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Satoru is excitedly running up the stairs to the school. His mission had taken longer than anticipated, mostly because the damn curse kept eluding him for the first two days, but now Satoru is finally back and he can’t wait to see Suguru.
He hates that they are being sent on different missions all the time now, but at least that makes the reunion all the sweeter.
If only Suguru would stop looking worse every time Satoru sees him, he bitterly thinks before he pushes that thought away, even as he rounds the corner to his room. Suguru should be waiting for him inside because Satoru texted him when he’ll be back and so there’s a bright, big, goofy grin on his face when he slams the door open, only for it to slide right back off when his room is revealed to be empty.
No Suguru, no ‘Welcome back home’ note, no nothing.
Immediately worry slams into Satoru because this isn’t right. Suguru is always there to welcome him home.
Satoru pulls out his phone, checking to see if maybe Suguru got send on a mission himself but there are no ne messages waiting for him.
“What the fuck,” Satoru mutters out and then drops his bag on the floor before he turns back around on his heels.
If Suguru isn’t in Satoru’s room, then he must be in his own, Satoru thinks, so that’s where he’s going next.
It’s right next door and Satoru doesn’t bother to knock, simply barges in as if it’s his god-given right to do so and in all honesty, it kind of is.
Neither of them have bothered with knocking for so long that they might as well break through their adjourning wall to make things easier on the both of them. Satoru thinks that maybe that is a project for the future, but all thoughts are wiped from his mind when he spots a distinctly Suguru shaped lump under the covers of his bed.
Satoru looks outside just to confirm that the sun is still high in the sky and it hasn’t suddenly turned into night but it’s still only midday and so there’s no reason for Suguru to be in bed.
“Suguru?” Satoru calls out, worry now insistently nagging at him and he walks closer on silent feet. “Hey, buddy, you doing okay?”
“I’m fine,” is the weak answer he gets and just from the tone alone Satoru knows what a load of bullshit that is.
“Is that why you’re in bed instead of waiting for me like you usually do?” Satoru asks and Suguru flinches.
“Fuck, you’re back,” he gets out and turns around under great pain if the groaning is anything to go by. “Welcome home,” Suguru breathes out and Satoru can do nothing but stare at him.
His face is a pallid white, a sheen of sweat clinging to his forehead and there are circles so deep under his eyes that they almost look black.
“Suguru, what the fuck? You’re clearly not fine,” Satoru rushes out as he drops to his knees at Suguru’s bedside. He puts the back of his hand to Suguru’s forehead but he doesn’t seem to have a fever. “What’s wrong?”
“Stomach ache,” Suguru shortly tells him and just then a new wave of pain must hit him because he curls in on himself.
Satoru puts a hand to his shoulder, hoping to at least ease his suffering by letting him know that he’s there but the worry only intensifies when he realises that Suguru is shaking all over.
“Fuck, have you seen Shoko?” Satoru asks but he can guess the answer, even before Suguru shakes his head.
The stupid idiot never goes to get help for himself.
“Don’t want to burden her,” Suguru gets out just then, which comes as absolutely no surprise to Satoru but this is clearly not something Suguru can deal with on his own.
“How long has this been going on?” Satoru asks, moving to push some hair out of Suguru’s face.
“Since the mission,” is Suguru’s short response and Satoru frowns.
“But you’ve been back for over a day!”
He knows because Suguru had messaged him once he arrived back at the school.
Suguru only hums at that and Satoru decides to take measures into his own hands.
“We’re going to see Shoko,” he tells Suguru, who manages to crack one eye open at that. “Don’t even argue with me,” Satoru interrupts him before he can even open his mouth but Suguru still speaks.
“Can’t walk,” he admits, his breath coming out short and Satoru goes cold with worry.
If Suguru is in so much pain that he can’t even walk then something must seriously be wrong with him.
“Fine, I’ll carry you, no problem,” Satoru immediately decides and reaches out for Suguru, sliding his arms under his knees and around his back before he hefts him up, just like that.
Suguru groans as if the movement only made everything worse and his clammy forehead falls against Satoru’s jaw.
“You’ll be okay again in a moment, I promise,” Satoru mutters, tightening his grip on Suguru and making sure to jostle him as little as possible as he walks towards Shoko as fast as he dares to.
Suguru doesn’t reply to him, his breath coming out heavy and shaking and Satoru clenches his jaw. Something is seriously wrong with Suguru and it really makes it hard to think straight.
“Shoko!” Satoru yells out when they are in the hallway leading up to her workspace and thankfully she opens the door before Satoru reaches it.
“What the hell!” Shoko says, hurriedly stepping to the side to let Satoru in, pointing over at the bed crammed into a corner of the room. “Put him down there, what’s wrong?” she immediately asks, following Satoru, her hands already hovering over Suguru’s form even before Satoru can put him down.
