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CARE INSTRUCTIONS: LYCORIS RADIATA
Common Name: Red Spider Lily / Hell Flower / Corpse Lily
LIGHT - Thrives in partial shade. Avoid direct sunlight. The bloom is most vibrant when hidden from the harsh light.
WATER - Do not overwater. Once the flower has bloomed, the leaves will wither and die. The plant survives best in states of neglect and drought, feeding on what is left behind.
SOIL - Prefers undisturbed ground. Historically found in graveyards, as the poisonous bulbs are said to keep away the scavengers that would disturb the dead.
⚠︎☠︎︎ DO NOT INGEST! ☠︎︎⚠︎
⚠︎☠︎︎ The plant is toxic. To handle it is to invite a slow, beautiful decay. ☠︎︎⚠︎
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The air in the bar was thick with the scent of stale beer and tobacco. A biting February chill rattled the windowpane outside, holding Tokyo in its cold embrace
Satoru Gojo sat hunched over the sticky wooden counter, nursing a glass of whiskey he didn’t particularly like.
His head throbbed. A dull, rhythmic pulse behind his eyes that felt like a countdown to a migraine.
Above the rows of dusty bottles, a small television flickered.
A local news segment was replaying an interview from the previous week.
"Detective Gojo," the reporter’s voice chirped over the speaker, "any comments on the Prometheus’s latest breach of the Ministry records?"
On screen, Satoru adjusted his eyeglasses and leaned into the mic. "Let’s no romantasise him with these nicknames. He's a thief, not a folk hero. Kenjaku is just another black hat looking for a payday. And we’ll have him in cuffs by the end of the month."
Satoru scoffed and took a sip of his drink. He’d been saying that for the past five years.
"Is that you?" The bartender nodded toward the screen, wiping a glass with a rag that had seen better decades.
Satoru pulled his black baseball cap lower, hoping to shield the shock of white hair that made him a walking lighthouse in a place this dark. Such a useless gesture honestly.
"Slow news day," he muttered.
"People like him, you know," the bartender said and leaned against the back counter. "The 'Prometheus.' Especially the kids in the wards. They like seeing the guys in suits get their records leaked. Makes them feel like someone's finally punching up."
"Punching up is still a crime," Satoru replied dryly.
A few seats down, an old man with a face like crumpled parchment let out a wheezing laugh. "The law's only for people who can afford to break it. Can’t blame a guy for evening the odds."
Satoru didn't argue. He didn't have the energy. He just stared at the amber liquid in his glass, wishing the world would stop spinning for ten minutes.
The bell above the door chimed, and a new customer approached the bar.
He stepped into the narrow space between Satoru and the old man, moving with easy grace.
"The usual, Sagishi?" the bartender asked, his tone shifting to something much warmer.
"Yeah," the man replied. He began tapping his fingers on the wooden surface in a slow, melodic rhythm.
Satoru kept his eyes fixed on his drink.
"Is that you on the TV?" the man, Sagishi, beside him asked.
Satoru sighed, refusing to raise his gaze. The headache was reaching a crescendo. "It is."
"Think you're gonna catch the guy?"
"Yup," Satoru replied, popping the p with a forced confidence he didn't quite feel.
"I hope you will. Good luck with it."
The man offered his hand, his palm open and waiting in Satoru’s peripheral vision.
Satoru finally looked up, ready to give a dismissive nod, but the words died in his throat.
It was startling.
The man didn't look like he belonged in a murky dive bar in the back alleys of Tokyo.
He was... beautiful.
With his sharp, elegant features and a calm, knowing expression, he looked like he should have been on a catwalk or a stage. He was smiling, his dark, almond-shaped eyes crinkling at the corners in a way that felt almost intimately kind.
"Thanks," Satoru managed, reaching out to shake the man's hand briefly.
His skin was cool, his grip firm.
The bartender placed a fresh drink down. The man took it, offering one last tilt of his head toward Satoru before turning away.
Satoru watched him go. He noted the man’s long dark hair, gathered into a messy bun at the nape of his neck, and the way his shoulders moved under his black jacket.
He watched him for a mere moment—just long enough to wonder why someone like that was drinking alone—before the throb in his temples forced him back to his drink.
The transition from one year to the next was usually a celebration of fresh starts, but for Satoru Gojo, it felt like a tightening of the noose.
Tokyo was a kaleidoscope of exploding fireworks and drunken cheers, yet the noise only served to sharpen the agonising throb behind his eyes.
The headache had become his most loyal companion.
It had intensified over the Christmas week when Prometheus—the media’s darling and Satoru’s personal demon—had executed his most audacious strike yet. He hadn't just leaked data this time; he had hijacked the digital billboards across Shibuya Crossing on Christmas Eve, broadcasting the private bank ledgers of the city’s top police officials while a scrolling ticker mocked Satoru by name:
“Still looking for the light, Detective Gojo? Maybe try opening your eyes. Merry Christmas, Satoru.”
"Try to relax, Satoru," Shoko Ieiri said, her voice cutting through Satoru's thoughts and the thumping bass of the Ginza lounge. She draped a heavy, comforting arm over his shoulders, a cigarette unlit between her fingers as she leaned into him. "You'll get a heart attack before you turn fifty."
"I am perfectly relaxed," Satoru lied, his jaw tight enough to crack a tooth.
Shoko rolled her eyes, her gaze lingering on the way his fingers twitched against his glass. "You’re vibrating like a live wire. If you get any more ‘relaxed,’ you’re going to blow a fuse."
"I’ll go get another drink," Satoru said, pulling away. He needed to escape the suffocating warmth of the booth and the pity in his friends' eyes.
The bar was a battlefield.
Satoru stood there for what felt like an eternity, his odd looks and towering height making him an easy target for the cold glares of the staff.
