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It could have been just minutes, or it could be years. All he knew was that if time was moving, it was moving pathetically slow.
Maybe if he didn't have the Six Eyes, the situation wouldn't be as awful. Maybe he wouldn't feel time passing at all, wouldn't even be conscious enough to perceive it anyway. When he would finally be released it would be as though merely half a second has passed.
Unluckily for him, he does have the Six Eyes, and he was completely and totally aware of his situation, and what led up to it. In fact, all he can do is think. He can't even feel his body, there is no sensation, nothing to see, nothing to hear. There is no sound, no light, he cannot speak, he cannot scream. All he can perceive is the purest blackest black, the definition of a void.
For someone who was supposed to be the strongest, he really was caught off guard. It might have been humbling if the fucker didn’t use the love of his life’s body to imprison him in the first place. If he could throw up his insides he might have already with how much he has pondered how Suguru's body was taken, eviscerated to be used and abused like a puppet on strings for someone else's own gain. How he had fallen right into the trap set for him as a pig led to slaughter.
The more he thinks the more he makes himself sick. He thinks of what could happen to everyone on the outside. Just how fucked over were they? How many casualties? He thinks about so many other things he shouldn’t, and at some point, he knew he’d drive himself crazy. If he kept it up, he’d be a liability when he got out, rather than someone with rational thought and awareness.
He started to compartmentalize his own mind for his own sanity. He constructed a world for him to exist while here, one where he wouldn’t have to face the current situation. It took too much concentration and a lot of gaslighting of his own mind to achieve it. Repetition, memories that had passed, horrible traumatic ones stuffed away neatly into a box so he could temporarily pretend they didn’t happen at all. At least, while he was there. His mind separates itself from the aware because it was the only way he could think to survive this personal hell.
He lives for the moments he manages to scavenge some blissful delirium. But he is never truly completely in the fantasy. He could never allow himself to fully enter it, because if he did, it would be harder for him to leave. Remember that none of it was ever real. When he finally was released and introduced to whatever atrocity that was on the outside, could he face it if he was stuck in a place that wasn’t ever real? A place he made up to give solace to his worst nightmares.
Mornings with Suguru were few and far between. The two hardly got to spend the night together and wake up together. There weren’t many days allotted to them where they could simply exist in each other's space. Where there were no obligations attached they needed to attend to.
He imagines Suguru would make breakfast, something sweet, and he would talk the entire time. Not knowing whether Suguru was actually listening or just placating him. The morning sun would shine through the window, and Satoru would see how the light just made their entire room light up in the most enchanting lighting. As if their mornings were heavenly.
He should have realized that they were. They wouldn’t have forever. He should have given more time, he should have done so many things differently.
A jujutsu sorcerer never dies without regrets.
He knew that, and he prided himself on being exceptional, but he wasn’t the exception. Not now, not here. He wondered what did Suguru regret? Did he wish they had more mornings? More time?
It always starts by waking up. As if when he lets himself enter, it’s actually the horrifying reality that he is leaving. If he could convince himself of that fact, he’d be happier. If he could totally and completely ignore which side he was truly in, it would make this all bearable.
“Satoru, wake up,”
Suguru’s soft voice would caress his mind, and he’d lose himself just a bit more, just to fall right into it. Next, his hands that he can recollect so clearly touch his face, and he can’t stop himself from opening his eyes to see Suguru right there in front of him.
He’s smiling in that soft way he used to as if he loved him more than life itself. Satoru could never believe that in his life he’d find someone who looked at him the way Suguru did. Who cared for him as much, wished him the best, and gave him the best. He appreciated it when it was there, but now that it will never be again, he realized he didn’t appreciate it nearly as much as he should have. They were young, and youth was something that no one ever appreciates while it’s theirs.
Now he’s starved for those moments. He needs to find it in his faraway memories, in his made-up creations just to not drive himself over the edge.
There is another way out, he’s aware.
Though he cannot feel his body, he knew of a way to end it all. He would have to do it to himself. He cannot starve here, and this would finally end his torment. He wouldn’t have any memories to wish he made or memories he wanted to relive, because he would just be dead.
When he thinks about finally doing it, he thinks of it like euthanizing a suffering animal. But he can’t. His work isn’t done. There’s still his students, Yuuji, Megumi, Nobara, the next generation who still have so much to learn and do, and he trusts them. He trusts that they will succeed, and one day he won’t be here anymore. He won’t have to sit in inaction, plagued by the past and his own thoughts.
To kill himself would be the easier way out, and he cannot meet Suguru again when he has others waiting on him.
He can only rest when he has no reason to keep going.
“Come on Satoru, wake up,”
Suguru’s voice calmly takes him in, the infinite darkness becomes light, and he can see again.
“There you are,” Suguru smiles brightly when he opens his eyes, “You sleep so deeply, I wondered if you were ever going to wake up.”
“I just…was having the strangest dream,” Satoru says voice faraway, he can’t seem to recall it now. He yawns, and Suguru begins to shift and get out of their bed.
“You can tell me all about it over breakfast.”