Work Text:
1)
[2.03 pm]
Satoru:
Suguru:
Satoru, lose my number.
Satoru:
why dont you just change it?
Suguru:
…..and why would I do that
Satoru:
isnt that normal in your line of work? running a cult must get you a lot of enemies, huh?
Suguru:
Last I checked, you’re personally responsible for completing my execution order.
Satoru:
so better hurry up and respond to the photo i sent ya, or ill come and execute you !!
Suguru:
……
[2.07 pm]
Suguru:
….you look really good. Show me your face. Drop the blindfolds.
Satoru smirks. For all his nonchalance, for his feigned depravity from them, from anything human, really - Suguru still moved like the boy he knew him to be. Still fell to the exact strings Satoru laid out for him.
Playing with him was a game, a dance, a chess match between two unrelenting masses of ruin. Two stubborn pieces on the board, caught in a decades long stalemate with no relent in sight.
But it was fun, at the end of the day. Still the most fun he’d ever had with anyone. The sense of living and the sense of excitement that brought itself into full view the moment Suguru was in focus, the moment Suguru decided to rear his head back around and stare Satoru in the face.
Satoru:
!!!!!!
Satoru:
there he is. execution delayed. for now.
Suguru:
For now.
[2.10 pm]
Suguru:
Now where’s my photo, Satoru?
What did he say? Easy. Too easy, almost.
______________________
2)
[8.17 pm]
Satoru:
suguruuu
sugu sugu suguruuuu
want your pretty hands on me
did i ever tell u that your fingers are so so pretty
long and pretty
like ur eyelashes
suguruuuuu
you know I can see when you’ve read these, right
Suguru:
Satoru, I’m in a meeting right now.
Satoru:
ooo do tell
who are ya meeting
Suguru:
Wouldn’t you like to know
Satoru:
cant blame a guy for trying, i still have a job yanno
Suguru:
Great. Now can you let me do mine?
Suguru huffs at his screen, pointedly waiting for the bubbles to pop up and indicate that Satoru is typing. Probably something irritating and funny, something that makes the blush rise to Suguru’s cheeks and makes him want to kill the idiots in front of him and rush out to Jujutsu High himself.
The bubbles don’t appear, not for one minute - or two, or three, or five. Which is extremely unlike Satoru, in every sense. Suguru doesn’t really message him first, not often - but he knows Satoru’s tells. He knows Satoru would drop everything in a second to not leave Suguru without a response. It moves something deep in his chest, this dedication - it makes Suguru remember what it felt like to be a seventeen year old love sick teenager. To run around the school grounds, skipping Yaga’s lectures to hold Satoru’s hands and intertwine their lips in their quiet corner behind the building. To run to the convenience store at the end of the day, their little group in tow, and watch as Satoru wrecked havoc over the sweets aisle, as Shoko bought yet another lighter because Haibara kept playing with hers.
Suguru isn’t a seventeen year old anymore, hasn’t been for a long time, and will never be again. Suguru isn’t in jujutsu high anymore - he’s a businessman. Some may even call him a cult leader, though he despises the connotation. He simply offers homes and purposes to those that are a little lost in life. All he asks in return is a little loyalty from those low-lifes.
Like the idiots sitting before him. He has to schmooze their hands to get some funding for his operations, he has to charm the pants off them to gain new members for his cul- organisation. He doesn’t have the time to blush at his phone screen like a lovesick child with too much time and too little direction.
He doesn’t have the time to allow his heart to pound at Satoru’s lack of response. No space in his head to wonder if this is truly the line, if this is how he loses him for good. An idiotic retort, asking his Satoru to leave him alone, in favor of sitting here in front of these blithering idiots and their fat cheque books.
The meeting drones on, his assistant brings them all an ensemble of tea and sweets - and he makes up his mind to fire him later. Suguru told every member of his staff that no sweets will enter this establishment. Nothing honey-like would do, nothing that makes his teeth rot, nothing that reminds him of a love lost.
The response doesn’t come for another three hours. Suguru has fired three members of his staff, is in the process of rolling out a new policy increasing the area around the premises that are a monkey kill zone, and is just about to give in to how he absolutely isn’t affected by Satoru and pick up the damned phone himse-
A ping.
Satoru’s text ring tone.
Suguru’s pretty fingers almost knock over his tea to grab the device in record speed.