He watched as the bartenders pointedly skipped over him, serving teenagers and businessmen who had arrived long after he had.
But this was nothing new to him. His face was a staple of the evening news, and in a city where Kenjaku, alias Prometheus, was seen as a digital Robin Hood, Satoru was the Sheriff of Nottingham.
"Hey, you're the detective, right?"
The voice was low, smooth, and possessed a rhythmic quality that cut through the cacophony of the bar.
Satoru felt his eye twitch.
He turned to the man on his right, ready to deliver a biting retort about public service, but the words died on his tongue.
The man was... familiar. He was striking, with a face that felt like a half-remembered dream from a feverish night. His eyes were brown, his features long and sharp. He looked like he broke women's hearts as a fun hobby in his free time.
He also looked like a bit of a jerk, wearing just black jeans, a grey hoodie, and a jacket on a celebration night like this.
"Have I met you before?" Satoru asked, his brow furrowing as he scanned the man’s beautiful features.
"Not really," the man said, a ghost of a smile playing on his full lips. "I saw you at Hamaguri last year. The bar in Kawasaki."
Satoru blinked, the memory slotting into place. The murky dive bar. The brief handshake. "Ah, right. Right."
The man chuckled, a gentle sound that Satoru felt in his chest. "Ichiro. Sagishi Ichiro."
"Satoru. Gojo Satoru," he replied, though he knew the man already knew that.
Ichiro turned back to the bar. "Oi, Takashi! Two Sapporos!" he called out, his voice cutting through the noise with effortless authority.
Almost instantly, a bartender appeared. He shot a weary, suspicious look at Satoru’s badge-heavy aura, but he set two cold beers down on the counter.
Satoru reached into his pocket to pay, but Ichiro’s hand moved faster, a blur of long fingers swatting Satoru’s bills away.
"Let me," Ichiro said.
"Why?" Satoru asked, his suspicion rising even as his headache ebbed slightly in the man’s presence.
"You look like you’ve had a rough night," Ichiro said, sliding one of the condensation-slicked bottles toward him. "Or... a rough year."
Satoru huffed, a genuine spark of amusement breaking through his exhaustion. "Thanks."
Ichiro clinked his bottle against Satoru's with a soft chime. "Last time we spoke, you were after the infamous Prometheus. Haven't caught him yet, right?"
Satoru leaned back against the bar, eyeing the man. Ichiro was tall—nearly Satoru’s height—and he carried himself with a languid grace. His dark hair was strangely long for a guy, a silken curtain that cascaded over his shoulders, framing a dangerously handsome face.
"Let me guess," Satoru said. "You're a fan of his?"
Ichiro looked down at his beer, his dark eyes hooded and unreadable. "I wouldn't call myself a fan."
"But?"
"But..." He looked back at Satoru, his gaze lingering on the sharp line of Satoru’s jaw. "I mean, there are worse crimes than some guy with a computer, don't you think? Like murder and shit."
Satoru laughed, a sharp, cynical sound. "That’s quite the understatement. The 'guy with a computer' just paralysed the financial records of the Metropolitan Police. He’s a chaos agent."
Ichiro took a slow sip of his beer, his eyes tracking Satoru’s movements with a lazy, heavy intensity. "I don't know much about his crimes. I just see the memes. To the rest of the world, he’s just a ghost in the machine."
"He's a man," Satoru corrected. "And every man has a weakness. A tell. A moment where he gets too cocky and steps into the light."
Ichiro just smiled. A small, private thing. "And what happens when you find him? Do you think the light will be what you expected?"
Satoru didn't answer. He was too busy noticing the way the bar's neon lights caught the dark depths of Ichiro’s eyes, and how, for the first time in a year, the throb in his head wasn't too bad.
"I have no expectations," he then said, his voice dropping into that low, authoritative hum he used when he was being serious. "He could very well be a woman. Or a group of people. But it doesn't matter. We’re close to catching him anyway." Satoru tilted his head back, taking a long, cold pull of his beer. He felt the liquid burn pleasantly down his throat.
"What, really?" Ichiro asked. He shifted his weight, turning his body fully toward Satoru. He looked genuinely intrigued, his dark eyes wide and fixed on Satoru’s face. It was the exact expression people got when they heard some particularly juicy gossip.
"Yeah," Satoru replied, wiping a stray drop of foam from his lip. "He’s getting... sloppier."
"Is he?" Ichiro tilted his head. "That's a shame for him. Why do you think that is?"
"He's getting cocky. That stunt in Shibuya? It was flashy, sure, but it was loud. When you're loud, you leave footprints. We’re starting to see the patterns in how he bounces his signals. It’s only a matter of time before he slips up and lets the mask fall."
"Well, that's good then," Ichiro said smoothly, leaning his elbow onto the bar, his shoulder almost brushing against Satoru’s. "Maybe he’s just tired of hiding. Or maybe he just wants to see if you're as good as the papers say."
Satoru gave a sharp, dry bark of a laugh. "If he wants my attention, he’s got it. I haven't slept properly in nearly two years because of him."
Ichiro hummed, a sympathetic sound. He eyed Satoru up and down, a slow, lazy appraisal that made Satoru’s skin shiver in a way that had nothing to do with the police work. "What’s it like, anyway? Being a cop? A detective?"
Satoru let out a long, weary sigh, his fingers tracing the rim of his bottle. "It’s my only day off, Ichiro. I don’t really want to talk about my job."
"Please, just tell me something," Ichiro insisted, a playful glint in his eyes. "I’ve never met a real detective before. Is it like in the movies? The dramatic stakeouts? The smoke-filled rooms?"
"Is anything like in the movies?" Satoru countered, raising an eyebrow.
Ichiro laughed, a warm, rich sound. "Touché."
Satoru took another gulp of his beer, trying to ignore the heat creeping up his neck. It was the alcohol, he told himself. Or the crowded room.
