of being a secret demigod or a secret vampire or a secret Divergent (whatever that means), he was just secretly really good at math, like, since birth.

It was a blessing… but it was also a CURSE. Because everyone was secretly jealous (because he was #3 on the leaderboard of Coolmathgames.com). Also because he got migraines. Also also because he got bullied, and they bullied him so much in class and in the halls that Satoru really couldn’t stand the idea of going to the cafeteria to get bullied even more.

Satoru went outside, sneaking out through the back door behind the classroom that they used for the Science Olympiad club. He was basically the only one who knew about that door except for the janitors and the teachers and the architect and civil engineer who originally designed the school’s layout. So basically, he was the only one. Satoru snuck out the door, propping it open with his math textbook. He hated math right now. Screw his math textbook! (Plus, it had a pink and purple paisley Vera Bradley stretchy book cover over it, so it wouldn’t get scuffed or anything.)

If Satoru was bad at math and also pretty with big boobs and long eyelashes then the jocks would think he was super cool and he’d be super popular. Not that Satoru cared about popularity and dumb shallow stuff like that. He just wanted to be able to go to class in peace, without being bullied. And maybe he also wanted to get invited to parties once in a while. Not because he liked underage drinking and illegal tobacco smoking (or worse, marijuana). He just liked dancing and music and normal party stuff.

And…

Well, Satoru had heard that people kissed at parties.

Not that Satoru needed to kiss people. And they also kissed at other places, like movies or parks. Satoru was waiting until college to date people anyway. Not because that was what his parents told him to do, but because he didn’t even like anyone in his high school. They were all dumb and lame and boring.

But kissing sounded fun.

And parties. Especially pool parties - Satoru’s house didn’t have a pool, and he felt weird about using the clubhouse’s pool on his own - at least without a special occasion. But with the way the jocks always bullied him (for being good at math), Satoru never got invited to parties, not even the big ones. And definitely not pool parties. He never got the chance to kiss people. Or date them, if he wanted to. Or - or any of that stuff.

He was too busy with jujutsu, and he was stuck behind the walls of a sprawling clan estate. He didn’t meet anyone normal until he was fifteen or so, and by then, it was way too late. While the rest of the world was having awkward first dates and cringey first kisses, he was inscribing messy barrier sigils and learning the centuries-old chants to his innate technique. He never really had a fucking chance, did he? To be normal? To-

No.

That’s a different story, a different character.

Go back.

Satoru curled into his knees, burying his face in his light wash denim jeans. He began to cry quietly, because he was never going to kiss anyone ever at all. After all, who would want someone like him - lame and ugly and really good at math! Ugh, he was so unfuckable!

“Don’t cry…”

Satoru gasped. He pulled his face upwards and looked upwards.

A really hot goth boy stood in front of him. He had dark hair and wore a dark t-shirt and dark jeans with a black leather jacket. That was how you could tell he was goth. His hair was long and shiny and probably would have looked good even if he crimped it and put in one of those leopard print fake hair highlights. His eyes were bright purple, like as bright as that one guy with black hair and really blue eyes that always pops up when you search for ‘emo boy’. (His name is Alex Evans, by the way, and there’s fanfiction of him on Wattpad.)

He was so hot.

“Your beautiful.”

Satoru gasped again as he spoke. Even his voice was hot! He seemed otherworldly, like he was from a different world. Like he was an angle from heaven… or maybe a demon!

“Beautiful faces like yours aren’t meant to frown,” he said, kneeling in front of Satoru. Satoru blushed. The hot guy reached out, taking Satoru’s red cheeks in his hands. “Will you smile for me, beautiful?” he said softly.

Satoru gasped again - a third time. His hands were rough and scarred, like he had been in a lot of fist fights. But when he touched Satoru, he was gentle. Satoru tried to smile, but he was so sad from being bullied.

“I can’t smile,” he said, not smiling. “I’m sad because I got bullied.”

The blackette frowned. “Why would anyone bully someone as perfect as you?”

Satoru felt tears tearing up in his eyes again. “B-because I’m good at math!” he cried, starting to cry.

Anger flashed through the black-haired boy’s eyes. “That’s not right,” he said angrily. “I’ll kill whoever hurt you.”

“Woooooaah, hang on a sec bud, this is rated T.”

“Oh, uh, yeah, you’re right. Sorry, my bad.” He cleared his throat and said: “I’ll hurt whoever hurt you.”

“Yeahhh… I dunno. I don’t really like the wording there. It’s kind of repetitive. Like, the ‘hurt’ and ‘hurt’? They’re too close together.”

“Yeah, true. It does sound repetitive. What about-”

“Maybe like-”

“I’ll make them pay for hurting you.”

“Oh, yeah, that’s good. That’s good.”

Anyway:

The ravenette’s purple eyes burned bright purple, like a glow-in-the-dark neon stick (a bright purple one). “Who did this to you,” he muttered under his breath. “I’ll make them pay for hurting you.”

“T-the jocks.”

“The football team?” he grimaced. “I’ll beat them all up.”

“No, cross-country, actually,” Satoru clarified, “our football team is pretty bad.”

“Okay, I’ll beat up the cross-country team then.”

“N-no, you can’t!” Satou stuttered. “It’s too dangerous!”

“Not for me,” he said, “I’m strong.”

The dark-haired boy smoothly took off his leather jacket and flexed. Satoru could see his biceps bulging through his band t-shirt - a really old and super niche band Satoru had never heard of called ‘Nirvana’. Wow, even his taste in music was hot!

“Wow, you do look really strong,” Satoru said, blushing bright red. He couldn’t look at the boy’s muscles without getting all hot inside! “But still-”

Two pitch-black, feathered wings suddenly rose from the boy’s back.

“Also, for some reason, I have wings,” he said.

Instantly, Satoru was overwhelmed by the urge to delicately comb through his raven-black feathers. The air between them immediately thickened with tension. Romantic… Sexual... He yearned to delicately stroke through the soft downy feathers on the undersides of his wings where they arched out from his broad back. Satoru would carefully straighten each ruffled feather, smoothing them down. And then, perhaps - if such a magnificent creature would let him so close… Oh, but there was something so unspeakably erotic about wings.

“B-but how?”

The strong boy looked off dramatically. He stared out into the distance, towards the four-lane divided highway that ran between the high school and a strip mall. He took a deep breath and finally spoke (very dramatically).

“Well I wasn’t going to tell you until chapter 4,” he said, “but I’m actually an angle sent from heaven to protect you, Satoru.”

“Wait what?”

“Also, I’m a thousand years old and I’m in love with you.”

“But I’m only in high school!”

-:-

Satoru is only upright in the technical definition of the word. Sure, yeah: he’s standing. But it feels like he’s looking at the world upside-down. Maybe it’s the world that’s turned around, not him. But it’s hard to tell. His head is still throbbing, and the Six Eyes are still swimming. It’s like they’re making up for lost time, for every second of peaceful sensory deprivation, he’ll get an hour of sheer overstimulation. They suck up every sight and sound, blasting signals into his brain.

It’s incapacitating. That’s why he freezes. That’s why, when Suguru leaves him in the hall, his lingering residuals staining the air like smog - that’s why he freezes. Satoru doesn’t even spasm, his tongue doesn’t twitch. He’s speechless, he’s stunned, he’s stupid. He can’t even come up with a wiseass quip to get his head on straight or a terrible joke to clear the air or a horrified what the fuck happened to you-

He just stares at the empty space, at Suguru’s cursed afterimage, staring and staring until the morning light shifts yellow and his eyes start to burn.

Satoru hears Yuki a split second before impact. But the Six Eyes are still twitchy, and the signal gets blurred. Satoru whirls around as Yuki’s hand lands on his shoulder. Her hand brushes him, clipping him in the jaw.

“Yuki-”

“Woah, sorry-”

“What happened to him?” Satoru asks, pleads. Yuki’s lips twitch into a slight frown. She opens her mouth, but hesitates. “Yuki,” Satoru starts again, but-

“Walk with me?” she says, sighing. She doesn’t even bother to look back as she sets off down the hall. So Satoru follows. Not like there’s much else he can do.

Yuki’s heavy footsteps echo down the hall, ripples of sounds thundering up from the floorboards. It’s deafening at first, but Satoru starts to remember how to filter. He focuses on blocking out the lower frequencies, dampening the long, heavy soundwaves of their steps. He tries to block the ultra high frequencies too - spring bugs buzzing in the field. It’s not a perfect filter, but it’s enough to declutter his senses, at least for a bit.

With the sound lessened, the Six Eyes narrow in on sight - and Yuki looks worse than she sounds.

“What happened to you?” Satoru blurts out.

She looks tired. There’s bags under her eyes, yeah, but it’s more than that. Her hair is dull, and her cursed energy is even duller. She’s not just tired; it’s not just a night of bad sleep. She’s fatigued. Deep, settled-in fatigue, a weariness that bleeds all the way into her bones.

“Are you okay?”

Yuki glances up to him, her blacker-than-black pupils probing into Satoru’s empty void. She bites her lip, then sighs.

“Nothing I can’t handle,” she says, which, at least, isn't an outright lie. It’s just a dodge. Because Yuki’s not okay and Suguru’s not okay and Satoru definitely isn’t okay, which makes three special-grades - 100% of all available special grades - not fucking okay.

“Shit hit the fan in Tokyo,” she says.

“No shit,” he mutters.

Obviously shit hit the fan. Probably at light speed, or at least supersonic. Suguru’s cursed energy was enough to tip him off there. But… if Suguru couldn’t handle it…

“The scouts are reporting signs of special grade curses popping up all over Tokyo.” Yuki sighs, crossing her arms. “I still think it’s a curse user, though.”

“Same one? Special grade?”

“Probably.”

And that’s bad, sure. But not that bad. Suguru could’ve handled ice lady, provided she didn’t get some insane power up once she found a t-shirt and jeans (and, like, sterile medical supplies for the hole in her chest). Suguru handed the other special-grade curse, whatever he ran into in the hospital. He didn’t even have a scratch on him when he came back.

Yeah, a special-grade curse user running around Japan is bad, obviously. But it’s not bad bad. It’s not ‘turbofuck Suguru’s cursed energy into dark matter’ bad.

“What happened to Suguru?” Satoru asks.

She doesn’t flinch; he’ll give her credit there. Although, she’s had plenty of time to brace for impact. But even though she doesn’t flinch, she fractures. Slow, strain-induced cracks propagate through her steel defense. She’s silent for a minute, and then she closes her eyes. She shakes her head.

“What happened, Yuki.” This time - he’s not asking.

Yuki looks up, gravity wells sucking the air out of his lungs. “You need to talk to him, Satoru.”

Which -

Obviously.

But Suguru doesn’t want to talk to him right now. So. Y’know.

Probably won’t go over well.

“He’s off missions,” Yuki says, “Indefinitely. Has been for a while.”

“What?” Satoru sputters. “He’s special-grade - he’s the only - how the fuck was he off missions if there are special-grade curses in Tokyo?”

“It’s complicated.” Yuki purses her lips.

“It’s bullshit.”

“C’mon,” she says, turning a corner, heading towards the classrooms, “I want you to see something.”

Yuki takes him into one of the empty classrooms. It’s even more barren than he remembers. There’s a blackboard and sticks of chalk, two rows of desks - more than they’ve ever needed, and a dusty, empty bookcase. There’s a pencil sharpener on the wall, but by this point, everyone’s long switched over to mechanical. Yuki pulls out their boxy little TV, rolling it out on a cart, and without plugging anything in, Yuki switches it on.

Cursed energy blooms from the remote, and the screen turns from a muted grey-black to real, full-force black as the screen powers on. Satoru squints at it. A faint layer of cursed energy shimmers on top of the screen, shifting errantly through RGB values. A little chibi crow pops up on the screen, saluting. And under that, bold white text pops up.

“Mei-ray DVD?” Satoru cocks his head. “You didn’t even put in a disc.” The logo disappears, and then the black slowly shifts into browns - a room somewhere - and the cameraman squawks.

“Wait is this..?”

“Yep. Mei Mei’s crows,” Yuki confirms. “She figured out a way to beam her crowsight into a video format.”

“Really.” Satoru blinks slowly, confirming with his own eyes - all six of them - that what he’s seeing is real. “Well that seems a little contrived.”

“Maybe,” Yuki shrugs. “Neat, though.”

“How did she even do that?”

“Binding Vow, I think.”

“Oh, yeah, maybe.” Satoru scratches his head. “You really can do anything with a Binding Vow, huh?”

“Yeah, it’s a real shame more sorcerers don’t use ‘em.”

Satoru supposes the surveillance angle is useful, just like Suguru’s curses or Yaga’s puppets. But screening to TVs? Satoru can’t really figure out when that’d be useful for a solo sorcerer like her. Maybe if she opens a call center - or sports betting. She’s got a real entrepreneurial mindset, that Mei Mei. Maybe she’s got some ideas on how to solve the American energy crisis, too.

“Is this-”

A grumbling voice speaks from the TV - it’s Suguru’s, tinged with static. Satoru’s eyes immediately snap back to the screen.

“How the fuck does this even work…” A little huff. “Okay… Uh. ‘Record’. Um, please.”

The crow chirps, then the whole image blurs as it shakes itself, ruffling all of its feathers. Satoru winces as the bright colors skid around the screen. Avian reflexes sated, the field of view shifts so that the whole room becomes visible. It’s the armory, one of the rooms in Jujutsu Tech’s basement. Although someone’s been renovating. The crates and equipment racks are shoved up against the wall to make room for a big training mat in the center of the room.

Suguru stands on one end - what’s left of him. He wears a thin, black compression top with a high neck, rather than their usual button down and jacket combo. His pants are his standard - high-waisted slacks - but now he wears a thick belt over the top to pull them tight.

It’s a testament to how awful Suguru looks that Satoru’s first thought is how much smaller he seems - how his ribs jut out beneath the tight stretch fabric, and how his baggy pants swallow him up. It’s a testament that to Satoru’s depravity that his second thought is that Suguru should pin him down and fuck him into the training mat without taking the compression top off.

Satoru coughs and looks over to Yuki, because he’ll combust if he keeps looking at the screen. “So what is this?” he asks.

“Wow,” Yuki stares at him, like she knows something. “You’re just… unwell, huh?” Like she can read his fucking thoughts.

“Shut up,” Satoru huffs, crossing his arms. He turns back to the screen. Fine. Combustion, here he comes. It’s gonna be Yuki who has to clean up the mess anyway.

She laughs. “Suguru recorded some of his training sessions. Asked me to take a look, so I did. But, uh. I want you to take a look too. There’s something kinda odd… Thought you might have some insights.”

“Eh, I’m not that great with the whole,” he gestures vaguely with his hands, making fists and waving them around. “Martial stuff.”

“Really,” she snorts. “Never would’ve guessed.”

“I am wounded, Yuki,” Satoru whines. “I am wounded, and you seek to wound me further with your words. I am literally at rock bottom, and all you do is bring me down.”

“Someone needs to,” she says with a little shrug.

Suguru picks up a quarterstaff, turning to face his opponent. It’s a lump of fabric, like a collapsed, poorly-stuffed scarecrow. Suguru’s eyes narrow as he focuses on the quarterstaff, like he’s infusing it with intent, channeling his cursed energy, but Satoru can’t-

Oh.

Well, yeah. Satoru can’t see it, if he is infusing it. Mei Mei’s crows don’t have the Six Eyes; they don’t have the receptors to sense cursed energy, so Satoru can’t see it through the video feed, either. Normal cameras are the same; if they could detect CE, maybe Satoru would be a special-grade scout.

It’s weird to see Suguru without his shroud of cursed energy, whether it’s white or black or a thousand colors in between. It’s just him and his muscles. And even at his worst, those are still special-grade. Suguru carefully walks onto the mat, testing the weight of the quarterstaff in his hand. He’s never needed a weapon other than his own hands, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t know his way around them. And maybe, with all the shit picking up in Tokyo, it’s a good time to learn a few new tricks.

“Ready.”

As Suguru speaks the command, the bundle of cloth shoots up like it’s being pulled on strings. So it is one of Yaga’s puppets, huh. Satoru had thought as much, but he’d never seen them so… lifeless. The cloth quickly fashions itself into a huge, lumbering teddy bear. Its limbs fill out, going from floppy to tightly-stuffed. Its eyes shift around, gleaming with cursed intelligence.

Suguru settles into a defensive stance, holding the quarterstaff half out, interposing it between them. He nods, waiting for it to approach. Which is a trap, if Satoru has learned anything about sparring with Suguru in the past, oh, three fucking years of his life. But with Suguru, you’re damned if you do, and double damned if you don’t. Because if Suguru decides how the fight is going, well…

The puppet is proficient in fighting, but it doesn’t have expertise in getting its shit kicked in by Geto Suguru. It barrels forward like a freight train. Even the gyroscopic cameraman quakes for a second before readjusting to its tremorous steps. Suguru holds his nerve, letting it get closer, closer, until it’s within reach of his quarterstaff. Then he swings. The wood explodes out from his wrist, fast.

“Holy shit,” Satoru mumbles.

“Yeah, he’s pretty good with the staff,” Yuki says idly, “Needs some work with blades though.”

As Suguru’s quarterstaff connects with the puppet’s chest, it nearly splits it in half. So, uh, yeah. Definitely infused. It rips through the front of the fabric. Cotton fill spreads out on the mats like cute, fluffy bloodstains. The bear lumbers back with a heavy grunt. The fabric stitches itself back into place, guided by an invisible needle. By the time the puppet moves to strike again, by the time Satoru looks back to Suguru - he’s already three paces away. When it lunges again, Suguru strikes at its legs, knocking it down.

The puppet leaps back up in an instant. It moves quickly, although not as quickly as Suguru. Suguru has to hit it with three full strikes before it even slows this time. The puppet is getting hardier, somehow. It’s a test of endurance, but Suguru hasn’t even broken a sweat. The puppet dives for him, and he dodges, swatting at the back of its squishy legs.

And suddenly Suguru winces. His grip falters around the quarterstaff. He doesn’t drop it, but-

And the puppet didn’t hit him, so-

Yuki pauses the tape. “You saw that, right?” she asks.

“Yeah.” Satoru nods. “I can’t tell,” he adds quickly, anticipating her question. And by the way she nods, he’s guessed it right. “Whatever’s happening to him… I can’t see his cursed energy like this - like, on tape.”

“So you’d have to see him fight in person, right?”

“Well… yeah, but,” Satoru swallows, “I dunno if…”

Yuki unpauses. “Keep watching.”

So, fine, he does. Suguru moves like a fucking viper. Any mass he’s lost, he’s converted directly into speed. And he’s good. Even at his worst, his footwork is miles better than Satoru’s has ever been. And he’s vicious, too. He beats the literal stuffing out of Yaga’s puppet again and again, but the puppet gets stronger, faster, and it doesn’t feel the pain that is clearly mounting in Suguru each time he fumbles the staff.

Until finally, he actually drops it. His footing slips, and the wood clatters to the ground. The puppet goes in for a knockout blow, but Suguru rolls to dodge it. He’s strong; he’s always been strong. So he shouldn’t be so surprised when Suguru counters with his own fist. He should’ve seen it coming, really.

But Satoru’s jaw still hits the floor when Suguru punches the hundred-kilo puppet clean through the wall. The whole room shakes. The feed blurs as Mei Mei’s crow hops away to avoid a falling shelf.

“...Shit.”

“Shit.”

And then the recording cuts.

“Yeah,” Yuki says mildly. “Shit.”

-:-

‘Shit’ is really just about all Satoru can make of the situation.

Because Suguru looks like shit, but he can still swing hard enough to send a body through a brick fucking wall. Which… Maybe that makes sense. The thing about suffering - the really shitty thing - is that it always makes sorcerers stronger. As long as they make it out the other end.

That’s what makes Satoru hesitate.

Because, see, for all that he knows that Suguru is suffering, he also knows that he’s not supposed to interfere. The monks would have his head - or his tongue, at least. Suguru is in a ’divine transformation’ or whatever. Like when Zuko gets sick in Avatar (the good one, not the blue people). These things come with aches and pains and flu-like symptoms. He’s the strongest; he’s not going to wither and die.