“Don’t know, he says it’s a stomach ache and that he had it since the last mission,” Satoru shortly tells her and Shoko nods, immediately getting to work.
Satoru doesn’t dare to interrupt her, but he keeps a tight grip on Suguru’s hand, as if his presence could help at all. Shoko works quietly, but the frown on her face lets Satoru know that whatever she finds is nothing good and Satoru can’t help but to bounce his leg in worry.
It’s only when Suguru finally relaxes, and Shoko lets out a long breath, that Satoru dares to speak.
“What’s wrong with him?” he asks but Shoko shakes her head, a concentrated look on her face.
After another moment Suguru’s hand goes slack in Satoru’s and Satoru’s eyes snap back to Shoko.
“He’s out cold,” Shoko tells him before he can ask. “I guess he didn’t sleep at all, the pain must have taken quite a toll on him.”
“What happened? Was he injured?”
Shoko shakes his head. “It’s not quite that easy,” she whispers out and beckons Satoru to step away from Suguru’s bed. “Let him rest for now.”
Satoru follows her to the opposite end of the room but as soon as they are there he looks expectantly at her again.
“Explain it to me,” he says and Shoko sighs.
“I keep telling him to not overdue it, but he never listens,” she mutters. “It’s his technique. You know how he always feels like shit after swallowing a curse?” she asks, though it’s a purely rhetorical questions because of course Satoru has seen the aftermath of that more than once already. “It’s not just the taste that’s upsetting to him. The curses eat through his stomach lining. Usually it’s not that bad, because he has enough time to heal between each curse, especially if he only has to take in one but—”
She trails off here but Satoru can fill in the blanks for him himself.
“But he’s being sent on more missions lately, sometimes back to back.”
“And the curses are getting stronger as well,” Shoko adds with a nod. “He was very close to having a hole in his stomach right now. And if that ever happens—if the contents of his stomach ever spill out into the rest of his body, I’m not sure I can heal him still. It’s dangerous but he doesn’t stop.”
“But you can heal him still at this stage?” Satoru asks but going by the look on Shoko’s face he guesses the answer is no.
“I can heal him back up, but until the curses are completely absorbed into him they continue to eat right through him. And it goes faster the stronger the curse. For it to be viable I’d have to be there for hours on end after a mission, which—it’s not feasible, Satoru. Other people need me as well and I can’t be glued to his side for longer periods of time.”
“But I can,” Satoru says, looking back over to Suguru. “I can heal him. I can stay by his side.”
“You can barely heal yourself,” Shoko shoots back, raising an eyebrow at him. “You can’t even heal a superficial cut on someone else. How are you going to heal his stomach?”
“I don’t know yet, but I’m going to figure it out,” Satoru says with a shrug. Shoko only stares at him in disbelieve, but Satoru doesn’t avoid her gaze. “Shoko, it’s Suguru. I’m going to figure it out,” he says, much more quietly and really, it’s as easy as that.
If it’s Suguru, he’ll make it work somehow.
~*~*~
Satoru spends the rest of the day at Suguru’s side, a hand on his arm and working on his reverse cursed technique. It requires a lot of effort to heal someone other than him, but Satoru can do it, by the time evening rolls around so he’ll only have to work on making it automatic, just like his Infinity.
Shoko seems reasonably impressed by his progress, though of course she doesn’t say so, and Satoru is confident that he can step in for her, at least when it comes to Suguru.
He still can’t heal a superficial cut on her, but neither of them mention that.
By the time Suguru finally wakes up again, it’s already dark out and Satoru is ready to fall asleep himself, but he still smiles brightly at Suguru.
“Welcome back to the living,” he says the moment he realises that Suguru is awake which promptly makes Suguru frown.
“I wasn’t injured,” is the first thing out of his mouth and Satoru rolls his eyes at him.
“No, you were just being eaten alive from the inside, no big deal.”
Suguru’s face closes off at that and suddenly Satoru understands why Suguru never mentioned it to him. He thinks this is a sign of weakness.
“So here’s the deal,” Satoru says before Suguru can do something stupid like pretend that it’s not that big of a deal. “You’re being eaten by your curses and Shoko doesn’t have the time to sit by your side and heal you back up for hours on end,” Satoru mercilessly tells him. “But I do.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Satoru,” Suguru sighs out. “You can’t heal other people.”
“I can. I figured it out.”
“What?”
“It’s you, Suguru, of course I figured it out for you,” Satoru whispers and reaches out for Suguru’s hand.
There’s a beat of silence where Suguru can’t quite meet his eyes before he speaks again.
“But you don’t have the time. You have missions of your own. I’ll be fine, Satoru.”
“Shut up,” Satoru hisses out. “You’re going to die, if you keep this up.”
Suguru clenches his jaw at that.
“So what? Our schedules barely align anymore. There’s no way you can heal me all the time. I’ll just—”
“I already talked to Yaga,” Satoru interrupts him.