[11.34 pm]
Satoru:
you done yet?
Suguru smiles. He feels the muscles in his neck relax, he feels the taste of his drink sweeten in his mouth. Despite himself, it tastes like relief.
Suguru:
I’ve been done for hours, Satoru.
Satoru:
aw did i keep the great geto suguru waiting?
Yes.
Suguru:
No. I’m busy, unlike you. I have things to do.
Satoru:
right right. things to do cults to run people to murder. yeah any little puppies piss you off recently?
Suguru:
Only one. He’s infuriating.
Satoru:
i always thought id be more cat if anything
Suguru rubs his forehead, the crease lines flattening under his fingers as his brain slips into that familiar place of banter, that happy place where Satoru is.
Suguru:
What were you doing, anyway
Satoru:
oh someones curious. tsk tsk
Suguru:
Satoru.
Satoru:
call me over and ill tell ya
He’s not going to tell him. Suguru knows this.
They don’t do this often - at least not as often as Suguru would like. They hadn’t spoken for a long time after Suguru left, at least, nothing coherent - a few late night calls, some because Suguru was drunk, others because Satoru was brooding. Some, because they’d gone out on their respective missions - Suguru to kill some non-sorcerer scum or Satoru to exorcise some curses, and maybe they’d gotten a little bloodied in their fights. Maybe, when they couldn’t run back to the other’s dorm and have the other wrap a gauze around their arm, a little text message across the country was all that forced to fill the gap.
Things had slowly spiralled from there. A joke, by Satoru, for the first time in the year since Suguru had left - something that made his heart flutter for the rest of day. A photo of his new outfit, the cult leader get up, as Satoru had dubbed it, sent without any telling information of his whereabouts. Without much thought.
3 am, a drunk and broody Suguru, an available and willing Satoru - an address to a warehouse not far from either of them, a late night drunken mistake spiralling into a sporadic routine.
The next morning, the clawmarks of Satoru’s nails digging red scars into Suguru’s back, Suguru foregoing his shirt as he took his morning stroll through his gardens.
Let the monkeys see, let them wonder. Let them know how staunchly he loves his strong.
A routine, every few months turned every few weeks. Just for some release, Suguru had told himself at first. But now they had a whole list of places they’d been together, a whole list of code words and some understanding of each other’s schedules to know when the other would come knocking.
Suguru had a hundred new memories of Satoru, of his lips, his hair, his fingers in his - the pretty words, the laughs, the soft quiet seeping into his bones. The way Satoru’s eyelashes would flutter shut once they were done, the way Suguru would hold him impossibly tighter in the dead of the night.
The sweet nothings, the promises that would come undone come morning, the quiet nights spent holding, not wanting, for once.
Here, now, the sounds of Satoru’s pretty moans echoing in Suguru’s ears, his faint blush and his bratty remarks being the only thing that filled his field of vision.
Suguru:
Always so fucking persistent.
Satoru:
i can see the cogs turning in your head u know
i know youve already cleared ur schedule
don’t you wanna see if you can make the strongest sorcerer your puppet, after all? maybe the 500th time’s the charm?
Suguru prides himself for his strong resolve, for all that it took to get him here. For all that he tore apart from within his own soul, without ever looking back.
But this. Him.
Everyone’s allowed a vice, right?
And Suguru’s long foregone any pretense of playing by the rules.
Suguru:
warehouse 3, 30 minutes
Satoru:
make it 20
______________________
3)
[9.04 pm]
Satoru:
Was it really killing you to stay?
Suguru:
Are you drunk?
Satoru:
you know i cant get drunk.
Suguru:
What’s going on, Satoru?
Satoru:
just. answer me. why couldnt you just stay?
Suguru:
Why are you thinking about this now?
It’s been years
Satoru:
maybe to you
i feel like im still watching you leave back in shinjuku
ive tried to turn around and walk away, but i cant
and frankly im fucking sick of it
Suguru doesn’t know what to say. He doesn’t know what brought this on, today of all days, after years of playing their little game without many issues. Sure, there was that wistful longing in Satoru’s eyes whenever they’d lie in bed together, that feel of senselessness that had nothing to do with sex and could be read by Suguru as easily as the other’s cursed energy. Sure, Suguru found himself nursing more drinks than he should when Satoru was sent on long missions, and found himself ruminating over their counted days together more often than he poured over the case files for his organisation.