"When I was a kid, I wanted to be a cop," Ichiro said suddenly, his gaze drifting to his beer. "Like every kid, I guess. Justice, the uniform... the whole hero complex."
Satoru smirked. "What do you do then? Since you didn't join the force to save the world."
"Nothing cool," Ichiro said, his voice dropping into a humble, almost shy register. "I work at my grandma’s flower shop. It’s quiet. A lot of lilies and chrysanthemums."
Satoru stared at him for a beat, and then he couldn't help the laugh that escaped him. It was a loud, genuine sound that drew a few looks from the people nearby. "What? You’re kidding."
"I'm not," Ichiro defended, though he was grinning broadly now.
It made Satoru’s heart race faster.
"You?" Satoru gestured to the man’s height, his features, and the sheer intensity he radiated. "A florist? You look like you should be breaking hearts or doing tattoos, not trimming stems for old ladies."
"Flowers are easy, Mr Policeman. No stress. No expectations. They just... bloom, and then they die. There’s peace in that."
Satoru eyed him. "You're a weird guy, Sagishi Ichiro.”
"And you're a very stressed man, Gojo Satoru," Ichiro replied. He finished his beer and set the bottle down. "You should come by the shop sometime. I'll give you something for that insomnia of yours. Lavender, maybe. Or… something else. Anything you'd like."
Satoru felt his heart skip a beat. "Is that an invitation?"
Ichiro’s gaze shifted then, losing its playful edge and sharpening into something far more intimate. The lazy, heavy-lidded look he’d been sporting focused entirely on Satoru’s mouth before traveling back up to his eyes.
"Do you want it to be?" the man asked, his voice a low, melodic vibration that seemed to bypass Satoru's ears and settle directly in his bones.
Satoru’s heart hammered hard against his ribcage. He felt a sudden, sharp surge of adrenaline—the kind he usually reserved for a high-speed chase, but this was different. This was visceral. He glanced quickly at the people surrounding them, but the bar area was a sea of anonymity; the bass was so loud and the air so thick with drunken laughter that they were effectively in a vacuum.
"Are you really a florist?" Satoru asked, his voice slightly raspy.
He was a detective; he lived in a world of cynicism and double-meanings. People like this didn't just fall into your lap at a bar.
Ichiro raised a dark, elegant brow. "Why would I lie about that? If I were going to invent a life for myself, I would have come up with something way cooler than thorns and pollen."
Satoru leaned in, his blue eyes narrowing behind the slight fog of the alcohol. "Maybe you're a journalist. Looking for a scoop on the guy who can’t catch Prometheus."
"A journalist?" Ichiro echoed, the word sounding foreign on his tongue.
Satoru didn't break eye contact. He was looking for a flinch, a micro-expression, any sign of a tell.
Instead, Ichiro let out a huff of genuine amusement and reached into his back pocket. He pulled out a worn leather wallet and flipped it open.
"See," he said.
Satoru looked down. It was a physical photograph, tucked behind a plastic sleeve. In it, a slightly younger, lankier version of the man stood with his arm draped affectionately over a tiny, silver-haired woman. They were standing in front of a modest storefront overflowing with buckets of sunflowers and hydrangeas.
A hand-painted sign above them read Sugawara Florals.
"That's my grandma," Ichiro said, his voice softening with a touch of real warmth. "And that's the shop. I spend my mornings de-thorning roses and my evenings wondering why handsome detectives are so paranoid."
Satoru felt a wave of relief so sudden it made him feel lightheaded. He looked at the photo for a beat too long, tracing the line of Ichiro’s younger smile, before looking back up at the man himself.
The tension in the air hadn't dissipated; it had just changed shape, turning from suspicion into a heavy, undeniable gravity.
"Do you..." Satoru started, his throat dry. He cleared it and tried again. "Do you have a girlfriend?"
The man’s lips twitched, a slow smirk spreading across his face. He seemed to relish the question. "No."
Satoru hesitated. The throb in his head was gone, replaced by a heat that was beginning to feel like a fever. "A… boyfriend, then?"
Ichiro leaned in even closer, until the scent of him—something like sandalwood and tobacco—clouded Satoru’s senses. "No boyfriend either. Just me, the flowers, and a... very empty apartment."
The invitation was standing there, naked and pulsing between them. Satoru felt like he was standing on the edge of a cliff, and for once in his life, he didn't care about the fall.
"Where do you live?" Satoru breathed.
"Setagaya," Ichiro replied, his eyes never leaving Satoru’s. "Near the park. You?"
"Hibiya," Satoru said, his voice barely a whisper over the roar of the New Year's countdown beginning somewhere in the distance.
Ichiro tilted his head, a stray lock of dark hair falling over his eye. He didn't move to brush it away. "Your place is closer," he noted, his voice a silken challenge.
Satoru didn't think about the paperwork waiting on his desk. He didn't think about Prometheus, or the headlines, or the fact that he was a cop picking up a stranger whose last name he’d only just learned. He just reached out, his fingers brushing against Ichiro’s jacket sleeve.
"Yeah," Satoru said, his pulse thundering in his ears. "It is."
Satoru didn’t feel even a flicker of guilt as he abandoned his friends.
Somewhere back in the pulsing heat of the bar, Shoko was likely looking for him, and Kento was probably checking his watch, but they were already fading memories.
Satoru moved through the crowd like a shark through water, the cold night air of Ginza hitting him like a physical shock as he pushed through the heavy glass doors.
He didn't need to look back to know Ichiro was there. He could feel the man’s presence, a steady weight trailing just a few paces behind.
The walk to his apartment was short—a mere ten minutes—but in the Tokyo streets, every second felt stretched thin. The city was loud around them, filled with the distant booms of celebratory fireworks and the hum of late-night traffic, yet between the two of them, there was only the sound of their footsteps on the pavement.
