Work Text:
“What if we didn’t go back?”
Satoru asks the question while Suguru is watching a whale shark curve on the axis of its route around the tank, seamlessly gliding towards the furthest end of the tank, away from him and Satoru. He doesn’t answer until the animal is too far to truly see, millions of gallons of seawater and other fish blurring the distance.
“Funny.”
His eyes flicker to the right side of the tank, where the whale shark has looped for the past 10 minutes, thoughtlessly circling around the exhibit, a myriad of smaller fishes following its shadow.
“I mean it. What if we didn’t?”
He pushes himself off the cold metal railing, turning to rest the small of his back against it, crossing his arms over his chest. Satoru is looking straight ahead at the tank, the blue light reflected on his face a few shades darker than his eyes.
“Are you feeling okay? You know how stupid that would be?”
“Would it be stupid? It makes sense to me.”
Satoru turns to face him just as the whale shark rounds the curve.
“Okay. Let’s say we don’t go back,” Suguru begins. “What about Riko? And Misato?”
“They’d come with us.”
He scoffs, “Yeah? Easy as that? Satoru, you’re not thinking about consequences.”
“I am,” he says, and Suguru stops himself from saying something when he sees the expression on Satoru’s face, his brows tight and mouth twisted into a frown.
“It might as well be death, right?” he says. “That isn’t fair. That’s a consequence.”
“You’re talking about Riko?”
He looks almost timid as he nods, and Suguru sighs.
“We’d have to ask her if she wants to. I can’t say I haven’t been thinking about it, either.”
The small smile that overtakes Satoru’s frown gradually turns into a smirk, and he leans in, tilting his head towards Suguru.
“If she says yes, you know this is gonna be annoying, right? And long? You ready for that?”
Suguru rolls his eyes, “You’ll be there, too. It’ll be fine.”
They ask Riko about the plan after they leave the aquarium when they’re gathered on a bench finishing the snow-cones Satoru had insisted on stopping for when he spotted a shaved ice cart packing up for the day. Riko and him are both tilting their respective paper cones towards their mouths to drink the red sugary liquid leftover, while Misato and Suguru are done with theirs. When Riko turns to excitedly tell Misato about one of the manta rays she touched back at the aquarium while she was elsewhere, Satoru looks over at Suguru knowingly.
Better now than never.
“So,” Satoru begins. “Tomorrow we head to Tokyo.”
Both Riko and Misato turn to look at him, and Suguru catches the concerned frown that Misato quickly hides away.
“I guess we do, yeah,” Riko says. “I wish we didn’t have to, it’s been fun, as creepy as you are.”
She sticks out her tongue at Satoru, and he frowns, reaching for her head to ruffle the top of her hair.
“You know, me and Suguru were going to tell you some good news but maybe now we won’t.”
Suguru laughs when Riko complains, reaching for Satoru’s eyeglasses in retaliation, but missing when he ducks his head and stands up.
“What’s the good news?” Misato asks.
“We don’t have to go to Tokyo,” Satoru exclaims as he throws his arms in the air, and Suguru rolls his eyes.
“What? Why?” Riko asks. Misato is eyeing both of them apprehensively.
Suguru reaches over to lower Satoru’s arms.
“What we mean,” he begins to explain. “We're giving you a choice, Riko. We can take you to Tokyo for the merger, or we can stay here to wait out the deadline. You should be free to go after.”
“Why—” Riko starts but is interrupted by Misato.
“Why would you do that for her? Won’t you be defecting?”
Satoru shrugs leisurely, but Suguru hears the sober tone in his voice.
“Eh, we can handle that. It just feels like bullshit that you don’t really get a choice, and I don’t like doing bullshit things.” He points a finger at Suguru, “You can thank Suguru anyway, he’s the one that agreed to it.”
“Oh,” Misato says, squeezing her hands over her lap. Riko is staring at them, eyes wide and lips stained vibrant red. She stands after a moment and steps towards them, and they eye her strangely before she lunges at them, haphazardly trying to wrap her short arms around them to no avail.