But-

It still hurts to watch. Satoru’s never been good about following what the monks say. He’s always had to cross his legs so he won’t keep shaking them. He’s always had to sit on his hands so he won’t fidget. He’s never been good at taking direction, and never been good at leaving things alone. He’s never been able to help himself - especially when it comes to Suguru.

So he follows, when he sees Suguru in the hall late that night. After dinner. After when Suguru should have had dinner with the rest of them, but he wasn’t at the table. Satoru follows, because he can’t sit still. And even when it's all dark, Suguru’s cursed energy draws him like a bright, shiny anglerfish’s lure. He keeps his steps light, following in silence, following him all the way to the kitchen. Suguru flicks the light on and fills the kettle in the sink. He slouches over the counter as the water starts to boil, and his shoulders drown in a winter uniform jacket that was tailored to fit him perfectly, once.

It’s too warm for a jacket though, and Suguru has always run hot. He’s a furnace - both for thermal energy and cursed. It’s why Satoru’s tent had felt so cold up north: he’d gotten used to mild winters, and he’d gotten used to sleeping with a space heater.

He’d gotten used to pinpricks of fire on his skin, or swathes of sunlight snaking around his stomach. A warm, steady weight at his back; Suguru’s cursed energy blazing like a bonfire in his chest…

“What are you doing up, Satoru?”

Suguru doesn’t even bother to look up when he speaks; Satoru’s so startled that he nearly hits his head on the door frame when he snaps back to attention.

“I-” Satoru stammers.

His cursed energy hangs around him like a tangled fishing net - writhing, restraining. Black, misty tendrils snake around his body, bulging and blurring out from his slender outline. It’s almost impossible to see him in there, underneath all the pain, all the hatred-

“I can make you something to eat.”

Satoru dodges.

That’s the best he can do. Well, dodging would take a sprightliness that he hasn’t quite recovered yet, on account of the brain damage and the eye damage and the true damage straight to his heart. So really, it’s not a dodge, it’s a block. Satoru twitches and curls into himself like a slimy snail that’s been poked right in the shell.

“I’m fine,” Suguru says flatly. “Just wanted some tea. Go to bed, Satoru. You need to rest.”

“You’re not.” The words on his tongue feel fizzy, unstable. “You’re not fine, Suguru. You - you don’t look fine.”

His cursed energy riles, the tendrils slither and hiss. Suguru looks over his shoulder then - all pitch-black contempt: “I’m not hungry.”

“You-”

“You need to sleep, Satoru.”

Satoru’s tongue finally snaps, sparking like lightning.

“You need to eat,” Satoru bursts out. “Are you serious? Don’t fucking tell me to-”

Because he’s impatient, because he’s reckless, and because he can’t just fucking stand there always so fucking useless-

And Suguru’s cursed energy tightens, condensing into dark coils. Constricting like eels, choking-

He couldn’t stand there - he didn’t - because Satoru’s hands are already fisted into Suguru’s loose fucking turtleneck sweater, pulling him up off the counter even though he’s not supposed to be able to pick Suguru up he’s never been able to pick Suguru up he’s not supposed to be able to move Suguru at all-

“You need to eat, Suguru,” Satoru pleads.

Satoru quickly drops him. His hands tremble as soon as they’re empty. All of the electricity leaps out of his skin in an instant, searching for a place to ground.

“Anything,” Satoru begs, barely a whisper, barely loud enough for the soundwaves to propagate through the thin, empty air between them. ”Just - something. Please.”

Suguru lets out a little breath. The tendrils of curse energy pulse, then they dim. The net loosens, and Satoru just barely catches a flash of ultraviolet glimmering beneath the black.

“I am eating, Satoru,” he says softly. “Just not solids. Mostly protein shakes.” He nods to the big plastic jugs above the fridge - vanilla, chocolate, and - ooh, caramel - that actually sounds pretty good. “I’m hitting my macros. Don’t worry, Shoko’s keeping track. I’m not, like, dying. Just… I know I don’t look great.”

“You’ve lost a lot of weight, though.” He says. Suguru winces. “You have, haven’t you?”

“Not that much,” he mumbles.

“Dude,” Suguru’s eyes flash with that black-glass edge again, and Satoru immediately puts his hands up in surrender. “Sorry,” he says. “I… I can’t pick you up. Normally.” Suguru tilts his head, confused. “I couldn’t. Before.”

“...Right.” Suguru deflates. Deep blue streaks swim through Suguru’s cursed energy as he seems to sink into himself.

“I mean, I’ve been lifting,” Satoru blurts, his tongue running off the rails again. “I can bench like two-hundred kilos. Like, easy. And you’re shorter than me, so.”

Suguru can’t help but laugh a little at that, although it’s small and quiet. It’s more of a forced-air kind of thing, really. Like the AC kicking on, just a low hum.

“Well, you do look stronger,” Suguru says lightly. His eyes skim the line of Satoru’s shoulders - impressed, maybe, or - but then he looks away, back to the kettle bubbling away on the countertop.

Satoru opens the fridge, gripping the handle tight. Because even if Suguru can’t do solids, he can do soup. And they must have the ingredients for fucking soup.
“Satoru,” Suguru warns. “I can’t… I haven’t been able to…”

“Look, you haven’t had my cooking,” Satoru protests, “At least… At least let me try? Just once. If it’s bad then - then we’ll figure something else out.” But when he opens the fridge, it’s - it’s barren. Takeout boxes, mostly. Eggs. Some sad oranges.

“Where the hell is all the food?” Satoru huffs, “Is Nanami not cooking anymore? C’mon there should be like, three things of pasta for me to steal. Or, like, garlic bread.” Satoru glances over his shoulder, eying the empty countertop “Where the hell is the bread?”

“It’s been… busy since you left.” Suguru purses his lips. “Nanami’s been busy with missions.”

“Oh.” Satoru feels the cold all the way down in the pit of his stomach. Cold like in the arctic, in a canvas tent, in an insulated sleeping bag that couldn’t have fit two if they really squeezed. “Um, right,” Satoru murmurs, “Sorry.”

“Everyone’s had to take more missions,” he sighs, ”But, um...”

“But not you.”

Suguru looks away. The kettle screams, and Satoru feels that on a spiritual level. “No,” he agrees, “not me.”

And as bad as Satoru wants to ask why, he knows - for a certainty - that he’s not going to get a straight answer. And if he pushes, he knows it might backfire. Normally, Satoru’s not so concerned with the collateral. But right now, he’s not sure how much more chip damage either of them can take.

Suguru pours himself a cup of tea - green. As he does, the cursed energy sloshing around in his forearm flashes, spiking back up it. Suguru winces, but manages to keep the kettle steady as he lowers it back onto the countertop.

“Well, like you said,” he mumbles, “I look like shit.” Herbal mist billows up from the half-filled glass. He takes a sip, doubtlessly scalding his tongue.

“It’s your cursed energy,” Satoru says as the realization crashes over him. His brain smashes observations together at light speed, but his mouth lags behind. “It’s burning extra. Calories, I mean.” It’s never happened to Satoru - lossless conversion, courtesy of the Six Eyes. And no one else except Yuki has enough cursed energy for it to be a measurable problem, and she can pack away enough pizza to cater a young child’s birthday party.

“That’s why you’re losing weight,” Satoru clarifies, since Suguru is looking at him like he’s grown a second head, or lost the one he has. “Your cursed energy is burning out of control.”

Suguru freezes.

“What’s wrong with my cursed energy?”

“Dude, it’s like…” Satoru hesitates, trying to think how he could possibly phrase it in a nice way. But he can’t, so he uses the technical term: “It’s like turbofucked.”

“Oh.” Suguru’s face ripples, a frown dashing his placid, glass-still surface. “Cool.”

“It’s not like - I mean, you’ll fix it.” Satoru swallows down the anxiety mounting in his chest, and he says, “you’ll get better,” even if he doesn’t feel it, doesn’t really believe it, doesn’t really know how the fuck one gets better from something that looks and tastes and feels like certain death.

But strong sorcerers always do, and Suguru is the strongest he’s ever met.

“You’ll fix it,” Satoru repeats, for his own sake as much as Suguru’s. “But, uh, you should try to control it.”

“I can’t,” Suguru says simply.

“Wh-”

What?

“What?”

That throws Satoru for a loop. Past a loop, it throws him into orbit. Because Suguru has always had control over his cursed energy. Even if he leaks, even if he snaps, he’s had better control than any sorcerer Satoru’s ever met in his life. Better than Satoru, and Satoru’s been training his whole life for this shit.

“Suguru,” Satoru intercepts him as he moves to leave, lamely blocking Suguru against the countertop. “What-” he chokes out, “what happened?”

“Nothing,” he says, carefully neutral. But he catches Satoru’s eyes just for an instant. By chance, by mistake. And his eyes wobble, red-rimmed, blue in the fathomless depths of his cursed energy. “Please don’t worry about me, Satoru.”

“How the-” Satoru’s voice cracks, “how the fuck can I not?”

Satoru reaches out on instinct, for his chest - no, for his shoulders - because friends do shoulders - but they’re not even friends - so - his hand? Satoru reaches for his hand - the empty one. The second his palm hits Suguru’s, cursed energy arcs into his skin. It stings, it burns, it fucking hurts. Satoru gasps, clutching his hand to his chest as he stumbles back. Electric energy still rattles up and down his bones, vicious lightning in a blue-glass bottle.

“Satoru,” Suguru sucks in a breath, stepping forward, and then - then he thinks better of it, he pulls his hand back. His eyes break open, raw and sharp. “Are you-” He sounds like he’s drowning. And the net draws tight. “Did I-”

“I’m okay,” Satoru says quickly. “I’m fine, it’s nothing, you didn’t-”

“Fuck.” Tighter and tighter and tighter, until his skin goes pale-blue. Suguru clutches his face in his hands.

“It didn’t hurt,” Satoru lies. He lunges, clutching at Suguru’s sweater - at the nets, wishing he could reach into the cursed realm and pull him free, “It’s okay, it’s okay,” Satoru whispers, “You didn’t-”

“Satoru, stop. Please, just-” Suguru shoves Satoru back - hard. But it’s not the impact that dazes Satoru; it’s everything else. The net sparks, blazing with white-hot lightning. Suguru twitches, freezes, collapses into himself.

“I’m sorry.” Suguru hauls himself up, then away, fleeing on unsteady footing. “I’ll - I’ll see you around, Satoru.”

He leaves his tea behind; it’s already oversteeped.

-:-

“Have you told Satoru?”

Satoru hears them, because he hears everything in the halls of Jujutsu Tech.

It’s not like he’s trying to. It’s just - it’s the Six Eyes. He’s not trying to be a creep or anything like that. It’s just that he can’t sleep; he can’t even really sit still. And tea doesn’t work, it’s never really worked, so he takes a hot shower, deciding to stay under the rain until the water goes cold. But it doesn’t, because apparently Yaga finally installed the heating runes he’s been begging for since he got to Jujutsu Tech. So it’s late by the time he finishes; it’s late when he calls it quits. The lights are off when he walks back into the hall, only blue moonlight trickles through the open walls. It’s so empty it feels haunted, and Satoru hears the spirits whispering.

“...You need to tell him, Suguru.” Shoko says.

Wait, told him what?

Satoru ducks around a corner when he remembers that he actually isn’t a ghost. He’s a little too corporeal to be invisible, and every human makes sounds - even when they’re holding their breath. He slips behind the wall, and he listens. It’s not like he can stop the Six Eyes from honing in on every shiny little barb. And it’s not like anything they say is gonna be worse than what’s in his head. So fuck it, he eavesdrops.

“He’s gonna find out at some point.”

“I know,” Suguru says softly.

His voice still feels like silk on the Six Eyes, even when everything else feels scratchy.

“I just think…”

It’s not like Satoru deserves to know whatever secret Suguru’s keeping. If it’s what happened to him then, or what’s happening to him now. If it’s how much weight he’s lost - the number, in kilograms - or how many days he’s been off of missions. Satoru doesn’t get to know a damn thing about Suguru now, and he shouldn’t. He cut himself off. Cold turkey. Maybe it’s better this way. It is - because Shoko thinks it is, and she’s normally right about this kind of thing. It’s better this way, but it doesn’t feel like it.

Because maybe.

Maybe he could help?

Not that he’s ever helped before but maybe - maybe this time - if it’s about jujutsu -

“He’s still recovering, Shoko,” Suguru says softly. “I think I should wait.”

“Yeah, from fucking RCT blowout, not-,” she huffs. “Satoru’s a big boy, he can handle a little-”

“Really?” Suguru says thinly, “You don’t think he’s gonna flip out?” Shoko is quiet for a minute. A long, long minute. “I think he might do something stupid, Shoko.”

Shoko sighs. “Something really stupid, huh.”

“Well,” Suguru hums, “he’s really stupid.”

Hey. Not wrong, but, like. Hey.

Satoru slides down against the wall, hugging his knees. Kinda stings, but it should. Karma and all that. There’s a couple of things that Satoru agrees with the monks on - in broad strokes, at least. He’s fine with the idea of the universe punishing shitty people. It's a good incentive to not be a piece of shit. Unfortunately, Satoru is a little too treat-motivated for karmic punishment to be an effective training tool. Also, he’s just an irredeemable piece of shit.

“He’ll flip out worse if he doesn’t hear it from you.” Shoko mutters. “And you can’t-”

“I know.”

“You can’t hide it forever.”

“I won’t, Shoko.” Suguru promises, though his voice sounds less steady than his words. “I just need a little more time.”

“You don’t have that much time left.”

Satoru peers around the corner just as the door slides shut. When the wooden pane bumps against the little metal rails, it sounds as loud as a car crash. And what’s even louder - metal on metal - is the clanging sound of Shoko’s key as it fits into a lock on Suguru’s door that definitely wasn’t fucking there before wait what the fuck why the fuck-

When she turns it, it sounds like she’s cocking a gun.

-:-

So, just for the record, Satoru does not think this is a good idea. But it’s the idea they’re going with. Even Suguru didn’t think it was a good idea, and he wasn’t willing to do it until Yuki slit her throat in front of him and healed it right back up without flinching. It still seems like a bad idea. Obviously Yuki’s gonna be fine - it’s Suguru he’s worried about. Satoru is usually right about everything, but Yuki is almost never wrong when it comes to training sorcerers. She’s got a knack for it. Probably because, unlike Satoru, she’s actually had to figure out how to train effectively.

Not that Satoru doesn’t train hard, he totally does, it’s just, like, different, y’know?

It’s like-

Never mind.

Anyway, when Satoru perches on the rail, watching Yuki and Suguru pull their hair up into matching high ponytails - he’s just kinda… along for the ride. He’s just there to watch - to be a super awesome and super important second set of eyes for Yuki. She can do all the teaching, he’s just a TA. Just a grader, even. Doesn’t mean he’s not nervous about the ensuing train wreck.

But like, that being said, if Yuki wanted him to really, fully pay attention to Suguru’s cursed energy, then she should’ve made him change out of that fucking compression top, because holy fucking-

He looks good. That’s the thing. It’s crazy that Suguru fucking looks good. Like, literally on the brink of death, and he could give that guy who plays Thor a run for his money (the good one, the original, before they started getting a little too… experimental). He’s way too skinny, sure, but Satoru could still suffocate himself in Suguru’s fucking pecs. And his arms are out on full display in that dumb little sleeveless high-collared tank top. The stretch fabric hugs every angle of his chest, and Satoru can’t help but zoom in on every little divot and plane, the topography of his musculature painted in a dozen different shades of black nylon. Satoru’s not sure if it’d be better if he went shirtless, or if he’d just be blinded by unsheathed bronze instead.

For all the weight that Suguru has lost, it’s clear that what’s left is pure muscle. He has a wiry sort of strength now - the kind that feels a little less steady, a little more dangerous. He looks good, yeah, but… it’s still a little unsettling. Suguru used to hold his stance like a brick wall. Now, he feels kinda like a sledgehammer. And it won’t help him - dropping down a weight class. Not against Yuki. Because she punches her weight and then some, and even the ten-ish kilos Satoru has on her isn’t enough to keep him steady in a spar.

“Hey, how are you feeling?”

“Ass,” he mumbles. Shoko joins him at his little crow’s nest behind the railing, peering down at the two brawlers stretching on deck. Satoru straightens. “But… significantly less ass. Thanks to you,” he says. “I’m sorry.”

“I’m not the one you need to apologize to,” she says, not bothering to meet his eyes.

It’s half true, half a lie. Satoru absolutely does need to apologize to Shoko. It’s just that he needs to apologize to Suguru like a thousand extra times and maybe also borrow a guillotine and offer Suguru a severed head as proof of the deed.

“No, um,” Satoru scrubs his face. The Six Eyes are already twitching from the sunlight, and it won’t get any better as the morning wears on. If his eyes are watery, it’s the sunlight. And the grass pollen. “You deserve one too. I’m sorry that I… I ran away. I dumped all that shit on the both of you. I didn’t think - I wasn’t thinking. I know I’m a piece of shit. So. Sorry.”

“Well, we agree on that.” Shoko pats his shoulder, thumping against his light uniform jacket. She lets out a little breath, and she looks at him. Probing, diagnosing, maybe gearing up for an autopsy, once Satoru finally drops dead. “...Why’d you do it?”

It’s a good question.

And Satoru’s got an answer.

He’s got about a hundred answers. It’s just that none of them are good ones. And none of them - not even all of them combined - justify whatever the fuck he did to Suguru.

“I mean, I wasn’t trying to…” Satoru shakes his head. “I was trying to… listen to you? It’s like you said - I was doing what was best for me, and…” Satoru lets his head fall into his hands. He sucks in a deep breath through the cracks in his fingers. “I wanted to do what was best for him,” he mumbles. “For once.”

“...Are you fucking serious?” Shoko says. And the Six Eyes are back, but he still needs line of sight. So he peeks between his fingers, looking at her. She stares at him, brown eyes as hard as ironwood. “...You cannot be this fucking stupid.”

“I’m pretty stupid,” Satoru says, “Many people are saying this: I’m really stupid.”

“You-”

“Oh, hey! We’re not late!” Haibara jogs up to the rail, perching on Satoru’s other side like a chirpy little goldfinch. Nanami walks up beside him like a feral Canadian goose. He glowers at Satoru, and Satoru feels his own anxious feathers ruffle up.

“You’re awake,” Nanami says flatly. “Oh joy.”

“Mostly,” Satoru says weakly.

It’s not like he expected a particularly warm welcome, but the way Nanami looks at him still makes his stomach feel like it’s full of ice. But even if Nanami hates his guts - even if the whole world does, rightfully - Yuki has a schedule to keep. She gives Suguru a firm pat on the back, then she starts to pace.

“Let’s just get this over with,” Satoru mutters.

One step, then two.

“Ooh, I can’t wait!” Haibara says with an overly-sweet smile. “Wait, is Suguru gonna-”

“No,” Shoko shakes her head. “Just cursed energy.”

Wait what?

Three steps, then five.

“Oh, Shoko,” Nanami asks quietly, “did you need me to get-”

“Don’t worry,” she nudges a small bag at her feet. “I’ve got everything here. Ice packs and-”

“And the defibrillator?”

“Yep. It’s in here.”

Wait why-

Ten steps, and then they turn.

It’s slow to start, the way these things always are. Suguru circles, cautious, and Yuki closes the distance. Suguru likes to wait; he likes to size up his opponents. He’s always been careful, preferring precision over initiative. But this feels different, somehow. It feels more hesitant, somehow. It’s like he’s not looking for the right time to strike; it’s like he doesn’t want to strike at all.

It’s almost like-

Like he’s…

Afraid?

Yuki strikes, her fist igniting in a flare of bright cursed energy as she does. Suguru steps to the side, dodging, and tries to shove her off balance. But either she’s too strong or he’s too weak. She doesn’t move an inch. And she’s not even using her cursed technique.

Satoru grips the wooden rail tight enough that it starts to splinter. Which isn’t that hard, because the wood is getting old. But still, Satoru is nervous. It’s a spar; it’s not life or death, obviously. But for some reason, it feels like it. Yuki’s always been strong, but Suguru could match with her - before. Even if he couldn’t win, he could throw down. And now, as they trade blows, he doesn’t even have that. His footing is quick, but it’s forced, reactionary. He can’t manage to gain any ground, so Yuki just bullies him back, full aggro.