Satoru kept his hands shoved deep into his pockets, his fingers curled into tight fists. His heart was thundering so violently against his ribs, he was certain it would burst through his chest.
It was an adrenaline high he couldn't control, a visceral reaction to the proximity of a man he barely knew, yet felt he had been searching for.
He stole a glance at the stranger.
Ichiro didn't seem bothered by the silence or the cold. His saunter was lazy, his movements fluid and relaxed, as if he were simply taking a stroll through a garden rather than walking home with a detective he’d just picked up. His expression was calm, his dark eyes reflecting the neon glow of the overhead streetlights.
"Do you mind if I smoke?" Ichiro asked.
Satoru swallowed hard, his throat feeling tight. "No. Go ahead."
Ichiro offered a small, appreciative smile.
He reached into the pocket of his black jacket and pulled out a crumpled pack of cigarettes and a sleek, silver lighter. He stopped walking for a second to cup the flame against the wind. The orange glow illuminated the sharp bridge of his nose and the long, elegant curve of his eyelashes.
He took a slow drag, the tip of the cigarette blooming into a bright, angry red, before exhaling a cloud of smoke that vanished into the winter mist.
He started walking again, the scent of tobacco trailing after him.
"You're very quiet, Gojo Satoru," Ichiro remarked, his eyes sliding sideways to catch Satoru's gaze. "Is the detective's brain still working? Trying to figure out if I have a concealed weapon or a criminal record?"
Satoru let out a breath he hadn't realised he was holding. "The detective brain never really turns off," he admitted, "but right now, it’s mostly just trying to keep my head from spinning."
"Is it the beer? Or is it me?"
Satoru stopped at the entrance to his building, a modern, sterile glass structure that felt far too cold for the heat radiating between them. He turned to face Ichiro, his blue eyes sharp even in the shadows.
"I think you know the answer to that," Satoru said.
Ichiro took one last pull of his cigarette before flicking the butt into a nearby bin. He stepped into Satoru’s personal space, close enough that the heat from his body was palpable. He reached out, his long fingers hovering just an inch from Satoru’s jawline, not quite touching, but the intent was enough to make Satoru’s breath hitch.
"I’m beginning to think," Ichiro whispered, leaning in until his lips were inches from Satoru’s ear, "that you’re much more dangerous than the people you’re chasing."
Satoru didn't wait.
The electronic lock gave a sharp, clinical chirp, and Satoru pushed the heavy door open.
The lobby was all brushed steel and muted recessed lighting, reflecting the high-salary status Satoru had reached far earlier than most of his peers.
"Sleek," Ichiro remarked, his voice echoing slightly in the quiet hallway. He looked around with a tilt of his head, his dark eyes taking in the security cameras and the polished marble. "A bit cold, maybe. But I suppose a man of the law needs a fortress."
"It's just an apartment," Satoru muttered, though he felt a strange prickle of self-consciousness as they stepped into the elevator.
The ascent was silent, the digital floor numbers climbing toward the top of the building. Satoru stood with his back against the mirrored wall, watching Ichiro. The man was leaning against the railing, the scent of his cigarette smoke still clinging to his jacket, looking entirely too comfortable in Satoru’s space.
When they reached Satoru's floor, the walk to the door felt like a countdown. Satoru swiped his entry card, and they stepped inside. The apartment was vast, a minimalist's dream of floor-to-ceiling glass overlooking the shimmering, jagged skyline of Tokyo.
Ichiro let out a low, appreciative whistle as he stepped onto the hardwood. He kicked off his shoes and draped his jacket over a chair with the ease of someone who had lived there for years. "The view is incredible, Satoru. You can see the whole city from up here. Like a god looking down on his subjects."
"I prefer to think of it as keeping an eye on them," Satoru replied, his voice a bit rough as he tossed his own jacket aside. He turned to face Ichiro, ready to make a comment about the wine he had in the kitchen, but the words never made it past his teeth.
Ichiro didn't give him the chance to be a host. He moved with a sudden, predatory speed, closing the distance between them in two long strides. His hands came up to frame Satoru’s face, his palms warm and slightly rough, and then he was on him.
The kiss was a collision. It was flavoured with the bite of alcohol and the lingering spice of tobacco. There was a split second of pure shock—Satoru wasn't used to being moved, to being initiated upon—but the feeling vanished as quickly as it came. He leaned into it, his hands finding the fabric of Ichiro's hoodie, pulling him closer until there was no air left between them.
They stumbled back toward the hallway, a frantic mess of hands and teeth. The alcohol made everything feel heavier, more urgent. Satoru felt the heat of the man’s skin through his shirt, and as they reached the bedroom, clothes began to hit the floor in a trail of discarded linen and cotton.
Satoru’s breath hitched as he pulled back for a second, his eyes scanning Ichiro’s frame in the dim light. Underneath the loose-fitting clothes, the man wasn't just lean—he had toned muscle on him. His shoulders were broad, his stomach a map of taut lines.
"You know," Satoru panted, his hands sliding over Ichiro’s abs, "your body doesn't really look like a florist's."
Ichiro let out a low, breathless huff of laughter, his dark eyes dark with desire. "I like working out. Carrying heavy crates of lilies is more taxing than it looks."
He leaned back in, his mouth trailing fire along the column of Satoru’s neck, his hands dipping lower. Then, Ichiro paused, his voice dropping into a tone that was quiet, absolute, and left no room for negotiation.
"Just so we’re clear, Gojo Satoru... I only top."
Satoru tensed. The air in the room suddenly felt very thin. In his limited experience with men, he’d always been the one in control—the one setting the pace, the one in charge.
It was his nature. He was a Gojo, he was a lead detective, he was the strongest person in every room. The idea of surrendering that control, of being the one to let go, sent a jolt of genuine fear through him.