The plan is: reach out to Nanami and Haibara to see if they’ll help. Satoru argues that Nanami might snitch on them, but Suguru defends the notion by saying that Haibara wouldn’t, so Nanami wouldn’t either. After that, they’ll keep the flight uncancelled to hopefully trick any bounty hunters keeping track, but switch hotels to another not funded by the college. Riko asks where they would get the money to afford that, and Satoru waves his wallet in the air. After, they’ll wait out the final day of the merger in Okinawa with Nanami and Haibara on stand-by in the airport, and then Riko is free to go.
They call Nanami and Haibara on speakerphone. They’re in their hotel room’s bathroom while the girls wait out in the bedroom. Suguru is holding his head in his hands on the toilet, attempting to ignore the ball of anxiety swirling in his stomach. Satoru is staring at the phone on the counter ring, resting his back against the door.
Haibara picks up on the second ring.
“Hello? Are you guys okay?”
“Yeah, yeah,” Satoru says. “We’re fine. Listen, we have some news.”
“Okay.”
“Can Nanami hear me?”
“No,” Haibara says before both can hear a grating rustling sound, and then Haibara suddenly sounds far away. “Okay, now he can. Say hi, Kento.”
“I rather not.”
Suguru stifles a laugh.
“How do you two feel about staying at the airport for another day?”
Suguru raises his head to look at Satoru as he asks the question, both Haibara and Nanami quiet.
“Why?” Nanami asks, “You’d be late for the merger, it’d be voided out.”
“That’s sort of the point.”
They’re silent, and as the seconds tick by, the muffled sounds of an airport from the phone the only sound in the bathroom, Suguru is ready to reach over, hang up, and figure out something else. Satoru is about to speak when Haibara beats him to it.
“Is Geto there ?”
Satoru raises a brow.
“I am,” Suguru says.
“You’re on board with this? It isn’t something Gojo is coming up with? ”
“Hey,” Satoru protests, glaring at the phone as if Haibara could see him. Suguru is staring at the phone screen, watching the call time increase second by second.
“Yeah, I’m on board. We agreed we think it’s the best thing.”
Another bout of silence, but this time far shorter. When the airport sound is suddenly gone, Suguru assumes they’ve been muted. When it unmutes almost two minutes later, they can hear a muffled intercom voice calling for a flight’s passengers.
“Okay. You have to do what you think is right, after all.”
Suguru blinks, “R-right. Thank you.”
“Keep us updated.” Nanami’s stern voice cuts through, right before the call is over.
“That worked,” Satoru says, right before laughing, pressing a hand against his face. “Oh fuck, that really worked. We’re in it now.”
It feels too easy, and Suguru’s vision narrows to the beige hotel towel hanging in front of him. It feels too easy, and he holds his breath, waiting for an unseen thread to unravel their entire plan.
“Hey, earth to Suguru.”
He blinks and Satoru is squatting beside him, the heels of his feet off the floor.
“Hey,” he responds.
“We got this, ok?” he says, the sudden burst of sound of Riko cackling from the other side of the door as Misato hushes her a distant comfort. “We got this.”
The hotel Satoru rents for them to switch out of is far less comfortable than the one the school had paid for, and he lies about his name to the unsuspecting clerk after a series of flirty eyes and suggestions. They have the blinds pulled shut, the passage of time outside of their small, stuffy reality apparent to them solely by their phones, and the lines of light that slice the room horizontally shifting throughout the day.
Satoru is on an absurd amount of caffeine, and Suguru has to flick his ear occasionally to keep him from nodding off. They’re sitting opposite the girls, who are on their bed; Misato with an arm wrapped around Riko’s shoulder, and Riko holding onto her sleeves in return.
Suguru thinks, in a strange way, that it feels like New Year's Eve. They’re waiting for the countdown of the bounty and the merger, Suguru occasionally checking the website they were able to find with a timer. Riko had asked to look at it but Satoru and Suguru both had vehemently disagreed, Suguru’s own stomach churning at some of the images and requests listed for sorcerers.
“Maybe I can get a job once we’re done,” Satoru had joked as he peered over Suguru’s shoulder, Riko having thankfully lost interest.
Suguru glared, snapping his cellphone shut briskly, “Don’t joke about that, Satoru.”
