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“For that reason, I can’t tell you that you have to live, Fushiguro.”
That could be it. It could be done with that, with him making sure he knows that Yuuji forgives him, that he understands him. He can live with that, can live with the last thing Megumi experiencing being kindness. Can live with the fact that not everyone is able to be saved, because he already knows that far too well. He’s adept at dealing with grief, knows that the loss is just the legacy of all the love that gives life meaning. He can walk away. He can bear the weight of the grief, be crushed and rearranged by it and keep going.
If he can be selfless for anyone in this world, he can be selfless for Fushiguro Megumi.
Another scene starts playing in front of him, and part of his consciousness is back with Sukuna, being lunged at, wild geese scattering as they exchange blows. He threatens to rip off the heads of everyone Yuuji cares about. And Yuuji hates, hates this man who refuses to be reached and everything that made him this way.
In his hate, he’s reminded of Megumi’s presence, the feeling of his fading soul, and, like it’s instinct, he goes to it.
He’s standing in an alleyway, and he can hear footsteps behind him, can feel Megumi there. He knows there is meaning in this, too, this desperation he’s feeling. It's something that belongs to him, same as his memories, same as his hope. And he thinks of himself, how ready he had been to die when he was the one hosting Sukuna. He thinks of how this kid in front of him was the one to keep him there, stubbornly refusing to let go, dooming himself because of it.
He knows that if there is a single person in this world who does not want to see him be selfless, it is Fushiguro Megumi.
He looks behind him, sees a little kid with spikey hair and a too-big backpack walking away from him and feels the string around his heart pull, the sting of tears in his eyes. Silently, he begs the kid to turn around, to look at him, too. As if he hears him, the tiny Megumi stops walking abruptly.
He turns around and looks at Yuuji, a little incredulous, sassy. “What’s with that face?”
Yuuji clenches his fist and cries for the first time in a while, tears falling, snot dripping from his nose. Eyes open as the tears fall, looking down at Megumi, determined to see him exactly as he is. A kid, not understanding just how loved he is. “It’s just,” he starts, voice breaking. “It’ll be so lonely without you, Fushiguro.”
He can walk to hell and back, broken and alone, with nothing to look at but the cold ground in front of him. That is not what he wants. He wants to walk the world with the first person he’d ever thought might be his best friend. He wants to prove Megumi right about whatever it is that he sees in him. He wants to look at Megumi, see him laugh, see him when he’s old and wrinkled. It is what his heart is pulling him towards.
He wants Megumi to come back with him, and be saved. Selfishly, emotionally.
The kids’ eyes widen, and Yuuji recognizes this face. It’s the one that Megumi makes when Yuuji is asking too much of him and he is about to give it to him anyway. And the scene in front of him changes.
Sukuna steps in his direction, and his leg is plunged in darkness.