cherry

Aquarius. 24. 🏳️‍🌈

[belimah]

18. I've Got All This Ringing In My Ears And None On My Fingers

art by mblydez

The apartment doesn't collapse after Kenny leaves. It doesn't look like something has ended.

Sukuna almost expects it to.

It should. Something should have moved in the world, cracked down the wall from ceiling to floor, shifted the furniture out of alignment, left the air visibly altered. It should feel like the aftermath of a fight, at least. Broken glass, blood on the floor, a door hanging crooked from the frame. Evidence. Sukuna understands evidence. He understands damage when he can see where it landed.

There is some pain, of course. He's not stupid enough anymore to mistake absence for immunity. Kenny still leaves an aftertaste in the apartment, a trace of perfume and hair product and expensive, useless rot. The bedroom still looks wrong because Kenny had been in it. The sheets are already stripped and shoved in the laundry basket with more force than necessary. The window is open even though the night air is too warm to cleanse anything properly. The little hair tie he tossed out is probably sitting somewhere on the pavement below, or maybe caught on a balcony ledge, looking pathetic and final.

But Sukuna doesn't feel like he is splitting apart.

That surprises him

The bed is bare except for the mattress cover, and the room smells too much like cold air now, like the city outside has been invited in to erase the last traces of someone who should have stayed in the past the first time they left him there.

He stands beside the bed for longer than necessary, listening.

Traffic, far below. A faint horn. The wind dragging over the edge of the building. Somewhere, a neighbor shuts a cabinet. Normal sounds. Stupid sounds. Sounds that keep existing with no respect for the fact that, minutes ago, he finally said the thing he should have said months ago. Years ago, maybe.

You have to go.

He thought it would feel worse. He expected something harsher, more vitriolic. The same sickness from the first time. He expects the familiar drop. That old, ugly internal fall, the one that used to start somewhere under his ribs and spread until his body felt too large and too hollow at once. He expects the same miserable animal feeling that had lodged beneath his skin when Kenny discarded him so easily while his body was useless, while Shoko had forbidden him from riding, while the knee throbbed until sleep came in rotten pieces and the world kept acting like he had been put on pause instead of violently removed from the only language he trusted. He remembers waiting then. Not in a way he admitted to anyone. Not sitting by his phone like some pathetic idiot in a movie. But awareness had gathered around the device all the same, every buzz dragging his eyes toward it, every empty hour making the silence louder.

Kenny had sent one message when he said he might retire.

Aw that sucks.

Three words, if that pathetic sound counted as one. Not even a question. Not even a performance of concern. Just the dull little dismissal of someone who had realized a machine might no longer produce the kind of shine they wanted to stand beside.

That had done something to him. He had called it anger. It had been easier to call it anger.

It had been the kind of injury that doesn't bruise anywhere visible, so he had put it into places where bruises made sense. Training too early. Snapping at Yuuji. Breaking things he then had to clean. Letting his mouth turn cruel because cruelty at least sounded like a choice. He had made a religion of not needing anyone who could leave, then got furious every time someone proved they could.

Tonight should have dragged him back there.

It doesn’t.

He is tired.

Drained, maybe.

There is a rawness under his skin, but it's not the old collapse. It's not the wild, crawling panic of being unwanted when he's not useful. It's not the ugly electricity that used to make him want to tear his life apart just to prove he could make the destruction look deliberate.

Kenny is gone.

The apartment is quiet.

He is still standing.

His hands ache faintly from the way he clenched them earlier, controlling himself when Kenny said your name in that slick, mocking tone, as if you were a delicate joke between people who understood the dirtier machinery of him better than you ever could. The memory makes his jaw lock.

Little teacher.

He has heard worse. He has said worse. None of that matters. There is something obscene about Kenny using you as a weapon, as if they know anything about the weight of your hand holding an ice pack against his shoulder through sleep. As if they could comprehend the way you looked at his ruined face and did not rearrange yourself around disgust. As if you were comparable to the glossy, empty people who loved a version of him that could be photographed.

He walks out of the bedroom before that thought finds teeth and root inside him.

The kitchen light comes on too harshly. He narrows his eye and opens one of the cabinets. Tea. Not alcohol. Not because he thinks alcohol would ruin him tonight, but it would soften the edges in the wrong direction, and he has had enough of cowardice disguised as appetite. The kettle fills. Water runs against metal. His reflection warps in the dark window above the sink — scar cutting pale through the side of his face, one eye red under the overhead light, hair shoved back messily because he has dragged his fingers through it too many times.

He looks like he always does.

He doesn't feel like he always does.

That's the part he doesn't know what to do with.

When the kettle begins to heat, he leans both hands against the counter and lowers his head. His shoulders feel heavy. His chest feels emptied out and full at the same time, a contradiction he hates because contradictions refuse to be solved by force. There is no action to take against missing you. No opponent to pin. No race to win. No machine to fix. No jump to clear. He cannot threaten longing into obedience.

He wants you.

The thought is not new.

It has been there all year, often enough that it lost the mercy of surprise. In locker rooms after shows, while applause still shakes through his bones and his body is buzzing from impact. In the bath after training, ice burning across swollen joints while steam rises around his shoulders. In sponsor meetings where everyone talks about resilience as if almost dying was a market strategy. In the passenger seat of his own car when Kenny sprawled beside him, talking too much, smelling like expensive perfume and old mistakes. In the few moments before sleep when the other side of the bed had weight again and somehow felt more empty than when it didn’t.

Wanting you is not the difficult part anymore.

The difficult part is knowing he is the reason you are not there.

There is no clean villain for him to focus on. Naoya had said the words at dinner, sure. Naoya had dragged the rot into the light with the subtlety of a dog vomiting on a white carpet. Kenny had been Kenny. His parents had taught him wrong, maybe. The industry had rewarded the worst of him. Crowds had made him think love looked like noise. All of that is true enough to be useless.

He still was the one who did it.

He still let you stand in rooms with men who knew something humiliating about the origin of your place in his life. He still never told you that the first night had begun in ugliness even if it became something else before he had the intelligence to understand it. He still stood in a parking lot with your hurt in front of him and chose to make himself the wounded thing, chose to accuse you before you could reject him, chose to use his own damage like a weapon because he could not bear the idea that you loved him when he had no victory to offer.

He had looked at love and called it pity because pity was easier to despise.

The kettle clicks off.

The apartment is too clean now. He made it that way after Kenny walked out because he couldn’t stand the evidence. He picked up a glass with lipstick on it and put it in the sink. He threw away a receipt Kenny left on the counter from some boutique Sukuna didn’t even remember passing. He opened the balcony door, then the kitchen window, then the bedroom window, as if air can be commanded into undoing a mistake.

It can’t. Still, the place smells less like Kenny now.

Tea is not his usual response to anything. He’s not the kind of man people imagine holding a mug between both hands while sorting through his fragile little feelings. He drinks coffee too bitter, water after training, protein shakes that taste like horrible punishment, sponsor energy drinks when contracts demand the appearance of brand loyalty. Tea is something you used to make when he was too wired after late events, when his body still had the track running through it, engine vibration ghosting in his hands, the roar of crowd noise buried in the hollows behind his ears.

You made tea like a ritual you pretended was casual.

You would ask what he wanted as if he ever gave helpful answers, then choose for him anyway. Something without too much caffeine. Something warm enough to make his hands settle. He used to mock you for it because that was easier than admitting the weight in his skull loosened when you set the mug beside him and told him, with that teacher voice you weaponized so naturally, to drink before he started acting like a demon on the furniture.

He pours himself tea now, alone, and watches the color bleed out slowly.

The smell rises thin, herbal, not quite the same as when you made it. He doesn’t know if the difference is the blend or the hands. Probably both. The mug is plain black, one of the few in his apartment not bought by someone else, and heat seeps into his fingers as he stands at the counter and waits for Yuuji.

His phone sits on the counter. Yuuji’s last message remains there.

I’m coming.

Sukuna had typed nothing after that. He had stared at the screen and thought about writing don’t, thought about saying he changed his mind, thought about turning weakness into irritation before his brother arrived and saw too much. He did none of it. That, too, feels like effort. Small, humiliating effort, but effort all the same.

He brings the mug to the table and sits.

The tea is too hot, but he drinks it anyway. The burn on his tongue gives him something straightforward to understand.

He waits. He doesn't pace. He wants to, but he doesn’t. He sits with one arm braced on the table, mug between his fingers, the apartment open and silent around him. The stripped bed waits in the other room like an accusation. He will need to put clean sheets on it before sleeping. He should have done it already. Instead, he lets the bedroom remain exactly as it is, because some part of him wants Yuuji to see the absence and understand without Sukuna having to say too much.

There was someone here. They are gone. I made them leave.

Not you. Not the one who should have been here, maybe. Not the one whose toothbrush had once stood beside his without him admitting he liked the domestic insult of it. Not the one who had folded clothes into his drawer and looked surprised every time he quietly made space. But still someone. A bad someone. An expensive mistake. The kind of mistake that proves he did not learn fast enough after losing you.

The doorbell rings. Sukuna’s body reacts before his mind does. His shoulders lift slightly, then settle. He hates that Yuuji can still make him feel caught, as if his brother is going to walk in and see through every wall Sukuna has left standing. But that has always been the problem with Yuuji. The brat looks at him and finds the soft parts by accident, then has the nerve to love them as if they are not embarrassing.

He stands and opens the door.

Yuuji is there in a hoodie, hair messy, eyes too awake for the hour. He must have come fast. He holds nothing except his phone and a look that tries not to be panic. He has gotten better at that, at not letting fear jump out of him immediately when Sukuna opens the door looking less than indestructible. But Sukuna sees it anyway. The quick scan — face, hands, posture, whether anything is broken, whether the air smells like alcohol, whether the apartment carries the sharp smell of a fight.

“I’m not dead.” Sukuna says.

Yuuji’s face pinches.

“Great greeting. Super normal.”

“You came to check if I was.”

“Yeah, and I’m starting with checking if you’re being annoying. Results are positive.”

The answer should irritate him. It doesn’t. Yuuji hardly really annoys him, but he would never admit it out loud.

Sukuna steps aside. Yuuji enters, kicks off his shoes, and barely gives Sukuna enough time to shut the door before turning and hugging him.

Tight.

Hard.

The kind of hug only Yuuji gives him because only Yuuji has survived long enough to know Sukuna will not peel him off by force. His brother’s arms lock around his middle and shoulders, face pressing briefly against his chest, body warm with the kind of unapologetic affection that used to make Sukuna stand there like someone had shoved a live wire into his ribs.

That has always been the exception. The first person allowed to crawl under Sukuna’s guard without being dragged out by the collar. The first person whose weight against him did not feel like a demand. As a child, Yuuji clung thoughtlessly, sticky hands in Sukuna’s shirt, drooling on him, falling asleep against his ribs as if Sukuna had been made to be a wall between him and everything else. Back then, Sukuna had not understood softness. He understood responsibility. He understood small limbs, meals cut into pieces, wet hair after baths, school bags, homework, fevers, the precise pitch of Yuuji’s cry when he was scared versus when he was hungry.

Love came later as a word.

The shape existed before that.

Yuuji holds tight enough that Sukuna feels the pressure against his scars, his shoulders, the tender places left in him by a year of pretending he doesn’t need what he lost.

He still stiffens. He always does at first. Then the old reflex loses to something older.

His hand comes up and lands on Yuuji’s back, broad palm between his shoulder blades. He doesn't squeeze much. He doesn't need to. Yuuji squeezes enough for both of them, the ridiculous brat, as if affection can be compressed into muscle and pressure and stubbornness.

Sukuna stares over his head at the hallway wall.

“I’m not crashing out this time.” He sighs.

Yuuji doesn’t let go immediately.

“You sure?”

“Yeah.”

“You texted ‘No’ when I asked if you were okay.”

“I just can’t organize my thoughts.”

“That’s normal.”

“Don’t say therapy shit at me.”

“It’s not therapy shit. It’s just true.”

Sukuna exhales through his nose and gives him a flat look.

“I’m tired, brat.”

That makes Yuuji’s hold loosen, not fully, just enough for him to lean back and look up. He has too much of their shared face in a different arrangement. Softer eyes. Open mouth. No instinct to make every expression look like a threat before anyone can call it need. The resemblance is less obvious these days because Yuuji dresses to avoid it, wears himself away from Sukuna’s shadow with deliberate little choices, but it's still there in the bones, the mouth, the set of the brow when worry digs in.

“Tired how?”

Sukuna looks away first.

“Drained. Empty. Don’t know.” He steps back before the hug can become something he has to think about too hard. “Kenny’s gone.”

Yuuji absorbs that. His face changes so quickly that Sukuna almost laughs. Relief, suspicion, anger, hope, all of it crowding for room. The brat has never been good at hiding from him. Or maybe Sukuna is only good at reading Yuuji because he spent years learning every shift in his little brother’s face to keep him safe, fed, understood, protected from the kind of household where being different could become a sentence without anyone using the word.

“Gone like… went home?” Yuuji asks carefully.

“Gone like they’re not coming back here.”

Yuuji’s shoulders drop with a breath he doesn’t quite let become dramatic.

“Oh.”

“Don’t sound that relieved.”

“I’m going to sound exactly as relieved as I am. Which is a lot.”

“Brat.”

“Yeah.” Yuuji looks past him toward the kitchen. “Tea?”

“Made some.”

“Good. Because this feels like a tea conversation.”

“Everything is a tea conversation to you when you’re trying not to say something stupid.”

Yuuji points at him while walking toward the kitchen.

“That’s called growth. You should try it.”

Sukuna almost tells him to fuck off. Almost. Instead, he gets another mug.

The normalcy of the action is strange. Yuuji moves around his kitchen like he knows where things are because he does. Because he has been here enough times in enough versions of disaster. Because when Sukuna had been twenty-six and ruined by the first collapse of Kenny’s absence, Yuuji had come over and made a breakfast so bad it should have counted as assault. Because his brother has a history of entering apartments where Sukuna refuses to ask for help and forcing life to continue through tea, food, terrible jokes, and the stubborn refusal to be chased out.

Sukuna pours tea into a second mug. Yuuji wraps both hands around it when he sits, though it's too hot to hold like that. He always does that. Always absorbs warmth like a kid, like comfort is something to be taken into the palms first.

The silence lasts long enough to become honest.

Sukuna sits across from him. He could talk about Kenny first. That would be easier. Kenny is easy to dissect because the conclusion is already finished. They hurt him. They used him. He let it happen because he knew how to be wanted that way. End of file. Close the drawer.

But that is not why he texted Yuuji. He drags one thumb along the side of his mug.

“I keep thinking about her.”

Yuuji’s eyes lift. Sukuna feels the room sharpen around the admission.

There are words he can say in public now that would have once been impossible. Injury reports. Pain. I need another week. I can’t see on that side. Tell Naoya if he touches my setup again I’ll break his fingers. Those became easier with necessity. This is different. This is a private exposure with no practical use.

He corrects himself internally the way he always has since losing you.

He keeps thinking about you.

He keeps thinking about your birthday coming closer. Your face when you laughed with your students, an image he has no right to and yet invents anyway. Your apartment, maybe with Maki, Shoko, Nobara, the others filling it with noise he used to tolerate only because you looked pleased in the middle of it. You in some restaurant with the boyfriend Yuuji has carefully never described unless asked directly by you. You wearing something pretty. You not wearing the shirts you returned through Shoko because they were his and therefore could not be kept without bleeding.

Yuuji doesn't interrupt. Sukuna continues, voice low.

“It’s driving me insane.”

“Thinking about her?”

“Wanting her.” The words scrape coming out. “Not in the usual way. Not just—” His jaw tightens. He doesn't need to say body, mouth, bed, thigh under his hand, the curve of your neck when you leaned over essays, the sound you made when amused despite trying not to be. Those wants are there, old and alive, but they are not the part tearing at him tonight. “I want her near. I want to talk to her. I want to know what her day was like. I want to hear her complain about students like she isn’t secretly fond of half of them. I want her in my kitchen telling me I’m making coffee wrong when she drinks that bitter garbage like it’s fucking medicine. I want—”

He stops.

The mug is too hot under his fingers. He welcomes it.

Yuuji stays quiet.

Sukuna breathes in through his nose, then out.

“And I know. I know I’m the reason she isn’t here. I know I don’t get to act like something was taken from me.”

The words land heavily and he feels his own anger pouring with them.

Yuuji looks down into his tea. Sukuna hates the silence but doesn’t fill it. Filling silence is how he usually avoids consequence. He has learned that much, at least. When things become unbearable, he used to swing first, speak sharpest, overwhelm the air until nobody could place a hand on the actual wound. Tonight, he waits because he asked Yuuji to come, and his brother came, and if he cannot stop performing control in his own kitchen with the one person who has seen him cry once and lived, then he has no business thinking about seeing you.

Finally, Yuuji asks,

“What do you want from me?”

There is nothing accusatory in it.

“I’m not asking you to be a bridge. Or a messenger. Don’t look at me like that.”

“I wasn’t—”

“You were thinking it.”

“I was… checking.” Yuuji’s grip shifts around the mug. “I still talk to her.”

“I know.”

“I’m not going to tell you things she doesn’t want you to know.”

“I know.”

“And if you ask me to bring her a message, I’ll say no unless she asks for it first.”

Sukuna’s eye narrows, but not from anger. The clarity stings, which means it's probably necessary.

“I just said I’m not asking that.”

“I need to say it back just to be clear.”

He wants to snap, then doesn’t. Yuuji sees the restraint. His expression softens with something like relief and sadness mixed together.

“Okay.”

Sukuna looks at the tea, untouched now.

“I want to know how to make it better. Or fix my own mess. Whatever wording doesn’t sound like I’m trying to put it on someone else.”

Yuuji’s thumb rubs slowly over the side of his mug.

“How the fuck do I make anything work without ruining her year again?” Sukuna asks. The question comes out rougher than intended. “That’s what I want from you. Not information. Not access. I need to know where to start before I make it worse.”

The room goes quiet again.

Yuuji thinks.

Sukuna can tell, and because it's Yuuji, he allows the waiting. The brat’s thoughts move across his face in small motions — brows drawing together, mouth pressing to one side, eyes lowering toward the table. He's not trying to produce the smartest answer. He is trying to produce the truest one, which is usually more annoying. And better.

At last, Yuuji sighs. It sounds tired.

Not tired of Sukuna. Not done. Just tired with the weight of having loved him through too many versions of self-destruction.

“Have you apologized already?”

Sukuna goes still.