When it’s a minute to midnight, they’re all silent. Suguru is staring at his phone and Satoru at the door when the time crosses over into 00:00. They had expected something catastrophic, maybe a sniper from somewhere across the street, or maybe a sudden apparition of Tengen himself, but nothing happens. The world moves on to 00:01 and 00:02. They get a text from Haibara at 00:03 with two words: good luck.
Riko is still except for her head, which she turns towards Satoru, then Suguru, and finally Misato.
“We should get some rest,” Misato says, offering the girl a private, maternal smile Suguru feels they aren’t meant to witness. When Riko starts to cry, Misato pulling her close with her own trembling shoulders, they don’t say anything.
They fall asleep easily, and to Suguru’s surprise, when Satoru retires to their bed, his breathing evens out sooner rather than later. Suguru keeps watch, sitting by the window in the cramped polyester hotel room chair, attentive to the three spirits set around the perimeter. When nothing happens for the first two hours, Suguru stands, sighing as he outstretches his arms above his head, a resounding crack in his tense shoulders as a result. Movement from the furthest end of the room catches his attention, and he watches Satoru sit up, white hair in spiky disarray. Satoru scans the room looking for him, and Suguru visibly sees him ease up once he spots him by the door. With a tilt of his head, Suguru motions for him to follow him outside, shutting the heavy door behind him quietly.
Outside, they’re too far from the beach to hear any waves, but the humidity is thick, sticking to the back of Suguru’s neck like a second layer of skin. It’s unpleasant but he decides he needs the fresh air and sighs as he leans against the railing, choosing to ignore the condensation his arms smear as he does. Satoru joins him after a minute, leaning against the railing beside him, their shoulders meeting. It’s too warm and uncomfortable but Suguru leans into the weight anyway.
“Shoko would be smoking if she were here,” Satoru says. His tone is soft, quiet enough that Suguru can’t imagine they’d disturb the girls inside, but not really a whisper.
Suguru huffs, “Yeah, she would. She’d also complain that we’re awake.”
“She would.”
Although they become silent, the world around them is not. Subtle sounds infiltrate their privacy; a car passing by the street in front of the hotel, the sway of the palm trees lining the sides of the parking lot in the breeze, and the monotonous buzz of the air conditioners jutting out from windows shutting on and off. Eventually, Suguru’s voice joins their mundane symphony.
“That’s it then, huh?”
“I guess it is.”
Another bout of silence settles between them, and it weighs heavily on Suguru. The view of the shore from their second-floor room is blocked by a series of other hotels and shorter buildings, but the briny, crisp scent of the sea lingers.
“Are you okay with this?” Satoru asks. “Like, are you really cool with this?”
“It’s too late for that,” Suguru replies.
“You can still answer the question.”
Suguru sighs and stands upright, “I told you, I’m on board with this.”
“Okay.”
There is an unseen pressure to Satoru’s lack of response and it drapes over Suguru’s shoulders. He doesn’t touch Satoru, but he looks over at him, and once Satoru looks back, Suguru speaks to the nebulous sky in his eyes.
“I can’t tell what you’re thinking.”
“Can you ever?” Satoru grins, bearing his teeth. It’s an act free of violence, mirthless in the 3 AM moonlight. When Suguru doesn’t play along, just watching him with blank but attentive eyes, Satoru relents.
“Things are going to be different, starting tomorrow,” he explains, and Suguru tries to follow along. “We didn’t even say bye. Isn’t that fucked up?”
“We could send Shoko a text if you want.”
Satoru barks out a laugh.
“Don’t get cold feet on me now,” Suguru says. “You’re the one who came up with this.”
“Don’t be stupid. I wouldn’t leave you.”
The statement is one of clarity, absent of the teasing and insincerity Suguru is used to deciphering and decoding from Satoru’s dialect. There is an untouched earnestness in its formation and quietly, Suguru realizes that they’ve decided as boys to possibly remain together until they die.
“Good,” he says. He wants to say he won’t leave him either, but it doesn’t feel like what Satoru wants to hear. A yawn curves the end to his work and he wipes at the small, drowsy tears that form in his eyes.
“Get some sleep,” Satoru says.
Suguru frowns, “You’re the one who hasn’t slept.”
“Not sleepy. Now c’mon.”