His cursed energy wavers, fluttering like floating strands of kelp along his forearms. It’s strong, still, but… He’s… He’s holding back, that’s all Satoru can tell. Even with the Six Eyes, that’s all he can tell.

And Yuki can tell too by the looks of it. She advances, pushing him back relentlessly, looking for an opening. And yeah, Suguru has always had a rock-solid defense, but Yuki’s got a nasty habit of busting through anything solid. If she can’t find an opening, she’ll just make one. Yuki lunges, but it’s a feint. When Suguru steps back, she slides forward, kicking his legs out from under him. He’s not fast enough, not this time, and his unsteady footing fails. He stumbles back, nearly falling. Yuki presses on without a moment’s hesitation. She gets a sucker punch in - a blazing streak of blue. Suguru stumbles even farther back. He catches her arm, pulling himself back up, but then Yuki yanks herself back and puts five steps between them.

She says something to Suguru. Something he can’t hear, but something that, by the twist of her lips, doesn’t sound kind. She spits on the ground, then wipes her mouth. Yikes. Suguru’s energy jolts, black turning blacker, and Yuki’s burns even brighter.

She dives back in. Two punches, neither of them clean, land on Suguru’s chest. He twists and bounces back like a spring, and he finally hits Yuki square in the stomach. His energy jolts white, ricocheting back through his arm. Suguru immediately flinches and cradles his elbow. He steps back, trying to put some distance in between them, but Yuki doesn’t let him get away. She fights dirty, going straight for his arm. Suguru drops, dodging below her grab, and kicks a spray of sand into her eyes. He can fight dirty too, thank fuck.

It’s a good distraction. It’d work on most people, but not Yuki. Yuki’s used to fighting curses that barely understand humans at all, let alone sparring etiquette. She charges forward, hitting him with quick jabs on his shoulders and arms. Suguru does his best to trade back, but it’s tough. He starts eroding. Her ceaseless advances eat away at him, like waves battering a seawall. And every time he blocks with his bad arm, and every time he throws his own punch with his good one, cursed energy shoots back up his own body.

His hair slips out of its tie, and his footing slips out of balance. When Yuki comes in again, vicious, Suguru shields his bad arm. But Yuki twists at the last minute, shoving him straight in the chest with a CE-infused strike that’s strong enough to toss him back. Yuki catches him as he stumbles, grabbing him by the scruff of his tank top and reeling him back up. She headbutts him, hard - hard enough that blood spatters her forehead.

“Isn’t she-” Satoru cringes, “she’s being too rough on him.” Suguru twists away, attempting to throw her back, but he can’t move her, even with all the cursed energy rattling around in his bones. “I’m - they should stop. I’m gonna-”

“Don’t,” Shoko says, putting a hand on his shoulder. “He’s a big boy, he can call mercy on his own.”

“He’s not going to,” Satoru says, not a hint of doubt. He wouldn’t. He’s never - but -

Obviously he never had to - not against Satoru.

“Then he doesn’t need to, right?”

Suguru punches back at her, but Yuki just tosses him to the ground. He falls hard, hitting the dirt. And Yuki just doesn’t stop - she hits him while he’s down, a punch to the stomach, the shoulder, the bad arm. But Suguru hits back, reckless and feral. They’re not clean hits, but they land, at least. And every time, his energy keeps sparking back into him, bright white and searing through his veins. It’s some kind of short circuit - that’s all Satoru can tell without testing the theory. His cursed energy isn’t coming out, not all the way. Because-

Because he’s holding himself back?

Is he still holding himself back?

Yuki gets up, springing to her feet. She pulls Suguru up like he’s made of feathers, not bricks. And then, the second he’s back on two feet, she punches him right in the nose. The cursed blow lands with a sickening crunch, and Satoru can hear everyone suck in a little breath, even Haibara.

“No - no, that’s too far,” Satoru says, hushed. “He’s not even - didn’t you tell them no bone breaks?”

“No,” Shoko says simply, eyeing him with those brown eyes. But finally, they show a little swirl of worry, like a burl in the oak. “Suguru said anything goes except CTs.”

Standard stuff. It’s just a nerf to Yuki, really. Suguru’s brawling strength doesn’t come from his cursed spirits, but the numbers mismatch is too much of an advantage against anyone who doesn’t have the right sort of technique to counter attacks from all directions. (Which, hey, didn’t even help Satoru all that much.)

So it makes sense, really. Suguru should match her strength, kilo-for-kilo. But he doesn’t, he’s slipping, and he’s going to wipe out. The punch in the nose leaves Suguru dazed, but he manages to hold himself up. He dodges out of the next punch, wiping a stream of blood from his lips. Yeah, it makes sense that they’re not doing CTs. It doesn’t make sense that they’re going for a knockout, apparently. Past touch, past blood, past the point of any spar. Yuki’s going to whittle him down until he gives. And Suguru… Satoru’s not sure Suguru even knows when he should give. Satoru’s not sure he’s ever had to.

Yuki lunges, hitting him with a punch to the jaw, then a kick to the stomach. He collapses in on himself, clutching his stomach. Yuki just presses forward.

“Nope,” Satoru rises from the rail, ready to separate the two of them with his own Infinity if he has to. “I’m stopping this.”

Suguru trips, falling back on a knee. And Yuki presses forward-

But he’s always been useless.

But he’s always been too slow.

He’s always been a step behind.

So when it happens - when Suguru punches back - when his fist lands with a deafening blast of cursed energy, pitch-fucking-black-

“You’re kidding me.” The shockwave propagates through the air, nearly deafening the Six Eyes with its force. “You-”

“Ah, shit,” Shoko curses, grabbing her med kit as she bolts for the field. “Not again.”

“You have got to be fucking kidding me.”

“Wait,” Satoru manages, when he finally picks his jaw up off the ground. “Again?”

-:-

“Fuck you,” Suguru huffed, though Satoru could hear laughter stuck in his teeth like popcorn. There wasn’t any real anger there - just amusement, affection… No, not-

Suguru leaned away from Satoru, holding the controller above his head to keep it away. But Satoru was lankier, and he was faster, and he had limbs like a wacky waving inflatable balloon man.

“You’re so fucking impatient,” Suguru snorted, shoving lightly at Satoru as he squirmed to grab the controller, “You really think you can do better?”

“Obviously.”

“Yeah?” Suguru smirked.

And then he twisted, and then Satoru twisted back, because he hadn’t learned nothing from Geto-sensei in all their spars. Suguru let out a surprised laugh - he went easily, falling back into the tatami mats. He gave - intentionally. Because Suguru was strong - strong enough to give, if he wanted to. Strong enough to rise from the mats and push Satoru down. Or strong enough to hold him - and careful enough to keep him in one piece.

So Suguru didn’t fight it - he didn’t want to. He just laughed, and then he smiled, and then he looked up at Satoru, catching all of the green light of the low-res sewers in his eyes, and reflecting it back. Satoru’s breath stuck in his chest - stuttering and shallow and shaking.

Beautiful. He was beautiful, splayed out over the mats, stretching and blurring like an oil panting. Green and gold and pink in his cursed stomach. Suguru was beautiful in the way you look at from afar. From the other side of a line of tape on the floor; from the other side of thick, protective glass. But there was nothing like that in between them now, and hovering over him, Satoru felt the open, unguarded space between them start to vibrate with ions, superconductive, magnetically attractive.

The controller lay abandoned somewhere on the floor, centimeters away from Suguru’s hand - and Satoru’s hand too, where it lay over Suguru’s wrist. Suguru swallowed slowly, and Satoru watched every millimeter of his throat tense and shift with the motion - high-res, a hundred thousand more polygons than Daniel’s dumb, unrendered face. The Six Eyes watched as Suguru’s breathing stuttered too, glitching with laggy FPS.

Satoru felt himself freeze too. He felt himself pause, lost somewhere in the menu screen as he gathered his thoughts, as he figured out what to do. He stared at his inventory screen - counting bandages and breaths and batteries - because his lungs weren’t working, and his flashlight wasn’t working either. He couldn’t cast a light into the shapeless space between them, and his sanity was dropping fast.

But life doesn’t work like a singleplayer game. There’s no pausing. When you stand still - when you crash - the rest of the world just keeps moving. And the NPCs - they will remember that. Suguru squirmed underneath him, still unpaused. His eyes shifted from happy and carefree, to - to something else. Something glitchy, something wrong, something corrupted - a bad save. And Satoru’s sanity finally tanked.

He knows, doesn’t he?

Oh, shit.

Satoru reared back, too late. But he can’t just reset, can he? There’s no save file to scum his way out of this one.

Or he’s gonna know. He’s gonna find out - soon.

Shit shit shit.

So he’s soft-locked, achievement missed, condemned to the bad ending-

What you really are; what you’ve always been.

“Satoru-”

“I-I’m gonna beat you,” Satoru stuttered, scrambling away. His greed was so thick it seemed to coat his skin, slimy and disgusting. He could feel it in his stomach too, like a burning, roiling wave of acid. And in his chest - cold needles pricking through. Satoru cowered, retreating from his ferocious desire. He pressed his back to the front of the couch and brought his knees to his chest - cradling the burning want in his stomach - smothering it. He made himself look away; he made himself look at the screen.

“I’m-” Satoru choked out, “I’m so gonna fucking beat you.”

The monster.

Chapter Text

All the Young Dudes
👁 Reads 6M | ☆ Votes 66.6K | ≡ Parts 66 | ⏲ Time ∞

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by ♡S. Gojo♡

Ongoing ○ 1 new part

***

“You can’t do this!” Satoru yelled dramatically. He crossed his arms angrily, glaring (irritatedly) at his stupid father and stepmother. “This is, like, slavery!”

“Indentured servitude, actually,” his stepmother said evilly, as she smiled (also evilly) behind her thick platinum blonde braid.

“I’m sorry, honey, but it’s our only choice,” his father said (not evilly, he’s the good parent in this story). “It won’t be so bad.”

“But you promised I could go to Hollywood!!”

“You will still get to go to Hollywood,” Mei Mei - his stepmother, who he hated - said. “As a tourist!!! If you behave, that is. They will want to take their maid with them when they travel, after all~!”

“Ugh,” Satoru groaned, “But that’s not the same thing! I want to study film! And minor in marine biology!”

“I know, sweetheart,” his father said, frowning sadly. His eyes were filled with disappointment, but Satoru couldn’t see them behind his dark shades. He sheepishly scratched his buzz cut. “But we don’t have any money anymore. Not since I got laid off from my nonspecific tech job that I only got due the storm of circumstances imposed by the Dotcom Boom.”

“But DAD!” Satoru yelled (angrily again), “I want to be AN ACTOR!”

He was interrupted by the sound of a doorbell ringing as the doorbell rang, interrupting him.

“Satoru,” his stepmother snapped. “Behave.”

She went to open the door.

“Oh, hello,” she said to the person on the other side of the door that she had just opened, “You’re exactly on time. My name is Mei-Mei.”

“You can’t do this!” Satoru shouted.

“Oh, just ignore him,” she said with an unpleasant grin. “I’ll go get the paperwork~!”

“Of course, there’s no rush,” the man outside said in a nice voice.

He walked into the room, and his appearance was even nicer than his voice. He had medium length black hair and wore eyeliner around his purple eyes. He was dressed in preppy clothes with beige slim-fit trousers (they called pants ‘trousers’ in England), a plain white untucked t-shirt, and a blazer that seemed like it was a little too small on him, but that was kind of the fashion at the time. He was also wearing a little bit of hair gel and he had a black earring on one of his earlobes, because he was a bad boy.

Satoru gasped loudly as he realized who it was.

He was THE bad boy: Suguru Geto.

“Mom!” Satoru gasped, even though Mei Mei was his stepmom and they weren’t really at that level yet.

“Hi there,” he said charmingly. He brushed back his black bangs and did that thing where he flipped his hair by moving his neck, although it didn’t work because of the gel. “My name is-”

“I know who you are,” Satoru said quickly and loudly and angrily (even though secretly he was totally fangirling inside). “Oh my god,” he said, turning to his stepmom, “You can’t sell me to ONE DIRECTION!!!”

“Don’t whine, Satoru, the paperwork is already signed,” his stepmother said meanly.

“Dad!! You have to do something! Don’t let that evil woman destroy our family!”

His father looked at him defeatedly.

“I’m sorry, Satoru.” He shook his head. He had tears in his eyes, but he didn’t take off his shades to wipe them away or anything. The shades stayed on. The shades always stayed on. “I promise it’s only temporary until I find a new job, which may take some time due to the follow-on effects of the Great Recession and my lack of easily transferable skills from my nonspecific tech job.”

“Ugh, I HATE YOU,” Satoru said madly. He crossed his arms and acted mad. Even if Suguru Geto was super hot - he didn’t want to be a maid! He wanted to be an actor and a marine biologist! He would never forgive his father for this.

“I’ll never forgive you for this!” Satoru said.

“Go pack your bags, Satoru,” his stepmother yelled.

Satoru stormed off to his room upstairs to pack his bags. If he was going to have to go be a maid for One Direction in HOLLYWOOD then he had better have all of his stuff at least!!1 He sighed frustratedly as he shoved his composition notebooks and gel pens into his black and white checkered Jansport bookbag. Then he started packing his boring unbranded suitcase with skinny jeans and baggy hoodies and Converse sneakers.

“Hey…” A soft voice came from the door to his bedroom.

It was… Suguru Geto!

Oh no! Suguru looked at Satoru with a concerned look. “I know you’re not happy about this,” he said kindly, “but it won’t be so bad. I think you’re really gonna like the band.” He smiled. “And we can definitely take you to Hollywood.”

Satoru smiled shyly. For a bad boy, he seemed pretty nice. And he was hot. But Satoru crossed his arms again though, because he wasn’t done being mad, even though Suguru was hot. Satoru opened his mouth to say something, but before he could, he was interrupted again.

"This is not a test, this is your Emergency Broadcast System. Announcing the commencement of the annual purge sanctioned by the U.S. Government. Weapons of class four and lower have been authorized for use during the purge. All other weapons are restricted. Commencing at the siren, any and all crime (including murder) will be legal for 12 continuous hours. Police, fire, and Emergency Medical services will be unavailable until tomorrow morning at 7:00 a.m. when the purge concludes.

Blessed be our new founding fathers and America... A nation reborn. May God be with you all."

“Oh yeah,” Suguru said. “I forgot it was the Purge.”

-:-

“What’s Satoru’s condition?”

It’s a good question. Unfortunately, Yuki doesn’t have a good answer.

“Well…” Yuki sighs. She takes the teacup Principal Yaga offers her, as well as the chair he pulls out. “He’ll probably recover,” she says, “but it’ll take some time.”

Yaga takes his own seat on the other side of his desk. The wooden span of the desk feels as wide as the distance between Japan and Canada. It may as well be an entire ocean; it certainly feels like she’s half a world away.

“He’s resting now,” she adds. “Shoko’s orders. He’ll - he’s going to need lots of rest.”

She’s as close to an expert as they’ve got - Ieiri Shoko. The clan doctors know a little more. They’ve been practicing for longer; they’ve been treating Satoru for almost as long as she’s been alive. But they’re clan sorcerers, and they’re in Kyoto. For a lot of reasons - some of them good - Satoru is avoiding Kyoto like the plague.

For a lot of reasons - some of them bad - Yuki lets him.

Yaga nods. He silently takes a sip of tea, scalding, bitter, and black. His expression is as still as a stone, but Yuki senses a ripple in his cursed energy - a twist of dread.

“There’s no reason to think he won’t recover,” Yuki says. She cradles her own teacup in her hands, watching the steam dissipate off the top. “He’s done this before - RCT burnout. More than anyone, I’d bet,” she chuckles, “Most of us would stop trying, right?”

Yaga huffs. “I suppose so.” He sighs and sets his mug back on the table. He glances out the window, where the cloudy morning light is slowly brightening into a day of full sun. The light doesn't bring much in the way of answers. Just a little more UV exposure.

“How are things in Tokyo?” Yuki asks. “I’ve heard-” she hesitates.

It’s only been a day since they landed in Tokyo. Yuki’s still jet lagged. The dust and dirt on her skin is on an international visa. Her body hasn’t caught up, much less her intel. The higher ups’ cadre of public scouts send reports to three places: the clans, the school, and the mercenary market. She’s got her own private scouts too, but they haven’t had their eyes on Tokyo lately - or anywhere in Japan. That was a mistake, obviously. Yuki’s made a number of mistakes lately. They all come back to one fatal error - trusting jujutsu society.

“I’ve heard there’s been a lot of curse activity lately,” Yuki says finally.

“Yeah.” Yaga’s lips press together into a flat line. “We’ve been stretched too thin here.”

In the four months since she last saw him, it looks like he’s aged 40 years. It’s easy sometimes to forget that there’s only about a decade between them. Yuki’s too young, really, to be leading the fight against powerful, rogue curse users. Yaga’s too young to be burying kids.

“That’s not that odd for winter, right?”

“Correct.”

“But…” Yuki frowns, “things haven’t slowed down since, have they?”

It’s March - the very tail end. Spring has sprung, and the warming weather should melt away the bitter, icy grip of seasonal curses. Winter’s generally a toss up, of course - there’s the cold, but for every snowstorm, there’s a cozy fireplace, and there’s the company of family and friends. When the snow finally melts into dew and the flowers start to bloom, the weaker curses generally start to shrivel away, starved of their negativity. Spring brings hope and life. It’s calm; it’s pleasant, even. Generally.

It’s March now, and the ice still hasn’t thawed.

“No,” he says simply. “They haven’t.”

Yaga takes a deep breath as he slips off his sunglasses. He carefully folds them as he sets them on the desk, his hands as precise and delicate as if he were sewing a puppet. The sunlight reflects off of the shiny tinted plastic like a solar flare. But Yaga’s eyes, dark and heavy, carry none of that same light.

“There have been more and more curses appearing recently. And, on average, they’re more powerful than usual. We just don’t have the manpower,” Yaga admits. “We can’t respond to all of the reports - not even half.”

“Well, Jujutsu Tech never should’ve been carrying so much of the load,” Yuki says, grimacing. Young sorcerers are the most vulnerable, but they’ve been treated as the most expendable. It was fucked when Yuki went through it, and it’s equally fucked now. “Of course you don’t have the manpower. You have four students?” Suguru, Nanami, Haibara, and technically Shoko, but she’s worth more at home than in the field. “Four - against… all of the curses in Tokyo? The higher ups should be helping more.”

Yaga shakes his head. “The higher ups aren’t the problem. Well,” he sighs, “not in that regard.” He digs a stack of papers out from one of the drawers in his desk. “We’ve paged every sorcerer in Japan ranked grade 2 or higher.” He sets it down between them. The paper smacks against the wood with a heavy slap. “It’s nowhere near enough.”

Yuki flips up the corner of the stack, scanning the subject lines of each report one by one. Case after case - they’re all curse sightings, and they’re all unclaimed.

“How many sorcerers do you have?” Yuki asks, “Not counting the kids.”

Yaga slides another paper across the desk - a list of all the active sorcerers taking missions in Tokyo. She recognizes most of the names - not all of them, but most. But there are absences - noticeable ones. Struck-out lines that mark a sorcerer as ‘retired’. That usually doesn’t mean that they’re relaxing somewhere on a beach.

“About twenty, give or take.”

“Twenty?” Yuki blinks, “Only twenty? Where’s-” She recoils, the chilling realization hitting her like a splash of ice water. “Are the clans not lending their sorcerers?” There are a few Kamo sorcerers on the list, as per their agreement. But the Kamos don’t have half the manpower of the Zen’ins - not to mention the Zen’in’s armory.

“The clans have agreed to help…” Yaga’s expression pinches tight, “Pending a vote on the assignment of resources and responsibilities.”

“A vote, right,” Yuki rolls her eyes. “When are they meeting?”

“They’re set to convene in a month - the end of April.”

“A month? We might not have a month.”

“I agree,” Yaga grunts. “However, this is the earliest that the Zen’ins would agree to.”