The question is so obvious that coming from anyone else, he would have called them stupid. From Yuuji, it lands like a hand placed against the center of his chest.

“No.”

Yuuji nods slowly, as if he expected that and hated being right.

“Have you acknowledged what you did wrong? To her. Not in your head. To her.”

Sukuna’s jaw flexes.

“No.”

“Then that’s probably the first thing.”

He looks away toward the dark window.

“I haven’t contacted her since the parking lot.”

“I know.”

That pulls his gaze back.

“She told you?”

“Not everything.” Yuuji’s answer is careful, loyal in two directions but betraying neither. “Enough.”

Sukuna hates that you had to tell anyone. He hates that you had to carry the story out of that parking lot and make it into words for people who love you because he made silence impossible. He hates that Maki knows exactly what to hate him for now, that Shoko does, that Yuuji does, that the damage became communal because he could not protect your dignity from a situation he created.

“Apologizing can’t just be ‘I’m sorry,’” Yuuji says.

“I’m not that stupid.”

“You kind of were.”

Sukuna’s eye cuts to him. Yuuji doesn't flinch.

“I’m not saying that to be mean. I’m saying you did a lot of apologizing in your head while acting like being wounded explained everything.”

Sukuna leans back. The chair creaks. Yuuji continues, voice softer now, but not weaker in any way.

“You need to understand what you did and why it hurt her. Not why you panicked. Not what you were afraid of. That matters, but it comes later. First you need to know what you put her through.”

“I know now.”

“Then say it.”

Sukuna stares at him. Yuuji holds his gaze. There is no challenge in it, no smugness. Just patience. It’s worse than being challenged.

“What, now?” Sukuna asks.

“Yeah. Practice on me if you have to. I’m not her, but if you can’t say it out loud to me, you won’t say it right to her.”

Something ugly and defensive rises in him. It has familiar teeth. He nearly lets it speak.

Then he thinks of you on the passenger side of his car, maybe laughing at something he said because he had won that day and you were happy for him. You in the hospital, saying you loved him too much, voice broken with fear. You in the parking lot, face tight with hurt as you asked if it had all started as a lie. He remembers the look in your eyes when he turned his pain against you. He remembers how you did not scream in the way someone else might have. You became steady. You became clear because he had forced you to be the adult in the ruin he made.

His hand curls around the mug.

“I regret not telling her.”

Yuuji waits. Sukuna exhales through his teeth.

“It started as something filthy. A game. A habit. A bet, sometimes, though I told myself it wasn’t serious enough to matter because the people involved knew what kind of thing it was.” His lip curls at himself. “She didn’t.”

The tea cools slowly between them.

“I took her home that first night knowing there was a story behind how I noticed her that she didn’t know. Then I kept letting her get closer. I let her take care of me. I gave her a drawer. I took a key. I let her stand around Choso, Naoya, the team, people who knew enough to make a joke out of it if they wanted. I didn’t tell her because by then I didn’t want it to be true anymore.”

Yuuji’s gaze stays fixed on him. The words begin to cut deeper the longer he speaks, but there is a strange relief to the cutting. Like opening a wound properly instead of letting pressure build under skin.

“And at the dinner, when Naoya said it, I didn’t protect her from it. Couldn’t, by then. The damage was already there. Afterward, instead of owning it, I made it about me. About being broken. Useless. Not the champion anymore. I said things like she only liked the sport, like she stayed because of pity or because she wanted the version of me before the crash.”

His voice goes rough. Yuuji’s expression shifts with pain, but he doesn't look away. Sukuna makes himself continue.

“I knew it was bullshit. I knew. That’s the part I hate most.” His thumb presses hard against the ceramic. “I knew she wasn’t there for money or cameras. She was there when there was nothing good to look at. In bathrooms. Hospitals. On couches. With food I didn’t ask for and ice packs I pretended I didn’t need. I knew, and I still threw those things at her because if she rejected me for being cruel, at least it wouldn’t be because I wasn’t enough.”

Yuuji is very still now. The apartment hums softly around them.

“I regret saying it,” Sukuna says. “I regret not being faster. I regret making her feel stupid for caring about me. I regret putting her in a position where leaving me was the only way to stop me from turning my self-hatred into her problem. She saw all of it and stayed. I knew that." He repeats as if repetition would make anything better. Maybe it does. Maybe it makes it clearer in his head how bad he messed up. "Then I stood in front of her and acted like she wanted the rider, the access, the good seats, whatever easy shit would make her sound like everyone else. Because I couldn’t understand why she was still there otherwise. Because if I made her shallow, I didn’t have to look at the fact that she wasn’t.”

Yuuji’s eyes shine with something too close to grief. Sukuna looks away.

“I used the injury too,” he says. “I knew she was careful because she watched me almost die. I knew she was scared because she cared, because she was there when I woke up missing half my fucking face and my depth perception and whatever version of myself I thought made me worth wanting. I turned that into pity. I made her feel stupid for loving me while I was broken.”

Yuuji’s fingers tighten around his mug.

“You told her she loved you?” Yuuji asks softly with a small crease between his eyebrows.

“No.” Sukuna’s laugh has no amusement in it. “She told me. In the hospital.”

Yuuji’s breath catches.

“She did?”

Sukuna nods once. The memory is not clean. It is full of pain medication, fluorescent light, the heavy wrongness of waking in a body that had been rearranged by impact and surgery. Your face near him. Your eyes exhausted, furious with fear, beautiful in a way that made no sense then because he could barely organize light into shapes. You saying you loved him too much after he made some stupid joke because he could not bear the tenderness without dragging arrogance over it.

He did not say it back. He thought, later, that he had answered. You’re here. Don’t leave. To him, at the time, that was as close to naked as language could get. But he knows better now. Not because he has become suddenly eloquent. Because he understands that asking someone not to leave is not the same as telling them why you want them to stay. Wanting is not the same as giving. Needing is not the same as loving well.

“She said it,” Sukuna murmurs. “I didn’t.”

Yuuji closes his eyes for a second.

“Oh, Sukuna.”

“Don’t start that shit.”

“I’m not judging.”

“You sound like you’re attending my funeral.”

“It just sucks.”

“Yes, Yuuji. It fucking sucks.”

Yuuji does not flinch. He rarely does with Sukuna. Instead he leans back into the chair and looks at the ceiling too, their shoulders almost aligned, both of them staring upward as if answers might be written on the plaster.

“She made you better,” Yuuji says after a long moment. Sukuna’s eye shifts toward him. Yuuji does not look away from the ceiling.

“Not like fixed you. That’s not what I mean. I know people don’t fix people. But when you were with her, you were…” He searches for the word and frowns when it doesn’t come fast enough. “More willing to be cared for, I guess.”

Sukuna’s mouth tightens. Yuuji continues before he can cut in.

“You hated it, but you let her do things. Food. Ice. Baths. Talking you down after rides. Making you rest even when you wanted to chew through the walls. You complained all the time, but you listened more. Sometimes.”

“Glowing review.”

“I’m being generous.”

“I don’t want to ruin her year again.” Sukuna hates the way that confession scrapes out of him. “That’s what I keep thinking. What if I go near her and all I do is drag the past back up? What if she’s finally fine and I become another fucking impact she has to recover from?”

Yuuji’s gaze lowers. Something in that movement is answer enough.

Sukuna feels it like a bruise.

“She’s not fine?”

“I’m not doing this.”

Sukuna breathes in through his nose and lets it out slowly.

“Right.”

Yuuji’s shoulders loosen, not because the moment is easy, but because Sukuna caught himself.

Small victory, maybe. Pathetic that it counts.

“I talk to her,” Yuuji says after a while. “You know that. I care about her.”

“I know.”

“And I care about you.”

Sukuna’s mouth twists.

“Unfortunately.”

“Very unfortunately.” Yuuji’s smile comes and goes. “So I’m not going to help you corner her. I’m not going to tell you private things. If you ask directly, I’ll probably get mad. But I can tell you this: if you apologize, make it about what you did, not what you want. Don’t ask for anything while you’re doing it. Don’t make her comfort you. Don’t make your regret so loud that she has to take care of it.”

Sukuna listens. The irritating thing is that every word makes sense.

“I know,” he says. Yuuji lifts an eyebrow. Sukuna glares. “I do.”

“Good.” Yuuji drinks more tea, now cool enough not to hurt him. “Then maybe start there.”

“Start where?”

“Understanding. Apologizing. Not fucking up.”

Sukuna stares. Yuuji gestures vaguely with the mug.

“Look, I didn’t say I had a complex plan.”

“That was useless.”

“It was foundational.”

“Never say foundational again.”

“I learned it from therapy TikTok.”

“I’m disowning you.”

“You can’t. I’m your favorite.”

“My only brother.”

“Still favorite.”

Sukuna scoffs, but there is no force behind it. Yuuji takes a careful sip of tea, then sets the mug down with both hands still around it. Sukuna studies him.

“You’ve gotten annoying.”

“I learned from the best.”

“So you definitely learned from Maki.”

Yuuji almost smiles. The mention of Maki brings your world closer. Sukuna imagines her finding out he texted, if he ever does. Imagines her taking your phone and replying with a threat. Imagines her physically standing in front of you if he appears too close, because she has always had a simpler relationship with violence than she pretends. He respects it more than he wants to admit. It is honest, at least. Maki loves you like a locked door loves a keyhole only you can use.

“She’ll run me over,” he says.

Yuuji looks up.

“Probably. I mean, you gave her reasons.”

“I know that.”

“Then maybe don’t show up in a way that makes her think she has to?”

Sukuna absorbs that.

“Again, how?”

Yuuji leans back, thinking again.

“You don’t corner her. You don’t use me. You don’t make a big thing. You don’t act like apologizing means she owes you a conversation. You accept no if she gives it. You keep it about what you did, not how much you suffered afterward.”

Sukuna’s mouth tightens. The brat is right, which irritates him enough to keep him grounded.

They talk for hours. Not continuously. Sukuna doesn't have that kind of clean confession in him, and Yuuji doesn't force one long emotional excavation just because the opening exists. They talk in uneven pieces, broken by tea refills and silence and one argument about whether Kenny should be blocked immediately or after Sukuna gets bored enough to send something cruel. Yuuji votes block. Sukuna says he is not twelve. Yuuji says twelve-year-olds at least understand blocking toxic people if given proper instructions. Sukuna tells him to shut up and blocks Kenny while Yuuji watches with the smugness of someone witnessing civic progress.

They talk about the first months after the breakup. Sukuna admits he waited for you to call him. Not because he thought you owed it to him. Because some arrogant, wounded animal in him thought pain that big had to pull both directions hard enough to force contact. When you didn’t, he told himself it was proof you were better without him. Then he hated that. Then he hated himself for hating it. Then he rode harder.

Yuuji tells him, without details, that you kept living. Sukuna pretends not to be grateful for that information and fails badly enough that Yuuji’s face softens.

They talk about the comeback. Sukuna describes the first time depth perception betrayed him over a jump after losing the eye, how distance became something he had to relearn with his entire body. How he hated the hesitation more than the injury. How Choso stood beside the track with a board and a face so serious Sukuna wanted to throw a wrench at him. How Nanami timed every controlled run like a man managing a volatile investment. How Shoko threatened to sedate him if he turned rehabilitation into an ego contest.

Yuuji says he watched the comeback clips online because seeing it in person felt too hard while they weren’t really talking. Sukuna feels that one like a strike.

“I was a shitty brother.”

Yuuji looks down into his empty mug.

“Yeah. For a while.”

There is no drama in it, which makes it worse and better.

“I’m sorry,” Sukuna says.

Yuuji’s fingers pause. Sukuna looks at him, forcing himself not to turn the apology into a joke or a complaint.

“For that. Ignoring you. Letting Kenny get in my head about you before. Doing it again after I knew better. You shouldn’t have had to chase me around my own bullshit.”

Yuuji blinks quickly, then looks away.

“Thanks.”

“That’s all?”

“What do you want, a parade? I’m processing.”

Sukuna rolls his eye.

“You’re annoying.”

“I came here at midnight because you texted me the emotional equivalent of a raccoon in a dumpster.”

“That sentence means nothing to me.”

“It means you’re welcome.”

They talk until the apartment begins to feel less like a place Kenny has left and more like a place Yuuji has entered. That is the difference, Sukuna realizes around three in the morning, when his head aches and his body finally starts to lose the edge of adrenaline. People leave traces. Kenny leaves contamination. Yuuji leaves warmth, crumbs on the counter from some snack he found in Sukuna’s cabinet without asking, a hoodie tossed over the arm of the couch, a second mug in the sink.

You used to leave flowers in his kitchen once. Not often. Not in a decorating way. Sometimes you would stop by with something small from a market or a student’s gift you said would die at your place because you’d forget to change the water. He called them weeds. You told him he had the emotional range of a drawer. He kept them alive anyway.

The conversation stretches from there in circles that return to the same wounds with slightly better tools each time. Yuuji asks questions Sukuna hates. What made the bet different in his head back then. When he realized you were not like the others. Why he never told you after he realized. What exactly made the parking lot go so wrong. Whether he wanted forgiveness or access. Whether he knew the difference.

That one makes Sukuna go silent for a long time. Forgiveness or access. He hates the question because there was a time he would not have known the difference. Forgiveness was not a moral category to him then, it was a door reopening. If someone forgave him, he could return to what he wanted. If someone did not, he could decide they never mattered or hate them for proving they did. He had thought in outcomes, not repair. Possession, not trust.

Now, sitting at his kitchen table with cooling tea and Yuuji’s tired eyes across from him, he understands the difference enough that it scares him.

“You can’t fix it by wanting her back.”

“I'm aware.”

“You can’t fix it by being sad enough.”

“I know.”

“And you can’t fix it by showing up like a grand romantic gesture and expecting that because you figured out your feelings, she has to be ready.”

Sukuna’s jaw sets, but he nods. Yuuji watches him carefully.

“Do you know that, or are you agreeing because you want me to stop talking?”

“I know it.”

“Okay.”

“I want her okay,” he says eventually.

Yuuji watches him.

“I want her to know I know. Even if she never lets me near again.” His voice drops. “I want access too. I’m not going to lie and pretend I don’t. I want her in my life. I want her back in every selfish way there is. But if I make the apology serve that first, then it’s just another thing I’m taking from her.”

Yuuji’s face softens.

“That,” he says quietly. “That sounds closer.”

Sukuna looks away. Closer is not enough. Closer doesn't put you beside him. Closer doesn't undo a year. Closer doesn't rewrite the dinner or the parking lot or the messages never sent because sending them would have been bleeding on your floor from a distance.

But closer is something.

The night thins around the windows. At some point, Yuuji makes more tea. At another point, Sukuna orders food because neither of them ate properly and Yuuji gets dramatically moody when hungry even if he claims he doesn’t. They sit on the living room floor with takeout between them because the table has become too heavy with confessions, and Yuuji talks about the last year in the careful way of someone carrying stories that do not belong entirely to him.

He tells Sukuna he was happy when he met you. It had nothing to do with you being pretty, though Yuuji says this with the innocent sincerity of a younger brother who doesn’t realize how violently Sukuna doesn’t need him noticing. Sukuna throws a napkin at him, and Yuuji dodges while laughing.

Not because you liked motocross either. Not because you took care of Sukuna after the first crash, though that had meant something too.

“I was happy because you didn’t seem like you were performing around her all the time,” Yuuji says, chewing slowly, gaze lowered toward the food. “You still acted like an asshole.”

“Thanks.” 

“You did. But it was different. You’d complain, and then you’d listen when she talked. You’d pretend not to care, but you remembered things. You let her help you even when you were being difficult. I hadn’t really seen you do that with someone outside the team. Not like that. She looked at you like a person.”

Sukuna says nothing. The city noise outside drifts in, distant and thin. A siren wails somewhere far enough to be unimportant. The apartment lights cast shadows under Yuuji’s eyes. He should be asleep.

“A lot of people look at you like something else,” Yuuji says. “Champion. Asshole. Monster. Money. Problem. Entertainment. Someone they can say they touched. Someone they can win something from. She looked annoyed at you, mostly.”

Sukuna lets out a rough breath despite himself. Yuuji smiles faintly.

“But she looked annoyed at you like you were real. And when you were hurt, she didn’t look disappointed. I always wanted you to have that. Someone who didn’t need you to be impressive before they cared.”

The room goes still in a way Sukuna cannot blame on silence. He feels his own body too clearly. The mug cooling between his hands. The healed pull of the scar. The tightness low in his throat, shame and longing and grief all tangled in the same ugly knot. He thinks of Yuuji as a kid, holding his hand in a crowded street without asking. Yuuji cheering at his first smaller races, screaming until his voice cracked even before sponsors, before Monster, before the world knew what to call him. Yuuji loving him badly sometimes, childishly, helplessly, but loving him before Sukuna could win anything worth displaying.

He had that. He forgot to count it because it did not come from the crowd.

“I fucked it,” Sukuna says.

“Yeah.”

The answer is immediate. Sukuna’s eye cuts to him. Yuuji looks almost apologetic.

“You said it. I’m agreeing.”

“You’ve grown bold, brat.”

“I’ve been bold. You just ignore it.”

A sound leaves Sukuna’s chest. Not quite a laugh, but close enough that Yuuji’s mouth flickers.

“I... always wanted you to get loved like that.”

The words hit him so hard he almost becomes angry. Not at Yuuji. At the sentence. At the audacity of it. At the way it puts a hand directly into the old cavity in his chest and touches something he has spent most of his life armoring over.

Loved like that.

Like care without invoice. Like patience without spectacle. Like someone watching him fail to be magnificent and staying to make sure he ate anyway. Like hands that did not clap because he won but pressed into his back after training because the muscles were locked and he was too proud to ask. Like your voice telling him substitutes should not take your classes because you had a life too, because loving him did not mean becoming furniture in his recovery.

He had not known what to do with it. So he had ruined it.

His throat tightens in a way that makes him want to stand up. Yuuji keeps talking, maybe because he knows if he stops, Sukuna will find somewhere to hide.

“I used to think, when we were kids, that if someone just paid attention, they’d see it. How hard you were trying. How much you did. How you took care of me even when nobody asked if you wanted to. I thought adults were supposed to notice that stuff.”

Sukuna stares at the carton in his hand.

“But they didn’t,” Yuuji says. “Or they did and acted like it was normal because it made life easier for them. And then you found bikes and everyone suddenly noticed you when you were doing something dangerous. And I hated that too, even when I loved watching you ride, because I could see it getting all tangled.”

Sukuna’s fingers flex once.

“You should have said this earlier,” he mutters, because that’s easier than saying the words hurt.