Yaga hadn’t been too happy to be summoned to Shoko’s workplace and he had been even less happy to hear about Suguru’s condition but he had agreed with Satoru’s plan. The elders were being informed only hours later and just like that, things fell into place easily.
“And he shut whatever your idea was down,” Suguru guesses but Satoru shakes his head.
“He agreed, actually, because not agreeing would mean you die in the next month.” It pains Satoru to say it, to know how close he came to losing Suguru and it seems that hearing it like that also puts things into perspective for Suguru.
“In the next month?”
“The curses are getting stronger and you’re taking in more and more of them. A month was the most generous estimate Shoko could come up with.”
Suguru takes in a shuddering breath before he nods.
“Fine. What’s the solution then? And don’t tell me I’m no longer going on missions, because that’s not happening.”
“It’s not,” Satoru agrees and squeezes Suguru’s hand, starting his healing again, because the curse Suguru swallowed last is still not fully absorbed.
“You really figured it out,” Suguru whispers, clearly noticing Satoru’s work.
“I did, it’s easy when it comes to you,” Satoru admits. “The solution is as follows: if it’s an easy mission we have the rest of the day off. If it’s a longer or more difficult mission we only go together. That way, I’ll always be around to heal you back up, no matter how many curses you have to take in or their power level. I’m currently working on making it an automatic thing, like with Infinity, so we’d only have to stay in contact. If I can figure it out, I can basically heal you in our sleep.”
There’s a beat of silence before Suguru snorts out a laugh.
“If you want to get into my bed that badly, you only have to say so, Satoru,” he then says, amusement colouring his voice and even though Satoru can feel himself go bright red he doesn’t hesitate to meet Suguru’s eyes.
“Okay,” he easily says. “Suguru, please let me get into bed with you.”
It’s Suguru’s turn to go red in the face and it makes Satoru smile.
“Not so confident now, huh?”
“Guys, I’m still right here,” Shoko’s exasperated voice interrupts them, making Satoru squeak in surprise and Suguru’s eyes widen.
Both of them kind of forgot that they aren’t in the privacy of their own rooms.
“Geto, good to see you awake again, now please get the hell out of my hair. This is a romance free zone and I’d like to keep it that way.”
“You’re just bitter because there’s no romance in your life,” Satoru tells her even as he helps Suguru out of bed.
“Say one more word and there won’t be any more romance in Geto’s life, either,” she threatens and Satoru shuts up immediately, which only makes Suguru laugh.
“Thanks for healing me up, Shoko,” he says, lacing his fingers with Satoru’s.
“You’re an idiot for not coming to me sooner,” she scolds him but her face softens. “Don’t let it happen again.”
“Don’t think I can even if I wanted to,” Suguru gives back, raising their clasped hands because Satoru is still healing him even as they speak.
“Yeah, he really is something, huh?”
“I’m still right here,” Satoru complains but the annoyance falls off him when Suguru gives him a bright smile.
“And I’m beyond grateful for that.”
“Alright, that’s enough, out,” Shoko immediately says when Satoru loses himself a little bit in that soft gaze and both of them jump.
“Leaving, leaving,” Satoru rushes out because he catches a glimpse of something shiny and sharp in her hand and he really doesn’t want to provoke her any further.
Satoru and Suguru rush out of the door, hands still tightly together, and they let out a relieved laugh once they are outside.
“Satoru, thank you,” Suguru says completely earnest and Satoru squirms under his gaze.
“Don’t thank me, good grief. You’d have done the same.”
“Except for how I can’t heal anyone.”
“Suguru, don’t be stupid. I can only do it because it’s you.”
“And because you’re brilliant.”
“Mostly because I love you,” Satoru shoots back, not daring to meet Suguru’s eyes. “And I’m pretty confident that if I had a serious problem like that you’d figure something out for me as well, right?”
He doesn’t quite dare to ask if Suguru loves him, too, even though the answer should be kind of obvious, and so this is the only thing he can do.
“Of course I would,” comes Suguru’s immediate reply. “Because I love you, too.”
Relief surges through Satoru at hearing that, but he still wasn’t prepared to see that love written all over Suguru’s face once he turns back to him.
“There you are,” he whispers and then leans in to brush a kiss to the corner of Satoru’s mouth.
Satoru lets out an embarrassing noise at that which only makes Suguru smile even more.
“Now, I think there was some talk about you learning how to heal me in our sleep? Better get to it, huh?” he cheekily asks and Satoru is beyond grateful for it, because just this morning Suguru was effectively dying so seeing him like this is like a balm to Satoru’s soul.
“I’ll need all the practice I can get,” Satoru agrees and pulls Suguru into the direction of their rooms. “Starting right now.”
It makes Suguru laugh, the warm sound wrapping around Satoru, making him smile back at Suguru. He’s certain that he’ll figure automatic healing out in no time and knowing that he can do this for Suguru fills him with a sense of purpose not even missions can.