But it worked. That’s how it always worked. When you find yourself unable to let go of something that happened almost a decade ago, when your being is consumed with rot and want, when your senses are overwhelmed by that one thing you cannot have - this is how it must work.
Quiet pockets of time, stolen from the rest of the world, in dingy hallways and in unkept promises. A secret life, fatal if unveiled, kept like an oath by two souls on the opposite sides of the sky. By two souls who cannot stand at an altar in front of a non-existing god to speak truer vows. By two souls who do not believe there exist any stronger promises than the ones whispered between the creases of their sheets in the dead of the night.
This is how they make it work.
Suguru, drowning under the weight of the world that crashed down on his shoulders when he was seventeen and still learning. Satoru, the harbinger of dawn, the bearer of the sky in his eyes - too bright for Suguru to bring along with him.
The messages keep coming, and Suguru isn’t as evil as he hopes to be, he supposes - because no matter what, he cannot stop himself from reading. Cannot bring himself to sever this line of connection between them and finally ignite the war that hovers its knuckles over their doorstep.
Satoru:
im serious, sug
i know u think about it sometimes
dont tell me you dont think we werentt good enough to make it work
Suguru:
‘We’re the strongest, after all’
is that what you’re trying to tell me?
Satoru:
theres nothing i can tell u that will get it through that thick skull of yours anymore
So im just asking. an honest answer, sug
you owe me that much
Suguru:
I dont owe you any-
How could i have not left-
I don’t know-
He backspaces everything he wants to say. There’s nothing to do, not anymore. No point running circles back to that dance they used to dance, that chess game he always used to lose.
Suguru:
Go to sleep, Satoru.
Satoru:
Right
He knows Satoru barely gets any sleep, and it would be hours before he goes down for his short nap right before the sun rises. He knows, no matter what he could say to him, that the river has already set its course, and the bedrock has long since been eroding away.
There’s no sleep behind Suguru’s eyes, no semblance of dreams to manifest themselves as he lulls himself into oblivion. There’s only his drinks, sprawled on a bed half empty and as large as the ocean.
There’s only him, the memory of Satoru’s sky-blue eyes, and the cold regret of what remains.
______________________
4)
[7.12 pm]
Satoru:
entertain me im bored
Suguru:
What am I? Your personal clown?
Satoru:
if the shoe fits?
Suguru:
You would know all about that wouldn’t you, idiot
Satoru:
annnnnywayyyyy
what are you upto. show me ur face
Suguru:
All you get.
Satoru:
i just fell off my chair
Suguru:
Hope it didn’t hurt too much.
Satoru:
little pains always welcome
[7.16 pm]
whos that doing your hair?
Suguru:
Are you jealous?
Satoru:
do i need to be?
suguruuuuu
who is that?
Suguru:
Nobody important.
Nothing you need to worry about :)
Satoru:
u suck
Suguru:
Later, if I’m lucky?
Satoru:
why dont you ask your little attendant for it
Suguru:
Satoru.
[7.24 pm]
I just told her to pack her bags.
Happy?
Satoru smiles. Despite himself, despite the fact that he’s probably overreacting and there’s a relatively innocent person out there now out of a job, he smiles.
Suguru’s insane. And he’s insane for him.
The thought makes Satoru dizzy, sometimes. The realization makes him a little insane, too. The glee he feels makes him believe he’s positively delirious. He knows there's no real harm, he knows in his bones that there is no one else - not for him and not for Suguru - but it is fun to play pretend. To tease out these insane reactions out of Suguru and see the confirmation of the love that thrums in his veins. The physical confirmation that Suguru would do a lot before ever letting him go.
Satoru:
no, the damage’s done
He should let it go. Should walk that line of deniability and faith, of reason and decorum - at least, as much decorum as can be maintained between the executioner and his impossible order. He should try and play nice with Suguru, if he wants this little peace of theirs to continue - if he wants to make him stay in whatever fragmented way he decides to.
But playing nice won’t be Satoru and Suguru, then, would it?
If there’s something safe and easy, something unassuming and honestly, boring, between them - that’s not really them, then. Suguru’s the kind of guy that ignites the fire - not turn away from it. At the very least, he’s the kind of man that’s curious enough to examine the damage, turn over the origins of a castaway matchstick.