“I did. You told me I was jealous and didn’t understand winning.”

Sukuna closes his eye briefly. Yuuji lets the answer sit.

“Yeah,” Sukuna says after a while. “I was a prick.”

“You were.”

“No hesitation?”

“I’m practicing honesty.” He smirks and Sukuna scoffs, but the sound has no force.

They talk until the clock numbers become offensive. Midnight passes. Then one. Then later. At some point the conversation turns to Shoko, to the garage, to Choso’s guilt, to Nanami’s silent disapproval, to Naoya’s continuing existence as a reason the world remains flawed. Yuuji laughs more when the topic moves away from you, but he always circles back gently, as if checking whether Sukuna is still standing near the truth or has wandered off to hide behind anger again.

He doesn't wander far. Not tonight. The fatigue eventually becomes physical. It settles into Sukuna’s shoulders, pulls at the socket behind his remaining eye, makes the scar on his face feel tight and overhandled by expression. Yuuji yawns so wide it looks painful, then denies being tired while blinking too slowly to be convincing.

“Go home,” Sukuna says.

“No.” Yuuji rubs one eye.

“You have your own place.”

“You texted me like a cursed Victorian ghost. I’m not leaving.”

“Did you have to put it like that? Talk normal, you’re giving me a headache.”

“Good. Sleep will fix it.”

They put clean sheets on the bed with the clumsy aggression of two people who both think they know the best way to do it. Yuuji gets the fitted sheet wrong twice. Sukuna calls him useless. Yuuji says at least he knows how to apologize like a normal person, then immediately ducks when Sukuna throws a pillow at him. The pillow misses because Sukuna lets it miss. They both know. Neither comments.

For a moment, they lie in the dark like they used to when Yuuji was small and nightmares made him sneak into Sukuna’s bed. Back then, Sukuna would complain, shove him toward the edge, then stay awake until Yuuji’s breathing deepened. He told himself it was because he didn’t want to deal with crying. It was never only that. Sharing a bed with Yuuji has never bothered him. It should, maybe, by the standards of people who didn’t spend childhoods tangled through necessity. Yuuji had slept in his bed as a kid often enough to make the habit feel carved into the old structure of them. Nightmares, storms, fever, loneliness he couldn’t name. He had woken with a small foot in his ribs, a drooling face against his arm, sticky fingers grabbing his shirt. He had told himself he allowed it because the brat would make more noise if refused.

Now Yuuji is grown, taking too much space, feet nearly hanging off the bed. Sukuna stares at the ceiling.

“Hey,” Yuuji murmurs, voice thick with sleep.

“What?”

“I’m glad Kenny’s gone.”

Sukuna closes his eye.

“Yeah.”

“And I’m glad you texted.”

He says nothing to that. Yuuji, almost asleep, adds,

“Don’t be stupid this week.”

Sukuna’s mouth shifts in the dark.

“Too broad.”

“Try.”

“Sleep, brat.”

Yuuji does. Sukuna stays awake longer, listening to his brother breathe and the city beyond the glass. Wanting you remains there, unsolved, but it no longer claws through him alone. It sits beside other things now. Apology. Patience. Fear. The possibility that he can act without demanding immediate reward.

For the first time since Kenny left, the bed doesn’t feel contaminated by absence. Not full in the way Sukuna wants. Not warm in the way your body would make it warm, not shaped by your breathing, your hair on his pillow, your knee pressed against him when you pretend you don’t sleep close. But not empty enough to swallow him either.

Yuuji breathes heavily beside him. Sukuna stares at the ceiling until sleep takes him in pieces, and it doesn't feel like falling.

It feels like being allowed to stop holding himself upright for a few hours.

When morning comes, the apartment looks less like an ending and more like a place he has to live in.

That's inconvenient.

Sukuna wakes with his neck stiff and Yuuji starfished halfway across the bed like an inconsiderate corpse. One of Yuuji’s knees is dangerously close to Sukuna’s thigh. His arm is flung over a pillow. His mouth is open. He still sleeps like he expects the world to forgive him.

Sukuna shoves his leg away. Yuuji makes an offended noise without waking.

“Still useless,” Sukuna mutters.

He gets up, showers, dresses for the garage, and makes coffee strong enough to resurrect the dead. Yuuji emerges twenty minutes later looking like something found behind a convenience store, hair smashed on one side, face creased from the pillow. He accepts coffee with both hands and no dignity.

Yuuji eats everything available for breakfast and complains there is no good cereal. Sukuna tells him to buy his own. Yuuji says older brothers are supposed to provide. Sukuna tells him younger brothers are supposed to become tolerable eventually, and he is behind schedule. It’s normal enough that the night before feels almost like a fever dream, except the air between them has shifted slightly. Not fixed. Not magically healed. Just cleaner in one corner.

At the garage, the world smells like rubber, metal, fuel, and heat. Familiar.

Sukuna understands that place better than his own apartment sometimes. The garage doesn’t ask for emotional precision. It asks whether bolts are tightened, whether suspension settings make sense, whether the bike responds, whether the body can handle what the mind demands. Concrete. Mechanical. Honest.

Yuuji comes along because he’s still in watchdog mode but disguises it by annoying Choso with questions and eating the food Uraume brought for Sukuna’s meal plan until Uraume looks ready to stab him with a fork. Sukuna pretends not to enjoy the way Choso relaxes when he sees Yuuji there, like the younger Itadori’s presence is proof Sukuna didn’t burn the night down after all.

Shoko appears around midmorning with a tablet in one hand and sunglasses pushed into her hair.

She stops when she sees Sukuna.

Her gaze flicks over him, doctor first, friend somewhere beneath. She takes in the face, the posture, the lack of fresh damage, the fact that Yuuji is sitting on a crate nearby eating something with powdered sugar and trying not to get it on any equipment.

“You look less awful than I expected,” she says.

“Your bedside manner gets worse.”

“I’m off the clock. Emotionally.”

He snorts. She comes closer, lowering her voice enough that the garage noise covers them.

“Kenny?”

“Gone.”

Shoko’s eyes sharpen.

“Gone as in out of the apartment or gone as in blocked before the next relapse?”

Sukuna’s eye narrows.

“Yuuji got to you?”

“No. I have pattern recognition.”

“Blocked.”

Her brows lift a fraction.

“Miracles do happen.”

“Don’t start this early, I already had Yuuji in my head.” He looks away toward the bike because saying the next part directly at her feels too exposed. "I’m done with that mistake.”

For a second, she says nothing. Then she exhales, quiet and relieved in a way that would offend him if he didn’t understand exactly why.

“Good.”

“That all?”

“I could give a speech.”

“Don’t.”

“I’ll spare you because it’s early.”

“How generous.”

Shoko studies him.

“You okay?”

“I’m not crashing out.”

“That’s not what I asked.”

“It’s the answer you get.”

Her mouth curves faintly.

“Unfortunately true.”

He leans one hip against the workbench. His body wants movement, the familiar irritation of a training day, but he keeps still. He’s learning that stillness doesn't always mean being trapped. Sometimes it means not running from the thing standing in front of him.

“Yuuji came over,” he says.

“I saw the emotional support idiot.”

“He’s not a dog.”

“Debatable.”

Sukuna’s mouth almost moves.

“We talked.”

Shoko’s expression doesn’t change much, but her attention deepens.

“I’m going to apologize,” he says. The words come low. Not a declaration for the room. Not something he wants overheard by Naoya or carried around the team like gossip. “If she lets me.”

Shoko is silent long enough that he looks at her again. She doesn’t look impressed, which is great. He doesn't think he could stand impressed. He looks away, toward the garage floor visible through the open door. A mechanic laughs at something. Choso’s voice answers, soft and serious. Someone starts an engine briefly, then cuts it.

"You should," she says, finally. That is worse than if she had mocked him. He scratches one thumb against the inside of his wrist. “And you should understand that apologizing doesn't guarantee access.”

"Yuuji said the same.”

“Yuuji is often emotionally correct.”

“Don’t tell him that.”

“I will if it annoys you.”

He exhales through his nose, then looks back at her.

“I don’t know if she’ll hear it.”

“She may not. She may hear it and still not want you near her. She may have moved on.”

His eye sharpens despite himself. Shoko’s gaze does not move.

The reaction in him is immediate and unpleasant. Not anger at her. A territorial, wounded flash that has no right to exist and therefore enrages him more. He has no claim. He forfeited the right to even ask. You could be with someone kind. You could be loved properly. You could have a life that does not include waiting for a damaged champion to learn accountability at the pace of erosion. He breathes once.

“Then she has,” he says.

Shoko watches the work it takes to say that and gives no mercy for it.

“If you plan to do this right, you don’t make that her problem.”

“I’m aware.”

“Good.”

He pushes off the wall.

“Anything else, doctor?”

“Yes. Don’t go to the bar this week.”

Sukuna’s attention locks onto her.

She doesn't elaborate. She doesn't need to, it’s your birthday week. Yuki’s bar. Shoko’s circle of women. Drinks. Your friends. You. The possibility opens in him so violently that his fingers tighten against the workbench.

“When?”

Shoko looks up. He knows he shouldn’t have asked. Her gaze cools.

“No.”

“I’m not planning anything.”

“No.”

His jaw sets. Shoko steps closer, voice still calm.

“If I tell you, you’ll do something stupid and call it fate.”

He wants to say he wouldn’t but he's not yet sure that would be true, so he says nothing.

Shoko’s expression softens by a degree.

“Let her have her birthday.”

That lands where it needs to.

Let you have your birthday.

Not his guilt. Not his longing. Not his dramatic return. Yours. A day where your friends spoil you, where you drink something too sweet and laugh at something Nobara says, where Maki watches the room like a guard dog and Shoko pretends she is not doing the same. A day that should not become about whether Sukuna has finally learned to arrive without ruining the floor under your feet.

He looks down.

“I’m not fucking it up this time.”

Her eyes soften only at the edges.

“I hope you don’t.”

“I intend to stop my fucking-up streak.”

Shoko’s eyes flicker with something he refuses to name as hope because hope from Shoko is too dangerous. She folds one arm across her middle, tablet resting against her side.

“I hope you do,” she says. “For your sake too, not just hers.”

He scoffs, but the sound is quieter than usual.

Yuuji leaves after lunch. He hugs Sukuna in the garage parking lot, because apparently shame is optional when one is emotionally hydrated. Sukuna stands through it with only one muttered insult, which Yuuji takes as a victory. Before leaving, his brother points at him and says,

“Don’t be weird.”

“That's useless advice.”

“Don’t be your worst kind of weird.”

“Still useless.”

“Think before acting.”

Sukuna gives him a flat look.

“Are you done?”

“No. But I have work, so you get a break.” Yuuji’s face softens again, irritatingly. “Text me if you feel… you know.”

“I won’t.”

“You can.”

Sukuna looks away.

“I know.”

Yuuji smiles like that answer matters. After he leaves, Sukuna trains, but not on the bike, although he wants to. Badly enough that want gathers in his hands, in his knees, in the old hunger between shoulder blades. Riding would clear the noise. It always does at first. The engine under him, the track opening, the body forced into precision so absolute that thought becomes useless unless it serves movement. He could burn through the agitation that way. Let the machine carry what the heart has no use for.

But wanting to ride because he is unsettled is exactly the kind of thing Shoko would call stupid. Worse of all, she would be right. So he goes to the gym.

Weights. Controlled movements. No reckless load. No punishment disguised as discipline. He hates how many rules he has collected. Warm up properly. Monitor the knee. Don’t overwork the shoulder. Watch depth perception fatigue. Don’t train through certain kinds of pain. Sleep. Eat. Listen. The list feels like a leash some days, but he also knows the leash is the reason he still gets to ride at all.

He lifts until his muscles burn cleanly, not destructively. He runs drills that leave sweat sliding down his spine and dampening his shirt. He stops before the old part of him can demand more just to prove he can take it.

Small victories are insulting.

Still, they count.

The next day, Choso mentions Yuki’s bar.

Not directly at first, because Choso has never been slick in the way Mei Mei is slick or cruel in the way Naoya is cruel. His caution is visible from across the garage, which is probably why Sukuna catches it immediately. He’s adjusting something near the bike when Choso says,

“We should keep some distance from Yuki’s this week.”

Sukuna’s hand stills over the part, and Choso continues without looking at him.

“The girls are doing a night out there.”

The girls. Not your name. Sukuna doesn't reward the attempt by pretending not to understand.

“When?”

Choso’s mouth presses together and the hesitation answers before he does.

Sukuna’s eye lifts. Choso sighs quietly.

“Sukuna.”

“When?”

“I shouldn’t.”

“No, you shouldn’t.”

Choso looks at him now, and there is guilt there. Old guilt. Dinner guilt. Bet guilt. The kind that has made Choso careful around your name for a year because he had known enough to be ashamed and not enough courage then to stop it.

“Tomorrow night.”

There.

The knowledge enters him like a lit match.

Tomorrow night, you will be at Yuki’s bar.

He knows the place. Knows the entrance, the counter, the screens, the back booth where you once sat with him while pretending not to notice his hand on your knee. Knows the way you look under the warm low light there, eyes bright when you drink, mouth softening around laughter when Maki says something brutal enough to be funny. He could go. Not with the team. Alone. He could appear near closing, make it accidental, let the city do what cowardice wants to call fate. He could see you before your actual birthday. Could confirm with his own eye that you are alright. Could maybe hear your voice.

His whole body leans toward the idea. He hates himself for it. Choso watches him carefully.

“What time?”

Choso pauses. Sukuna’s mouth tightens.

“Don’t answer.”

“I wasn’t going to.”

Silence.

Then Choso says, quietly,

“I’m sorry.”

Sukuna looks at him. Choso keeps his eyes on the wheel.

“For knowing. For not telling her. I told myself it wasn’t my place. That you had changed. That it would hurt her for no reason once it became real.” His fingers slow. “I was wrong.”

Sukuna’s instinct is to absolve him because Choso’s guilt is inconvenient and because Sukuna doesn't like seeing his friend look like that. But absolution would be another way to make himself comfortable.

“Yes,” Sukuna says instead. “You were.”

Choso nods once. Sukuna looks away first.

“So was I.”

“Yeah.”

It is not gentle, exactly. But it's honest.

“Relax.” Sukuna sets the tool down. “I’m not going to the bar.”

Choso’s shoulders loosen, though not fully. A small nod.

“Good.”

“Don’t say it like you were expecting me to be a dog.”

Choso’s expression goes too honest.

“I was worried.”

Sukuna looks at him. Choso doesn't look away. That, too, has changed over the year. Before, Choso might have absorbed Sukuna’s irritation in silence and let it pass as weather. Now he stands there with the weight of what he failed to do before, and he doesn't cower from being useful after the damage.

“I don’t want her birthday ruined,” Choso says.

Sukuna’s jaw works.

“Neither do I.”

The words come out rough, but they come. Choso nods again, this time with something like respect.

That night, Sukuna doesn't go to Yuki’s.

It takes more from him than he wants to admit.

He spends the hours like an animal kept from pacing by will alone. Gym again, but lighter. Shower. Food. Laundry. A tedious review of sponsor obligations Mei Mei sent with too many highlighted sections. He checks his phone too often and hates every instance. No one texts him anything about you because no one should. He has no right to updates, no right to the shape of your night, no right to know if you laugh, if you drink, if Yuki is nice to you, if Shoko says anything about him.

At one point he stands near the window, city lights below, and imagines the bar. Imagines walking in. Maki would see him first. That thought almost makes his mouth curve despite everything. Of course she would, she would turn her head like a blade being drawn. Shoko would probably swear. Nobara might loudly ask who invited emotional property damage. You would look at him, and he would have to live or die by whatever crossed your face.

He stays home.

It feels pathetic.

It's probably the first decent thing he has done all week.

The next day, he goes to the shopping mall, and that, somehow, feels more humiliating than any apology practice.

He parks underground and sits in the car for a moment with the engine off, listening to ticking metal and the muffled sound of another car passing through the level. He could leave. This is stupid. Buying you something before knowing if you will ever speak to him again is stupid. He can already hear Yuuji asking whether this is about apology or outcome. He can hear Shoko asking what the gift is supposed to accomplish. He can hear Nanami suggesting that unrequested gifts may complicate the message.

He almost leaves.

Then he thinks of you grading papers until your pen runs out and you make that small annoyed sound under your breath.

He gets out.

Sukuna doesn't belong in shopping malls unless he is being paid to appear near a sponsor installation or dragged through one by someone who wants a normal afternoon. The air is too bright. The lights are too even. The music is too cheerful in a way that makes him want to dismantle a speaker. People look at him, then look away, then look again when they recognize the face. A teenager whispers to another teenager. A man in athletic wear stares at the scar with the vacant rudeness of someone who thinks famous people are public property. Sukuna gives him one look. The man remembers his shoes are interesting.

He walks past the stores with no interest in most of them, then slows near the one he remembers. The pen store is still there.

Two years ago, you stopped there.

He remembers the day with stupid clarity. You had been walking beside him after he bought something he didn’t need, complaining that rich people invented expensive versions of simple objects just to feel less mortal. He had been half listening, which means he had been listening completely while pretending the opposite. You had stopped near the glass display of pens, eyes flicking over the prices with disbelief. Not desire at first. Curiosity. You stared at the prices like you were studying a cultural illness.

“Who spends that much on a pen?”

“People who sign things worth more than your apartment.”

“That is such a depressing answer.”

“You asked.”

You had leaned closer to the glass, reading the small placards. He had watched your reflection more than the pens. Hair near your cheek. Brows drawn. Mouth moving faintly as you calculated something in your head. You did that when thinking. He used to find it amusing before he understood it was one of those small things he watched because he loved you.

He enters the store.

The attendant recognizes him and becomes too polite. Sukuna ignores the hovering and goes to the display from memory. Some models have changed. Some remain. His eye searches until it finds the one.

Black. Gold details. Elegant without being delicate. Expensive, yes, but not obscene by his standards. Obscene by yours, which matters less because you are not here to argue. It had caught your eye for exactly six seconds before you moved on and started mocking rich men who needed luxury writing instruments to feel important.

He remembers everything. That's the problem.

He asks for the model. She brings it out. He holds it in his hand and thinks about your fingers stained with red ink after grading too many papers. Thinks about the pens you left in his car, in his kitchen, on his coffee table, uncapped half the time because you claimed inspiration and irritation both required immediate writing access. Thinks about you hunched over student work, muttering that one day a teenager’s comma placement would send you to an early grave.