He places a hand on the small of Suguru‘s back, ushering him towards the door with the lightest of touches. Inside, when Suguru crawls into bed and Satoru sits beside him, turning on the television in the room on mute with blocky subtitles, Suguru falls asleep easily, his eyes drooping shut as the subtitles blur.
Shoko calls them just as they’re about to break their phones the next day. She calls Suguru’s phone specifically, and Satoru and him share a hesitant look before they answer. They’re standing by the garbage can beside the ATM Satoru is waiting to use.
“Hello?” Suguru asks, putting the call on speaker as they huddle together.
Riko and Misato are sitting on a bench opposite of them, nervous. Suguru waves a hand dismissively and they visibly relax. They’re supposed to be looking for airplane tickets to wherever they have left to go, and if Suguru remembers correctly it’s some country-side house that belonged to Misato’s family.
“What are you two doing?”
She doesn’t sound angry, but her tone is pointed in its lack of animosity.
“What’s the answer that won’t have you angry at us?” Satoru asks. Suguru purses his lips as if to say not now.
“Too late for that. Were you even going to call me? Yaga is losing his shit and the higher-ups are pissed, they’re calling you traitors.”
“They’ll find another vessel,” Suguru interjects. “Riko doesn’t have to be it.”
“So, you get to pick favorites now? ” Shoko says, and Suguru feels the words in his stomach. “If you two hadn’t liked Riko, if it had been some old geezer or a bratty kid, would you do this? You can’t just pick who to save.”
“Why not?” Satoru says. “Why not? Those living fossils get to pick who lives or dies all the time, why can’t we once?”
“Whatever,” and finally, irritation bleeds into her words. “ You two better be careful. I don’t want to see either of you in the morgue. I’ll kill you.”
It’s as close to goodbye as they’ll get, and neither fights it when she hangs up. Neither comment on it when Satoru steps up to the ATM, but when Suguru sees the amount of money available in his account, his eyes widen and he turns to Satoru in disbelief.
“You had that much and you couldn’t pay for me or Shoko more often?”
Satoru rolls his eyes, “I had a limit, it’s not my money, it’s the Gojo money. It’s mine when I’m 18.” He pauses as he says that, his fingertip hesitating before typing in the daily withdrawal limit, “Actually, I guess it won’t be since we’re traitors.”
At the airport, their goodbye is short. They don’t act as if this is the last time they’ll see one another, and when Suguru really thinks about it, they had barely known one another for four days. We’re traitors for someone we’ve known for barely a week, he thinks, doubtful, but then he looks over to see Satoru draped in the uncomfortable airport chair, playing some type of word game with Riko. He tries to picture the seat empty, tries to picture the girl lost in time and unremembered except by them, and breathes.
When their flight is called, Misato and Riko are both glossy-eyed despite there being no real need for such an emotional goodbye.
“Thank you for everything,” Misato offers when Satoru and Suguru stand to leave.
“Ugh,” Satoru groans. “Enough sappy shit already, just go.”
Suguru is about to chastise him, but Riko grins, toothy and wide, and steps towards him. She stands proudly, both of her hands on her hips.
“I’m going to find you when I’m older and stronger,” she declares. “And I’m going to kick your ass.”
“Oh, really?” Satoru teases, hovering over her due to his height. “Can’t wait then.”
They grin wildly at one another, and once Riko and Misato are out of sight, offering one final wave before they disappear into the boarding corridor, Satoru and Suguru both exhale. The world moves on around them, undisturbed as passengers and employees a lot walk past them, talking among themselves.
“Now what?” Suguru asks.
Satoru motions towards a rack of travel brochures along the wall beside the screen with itineraries.
“Where do you want to go?”
It doesn’t feel real, and Suguru can’t figure out why. There is something dreamlike in the manner they pass through time now, their bodies unattached to any real schedule or structure. They spend days and nights on either train, bus, or even airplane, although that becomes a rarity, available to them only after a burst of money comes to them. When they visit more rural areas, country-side towns known to tourists and locals alike for haunted, abandoned taverns and other well-kept secrets of the sorts, Satoru will barter with inn-keepers, offering exorcisms in exchange for meals and rooms. The first few times they don’t believe him, and Suguru is filled with anxious dread when he raises his hands and turns a soda can in the trash into a cube of metal. He worries rumors will spread and they’ll be found, but the inn-keepers are always shocked, and then unravel into a series of requests. More often than not, they find themselves preferring to frequent smaller towns because of this. It’s easy to barter, and Suguru finds himself enjoying the landscape on their time off, although that in itself is subjective.
