Work Text:
Suguru's losing weight.
Is he on a diet, or something? That's a terrible idea. They're sorcerers, can't go running around punching shit daily on a diet. Well, a good diet, maybe. But not the kind that makes you sorta… shrink. The kind that makes your bones stick out, that kind. 'Cause that's happening to Suguru right now, just a little bit, and it's honestly kind of freaky.
"You okay, man?"
Just the summer heat, he'll say, or just the stress, you know? But the summer heat and the stress come and go and Suguru's still looking thinner.
On the rooftop they eat wagashi out of a tupperware container, hanging their legs off the edge and letting them dangle into space. Suguru looks exhausted and sick, but he hasn't mentioned going to sleep. It would be weird to leave now. Besides, Satoru's not about to waste good wagashi. Especially not the stuff that Haibara bought for them. Shit, this was supposed to be an occasion, eating it together, but all they can do is mope.
"I miss last year," Suguru says.
"Hmm," Satoru agrees, his mouth full. "I miss last week."
"I don't," Suguru says, and he sounds weirdly annoyed. "I miss last year. Like I said."
Yeah, well, Satoru doesn't miss staying up all night during missions, so there's that. "What about it?"
"Going on missions with you and Shoko." His cursed energy grows a little before settling again. "We only ever go alone now. What if something happens? Who are we supposed to count on?"
"Thinking about Haibara again?" Suguru had inspected the body. He'd come out of the morgue looking so dead inside it wasn't even funny, but Satoru had been distracted by the way that Nanami's cursed energy writhed. Like a dying insect's limbs.
"So what if I am?"
"Damn, I was just asking." Satoru holds up a hand like calm down, then takes another wagashi. "You gonna eat the last of that?"
"I'm not hungry."
"You sure?"
"Take it. It's for you anyway."
"I thought you said he brought it back as a souvenir for you," Satoru says, stuffing the last wagashi into his mouth.
"I asked him for something sweet so we could share it." He breathes out. Maybe it's supposed to be a laugh. "I wasn't expecting him to splurge like that."
"Not like the money was going anywhere else," Satoru says.
Suguru's cursed energy spikes and seethes, and his expression turns dark.
"Too soon?"
"You think?"
Satoru finishes off the wagashi but feels too awkward to get up.
"Satoru," Suguru says. "Can I ask you a stupid question?"
"Shoot."
"What makes you keep being a sorcerer? Isn't it hard for you?"
"That's two questions, and no, not really. You know that." Satoru elbows him. "I'm the strongest, you know. It's not hard to fight weak spirits."
"I know," Suguru starts, angrily. Then he takes a breath and keeps going, not so angry. "Just... isn't it rough on you? In general?"
"No. Is it rough on you?"
"No."
"Seriously?"
Suguru glances sideways at Satoru, kicking his legs back and forth. His cursed energy is doing some kind of weird distress dance, but Satoru's not touching it with a ten-foot pole until Suguru makes the first move. "...Yeah, sometimes," Suguru says.
"How?" Satoru wonders. "Aren't you strong enough to beat whatever you need to, at this point? There's no way you're getting tired of it." The rush of battle, the exhilaration of exorcising a spirit - well, it's not really all it's cracked up to be excitement-wise when you get to be high-level, but it's still satisfying.
"You know what, just forget it." He sounds genuinely disappointed, again. "You wouldn't understand."
"Then explain it to me," Satoru says.
A long silence later, Suguru sighs. "They just taste bad," he says. "Cursed spirits, I mean. And for what? To protect people? They don't give a fuck."
"They sure would give a fuck if they started dying," Satoru points out.
"Mm. That's my point. They create cursed spirits and then it's my job to get rid of them. Why should it be my job? I'm not fucking causing it."
"True."
"But I can't stop. I've got nothing else going for me."
"Mm."
"God, sometimes I wish a cursed spirit would just kill me and be done with it already, you know? Before I do it myself."
Satoru falls silent.
Suguru turns to meet his eyes a second later, and they're ice cold. He had sounded casual but he's a good actor after all. "I've upset you," he says.
"N- no? I-"
"Don't worry." He takes a long breath and gets up. "Just forget I ever said anything. Goodnight, Satoru."
"Oh -" But Suguru's already gone, and Satoru knows that whatever test Suguru was performing, he failed it miserably.
I am standing in front of a door. The plaster walls of the hallway are covered in little nicks and flaking paint and chipped plaster. The white door is the only door in the hallway. It has a little peephole on it. The doorknob is tarnished. It has a little card beside it in a little plastic cover. The card has a name written on it in Sharpie pen.
I am standing in front of a white door in a blank hallway. The door is not much taller than I am. I've had a growth spurt recently and I stand tall and spindly and dressed in black, like a spider. I'm stronger than I look.
I am standing in front of the door to my friend's apartment. Two hours ago my other friend smiled awkwardly at me when she asked me if I'd seen him recently. She figured, since we were friends, maybe. But I hadn't. I couldn't remember my friend's name. It's printed on this card beside the door, but the card has water damage and I can't read it.
I am standing in front of a door in a hallway that goes on forever. I am very close to the door. Close enough to see the grains in the wood. Inside of the room I can hear things. I can hear the cars through the open window. I can hear a rope creaking. I can hear the air conditioner on medium high. It's a hot, humid day, and I am sweating into my school uniform. A smell oozes from the crack under the door. Smells like a badly maintained outhouse. Or a room full of bodies, like you'd see on a job.
I am standing in front of a door. One hour and fifty-nine minutes ago my other friend suggested I go check in on the man who rents the room behind this door. This is an office building, not a residential building. And nobody uses it. It smells like shit in here. I said, "sure, I will.