A pen. Useful. Not a shirt with his name. Not a ticket, not a pass, not access. Not something that drags you back to stadium lights. Not anything that asks you to return to motocross, to him, to the champion. Not jewelry that competes with someone else’s place in your life. Not a gift that announces wealth for the sake of making you feel it. Just something for your hand, your work, your ordinary days.

Something that says he remembers without saying you owe him for remembering.

“I’ll take it,” he says.

The saleswoman asks if he wants it wrapped and he almost says yes. Then he imagines some perfect store wrapping, polished and impersonal, and decides he hates it.

“No. Just the box.”

He buys black paper and red lace elsewhere because apparently he has become the kind of man who stands in a stationery store judging ribbon thickness on a Wednesday. The absurdity of it follows him home.

Wrapping the gift is fucking war.

The first attempt looks like a crime scene involving paper. He tears it off and starts again. The second is uneven. The third has one corner that refuses to fold correctly. Sukuna sits at his kitchen table, scar tight with concentration, fingers too large for delicate neatness, and becomes furious at an inanimate object in a way that would make you laugh until he threatened to throw the whole thing off the balcony.

He doesn't throw it. He gets scissors. Tape. Tries again. By the fifth attempt, it looks decent. Not perfect, but decent. He ties the red lace around it and stares at the finished box for a long time.

It looks like something someone tried to do well.

That unsettles him more than if it looked flawless.

He leaves it there for a while, staring.

A gift for your birthday.

A gift for your work.

A gift that has nothing to do with his name, his number, his bike, his sport, his fame, his body, his guilt. Not a shirt you would sleep in and then have to return through Shoko because keeping it would hurt. Just a pen. Something useful. Something you can hold in a classroom, in your life, away from him.

If you throw it back in his face, he will deserve that too.

His chest feels strange.

On Thursday, he nearly doesn’t go. That's the truth he wouldn’t tell anyone.

He wakes with the thought already there and spends the day pretending it's not. Training is light. Shoko checks him once and says nothing, which is somehow worse than a warning. Choso avoids asking but watches anyway. Nanami speaks to him about schedule adjustments and then pauses before leaving, like he might say something human, decides against it, and simply tells Sukuna to drive safely if he goes anywhere after work.

Everyone knows.

He hates it. He’s grateful.

By late afternoon, the gift sits in the glove compartment.

He sits in the driver’s seat outside his building with both hands on the wheel, engine off, thinking through the possible outcomes with the grim practicality of studying a dangerous track.

You might refuse to approach. Maki might approach instead. That one would be painful and possibly involve property damage. You might tell him to fuck off. You might look at him with nothing.

That possibility is worse than anger — anger would mean something still has heat. Nothing would mean he is late beyond repair.

He tells himself he is ready for no, yet he's not sure anyone is ever ready for no from the one person whose yes became a private religion before he had the sense to notice he was kneeling.

Still, he starts the car. He parks down the street from your school, far enough not to make a scene. The old spot. Muscle memory guides him there before thought can interfere. He hates that too. He sits with the engine off and waits.

Teachers leave in clusters. Students spill out earlier, then thin. The sky dims. He checks the time too often. His fingers tap once against the steering wheel before he stops them.

Then he sees you.

You walk beside Maki. For a second, the world narrows so violently that he forgets to breathe.

Not a memory trapped behind glass. Not a photo he should not look at. Not an imagined shape in the passenger seat. You. Bag on your shoulder, posture tired from the workday, face turned slightly toward Maki as she speaks. You look like you have lived a whole year without him, and that truth strikes him with both grief and relief. You are not frozen where he left you. You are not a monument to his regret. You are alive, dressed in a way that makes him think Maki had influence, mouth moving around an answer he can’t hear.

You see the car.

Your step changes.

Maki’s changes faster.

Sukuna almost smiles despite the nerves chewing at his stomach. Maki looks ready to commit a felony from twenty meters away. Good. You deserve people who will stand between you and harm without waiting for permission from the person who caused it.

You speak to her. Maki looks at you like she is deciding whether trust is a mistake. Then you hug her.

Sukuna’s hands tighten on the wheel.

He doesn't know why that is the moment that hurts. Maybe because the hug is familiar. Maybe because he remembers being folded into your life enough to know how rare casual affection used to be from you, how carefully you chose where to put your body. Maybe because Maki letting you walk toward him alone is not forgiveness, but it's proof she trusts you to know your own strength.

You approach the passenger side. He lowers the window. Your face appears in the opening, and every rehearsed sentence in his head dies immediately.

You look at him.

He looks at you.

He thinks, with useless clarity, that no photograph, no memory, no dream had gotten you right. They had all flattened something. The real you has motion under the skin, guarded warmth, tired eyes still sharp enough to cut through him, birthday softness hidden under the practical set of your mouth. He can see surprise in you. Caution. A thousand things he doesn't deserve to name.

He says nothing because every word feels too large or too small.

Then you ask if he’s lost.

For one second, he is.

Completely.

Then the old smirk comes to save what can be saved, but it arrives changed. Less armor. More confession than he intended.

“A little lost, yeah,” he says. “You want to chat and maybe help me find my way?”

He’s ready for no. He hopes he is.

You open the door. The sound of it nearly undoes him.

You slide into the passenger seat, buckle yourself in, and ask where he’s trying to go. As if this is normal. As if his whole chest has not become a room with the windows blown open. As if your presence in the seat beside him doesn't make the car feel like it has been returned to its proper shape after a year of being expensive and empty.

Your pick, he says, because it's your birthday, because he has no right to steer more than the car tonight. When you choose McDonald’s, he almost laughs. He expected rejection, maybe fury, maybe one stiff conversation through the window. He did not expect fries. He did not expect you sitting beside him in the drive-through while he pays for nuggets and cokes like some absurd, domestic version of a date neither of you is foolish enough to call one. He doesn't expect the ache of it to be so warm.

He takes you to the green area because he needs space around the conversation. A restaurant would trap apology under etiquette. His apartment is impossible. Your apartment is forbidden ground. The car alone is too intimate. The hood, the moon, the city, fast food wrappers between you — that is ridiculous enough to survive honesty.

He thanks you for talking to him. You nearly choke and for a heartbeat.

For one horrible second, instinct surges so hard he almost grabs you. His hand lifts, then stops because you are coughing but not dying, and he has no right to put hands on you just because fear moves faster than thought. He waits, body locked, while you recover with coke and watery eyes. When he says he deserved that reaction, your crooked little smile feels like mercy.

He apologizes.

Not well, maybe. Not perfectly. But honestly.

The words feel like dragging barbed wire out of his throat. He says the bet. He speaks of the stupid shit after races, the way he thought it common, the fact that common doesn’t mean harmless. He says he broke your trust. He watches your face for every flinch because he deserves to see it. When you say yes, it was a break of trust, something in him lowers its head. When you accept the apology, something else tries to rise too quickly. For one dangerous second, relief rises too fast. He crushes it down. He's not done. So he keeps going.

He tells you the uglier part. That he knew. That he always knew you weren’t there for the fame or money or access. That the parking lot was not ignorance; it was cowardice wearing self-loathing. He doesn't use those exact words because if he tries to make himself sound too emotionally literate, he will start to hate his own mouth. But he tells you enough. He sees you understand. Says he didn’t understand why and ruined it rather than risk being left for reasons he could not control. The admission is humiliating in the exact way it needs to be. You tell him he should consider putting off the match instead of lighting himself on fire, and the humor in it should make it easier.

It really doesn’t.

It makes him miss you so sharply he almost looks away.

There you are. Cutting him open and making it sound like banter because you know he can receive truth better when it has teeth.

He says he is working on it. He really means it.

Later, when you tell him you saw he returned to being champion, pride rises before he can stop it. He hates that you can still do that to him. Thousands of people can say it, and he can process it as fact. You say it, and something in him preens like a beast being touched by its chosen hand.

He tells you he is listening to Shoko. You say you’re glad she is putting sense into his head. He says careful because the old reflex steps forward first. You ask or what.

The old answer waits behind his teeth. Something sharp. Something flirtatious. Something to make your eyes narrow and your pulse change. He can feel it there, familiar as leaning into a turn. Or what, brat? Or I’ll show you exactly how much sense I’ve got. Or some worse variation that would put him back in control by turning vulnerability into heat.

He doesn't say it. He thinks of Yuuji at the kitchen table asking whether he has apologized. Thinks of Shoko telling him not to fuck it up. Thinks of you in the parking lot, having to be steadier than he deserved. Thinks of every time you called him out and he made it into a fight because being seen felt too much like losing.

“Or I’ll deserve it,” he says.

Your breath changes. He hears it.

The sentence feels ugly leaving him, but not because it's false. Because it's not armored. It offers no dominance, no threat, no seduction. Just the bare acceptance that if you call him stupid for acting stupid, if you tell him he needs sense because he has lacked it, then that is not an attack. That's earned.

He doesn't know if you understand all of that. He thinks maybe you do.

You look away first. Something in him aches with the restraint of not reaching for you.

The gift comes later.

He has prepared for you to reject it, too. He has prepared for you to call it too much, too strange, too late. He has not prepared for the silence when you open it and recognize the memory. That's worse and better than words. Your face changes in small ways he knows too well — eyes focusing inward, mouth softening, old tenderness and pain moving under your expression like light through water.

Then he says the practical thing about ink because if the moment deepens too quickly, he might do something unforgivable, like tell you everything at once.

You call him insane. He almost grins. You say you like it. Genuinely. He believes you.

The drive home is almost unbearable.

Your thigh is right there. He doesn't touch it. Your hand rests near your bag. He doesn't take it.

You sit in his car again, familiar and not his, and he keeps both hands where they belong like a man learning a foreign language through punishment. The absence of touch fills the car so thickly he wonders if you feel it too. Aside from that, the drive good in all the places where good becomes dangerous. The music argument. Your laugh. The familiar shape of you in the seat. The fact that his hand stays off your thigh and every nerve in his palm notices the absence. He has touched you a thousand times in memory. Tonight he touches nothing without invitation, and the not-touching feels like holding weight over his head until his muscles shake.

At your apartment’s gate, he tells you he missed you.

He had not planned to say it like that.

He planned an apology. A gift. Maybe a goodbye. Not the confession that slips out at the curb because the night is ending and his body reacts to that ending like loss beginning again.

You freeze.

He tells you that you do not have to say anything. He means it, though some selfish part of him is already bleeding out around the possibility you won’t.

Then you say you missed him too.

Hope is violent.

He had forgotten that.

It hits him so fast he almost becomes reckless with it. Almost reaches. Almost says too much. Almost asks for something because wanting opens its mouth and tries to eat the room. But you are still talking, and he hears the caution in your kindness. You are glad he is taking care of himself. Glad he is thinking. You don’t know what to make of it. You are glad you talked at least once.

At least once.

Dread flashes cold through him and his chest sinks. Maybe he wasn’t as ready as he thought for a no. But he won’t make it your problem.

Then you hand him your phone.

Put your number in, if you want.

He stares. The screen glows between you like an offered blade, handle turned toward him. His number, deleted. Of course you deleted it. You should have. You should have burned every route back to him and slept better for it. Still, seeing the blank contact field hurts in a small, precise way he doesn't expect. Champion is gone. The stupid arrogance of his first invasion of your phone, gone. No emoji, no title, no private joke.

It should be gone.

His hand feels too large around your phone. He types only the number. Not the name, title, nothing. He gives it back and watches you type Sukuna.

Just Sukuna.

His chest tightens. You don’t ask him for his phone and he doesn’t hand you it. He never deleted your number. He could say that. He doesn’t. Saying it would make it sound like loyalty instead of inability. Like restraint instead of cowardice. He has had your number all year and done nothing with it because doing something would have meant choosing between apology and hunger, and until this week he did not trust himself to know which was which.

He waits until you are inside before leaving.

Only when the door shuts behind you does he let his head fall back against the seat. His hands stay on the wheel. He sits there long enough that someone walking past glances at the car, then away.

The night inside him is impossible to organize.

You missed him. You took his number. You liked the pen. You did not forgive everything. You did not erase anything. You did not fall into his arms or let the scene become easy enough for him to confuse access with repair. But you opened something. Not wide. Not safely. A crack. A door with chain still on. Light under it.

He drives home slowly.

The windows are down despite the heat, letting the night air drag through the car and cool the sweat at the back of his neck. He doesn't turn on music. He lets the road noise fill the space where your breathing had been. At a red light, he looks toward the passenger seat and almost sees the black gift paper in your hands again, your thumb brushing over the box.

He doesn't text you.

He wants to.

Badly.

His phone sits near the cup holder. Your contact is still there from before, unchanged, untouched, a relic he never had the courage to bury. He could send something simple. Thank you is too heavy. Happy birthday again is too soft. I love you is not a text to throw like a grenade into the first night you allowed him near.

So he drives. Near his place, he stops for gas.

The station is nearly empty, washed in white artificial light that makes everything look slightly unreal. The air smells like fuel, hot concrete, old oil, and faintly of fried food from the convenience store attached. He gets out, opens the tank, starts pumping. The numbers climb on the screen. His body feels tired now in a way that has nothing to do with training.

He thinks of your voice saying you missed him too. He thinks of Yuuji’s face when he asks whether Sukuna apologized. He thinks, absurdly, that maybe he should buy new sheets that don’t carry ghosts.

Then he hears it.

Tiny.

Almost swallowed by the low hum of the station.

A meow.

Sukuna looks up.

Nothing.

He finishes pumping, replaces the nozzle, tightens the gas cap. Another small sound comes from near the pumping machines, weaker this time but fierce in shape, as if the thing making it believes volume can compensate for size.

He looks toward the pumps, then the trash bins. Nothing moves. Irritation already starts forming because this is not his problem. He has had enough emotional revelations for one birthday night, and it is not even his birthday.

“Where the hell are you?”

The sound comes again, louder when he lowers himself a bit. Comes from a narrow space between the pump base and a concrete barrier, where grime and dead leaves have collected. Sukuna crouches, black pants stretching over his knees, one hand braced on the ground. It is a stupid position for a man his size in a gas station at night, but no one is close enough to stare.

At first he sees only dirt.

Then two eyes.

A tiny orange face glares at him from the shadows.

The kitten is filthy. Scraggly in the ugliest way possible, fur clumped with dirt, ears too large for its head, body so small he cannot understand how it produces such offended noises. It hisses, or tries to. The result is pathetic. Then it meows again, louder, as if furious that rescue has not already been completed.

Sukuna stares at it.

“No.”

The kitten meows.

“No,” he repeats, more firmly, as if the animal understands language and contractual boundaries.

It attempts to retreat deeper into the gap and bumps into the back of the space instead. Its little head turns. Its mouth opens again. Another meow. Fierce. Demanding. Absurd.

Sukuna closes his eye briefly.

“Fuck’s sake.”

Sukuna curses under his breath and reaches in.

It takes patience.

He is not known for patience, but apparently tonight is full of humiliations. He has to flatten his hand, hook two fingers carefully under its chest, and coax its little body out without hurting it. The kitten protests with the confidence of an animal twenty times larger. The space is tight enough that his forearm scrapes concrete. The kitten twists, all bones and fluff and outrage, but he catches it around the middle, careful despite himself. It weighs nearly nothing. When he finally frees it, it fits in his palm.

That is the worst part. It fits in his fucking hand. Things that small should not make that much noise. He draws it out and lifts it under the station light.

Small, dirty, scrawny, orange fur clumped with grime, ears too large for its head, paws pathetic and dusty. It glares at him with watery eyes and meows so fiercely he almost laughs.

Female or male, he has no idea. The kitten that fits in one hand glares up at him and meows again.

“You’re ugly,” he tells it.

The kitten screams.

“Stinky too.”

It tries to climb his thumb. He holds it up slightly, inspecting. Too thin. No collar. No sign that anyone owns it. Maybe old enough to eat something solid, maybe not. He knows nothing about kittens. He knows engines, bodies, injuries, tracks, contracts, how to take a corner when the rear wants to slide out, how to read a rut before it throws him. He doesn't know what to do with a dirty orange creature smaller than one of his gloves.

It's not his problem.

The kitten’s paws flex against his palm. He looks around. No other cats. No mother slinking near the trash. No siblings crying under the pumps. Just this one tiny, dirty creature, abandoned or lost or stupid enough to wander into a place where cars and heat and hunger would kill it quickly. It will probably die in a day or two if no one takes care of it. If its mother doesn't return. If it even has one nearby.

Not his problem, either way.

He has no time for a pet. He has no interest in becoming responsible for a fragile little thing that needs feeding schedules, vet appointments, litter, whatever else cats require. He travels. He trains. He wakes before dawn, comes home after dark, forgets to buy groceries unless Uraume threatens him with controlled meal plans. He barely knows how to take care of himself in a way people consider emotionally acceptable. He's not a person who owns animals.

The kitten licks a dirty paw and then tries to bite his thumb. No teeth worth respecting.

He takes out his phone with the other hand, holds the kitten up, and takes a picture. Its ears flatten. Its eyes look enormous and furious. It resembles a wet dish sponge with a few ambitions.

He sends it to Yuuji.

Looks like you as a baby. Fucked up and stinky.

Yuuji answers faster than any employed adult should.

THAT IS A BABY WHERE DID YOU GET A BABY SUKUNA DO NOT LEAVE THE BABY

Sukuna stares at the messages.

The kitten meows.

“I wasn’t going to,” he tells it, annoyed because maybe he was. He returns to the car.

The kitten is too dirty to put directly on the leather. He reaches on the backseat, grabs the jacket he keeps there, and wraps the animal in it. The jacket is expensive enough that a rational person might hesitate. Sukuna doesn't. The thing is shaking, either from fear or cold or the sheer effort of being alive while weighing less than a decent steak.

He sets it on his lap once he is in the driver’s seat. It immediately attempts to climb his shirt.

“No.” He catches it. “Stay.”

Meow.

“Don’t start.”

Meow.

“What the fuck am I doing?”

He searches for a 24-hour vet with one hand and a growing sense that he has lost control of the evening in a way no track has ever managed. The nearest one is fifteen minutes away.

He drives there while the kitten settles into the jacket on his lap, tiny claws occasionally pricking through fabric into his thigh.

“What the fuck am I doing?” he says to the empty car.

The kitten purrs. That shuts him up for three whole seconds.

At the vet, the receptionist recognizes him and then visibly decides to prioritize the filthy orange creature over celebrity, which is the first useful reaction anyone has had to his face in months. He says he found it at a gas station. She asks if he plans to keep it.

“No.”

She asks if it's a girl or a boy.

“How the fuck should I know?”

