Chapter Text
Yet here’s a spot.
The hard edges of the hotel roof pressed into the backs of Yuuji's knees where he sat, alone.
It was difficult to see the destruction sewn through the city when you were in it, surrounded by monstrous buildings and towering creatures. From up here, it was a few stitches away from 'wasteland.' Everything was bare concrete and burnt. Most buildings here were upright, but squinting in the dark, he could see shattered glass here, a corner lopped off there, gaping holes in the road. Mostly sorcerer-made damage. He wishes he could say with confidence that he hadn't had a hand in any of it.
November blew all around him, breezing over his bare arms. He should have put on a hoodie.
He folded his arms. The rough skin of his fingers snagged on the hem of his T-shirt, the fair hair on his biceps. Hands back to balled fists again, reeling from the catching feeling that rang through his teeth. He kept forgetting.
Out, damned spot, out, I say!
Yuuji picked at his fingertips with his teeth, at the calloused ever-red skin there. Still numb from where he'd dragged them against the tarmac. New skin didn't last long. Neither did his nails, which were so short they were practically non-existent. His cuticles were white and flaking, crumbed with dots of blood.
Any crevice of his hands that weren't peeling away were dulled with thin strokes of dry scarlet, caked in dead skin like sugar — the lines of his palms, between his fingers, a dark patch by his wrist he couldn't get rid of. He didn't notice he picked at it until it stained his sleeve.
One. Two.
Why then, ’tis time to do ’t.
He'd been washing his hands earlier, in the hotel bathroom. Yuuji washed his hands a lot. Whenever he could. Sometimes when he was sure they were clean, he just let the water run over his skin. But it had to be cold. The last time he'd washed his hands in hot water, every second blink had turned it red, then back again, then red.
He hadn't heard Megumi knocking on the door, hadn't heard him say "Itadori" in his usual soft bite, hadn't even noticed he was there until he'd reached over and turned off the tap.
Hell is murky.
Shame rushed through his veins as he locked eyes with Megumi in the mirror. Dark strands of hair falling in front of his eyes, mouth pulled into a thin line. Others might have seen the expression as stern. Yuuji could tell he was worried.
Tearing his eyes away, he turned around and dried his hands.
Fie, my
lord, fie, a soldier and afeard? What need we fear
who knows it, when none can call our power to
account?
He averted his eyes from the broken city below, tilting his head back to watch the shifting sky. Before entering the Culling Games, a brief fear had flashed though his mind that he wouldn't see the light of day for weeks, that he'd be trapped inside an opaque fishbowl, Shibuya all over again. Thankfully, the sky was still visible inside colonies, letting time pass by normally, slow as it was. Stars faded from view one by one, shrinking back into space, pulled away with a tide, like a darkened blue curtain.
Thin streaks of sunlight began to pour in the gaps between buildings, some wider than others. Ground-level windows glowed gold, but the sky was reddening, painting his hands with the stuff.
Yet who would have thought the old man
to have had so much blood in him?
He jerked his head back up again, out of his hunch of misery, compelling himself to not look down, at himself, at the ground, imagining that by looking away from his body and everything it touched, he could pretend his head was somewhere else, floating, detached.
He reminded himself why he was here. To save Tsumiki. To save Megumi.
The Thane of Fife had a wife. Where is
she now?
Then he could finally go back to killing time until someone decided to execute him again.
The space between his brows tingled. His cheekbones itched. Sukuna hadn't had much to say for himself in the past while until a few hours ago, when he'd grabbed Yuuji's consciousness by the scruff and called himself 'The Fallen.' His heartbeat still hadn't settled itself.
Five months. Five months since he'd accidentally become a jujutsu sorcerer. Since he'd become a vessel of the most dangerous curse to ever live. Since he'd heard his grandpa take his last breath. Since he'd left home.
He missed Sendai. The corner store where he bought his lunch on schooldays, and snacks on weekends. The cinema he frequented as early in the day as possible for the discounts. His old school, his old subjects. His old house.
His old body.
Usually, he didn't think about it. It made life easier not to. But if he was honest with himself, his body didn't feel like his anymore. His skin felt thicker, his limbs heavier, his head ever-aching every day since the summer. He was trapped, really, inside layers of skin and flesh and muscle. A hostage. A prisoner whose only escape was a miracle he didn't have a will to wait for, or divine intervention.
Death.
Yuuji had an equation he'd been chalking up in the corner of his mind. He thought about addition. About division. About how, on average, the world would be a better place without him in it.
Megumi would be safe.
The sun kept creeping upwards, never quite reaching him.
What, will these hands ne’er be clean?
Rusted iron rasped behind him, the opening and closing of a door. Those tell-tale shoes beat steadily towards the edge of the roof, and Yuuji could feel his heart beat twice between each step.
Megumi sat down beside him, wordless, a hand's length between them.
No
more o’ that, my lord, no more o’ that. You mar all
with this starting.
"You get much sleep?" he said, voice low, like a kind dark room.
Yuuji decided not to lie. "No."
"Hmm."
A small silence nestled itself between them, and Yuuji gave him a sidelong stare, letting his breath be taken away. The way the same wind that cut through Yuuji blew flyaway hairs all around Megumi's face in an animated picture frame was unfair, frankly, and his cheek held a striped pink imprint from where he'd been sleeping on the couch. He wanted to reach out, feel the pattern of each line under his fingers.
Except he wouldn't be able to feel it, would he? With these scabs where his nerves used to be?
"The nights are still getting longer," Megumi said. "Gives us more time to plan."