I am standing right in front of my friend's door. I can't move. I reach for the door handle. It's cold metal. It's not locked. I can't open it.
I am standing in front of a door." I can't see him, but I know my friend is on the other side of the door. I can't see him like I usually can because he isn't generating energy like he usually does. But I can smell him. The smell is oozing through the crack under the door.
I can't open the door. I won't open it. I don't want to.
I am standing in front of a door. I want to go back. People say I can do anything, but I can't go back in time, and I can't help what I don't know about. Often, by the time I realize, it is too late for somebody or another. Never me, though. I don't usually cry about it.
The air presses against me. I can't go back, can't make myself move forward. I laugh at myself and the way my hands shake.
"I am standing in front of a door. I knock on the door again. Hello? Are you there? Can you hear me?" Are you there? Can you hear me? It's me, your best friend in the whole world. I'm right outside your door, please let me in. I catch a whiff of that ugly smell again, and the buzz of flies. I can't move. I want to say something, but my throat feels paralyzed and heavy. I try anyway, and
He wakes up trying to say something that comes halfway out as "Su-" and then he bites the rest of the word off, already forgetting what he was going to say. He realizes he's in bed, and, a moment later, that all of that was a dream.
A calm relief crashes over him, and he pushes the dream to the side as he pushes his blanket off, letting the cool air hit his chest and neck. He's damp with sweat. The clock flashes 05:41. It's twenty minutes until his alarm goes off, but he doesn't want to go back to sleep, the creepy vibe of his dream still lingering in the back of his mind. The first light of morning slowly begins to filter through the curtains.
He gets out of bed, stretching the usual training-soreness out of his limbs. He takes a shower to get the damp off, tugs on his uniform, gels his hair, puts on his glasses, and he's out the door by 5:56. He does his usual morning laps of the school, feeling the fresh air on his skin, stretches, and heads down to the training grounds to get some practice in before breakfast.
Suguru's already there when he arrives. He's got two of his curses out, some kind of gross squidgy bug - maybe a 2nd grade, semi-first by the glow of its energy - and a first-grade humanoid that Satoru recognizes from a mission about a year ago. They're wrestling each other while Suguru watches, his hair untied and blowing across his face. Satoru watches his expression closely, but he just looks bored.
Satoru shrugs and moves closer, not bothering to hide his movements.
Suguru turns, raising an eyebrow. "You're up early."
"Yeah, man, I had a weird dream." Satoru hops over the fence and walks over to where Suguru's standing.
"Hah. What else is new." Suguru laughs, but it's forced.
"Occupational hazard," Satoru quips, then frowns when Suguru doesn't respond. "Man, you good? Your vibes are kinda off."
"Speak for yourself." Suguru spares him a glance. His eyes have dark circles under them.
"Like I said, I had a weird dream." Satoru shrugs. "But you haven't said anything yet."
"Since when do you care?" Suguru asks bitterly.
"Hey, hey, hey, man, I resent that," Satoru protests. He’s been asking how Suguru’s doing since before Haibara died. But they don't say that sort of thing to each other.
Suguru gets it. He kicks at the ground. "Yeah. Sorry. Just a rough mission. Caught a first-grade, but I couldn't keep it down."
"What, like you yakked it up?" Satoru snorts. "Hell of a gag reflex. Too big for ya?"
"Shut up," Satoru groans. "You try swallowing somebody else's vomit, tell me how you like it."
"No thank you," Satoru says, clasping his hands together. "I like having clean, sexy powers-"
"Like ripping curses apart at the atomic level?"
"See, you get it." Satoru claps him on the back. "So, what'd you do? Just exorcise it?"
"Yeah." He doesn't sound hyped about it. "It got some civilians, too. Fuck, I... I don't know, Satoru." Out on the field, the first-grade gets the upper hand and crushes the bug's abdomen with one powerful blow. The bug screeches in pain, and Suguru sighs. "Alright, enough." They both freeze and melt into energy, which quickly flows back into the roiling pool of cursed energy inside of Suguru. Suguru still doesn't leave, despite the pitch being empty, so Satoru doesn't either.
"I didn't feel bad," Suguru eventually says.
"Huh?"
"The civilians. I didn't feel bad. They ignored my instructions and ran into danger. It was their own fault they died."
Satoru doesn't answer.
Suguru sighs, groans and runs his fingers through his hair. "Fuck. I don't know, okay?" His energy output spikes, his control falters, then it evens out. "I don't know."
"Well," Satoru says, hesitating. "You tried."
"Not really."
A long silence.
"My dream was about you."
That catches Suguru's attention. "Oh?"
"You were in your apartment," Satoru says. "Shoko asked me to check up on you since we hadn't seen you in a couple of days. I couldn't open the door or sense you, but I knew you were on the opposite side 'cause I could hear a rope creaking. I could smell you, too."
He raises an eyebrow. "And what did I smell like?"
"Like… roadkill..." Satoru's voice dies.
There's an awkward pause.
"Right." Suguru smiles sardonically. "Well, good thing you don't have a history of prophetic dreams."
Satoru laughs, maybe a little too loud. "Have you eaten?"
"No. I came straight down here when I woke up." Suguru stretches. "Why, are you paying?"
"If you want," Satoru says.
"Man. You're acting weird today."
"Maybe I just wanted to be generous."
"Or maybe a curse came and sucked out your brains through your nose while you slept. It would explain the dreams." Suguru rolls his eyes. "Come on, let's go. We don't have very long now."