The receptionist blinks. The kitten meows from inside the jacket. The receptionist looks at the kitten, then at him. Sukuna scowls.

“Check it.”

The vet is a calm woman with tired eyes who has clearly seen stranger things than Ryomen Sukuna standing in her clinic near midnight with a gas station kitten wrapped in designer fabric. She examines the animal with quick, gentle hands while Sukuna stands nearby, arms crossed, feeling absurdly large and useless in the bright little room.

His phone keeps buzzing.

DID YOU TAKE IT TO A VET answer me!!!!!! if you abandon that baby i’ll never forgive you actually you wouldn’t right you’re taking it home aren’t you send pics

Sukuna sends one picture of the kitten in the carrier glaring through the bars.

SO PERFECT what’s the name

Pest.

NO!

Female. Rare for an orange cat, apparently. Barely three months old.

Underweight, dirty, hungry, but not beyond saving. No obvious injuries. Needs deworming, vaccines, flea treatment, proper food, warmth, monitoring, patience.

Patience again.

Sukuna stands in the exam room while the kitten is handled by people who know what they’re doing, and he experiences a strange, irritating sensation every time she protests. The vet is gentle. The assistant is careful. The kitten is not being hurt beyond necessary medical indignities. Still, when she cries during the vaccine, Sukuna’s jaw tightens.

The vet explains things. Sukuna listens with the same intensity he gives technical briefings because apparently this is his life now.

“I’m not keeping it,” he says at one point after sending a quick update text to Yuuji saying it’s a girl, and the vet pauses only long enough to glance at him.

“Then you’ll need to find a foster or shelter, but tonight she needs somewhere safe.”

The kitten, on the exam table, puts one paw on Sukuna’s hand and purrs.

Betrayal.

He buys everything. Litter box. Litter. Carrier. Small bed. Wet food for kittens. Formula because he doesn’t know how long she has been alone or whether she needs extra support. Bowls. Toys because the vet says stimulation matters and Sukuna, apparently, is now a man buying a small felt mouse at midnight while questioning every decision that has led him to this exact humiliation.

Yuuji calls while he is paying. Sukuna ignores it.

Yuuji sends twelve messages.

ARE YOU KEEPING HER SHE IS A GIRL???? ORANGE GIRL???? SPECIAL BABY SEND MORE PICTURES SHE IS SO CUTE WHAT IS HER NAME SUKUNA ANSWER ME DONT NAME HER SOMETHING EVIL Actually name her something a little evil

Sukuna pockets the phone.

By the time he gets home, it is far too late and he is carrying enough cat supplies to suggest a planned adoption rather than a gas station ambush.

The apartment receives the kitten with confusion. Or maybe that's Sukuna.

He sets the carrier in the living room and stands among bags and boxes, suddenly aware that he has no idea where anything should go. He chooses corners by instinct. Litter box in the laundry area, not too close to food. Food in the kitchen. Bed in the living room where it can be warm but not underfoot. Toys dumped into a bowl because he refuses to scatter little bells across his floor like a cheerful idiot.

The kitten watches from the carrier, eyes huge.

He opens the door. She does not come out.

“Of course,” he mutters. “Screamed the whole drive and now you’re shy.”

She meows at him.

She is small enough to vanish under the couch, so he blocks some dangerous spaces with boxes and old towels. The kitten watches from the carrier, eyes huge, body low, judging every movement.

“You’re welcome,” he tells her.

She meows.

“Yeah, yeah.”

He remembers the vet’s instructions about cleaning her with a warm wet towel, not a full bath yet because she is small and might get chilled. He prepares water, tests the temperature against the inside of his wrist with more care than he wants to admit, and brings the towel over.

Getting her out of the carrier is another negotiation.

She emerges claws first, then nose, then the rest of her scraggly body. He holds her carefully, one large hand under her chest and belly, the other steadying her hind legs. She is absurdly small. He cannot stop noticing. Her ribs are too easy to feel. Her fur is rough under the dirt. She should not be this willing to exist in his hand.

The warm towel touches her back. She freezes. Then purrs. Sukuna pauses.

The sound is immediate. Ridiculous. A tiny, rumbling trust offered with no proof besides warmth and contact. He wipes along her spine, careful around bones, and she leans into it like he has done something worthy. Dirt comes away in smears. He rinses the towel. Wipes again. Her orange begins to brighten underneath, striped faintly, more color than grime now. Her paws are the worst. She complains when he cleans between tiny toes, but even then she purrs between meows, furious and pleased in alternating breaths.

“You’re confused,” he tells her.

She bumps her head against his thumb.

“Stupid animal.”

Purr.

He dries her with a soft towel, rubbing gently until her fur sticks up in all directions. She makes biscuits against the towel while he dries her, claws catching in the fabric. He should find it annoying. He does, technically. He also keeps his hand cupped around her back so she stays warm. She looks worse for a moment, then better. Smaller somehow when clean. Younger. Her ears still too big. Her eyes less crusted, though one remains a little watery. She shakes herself with great seriousness and nearly falls over.

Sukuna catches her before she tumbles off the towel. He stares at his own hand under her belly.

“Hopeless idiot.”

She eats wet food like she has been starving for days. Then meows for more.

“You’ll make yourself sick.”

Meow.

He checks the vet instructions, gives her a little more, waits, then mixes formula because he doesn't trust that she has had enough. She drinks messily, nose getting wet, and purrs between swallows. Sukuna sits on the kitchen floor in black clothes that now have orange fur and damp spots on them, holding a shallow dish for a creature that should not be his problem. The kitten keeps lapping at it messily, getting some on her chin.

He wipes it off. She purrs again. It starts to do something to him, that purring.

Every time he touches her, she purrs. Not after earning anything from him. Not after he proves he can provide long-term stability or a successful career or victories or a body intact enough to be useful. He touches her and she purrs because warmth arrived and she accepts it with the reckless stupidity of young animals. This creature doesn't know him. It doesn't know Champion. Doesn't know Monster campaigns or what he did to you or how many people scream when he clears a jump. It doesn't know he is dangerous, except perhaps in the basic animal way of recognizing size. It has been with him less than an hour, and still, under his hand, it purrs as if touch means safety.

It should mean nothing. It doesn't mean nothing.

His phone buzzes again.

DID YOU NAME HER

Sukuna sends a picture of the kitten with her face in the food.

Not naming it.

HER and yes you are she looks like a tiny flame or cheese puff

I’m blocking you.

NAME HER CHEESE PUFF

Sukuna puts the phone face down.

He places her in the little bed in the living room once she has eaten and been cleaned. The bed is soft, gray, shaped like a ridiculous little nest. She stands in it, sniffs, kneads once with tiny paws, then climbs out and follows him. He returns her to the bed. She follows him again, tiny paws silent on the floor, tail up with weak but determined authority.

“No.”

Meow.

“Stay.”

Meow.

He picks her up and places her back. She climbs out before his hand has fully left.

This repeats enough times that he becomes aware he is being trained by an animal that weighs less than his boot.

“I killed people for less disrespect,” he mutters.

She purrs when he picks her up again. That makes the threat ineffective even to him.

He puts her in the bed a seventh time, this time adding the warm towel beside her like the vet suggested. She considers it. Steps on it. Turns once. Then hops out and trots after him with surprising determination for something that still walks like each limb was assigned separately.

Sukuna points at the bed.

“That cost money.”

Meow.

“You’re not sleeping on me.”

Meow.

“I don’t even know you.”

She makes a tiny chirping sound and tries to climb his pant leg. He lifts her before her claws can do damage and holds her at eye level. She dangles with complete trust and no dignity. Orange, clean-ish, full of food, purring because his hand is under her chest.

Something in him tightens. He thinks of Yuuji as a baby again. Messy. Warm. Dependent. Trusting him without asking whether he knew how to be trustworthy. He thinks of you in his bathroom, carefully changing bandages while he stood there ready to be ugly and unwanted, and how you touched his ruined face like it did not reduce him.

He doesn't like where those thoughts lead. So he puts the kitten in the bed again and goes to his bedroom. The kitten follows, slower now, tired from food and warmth and whatever enormous journey led her from a gas station gap to his apartment floor. He looks down at her from the doorway.

“No.”

She looks up.

Her mouth opens.

He shuts the bedroom door.

Fifteen minutes.

He lasts fifteen minutes.

Fifteen fucking minutes of endless meows.

The meows begin as complaints. Then they become questions. Then they become tragedies performed by a creature with the lung capacity of a squeaky toy and the persistence of a debt collector. Sukuna lies on his bed with one arm over his eyes, trying to ignore it.

“No.”

Meow.

“No.”

Meow.

He turns onto his side.

The meowing becomes louder.

He sits up, furious.

“This is manipulation.”

The kitten, beyond the door, does not care.

He has ignored crowds booing. He has ignored pain after crashes. He has ignored Naoya talking.

He can’t ignore the kitten.

“This is pathetic,” he tells the ceiling.

Meow.

He gets up.

The second he opens the door, she marches in like a victorious general with the size of a tissue.

“You’re not sleeping on my face.”

She ignores him. He gets into bed. She attempts to climb the blanket, fails, tries again with such violent determination that he sighs and lifts her onto the mattress. That's not him loosing to an animal that weights the same as a bunch of grapes. That's him making an informed decision to stop a noise. That's what he tells himself as he sets her near the pillow and arranges the blanket so she cannot fall off the side. She ignores all the careful space he makes and waddles directly toward him when he lies down. Her tiny paws press against his collarbone. She sniffs his jaw, his scar, the dog tag chain near his neck. Then she climbs into the crook between his shoulder and throat, turns in a circle so small it barely counts, and tucks herself there.

The kitten is warm against his neck. So warm for something so small. Her fur is still slightly damp in the deeper layers despite the towel. She smells faintly of kitten food, clean water, and the medicated wipe the vet used. She's almost weightless. Each purr vibrates against his skin, tiny and steady, a living engine with no horsepower and far too much trust. He can feel her breath. Feel the minuscule flex of her paws. A claw pricks his skin once before retracting.

Sukuna doesn't move.

If he moves, he might crush her. That's the first excuse his mind offers. It’s practical. Acceptable. He lies still because she is small, not because the trust of her body against his neck has pinned him more effectively than any weight could.

After a minute, he reaches for his phone.

The kitten opens one eye, then closes it again.

He takes a picture.

It is badly angled. His scar is half visible, his expression caught somewhere between annoyance and disbelief, and the kitten is a small orange comma tucked under his jaw, asleep like she has survived the whole world and decided he will do.

He looks at the photo.

His first instinct is to send it to you.

That hits him so hard his thumb hovers over the screen.

You would laugh. He knows exactly how. The first startled little sound, then the warmer one when you zoom in and see the kitten’s paw pressed against his shirt. You would ask where he found her. You would tell him not to pretend he wasn’t keeping her. You would probably send some practical article about kitten care three minutes later because affection, from you, always came with research. You would say she is cute. You might say he is cute if you were feeling especially cruel.

His chest tightens. He doesn't send it. Not tonight.

Tonight, you gave him a number-shaped door. He will not kick it open with a kitten picture because he is lonely and wants your laugh in his hand.

He sends it to Yuuji instead.

Yuuji replies with screaming in text form so fast Sukuna regrets it immediately.

SHE’S IN YOUR BED???? SUKUNAyou’re a dad now

Die.

what’s her name

Pest.

her name is not Pest

It is until she earns better.

she already earned better by being baby

You were also baby. Look how that turned out.

emotionally available enough to help you, so pretty good actually

Sukuna snorts quietly. The kitten shifts at the sound and presses closer to his neck. His thumb hovers over your contact again.

No.

He locks the phone and sets it aside. The room settles. He looks at the kitten sleeping against his neck.

The day was yours.

That's the thought that comes, quiet enough to hurt.

It was your birthday. Your day. Your dinner of greasy fries on his hood. Your gift in black and gold. Your mercy, measured and cautious. Your hand offering the phone. Your voice saying you missed him too without letting him make a home out of the sentence. And somehow, he is the one lying here with gifts.

Your forgiveness, or something near enough to make him careful. Not full forgiveness. Not absolution. But a first thread. Your number alive again in his future. This tiny creature pressed to his throat, purring like his touch is not something to survive. He thinks of the absurdity of it and almost laughs. It comes out as a scoff. The kitten doesn't wake.

That thought comes strangely as he lies in the dark with a kitten tucked under his chin and your number alive again in the world between you. Your birthday, your week, your gifts, your friends, your life. He went to you prepared for rejection and received conversation instead. A hearing. A number. Your voice saying you missed him too. Enough mercy to feel undeserved without becoming something he is allowed to waste.

And then this.

A filthy little creature screaming at a gas station until he picked her up. A scrap of life that should not trust him but does. A warm body purring at every touch, as if his hands have not broken things, as if his presence is enough to mean shelter. It feels almost offensive, that kind of acceptance. Too fast. Too clean. Too innocent to know what it is doing.

He thinks of you holding his face after the bandages.

You were not innocent. You knew more than the kitten. You saw the damage. You saw him mean, afraid, vain, ruined, restless, cruel in small ways and soft in ways he denied. You stayed anyway for as long as he let you before making it impossible.

The kitten purrs. Sukuna closes his eye. He does not know what to do with the fact that life keeps offering him small, breakable things after he has spent so long proving he can survive impact. A brother who comes when he says no. Friends who warn him away from doing harm. A doctor who still hopes he won’t fuck it up. A pen wrapped badly on his table and accepted in your hands. A tiny orange girl curled against his throat like he is safe.

Maybe this is not absolution.

Maybe nothing is.

Maybe it is only responsibility.

He can work with responsibility. He understands that better than peace.

Feed the kitten. Take her to the vet again. Do not overtrain. Do not ride angry. Apologize without asking for reward. Let Yuuji stay close. Do not use Shoko as a door. Do not turn Choso’s guilt into convenience. Do not message you tonight just because he wants to. Learn the difference between wanting and taking before wanting turns into damage again.

The kitten’s purr becomes slower. Her tiny body sinks into sleep. Sukuna lets his breathing follow, carefully, as if he could disturb the trust by existing too sharply.

Just before he falls asleep, he thinks of your smile when you said the pen would grade every test. He thinks of your hand holding the phone out to him.

He lies in the dark with a hand resting carefully near the small curve of orange fur. The city hums beyond the windows. The clean sheets smell unfamiliar. His neck aches slightly from holding still, but he doesn't shift.

He thinks of you lying in bed somewhere across the city, maybe looking at his name in your phone. Maybe not. Maybe sleeping already. Maybe telling Maki the night was good, or not telling anyone yet, keeping the shape of it private until morning. He doesn't know. He's not owed the knowing.

That's the lesson he keeps returning to. He can want and not take. He can miss and not bleed on your floor. He can hold a creature gently without making its trust a proof that he is good.

The kitten purrs harder when his thumb moves lightly over her back. His throat tightens again.

“Stupid soft thing,” he whispers.

She sleeps. Sukuna closes his eye.

The emptiness beside him is not cleanly empty. It has a small, warm interruption at his neck. It has the echo of your voice from earlier. It has Yuuji’s arms around him from the night before and Shoko’s warning and Choso’s quiet honesty. It has discomfort, consequence, restraint, and the thin, terrifying possibility of doing one thing right after doing so many wrong. He still doesn't know how to fix everything. He doesn't know if he can.

But he knows the first steps now, and they are smaller than winning. Smaller than a comeback. Smaller than surviving a crash and making the world clap for the scars.

Apologize. Don’t demand. Don’t use pain as payment. Let the birthday be yours. Let the number sit until you choose. Feed the kitten. Listen when it cries. Stop leaving fragile things to die just because he didn’t plan to need them.

For once, Sukuna doesn't feel like the night is asking him to prove he deserves what it gave him by bleeding for it.

It only asks him not to crush it.

So he stays still.

He lets the small creature breathe.

He lets your number remain untouched.

He lets the quiet hold.

Sleep comes slowly, then all at once. The last thing he feels is the purr against his throat, soft and insistent, like a tiny engine keeping time beside his pulse.

The last thing he thinks is your name.

Not as a wound this time.

As a direction.

You're a canary, I'm a coalmine Cause sorrow is just all the rage Take one for the team You all know what I mean

And I'm so sorry, but not really Tell the boys where to find my body New York eyes, Chicago thighs Pushed up the window to kiss you off

The truth hurts worse than anything I could bring myself to do to you The truth hurts worse than anything I could bring myself to do to you

Do you remember the way I held your hand? Under the lamp post and ran home This way so many times I could close my eyes

The truth hurts worse than anything I could bring myself to do to you The truth hurts worse than anything I could bring myself to do to you

The truth hurts worse than anything I could bring myself to do The truth hurts worse than anything I could bring myself to do to you The truth The truth

@mischivana @kunaskult @mako-sea @oranoyaora @dogggggggblog-kaye @inlovewithpsychos @onlykuna @cheam-creems123 @ravenraa

she does have a name if you're wondering, feel free to try and guess 🫰🏻

[bemycherrynow]

I have some new crackships!!

Yuuji x Olivia Rodrigo (I got this from TikTok lol)

Sukuna x Beyoncé

[bemycherrynow]

Is it bad that I kinda want Maddie and Tom’s relationship in Sonic 4 to be on the rocks?

Like they’re arguing about idk whatever and in turn that makes Sonic nervous about love cause if the two people he adores can have problems then he’ll probably think everyone else is screwed too. Plus it would give some nice tension between him and Amy (him liking her but being scared of his feelings)

[welcome-to-green-hills]

What We Know, What to Expect & Moving Forward

(Sonic Movie 4 Edition)

Hello, Everyone! ❤️✨

As of today, we are officially 8 months away from the release of the fourth Sonic movie! 🦔💖🌹

I promise that I have not forgotten about making a master post concerning everything related to the fourth Sonic movie. As I was gathering breadcrumbs and details, I was in the process of wrapping up my final semester of graduate school (I am pleased to say I now hold a Masters degree Anthropology, focusing on archaeology. Hooray!)

Enough about that.

It’s time to get serious. 😈

Welcome to Green Hills! I am Mystery (she/her/hers), and I have the pleasure of delivering breadcrumbs and information concerning the Sonic Cinematic Universe. For years, I’ve delivered up-to-date information concerning everything related to the films and franchise. For the last film, I introduced the Master Post, a growing thread containing monthly updates about the film with various links to information. Breadcrumbs that I’ve given in the past, such as when I provided small things for the third movie, will always be tagged as a spoiler—for example, #sonicmoviespoiler, #sonicspoiler, #sonicmovie4spoiler, #sonic movie 4 spoiler—and put underneath the “read more” tab. (These breadcrumbs are small tidbits given to me that can be shared). Just as I’ve shared in the previous master post, I’ll share everything involved with the fourth Sonic Movie since April 2024, the month in which Paramount acquired the rights and licensing for the movie.