“Smells like bullshit. Why are they stalling?”

Yaga sighs. Yuki has no love for the clans; Yaga knows that as well as anyone. But still, he picks his words carefully. He takes a sip of tea, then continues: “The Zen’ins insist that the Gojos are attempting to manipulate the situation to their advantage.”

“What advantage?”

“They claim that the other clans are hiding their own resources to shift the burden of protection onto the Zen’in clan. It’s no secret that they’ve got more combat sorcerers than the other clans; they’re arguing that it’s inequitable.”

Right. Of course, in the past, they’d argued that their generous supply of combat sorcerers should reduce the amount they were obligated to pay into Jujutsu Tech’s funding. But obviously supply doesn’t mean actual deployment. Right. Yuki’s eye twitches.

“What do they mean, ‘hiding resources’?” Yuki sighs. She points at the paper, to a Kamo struck out in black pen. “The Kamos have deployed plenty of sorcerers.”

“The Gojos haven’t.”

“Well, sure - they’ve sent plenty of scouts, though,” Yuki says. Their techniques aren’t suited for modern mission-based sorcery; neither is their obsession with ritual. They don’t quite fit into the new era of jujutsu, but like a rooted tree, it’s harder to get rid of after it’s grown old. “The Gojos barely have combat sorcerers. It’s just-”

Yaga’s mouth twists into a bitter smile.

“...It’s just Satoru,” he finishes.

“Right.” Yuki sighs.

“The Zen’ins allege that his absence was an intentional move to sabotage their clan’s standing among the big three.”

“Obviously,” she mutters, “Everything’s a power play.” She shakes her head. “So we’re on our own, then?”

“For a month, at least.”

Yuki sucks in a breath. “Okay.” She takes the first packet from the stack of unanswered reports, glancing at the subject line. “Let’s talk about the cases, then,” she says, “I’ll see what I can do.”

Yaga straightens, nodding. He slides the stack of papers to the side and opens the first report up. As fickle as their intel has been as of late, it’s better than nothing. And Yuki will take anything, really, at this point.

“An unusual flooding incident in the Nagano prefecture,” he explains. There’s a map on the first page, though the area highlighted as ‘possible curse activity’ is too broad to really be useful. “No curses were spotted, though there were residuals.” He flips to the second page, which contains a list of notes from the scouts. “If it was a curse, they’re thinking it was just one - medium grade, maybe. Probably a roamer, too. They didn’t spot any signs of a lair.”

“Any casualties?”

“No.” Yaga shakes his head, “Fortunately not. The flooding occurred by a shrine just outside of Saku. It was empty at the time. One of our windows sensed residuals after the fact. Scouts moved in to confirm.”

“It could just be CE from the shrine though, right?” Yuki looks at the map. Even though it’s inland, and far from the sea, the Nagano prefecture floods plenty when the rain picks up. “There’s a river nearby, too. It’s been raining more this spring, hasn’t it? At least, it snowed more in the winter… Could just be climate change.”

“I thought so too,” Yaga says, “We had the scouts take samples of the water for residual analysis.” Yuki nodded. No one except Satoru could perfectly match residuals to one sorcerous origin, but detecting the presence of residuals at all could still be useful. If the water retained residual CE once it was removed from the shrine, it would have to be a product of sorcery. “They brought it back to the lab and ran a few tests.”

“And?”

Yaga grimaces.

“It was seawater.”

-:-

“Wow… Tsukumo’s really tough!”

Yu knows that, of course - silly! Yu knows that she’s special-grade. There’s only three of them, so it’s not too hard to keep track. Yu knows that she’s got years and years of experience on the rest of them. Not that he’s calling her old! Just, y’know, older. Yu knows that there’s nothing to worry about!

But Yu’s heart still nearly stopped when she flew across the clearing.

She’s strong. Yu knows she’s strong - way stronger than him. But - still - his chest locked up and his whole body froze when he watched it happen. When she crashed through the paneled wall, sent flying by one nasty punch from Geto. He held his breath, decay crawling up the back of his throat as she lay there in the heap of rubble. He can’t really taste his own cursed energy, not the way Gojo can. But there was something in his mouth that tasted like formaldehyde. He held his breath as his body flipped between hot and cold, as his clenched fingers started to turn a little white - maybe a little blue. He held his breath as he waited for her to get up.

She did; she got up - oh, thank goodness, she got up.

The air comes rushing back into his lungs like helium - light, and dizzying, and a little cold. She’s fine. When Tsukumo flips back onto her feet, Ieiri and Gojo are already halfway to the clearing. She’s fine. Yu slumps over the railing as everyone else scatters to their places, everyone but Nanami. They hung back as always, watching the third years run ahead.

“Yeah,” Nanami mutters. “She is.” His voice rumbles like thunderclouds, stormy and grey. Yu glances at him - his face isn’t much better.

The wind in his chest calms a little, dying down to a fluttery breeze. “Oh, c’mon,” Yu laughs. “Why are you all brood-y?” He puffs out his lips like a duck. “Y so srs?” he says, though the effect is probably lessened by his lack of face paint and smeared red lipstick. It’s not that funny, but it’s harder to be funny these days. Nanami huffs out a little laugh anyway.

“You’ll be that tough one day too, y’know,” Yu adds, bumping their shoulders together.

Unlike Yu, Nanami actually has a lot of potential. Not all sorcerers are cut out to be combat sorcerers. Yu’s known that ever since the beginning. Yu barely had enough aptitude to train in combat sorcery to begin with, and he’s been just about hitting his cap. It’s fine. Scouts are still useful. All you really need for that is the ability to see curses, right? He’s at least got that.

Nanami’s different, though. He’s suited for combat sorcery for sure. His technique is a little complicated, but it’s useful. And, importantly, it actually does something. And ever since he’s started training with cursed tools, he’s just been getting stronger and stronger. He’s far stronger than Yu, even if they’re technically still the same grade. But every mission they go on, it’s clear that they shouldn’t be. Nanami carries way more than half his weight. More than two thirds. Maybe even more than three quarters.

Nanami’s there to exorcise curses; Yu’s just there to keep his morale up.

“...You think so?” Nanami mumbles. “I don’t know.”

“I mean, maybe not special-grade,” Yu hedges. Special-grades are, like, actually monsters - not in a bad way, just in a totally, incomprehensibly inhuman way. Maybe they’ll - Nanami will never be that. But that’s fine. “Maybe just a grade 1, but - I think you’re pretty strong.”

“I don’t even-” Nanami shakes his head.

Yu tilts his head, “What?”

Nanami stares out at the field, at the scorched bit of earth Geto left behind. He’s long gone now, fading back into the shadows of the dorm halls. The trampled patch of grass he and Tsukumo fought on is still stained with his cursed energy - a black afterimage. It’s withering, like he’s salted the earth. That never happened before, back when they used to spar together. But Geto’s different now.

They’re all different now.

“I don’t know if I can keep doing this,” Nanami says. “...If Geto can’t-”

“Hey,” Yu interrupts, “Geto’s gonna be fine.”

Probably.

Maybe?

He’s doing… better? Yu’s not sure. It’s been months since they trained together. And, well… They don’t train together much anymore. But Geto’s been training alone, down in the armory, warded by layers and layers of inscribed seals. They don’t see each other much anymore. He and Nanami are out on missions, and Geto locks himself away in the bunker from dawn until dusk. They don’t talk much anymore. They eat together, if he and Nanami aren’t on an away mission. That's pretty often, though. They take at least three missions a week, and usually at least one requires overnight travel. Sometimes they make it back for dinner, though, and Geto will eat with them, quietly exhausted from his own training. After that, Geto holes up again for the night. Sometimes they see him for coffee the next morning. Not breakfast, though.

It feels a little hollow, training without Geto. But Yu can’t really talk. Nanami always trained with him more. They were a better match. Geto was still unbeatable in hand-to-hand, but Nanami had a knack for weapons. Yu had a knack for… not that! Which is fine! He’s passable with a katana; it’s just not really his strength. No part of combat sorcery seems to be his strength, though.

And that’s fine too. Yu’s been studying other things, too, trying to find that mysterious strength of his, if it exists at all. He’s been studying veils and residuals - he can draw a mean veil! It’s a good way to be mission support. Not that Nanami couldn’t draw a veil, but he’s only got so much CE. Better for Yu to spend his own on easy stuff like veils. Better to spend his time reading the reports - picking out little details that might be important later. Better for him to carry extra medical supplies instead of extra weapons.

They make a good team, even if it’s not a very even one. It’s the best team they can field, anyway. There’s not many sorcerers left in Tokyo, and Yu’s the only other student cleared for combat sorcery, with Ieiri locked in the clinic. With Tsukumo and Gojo back, the number of sorcerers at Jujutsu Tech is objectively doubled, but they both count for like, a hundred sorcerers, right? Maybe it’ll lighten their load. But then again, Yu and Nanami aren’t cleared to go after the stronger curses. And, if no one’s been around to deal with them… The two special-grades probably have a mountain of missions with higher priority than the easier ones that Yu and Nanami are struggling through.

But just the fact that they’re back means it’s going to be okay now. They’ll still have to work hard, but they can relax a little now, can’t they? The special grades are gonna do special grade stuff! They’re gonna kill all the curses. They’re gonna fix everything in Tokyo. They’re gonna fix Geto too.

“Yu.”

Nanami closes his eyes. That desecrated patch of grass is probably still burned into the back of his eyelids, with how long he’s been staring.

“Do you really think that?” he asks softly.

Does he? Yu doesn’t really know what to think. With stuff like this, you can think yourself into circles. It’s impossible to say what’ll happen. His intuition isn’t really a thinking thing, so much as a knowing thing. So Yu asks the Universe - what does he think? What does he know?

Problem is, the Universe doesn’t respond this time.

That’s okay, though. Maybe the Universe doesn’t know what to think, either.

“Yeah,” Yu chokes out, pressing on a thin smile. “I do.”

-:-

“Suguru-”

A wave of cursed energy crashes against the bathroom door, crushing heavy against the Six Eyes like a tsunami filled with cinderblocks.

“Don’t-” Suguru coughs.

It’s wet - it’s a wet sound, really wet. Like he’s bleeding, like he’s sick, like he’s drowning - concrete casts on his feet.

Satoru sucks in a breath. “Hey-”

“I’m fine, Satoru,” he spits, “just go.”

His cursed energy oozes out under the door, spreading and seeping into the tile like an oil slick. It’s iridescent, but pitch dark. And instead of smooth and glossy, it’s sharp. Satoru can taste it, sour and sulfurous. Satoru stumbles back, wondering for a brief second if it’ll eat the rubber soles of his shoes. But - it’s just jujutsu. Twisted, though.

It’s vile. It’s not right, it’s certainly not fucking fine. The dark pool shimmers with a strange, reactive sort of energy. Electricity courses through it - like it might throw sparks. It stains the air and the earth with a corrosive despair. It’s different, it’s odd, it’s wrong, because - because he’s always-

He’s always had a little bit of sadness, buried deep. A twist of blue buried in his prismatic colors. It’s why he’s so strong. Happy sorcerers never amount to much. They just don’t have the juice - not like Suguru. Sadness is his well, and it’s a real deep one. But despair? Despair is vile, bitter - it fills Satoru’s mouth with ash. He hasn’t had that since…

Since a long time ago.

“You’re not-”

“Leave.” And the miasma bursts - blue and white lightning explodes out of the mire, arcing up towards Satoru. He stumbles back, catching himself on the wall. Bitterness floods his nose and mouth. It’s wrong, so noxious it makes Satoru’s skin itch and burn without even touching it.

“Just leave me alone,” Suguru pleads, and his voice - it wavers. Satoru presses himself up against the door, stepping into Suguru’s caustic cloud. The air is thick and toxic with corruption. Maybe it won’t actually suffocate him, but Satoru feels like he ought to hold his breath anyway.

“...I-” Satoru stutters, “I can’t just-”

Suguru snaps finally, and his voice cuts its way out, cruel and cold. Like shards of ice digging jagged paths into Satoru’s chest.

“Can’t you?”

Satoru freezes.

He’s right, that’s the thing. It’s not unfair, or cruel, or even fucking wrong to say so. It’s objectively correct, no matter how much it fucking hurts. It should hurt. It should kill him, in a just universe. He can accept that. He can agree with it, even. But as much as Satoru can objectively accept the sentence he’s been given, that he should jump in front of a car or a train or a fucking asteroid - that doesn’t close the hole in his heart. Suguru’s acid eats away at the gaping wound in his chest. The flesh puckers at the corners, sizzling as it corrodes into mush.

It hurts.

“I’m sorry,” Suguru says softly.

What hurts worse is the way Suguru’s voice breaks again, the way it instantly dissolves.

“I didn’t-” Suguru coughs again, wet and bloody. “I’m sorry, Satoru. Please just leave me alone, okay?”

The inky black pool under his feet swirls and thickens. The blue-white sheen fades away as it turns matte. It’s heavier now, slower. Thick like molasses, but it tastes like salt.

“I’ll be fine.”

“...Okay, Suguru.”

-:-

“There’s no way we can handle this alone,” Yuki sighs. She puts the twentieth case packet on the growing stack of reviewed files on the corner of Yaga’s desk. “They’re popping up everywhere. Even scouting this-” Yuki groans, “I mean, what the hell happened?”

Yaga shrugs helplessly.

“I thought we were just dealing with one - maybe two curse users,” Yuki muses. “But… This. It’s like the curses are waking up. Or new ones are being born? There’s no way this could be one person, even a duo… The effects are too different. We’re looking at like, at least a dozen distinct CTs.”

“I agree,” Yaga says grimly, “It’s inexplicable.” He slides open the drawer and takes out another file - much thinner. “I called in Mei Mei as well. She’s helping us gauge the actual power level of some of these curses, so we know what’s safe to take.” Yaga slides the contract over. “Her scouting has been helpful, but… You know how she operates.”

“Yeah.” The cost quotes alone are special-grade. Yuki grunts. Look, Yuki’s got no loyalty to jujutsu society. It’s fucked, even down to the roots. She can appreciate Mei Mei’s mercenary attitude. But surely, she can stand to take a case or two pro bono.

“We need clan help. And clan money.” She groans. “We mostly need sorcerers. Clan sorcerers.”

“I agree.” Yaga nods. “End of April,” he echoes. “We just have to hold out until then. And then, hope they agree too.”

Yuki scowls. “They will.” She glances back at the active roster, at the lines struck through in pitch-black ink. “But sorcerers are going to die while they’re dragging their feet.” Yuki sighs, grabbing the stack of twenty reports. “Fuck it, I’ll get through these this week.”

“Yuki,” Yaga says, soft and stern. “You can’t do this alone. Even Satoru can’t be everywhere at once.”

She chuckles bitterly. “Not yet.” But… “Yeah, I know.” Yuki flicks through the packets, sorting them by estimated curse grade. “Whatever’s coming, it’s not going to stop. We need to figure out what’s causing all of these new curses to pop up, but we need some breathing room. I’ll take the easy ones first, clear some areas. That’ll buy us time.”

“We need more people on the ground,” Yuki concedes, “But… I don’t want to send the kids.” They’re tough. Sorcerers have to be. But they’re not unbreakable. Satoru is living proof of that. And Yuki is living proof of how easy it is to accidentally break ‘em.

“I don’t know if we’ve got a choice,” Yaga says, tight-lipped. “The travel time alone - new curses are popping up every day.”

“Whatever we’re up against has to be special-grade.” Yuki says, “I know the curses we’re seeing in reports are weaker, but…” she sucks in a breath, “there’s gotta be a master curse, Yaga. Someone - something - pulling the strings. Who knows when they’re gonna pop up again. There’s no way it’s safe to send anyone grade 2 or lower up against these curses. Even in groups… I don’t know.”

“I agree. But there aren’t many grade 1 sorcerers outside of the clans.” The active mercenary list is a short one, and it’s only gotten shorter. But most high-grade sorcerers get poached by the clans sooner or later. And if they’re stonewalling Jujutsu Tech, then…

“Yeah, it’s a skeleton crew.” She scans the list again. There’s a few grade 2s that might be able to hack it. Kusakabe - he should have been promoted already.

“What we really need,” Yaga mutters, “is special-grades.”

“You got me and Suguru,” Yuki huffs. “Satoru’s still out of commission, though.”

He hasn’t woken up yet. They’ll know more when he does. If it’s looking like it’ll take a week, or a month, or a year. All she can hope is that the time estimate is something finite. But whatever it is - however long - Satoru’s off the table. Satoru’s gonna fight that, Yuki can already tell. But he doesn’t need to be throwing himself into dangerous missions, not when he’s just recovered. If they’re smart about it, they’ll keep him locked in his room until things get safer.

Yaga sets down his tea. It should be quiet - his mug clicking against the wood. But it seems to echo throughout the office, maybe because everything else in Yuki’s mind goes so quiet when he says:

“Just you. Suguru’s out of commission too.”

“...What?”

-:-

So, obviously Satoru tries again. Because he’s an asshole, because he has no self-control, because he has the sticking power of Baby Shark, and none of the same appeal to a children’s audience. But Yuki says Satoru needs to talk to Suguru, and Shoko says Satoru needs to talk to Suguru, and Satoru says that Satoru really needs to talk to Suguru before he puts his head through a brick wall.

Yeah. He needs to talk to Suguru.

As much as Suguru doesn’t want to; as much as Suguru doesn’t deserve it. Suguru won’t listen, probably, because Suguru hates him, probably, despite what he says. But it’s unavoidable, right? Something has to give. It’s like in those arcade games, where you eventually get to a level that’s impossible to beat. When there’s just rows and rows of alien spaceships or fire breathing dragons or unusable tetris blocks. When you slam into a wall of rocks at mach speed, finally unable to outrun the creeping timer. When you spin out, when you total your car, when all of the pixels explode into glittery TV static.

Satoru finds him in the showers. It’s not hard. Everyone else is accounted for, and the shower’s been running for a while. At least half an hour, maybe longer. The whole men’s bathroom is filled with steam. It smells kind of like eucalyptus, or maybe green tea. A little bit like ash, and a lot like the smoke from a grease fire.

“...Suguru?” he starts awkwardly. The rough, rumbly noise of the shower splattering against tiles drowns him out, though. So he clears his throat. He presses his back against the tile wall separating the showers from the rest of the bathroom and he tries again. “Suguru?” he says. His voice still wobbles, but at least it’s loud.

He doesn’t hear any response except the shower. The falling, splashing water rubs at the Six Eyes like sandpaper, grinding him down. He’d be tempted to check if the showers were just empty - or haunted. If some ghost or curse had taken up residence - like that hot boy that died in Murder House and haunts the crawlspace. Of course, he’d sense the curse if it were something like that - he’d feel its pure CE, raw and monstrous.

Instead, he just feels Suguru’s - a dark pool of oil, black as night.

“...What?”

Suguru’s voice is barely audible over the shower. But it’s there.

“...I thought I told you to leave me alone, Satoru,” he says. His voice is soft, but steady. It doesn’t crack like glass. It just sits, heavy, like a stone sunken into the ocean floor.

“I know-” Satoru blurts, his breath hitching, like bubbles in his chest. “Um, I know, but-” he clenches his fists, nails digging into his palms like shattered clamshells. “But - I thought-” Satoru hesitates. “Yuki wanted me to talk to you.” That part’s true. “Um, about your jujutsu.”

That part’s probably not.

Technically, Yuki didn’t say what he should talk to Suguru about. So technically it’s not a lie. It’s just… an assumption. A faulty one, maybe. But that’s not his fault. Everything he does is faulty, and now everything he sees is faulty too, thanks to the Six Eyes. Suguru’s energy bubbles, eating into the tile like acid. There’s despair and there’s hate-

“To help you figure it out,” Satoru adds quickly, uselessly. “To fix it.” It’s not a lie, it’s just-

He hasn’t figured out how to fix it yet.

“Okay.”

Suguru doesn’t say anything else. The shower just keeps running. Satoru tries to listen, he listens really hard, for a shift in the sounds of the water. Anything to indicate that Suguru’s moving. Anything that indicates he’s alive. But there’s nothing of the sort. Just stillness and static - just water crashing over the tile in patternless waves.