So when Satoru’s the one holding the light, the one who’s dangling the golden flicker of his fingers in Suguru’s face, he knows his cult leader would not be one to resist.
Suguru:
Hmm, damage’s done, you say
What can I do to fix it, I wonder?
Hook. Line. Sinker.
It shouldn’t hurt. This playful banter between them, this circling dance that’s been danced for ten years and running - it shouldn’t hurt. By all logic, it’s been far too long for Satoru to still harbor anything for the man that used to be his best friend, and the rift between them has been opened far too wide to ever demand the building of a bridge.
In fact, Satoru is crazy enough to indulge Suguru, the cult leader, the curse user, the defector. He’s crazy enough to risk everything he’s built over the past decade, to tear it all apart and place it in Suguru’s still-gentle hands.
He remembers how soft they used to be, before the burns. He knows how soft they still are, despite it all.
And in those hands, he loses his mind, his sanity, his logic.
So he takes what he can get from him, and he gives him his all. He allows the jealousy over some unnamed helper in Suguru’s perimeter to course through his veins and revels, like a child in a dress-up competition, when he names Satoru the sole winner of his caged heart.
He is playing pretend, he supposes.
But it’s the only way he knows how to reach the remnants of his truth.
So he puts on a smile, musters up the courage, and types back.
Satoru:
im free tomorrow night
figure it out by then
The reply is instant. Too casual to be anything but, too quick to not have had Suguru on the edge of his seat.
Suguru:
I always have ideas on how to please my toru
Satoru huffs, fighting back a smile - genuine this time, despite the racing heart - types back an address, and dreams of a blue spring.
______________________
5)
[10.45 pm]
Satoru:
what the hell kinda stunt was that
what the hell are u doing, pulling up to jj high liek that
do u have a fucking deathwish
“long time no see, satoru” ill tell ya
your dick was in my mouth six days ago, fuckwad
Suguru:
Come now, Satoru. It’s nothing personal. You know how it is.
Most days. Most days, Satoru can keep up with their little secret love affair as nothing but two adults who can’t help but fall back into old patterns, who can’t help but fall back into each other. Most days, Satoru quells the thirst in his throat for the soft lullaby that is his Suguru quite easily, or at least, as easily as the gaping gap in his heart can be fixed. Most days, he distracts himself by taking care of his students, or going on missions, or buying over-the-top souvenirs for everyone just because.
Most nights, he finds himself in Suguru’s arms, his beautiful hair draped over them like a shield, and he pretends it is enough. He pretends that this is all he needs, all he asks for, and that there is no chasm underneath his heart begging to be bridged across each time Suguru’s lips curve around his name.
For the most part, it works. He forces himself to forget about it come morning - forget how it feels to turn off his infinity, how it feels to have Suguru’s fingers dance across his skin. Forgets the face he makes when he’s at his heights, when he’s about to come undone. Forgets the sweet words he kisses into Satoru with his honey-dripping tongue, the possessiveness of his claims on him, the bloodied markings on his being, the absolutely certain stamp of the love on him.
He smiles, and goes on missions, and teaches his students. He puts up with the higher ups and kills the curses because that’s what he’s meant to do. He’s been cursed with not just the weight of being the moral compass, but also of being the decider, and the soldier that must follow through.
He’s cursed with immense power, with the power to wreck the shoulders their society stands on - and he must hold true to deliver a better future for his kids.
So, come the morning, he must forget.
Satoru:
no i dont, actually
are u fuckin stupid
leave the kids outta this
Suguru:
Shouldn’t they know what kind of life they’re signing up for?
That Yuuta boy, he has a curse that follows him around, doesn’t he?
There’s a few stories I could tell him.
Satoru:
youre pissing me off
you should really stay on my good side. need i remind you that im the only one holding back all the higher ups against you.
Suguru:
Aw, you’re right. I should be more thankful for my strongest.
Anything I can do to make it better, love?
Jelly. His legs feel like fucking jelly. The maniac that is his Suguru just invaded his place of work and declared war on all of them, with no signal to his plans, as per usual, but he’s here being smug and charming in Satoru’s phone, and Satoru feels like jelly.