Sometimes, he’ll wonder what it would be like to live in these places. He wonders where the nearest grocery is and if the prices are lower than what he’s used to, and where the nearest school is, and up to what grade they host. Sometimes when Satoru and him are able to venture out into the scenery, hiking through forestry or uphill on a mountain, he wonders what there is to do in these places, wonders if locals will do what they do, will see what they see, or if the pastures and mountains and lakes that surround these kept-away places are mundane in locals’ eyes, the vivid greens and translucent blues Suguru sees and yearns to memorize toned down into something else, something not worth staying for.
Suguru wonders if they stayed in one of these places, if they’d want to leave eventually, just as they had from Tokyo.
On occasion, he’ll confess these thoughts to Satoru. The confession will lead to curiosity, and Suguru asks where he’d work if they stayed in this town or the next, and each time Satoru answers with something different.
“A farmer,” he had said in one rural town, one side of it looped around a small lake, the other bordered by forest. “Or maybe a carpenter.”
“A blacksmith,” he had mumbled with a mouth full of food when they had stopped in an old mining town, the mines long closed but open as museums.
In a coastal town they stayed almost a week in, he had pointed a finger at Suguru when he asked the question, his open, floral shirt rustling as the fan in their cramped rented room pivoted towards them.
“Why am I always the one working in these scenarios? You could get a job, too.’
“I never said I wasn’t working,” Suguru argued.
Satoru huffed, retracting his hand and using it to fan himself.
“We could be fishermen,” Suguru suggests, before wrinkling his nose. “Actually no, I don’t think I could handle the smell.”
“That’s because you’re prissy.”
Suguru narrows his eyes, “Oh, as if you aren’t?”
Satoru stands then, nearly knocking over the open water bottle that was by his knee. The inn they’re in is small, and when Satoru stands upright, the top of his head almost touches the wooden ceiling.
“I’m not prissy. I could be a fisherman. I’d be badass at it, I’m sure I could use red for it.”
“You’d use a cursed technique to fish?”
Satoru shrugs, “Why not? If it makes the job easier, screw it.”
Suguru blinks, and when he imagines the bodies of helpless fish flopping against the shore after a sudden ejection from Satoru’s technique, the body of water in question nearly empty from the brash attack, he holds onto his stomach, laughing hard enough that his sides ache.
They find themselves on a bridge after seven months on the run, Suguru enraptured by a travel brochure Satoru had absentmindedly plucked out of the train station’s magazine rack as they exited. There are hundreds, possibly thousands, of padlocks locked onto the metal, rusting railing of the bridge, each with some type of written message in marker, some with small doodles of hearts and faces. Satoru watches as a couple a few feet ahead of them locks a blue padlock onto the railing, giggling to one another as they kiss quickly before tossing what Satoru assumes is the key out into the sea.
“So, why this bridge for this romantic shit? Does the brochure say?”
Suguru hums as he continues to read.
“I can’t find why, but apparently this island was made by a goddess to entrap a sea dragon.”
“That doesn’t sound romantic.”
“Well, she’s related to love, and they got married for some reason, so. This bridge is also a lucky spot for first kisses too, apparently.”
Satoru snorts, “Okay. Any luck finding a place to eat, yet?”
“No, not really.”
He sighs and rests his elbows atop of the railing, frowning when he struggles to find a comfortable position with the padlocks that jut out. The whole reason they’re on the bridge to begin with is to cross over to the main island to find somewhere to eat, and although Satoru had said they could just go and pick a place, Suguru wanted to see if the brochure had any suggestions. The couple he had been eyeing turn to them, mumble something to one another and then leave.
Satoru frowns. They must be the only non-couple on this stupid, cheesy bridge.
All at once, he gets an idea.
“Suguru.”
He looks up, piqued by Satoru’s serious tone.
“What?”
“We should kiss.”