But then he looked at the stranger. He saw the challenge in those dark eyes, the calm confidence, and the way the man didn't look at him like a police officer, but like a man he intended to break.
The throb in Satoru’s head was entirely gone. In its place was a reckless, terrifying curiosity.
"Okay," Satoru whispered, his voice steady even as his pulse raced. "Okay."
In his twenty-five years, Satoru had rarely allowed anyone close enough to see him without his armour. His few romantic or sexual encounters had been clinical—short-lived, efficient, and largely forgettable. It was usually a one and done affair. A bit of perfunctory preparation, a release of tension, and then the return to his solitary, high-stakes life.
But this stranger, this Ichiro, was doing something Satoru hadn't expected. He was taking his time.
As they moved onto the expansive bed, Ichiro didn't just take; he explored. He kissed Satoru with a devastating slowness, his mouth moving as though he were memorising the curve of Satoru’s lips, as though he were searching for something deeper than a New Year’s Eve thrill.
It was unnerving.
Satoru was the detective, the one who scrutinised others, yet under Ichiro’s steady gaze, he felt like he was the one being solved.
When they finally located the lubricant and condoms in the bedside drawer, Satoru felt a rare tremor of nerves. He was out of his element, hesitant and exposed.
But the stranger’s dominance was not a thing of violence. It was a calm, absolute authority. The man’s teeth grazed Satoru’s chest, sparking white-hot flares of sensation.
And he used his fingers with the same precision Satoru imagined he used on his flowers—careful, steady, and patient. He worked to stretch Satoru, waiting for the tension to ease out from the detective's rigid muscles, letting him adjust to the invasive, heavy heat of the contact.
"Does it hurt, Satoru?" Ichiro asked. His voice wasn't just a whisper; it was a low-frequency purr that vibrated against Satoru’s jugular.
"No," Satoru groaned, the sound torn from the back of his throat.
A liquid, heavy coil of pleasure was building deep in his gut, drowning out the last of his analytical thoughts.
"No, just... just fuck me."
The man let out a dark, melodic chuckle against his skin, a sound of pure satisfaction. "Turn over."
Satoru obeyed instantly.
The power dynamic had shifted so completely that he felt brainless, his body reacting to the command before his mind could process it.
He pushed himself onto his hands and knees, the cool silk of the sheets the opposite of the furnace-heat of the man hovering over him.
The night that followed was nothing short of euphoric.
Satoru, the man who was always in control, found himself reduced to a collection of raw nerves and desperate gasps. He was clawing at the expensive sheets, his back arching as he met every deep, punishing thrust.
Lewd, broken sounds spilt from his lips—noises he hadn't known he was capable of making—as he surrendered every bit of his dignity to the man behind him.
"Fuck," the man moaned into the crook of Satoru’s shoulder, his grip on Satoru’s hips bruising and possessive. "Fuck, fuck, fuck. Satoru, you are perfect. So perfect."
Satoru thought that would be the end of it—the peak before the plateau.
But an hour later, they were tangled together again, this time against the wet tiles of the shower wall. The room was thick with rising steam, blurring the world until there was nothing left but the spray of the water and the friction of their bodies.
Then, as quickly as the storm had started, it passed.
While Satoru was still coming down from the high, draped in a towel and hazy with exhaustion, Ichiro began to get dressed. He moved with that same infuriatingly calm grace, pulling on his hoodie and sliding into his jacket as if he hadn't just spent the last two hours shattering Satoru’s composure.
He didn't linger. He didn't ask for a glass of water or a place to sleep. He simply leaned down, pressed a final, lingering kiss to Satoru’s lips, and smiled.
"Happy New Year, Gojo Satoru," he said softly.
Then he was gone. The heavy click of the apartment door echoed through the empty space, leaving Satoru in a silence that felt deafening.
Satoru walked over to the floor-to-ceiling windows, his legs feeling heavy and weak.
He stood there, naked and sore—a delicious, dull ache that radiated from his backside—and stared out at the sprawling, neon-lit skeleton of Tokyo.
Dawn was still an hour away, the sky a bruised purple-black.
He’d almost asked for his number. The words had been right there, hovering on his tongue, but he’d choked on them.
Would a detective ask a florist for a second date after a night of being ruined against a mattress and a shower wall? It felt... inappropriate.
Sagishi Ichiro.
Satoru repeated the name in his head, a mantra. He didn't need a phone number. He was a detective. He had access to every database in the country. When he got to the office in a few hours, he would run the name. He’d find the shop, find the address, and see if the "Sagishi Ichiro" in the system matched the man who had just left a permanent mark on Satoru’s memory.
Surely, a name like that would be easy enough to find.
The first of January was a day meant for shrines, family, and the slow quiet of tradition, but Satoru Gojo found himself sitting in the sterile, fluorescent hum of the precinct.
The air in the office was stale. Most of the desks were empty. Only a handful of patrol officers remained on duty, their voices hushed as they nursed their hangovers in the breakroom.
Satoru was the only detective present.
He sat at his terminal, his posture uncharacteristically stiff.
Every time he shifted in his ergonomic chair, he felt the sharp, hot tug of muscles in his lower back and bottom. A reminder of the man who had been pinning him to the sheets only hours prior.
He took a long, cloying sip of his coffee. Shoko would have had a field day with him; the liquid was more cream and sugar than bean, a pale, sugary sludge that he needed to counteract the bitterness of his own exhaustion.
The soreness didn't irritate him.
Instead, it acted as a tether, fueling a restless, manic energy. He logged into the National Police Agency’s centralised database, his fingers flying across the keys with practised ease.
Search: SAGISHI, ICHIRO.
He hit "Enter".