Something inside Satoru shakes, with rage or want - he’s not sure. Usually, when it comes to Suguru, it’s a mix of both. A thrum of life and regret pulsing in his veins, infecting his blood. A drum of unbearable love and want, washing everything clean, pumping his heart to the beat of one name.
Satoru isn’t sure what breaks first, his mind or his resolve. All he knows is that he’s tired, and that Suguru beats for him just as much as he does for the other, and he wants to declare war on the higher ups sometimes, too.
He knows that Suguru is not who he used to be, not the boy he met at fifteen and fell in love with perhaps in the lifetime before, or at the birth of the cosmos.
But Satoru isn’t who he used to be, either.
Satoru doesn’t smile as much as used to - at least not in the way he once did. Nowadays, it comes from training his students, from finding pockets of time with Shoko, from watching the next generation of sorcerers do better than they ever could.
So yeah, despite everything, it’s a slippery slope he heeds upwards.
Satoru:
youre impossible, suguru
Suguru:
You love me.
Nowadays, his happiness comes wrapped under seven layers of absence, of lack. It comes hand in hand with Suguru’s signature of curt remarks, of unmet desire, cutting him open.
It comes like a rock against the flowing tide, fated to erode. Fated to turn to dust and be swept away in its pull. Like Orpheus, doomed to turn and face his lover, doomed to damn them both to an eternity in hell.
You love me.
And isn’t that the truth, all these years, despite everything?
[10.54 pm]
Satoru:
warehouse 21. dont be fucking late or i swear to god.
im going to tie u up and make u watch.
Suguru:
Using me like a toy
A reward for my heinous crimes? :D
Satoru:
fuck you
Satoru is left, doomed to wonder, if the lyre still sings as they walk backwards and make home in the collapse.
______________________
+1)
[12.34 am]
Suguru:
Hi
Satoru:
/?????
a first text by the great geto suguru???
to what do i owe the honor
Suguru:
Don’t make me laugh.
I’m bleeding.
Satoru:
oh?
how so? a monkey got the better of you?
Suguru:
I’m actually going to laugh now.
[12.40 am]
Suguru:
Aren’t you worried?
Satoru:
about what?
Suguru:
About me?
I just told you I'm bleeding. Some sympathy would be nice.
Satoru:
didnt think you came to me looking for sympathy
Suguru:
I look to you for everything.
Satoru:
ok ur freaking me out, sug
are you okay?
Suguru:
You asked me why I left. A couple months ago.
Do you really want to know the answer?
Satoru:
….
do you really want to tell me?
Suguru:
Satoru, you have no clue about what I want.
[12.45 am]
Suguru:
I want everything. I want you, with me. I want us, next to each other and not on the opposite sides of this war. I want the higher ups to eat shit and die. I want you to
I want Haibara to be happy, alive
I wanted Riko to be alive.
[12.50 am]
Satoru:
tell me
whyd you leave
we couldve killed them all together . after riko. after haibara
Suguru:
But what does all that matter? It’s all long gone. It was gone long before I left.
[12.53 am]
Satoru:
u know i wouldve done it. u know i was just as angry as u
u know i wouldve done anything to keep u
Suguru:
and then what, toru
u kill everyone in jj society and then? We run off into the sunset together?
There’s a chasm open in Suguru’s being, and he’s not referring to the stab wound currently making him see visions. There’s a dam that’s been beaten down and broken, pulled open by his teeth, and the words slip out without respite.
Suguru:
I make you lose your morals, your composure, your sense of being for
For what exactly? Because I lost my fucking mind looking at what they did to others like us?
Satoru:
where are you rn
Suguru:
.
I made it back to the base.
Stitching myself up now.
Satoru:
you were always bad at that
[12.57 am]
Satoru:
ill be there in 20.
The Satoru he used to know wouldn’t give a damn about a lot of things. Would laugh in the face of measly stab wounds, would have one look at it and tell Suguru to stitch himself up so they could play and go bother the underclassmen. Wouldn’t understand that Suguru wasn’t like him, because to the Satoru of yesteryears, the idea of there being a singular difference between himself and his Suguru was an absurd one.
But they weren’t sixteen anymore, and Suguru couldn’t find the pieces of his old self anywhere outside of the look in Satoru’s eyes.
Suguru:
Didn’t think you knew where our base was.
Satoru:
six eyes, remember?
ive known about your little base for years
Suguru:
You can’t show your face at the base, Satoru. You know this.