“I’m gonna, um-” Satoru takes a deep breath. “I’m just gonna come in, ok?”

“Satoru-”

“I’m not - don’t worry, I’m closing my eyes,” he stutters as he stumbles blindly into the showers, finding his usual stall. “Not that they fuckin’ work right anyway, but…”

He’s not trying to be a creep, not that he’s succeeding at not being a creep. And Suguru knows that, probably. He knows Satoru’s terrible at keeping his eyes to himself, and not much better with his hands. He’s trying to be better. Does Suguru know that he’s trying to be better? Should Satoru tell him?

Would it help? He can put the blindfold back on, if that helps. If it’s enough that Suguru wouldn’t have to see his pitiful face. Or can just stick a fork in his eye sockets and short-circuit them again. The effort counts, right? It counts if he scratches himself bloody trying to rip himself away from Suguru. It counts if he hates himself double, to make up for Suguru’s slack.

Satoru suddenly bumps into one of the dividers. Satoru grabs the edge, steadying himself, and he pulls himself closer - wrong fucking closer - and scalding water sprays him. Instinctively, Satoru activates Infinity, and-

“Shit,” Satoru gasps. The water wavers in the air, then it crashes down onto his skin like splattering oil. “Ow.” Satoru crumples against the divider as fire floods his veins - cursed energy ricocheting back into his core.

“What are you-” Suguru huffs, and then he’s closer, softer- “You idiot,” he murmurs. Wet hands find his shoulders, steadying him. It takes everything Satoru has not to open his eyes, not to see, but-

“I’m sorry,” Satoru whispers. “I’m an idiot.” Suguru gently steers him into his stall. Hot water seeps through Satoru’s cotton sleeves.

“Yeah, you are.” Suguru sighs. “Are you okay?” Satoru nods clumsily, blindly.

Suguru’s hands leave his shoulders, and the wet patches where they were get a little colder with every second. Satoru hears footsteps, and the sound of the water changes too. Satoru cracks his eyes open. Luckily, Suguru has disappeared behind the divider. Coast’s clear. Satoru slides down against the back wall of his stall, beneath the cubby where his 3-in-1 body wash lays untouched, covered by a faint layer of dust and dried soap scum.

“Is your technique still gone?”

“Kind of. Yeah. I mean-” Satoru mutters, “It’s glitchy. Not gone gone. But I can’t really… Do anything.”

“You should be more careful.”

“I know.” Satoru curls into a ball, hugging his knees to his chest. The tile floor is wet, even in his stall, and it begins to seep through his trousers. But a wet ass is a fair price to pay to hear Suguru just a little better.

“You need to take care of yourself, Satoru.”

“Yeah…” Satoru sighs, “I’m not good at that.”

Suguru’s cursed energy swirls, blue streaks darkening into a deep purple, oily, with a dark sheen of iridescence.

“...Why are you here, Satoru?” Suguru says, his voice thick with fatigue. “What did Yuki want you to talk to me about?”

“Oh, uh…” Satoru freezes, reaching numbly for the pretense he’d thought of before his nervous system decided to take a toaster bath. “Right, uh, cursed energy,” he gulps. And, hey, like, for what it’s worth - he was analyzing Suguru in his spar. Before the whole ‘horrifyingly corrupted cursed energy that looks and tastes and smells like he’s dying like he’s drowning like he’s rotting from the inside out-

“It’s called a Black Flash,” Satoru blurts out.

Before all that, Satoru did notice a thing or two.

“The thing you did when you punched Yuki through a wall,” he clarifies.

It’s a little easier to think when he’s thinking about jujutsu. ‘Cause he doesn’t know jack shit about people. He doesn’t know what to say to Suguru, doesn’t know how to fill the empty space he left between him when he ran away to the other side of the world. He does, however, know about jujutsu. He knows a lot about jujutsu. The sorcerous part of his brain is always running quietly in the background, like some computer process. Satoru recites the text effortlessly; the definition burned into his brain before he learned to ride a bike.

“It’s a distortion in space that occurs when you apply CE to a strike within 0.000001 seconds - 10 nanoseconds - of a physical hit, dealing 250% damage to the target.”

“It’s, um - it’s really impressive,” Satoru adds, when Suguru doesn’t respond. “You’re really strong.”

There’s a ripple beneath them, a change in the rhythm the shower paints onto the tile as raindrops fall around Suguru’s shape. The current shifts, and Satoru watches rivulets run down the tile. Glassy bubbles swim in the dark water, slowly circling the drain.

“Most sorcerers never land one in their whole lives,” Satoru presses on, “And - I mean, they try. ‘Cause you can do it with any technique, so, in the clans, it’s something everyone trains for. But it’s hard. I mean, I’ve never done it, and like, timing’s not even an issue for me, obviously. But it’s kinda like, a luck thing, so-”

He’s rambling, yeah. It’s easy to ramble. He’s just matching the showerhead, noisy and chaotic - unintelligible sounds.

“I’ve only ever seen Yuki do one before,” Satoru adds, a little slower. He stems his rambling flow, building a dam with his forearms. He crosses them over his knees, resting his chin against them. “Even she can’t do it all the time - no one can. But… Yuki-”

“Is she okay?” Suguru asks suddenly. His voice is thin and rough, like a rag that’s been used a few too many times, scrubbed too hard against tile.

“What? Yuki?”

Satoru fights the urge to peek around the divider, to see if the rest of Suguru is just as worn down. He’s got that suspicion, obviously. Not like it would help to have it confirmed, though. Not like Suguru would let him fucking help-

“She’s fine,” Satoru says, squeezing around his legs to keep them still. “I mean, yeah, you punched the shit out of her. You’re, um… You’re really strong now. Like I said. She - uh - she probably wasn’t expecting it. Oh - I mean, not that that’s why you got her, it was a fair fight, I’m not saying-”

“She’s not hurt?”

“Yeah, she’s fine. She’s tough. She’s got RCT.”

“...Oh,” he sucks in a breath. “Good.”

“And, like, she knows how Black Flashes go. She was dazed, but it wasn’t that bad.“

“Right…”

“You only landed one,” Satoru continues, adding details, because he’s got details - the Six Eyes gives him details. And maybe Suguru will feel better about it, with details. maybe that’ll help. “Black Flashes are kinda weird like that. It’s 250% for the actual Black Flash, but if you keep going, if you get a few off, then you can kinda get into the zone. And if you do that, then your power output goes up to 120%, so that’s actually an effective 300%. Which is like, a lot actually. Especially if you’re already strong. That’s why the clans are so obsessed with it - if you could teach it, doesn’t even matter if you have a shitty technique. But you can’t, really - you’ve got it or you don’t.” Satoru chuckles. “But you do, because of course you do - and once you master Black Flash-”

“I’m not,” Suguru mutters. “I’m not gonna master it.”

“...What?” Satoru huffs out a little laugh of disbelief. Still? It feels like everything’s changed - his stance, his smile, his cursed energy, black as the void. Even the way he wears his hair has changed. But maybe some things don’t, ever. Even if you flee the country. Even if you shatter everything and try to bury it in the snow.

“You will. Don’t underestimate yourself, Suguru,” Satoru says, “Yeah, it’s luck, but it’s not just luck. Once you’ve done it once, you can do it again. Not on cue, exactly. You can’t really control it, even if you’re really good. But you’re really really good, so-”

“...It sounds dangerous.”

“I mean, not really,” Satoru says, shrugging like Suguru’s got x-ray vision. But he doesn’t, so it’s lost on his side of the divider, same as Satoru’s twitchy, restless hands. “You just gotta be good at other shit too. Don’t count on a Black Flash to save you.”

“You could hurt someone,” Suguru protests.

“Well, yeah, that’s the point,” Satoru huffs, rolling his eyes. “That’s, like, the whole point of jujutsu, in case you hadn’t noticed.”

“...Right.”

He sounds awful. Ragged. Like someone’s torn a hole in him, loose threads fraying from a gaping wound. Quieter, too - dissolving under the shower. It’s been going for almost an hour now, eroding Suguru - washing him away. And Satoru wonders what it is that he’s so desperately trying to wash out. If it’s blood and bile, or if it’s himself.

“Suguru…”

Suguru doesn’t answer, of course. Satoru swallows down the shards in his throat and tries again.

“What happened to you? When I was gone…”

Suguru doesn’t answer.

“You don’t have to tell me that, I guess, but… Are you okay?”

And when Suguru still doesn’t answer, Satoru doesn’t wait. His useless hands can’t stop his mindless limbs from moving. He peeks around the divider.

Suguru is curled into himself, head to his knees, facing the wall. Inky black tendrils of matted hair swirl down his back. Are they longer? They must be. They look like they could choke him, if they knotted around his neck. It’s dark in the showers; there’s only dim light from the other room. Maybe the automatic lights went off, or maybe Suguru never turned them on. But the Six Eyes don’t need much light to see by, and what he sees stands out - stark and pale. It’s white as bleached bone. And it tastes, and smells, and it feels like death.

Satoru hears the air leave his lips, the pathetic gust of a sound.

“What…”

Suguru slowly lifts his chin, his eyes as dark as polished stone. The net of dark cursed energy flickers around him, flashing with electricity. Satoru’s eyes - all six - snap to his neck. A strip of seal paper wraps tight around his throat. A strip of seal paper digs raggedly into his jugular, cutting off the cursed energy flowing through his lungs. A strip of seal paper is tied around Suguru’s neck, as tight as a noose.

A strip of seal paper engraved with the higher-ups’ sigil.

-:-

“...They decided what?”

“...I couldn’t stop it.” A raw, rare bit of vulnerability punches through Yaga’s voice. He leans onto his elbows, clutching his temple with a fist. “It was a unanimous vote.”

“It can’t have-“ Yuki sucks in a breath. “The Gojo clan voted in favor?”

A bitter smile flashes over Yaga’s lips. He speaks softly, slowly, stilted:

“The Gojo clan declined to send a representative.”

-:-

“Hey, Suguru?”

He was perfect; that was the death sentence.

Suguru was perfect in the way that diamonds were - smooth, cloudless, and infinitely faceted. He had the kind of angles Satoru could stare into forever, watching photons refract and scatter into his soul. The moonlight hit his skin that night, and he was utterly divine. It was unfair, Satoru thought, that silver looked just as beautiful on him as gold. He was beautiful - that was the problem. Beautiful like the night, beautiful like a storm, beautiful like the call of the void. He was the kind of beautiful that made men jump from their ships, or plunge into hell.

When Suguru turned to Satoru, silver on his lips, Satoru felt more like a bird that’d flown straight into a window. He forgot how to speak, but even if he could, it’s not like he remembered the words he was gonna say. And then Suguru stared at him with eyes so shiny they flickered like stars. And it felt like the rest of him should be up there in the night sky too, immortalized as a constellation. The only problem there is that a few polygons don’t really capture the entirety of Suguru’s celestial body. They don’t do it justice. Nothing does; nothing short of divine senses like the Six Eyes. That was why Satoru’s chest felt like the empty void of space. ‘Cause he could see. He could see… everything now. He could see the heat radiating off of Suguru’s flushed cheeks. The hitch in his breath; the slowness in his shoulders. Suguru’s eyes looked a little bluer in the moonlight - a little closer.

Was his shoulder a little closer too? Satoru couldn’t tell. It was hard to keep track - his position, his momentum. Satoru couldn’t do both at once; thanks, Heisenberg. But Satoru was usually fine with breaking the principles of quantum mechanics. It was the alcohol that was the problem.

The fluttery fire in his chest threw off his precision. All of his floating points seemed to fly away. Was he closer? Or was the space between them just warped? Was he closer? Or was Satoru just hypersensitive to his body; double-detecting every signal he radiated. Was he closer? Or did Satoru just want him to be.

But, no-

Because Suguru did lean forward - closer, closer. His cursed energy bubbled up in smooth currents in his chest. Then he curled into the railing, and his lax shoulders fell, calm and comfortable even though the wooden rails poked into his shoulders. His hair tumbled down like black silk as he tilted his head. Suguru looked at Satoru, hazy-eyed. His expression smoothed out like polished stone. Satoru’s breath caught in his throat - fitful ions bouncing around, trying to spark lightning.

If the alcohol made Suguru smoother, it made Satoru utterly jagged.

Satoru wished he could drag himself across Suguru’s adamantine soul and let it grind him down into dust. The Six Eyes frizzed and frayed, messily snagging on each and every detail of Suguru - his face (smooth), his hand (a little rough), his cursed energy (somewhere in between). The buzz over his senses was like a cloud of mist, but instead of blurring Suguru out, the light just reflected and flashed back. It blinded Satoru; it dazed him. That’s why you’re not supposed to turn on your brights when it’s foggy; that’s why you’re only supposed to have two eyes, not six.

Satoru’s head throbbed. He was lost - adrift in a sea of strange sensations. Every individual signal was taxing to take in. And together, they blended into too much. But then Suguru’s cursed energy brushed against Satoru’s skin, fuzzy like fleece. It felt stronger. Everything felt stronger. But ‘stronger’ didn’t suffocate him - it just felt solid. Satoru’s fingers clenched around Suguru’s hand, pulling at it like a tether. But - Suguru’s thumb idly brushed down his wrist, soft and strong and safe. So why did his heart feel like he’d pulled a ripcord instead?

“Can I kiss you?”

Because-

Because it was safe?

Because… it wouldn’t hurt?

That was the thing - it didn’t hurt with Suguru. Touching, feeling, existing - it didn’t hurt with Suguru. It wasn’t numb; it wasn’t normal. It was confusing. Even light, incidental skin-to-skin contact always made Satoru itch; kissing someone would probably make him combust. But it didn’t hurt - when Suguru held his hand. So maybe, then, the rest wouldn’t hurt either. Maybe…

Maybe he could test the theory?

Maybe he could see if Suguru was an exception to the Six Eyes’ hellish restrictions.

Maybe he could find out if the stupid little dream he’d had since he was fifteen was some faraway, unrealistic fantasy, or just, like, contemporary fiction.

Suguru stiffened - his cursed energy swirled, yellow and then blue and then pink.

Not safe, not safe, holy fucking FUCK it was not safe. What was he thinking? It was fine - Satoru could lie - he could just lie, right?

“For, um-” Satoru gasped, a cold mist coiling up in his chest, “For practice?”

And that’s not a good enough lie - not even close. What the fuck was he thinking? Suguru stared at him, his eyes going wide and strange.

Okay, new lie, new lie-

Satoru could lie and say he didn’t mean it or it was a joke or he’s drunk or he’s being dumb or maybe he forgot how to speak Japanese and it means something different in-

“Sure.”

Suguru let out a little huff, lying back against the railing. The moonlight slid along his skin, dripping down it like rivers of mercury. If the alcohol made Satoru stupid, then maybe it made Suguru stupid too. Maybe it just made Suguru hard of hearing. But Suguru looked at him with flushed cheeks and fluttery eyelashes - with a furrow in his brow, like Satoru was late for training. Like he’d heard correctly; like he was waiting. Satoru should - he should back out, right?

(But he can’t he can’t he can’t-)

“O-okay.”

He could come up with a better lie later. Maybe for Suguru, maybe just for himself. He could do that when his head wasn’t spinning. When Suguru’s cursed energy wasn’t coiled around his fingertips. When his heart wasn’t trying to rip itself out and jettison itself into the upper atmosphere.

(He should stop he should stop he should stop-)

“I’m-” Satoru twitched. Brainless, speechless, heartless.

This was good, actually. Because it would hurt, probably. And that would fix him, definitely.

Like electroshock therapy. Negative reinforcement. It would hurt when Suguru kissed him, which would work out, because then Satoru wouldn’t want it anymore. He’d test the theory, and he’d prove the most obvious conclusion. Occam’s razor and all. Satoru would still be broken, sure, but he’d be broken in the right way - the way the monks always wanted him to be. He wouldn’t be broken in the shameful, greedy, hushed-accusations kind of way. The disgusting way, the grotesque way, the way that he only let himself imagine once he’d triple checked the lock on his door and stuffed a fist into his mouth.

It would hurt, and then he’d just be broken in the normal way. And if that doesn’t work, if a little shock’s not enough, they could just turn up the voltage. Up and up and up until he fries.

Satoru clumsily touched Suguru’s face. Suguru’s warm skin buzzed, tingly and bright, and Infinity naturally flicked up over Satoru’s fingertips. It was protecting him; maybe it was protecting Suguru too. Everything in Satoru’s chest was pure strong acid - aqua regia - so corrosive that it dissolved all it touched.

“I’m gonna…”

(This isn’t right this isn’t right this isn’t right-)

“Go ahead,” Suguru mumbled, soft lips and softer eyes. “Don’t block your lips, dumbass.”

“...You can tell?”

Suguru sighed. He leaned in, too, like-

Like maybe he didn’t hate it? Or, he didn’t hate the idea of it, anyway. Like maybe he wouldn’t gag if he felt Satoru’s real lips cover his own. Like maybe he wouldn’t be disgusted if Satoru’s lips didn’t feel just like a girl’s, if they didn’t taste like sugary lip gloss. He felt Suguru’s cursed energy fizz beneath his fingers, where their hands were still intertwined - where Satoru had a fucking death grip on Suguru’s wrist, and Suguru just let him cut off circulation. Suguru let out a hum, soft and steady. His eyes lightened - pastel lavender - and Satoru breathed him in. His chest filled with flowers. And he wondered, for a second, if they were the kind that would grow and grow in his lungs until they killed him.

“Don’t stall,” Suguru whispered.

“O-okay,” Satoru stuttered, letting out a nervous laugh. Carbon dioxide bounced around in his lungs; the rest of his mouth was all hot air. And soju - artificial peach with a side of poison. “Okay, Geto-sensei.”

Satoru kissed Suguru, and he broke - that’s when he truly broke.

Because it was perfect.

It was perfect, and it was devastating. Suguru’s lips were gentle, but solid as a stone. A little chapped, a little rough - but not as rough as his hands. They weren’t soft like a girl’s. And he didn’t bend when Satoru accidentally leaned against him. He took Satoru’s clumsy, lanky limbs and held them still. He took all of Satoru, anchoring him when the Six Eyes started to float away.

He tasted like smoke and soju, with a twist of green tea. Nothing like fruit or candy - but it was perfect on Suguru. The bitterness should’ve made Satoru wince - he’d never been able to stand bitter things. But on Suguru, the taste was intoxicating. He craved it. He wanted to chase it; lick the bitterness out of his mouth.

And Suguru’s cursed energy - it didn’t shock him. It didn’t burn him, or stab him, or coat his skin in vile sludge. It just tickled a little bit. Suguru’s power hummed beneath his skin, obediently staying below the surface. He was a storm packed up into a tiny little box, lid closed and tied with a perfect bow.

It’s fucking unfair, is what it is. How easily Suguru always managed to do the impossible. Matching Satoru, beating him - always a step ahead. How he managed to create where Satoru has only ever been able to destroy. How he slipped right through Infinity, closing the infinitely dividing distance with his paradoxical lips. He was impossible, imaginary - floating off on some unpicturable axis with AC currents and quantum wave equations.

“Is that-” Satoru mumbled, his heart leaping and catapulting and somersaulting. Satoru leaned in-

Fuck.

“W-was that okay?”

‘Okay’? Suguru should punch him in the throat. Satoru yanked himself back. He’d do it with a Blue, if his head was on straight. Or maybe he could just use that Blue to crush his tumorous heart inside his chest before it metastasized.

‘Okay’? No, no, not okay, not at all. Satoru’s never gonna be okay again in his whole goddamn life. Because he’d already memorized the feeling of his lips - the texture, the shape, the taste. He’d felt Suguru’s heat, branded it onto his skin where Suguru’s fingers curled around his wrist.

‘Okay’? It was unfair that Suguru could bypass the laws of reality, but it was justice that Satoru would suffer for it. He’d clawed his pound of flesh out of Suguru - ripping and bleeding and eating him alive.

(Do you hate it do you hate that do you hate me-)

Satoru choked. “I-”

What does he say? What can he say?

'I’m sorry and I’m gay and I’m lying and I’m broken and I’m selfish and I’m in l-

“Come on,” Suguru murmured.