Suguru’s eyes widen, and he lowers the brochure.
“What?”
Satoru waves a hand in the air, gesturing towards the bridge.
“I don’t know, you said it was a good spot for first kisses, and technically we’re tourists, so we might as well.”
Suguru’s eyes narrow, “You want to kiss because that’s what the brochure mentions?”
“What? Are you nervous?” Satoru mocks, witness to a vein by Suguru’s temple twitch.
“I think out of the two of us you’re the one who hasn’t kissed anyone,” he argues.
Satoru scoffs, “What, and you have?”
Suguru smirks, “Matter of fact, yeah, I have, as a dare when I was a kid.”
Satoru groans, pushing himself off the railing and stepping closer to Suguru. He puts a hand on either side of him, and Suguru's cheeks warm to rose. He hopes he can blame the sun for his own, but Suguru’s smirk says otherwise.
“Let’s just kiss, okay? We don’t have to think about it.”
“We’ve been on the run for almost a year because we ‘didn’t have to think about it.’”
Satoru frowns, “Do you not want to kiss me? Is that it?”
Suguru presses his knuckles against Satoru’s chest lightly, “It’s not that.”
“Then what is it?”
“This would change things for me. Would it for you?”
It’s surprisingly honest, and Satoru feels Suguru press harder against his chest with his knuckles.
“You’re Suguru to me,” Satoru says. “You’ll always be Suguru to me, regardless if you’re my friend, boyfriend, or husband.”
“Okay.”
Satoru raises a brow, “Okay, what?”
Suguru groans, “Don’t be an asshole, just kiss me.”
He swoops in quickly, and although the kiss is far from awkward it isn’t great, and when Satoru pulls away, he bumps his nose into Suguru’s.
Satoru knows what’s coming when Suguru tilts his head with a sly grin.
“I thought you were joking, you really haven’t kissed anyone before, huh?”
Satoru huffs, scowling as he tries to shove Suguru away, the two entangling their arms as Suguru tries to shove him back.
When Satoru suggests they stay in a city for a week, Suguru disagrees.
“Won’t that be risky?”
Satoru tries not to be annoyed, but there is an itch in the back of his throat that he’s been unable to ignore for the last few weeks, growing until his hands and legs were fidgety, desperate to leave the towns they’ve been staying at faster and faster. The last town they had stopped in, they had only planned for one night. Satoru can tell it’s been bothering Suguru.
“It’s been almost a year, let’s just do it.”
There’s a frustrating crinkle between Suguru’s brows and Satoru frowns.
“I just don’t think it’s smart, we’ve had only one run-in so far. A city makes it harder to not be seen.”
“Suguru,” Satoru whines, and although it’s meant to be playful, it sounds sour. “We don’t have to stay for a week, how about that? Just a few days, come on.”
“Fine, okay,” Suguru relents, and Satoru grins as he leans in and presses a kiss to the top of his head.
Something Satoru has been unable to find the words to properly explain to Suguru is that, unlike him, he’s started to miss the chaos of the jujutsu sorcerer reality they had been a crucial part of. It’s not like he wants to go back to school or bow his head to the higher-ups, but he misses the action. He misses the sensation of power becoming him and him becoming power, and he’s afraid that admitting so to Suguru will cause a schism between them. He hopes that the city visit helps, and when he tells Suguru he’s found a sort of a freelance gig from the website they had found nearly a year ago, Suguru is hesitant but permitting.
It’s easy. Stupidly easy, but Satoru feels more satisfied than he has in over a month when the cursed spirit splatters against concrete in putrid blue and purple watercolor. He makes more money, too. It’s why Satoru insists that they frequent more cities, even going as far as to bargain with Suguru.
“We can bounce back and forth,” he argues. “Make money in a city, relax in a town. It’s a good idea.”
Suguru frowns but plays along, and Satoru ignores the strange, almost guilt-ridden feeling expanding in his ribs.
It goes to shit after three jobs.
In retrospect, Satoru should have known better. He should have trusted his instincts when the job listing barely had any information, just a two-sentence summary of what was expected, followed by the absurd amount to be paid, and the difficulty of the deal, which included a deadline of the same day it was posted.
He hadn’t even told Suguru. He had lied, saying it was another cursed spirit bothering some shady business owner.