The system whirred for a heartbeat before a single result populated the screen. Satoru felt a strange, tight knot in his chest loosen. He clicked the profile.
An old, digitised passport photo flickered to life.
The Ichiro in the image was much younger—perhaps sixteen—with the lanky frame and soft jawline of an adolescent, but the eyes were unmistakable. Even in a low-resolution government scan, they were dark, heavy-lidded, and possessed that same unsettlingly calm depth.
Satoru leaned in, his eyes scanning the data fields.
Name: Sagishi Ichiro
DOB: July 7, 1978
Birthplace: Akita Prefecture
Current Residence: Setagaya, Tokyo
The man was twenty-seven, two years Satoru’s senior.
Satoru felt a smug, private thrill.
He scrolled deeper into the family tree, his eyes skipping over tax records and residency permits. He found the parents, both still registered in a small coastal town in Akita. He found the grandmother, a woman named Sagishi Hina, who was indeed the registered owner of a small business in Tokyo: Sugawara Florals.
Satoru sat back, the sweet coffee coating his tongue.
He felt a wave of relief so potent it almost made him laugh.
He had been a cop already long enough to be cynical, to expect the worst of everyone, but Ichiro had been telling the truth. He wasn't a journalist, he wasn't a spy, and he wasn't some phantom of the digital underworld.
He was just a florist with a penchant for expensive Ginza bars and a talent for making Satoru Gojo lose his mind.
Why would a man like that lie, anyway? He had no reason to.
Satoru clicked into the parents' records, curious now, his detective’s instinct morphing into a personal obsession. He wanted to know where those eyes came from. He wanted to know what kind of childhood produced a man who moved with the grace of an assassin and spoke with the gentleness of a monk.
The father’s record was clean—a mid-level civil servant. The mother had been a teacher. No criminal history. No outstanding debts. No red flags.
Satoru’s gaze drifted to a small, linked file at the bottom of the grandmother’s business registration. It was an old police report from four years ago—a minor breaking and entering at the flower shop.
Satoru opened it, expecting a standard burglary.
Instead, he found a grainy scan of a handwritten witness statement. The handwriting was elegant, even then.
"The suspect didn't take any money. They just opened the records and rearranged the inventory logs. They left a note saying the accounting and security were inefficient."
Satoru frowned, his brow furrowing as he stared at the screen.
Something about the phrasing felt like a splinter under his fingernail. Security was inefficient.
Satoru rubbed his temples, the throb in his head threatening to return. He was overthinking it. He was a detective; he saw patterns where there were only coincidences. He closed the file and stood up, stretching his aching limbs until his joints popped.
He didn't need to over-analyse a four-year-old burglary. He had a name. He had a location. And most importantly, he had the memory of Ichiro’s breath against his neck.
He finished his coffee, tossed the paper cup into the bin, and grabbed his coat.
He had a city to protect and a "Prometheus" to hunt, but for the first time in a while, Satoru Gojo felt like he was actually winning.
Two weeks had passed since New Year’s Eve, and Satoru had spent nearly every waking hour submerged in the aftermath of a catastrophe.
Kenjaku had outdone himself.
He hadn't just breached a system; he’d orchestrated a symphony of chaos. By exploiting a zero-day vulnerability in the networked security grid of a major diamond exchange in Chuo, he had remotely frozen the vault’s fail-safes and looped the CCTV feeds with pre-recorded footage of empty hallways.
While the security monitors showed nothing but silence, a physical crew had walked in and stripped the place bare of nearly three billion yen in uncut stones. It was the perfect synthesis of high-tech sabotage and old-school thievery.
Satoru had been at the precinct for forty-eight hours straight, fuelled by caffeine and spite, following Dark Web marketplaces, interviewing witnesses, looking through evidences, pulling out too many hairs.
Until he finally collapsed back into his apartment, his mind a frayed wire, and stepped into the shower to wash the grime of the station off his skin.
He was standing under the spray, eyes closed, when a sharp, rhythmic knock echoed through the quiet apartment.
Satoru froze.
The water drummed against the tile, but his ears were tuned to the door.
No one knocked on his door.
His friends called; his colleagues used the intercom.
This was not anyone he knew.
Satoru killed the water.
He grabbed a towel, snapping it around his waist, and reached for the service pistol he’d left on the vanity.
Dripping wet, his heart rate spiking into a familiar, cold professional rhythm, he crept toward the entryway.
He peered through the peephole.
The tension drained out of him so fast it left him dizzy. Standing in the hallway was the beautiful stranger.
"Just a minute," Satoru called out, his voice raspier than he intended.
He tucked the gun into a drawer near the door, out of sight but within reach. He didn't bother with a shirt or drying his hair. He simply unlatched the deadbolt and swung the door open.
Ichiro stood there, framed by the sterile hallway light. He looked different than he had at the bar—more dressed down, more shadows under his eyes.
He wore a heavy dark jacket over a grey hoodie, black sweats, and a black baseball cap pulled low over his brow.
His gaze started at Satoru’s damp, messy white hair, travelled slowly down the expanse of his bare, wet chest to the towel at his waist, and then back up again.
"Sorry for the interruption," Ichiro said, his voice as smooth and steady as Satoru remembered. "I realised after I left that I never actually gave you my number. It felt... unfinished."
Satoru leaned against the doorframe, trying to ignore the way his skin hummed at the man’s proximity. "How did you even get in?"
Ichiro offered a sheepish, lopsided smile, tilting his head. "I waited for a neighbour to leave and caught the door before it latched. A bit cliché, I know, but I didn't think 'the florist from the bar' would be a valid reason for the concierge to buzz me up."
Satoru let out a huff of laughter, rubbing a hand through his wet hair. "You broke into a detective’s high-security building because you forgot to leave your digits?"
"Is that a crime?" Ichiro asked, stepping a fraction closer. The scent of the cold night air and that faint, sweet tobacco clung to him. "Or can I be let off with a warning?"