Suguru tipped his chin up with two terribly gentle fingers. Infinity flashed up around him, sequestering him, denying him. But-

Satoru forced it down. Even in solitary, even on death row, even a monster deserved his last meal. Suguru’s special-grade power radiated under his fingertips, soft and warm. It flowed into Satoru’s skin, filling his chest with soft cotton. He nearly choked on it. He met Suguru’s eyes, nerves rattling up and down his spine. Could Suguru see it on his skin? His guilt; his greed? Could he feel the corruption in Satoru’s heart, calling out to him like a weakened, wriggling curse?

The Six Eyes couldn’t tell him that. They could only see Suguru’s body, not his mind. They couldn’t tell him the words that would form on Suguru’s lips. They couldn’t see the future - the branching paths - if there were any where Suguru wouldn’t hate him.

They could only tell him that Suguru was looking at him, looking at his lips, looking with eyes like deadly nightshade.

“You can do better.”

-:-

FROM THE OFFICE OF THE JUJUTSU INSPECTOR GENERAL:

JUJUTSU SOCIETY HIGH COURT, SECOND CIRCUIT - TOKYO METROPOLITAN AREA

JUJUTSU HEADQUARTERS, REPRESENTED BY ZEN’IN OGI

(PLAINTIFF)

VS

GETO SUGURU

(DEFENDANT)

CHARGE(S) BROUGHT:

ENDANGERMENT OF SORCEROUS MINORS, RECKLESS USE OF COMBAT SORCERY, MURDER

VERDICT(S):

THE COURT FINDS THE DEFENDANT, GETO SUGURU, GUILTY OF ENDANGERMENT OF SORCEROUS MINORS.

THE COURT FINDS THE DEFENDANT, GETO SUGURU, GUILTY OF RECKLESS USE OF COMBAT SORCERY.

THE COURT FINDS THE DEFENDANT, GETO SUGURU, GUILTY OF MURDER.

SENTENCING:

The high court considers a number of mitigating factors present in the case of the defendant, Geto Suguru, indicted on three charges involving the unauthorized use of lethal special-grade sorcery. Uncontrolled use of sorcery is held to be the most serious of crimes in jujutsu society, and must be punished accordingly. In the case of high-grade sorcerers, this crime is even more severe, as the potential repercussions are far more damaging.

The high court considers the defendant’s lack of clan affiliation, and thus the absence of established society members able to monitor and rehabilitate and/or indefinitely detain the defendant. The court considers the defendant’s past reliance on jujutsu society and its generous resources, including his subsidized admission into the public jujutsu schooling system. The high court considers the defendant’s rank as a sorcerer: special-grade (public-practicing). The court considers the defendant’s legal status as a juvenile. In light of the severity of the crimes committed by the defendant, the high court has determined that the defendant is to be sentenced as an adult.

For the grave crimes committed, the high court hereby sentences the defendant, Geto Suguru, to death.

Chapter Text

It’s dark out.

You should’ve been home an hour ago.

That’s what you get for working late shifts at the frozen yogurt shop. The time slips away, slivers of the clock face disappearing under a thin, ticking hand. It’s easier to lose track of time when you’re alone. And you’re alone tonight; Rachel flaked. Called out ‘sick’ even though you know it’s because her boyfriend’s in town. He’s visiting from his college upstate, where he’s studying marketing. Or, no, journalism? She tells you, but you never remember. But, anyway, Rachel’s out. So you close alone, cleaning up wet cups and sticky countertops. It’s ridiculous - serving froyo past ten - but it’s all the rage these days. It’s easy, quick, simple.

In a town like this, everyone’s looking for simple.

It’s pitch black when you get out into the parking lot. It’s a new moon tonight, and when you shut off the lights inside the froyo shop, the whole lot seems to go dark. Dim neon, pink and green, casts weak, sickly light onto your beat-up Camry. Turns the off-silver into a jaundiced beige. You slide into the car. Start it.

The engine doesn’t quite turn over. It rumbles, growling and snarling until you give up. You smack the steering wheel, and you try again. The engine coughs, spitting out phlegm. It works this time. You take a deep breath. There’s a mist floating above the asphalt, thick and wet. There’s something strange in the air tonight. Not just the mist. You can’t quite put your finger on it. Maybe because there’s nothing there - nothing solid to touch.

Maybe you’re just tired.

You check your phone - it’s almost 2 in the morning. You’re only at 18%. You don’t need more than that to get home, though. You don’t need GPS at all. You turn on your headlights, then try the brights. They flare a blinding white, bouncing back off the mist. Shit. You wince. Too bright. So you flip back to normal headlights. They’re not much help, but that’s all you’re gonna get on the road. Half of the street lights in town are broken.

You can only tell at night - how much of this town is actually broken.

OKAY soooooo what r u wearing girl???

1. A super cute button up short-sleeved shirt with a pink miniskirt and a pink sweater and a pink headband! Ballet flats with ankle-high white socks with a little tulle edge. Plus pearl earrings and a little gold charm bracelet with a heart on it!
2. Black EVERYTHING. I am Goth.
3. A long sleeved shirt with a sweater vest and a long skirt with stockings and flats.
4. Gym clothes and my varsity jacket! Go Wildcats!
5. Probably just some comfy clothes. Jeans and a band t-shirt with my dad’s old flannel and some converse sneakers and a slouchy beanie probably. I don’t really pay attention to fashion or whatever.

Omg EXCELLENT choice! U r so freakin’ HOT in [your outfit] that it almost makes up for your sickly pallor. Dark bags hang under your eyes, staining your skin a muddy purple. Fatigue practically drips off of your body, viscous as molasses. You’re exhausted. And you’ve been exhausted. You’ve been exhausted for months, haven’t you?

It’s a quick drive home.

20 minutes without traffic. It’s a drive you make every weeknight; it’s a drive you could make in your sleep. Might have to do it in your sleep this time. You’re that close to passing out. Doesn’t help that the only thing in your stomach is free froyo. Once you burn through the sugar and cream, it’s just ice.

Your stomach feels a little hollow. It also feels a little leaden. Your hand slips as you try to buckle your seatbelt. You get it the second time. Put it in drive, pull out of the spot. Suddenly, the car speakers jolt to life, rough sounds pushing through the speakers from your corded-in iPod. It’s enough to make you jump. The sound fuzzes for a second, distorting.

Static crawls up the back of your neck.

Wewt wewt - party in da house!!! WHAT is on ur playlist???

1. Pop!!! You Belong With Me by Taylor Swift!
2. Death metal with a LOT of SCREAMING because i’m GOTH.
3. Classical music.
4. My workout playlist, starting with Let’s Get Physical by Olivia Newton John!
5. Just like some niche indie and alt rock bands you probably haven’t heard of, like The Neighborhood and the Arctic Monkeys and Paramore.

I LOVE that [song/band/entire musical genre]! You hit play on your favorite playlist as you get out onto the road. The speakers purr and crackle - that’s why your car shakes a little as you pull out of the strip mall. So you turn it down. The shaking doesn’t stop. The lyrics are familiar, the melodies too. You focus on the music, willing it to pull you out of the mist. Out of this odd, unsettling fog.

It doesn’t.

It gets your heart pumping, at least. You should’ve gotten a job at a coffee shop instead. At least then, instead of free froyo, you could’ve made yourself a double shot for the road. Your eyes start to sag, but you force them open. You tap into the lyrics, hum a few notes under your breath. The road seems longer today.

The trees seem taller, too.

Too tall. Too… They don’t seem like themselves. As you drive further out of town, the trees seem to thicken into walls. Ivy climbs over them, blurring the branches into thick, hungering arms. Blocks out the moonlight, little of that as there is. You slow down, looking for road signs, but you don’t see any. Maybe they’re buried under the ivy too.

The road only goes one way - straight out into the dark. And the road doesn’t seem like itself either anymore. You can’t see a single streetlight - not even a broken one. It doesn’t look like any stretch of road you remember. But you didn’t turn; you didn’t need to make any turns, so…

Shit-

CRAAAAAAACK

You swerve too late.

The windshield cracks, loud as a gunshot. Something heavy slams against it, and the glass crunches. Spiderweb cracks shatter out from the center - it stays in one piece. You shudder, and you scream, and you nearly suffocate the steering wheel in a chokehold as you skid. Your car almost goes off the road. You pull to the side, shaking. You’re still shaking.

“S-shit… What the hell was that!?”

You fumble with the seatbelt. It takes two tries to get it off. You manage to get out of the car. The night’s cold, but your skin feels like it's on fire. The mist swirls around your feet. You almost trip.

It’s a deer.

You hit a deer. Or, the deer hit you. Leapt right into your windshield. You didn’t see it coming - obviously. You would’ve… You’re just tired, probably too tired to be driving. But you hit the deer, and now it’s bleeding out on your windshield. Blood trickles into the little cracks, painting the whole hood rusted red. You wince as you push the deer off of the windshield. It flops down, limbs crunching as it lands. Gross. God. It’s so…

You get the deer out of the road. You don’t know how. Maybe it’s light - the runt of the litter. Maybe the adrenaline gives you some crazy manic strength. But you pull it off, and you get it out of the road. The deer doesn’t move - doesn’t even twitch. Dead on impact. Its glassy eyes don’t follow you. They just stare, unfocused, out into the dark woods. The animal’s blood gets all over your hands. It stains your sleeves. You don’t think before you wipe them - now your legs are stained too.

OMG!!! How do u react to da blod?!

1. Ewwwwwww!!! Super gross! I take my sparkly pink mini hand sanitizer bottle from Bath and Body Works out of my purse (a sparkly silver rhinestone clutch with a detachable shoulder strap inside) and I wash all of it off immediately!
2. I’m Goth so I go up to the deer and get even MORE of it on myself, ideally my face and IN MY MOUTH
3. I’m probably slightly traumatized, but I’m also pretty detail-oriented! I’m mostly focused on getting out of the creepy woods, so I ignore the blood and get my paper map out of the car.
4. Nothing a little ibuprofen and electrolytes can’t fix, haha am I right ladies?!
5. Sure, like, it’s kinda gross but whatever. I’m not a girly girl, so I don’t, like, scream or anything. I probably even roll my eyes thinking about how freaked out and useless Rachel would be. I just wipe the blood off and tough it out.

Like 1D says, KEEP CALM AND CARRY ON!!!! Windshield’s busted, but at least it’s in one piece. The wipers get enough of the blood off that you can see, even if all you can see is the mist. It’s gonna be a bitch to drive, not just tonight, but until you can scrape together enough cash to replace the glass.

At least it’s not totalled. The engine still works. The lights are still on. At least you can drive. You just need to get home. Your dad’s home.

It’ll be okay when you get home.

You sit back in the car, and you take five deep breaths. By the end of it, you’re not good, but you’re good to drive. You have to be. You start to drive again. The mist gets thicker, maybe thick enough to slow your car down. But you’re slower too, because you’re skittish now, too. Nerves on edge. You’re not gonna hit another deer - not at 2 AM. But you shouldn’t have hit the first one, either. So you drive slow, you keep your eyes peeled, you look for the next light.

There’s no next light.

Not after five minutes, not after ten. You’re driving slow, sure, but it doesn’t feel like you’re driving at all. And then, with a sudden jolt, you’re not. The car hacks up a lung; wailing and shaking as the engine sputters out.

“Damnit!”

You slam your fist against the wheel. You turn the key again, but it’s dead. Doesn’t even make a sound this time - not even a death rattle. You fall back into your seat. Your foot bangs against the gas pedal. You check your phone - dead.

You’re lost.

If that wasn’t clear, you’re totally fucking lost. And maybe the car’s only getting you more lost, but at least - at least it’s safe. You bite your lip, trying to stop it from trembling. Doesn’t work; it just makes them chapped.

You squint out into the road. Further out, tucked into the trees, you see it - a little metal rectangle. A street sign, maybe. Can’t read it from here. You’ve got to get closer. When you get out, the asphalt is dirt under your feet, and the trees around you are spindly pine, not the thick oaks you’re used to. But there’s rows and rows of them, sticking out of the earth like bent nails. They’re so dense you can barely see anything through them at all, let alone the road home.

There’s a little cross street marked by the sign. It’s nothing much, just a battered dirt path leading out into the woods. But there’s probably nothing much out here at all, anyway. Maybe a house. Nothing you’re looking for - a mechanic, a hospital, a goddamn police station.

But it’s a road. It’s a marker. Maybe you can at least figure out where you are. You duck back into the car. You get a flashlight out of the glove compartment, and you turn it on. It turns on, thank god. You get the flashlight, you get the map, you get an old sweater from the back seat - a cheap, pilling polyester hoodie from your high school days - and you pull it on over the dried deer blood.

Aaaaaaand! What is the ONE last thing u just HAVE to take with you??!

1. My sparkly pink lip gloss, duh! I apply a coat before I go out into the creepy woods! I always look cute, even when facing certain death!
2. My ornate plastic crucifix from Hot Topic. I hold it out in front of me as I walk. But upside down, because I’m actually trying to attract demons and malevolent spirits. Because I’m-
3. A good book! If I don’t find help, maybe I’ll be able to find a cozy nook in a tree or something and get lost in my favorite stories until morning.
4. My water bottle and a hairband. I don’t need any other equipment for cardio. Go Cats!
5. My iPod and a set of earbuds. I put them in and turn on my favorite song. It’s from a really old band, which you probably haven’t heard of, because they’re like older than I am. But it reminds me of my dad, and the times that we would hang out together before he and my mom got divorced. It’s called Boulevard of Broken Dreams.

Smart! U grab [item] and u r ready to explore!!

You’re freaking out.

Functionally freaking out, that is.

You’re freaking out in the way that animals do - fight, flight, or freeze. The adrenaline kicks into your body, hot and sharp. It keeps you a little warm, at least, as you flee into the cold, wet night. You hug your bloodied sweater to your sides. You leave the car. Each step takes you farther from the light - farther from safety, or the facade of it. The trees seem to bend behind you as you walk down the path. They envelop you, swallowing you whole like a boa constrictor. They’re halfway to eating the road, too.

You point your flashlight at the overgrown street sign.

Clo-

Your flashlight flickers. Damnit. You smack it.

Cloverfi-

It goes out again. So you go up to the sign, close as you can, and you squint. You peel away the ivy. The silver, printed letters just barely shine in the moonlight that makes it down from the treetops.

Cloverfield Lane.

There’s not a Cloverfield Lane anywhere in your town, not as far as you know. You don’t even remember seeing it on your map. How far did you drive? And in what direction? You sigh and turn back to the car.

And the car’s gone.

Your flashlight flickers back on, not that it’s much use. You point the beam down the path, but you only find leaves and dirt. There’s nothing out here. Nothing but trees. Doesn’t do you a lot of good, but neither will standing still, waiting for coyotes to find you. So you walk down Cloverfield Lane, running on fumes and froyo. You let your feet take you forward; you keep your distance from the trees.

The trees part. Sooner than you’d think. The battered path turns into a battered driveway. The mist starts to sink into the earth. The trees recede into your peripheral vision. And in front of you, there’s a house.

This is a bad idea.

It’s a mansion. It’s at least twice the size of your own house - maybe three times. It has fancy stonework, and thick hedge walls. There’s a long, pull-in circular driveway. And around that, there’s a high iron gate. Gate’s open, though… It’s not quite inviting, but… It’s open.

This is a bad idea.

You go through the gate. You go up the steps, you go to the door. You raise your hand to the doorbell, but…

You take a deep breath. There’s noise coming from inside, and there’s light. Yeah, it’s a bad idea, but it’s cold out - and it’s only getting colder. It’s a bad idea, but the woods you’re lost in aren’t the woods you know. It’s a bad, bad idea, but every other idea you’ve had sounds worse.

So you knock.

The door swings open and u immediately see five HOT boys! Who do u look at first?!!!

1. The dangerous-looking hot guy with a really big knife on his belt!
2. The GOTHIC one wearing a cape.
3. The shy one in the corner with really pale skin.
4. The muscular one with sick tats!
5. The punk one wearing a trench coat.

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧ ₊˚ 🗡 ♱‧₊˚. ⋆₊ ☽༺⋆ཐི◯ཋྀ⋆༻ ☾₊⋆ .˚⊹. ࣪𓉸 ࣪⊹˚. ✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧

WELCOME TO THE CURSED REALM - WHO WOULD FALL FOR YOU!!!!???!?

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧ ₊˚ 🗡 ♱‧₊˚. ⋆₊ ☽༺⋆ཐི◯ཋྀ⋆༻ ☾₊⋆ .˚⊹. ࣪𓉸 ࣪⊹˚. ✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧

MOSTLY 1S: You got SUGURU!

You go up to the dangerous looking one. He looks dangeorus!

“Name’s Suguru,” he says boredly. But as he looks at you, you notice his eyes light up a little. (With danger!) He stares at you for a second, and you feel creepy shivers all down your spine! “I’m a serial killer,” he says, gesturing to the really big knife on his belt (which you already saw). Also, there’s, like, bloodstains on his shirt and stuff. “Uh, I’m not wearing the mask for the introduction scene, but I do have one, for the record.”

MOSTLY 2S: You got SUGURU!

You go up to the GOTHIC one. He seems to sparkle unnaturally???

“My name is Suguru,” he says. You notice that his teeth are really white!!! You gasp as you see fangs poking out of the corners of his lips. He smiles and lets out a dark laugh as he sees you staring at them. You blush. “I am a vampire,” he says with a smirk. “But don’t worry. I won’t bite - unless you ask.”

MOSTLY 3S: You got SUGURU!

You go up to the shy one. You almost don’t see him at first!

“U-um, my name is Suguru,” he says softly. When you look at him closer, you notice that his skin is almost transparent! You reach out to him, trying to touch it, but your hand goes straight through his. You gasp. He’s a ghost! (omg how do u think he diiiiied?? probably in a SAD way). “I-I’m a ghost,” he stutters, “But please don’t be scared of me.”

MOSTLY 4S: You got SUGURU!

You go up to the muscular one. He’s SUPER hot. And RIPPED.

“Yo, the name’s Suguru,” he says. His muscles ripple with strength as he casually flexes. His biceps and triceps and quadriceps (probably) all bulge out and ripple. His arms are covered in tattoos in black and silver ink, all in the shape of moons and swirls and other nature symbols and stuff with really deep symbolism. He grins at you wolvishly. “So, uh, are you more of a cat person or a dog person?”

MOSTLY 5S: You got SUGURU!

You go up to the punk one. He has really sharp jawbones. And PIERCINGS??

“I am Suguru,” he says mysteriously. He watches you with piercing, bird-like eyes. His eyes drag down your body, noticing your messy hair and the bloodstains on your worn-out hoodie. “I am a dangerous crow boy,” he says cryptically, “And my job is to destroy the plastic you are wearing.”

-:-

“It was my decision.”

It’s Suguru’s voice that shatters the silence. It’s unmistakable; it’s his. He even has the audacity to sound like himself - smooth as silk, stoic as a stone. It’s not his voice that throws Satoru off; it’s the words. Because those aren’t his, they can’t be his, because that would mean-

“It’s a stupid fucking decision.”

Suguru’s lips twitch, and a stitch of irritation creases his brow. He quickly schools his expression back into place, snuffing out the sparks on his tongue. He sighs, then paints on a smile - a fake as hell smile - like he’s talking to the higher-ups, not Satoru.

“...It’s the responsible one,” Suguru says politely.

Satoru nearly lunges across the room. Yaga catches him by the shoulder, pushing him back down into his seat. Which wouldn’t work, except the sudden motion makes Satoru’s stomach churn and his head spin and his tongue sting with the taste of bitter, burning rubber. And none of that is worse than Suguru’s cursed energy: rotting chrysanthemums, the unmistakable scent of a man waiting to die.

“Responsible?” Satoru shouts, and his head rings like a bell. Not a bell. That’d be a bright sound, and Satoru’s head feels rusted and dull. It rings like a crooked doorstop, thick coils of iron smacked around by a thick, wooden two-by-four. Satoru rises from his seat again, shrugging Yaga off. This isn’t a conversation they should have sitting down.

This isn’t a conversation they should be having at all.

“You call that fucking responsible?” Satoru seethes.

“Right, that’s probably a new word for you - responsibility,” Suguru slashes back, sliding between Satoru’s ribs like a thin knife. “Do you need me to explain the concept?”