Release Dates:

Global release dates for the fourth Sonic movie have been slowly released since 2024. By the time the post has been published online, the following dates have been confirmed for the release of the movie. These have been organized based on the dates that they come out in each region and continent. Box office ratings can be found HERE when the movie releases in each region:

North America:

March 18th, 2027 in Mexico

March 18th, 2027 in Panama

March 19th, 2027 in the United States

March 19th, 2027 in Canada

South America:

March 18th, 2027 in Argentina

March 18th, 2027 in Bolivia

March 18th, 2027 in Brazil

March 18th, 2027 in Chile

March 18th, 2027 in Colombia

March 18th, 2027 in Ecuador

March 18th, 2027 in Paraguay

March 18th, 2027 in Peru

March 18th, 2027 in Uruguay

March 18th, 2027 in Venezuela

Europe:

March 17th, 2027 in Belgium

March 18th, 2027 in Albania

March 18th, 2027 in Austria

March 18th, 2027 in Bulgaria

March 18th, 2027 in Croatia

March 18th, 2027 in Cyprus

March 18th, 2027 in the Czech Republic

March 18th, 2027 in Denmark

March 18th, 2027 in Germany

March 18th, 2027 in Greece

March 18th, 2027 in Hungary

March 18th, 2027 in Iceland

March 18th, 2027 in Italy

March 18th, 2027 in Montenegro

March 18th, 2027 in the Netherlands

March 18th, 2027 in North Macedonia

March 18th, 2027 in Portugal

March 18th, 2027 in Serbia

March 18th, 2027 in Slovakia

March 18th, 2027 in Slovenia

March 18th, 2027 in Switzerland

March 18th, 2027 in the Ukraine

March 19th, 2027 in Estonia

March 19th, 2027 in Finland

March 19th, 2027 in Latvia

March 19th, 2027 Lithuania

March 19th, 2027 in Norway

March 19th, 2027 in Romania

March 19th, 2027 in Spain

March 19th, 2027 in Sweden

March 19th, 2027 in the United Kingdom

March 24th, 2027 in France

April 2nd, 2027 in Poland

Australia/Oceania:

March 18th, 2027 in Australia

April 1st, 2027 in New Zealand

Asia:

March 11th, 2027 in Singapore

March 11th, 2027 in Malaysia

March 17th, 2027 in Indonesia

March 17th, 2027 in the Philippines

March 18th, 2027 in Bahrain

March 18th, 2027 in Iraq

March 18th, 2027 in Israel

March 18th, 2027 in Jordan

March 18th, 2027 in Kuwait

March 18th, 2027 in Lebanon

March 18th, 2027 in Oman

March 18th, 2027 in Palestine

March 18th, 2027 in Qatar

March 18th, 2027 in Russia/CIS

March 18th, 2027 in Saudi Arabia

March 18th, 2027 in South Korea

March 18th, 2027 in Thailand

March 18th, 2027 in the United Arab Emirates

March 19th, 2027 in Bangladesh

March 19th, 2027 in India

March 19th, 2027 in Pakistan

March 19th, 2027 in Taiwan

March 19th, 2027 in Turkiye

March 19th, 2027 in Vietnam

March 25th, 2027 in Hong Kong

April 2nd, 2027 in Japan

Africa:

March 18th, 2027 in Egypt

March 18th, 2027 in Ethiopia

March 19th, 2027 in South Africa

A quick caveat that I must address is that these dates are not 100% concrete. However, I feel that it’s safe to say that a great majority of these dates are correct. I would be mindful of potential pushback dates due to dubbing and the film's availability. Please keep in mind that some regions may have the luxury of having an earlier screening. Just because the film may release in the United States on March 19th, 2027, doesn’t mean that ALL movie theaters may release it on that date. Some may release it a day or two early to begin tracking opening and box office sales.

Another thing to note is this film has multiple dates it's releasing on. The earliest date it’s releasing on is March 11th, 2027. It is in the best interest of everyone to begin muting hashtags, unfollowing, and/or blacklisting accounts as early as March 8th, 2027. And please, remember to tag spoilers.

Returning & New Actors:

To begin, Jeff Fowler will return to direct the film. Pat Casey, Josh Miller, and John Whittington will return to write the script. Tim Miller, Neal H. Moritz, and Tyson Hesse will return to produce the film. All details of the production crew can be found HERE.

The following actors and actresses will return to reprise their roles as human characters:

James Marsden as “Tom Wachowski”

Tika Sumpter as “Maddie Wachowski”

Jim Carrey as “Dr. Ivo Robotnik”

Lee Majdoub as “Agent Stone”

We welcome Matt Berry, Richard Ayoade, and Sappir Laniado to the SCU universe as human characters. At this moment in time, roles are to be determined.

The following voice actors and actresses will return to reprise their roles as anthro characters:

Ben Schwartz as “Sonic the Hedgehog/Wachowski”

Colleen O’Shaughnessey as “Miles ‘Tails’ Fox/Wachowski”

Sir Idris Elba as “Knuckles the Echidna/Wachowski”

Keanu Reeves as “Shadow the Hedgehog”

We welcome Kristen Bell as “Amy Rose” to the SCU universe and Wachowski family (potential voice claim video), as well as Nick Offerman, who will voice a character (to be determined), and Ben Kingsley, who will also voice a character (to be determined).

As of now, Metal Sonic does NOT have a determined voice actor. There is a 50/50 chance of Metal speaking in the film. If this is the case, director Jeff Fowler (2024) confirmed that if Metal were to have a voice, it would be Ben Schwartz’s role. 

Additional extras have not been listed as of yet. It is currently unknown if Natasha Rothwell will return to reprise her role as “Rachel Handel,” if Shemar Moore will reprise “Randall Handel,” if Kristen Ritter will reprise “Agent Rockswell,” if Melody N. Niemann will reprise “JoJo Handel,” if Alyla Browne will reprise “Maria Robotnik,” or if Adam Pally will reprise his role as “Wade Whipple.”

Flexibility & Mandates:

To this day, I still receive questions concerning both the flexibility and mandates concerning the films. I will be the first to say that the word “mandates” is a buzzword in this fandom that’s typically associated with a negative connotation. Let me ease your mind by saying that mandates are not necessarily a thing for this branch in the Sonic franchise. In a podcast interview from 2021, head writer Pat Casey shared that mandates were not a thing, nor a worry, when writing the films. Instead, they are provided suggestions and have asked for source game material from SEGA in the past. Along with suggestions, they work closely with Tyson Hesse, one of the main staff members of the Lore Team and the producer of the film. These suggestions are NOT the same as the IDW comics. If the writers are not sure of something about Sonic lore, they contact SEGA. There is consistent communication between the film crew, Hesse, SEGA, and Sonic Team.

There are a couple of rules that the SCU crew has to follow. Nothing daunting, I promise. A rule that the SCU crew and Sonic Team made was to draw canon material only from the games due to familiarity. Sonic is a video game icon. The only time that there was a major interference between the SCU crew and Sonic Team was the movie’s lore on the Chaos Emeralds. The original concept was to have the Chaos Emeralds and the Master Emerald be separate entities. However, Pat Casey and Josh Miller were afraid to utilize this concept in fear of it being too close to the Marvel Cinematic Universe (The Infinity War and Endgame). A compromise was made to where Sonic and Tails could find the Master Emerald, break it open to reveal the Chaos Emeralds, and then having the Chaos Emeralds be used to make Sonic and Shadow go super. They are to remain housed within the Master Emerald and reassembled when they’re not in use.

The following are other points-of-discussion concerning the flexibility and guidelines of the Sonic Cinematic Universe:

“Everyone recognizes Sonic as a video game icon rather than a TV show or a comic strip.” Pat Casey (2024)

You will not see things drawn from the comics and other outlets unless SEGA and Sonic Teams ask for it. Things drawn from comics and other outlets outside of the games are treated as Easter Eggs. (I.E., Sonic’s racecar bed is nearly identical to the bed he had in the Archie Comics).

New lore can be created–I.E. chaos emeralds being entities within the Master Emerald rather than viewed as separate items–as long as it follows elements of games and is reinvented in a way for both fans and newcomers to understand.

The movies are 100% NOT canon to the video games, but take heavy inspiration from them. They exist within their own canon universe, though there is a very high demand for Sonic Team to adapt Agent Stone to the game-verse.

Ian Flynn has NO involvement with the movies whatsoever. Ian Flynn remains a freelance writer for the games and comics only.

Tyson Hesse remains as one of the producers of the films and the main creative consultant due to being part of the Lore Team.

Pat Casey and Josh Miller have asked for game-material ONLY for Shadow's characterization; they do not plan to use the comic books or previous TV shows for writing Shadow (Legacy, 2022). This applies to analyses of character development for Shadow and Knuckles in future films.

The movie canon will NOT replace game canon. Those will remain SEPARATE canons and universes, just like how the producers and director for Sonic Prime said that it was a DIFFERENT canon from the games.

Filming Location:

Towards the beginning of 2026, voice actors began to record their lines for the fourth movie. Each actor and actress had a different date for recording. Ben Schwartz and Coleen O’Shaughnessey both began to record their lines on May 27th, 2026, and Kristen Bell began on June 3rd, 2026. Neither Sir Idris Elba, Keanu Reeves, Nick Offerman, or Ben Kingsley announced when they were recording their lines.

The human cast of characters began shooting their scenes from March 2026 to May 2026 on site. Aerial shots were documented via drone shots on Bora Bora and Tahiti. Most of the studio filming was shot at Shinfield Studios in Berkshire, United Kingdom and at a production facility in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. I would also be mindful that this will be a film that uses a lot of visual effects and CGI.

Story & Generalized Plot: (COMPLETE)

A very generalized synopsis of the fourth Sonic movie, released in early 2026, right when the title card teaser was released on the official Twitter account and YouTube channel: “Sonic the Hedgehog, accompanied by a new heroine named Amy, faces a new technological rival known as Metal Sonic.” Upon the synopsis, both Pat Casey and Josh Miller teased in 2024 that AmyRose will have just as an important role to the film and being as significant as Sonic.

The film currently does not have a detailed synopsis released. However, private screening events, such as CineEurope 2026 and Cinemacon 2026, have provided a small glimpse into what to expect for the film:

The teaser trailer featured Sonic. Shadow, Knuckles, AmyRose, Metal Sonic, and Dr. Robotnik only

Both AmyRose and Dr. Robotnik had complete lines, stating that “Dr. Robotnik saved the world.”

Dr. Robotnik still wore the space suit that his grandfather, Gerald Robotnik, crafted him on the Eclipse Cannon.

Shots of Dr. Robotnik held prisoner in a dungeon were highlighted (don’t be weird, y’all)

The teaser had a mixture of old shots from the third film and new shots from the fourth film edited together

Dr. Robotnik was seen crawling out of a spaceship, more than likely the Eclipse Cannon

Sonic, being the cute blue ball he is, had plenty of shots running around

The trailer highlighted Dr. Robotnik as a more “heroic type.” This could extend to saving the world from his grandfather, or enslaving mankind and having his followers viewing him as a prophet.

It is also important to note that Sonic 4’s story and synopsis might be released far earlier than expected. One of the earliest pieces of merchandise to purchase for the film is the movie’s novel, which releases globally on November 27th, 2026. This book is currently available to preorder, but won't officially release until December of 2026. More than likely the release date of this book will change, but it would be best to begin muting, blacklisting, and unfollowing blogs associated with the SCU until it’s safe to unmute. I will keep everyone informed on whether or not the book’s release date will change.

Music Selection:

Music is the heart and soul of the Sonic community. Since 2019, fans of the series have expressed their hopes and wishes for the films to feature music from the games. While the third movie successfully incorporated three renditions of “Live and Learn (2001),” a variety is still needed. This is appreciated immensely. This has been one of the few major criticisms of the films and spinoffs so far. The composer for the fourth Sonic movie has not been officially announced. It is safe to assume that Tom Holkenborg (Junkie XL) will return to compose the film, as he did for the past three films and the Knuckles spinoff.

An interview with both Pat Casey and Josh Miller in late 2022 stated that SEGA’s copyright laws for their music are tricky to include into the films. He and Jeff Fowler still hope to find a loophole in the copyright to incorporate into the films. Remnants of Sonic CD did play during the title card teaser when it was released in February 2026 (LINK), implying that there was some sort of chance of there being more Sonic-sounding music.

Leaks Online:

Knock on wood!

Surprisingly, nothing major has leaked concerning the film and the Event film. Everything has been tight-lipped concerning characters, plot, and more. Anything small is usually the breadcrumbs that I give on occasion. Do not expect this silence to go on forever. Information will slowly trickle into social media outlets and fandom newspaces around the autumn season.

Social Media Presence:

Both the actors and writers have shared that no members of SCU CANNOT share anything related to the films and spinoffs online. They are under a strict NDA contract that could remove them from the projects entirely if discussed publicly. Questions online, private interviews, and so forth cannot be shared unless Paramount gives them permission to. If you ask them a question on Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, or any other social media platform regarding the movies, they will ignore it. This isn’t them being rude; it’s them honoring an NDA contract. 

They will share their excitement with you, I promise.

Movie Ratings (Global):

At this moment in time, an official rating has not been released for the fourth film. Traditionally, both the films and the spinoff have had a PG rating. It can be inferred that the fourth film will also be rated PG. Hard PG. Movies that do contain a PG rating feature an occasional cuss word, such as “hell” and “damn,” but it’s not always a guarantee. The previous films do have a history of occasional swearing from either Dr. Robotnik or from other human characters. Official ratings/certificates for both of the series are expected to release closer to their aimed launch dates. These ratings/certificates are usually given four weeks before released to the public.

Continuation(s):

In December of 2024, an Event Film was announced as a project under development. There is no material available about this event film at this moment in time. The only information that is available about the film is that it will release in the United States on December 22nd, 2028.

Reliable Sources:

In a world full of artificial intelligence, internet popularity contests, and misinformation, it is very hard to tell whether or not someone is a trustworthy source. This is understandable. For the love of god almighty, do NOT use Giant Freaking Robot as a source. They are notorious for spreading misinformation. ScreenRant is a site that I am weary about retrieving information from as well. Much like the GameInformer, ScreenRant does not do a decent job informing their audience on whether or not articles are opinion pieces or not. I do not consider DanielRPK (Daniel Ritcheman) a reliable leaker either. A good majority of the “leaks” that he’s shared about the SCU have been debunked by crew members–such as when Daniel claimed that the Chaotix were drafted for the Knuckles series, but Toby Ascher confirmed that it was a fake leak. Twitter account user “MyTimetoShineHello” is not a reliable leaker as well. They have been community noted several times on Twitter for creating fake leaks, creating AI-generated images, and rage-bainting fans for “clicks and views.”

The following are blogs and resources that can be used as a guide:

TUMBLR

TailsChannel

Movie-Robotnik-Positivity

SonicStation

SonicMovieUpdates

Kitsuoi

If you want to include myself to the list, then cheers!

TWITTER

TailsChannel

SonicMovieUpdates

DiscussingFilm

The Hollywood Handle (60/40)

o_Azul35

Cybrid01

Contrieorb4

The official Sonic Cinematic Universe account

Any staff members of SCU

If you want to include myself to the list, then cheers!

INSTAGRAM

TailsChannel

Cybrid01

Paramount Pictures

Any staff members of SCU

TailsChannel

Variety Magazine

ScreenRant (Please be careful reading subtitles. Sometimes they don’t like to clarify whether or not it’s an opinion article or not unless a subtitle is given).

The Gamer

DiscussingFilm.net

SonicStadium.org

REDDIT

Reddit is notorious for leaking NDA special screenings, photos, as well as having members of the SCU crew make throw-away accounts to post teasers.  “Leaks” of any kind can be found in either “#SonicMovie4” or “#SonicMovie” chat rooms with a spoiler warning. Reddit posters that usually make these leaks get to see special screenings of films in mid-production. Understand that these advanced screenings are given to people on invitation; they are asked to watch a film that’s in mid-production and critique it for improvement. If leaks are shared about their advanced screening, they can’t always go into full detail due to violation of their NDAs. On the rare occasion that they do share details of the screening, the posts are taken down by both Paramount and by Reddit Staff within 24 hours.

It is also common for there to be two screenings of the same movie with minor tweaks. I.E., in 2019, two versions of the first movie were available for test screening within a week’s time. One test screener’s filming experience featured a “campfire scene” and Longclaw going to earth with Sonic. Another test screener’s filming experience was the same, but featured a Dr. Robotnik and Agent Stone fight scene with General Walters. These were scrapped later on and found in the first movie’s “deleted scenes” feature.

The best advice that I can give for checking the authenticity of a post is to look for consistency, as well as HOW test screeners describe their experience. It’s easy to tell the difference between sharing a feeling and telling a fabricated story for likes.

The Usage of Artificial Intelligence:

I strongly feel that this is a topic that should be discussed for the fourth film. The point of this section is to present the available information for you all to see, as well as keep you informed on some ethical decisions that are being made.

It’s no surprise that the entertainment industry is quickly relying on artificial intelligence in film production. Whether it’s for concept art making, visual effects, producing voice lines, rigs, backgrounds, scripts, and more, A.I. is becoming an unfortunate presence in a creative profession. In this case, artificial intelligence was used in the production and planning of the third Sonic movie. When concept art was released publicly online in 2025, fans speculated the use of AI in creating the Eclipse Cannon, the costume designed for the Buyer in the spinoff, and some first encounter scenes of Team Sonic meeting Shadow in Tokyo. The creator of the concept art, Marcin Rubinkowski, stepped forward and confirmed the use of AI for the concept art. Their online portfolio was updated shortly after, when fans asked for clarity on which of the photos uploaded were authentic pieces of art or AI-generated. It was not disclosed whether or not the AI program was trained on Rubinkowski’s art style to create the images. As of now, Rubinkowski has not confirmed whether or not they will return to be a concept artist for the fourth movie. Within the same year, composer Tom Holkenborg admitted to using AI to generate musical riffs, textures, and synth elements to integrate into the film’s soundtrack.

It is unknown the extent of artificial intelligence used for the third Sonic movie and future films.