It wasn’t a difficult job. He arrived on the scene at a chapel that seemed pristine on the outside; walls painted a strange yellow adorned with well-crafted and colorful murals depicting crowds holding up suns. Once he was inside, it was a different story.
Bodies were strewn over the wooden pews that were inflated by their edges from soaking up blood. He felt drops of it drip onto his shoulder, and peered up to see the carnage had made it to the ceiling, clinging to and dangling from the row of hanging, flickering chandeliers. There was a shrill, ear-piercing sound, and Satoru’s eyes glazed over the space, trying to find its source. In the center of it all was a teenager, probably thirteen by the looks of his awkward frame, crouched by an altar holding onto his head as he mumbled something to himself repeatedly.
Satoru stepped towards him, able to discern the words it was an accident, dad said, it was an accident and briefly remembered the listing.
Clean up of cursed spirit scene. Discretion necessary, HIGH DIFFICULTY, PROOF DUE BY 11:59 PM.
The teenager jerked then, pushing himself away from Satoru when he noticed him and banging his head against the altar, some bronze chalices and plates clattering to the ground.
“Get away from me, get away from me—”
“I’m not here to hurt yo—”
The boy screamed, and a monstrous gnarl followed. Satoru blinked, raising his arms instinctively in front of him as a lumpy, colossal cursed spirit lunged at him from behind the boy, both of its mouths open. Purple illuminated the space in a flash of blinding light, and then it was over. He had asked the poster if the proof required a photograph of the boy’s corpse, and felt nothing when he received the word yes in response.
As he crouched in front of the remains of his torso, raising his phone in front of a violent but bloodless crescent carved into his right sight, he thought that if he had been anyone else, maybe Yaga or Nanami, that the boy could have been taken into the system.
He makes it back to their hotel room late. Suguru is visibly upset, and Satoru is ready to be berated for worrying him, for coming back to another one of their temporary homes so callously, but Suguru doesn’t condemn him. Instead, he stands from where he’s seated on a bed and nears him, raising his hands in front of Satoru, waiting for him to consent.
Satoru closes the distance, leaning his weight against Suguru.
“What happened?” he asks.
He wants to lie. He wants to lie so that he can begin the process of halting the squelching sounds that have been constant in his mind for the last two hours.
“I killed someone.”
He feels rather than sees Suguru’s surprise, his shoulders rigid against him.
“What?”
“It was an accident,” he says. “Actually, no. I killed him. He attacked me and I killed him.”
“It was self-defense then,” Suguru suggests.
Satoru makes a sound that’s halfway between a laugh and a yell.
“No, he didn’t have a chance. He was a kid.”
I killed a kid, he thinks of saying. Can you believe that?
Instead, what he does is let Suguru silently guide him to the bed he had been seated on when Satoru had arrived. Satoru sits beside him and sluggishly realizes that there is blood on his clothes that will probably stain the sheets. He hadn’t even had infinity on.
“You can go back,” Suguru suddenly says. “They’d accept you, you’re the strongest sorcerer alive.”
“What about you?”
“I’d be fine.”
Satoru shakes his head, “No. Not without you.”
Suguru places his hands over Satoru’s wrists, and squeezes, once.
“No more jobs like this, okay? No more.”
“Okay.”
It’s a year on the dot when Satoru turns towards Suguru and nudges him underneath the white and green tarp of an inn they’re staying at.
“I got you a gift,” Satoru states.
Suguru twists his head to eye him, an eyebrow arched in wariness. He’s mostly confused, Satoru can tell. For the last month they haven’t had much time split away from one another, mostly because Satoru has, admittedly, been distant.
“I don’t have anything for you,” Suguru replies, just as hushed. “Hold on.”
He sits up and disappears into their room to gather his slip-on slippers before heading towards the rental office.
“Where are you going?”
“I’m getting you something, just stay here. It’ll be a literal minute.”
When Suguru returns, holding something behind his back, Satoru pats the spot next to him.
“Here,” Satoru says, plopping the box onto Suguru’s lap once he’s sitting. In return, Suguru dumps an array of vending machine sweets into Satoru’s, who starts to laugh.
“Next time get me something better.”