"Yeah."
Yuuji didn't want to think about December. Pockets of warmth in the cold, the excitement of the festive season, being surrounded by loved ones in the darkest days of the year. He couldn't count on making it that far. The chances of him coming back to life for the third (or was it the fourth?) time were slim.
But he couldn't tell Megumi any of that. He didn't want to worry him.
He thought instead about why he was here, about what he had to do.
"Tell me about your sister."
Megumi blinked, and a fond, faraway look passed over his face. "You'll like her. It'll probably take her a while to readjust to the world, but…"
Here’s
He sighed. "She's missed a lot. I've tried explaining things to her already, but she got overwhelmed. Shibuya, the Zen'in Clan, The Culling Games… I think she was mostly just sad that I had to know any of it. She probably hid more stuff from me when I was little than I realised. I don't know."
the smell
"I've missed her."
of the blood
Yuuji could feel his throat tightening around a lump. He had no idea why.
"I really would like for the two of you to meet though. She'd like you too."
still.
An ice-cold sense of relief poured out of Yuuji's heart to the rest of his body, unbidden. He unclenched his jaw, uncurled his fists, lowered his shoulders. Megumi's voice tended to have that effect on him, but this was different.
Megumi was going to be okay. He was going to be happy. Once he had Tsumiki back, he wouldn't need Yuuji anymore.
He heard a faint scratching sound by his thigh. Megumi's grip on the concrete tightening. Yuuji glanced up at him, caught the shape of his frown.
"You're thinking," he said.
Yuuji gave him a half laugh. "What, am I not allowed to think?"
"Not about that."
He swallowed. "About what."
Megumi breathed out through his teeth, squeezing his eyes shut. Yuuji looked back down at his hands and started picking at a scab by his knuckle on his left hand.
"I feel like I'm running out of ways to ask you this," Megumi said, too quietly.
"Ask me what?"
"You know what."
Yuuji laughed again, though it took significantly more effort this time. "Oh, c'mon Fushiguro—"
The skin of the scab gave way. He went still, like a prey animal.
All
the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little
hand. O, O, O!
Megumi's hand swooped over the gap and grabbed Yuuji's wrist, disturbing the drop of blood, causing it to trickle down the the back of Yuuji's hand, the first raindrop on a skylight.
"Itadori." There was no aggression in it.
And when Yuuji met his eyes, green and greying underneath, pained, he felt as though his hand was being severed rather than half-held.
Megumi ducked his head. "Please, just…"
He began to stroke Yuuji's wrist with his thumb, back and forth, back and forth, until he smudged the droplet into a blush-streak. His thumb froze. Yuuji's pulse skyrocketed.
Hesitating for barely a beat, Megumi brought Yuuji's hand to rest on his thigh, took the end of his shirt, and began to wipe away the blood.
Oh.
Wash your hands. Put on your nightgown.
Look not so pale.
It was too gentle. Too soft. Yuuji forced his stare away and tried to convince himself to breathe, to breathe. Megumi's hands were so cold, almost blissfully so. He didn't dare speak for fear he'd say something he meant. Instead he watched the sun come into view, pale, drained of its gore, which was spattered over the city's many faces. Megumi held Yuuji's one hand in both of his. Cradled it, really.
Yuuji swallowed.
"I think I need to hear you say it. I don't know if it would—" he searched for a word, gesturing with his free hand "—help, much. It might. I don't know."
I tell you yet again, Banquo’s
buried; he cannot come out on ’s grave.
He felt his hand being raised up. He felt a single, satin kiss just below the wound. His head turned.
Megumi didn't look up.
"I'll still need you."
To bed, to bed. There’s knocking at the
gate.
I'll need you too, he wanted to say. I need you I need you I need you. But he wants you, wants to do something to you.
I can't let that happen.
He figured that his equation was quite simple. Let Yuuji equal zero.
Pulled by something in the centre of his chest (his heart? he wasn't so sure), he let his forehead slowly come to rest on Megumi's shoulder.
"I'm so tired."
Megumi laced their fingers together. "I know."
He felt Megumi's shoulder rising and falling with each breath, the pressure of his clavicle against his cheekbone. The fleeting, aching desire to carve a hole between shoulder and neck to make a space for himself above Megumi's lungs, and stitch up the entrance after him. To be a nesting doll.
"I don't know what to do," he said. "After."
With a quiet sigh, Megumi laid his head on Yuuji's. "Just don't die again."
Come, come, come, come. Give me your
hand.
"You've been awake all night, haven't you?"
Yuuji nodded against him.
Megumi shifted his weight, swinging his legs back around to the roof rather than over the edge. Yuuji felt unbalanced, liable to tip, one way or another.
"C'mon," he said, "you need to sleep."
"But it's morning."
"You still need to sleep."
Yuuji sighed. He didn't have the energy to fight, to bite back. "Okay."
He reached out his hand, and Megumi took it, easing him upwards, away from the edge. He turned to take one last glance at the sky, around the edges of the sun. Less red now. Again, his eyes went downward.
The concept of taking his own life seemed more difficult now, requiring more effort than he had left in him. He didn't have the energy to kill anyone, let alone himself. And yet, he still felt a passive desire, somewhere, in the back of his mind, like hunger, like lust, to be dead.
What’s done cannot be undone.
He squeezed Megumi's hand, but could not smile at him. Maybe he'd have the energy later.
If Megumi still needed him, maybe he'd try a little while longer.
To bed, to
bed, to bed.
Lady Macbeth exits.