Satoru stepped back, opening the door wider. The logic in his brain was screaming about protocol and red flags, but the heat in his blood was louder. "Get in here before the neighbours see a half-naked cop talking to a trespasser."
Ichiro stepped inside, his eyes immediately sweeping the room with that same analytical calm he’d shown before. He looked at the discarded files on the coffee table—blurry photos of the diamond exchange heist and technical readouts of the breached servers.
"Busy week?" Ichiro asked, his back to Satoru as he studied the mess of the investigation.
"You have no idea," Satoru muttered, closing the door and locking it. "Someone is trying to burn the city down again, and I'm the one holding the bucket."
Ichiro turned around, his expression unreadable under the brim of his cap. "Maybe the city needs to burn a little, Satoru. Just to see what's underneath the soot."
Satoru paused, his hand hovering over the door handle. There was something in the way Ichiro said his name—something heavy and knowing—that made the hair on his arms stand up.
But then Ichiro smiled, and the shadow vanished. "But you look exhausted. Maybe the bucket can wait for one night?"
The bucket did more than wait; it was kicked across the room and forgotten.
By the time they were done, Satoru had lost count of the times he had reached his breaking point and succumbed to the pleasure.
Between the booze from earlier in the week and the sheer physical exhaustion of his job, he should have been dead to the world.
Instead, he was hyper-reactive.
The stranger was thorough, switching from his mouth to his fingers to his cock with a devastating, practised patience that felt like an interrogation of Satoru’s body, making him come over and over and over again.
By the time they lay tangled in the damp sheets, the detective’s brain was a pile of useless mush.
He was heaving, his chest rising and falling in jagged bursts, his skin slicked with a fine sheen of sweat that cooled rapidly in the air-conditioned room.
"Where..." Satoru started, his voice cracking. He swallowed and tried again. "Where did you learn to do that?"
Ichiro let out a breathy, dark laugh. "It was that good, huh?"
"I think I saw God," Satoru muttered, his arm draped over his eyes. "And He told me to fuck off."
"I'm flattered, then." Ichiro rolled onto his side, propping his head up on his hand. His other hand began a slow, torturous path, tracing the line of Satoru’s abdominal muscles down to his navel. He leaned in, pressing a soft, lingering kiss to Satoru’s sternum, then his neck. "Satoru..."
Satoru glanced at him. "Yeah?"
The man settled back down, his dark eyes fixated on Satoru’s face with an intensity that felt heavier than his physical weight. "Do you have a favourite case?"
Satoru blinked, the question catching him off guard. "A favourite case? Do you have a police kink or something?" He arched a brow.
Ichiro laughed. "Nah, nothing like that." His finger continued its rhythmic stroking of Satoru’s chest. "Tell me something you’ve worked on. Something you solved that made you feel like the hero the papers say you are. I'm curious."
Satoru sighed, his gaze drifting to the dark corner of the room. "I don’t know. Honestly? I can’t fully focus on anything but Kenjaku. Even when I’m closing other files... when I'm catching the low-lives and the corporate thieves... he’s always there. In the back of my mind. Mocking me."
"Why does he bother you so much?" Ichiro asked quietly.
"Because it's personal," Satoru admitted, his voice dropping. "He started when I was a rookie. Just a few months out of the academy, and he hit a local precinct's payroll. I was the first one to realise the breach wasn't a glitch. I think I almost had him back then—I think I saw him on the CCTV footage of a library, using the computer there—and ever since, he’s been targeting me. He embeds my badge number in his encryption keys. He sends 'Merry Christmas' pings to my private work terminal. Once, he even redirected a food delivery to a stakeout I was on—Sichuan pepper ramen, exactly how I like it. He’s not just a criminal; he’s a shadow that follows me."
Ichiro leaned back into Satoru’s neck, his breath hot against his skin. "Sounds like he’s obsessed with you."
"Because he knows I’m obsessed with him," Satoru exhaled, a bitter smile touching his lips. "Whatever. I will catch him. I’ll be the one to turn his lights off eventually." He turned his head to look at Ichiro, trying to bridge the gap between his world of sirens and this man’s world of petals. "How about you? Do you have a favourite flower? Since you're a... you know. Florist."
Ichiro bit back a smile, his eyes shimmering with a private mirth. "A favourite flower?"
"Yeah. Something you like the most to... I dunno... do florist things with."
Ichiro looked thoughtful for a moment, his fingers pausing on Satoru's skin. "The Lycoris radiata," he said finally. "The Red Spider Lily. People think they’re omens of death or final goodbyes because they grow in graveyards. But I like them because they bloom when the leaves have already fallen. They stand alone. They don't need a system to support them."
Satoru grunted, the poeticism of it lost on his tired mind. "Spooky. Fits you, I guess."
Before Ichiro left in the pre-dawn hours, he pulled a scrap of paper from his pocket. He scribbled a string of numbers on it and pressed it into Satoru’s palm. "Call me when the bucket is empty, Gojo Satoru."
Satoru watched him leave, feeling a strange, hollow ache in his chest that had nothing to do with the physical soreness.
He waited three days.
He wanted to seem like he wasn't desperate, like he wasn't checking the paper every hour.
On the fourth day, sitting in his car outside a crime scene, Satoru finally dialled the number. He held the phone to his ear, his heart doing a stupid, youthful skip.
“The number you have dialled is not in service. Please check the number and dial again.”
Satoru pulled the phone back, staring at the screen. He redialed. Same result.
The cold, mechanical voice of the operator was the only answer he got.
The very next day, Satoru sat in his car for a long time, the engine idling and the heater blasting a dry, artificial warmth that didn't reach his bones.
He had redialed the number twenty more times.
Every time, that same mechanical woman’s voice informed him that the number was not in service.