Moving Forward:

There are some final things that I’d like to address before I publish this post:

Paramount Pictures officially received its license for the fourth Sonic movie on May 19th, 2026. But the movie begun its planning in April 2024

A new movie will release alongside the fourth Sonic movie in 2027. There is “Nightingale” on March 19th, “Gatto” on March 5th, and “Godzilla x Kong: Supernova.” These films should not interfere with the release of the movie. The Legend of Zelda movie has been rescheduled to April 30th/May 1st release date.

Merchandise for the film will be released closer to the holidays and in the very beginning of 2027. There is no information regarding what merchandise will look like, but it’s safe to assume that it’s apparel, books, accessories, toys, figurines, and vinyl statues.

This will be a monthly update post. The next update will be a month from when this is published (I.E., August 19th, September 19th, and so on)

Do not expect anything related to the Event film until late 2027

The social media accounts for the Sonic Cinematic Universe have already begun to hype post the upcoming film.

Do not expect anything super duper groundbreaking for the SCU at San Diego ComiCon 2026. Expect a mention of its existence, but NO trailer or sneak peeks. San Diego Comic-Con MIGHT have something for the Event film in 2027.

The production name for the fourth Sonic Movie is called “Palmtree Panic” for those working on the film

You can now view the fourth Sonic movie in IMAX

Concept art that was made for the third Sonic movie has a 50/50 shot of translating to Sonic 4’s story. This is not a guarantee though

Tika Sumpter claimed AmyRose as her daughter on Instagram

Tika Sumpter and Sir Idris Elba finally got to meet while filming the fourth Sonic movie, they got to tour some sites

There was no new additional information regarding the Event Film releasing in December of 2028, but more than likely focuses on a character

There are no plans for a season two of the Knuckles Series

The untitled Event Movie will NOT release on December 22nd, 2028 in Turkey. It has been moved to a January 19th, 2029, release date

Anyone can edit Google and add things. Jenna Slate is NOT a confirmed actress for the film

The event film that was trademarked on December 1st, 2025, is titled “Sonic Universe,” as well as confirming that it’s a film. NOT a TV show

Expect a fifth film. Not the Event film, a fifth film of the SCU’s main timeline.

Expect radio silence for extended periods of time. The fourth Sonic film is meant to be a major improvement from the last three films and spinoff series. Paramount has been cracking down on leaks and anonymous tippers online for the past two months. There will be times where we receive a flood of information about the films, other times there will be nothing. This is completely normal, I promise. We are all in this together.

[belimah]

16. So Much (For) Stardust art by mblydez

January makes old things louder.

Sukuna hates that about it.

He hates the clean start people insist on forcing over it, the new contracts, new campaigns, new season plans, new sponsor meetings with expensive coffee and rehearsed optimism. He hates the way everyone speaks as if the year has shed its skin just because numbers changed on a calendar, as if rot does not know how to survive under fresh paint. Monster renews his contract before the first month has settled properly into itself. Mei Mei calls it excellent timing. Kusakabe pretends not to look relieved when the papers are signed. Nanami says the extension gives them leverage for the opening events, his voice even, his expression composed, already rearranging the year into logistics. Everyone around him talks about momentum, return value, audience retention, performance schedule, controlled risk, visual continuity.

Sukuna hears all of it.

He understands all of it.

He even agrees with most of it.

His body is ready. Not the way it used to be before the crash, because there’s no returning to that body. The old one died somewhere between metal, dirt, surgery, and the dark behind his ruined eye. This one is rebuilt. Meaner in some places, more deliberate in others. His neck turns farther now before big landings, his shoulders compensate before he has to think about it, his left eye tracks distance with a precision carved out of brutal repetition. His scar still tightens in cold air and under strong lights, his knee complains when humidity shifts, his ribs sometimes remember impact as if memory can live in bone. None of that matters enough to stop him.

He can ride. He can perform. He can win.

By every external measurement, the machine is functional again.

The problem is that January also means your birthday is coming.

That thought sits behind everything like a second pulse.

He is lying in bed in the dark, one arm bent behind his head, his other hand resting flat over his stomach. The apartment is quiet except for the low hum of the air conditioner and the faint movement of another person shifting under his sheets. Kenny’s hair is spread over the pillow beside him in a loose, expensive-looking mess, their skin bare at the shoulder, their breathing smooth enough to suggest sleep had almost taken them before they felt him disappear without moving.

That’s the most irritating part about Kenny. They are good at sensing when attention leaves them. Not feelings, not sincerity, not the interior shape of another person, not in any way that requires care. But attention, yes. They know when a room stops feeding them.

Kenny turns onto their side, the sheet sliding low over their waist. Their eyes open lazily, catching what little light bleeds from the city through the curtains.

“What’s in your head, Kuna?” they ask, voice still soft from sleep but edged with annoyance at not being the answer. “You look bleak.”

Sukuna doesn’t answer immediately. His stare remains on the ceiling.

Bleak.

That’s a word Kenny would choose. Something pretty enough to sound observant without touching anything specific. You wouldn’t have said bleak. You would have looked at him too long, too quietly, and then asked if his knee hurt, or if the contract meeting went badly, or if he had eaten dinner like a person instead of pretending coffee and spite counted. You would have guessed closer because you always did, sometimes in ways that made him want to bite and sometimes in ways that made him want to put his face against your stomach and feel your hands on his hair and stay there until the world stopped asking for blood.

Your birthday is soon.

He remembers the date because of course he does. He remembers stupid things when they are yours. He remembers your coffee order, your school schedule from a year that is no longer his to know, the side you prefer when walking near traffic, the way your hand used to find his jaw before you kissed him if he came home in a mood too ugly for language. He remembers the little shift in your voice when you were trying not to ask for something. He remembers the first time you wore one of his shirts to sleep and how he called you nosy for stealing clothes from a drawer he had cleared specifically for you.

He remembers thinking gifts were easy because money was easy, and then learning very quickly that gifts for you were not easy at all because you didn’t want proof of expense. You wanted proof of attention.

He had bought you something small then.

Not the main gift. The main gift had been practical and chosen after three days of pretending not to browse online for it. But the small one had mattered more because you touched it first, laughing under your breath with that look you got when something hit the soft place you did not like showing. He thinks of that now with Kenny asleep where you never are anymore, and the remembering is so sharp it nearly makes him sit up.

He remembers your birthday last year because he had nearly ruined it by being injured, angry, and still convinced he could return faster than flesh allowed. You had not treated it as a ruined thing. You had eaten takeout with him, your feet under his thigh on the couch, laughing at something he did not find funny until your laughter made it worth tolerating. He had watched you lean over a slice of cake with a candle stuck into it because he had refused to buy a whole one “for one damn person” and then bought the expensive single slice anyway. You had closed your eyes before blowing the flame out. He had asked what you wished for. You told him wishes did not work if spoken aloud. He told you that sounded like weak superstition. You told him he said that because he was jealous the universe might listen to you more than to him.

He had kissed you to stop you from smiling like that.

Now your birthday approaches and he does not even have the right to send a message.

The wrongness of it makes something in his chest feel compact, dense, pressurized. Not grief in any clean form. He knows grief as a concept — he has read about it, observed it, watched other people collapse under it with the same detached curiosity he had for storms as a child. This is not just missing. It is the sensation of having built an entire discipline around not needing, then discovering need has been living in the walls, chewing through the structure without sound.

Kenny’s fingers walk across his ribs, light, familiar, performative.

“Don’t ignore me. It’s unattractive.”

He turns his head enough to look at them.

In the low light, Kenny is still beautiful. That has never been the problem. They know how to be looked at. Every angle is managed even in bed, every lazy blink somehow aware of its own effect. They have always had the kind of beauty that doesn’t request attention but invoices the room for it afterward. Years ago, that had made sense to him. Beauty, desire, access, victory, reward. Simple exchange. Easy pattern.

Tonight their face only makes him tired.

His mind does what it has been doing too much lately. It opens backward.

Not to you first.

Farther.

To the first house. The first rooms. The beginning of being a person before he knew personhood could be failed.

He remembers being small in fragments, but the fragments have edges.

Warm bathwater. His mother’s hand under his back when he is too young to hold himself upright. The smell of soap, milk, steamed rice. A toy with bright pieces he lined in straight rows instead of stacking. His father’s voice saying his name, low but not yet cold. His mother feeding him with patient movements, wiping his mouth, smiling sometimes when he stared too intensely at the spoon before opening his mouth. He remembers being lifted. Dressed. Carried. Entertained in the ways adults entertain babies because they believe babies are mysteries full of simple doors. He remembers hands. Both parents had hands, then. Hands that touched him because he needed touching to live.

He was their first child.

That seems obvious as a fact and unbearable as an accusation.

It was his first time being a child too.

That part took him too many years to understand. Adults behave as if children should arrive knowing how to be children in acceptable ways, as if infancy comes with instinctive gratitude, toddlerhood with convenient softness, boyhood with recognizable signals.

Sukuna arrived with nothing. Just a body, a brain, hunger, sensation, noise, light, the unpleasant surprise of needs he could not name. He cried, but not often. That became one of the first stories told about him.

Such an easy baby. He hears it sometimes even now in old relatives’ voices. Easy, because he didn’t scream long enough to disturb the house. Easy, because he stared instead of demanding. Easy, because he slept when placed down and watched ceiling shadows until his eyes closed. Easy, because when he started talking early, the adults laughed at his words and called him smart, then grew unsettled when he used them too precisely.

He crawled early. Walked early. Spoke early. Read numbers before someone thought to teach him properly. Remembered instructions after hearing them once. A prodigy, perhaps, though he did not know the word then. He only knew adults reacted well when he did something before they expected it. Their voices rose. Their faces changed. For a short while, their attention came easily if he performed development like a trick.

He remembers his father holding out blocks and asking colors.

Red.

Blue.

Yellow.

Green.

He remembers his mother clapping the first time he named all of them without hesitation. He remembers the sound because it was sharp and bright and directed at him. A sound made for him. He had looked at her hands, then at her face, trying to understand the relation between the answer and the noise. He answered faster next time.

The reactions became smaller.

That is another thing he remembers, though he doubts they do.

The first time is magic. The second time is impressive. The third time is expectation. After that, it becomes part of the furniture of him.

Of course Sukuna knows that. Of course Sukuna can do that.

He is four when the pediatrician refers his parents to another doctor.

He remembers the waiting room more than the doctor. Too white, too quiet, with picture books arranged on a low shelf and toys he does not touch because they smell like too many hands. His mother sits beside him, her fingers worrying the strap of her bag. His father fills out forms with a pen that clicks twice every time he pauses. The sound irritates Sukuna so much that he watches the pen instead of the room.

The doctor is a woman with a calm voice. She asks him questions. Some are stupid. Some are interesting. She gives him patterns to copy, pictures to interpret, blocks to arrange, stories to explain. She watches him while he watches everything else. Her smile is careful in a way he dislikes without understanding why. Adults smile differently when they are trying to hide that they are studying him.

He doesn’t remember the words said afterward. He remembers the drive home, the muted conversation in the front seats. His mother quiet. His father saying something about not making a big deal. His mother saying the kindergarten will have to know something if he does not adjust. His father saying he is smart, he will adjust. Sukuna sits in the back with his shoes swinging above the floor mat, looking out the window, wondering what there is to adjust to.

Much later, so much later that the information no longer has teeth, he finds out the woman was a neuro-psychologist. Testing him for neurodivergence.

By then he doesn’t care for the label. Not because it means nothing. Because everyone had already acted on the conclusion without giving him the language. They treated him as wrong in all the ways that mattered while praising him as exceptional in all the ways useful to them.

Kindergarten is the first place he realizes other children are a separate species.

They move too much. They speak too much. They ask questions without wanting real answers. They scream when happy, scream when angry, scream because screaming appears to be a social language among them. They touch things without reason, knock over towers, lie badly, change rules mid-game, cry when their own unfairness produces consequences.

Sukuna does not hate them at first. Hatred requires investment. He simply has no interest.

He does his chores. He completes lessons. He listens when teachers give instructions because instructions are clean. Put this away. Sit here. Draw this. Trace this line. Wash hands. Eat. Nap. Stand in line. He can do all of that. It gives structure to the day. The teachers praise him for being capable, then speak over his head with concern when he does not play.

“He doesn’t seem to know how to socialize,” one says to his mother at pickup, bending slightly with that soft adult voice that pretends children cannot hear if the tone is gentle enough. “He doesn’t initiate with other children. He answers when spoken to sometimes, but he prefers being alone.”

Sukuna stands beside his mother’s leg, backpack straps held in both hands, watching a bead of sweat move down the teacher’s neck. He remembers thinking the teacher is wrong. He knows how to socialize. Other people talk. He listens. If they say something worth answering, he answers. If they say nothing useful, he does not. The system seems obvious.

His mother’s hand rests briefly on his head. It's light. Distracted.

“We’ll talk to him,” she says.

They do not. Not really.

His father asks at dinner why he does not play with the other kids. Sukuna says he doesn’t want to. His father says he should try. Sukuna asks why. His father looks annoyed because why is often treated as defiance when adults do not have a good answer.

“Because that’s what children do.”

Sukuna looks down at his food. He remembers rice sticking to the side of the bowl.

“I do other things children do.”

His mother sighs softly. His father says his name with warning in it.

Sukuna learns another thing — asking for reasons makes adults tired of him faster.

So he stops asking out loud as much.

When he is six, Yuuji is born.

The house changes before the baby even arrives. New furniture, new clothes, little folded things, soft blankets, bottles, visitors touching his mother’s stomach and laughing. Sukuna observes the preparations with a kind of detached curiosity. A baby is coming. A brother. Everyone says this with excitement, as if the category brother should create feeling in him before the person exists.

He doesn’t know what he feels at first.

Confusion, mostly.

When Yuuji comes home, he is small and red-faced and loud. He has the same pink hair in softer wisps, the same family mouth, the same capacity to become the center of a room by existing. Sukuna stands near the doorway while relatives hover and his mother sits on the couch holding the baby like something sacred. His father’s face is different. That’s what Sukuna notices most. Not just happy. Open. Unarmored. He bends over Yuuji, touches one tiny fist, laughs when the baby grips his finger.

Sukuna watches the laugh. He has seen that laugh before, but not often and not directed at him like that. Not with such helpless delight. His mother makes sounds he has never heard from her, soft nonsense, musical and embarrassing. Yuuji responds by wriggling and blinking and being alive in a way that earns celebration without achievement.

The first ugly feeling is not jealousy. Yet.

It’s confusion sharpened by calculation.

What did Yuuji do?

There must be a rule. Sukuna’s mind looks for rules always, because rules make the world survivable. Good action creates good reaction. Wrong action creates correction. Need produces care. Excellence produces praise until excellence becomes baseline. Crying sometimes produces irritation, sometimes touch. Socializing is required but not explained. Babies produce warmth by existing.

He stands very still and tries to understand the mechanism. His mother notices him after a moment.

“Do you want to see your brother?”

Sukuna approaches because he does. Curiosity wins over unease. Yuuji’s face is wrinkled, unimpressive, his eyes unfocused. One hand opens and closes near his cheek. Sukuna leans closer. The baby smells like milk and clean cloth and something sour underneath. He makes a small sound, not quite a cry.

His mother smiles.

“He’s saying hello.”

“He isn’t,” Sukuna says. “He can’t talk.”

His father makes a short sound that is almost amused, almost disappointed.

“Don’t be difficult.”

Sukuna looks at Yuuji again.

Yuuji’s fingers close around nothing.

He decides, then, that the baby is not at fault.

That part is important.

Whatever is wrong with the rule, Yuuji has not written it.

So Sukuna likes him.

Not with instant brotherly devotion that adults would know how to photograph. But he likes him with the clear, practical certainty he applies to things he chooses to keep. Yuuji is loud, but his loudness is not malicious. He is needy, but babies are supposed to be needy. He does not speak in confusing half-meanings. He cries because hungry, tired, wet, startled, uncomfortable. Problems with solutions. Sukuna understands that better than he understands kindergarten.

By nine, he is feeding Yuuji more often than anyone admits.

Not every meal. Not enough for someone outside the house to call it neglect in a clean, official voice. But often. His mother returns to work. His father’s hours stretch. Yuuji becomes a toddler with too much energy and no respect for quiet. Sukuna learns how to prepare simple food because waiting creates chaos and chaos makes the house worse. He learns what Yuuji will eat, what he refuses, how small to cut fruit, how to cool rice so he does not burn his tongue, how to wipe his face before the mess becomes unbearable.

“Open,” Sukuna says, holding the spoon.

Yuuji opens his mouth too wide, eyes bright, hands slapping against the high chair tray.

“Don’t hit things while eating.”

Yuuji laughs, rice on his chin. Sukuna wipes it with a cloth. His movements are more careful than gentle at first, because gentle is a tone he is still studying. But Yuuji accepts him without needing the performance perfect. That’s strange. Yuuji reaches for him with sticky hands, calls him Kuna before he can manage anything longer, follows him with a baby’s absolute assumption that presence means safety.

After school, Sukuna sits in his room with books open while Yuuji crawls and later toddles around the floor. He keeps dangerous things out of reach. He blocks outlets. He learns to read with one part of his mind while tracking Yuuji with another. He likes books that are too advanced for him because they don’t punish him for not understanding immediately. They sit still. They let him return. They define terms. They explain systems. Animals. Machines. Human anatomy. Space. Later, psychology books he only half understands but reads anyway because people are harder than engines and less honest than weather.

Yuuji falls asleep sometimes against his leg. Sukuna lets him.

When Yuuji drools on his pants, he grimaces and keeps reading.

By twelve, Sukuna reads about people deliberately.

Friendship. Body language. Facial expressions. Conflict resolution. How to tell if someone is lying. Why groups exclude. Why children bully. Why teenagers perform. Why adults say one thing and mean another. Some books are useless, full of sentimental garbage and simplified diagrams. Others give him tools. Not enough to feel natural, but enough to create scripts. Look at people between the eyes if direct eye contact feels too abrasive — they will not know the difference. Ask a question back if you don’t know what response is expected. Laugh when others laugh, but not too late. Don’t correct every incorrect statement unless correction is the purpose of the interaction. People care about tone more than precision. This is stupid but observable.

Yuuji is six by then and refuses to leave his side.

A little shadow, bright and loud and convinced Sukuna belongs to him in the uncomplicated way children claim what they love. He sleeps in Sukuna’s room more often than their parents know. Sometimes on a futon beside the bed, sometimes crawling right into Sukuna’s bed after a nightmare, hot little body pressing against his side, arms thrown around him with no survival instinct whatsoever. Sukuna complains the first few times because Yuuji kicks and drools and radiates heat like a broken appliance.

Yuuji only tightens his arms.

“Kuna, don’t move.”

“I live here.”