“Yeah, you can explain something to me,” Satoru growls. He stalks over to Suguru, fisting his hand into the front of his baggy sweatshirt. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

“Satoru-” Yaga cuts in. His hand comes down on Satoru’s shoulder, but Infinity flickers up behind Satoru’s neck, and it never quite lands.

“Not as bad as whatever’s wrong with you.”

Suguru’s eyes pierce straight through the veil, black with pin-sharp hate. His oily cursed energy flickers up in his chest, oozing under the fabric. He can’t feel the sliminess of it, not with the shroud of cotton between them. But he can taste it, toxic and bitter, congealing over Suguru’s skin. Suguru calmly brings his hand up, peeling Satoru’s fist out of his sweater. He’s gentle as he does it, but the second their skin brushes together, electricity arcs through Satoru’s wrist, sending sharp shocks up his forearm. Satoru flinches back, shoving his arm down to his side. Suguru freezes.

“Satoru-”

“Bullshit,” Satoru spits. He pulls at the anger, lets it crash over the weakness and the hurt. He bullies forward into Suguru’s space, desperate to wipe that terrible fucking look off of Suguru’s face, the look of worry-

“That’s fucking bullshit,” Satoru snarls, “Because I don’t wanna kill myself.”

“...Fuck you, Satoru.”

“Fuck you. I’m not fucking - giving up.” Satoru snaps. “And you shouldn’t either. Did you turn into a quivering pussy while I was gone or something?”

Suguru takes a deep breath, sucking his cursed energy back down. But it spikes - sharp currents of electricity crackle along his throat. The seal collar glows blue, and it tightens around his neck.

“The council decided-”

“And you’re just going to let them?”

“Right,” Yaga says, interposing himself between them. “You two are clearly not ready to speak about this. Geto-”

Suguru ducks his head, and his cursed energy ebbs. “Sorry,” he says, “I - you’re right, Principal Yaga. I apologize.”

“Let’s speak of this more later,” Yaga says. With a curt nod, Suguru turns, and he leaves. The door slides shut with a dull click. The sound echoes through the office, grave and final. “Give him time,” Yaga sighs.

“Time?”

The air spikes, cold, sharp, and bitter. Acrid cursed energy billows out into Yaga’s office. Ozone fizzes up, the freaky, electric heaviness that stains the air before a storm.

“He doesn’t have any fucking time.”

“Satoru.”

Grief weighs Yaga’s voice down, sinking it into rumbling bass notes. Yaga turns, going back to his desk - to the electric kettle in the corner, and Satoru sparks. Because if Yaga is going to tell him to calm down, if Yaga is going to ask him if he wants tea, he’s gonna throw the whole boiling fucking pot out the window.

Instead, Yaga opens a drawer, and he pulls out a file.

“Sit down,” he says softly. “Read this, and then we can talk.”

Satoru feels all the fight drain out of him as Yaga gently tips him back into his seat. The bright anger is replaced with sadness, deep and blue. His eyes start to burn, and his cursed energy thickens into suffocating humidity.

“What the fuck happened?” Satoru chokes out. Yaga doesn’t even call him out on his language - he’s probably expecting a more volatile type of curse. Satoru just stares down at the paper. The words swim in front of him, bobbing up and down like Suguru’s fucked-up goldfish. “Unauthorized use of lethal sorcery?”

It doesn’t make sense. Suguru has never been reckless. He’s certainly never done anything unauthorized. Suguru has always kept himself on a tight leash. He always draws veils before they start a mission, always thinks about the collateral damage they cause during, and always writes full, formal reports after. He won’t even summon his curses if there’s a chance a non-sorcerer could see. Not that they’d recognize it if he did; it takes repeated exposure to break through a non-sorcerer’s cloud of innocence. When they fight curse users, he always starts with curses trained to subdue, not kill. He cares about people - all people - the good and the bad.

Lethal sorcery?

“He wouldn’t kill someone on purpose. Not if he had any other choice,” Satoru says. But that’s what it says in front of him. Stamped out in bold, black, blocky print. Charged with murder, sentenced to death. “Not without an order.”

“No,” Yaga agrees. “Suguru wouldn’t.”

“He’s not dangerous,” Satoru insists. “I swear, he’s not. He’s not a curse user - he shouldn’t be executed. They just - none of the higher ups know what the fuck they’re talking about. They just hate him, and-”

“I know, Satoru,” Yaga says gently. He reaches out over the desk, putting his hand over the court files. And there it is, the stupid tea. Green tea with berries, bitter and medicinal. “It wasn’t my decision,” Yaga adds.

Satoru feels his heart crack. “...Suguru said it was his.”

Yaga nods silently.

“Why would he do that?” Satoru takes the stupid tea. He smells ginger in it - maybe that’d settle his stomach enough to get it down. But the cursed energy inside of him is still churning like a storm. He just grips the mug, letting the clay sear his hands pink.

“His cursed technique has become… somewhat unreliable,” Yaga explains. “He was wounded on a mission in December, and he lost the ability to control his technique. He hasn’t recovered yet.”

“He’ll fix it,” Satoru pushes. “We’ll fix it.”

“Hopefully, yes. He’s been trying to get it back under control, but… No luck yet. He still has time. The council agreed to suspend his sentence until the end of this term.” Yaga’s lips push together into a flat line. “I’m glad you’re back, Satoru. I’m hoping you and Yuki can help him. ”

Satoru grits his teeth, biting back a scream. Suguru will regain control - of course he fucking will. But in a few months? Sorcery doesn’t work on deadlines. Not the advanced stuff. Satoru’s been working on RCT for years and he still can’t do it. And Satoru’s got a whole library on RCT. Suguru’s got nothing for his technique.

“He can do it, he just needs more time,” Satoru pleads. He’s not sure who he’s even pleading to - the higher ups, or the heavens. “He needs more than, like, four fucking months.” Satoru chokes. “And - he doesn’t need to be executed. There has to be something else. Like - a cursed tool, or - or a Binding Vow?”

“I agree.” Yaga’s fingers clench tight around the mug. “...It wasn’t my decision.”

When Satoru finally swallows down a sip of the grassy tea, it tastes like blood in his mouth.

“...Right.”

-:-

Yu Haibara is generally happy to help, whatever it is that he’s helping with!

“Okay, so, I want you to pick one of these files.”

He’s just not so sure if he’s actually helping, or if people just want him to feel like he is.

“Um, okay, sure!” Yu nods, taking the files that Tsukumo hands him. He takes a quick look at the subject lines-

“Don’t read them,” she interrupts. “Just pick one.”

Yu glances at Nanami. Nanami glances back. Nanami’s actually really helpful at this part: determining when Yu’s actually being helpful. Because Nanami hates being helped, and he hates humoring people even more than that.

“Yeah.” Nanami shrugs. “Just pick one, I guess.”

So, that’s that. With Nanami’s seal of approval, Yu can mark this as Actually Helpful. So he takes the stack of papers and blindly reaches into it. He tugs one out from the middle of the pile. As he touches it, ice crawls up his forearm. He quickly shoves it back in.

“No, take that one out,” Tsukumo says firmly. “I want your first pick.”

“No, um…” Yu swallows down the cold spit in his mouth, and he lets out a nervous laugh instead. “I, uh…” he scratches the back of his neck, “I don’t have a good feeling about that one.”

“Yeah.” Tsukumo nods. Her sharp, black-pitted eyes flick to Yu, and Yu feels gravity flip inside of his stomach. “That’s what I’m looking for.”

“...Okay.” Yu nods.

He pulls the file back out. Cold needles jab at his skin. It’s not cursed energy - not as far as he can sense, but it’s close enough. Dread, invisible and formless. Yu shudders as he looks at the paper. But he doesn’t see anything too scary - not with his eyes, anyway. It’s a low grade mission. An abandoned house somewhere north of the city - a duplex, actually - one in a row of townhomes.

“Oh,” Yu says, breathing a sigh of relief. “Actually, I think we can handle this one.” He points to the header as he shows it to Nanami. “Look - it’s just grade 3!”

“Nope, this one’s mine,” Tsukumo shakes her head and gently takes the file from his hands. “You guys are on spring break.”

“Huh?” Yu squawks. Tsukumo pats him on the back a little too hard, but Yu catches himself before he stumbles. He tilts his head. “Are you sure, Tsukumo-san?”

“Yeah, you’ve both got, like, classwork and stuff to catch up on, right?”

“I mean…” Nanami mumbles, “Sort of.” Tsukumo reaches out and ruffles his hair. Nanami silently takes it, although his face turns a little green. “Study hard for all your tests!” Tsukumo calls as she heads out. “Especially math! You’ll need that for university.”

“Right!” Yu cheers. He waves back at her, though she probably doesn’t see it, since she’s already halfway out the door.

“Classwork.” Nanami says flatly, “...We need to ‘catch up on classwork’.”

Yu laughs. They do have classwork, sort of. They have so many mission reports to fill out these days that Principal Yaga mostly just assigns them readings now. Sometimes there’s an essay, although it’s usually just a few long free response boxes. They haven’t had any tests in a while - not since the fall. Principal Yaga says it’s fine, they’ll catch up when things slow down. He’s probably right.

The Universe says it won’t matter either way.

“At least we get some time off!” Yu smiles.

“University…” Nanami mutters, smacking a hand over his stony face. It starts to crumble a little under that, grey slate ground into dust. Yu nudges Nanami’s shoulder with his own.

“What would you study?” Yu asks, “If we could go. Would you go?”

Nanami’s cursed energy mellows out, like coffee tempered with heavy cream. His hand drops from his face, and when he looks at Yu, his jagged edges seem a little softer, smoother, worn in, instead of worn down.

“I don’t know,” Nanami admits quietly, “But… I’ve thought about it.”

“History? I feel like you’d really like history.” He’s read Nanami’s essays - and not because he was cheating! They’re allowed to help each other, especially with research stuff. And Nanami’s essays are always so detailed, with like twice as many citations as anyone else’s. He’s precise and meticulous, and his arguments about jujutsu are always ironclad. “Oh! Or law!” Yu adds, grinning, “You’d be a great lawyer.”

Nanami shakes his head.

“Computer science,” he says simply. “It’s better for job security.”

-:-

Suguru isn’t happy about the situation, obviously.

Not the execution; he seems perfectly fucking happy about that.

No, he’s pissy because Satoru actually gives enough of a fuck to try and save his life, since apparently everyone else has already thrown in the towel. He’s pissy because he has to talk to Satoru about it. Because Satoru has to know what he’s working with, if he’s going to work this out at all. It can’t be that hard to de-fuck Suguru’s cursed technique. Maybe he’s got fuck-all of an idea where to start, but that’s why they’re talking. That’s why they’re sitting in the infirmary, talking.

“Shoko already looked at it,” Suguru mutters, dodging his gaze. Lucky for him, the Six Eyes are back, and Satoru can see his carmine hatred through solid walls, unless it’s blocked with a thin sheet of lead. “This is pointless. You can’t even use RCT.”

“Suguru,” Shoko says gently. She’s perched on her rolly chair, a few feet away from Suguru on the cot. She’s got a little hate in her too, but it’s only a candle compared to Suguru’s bonfire smoking up the infirmary.

“No, he’s right,” Satoru says. “I’m fucking useless.”

It’s true. Satoru is pretty useless when it comes to healing. But there’s nothing more useless than laying around and doing nothing, which is apparently the only fucking thing anyone else has tried over the past few months.

“But so are you right now,” Satoru adds, jabbing with his pointed tongue. “So how about you just sit there and look pretty, huh?”

Shoko glares at him. Her eyes soften as she turns to Suguru. She rolls up to his side, dragging the wobbly rolly chair over the tile. “Look,” she says, “Satoru might be able to help me heal you. He might be able to… see something I didn’t.”

“Right.” Satoru claps his hands together. “You heard the good doctor,” he says. “Strip.”

Suguru scowls, but he does as he’s told, like the gutless goody-two-shoes he is now. He peels off his high-collared tank top, baring his chest. And what’s beneath the cotton is almost as grotesque as the fucking sigil collar.

Two deep, gnarled scars cut down the length of his chest, raw and red and angry. His skin is a motley quilt of scar tissue, old and new. Wounds that have healed, and wounds that refuse to. The scars cross over each other in a wide X, spanning all the way from his hips to his shoulders. The cuts were clean. Straight and precise as a surgeon’s scalpel. But they’ve festered, and the lines have blotted out into thick smudges. The edges of the torn tissue curl, puckering up like they’re on a drawstring. They’re not quite pulled tight enough to sew his chest all the way shut. Raw, inflamed skin burns red between the cracked scabs.

“Well?” Suguru spits. He stares down at the tile, and his forearms twitch. He fights the urge to pull them over his chest. “Everything you hoped for?”

Thick cursed energy billows out from the wounds, melancholy black bile. It’s noxious and just… just fucking twisted. It probably won’t kill him to breathe it in, but Satoru finds himself holding his breath anyway.

“I need to touch you,” Satoru mumbles.

It’ll hurt him if he touches it. Obviously. Satoru knows that the instant he sees the dark, twisted spirals. But he needs to know - how it feels, how it hurts. He needs to know what the fuck is wrong, if he’s ever going to make it right.

“Whatever.” Suguru still doesn’t meet his eyes. He closes them instead, tilting his head back. A fresh slurry of cursed sludge gushes out of the lacerations in his chest, thick and blue. “You can touch me.”

Satoru dips his fingers into Suguru’s repellent humors, and immediately, he flinches back. Despair coats Satoru’s senses like oil. It’s cold. Ice cold, like a frozen lake. Beneath the cracking glass, there’s something hidden in the black depths. It leaches all the heat from his body, leaving him brittle and shivery. It pricks at Satoru’s senses; it stabs at his skin like needles.

But it’s not Suguru’s.

Not all of it. The net of cursed energy that’s trapping him - that’s got Suguru’s fingerprints all over it. The oily drip, that’s Suguru’s too. It’s his despair, his resignation. And it tastes bitter, just like the oversteeped tea on his tongue. But there’s something right at the core of his chest, cold and sharp. Like steel spurs on a barbed wire fence. Like a garotte drawn tight, digging into his neck. Like an ancient blade, Stygian iron. It’s cold - way too cold - and Suguru’s always run hot.

“...It’s cursed.”

“What?” Shoko says, her eyes snapping to Satoru.

“The wounds, they’re cursed-” Satoru blathers on. His supersonic mouth barely keeps pace with his mind, which is flying off at light speed. “Yeah, actually, yeah. It was made by a cursed tool, I think, and-” he blinks. “It’s old. I don’t - I don’t recognize it, but it’s probably Heian era, if it’s that strong. Maybe-” He looks at Suguru. “Wait, who were you fighting? Was it a curse? What happened?”

Suguru doesn’t answer. So Satoru looks at Shoko. She doesn’t answer either.

“I get it,” Satoru snaps. “Look, I get it, I’m an asshole and I fucked everything up. Great. Cool. No objection, your honor. But you’re going to have to fucking tell me what happened so I can de-fuck it, okay? I don’t care if you want to like, punish me. I get it. I deserve it. Fuckin’ fine. But I’m not going to let Suguru fucking die because-”

“We don’t know.” Suguru cuts in. His voice is smooth. Softer now, not as sharp. It still pierces right into Satoru’s brittle, freezer-burned heart. “I don’t remember anything.”

“...What? What do you mean you don’t remember?”

Suguru sucks in a breath, puffing out his chest; Shoko deflates.

“I know I went down. Shoko found me in the woods after.” He purses his lips. “She saved me.”

“...The woods? What woods?”

Suguru glances at Shoko; Suguru glances back.

Something passes between them, whether it’s jujutsu or telepathy or just plain old vibes. But that thing passes over Satoru, skipping him entirely.

“What fucking woods?” Satoru asks.

Suguru nods at her; Shoko shakes her head.

“...While you were gone,” Shoko starts, “we went to Kyoto.”

-:-

Satoru’s back on missions, because he has to be back on missions.

Yuki fights him.

Shoko fights him less.

Yaga doesn’t fight him at all.

Doesn’t matter, though. Fact is, his cursed technique is back - not all the way, but mostly. It’s back enough that he can summon a Blue without crushing his own grey matter. Using jujutsu still makes his head throb, but the pain is dull enough that he can do it without flinching. It probably fools Yaga, it might fool Yuki, it definitely doesn’t fool Shoko.

She knows, probably, that he’s still in pain. That he’s still got side effects, that his jujutu’s still on the fritz. But she also knows that Tokyo’s underwater. They’re drowning in curses, and one special-grade is only enough to bail water.

“You don’t have to go if you’re not ready,” Yuki says, crossing her arms. She’s watching him like a hawk, black eyes and curled talons. “This can wait.”

“No it can’t.”

If it could, Yuki wouldn’t have mentioned it to Satoru. And she held out for a while, for what it’s worth. She didn’t mention anything to Satoru. She hid case files in her empty classroom-turned-office. She gave her mission reports directly to Yaga - only to Yaga. But the missions piled up, and Yuki started to show a little wear and tear. They kept running later and later, and Yuki kept slipping in past midnight. Even without the Six Eyes, Satoru wouldn’t have missed that. She put up a good fight.

“It’ll be fast. I’ll teleport there,” Satoru says.

He shoves a few things into his mission bag. The scouts’ report, a water bottle, rations - wait, no rations. The water bottle’s probably overkill too, to be honest. They travel pretty light in Japan, unless they’re going out into the sticks. It’s not like the tundra, no icy wilderness to tame. All he needs are the basics. A flashlight, a pocketknife - he probably doesn’t even need the mini medkit, but he packs it anyway, for the painkillers.

“I’ll be back in, like, an hour.”

“...Are you sure?”

“Yeah, Yuki,” he sighs. “I’m sure. I’m fine. I’m good. Back in action. You heard the good doc; Shoko cleared me for missions.”

“Shoko cleared you,” she agrees, though it doesn’t really sound like she agrees. She crosses her arms. Her nails dig into her bicep, clutching a little too hard at the skin.

“Yuki, I’m just checking residuals, right?” Satoru sets his bag down on the counter for a second. With a loud, crunchy zip, he yanks the zipper shut. “I’ll be in and out, won’t even need to use a Blue.”

Yuki bites her lip. She feels wrong, probably, about sending him off on his own. Hasn’t worked out so well in the past. Worked out pretty fucking bad in Montreal. But Satoru’s a big boy, and whatever they’re facing is even bigger than that.

“I’ve got this,” Satoru says. “And I’ll call you if I don’t.”

“Okay,” she sighs. “In and out, just like you said. Don’t get distracted.”

“I won’t.”

“Keep Infinity up the whole time,” she says. “Don’t let your guard down.”

“I won’t.”

“Meet back here for dinner. You’re paying.”

“I w-”

Yuki grins.

“Yeah,” Satoru catches himself, and he lets out a laugh. It feels wrong, laughing while everyone else is starting to choke. But he can’t help it, and Yuki lightly punches his shoulder. She’s smiling too. “Dinner,” he nods. “And you’re paying.”

-:-

Right, so, like Satoru said, he’s fine. It’s fine. In and out, nothing to it but to do it.

The mission takes him to an old duplex in town, nothing too special. There’s no mass grave - not even a single grave, actually - the scouts couldn’t find any records of an actual death in the house. It’s less of a cursed site than the stage of the Nickelodeon Kid’s Choice Awards - at least that one’s got radioactive slime and a few real monsters. This place has nothing. Yuki checked the house over first; she even wasted her time exorcising a grade 4 curse. Satoru could’ve done that even without sorcery. But, okay, fine, she’s babying him. She doesn’t need to, but she wants to. Makes her feel better, about-

Even with Yuki’s residuals splattered all over the entryway, the duplex is basically clean. It’s quiet, not a whisper of sorcery to be heard. No spooky scary skeletons sending shivers down his spine. Not even a pack of goth or alt-goth or techno-goth kids dancing under a bridge. No random serial killer kid named Jeff with a face photoshopped by someone who only vaguely understands the concept of a Glasgow smile.

So, anyway, it’s not scary. But there’s a little bit of cursed energy that Satoru picks up on once he gets into the genkan. It’s muddy, dusty, and a little bit dark. The cursed energy blends into old shoe tracks on the floor, engraved into the scuff marks.