He drove to the address he had pulled from the database on New Year’s Day—the Sugawara Florals shop. It was located on a quiet corner in a residential pocket of Setagaya.
The shop looked exactly like the photo in the wallet: a modest, charming storefront with wooden bins of winter blooms braving the cold.
Satoru stepped out of the car, his heart doing a nervous thud. He felt ridiculous. He was a detective of the Metropolitan Police, yet he was standing here like a jilted teenager, adjusting his coat and wondering if he had overstayed his welcome.
The bell above the door gave a bright, cheery chim-chime as he entered.
The air inside was humid and sweet, and dense with the scent of lilies and damp soil.
A customer, a young woman picking out a bouquet of white carnations, glanced at him briefly, then looked away.
Satoru stood by the door, his height making the small shop feel even more cramped.
From the backroom, an old woman emerged.
She was small, her back slightly hunched, carrying a heavy ceramic vase. She had silver hair pinned back in a bun and wore a green apron stained with plant food.
Satoru cleared his throat, his professional mask sliding into place to hide his anxiety. "Excuse me. Good afternoon."
The woman looked up, squinting through thick glasses. "Good afternoon, young man. Can I help you find something? We have some very fresh camellias in today."
"Actually," Satoru said, stepping toward the counter. "I’m not here for flowers. I’m looking for your grandson... Ichiro? Sagishi Ichiro?"
The woman froze. The pleasant, customer-service smile vanished from her face, replaced by a look of profound confusion. She set the vase down on the counter.
"I’m sorry?" she asked, her voice turning thin. "What is this about?"
Satoru hesitated. He didn't want to sound like a stalker, but he didn't want to flash his badge and scare her either. "I... I met him recently. At a bar. We spent some time together, and I realised I didn't have a way to reach him. I just wanted to see if he was here."
The woman’s expression shifted from confusion to something sharper—something like pain. "A bar? You met Ichiro at a bar?"
"Yes," Satoru said, his brow furrowing. "On New Year's Eve."
The woman stared at him as if he were speaking a foreign language. "Young man, I don't know what kind of game you're playing, but it isn't funny. Is this about the estate? Is this some police matter?"
"Police?" Satoru caught the word, his instincts finally screaming. "No, I'm... I am a detective, actually. Gojo Satoru. But I'm here on a personal matter. Is Ichiro in some kind of trouble?"
"Trouble?" The woman let out a wet, choked sound that might have been a laugh. "Detective, I don't know who you met. But my grandson, Ichiro... he’s been dead for five years."
Satoru felt the world tilt. The smell of the lilies became suddenly cloying, suffocating. He blinked, shaking his head. "What? No. That’s—that’s not right. I met him. I was with him. He’s about my height, long dark hair, very... very distinct looking."
"Ichiro was five-foot-seven and had a buzz cut for the military," she snapped, her voice breaking with grief. "He died in a motorcycle accident in Akita in 2001. Five years ago, Detective! How dare you come in here and say such things!"
Satoru felt cold. A deep, awful chill that started at his spine and radiated outward. "I saw the records," he whispered, more to himself than to her. "The National Database. I saw his photo. I saw your shop listed as his place of employment."
"Then your records are wrong," she said, her hands trembling as she reached under the counter. She pulled out a small, framed shadowbox. Inside was a memorial, a picture of a young man in a uniform, smiling broadly.
He was plain. He was shorter. He was entirely, fundamentally not the man who had pinned Satoru to his own headboard.
"This is my Ichiro," she whispered.
Satoru’s hands shook slightly as he took a photo of the article. He didn't wait to explain. He stumbled out of the shop, the bell ringing a frantic goodbye behind him.
He sat in his car, the engine idling, and dialled the station.
"Haibara," he barked into the phone. "Check the death records for Sagishi Ichiro. Physical archives. Hospital records. Cross-reference them with the digital database I looked at on January first."
"Satoru-san? What’s going on?"
"Just do it!"
Days passed in a blur of frantic, obsessive investigation.
The results were a nightmare.
In the physical world—the world of paper files, hospital basements, and dusty funeral home ledgers—Sagishi Ichiro had been dead five years. But in the digital world, Ichiro was alive, well, and had a face that looked like a prepubescent idol.
Someone had hacked the National Police Database. They hadn't merely stolen data; they had fucking rewritten entirely a dead man’s life. They had swapped the photos, scrubbed the death certificate from the servers, and created a digital ghost specifically for Satoru to find.
Then a week later, the city held its breath.
Every screen in Shibuya—every television in every shop window and every billboard above the crossing—flickered to life. It wasn't a bank heist this time.
It was a complete takeover of the city’s broadcast signal.
The screen stayed black for three seconds before a single line of white text appeared, scrolling slowly across the monitors of the Metropolitan Police Department:
"ᑢᗩᖶᑢᕼ ᘻᘿ, ᕲᘿᖶᘿᑢᖶᓰᐺᘿ ᘜᓍᒚᓍ.
ᘺᓰᖶᕼ ᒪᓍᐺᘿ, ᒪᖻᑢᓍᖇᓰS ᖇᗩᕲᓰᗩᖶᗩ."
The precinct erupted into chaos.
Detectives were shouting, technicians were slamming their hands on keyboards, and the Chief was demanding an explanation.
"'Catch me, Detective Gojo. With love, Lycoris radiata?'" Yu read out loud, squinting at his screen. "What the hell is a Lycoris radiata? Is that a new virus strain?"
Satoru didn't hear the noise.
He didn't hear the phones ringing or the sirens outside.
He felt as though the air had been sucked out of the room. He could still feel the phantom sensation of those long fingers tracing his spine.
He could still hear that low, melodic voice asking about his favourite case.
"Red Spider Lily," Satoru whispered, his voice a ghost of itself.