“Fuck off,” Suguru returns. Satoru doesn’t try to pretend that he isn’t watching how Suguru's hands are unraveling the simple black ribbon holding the box shut. When it’s finally open, revealing the ring inside, Satoru gulps. It doesn’t look overly extravagant, but a black band with a gold groove coiled around it rests inside the box. Suguru jerks his head up to look at Satoru, who is now pointedly avoiding looking at him, scratching the back of his neck.
“Satoru.”
“Don’t get any ideas,” Satoru quips, “I saw it and I just thought you’d like it.”
“When? How much?”
Satoru sticks out his tongue, “Does it matter?”
“Yes, it does.”
When Satoru doesn’t answer, instead derailing the conversation into where they should go next and what Suguru could buy him as a gift in return, Satoru doesn’t miss how Suguru slips the ring on anyway.
Yaga finds them almost a year and a half after they first left. They’re both surprised to see him waltz into the restaurant they’re seated at so casually, and even more surprised when he pulls a chair from an empty table to theirs and sits.
“Are we splitting the bill?” Satoru says, to break the ice.
Suguru raises a hand to his mouth to stifle his laugh.
“I should kill you two, I swear,” he grumbles through tight lips.
“You won’t,” Suguru says.
“You can’t,” Satoru corrects.
It’s mostly a joke but it’s also a reminder of who they are and who Yaga is, and what they’re capable of, despite their public surroundings. Yaga catches on and sighs.
“You two gave me a real run for my money. I won’t even bother telling you how I found you both, but I have some news to communicate.”
Satoru rolls a hand in the air, “Go on.”
“The higher-ups have redacted their official statement labeling you both traitors.”
Suguru’s mouth opens to comment but Yaga continues.
“I don’t really expect you two to come back at this point, but I thought it was worth mentioning that you could interact with everyone now.”
“Why the sudden change?” Satoru asks.
Yaga unfolds his arms and taps the table, “They found another merger in time. Tengen is fine, if you were even wondering. The traitor statement was to punish you two, but it’s not like everyone was lining up to take up the missions to find you. The ones who did failed, clearly.”
“So, that’s it, then?” Suguru says.
“That’s it.”
The laughter that bubbles out of Satoru is as unbelievable as it is disruptive, Yaga telling him to shut up as the tables around them were starting to turn and look.
The luxury and comfort of silence are not lost on Satoru.
The moments it takes for the world to settle in and for Satoru’s eyes to become accustomed to the reality of their bedroom is a daily repose Satoru indulges in when he wakes up. In the moments when Suguru is still asleep beside him and the arm tucked underneath his pillow is still static with numbness, Satoru becomes aware of the ease of familiarity in which they found themselves now; clothes are thrown over a chair with sleeves that are reversed, a singular art print of a dragon Suguru liked from a flea market enough to buy hangs by the bedroom door, and an array of books are stacked by their mirror, burnt up ashes from incense smeared on the covers.
Satoru’s vision is blurry with sleep as their private world materializes around him, a tender and welcome silence that’s rare slowly diluting into the faintest of recognizable sounds; the air conditioning unit steadily humming, a car passing by every couple of minutes, Suguru breathing punctuating each with an exhale.
It isn’t a new sight to Satoru, nor is it uncommon, but it’s astonishing all the same to turn his head and see the curve of Suguru’s cheek, to see the ink spill of his hair over his shoulders and onto the space between them. Their legs are intertwined underneath the sheets, and Satoru shifts to try to touch Suguru’s hair, but it’s enough movement to have Suguru wake up. He turns to sleepily look at him, confused from sudden consciousness before comfort settles over his features and he nestles his face against the pillow again.
“Hey,” Satoru says.
“Mm.”
“Maybe we should make the ring I got you two years ago mean something.”
One of Suguru’s eyes opens and Satoru rubs away some of the crust formed by his nose.
“At 8 in the morning? Go back to sleep, idiot.”
Satoru grins, pulls his hand away, and slips off the bed. He drifts to the mess of clothes gathered on the chair and picks out a shirt and something else to wear.
“Don’t think I’ll forget about this when I wake up,” Suguru threatens.
Satoru laughs, “I wouldn’t dream of it.”