Whoever lived here didn’t die here, but they left bloodstains.

Satoru sees it on the wall. Dark, thick beads of cursed energy drip down from cracks in the panels, leaking through the flaking wallpaper. Grief, isolation, abandonment. It’s not sorcery, though. Just regular cursed energy - the kind that non-sorcerers ooze without even meaning to. It’s raw, unrefined by a sorcerer’s impulses. And it makes Satoru’s skin crawl.

He grits his teeth as he shuts the door behind him and steps down the hall. Dread envelops him like a cloud of smog. It’s weak, but it’s everywhere. It chipped away at the place, eating into it like a million footsteps over a temple’s stone stairs. Paths of sorrow carved under constant, worried pacing. It’s not that it was strong, or sorcerous, or anything special at all. Just constant. Day after day, a river of small misfortunes ran through this place, eating away at the house’s foundation.

There used to be pictures hung up in the hall.

Satoru notices the little holes in the plaster. He never hung anything up in his room at Jujutsu Tech, because he didn’t want to use nails. Nails are permanent, and that… It feels like it means something, when you put a nail in the wall. It’s just the stars on his ceiling, and those are adhesive. And he’s thought before, y’know - about how when he takes them down, they’ll probably peel away some of the paint.

He doesn’t care about that, he just - he thinks about it sometimes.

Whoever lived here didn’t care about that sort of thing, though, because there’s all sorts of little holes and scuffs and indents. The wallpaper is discolored in circles and rectangles - big shapes that once framed big things - whatever they thought was important enough to put up on the wall, using a nail. Whoever lived here actually lived here, and they didn’t mind staining the place with that messy, bloody life of theirs.

They were sad when they left.

The house was probably sad too. That’s why it’s weeping still, some ten years later. They weren’t the last tenants, though. Satoru read the report. The last five owners lived there for less than a year each. Whoever stained the house - it wasn’t them. A year doesn’t do this. Not even the shittiest year you can imagine. Each of the squatters had some bad luck, though. A car accident, lost a job, a family emergency. They all had to move out before the 12-month lease was up. After that, it sat abandoned for a while. Same luck spread to the rest of the block, and now the whole complex sits empty, gathering dust.

That’s just how it goes with cursed places. No one really notices. They can’t, if they’re not sorcerers. It just starts with bad luck, bad vibes. A kid comes along and says the place is haunted, then someone boards up the windows. People move away, looking for greener pastures. If they stay, the curses eat them. And then the place eats itself.

Satoru moves into the kitchen next. It’s fine. It’s a kitchen, like any other kitchen. It’s empty, or mostly empty. He finds a bag of rice in the pantry, though it’s just down to the dregs. Doesn’t look like it’s rotten or infested with anything, though. It’s probably just stale as hell. There’s a few dust bunnies in the pantry too, and a broom that no one’s been using to sweep them up with.

The cursed energy thickens in the kitchen. There’s a tremble to it now, an uncertainty. It’s blurry, and hard to make out. It wobbles under the Six Eyes, shifting from blue, to purple, then back. It’s still not sorcerous, though. It’d be stronger if it was. And it’s old, too. If it was new, it’d be sharp.

He goes into the living room next - that’s probably what it was. It’s hard to tell without the furniture. But it’s a decently-sized room. Satoru envisions where he’d put the couch. There’s room for a coffee table too. He sees a ding in one of the walls, about waist height. Maybe there was a cabinet or something. It’s just about tall enough to hold a TV. There’s scuffs and stains on the carpet. Not like, gross stains, just life stains. Regular wear and tear kinda stains. Nothing that’d void the carpet’s warranty.

Yeah, this was probably the living room. They probably had guests over here, sat them down over there. Maybe they had coffee? Satoru’s not really sure what you do with house guests, other than sit and talk and eat. That’s the only thing they ever show on TV sitcoms, and, well. That’s all Satoru’s got to work with.

The closer that he looks at the carpet, the rougher it is. He pokes at a small, pink stain with the toe of his shoe. It’s not sticky or anything, and it moves with the shag. He squats down to get a closer look. Marker, maybe. Permanent or semi-permanent marker. He spots more marks, now that he’s closer. Blue, orange - they’ve got it all. Maybe someone did bleed out on the carpet here, and his name was Roy G. Biv.

They had kids.

A prickle starts up the back of his neck, cold and familiar. The Six Eyes jolt, and there’s a static shock as he senses it: sorcery. Real sorcery. It’s only a wisp, thin and faded. It’s old, almost too old to make out. But the sense, or the sense that there’s something to sense, pulls Satoru all the way into the next room.

It’s a smaller room, a bedroom. It has a little square window that looks out into the alley. It’s a shit view, but at least it lets some light in. There’s not enough room to put the bed facing the window. They probably cornered it for space. Satoru can’t see the residuals, but he can feel them. It’s like… cobwebs. Soft and stringy, silvery threads of silk. They drag over his hands, putting up some minute, invisible resistance.

He follows the threads into a tiny bathroom. It’s not dirty, but not clean. The white tile is grey with dust, and the mirror is dull and water-stained. At least it’s not cracked. The place isn’t nearly cursed enough for that. Satoru tugs his sleeve down over his wrist, bundling it in his fist. He rubs it over a spot in the mirror, wiping it clean. That’s where he sees the first ghost of the night.

Satoru’s alive, but he doesn’t quite look it.

Certainly doesn’t feel it, in his hollow crypt of a chest. His face is thinner, more angular - like Naoya’s. His hair is shorter too, and it falls flat and dull instead of fluffing up. It doesn’t look good when it’s not stuffed into a beanie. The front of his uniform pulls a little too tight, and his shoulders don’t fit in the sleeves like they used to. It’s because he’s stronger, apparently. But he’s never felt so goddamn weak.

Satoru licks his chapped lips, and tries to pull them into a smile. They’re too dry, so they crack a little. And his smile doesn’t quite look right, because it isn’t quite on right. It’s too thin and too crooked. Like his uniform, he wears it like ill-fitting hand-me-downs. It doesn’t look like his smile, because it isn’t his. Satoru can’t remember the last time that it was.

He’s always looked a bit like a ghost - deathly pale. But now he looks like ice - brittle and see-through. And there’s nothing inside him except cursed energy, not even guts. There’s no warmth to his face. He’s still a little frozen, from before - from Canada - there’s a part of him that never thawed back out. He looks like Montreal - blue and white and grey. He looks like a corpse.

Did he kill the right part of himself? Or did he just put it on ice? Did he-

Satoru hears the front door open.

-:-

“You don’t have to be gentle with me, y’know.”

“Someone needs to be.”

Suguru smiled, as sweet and slow as honey as he pressed his lips against Satoru’s, and pressed them both into Satoru’s sheets. He’d made his bed in haste, and they weren’t quite tucked in with the precision he’d normally use. But it didn’t seem so important these days, not with how often he bunched them up and threw them in the wash.

Satoru’s breath caught in his throat as Suguru kissed down the side of it. He tangled his hands into Suguru’s hair, wrapping the black strands around his fingers like a skein of silken thread. His shimmery cursed energy hummed in his chest, purring against Satoru’s skin. The rough cotton at his back, and Suguru’s firm chest on his own - he could melt between them, or sublimate into vapor.

“I-” Satoru gasped, “I changed my mind, actually.”

“Oh,” Suguru’s weight immediately dissipated from his chest. He pulled himself up, away - “Sure. We don’t have to-”

“Shut up,” Satoru rolled them over, pinning Suguru before he could vanish into mist, “I didn’t mean I wanna stop.” He pushed Suguru back down into the mattress, and he felt Suguru’s solid heartbeat beneath his hands, heavy and constant. “I just wanna do something… different? If - um - if you’re down for that?”

“Okay.” Suguru nodded, “Of course, Satoru, anything. What, uh… what do you want to do?”

“I want, uh-”

-if you want it too-

“To edge you?” Satoru murmured, the words no thicker than air on his tongue. His mouth felt a little dry as a gale blew through, rattling up his words like a flurry of leaves. “Um, like the sex way, not the landscaping way. In case that wasn’t clear. I just - I thought, maybe I could try?”

“...Oh.”

“If-” Satoru stuttered “-If it’s okay-”

-if it’s not too much-

-if it’s not weird-

Suguru stared up at him, his eyes wide, his mouth even wider. “You want to..”

“I want to-”

-to try to do something you like for once-

-to make it good for you the way you make it good for me-

-to see you fall apart the way I always do when you-

And suddenly a laugh tumbled out from Suguru’s lips, heavy as a riverstone, polished by the currents.

“Okay. Sure, why not,” Suguru shrugged, “Bet I’ll last longer than you.”

“...Like that’s hard.”

Satoru’s heart knocked around in his chest, tangling in the thin, wispy webs woven between his ribs. He swallowed down a spidery breath as Suguru looped his arms around Satoru’s waist. Suguru simply smiled, soft as down feathers, and dusted the cobwebs away.

“I mean, you could definitely make it hard for me,” Suguru said, “if you wanted to.”

Suguru turned them, laying Satoru on his side. He rolled onto his back. Golden light bounced and scattered into the Six Eyes as his chest rose and fell. The fading sunset cast colors all along his skin - pink, purple, and orange. His eyes met Satoru’s, violet turned rose. He took Satoru’s hand in his own. And he moved it. Satoru nearly gasped as his palm closed around Suguru; Suguru barely let out a sound. He barely squirmed, barely seemed to feel it at all. It was unfair. It was fucking unreal. But his cursed energy wobbled, swirls of pink bubbling up in his stomach. Satoru tightened his fist, and Suguru’s breath finally, finally stuttered.

“O-okay,” Satoru whispered, “Tell me when you’re close.”

“...Yeah.” Suguru closed his eyes and let his head fall back into the pillow. Rivers of black ink spilled over the blank sheets, painting it with illegible calligraphy. The Six Eyes squinted, trying to find characters in the curls of his hair, trying to read Suguru’s lips as they parted around a sigh.

“You’re always so quiet,” Satoru mumbled.

“It’s-” Suguru huffed, “...It’s not like in porn, y’know.” Red crept up his chest, and Satoru felt his skin heat a fraction of a fraction of a degree. His cock stiffened in Satoru’s hand, and his words came slower, clumsier. “Normal people aren’t like - whining and shit.” Suguru let out a soft curse. “Wait - close-”

Pale precome beaded at the tip of his cock, shiny and slick. Satoru stilled his hand, feeling him throb in his grip. His hips shifted, and he winced as his cock pushed forward against Satoru’s palm. Suguru gasped, “Satoru-”

“Sorry!” Satoru yelped, quickly letting go of his cock. It fell heavy against his stomach, flushed skin against the bronze of his abs. He wanted to keep touching Suguru - it didn’t seem fair that he couldn’t. Seemed like more of a challenge for Satoru than Suguru - one he could definitely, definitely fail. Satoru resisted the urge to sit on his hands, and he tangled them in the sheets instead.

“You can touch me somewhere else,” Suguru whispered. “Ah - only if you want to, I mean.”

“Okay-” Satoru nodded clumsily. “Um, yeah.”

“Just not my dick,” Suguru sucked in a breath. “Or I’ll, y’know…”

“Yeah,” Satoru whispered. “Yeah, I got it. You’ll blow your load.” Suguru choked. “You’ll cream all over me, Betty Crocker style. Super moist, french vanilla.”

“Who the fuck is Betty Crocker?”

Satoru’s fingers traced lightly over Suguru’s stomach, piping patterns into the divots of Suguru’s hips. He folded them over Suguru’s abs, then his pecs. Suguru’s breathing rose beneath Satoru’s hands, airy as whipped cream. Suguru surged up to kiss him, locking his arm around Satoru’s waist.

“Suguru-”

“I-” Suguru pulled back, licking glazy sugar off his lips. “I think you can go again.”

It was harder the second time - harder for Satoru. Suguru’s cock was hard, shiny, and flushed red, just like strawberry candy. And just like hard candy, it’d become second nature for Satoru to shove it in his mouth every chance he got. His tongue felt heavy and wet - and surely it would’ve been put to better use wrapped around Suguru’s cock. But Satoru bit his tongue. He stroked Suguru with his hand instead, too slow and too loose. He settled for the taste of Suguru’s cursed energy, smoke blooming on his tongue. It felt like seconds - only seconds - before his body twitched again under Satoru’s touch. Suguru cursed.

“Wait, already?”

Suguru rolled his eyes. “...Shut up.”

“I mean,” Satoru backpedaled, biting his tongue. “Like, obviously. ‘Cause I’m so fuckin’ good at this. ‘Cause-”

“How long has it been?” Suguru huffed.

Satoru hadn’t been keeping count, not really. And he probably should’ve been, for the sake of competitive integrity. But he couldn’t really care about the competition - not when his odds seemed so terrible of outmatching Suguru. But maybe the odds weren’t so wide, maybe they weren’t so unevenly matched. It hadn’t felt like that long. But it’d been long enough. Too long for Suguru to bear, twice as long for Satoru, and infinity times as long for the Six Eyes, because of time dilation.

“Long enough,” Satoru said, deciding it only the second that the words tumbled out. “You can - wait-”

Clouds rolled through his mouth, light and fluffy. Watery, vaporous wishes weighed down his tongue. So Satoru asked for the moon, hoping to snag even the tiniest star instead.

“I’ll let you come,” Satoru whispered, a vacuum in his lungs, “But only if you beg for it.”

Suguru’s eyes cracked open, fluttering ultraviolet. And he smirked.

“Alright,” he said, “Please, Satoru,” His voice was thin, needy, and so obviously an imitation of Satoru’s when he got that way… When he got desperate. “Please let me come,” Suguru whined, “Please, Satoru, I need it.”

Blood rose quickly into Satoru’s cheeks, heating them enough to turn them red and radiative. It wasn’t fair - that’s why. It wasn’t fair that Suguru wasn’t half as desperate as Satoru would be in his place. And it wasn’t fair that he just - he just gave like that. That Satoru didn’t even have to work for it. It wasn’t fair that Suguru couldn’t be arsed to feel the least bit embarrassed, when Satoru himself felt like shriveling up into a tiny, novelty pack of freeze-dried sorcerer.

“You’re-” Satoru stuttered. “You’re shameless!”

Suguru laughed, bright as the stars. And he leaned in, his lips tickling over Satoru’s neck. “What exactly am I supposed to be ashamed of?” Satoru’s lungs froze, and his next breath came out shaky and frostbitten. Suguru’s chest pressed up against his, searing him with warmth - blazing warmth.

Suguru whispered: “Wanting this?”

…Yes?

Obviously, yes.

“You’re the one who asked me to beg,” Suguru chuckled. His hand settled on Satoru’s side, pinching teasingly at the soft skin above Satoru’s hip. Satoru jolted, smacking at Suguru’s hand.

“Yeah, but-”

“But what?” Suguru purred “I’m just obeying you, Satoru.” He curled both his arms around Satoru’s waist, drawing him in. Satoru gasped as their legs entwined. Suguru’s hard cock pressed against his thigh, and he rasped, “Sorry. We can’t all be brats.”

“You’re supposed to let me bully you,” Satoru whined. He got his hand on Suguru’s cock again, to show the motherfucker. “Like you bully me,” Satoru huffed, “like you torment me, you - you sadist.”

“Fucking…” Suguru groaned, his hand gripping Satoru’s hip hard enough to bruise. “You torment me plenty, Satoru.”

Suguru grappled Satoru down into the sheets. Overwhelming, universal, constant - a force just like gravity. He was an axiom, inarguable. All Satoru could do was let himself be pinned under his unstoppable force. Satoru clumsily threw his free hand around Suguru’s shoulder, nails digging into the meat of his back. He shivered as Suguru’s lips skated down his jaw, latching beneath his ear.

“Please, Satoru,” Suguru sang, “Touch me, please.” Satoru could feel the smirk against his skin. He tightened his hand around Suguru’s cock, and Suguru’s hips shifted into him, pressing into his palm.

“Oh, fuck you,” Satoru mumbled, shuddering. Satoru’s body burned at the rasp of Suguru’s voice; his hand around Suguru’s cock barely seemed to throw sparks. It wasn’t fair.

“Need you, Satoru,” Suguru moaned softly. “Please?” Suguru’s hand wrapped over Satoru’s, guiding it along his length. Cheater. It wasn’t fucking fair. “Oh, I’ll do anything, Satoru~.”

Satoru’s whole body felt as if it were set ablaze. He felt bullied. He felt tormented.

Satoru rolled on top of Suguru, nearly sending them both off the edge of his undersized mattress. Suguru chuckled and dragged them back towards the center as Satoru clambered over him, straddling his hips.

“You’re such an asshole,” Satoru huffed. He tightened his grip, stroking Suguru’s cock, and a deep shudder rolled down Suguru’s spine.

“Satoru,” he murmured, lips pressed into Satoru’s temples. His voice dripped over Satoru’s skin like honey - like wine, not so sweet, but much more intoxicating. “Can I?” Suguru whispered. Finally his breath came shorter, hitching over a single word: “Please, Satoru?”

“I hate you.”

Suguru broke into a laugh, and then that broke into tiny, airy moans as Satoru’s hand sped up on his length. His eyes went faraway, cloudy, lost in the heavens. Satoru chased the upper atmosphere on his tongue, fizzy ions and the taste of lightning. All through it, even as Suguru came undone, he held Satoru together. Soft and steady, teasing encouragement into Satoru’s ear. Thunder pulsed inside his head too as the storm built. Satoru wasn’t far behind - all it took was a touch, a kiss, and one, nearly-silent whisper of his name.

‘Please, Satoru?’

Suguru lay on his side, panting as he came down from the cosmos. His dark hair fell over them both, black as the night, shining with stars. Satoru was still lost somewhere in orbit, this Six Eyes flooded with light from a blazing sun. Suguru’s soft, grounded touch yanked him back down, tethering him to earth.

Is afterglow supposed to be so literal? Or is it only the Six Eyes that see how Suguru actually glows? Gold on his skin, platinum underneath. His cursed energy swirled into glittering pastels, suffusing the room. Beneath his skin, it sang to the Six Eyes, captivating him with its chaotic melodies. Satoru reached out to touch it - couldn’t help but touch it-

“So?” Suguru hummed sleepily.

And… Suguru didn’t seem to mind.

His cursed energy smoothed, turning to velvet. “Everything you hoped for?” he asked.

“I’m not-” Satoru blushed, “...I’m not great at the whole, uh, ‘dom’ thing, huh?” Suguru laughed, vibrations resonating into Satoru’s ribs.. “I mean, it’s - like… You’re a natural at it.”

“Well, I mean…” Suguru winced. “You’re a bit…”

Submissive? He isn’t, not really. Not to just, like, anyone. He’s not some - some girl or something, or like, some limp-wristed gay guy who wants to be a girl.

Suguru hemmed, “...Y’know…”

It’s just Suguru that makes him want to be held, or even held down. It’s just Suguru that makes him think, maybe it wouldn’t be so bad if he was a girl, if he could Binding Vow his way out of pregnancy and periods. It’s just Suguru, because he’s an exception to every rule in the universe, whether it’s about physics or jujutsu or apparently human attraction.

And it’s mortifying, isn’t it? That-

“...You’re kind of an impatient little shit?”

That - what?

“It’s like…” Suguru stared at him, hands hovering awkwardly in the air. He gestured vaguely with them, like he could box up the space between them and send it away. “I dunno, like, a delayed gratification thing?”

“Oh.”

Not that - and it’s not that Satoru wanted Suguru to think of him as submissive or girly or gay-guy-girly. Or small enough to be held, or weak enough to be held down. He was all of those things, maybe, maybe just a little bit. But-

“I mean, I’m sure you could be good at it if you, like, practiced,” Suguru said, “Being a dom - I mean.”

But-

Satoru doesn’t want Suguru to think of him like that either - too strong to be held at all.

“...Should I practice?” Satoru stammered. “I mean, do you… Do you want… that?”

Suguru just shrugged.

“I don’t care,” he said, tugging Satoru down into the mattress, pulling their bodies flush together. He mumbled - as his eyes slipped shut: “Do whatever you want, Satoru.”