Satoru:
arent u their leader? u cant sneak a single person into ur own home?
and i thought i was the puppeted beast
The words sting more than the stab wound currently cleaning him out.
He mulls it over for a minute, the idea of Gojo Satoru, the strongest sorcerer of their time, here, at their base. Just walking along the halls like he was another member of the organisation, just another person who was sick of lending his help to those that were most ungrateful.
But Satoru was never just another person, and he was never one to refuse his help. Not after everything. Not after Riko, not after Haibara.
And certainly not after Suguru.
Suguru considers this, weighing the feel of Satoru’s gentle care, his off-brand sense of duty when it comes to him, his sudden change in demeanor at the mention of Suguru’s bleeding heart against the risk of the base.
And no matter how much it hurt, that was the thing he loved the most about his Satoru.
The base line is, after all, that Suguru’s in too much pain and in too much love to say no.
Suguru:
If this bleeding doesn’t kill me first, you will
Fine. Enter through gate 3. I can clear the guards.
Satoru:
are we adding gate 3 to our list of spots, then? :D
Suguru:
If I survive the night.
Satoru:
u know i would do anything to have you, right?
He knew. He knew Satoru would do so much for him, if he had only asked. He knew that his Satoru also knew that he would never ask that of him in the first place.
Somehow, that only made him ache more.
Suguru:
And I had to do whatever it took to let you go
The reply doesn’t come for a few minutes - though to Suguru, it feels like the weight of their years lost bearing down on his shoulders. He half doesn’t expect one, doesn’t expect Satoru to come running whenever he called - or didn’t, not exactly, not with any words that could mean anything. But he also knows Satoru would whack him on his head for that train of thought.
For thinking, even for one second, that he wouldn’t spare him if he’d only asked.
[1.18 am]
Satoru:
im here
open the door
______________________
The light filters in through the windows on the east side, hitting the back of Satoru’s eyelids. He flutters them open, feeling like he’d slept for days as opposed to a couple of hours.
The bedsheets are soft. Silk, the color matching Suguru’s gojogesa robes. They smell distinctly of sandalwood, of Suguru’s perfume.
Suguru’s hands are in his hair. One caressing his neck, the other holding him close around his nape.
Suguru’s breath falls lightly on Satoru’s cheeks. Satoru moves his hand from his waist and to his chest, feeling his steady heartbeat underneath his palm, proof that Suguru is here. Alive. Despite everything.
Satoru feels himself wanting for another lifetime getting lost in these sheets’ folds.
Another city, another time period, another time where he wasn’t the sole bearer of the weight and Suguru the sole opposer to how it made his shoulders crack.
Another bed, perhaps this same one, that smelled not only of sandalwood but also of Satoru’s pine perfume - that led to a quaint house, a kitchen that held his sweets and an entryway that welcomed their friends. A bookshelf in the living room that held all of Suguru’s books, that held all the figurines Satoru would win for them during their weekly trips to the arcade.
Satoru finds himself getting lost in this other life they would’ve had. One where he wasn’t touched by divinity, one where Suguru wasn’t taken from him by the hands of rot. One, where grief was a faraway concept, where it only existed in the last breath he’d take in Suguru’s wrinkled arms, not settled in the crevices of his ribcages at the young age of sixteen.
(But he cannot. This is the only lifetime they have.
They have made the bed, and now they lie in it.
The only one they’ve ever let themselves have.)
But Suguru stirs, his palm finding Satoru’s cheek, caressing his skin, his lips attaching him to his forehead before Suguru’s eyes even flutter open - as though his body instinctively craves to be closer to Satoru, conscious or not. A sigh leaves his lips, content, as though the world hasn’t caved in yet - hasn’t made itself known to Suguru’s sleepful state.
Satoru instantly tightens his grip around his waist, settling his face in the crook of Suguru’s neck.
“G’morning, ‘toru,” comes Suguru’s muffled voice, laden with sleep and the earth-shattering comfort of love.
Satoru demands his heart to settle, lest the rapid heartbeat stir Suguru awake. Not yet. “Sleep some more, Suguru.”
Suguru cards his fingers through his hair, tightening his hold, and Satoru’s grip is knuckle-white, as he forces his eyes shut and lulls them back to a fleeting spring.