“Don’t move...”

“Yuuji. You’re on my arm.”

“Then don’t need it.”

Sukuna stares into the dark over Yuuji’s head, irritated and oddly still inside.

He doesn’t move.

He makes sure Yuuji feels included. Loved, though he would not have used that word then because love is too imprecise, too often declared by people who fail at basic care. He helps with homework. He attends school events when their parents can’t. He remembers Yuuji’s friends’ names because Yuuji cares. He puts an extra snack in Yuuji’s bag because the brat always gets hungry before club. He threatens older kids who shove Yuuji too hard and teaches Yuuji how to plant his feet when someone tries to knock him down.

He still doesn’t know what he’s doing. That’s the truth of it.

He’s a boy raising pieces of another boy with information stolen from observation, books, instinct, and the terrible private vow that Yuuji will not feel like he does.

By fifteen, Sukuna has learned to pass better.

Not perfectly. Never perfectly. There is always something off if people look too long. But most do not look long unless invited by fear or fascination, and Sukuna learns to use both. Acceptance is one route. Intimidation is another. He builds himself through trial. A smirk at the right time. Silence shaped into threat instead of confusion. Cruelty used sparingly at first, then more smoothly when he realizes people prefer being afraid of him to being unsettled by not understanding him. Bad reputation gives structure too. If they call him dangerous, they stop expecting softness. If they call him arrogant, they stop searching for uncertainty. If they call him an asshole, every social failure becomes character instead of deficiency.

That’s convenient.

He grows into his body hard and fast, all height, muscle, sharpness. Karate helps. Discipline helps. Fighting gives him rules people can’t disguise. An opponent moves — he reads weight, angle, breath, tension. Consequence arrives immediately. No hidden meaning. No polite lie. No one says nice job while their face looks disappointed. He wins or he loses, and losing creates work.

At home, Yuuji is nine and still bright, still affectionate, still convinced his older brother is the strongest person alive. But school begins to show cracks around him. Not socially. Yuuji makes friends as easily as breathing. Teachers adore him. Other children want him near. He is sunny, energetic, disorganized, distractible in a way adults call charming until grades enter the conversation.

Sukuna hears his parents in the kitchen one night. He is supposed to be studying.

Yuuji is asleep at the table over a worksheet, pencil still in hand, mouth slightly open. Sukuna had tried to make him finish, but Yuuji’s eyes kept drifting, his attention slipping away from numbers as if numbers were coated in oil.

Their mother speaks first, quiet with worry.

“His teacher says he isn’t paying attention. His reading is fine, but math…”

“He’s careless,” their father says.

“He’s trying.”

“He needs to try properly.”

There is a pause. Sukuna turns the page of his book without reading.

Their mother says, barely above a whisper,

“I thought he would be the normal one.”

The normal one.

The words do not hit Sukuna with a crash. They enter cleanly.

Precise incision. No blood at first.

Yuuji shifts in his sleep, cheek pressed to the worksheet. His pencil rolls off the table. Sukuna catches it before it hits the floor, silent out of habit.

The normal one.

So Sukuna is not normal.

He knew that already in pieces. From doctors. Teachers. The way his parents’ faces tightened when he reacted wrong. The way praise cooled once they accepted his competence as function rather than miracle. The way adults called him mature when they meant unnerving. But the sentence in his mother’s voice arranges the pieces into something with a name, even if the name is only wrong.

Wrong, then.

He is wrong, and Yuuji was supposed to be proof that the family could produce right.

Something ugly begins to rot in his small self that night.

Not toward Yuuji. Never toward Yuuji.

Toward the rule. Toward the invisible scale that weighs children differently.

Sukuna looks at his sleeping brother and feels a hard, cold certainty settle in him. Yuuji will not hear that sentence if Sukuna can help it. Yuuji will not stand in a hallway while adults discuss his defects with gentle voices. Yuuji will not have to earn warmth through usefulness or lose it by failing to perform the correct kind of normal. If their parents worry about grades, Sukuna will fix grades. If teachers complain, Sukuna will handle teachers. If other kids make fun of him, Sukuna will make fear educational.

The next week, when two boys laugh because Yuuji gets a math answer wrong in front of class, Sukuna waits after school.

He doesn’t hit them. That would create adult attention too quickly. He speaks to them instead, cornering them by the fence with his school bag over one shoulder, his expression calm enough to make both boys go quiet before he finishes the first sentence. He tells them exactly what will happen if Yuuji comes home embarrassed again because of their mouths. Not dramatic threats. Specific ones. Believable ones. He has learned by then that fear works better when given shape.

One boy cries. Sukuna finds that annoying but effective.

Yuuji never knows.

Or maybe he does, because Yuuji always knows more than Sukuna gives him credit for, but he doesn’t ask. He only sits closer to Sukuna during dinner that night and steals a piece of meat from his bowl. Sukuna tells him to eat his own food. Yuuji grins.

At the same time, Sukuna works harder.

That’s the part he hates remembering because it is humiliating in retrospect, the sincerity of it. The pathetic logic of a kid that still wants his parents’ approval. He brings his parents things to be proud of. Best grades, always. Perfect scores. Competition certificates. Karate trophies. Teachers calling him exceptional. Courses completed ahead of schedule. Projects praised. Anything measurable, anything undeniable.

He cleans. He cooks. He takes care of Yuuji.

He walks him to school and back when schedules allow, takes him to soccer, waits during practice with homework open and one eye on the field. He remembers permission slips. He signs some when their parents forget, mimicking signatures after studying them. He packs lunches when mornings are chaotic. He does laundry because clean clothes are a solvable problem. He becomes useful in every direction available to him.

Still, his achievements meet the coldness of expectation.

His father glances at a report card full of top marks and says,

“Keep it up.”

His mother sees a trophy and asks where he wants to put it, not with delight but with household practicality.

A teacher says he is one of the most disciplined students she has taught. His father nods like he has been told the weather.

Then Yuuji brings home a high grade in math after weeks of struggling.

Their mother cries.

Not sobbing. But her eyes fill, and she pulls Yuuji into a hug so fast his backpack knocks against the table. His father ruffles Yuuji’s hair and says he knew he could do it. They order takeout that night. Yuuji glows under the attention, smiling with rice on his cheek, delighted and proud and loved so openly Sukuna has to look away.

He doesn’t begrudge Yuuji the celebration, and that makes it worse. Because if he hated Yuuji, the feeling would have somewhere to go.

Instead it folds inward.

What else does he need to do?

What level of excellence unlocks that face from his mother? What kind of victory makes his father reach for him without restraint? What missing part of him must be compensated for with usefulness, discipline, money, violence, perfection? If being good is expected, then good is worthless. If being excellent becomes expected, excellence is also worthless. The target keeps moving because maybe the target was never behavior at all.

Maybe it’s him. Maybe something in him makes praise harder to give.

He doesn’t have language for despair then. He has anger, and anger is useful. He trains harder. Studies later. Learns to need less visibly. If warmth cannot be obtained, then control will do.

Then one summer, he is riding bikes with Yuuji around the neighborhood.

It’s nothing. That’s the infuriating thing. Not a grand revelation. Not a coach discovering him under stadium lights. Just heat shimmering over asphalt, cicadas screaming from every green place, Yuuji pedaling behind him on a bike slightly too big for him, laughing every time his front wheel wobbles. Sukuna rides ahead, old bike rattling under him, doing small tricks out of boredom. Lifting the front wheel. Hopping curbs. Turning too sharply just to hear Yuuji yelp and try to imitate him.

Near a bar with its door propped open, a small television plays a motocross show.

Sukuna slows because movement on the screen catches his eye. Dirt, bikes, flight, bodies suspended over ramps with a kind of violent grace that makes his mind sharpen and focus. He has seen motorcycles before, of course. But not like this. Not riders turning danger into something structured, not machines launched into air with control so precise it looks like arrogance.

A drunk man outside the bar notices him.

Older. Red-faced. Loud. The kind of uncle stranger every neighborhood has, half sweat and beer and unsolicited commentary. Sukuna would have ignored him, but the man points.

“Oi, kid! Look at you! You could be a professional biker!”

Sukuna stops fully, one foot hitting the ground. Yuuji bumps into his back tire and complains.

The drunk man claps when Sukuna lifts his front wheel again almost without thinking. It is a stupid maneuver. Basic. Barely anything. The kind of thing any bored kid with balance can do after enough scraped knees. But the man cheers as if Sukuna has done something worth witnessing.

“See? That! You’re good! Do it again!”

Sukuna stares at him. The man is excited. Not because of a report card. Not because excellence has been expected and delivered. Not because Sukuna is useful. The man sees a trick and responds with open, uncomplicated delight.

It hits somewhere deeper than it should.

Sukuna does it again.

The man claps louder, laughing, calling to someone inside the bar to look at the kid. Yuuji starts bouncing on his bike, yelling that his brother can do more, that Kuna is the best, that he can jump curbs and ride with no hands and go faster than anyone. Sukuna snaps at Yuuji to shut up, but there is no heat in it.

Something clicks.

Maybe this is the secret.

Not grades. Not chores. Not being quiet. Not being mature. Not being useful in invisible domestic ways no one celebrates because the house absorbs them.

Performance.

Danger.

Spectacle.

A thing that makes strangers react before they can decide he is wrong.

If he becomes excellent at that, maybe he will be deserving of love.

The thought is not phrased so cleanly then. At fifteen, it is more sensation than sentence. A door appearing where there had been wall. A rule finally visible. If he can make people cheer, if he can become undeniable in a way that forces excitement out of them, if he can do something so difficult and dangerous that no one can call his excellence expected, then maybe the warmth will come and stay.

He doesn’t know why Yuuji is deserving by existing.

For some reason, Sukuna needs the harder path.

Fine. He’s good at hard paths.

Convincing his parents takes planning.

He doesn’t ask like a child wanting a hobby. That would fail. Hobbies cost money and produce inconvenience. He presents it like an investment. Dirt bike courses. Local competitions. Possible sponsorship tracks. Prize money. Brand paths. He researches costs before approaching them, prints information, prepares counterarguments. He says he will pick side jobs when possible, do whatever work accepts him, pay back equipment costs if necessary. He says he has discipline from karate, grades stable enough not to suffer, schedule management already proven. He says motorsports can become lucrative if entered early and taken seriously.

He watches their eyes.

For once, when money enters the conversation, something gleams.

Not love. Not yet. But interest.

Interest is enough to exploit.

They buy his first dirt bike after arguments, conditions, warnings about grades and injuries and wasting money. But they buy it. Used, not new. Scratched, stubborn, imperfect. To Sukuna, it may as well be alive.

The first time he sits on it, the world narrows in a way he trusts.

Weight under him. Handlebars. Throttle. Brake. Balance changed by engine and terrain. Noise entering his body through bone. There are too many sensations at first, but unlike a room full of people, they connect directly to consequence. Too much throttle, the bike bites. Bad posture, the ground punishes. Wrong timing, pain. Correction produces immediate improvement. He understands that. He respects it.

He learns motocross with a viciousness that frightens people before it impresses them.

Coaches tell him to rest. He rests enough to keep them from interfering, then studies. Videos, manuals, race footage, mechanical breakdowns, body positioning, line choice, suspension behavior, traction, weather, dirt composition. He watches riders frame by frame until he can see mistakes before commentators name them. He loses sleep before seventeen, not because school demands it, but because there is always another thing to understand. How to scrub properly. How to carry speed through ruts. How to recover when the rear steps out. How to land without letting impact travel wrong through knees and spine. How to make fear irrelevant without pretending physics can be insulted into submission.

He fucks himself up often.

That’s part of the education, though no one calls it that.

Sprained wrists. Bruised ribs. Split skin. A shoulder slammed wrong into dirt. Knees swelling under ice packs. Ankles stiff enough to make stairs irritating. He learns pain by category. Useful pain, warning pain, ignorable pain, dangerous pain disguised as ignorable. He’s not always good at stopping. Stopping feels like losing a reaction before it happens. Stopping feels like becoming invisible again.

Yuuji watches everything. His biggest fan before anyone else learns the role.

He stands at fences, leans over barriers, shouts himself hoarse at local races as if Sukuna is already a legend. He tells anyone near him that his brother is going to be champion. Sometimes people laugh because Yuuji is small and sincere and loud enough to be entertaining. Sukuna pretends not to hear.

He hears every time.

By nineteen, he is a young prodigy.

People use the word again.

This time, he makes sure it does not cool into expectation before it becomes leverage.

Small brands notice. Then medium ones. By twenty, he is being searched by people who saw him ride and understood that whatever is wrong with him socially becomes irrelevant once he is on a bike. On the track, his wrongness converts into precision. His lack of ordinary fear becomes marketable. His intensity becomes talent. His arrogance becomes narrative. The world does not require him to soften if he wins hard enough.

Good.

By twenty-three, he rides for a medium brand, stunts and races big enough to put real money under him but not yet the kind of empire that makes men like Kusakabe talk in measured tones about global reach.

That is when he meets Choso. Choso is not like most mechanics.

Most know their work, but they talk to riders like riders are either reckless idiots or divine instruments. Choso talks to the bike first, then to Sukuna like Sukuna is capable of understanding every bolt, adjustment, and consequence. He is quiet, heavy-eyed, with hands that always seem to be either holding a tool or thinking about one. The first time Sukuna corrects a suspension assumption before Choso explains it fully, Choso pauses, looks at him properly, and then continues with more detail instead of less, and that earns more of Sukuna’s respect than flattery ever could.

They bond quickly because technical obsession is easier than friendship.

Friendship is vague. Shared fixation is clean.

Choso can talk for twenty minutes about traction changes under different dirt moisture without once requiring Sukuna to perform normal warmth. Sukuna can argue about setup without Choso taking disagreement as disrespect. They understand the sport as machinery, violence, calculation, and art, though Sukuna would never use the last word aloud.

Yuuji likes Choso immediately. Yuuji likes most people immediately, but this is different. He says Choso seems nice. Sukuna tells him nice does not set a bike properly. Yuuji says maybe not, but it helps when people have faces. Sukuna calls him an idiot. Yuuji laughs.

Yuuji tries to ride because of course he does. Sukuna should have expected it sooner.

For years, Yuuji watches him like motocross is something holy simply because Sukuna is inside it. He wants to understand from the body, not just the fence. Sukuna helps because refusing outright would only make Yuuji find someone less capable to teach him. He starts him small. Controlled. Basics drilled until Yuuji complains. Balance, posture, braking, throttle discipline. Yuuji is not terrible at first. He is athletic, brave, responsive when focused. But focus is the issue, and something else too. That fine edge Sukuna has, the part that reads danger as data before feeling can interfere, Yuuji does not have it in the right shape.

He has heart. Heart is not enough when wheels leave the ground.

The crash happens in a crowded practice environment that still turns frenzied and messy too quickly. Yuuji misjudges timing, panics when another rider closes, loses control badly. Sukuna sees the error before impact and moves before thought, but distance is distance. Yuuji goes down hard, bike twisting away, his body sliding wrong across dirt. Another rider barely misses him. Then another. For half a second, the world becomes all noise and dust and the impossible sight of his little brother on the ground where machines can trample and crush him.

Sukuna reaches him furious.

Not at Yuuji first. At the track, at the riders, at himself, at physics, at every condition that allowed the scene to exist.

Yuuji is conscious, dazed, crying more from shock than pain at first. Sukuna’s hands shake when he checks him, and that makes him angrier. He snaps at everyone. At medics, at coaches, at Yuuji when Yuuji tries to sit up too soon. His voice goes cruel because fear has nowhere else to go.

Afterward, when injuries prove ugly but survivable, Sukuna forbids him from riding again. Not advises. Forbids.

Yuuji argues until Sukuna says if he catches him on a bike again without permission, he will dismantle it and make him watch.

Their parents blame Sukuna.

Not directly at first. They talk around it, like cowards. He encouraged him. He should have watched better. He knows how dangerous it is. Yuuji is seventeen. Yuuji only wanted to be like him. The accusations gather in the kitchen, living room, hospital corridor. Sukuna stands there taking it because some part of him agrees. He was supposed to protect Yuuji. He let the danger get close enough to touch.

Then Yuuji, bruised and bandaged and still too pale, lifts his head from the couch and tells them to stop.

His voice is hoarse but firm. He says it was his fault. He says Sukuna warned him. He says Sukuna helped him more than anyone else could have. He says if Sukuna had not been there, it would have been worse.

Sukuna feels something ugly inside him then.

Not gratitude or relief.

Wrongness.

Yuuji protecting him is wrong. The direction is wrong. The order of the universe, already unreliable, tilts in a way that makes Sukuna want to leave the room and break something. He is the older brother. He takes the hit. He handles blame. He stands between Yuuji and whatever comes. Yuuji should not have to drag himself upright and defend him with a split lip.

The feeling does not leave quickly. He grows a little apart from Yuuji after that.

Not with an announcement or cruelty sharp enough for Yuuji to name. Just distance. More training. More travel. Messages answered later. Calls missed because he is busy, then because he does not know how to explain the thing in him that recoils from being protected by the person he was meant to protect. Yuuji notices, of course. Yuuji always notices when Sukuna tries to vanish in increments.

He never lets estrangement finish forming. He keeps texting. Calling. Showing up at events. Sending stupid pictures. Acting like distance is a temporary weather condition and not a wall Sukuna is trying to build.

When Sukuna wins his first big championship, Yuuji is there.

Of course he is.

Sukuna remembers the day by sensation more than chronology. Heat under gear. Damp hair. Dirt at the back of his throat. The brutal satisfaction of every risk landing clean. His forearms swollen with effort, fingers stiff around grips, heartbeat still in his teeth after the final lap. The crowd is not the largest he will ever hear, not even close, but at the time it feels like the world finally understands its purpose. Noise rises for him.

Not for a report card. Not for domestic usefulness. Not for being quiet, mature, easy, wrong in productive ways.

For him at full violence. For him winning.

He grins after taking the helmet off.

Vicious, people say later. They are not wrong. It’s also happy.

Yuuji sees that part because Yuuji sees too much.

He catches Sukuna afterward away from the worst of the cameras, eyes bright, face flushed from shouting. He launches himself at Sukuna with the same reckless affection he had as a child, though now he is bigger and hits harder. Sukuna absorbs the hug with a grunt and insults him automatically.

“Get off me, brat. You stink.”

“You stink,” Yuuji says, muffled against his chest. “You literally just raced.”

“That’s different.”

“It’s worse.”

Sukuna shoves him back by the forehead, but not hard.

Yuuji digs in his pocket and pulls out the dog tag. Cheap, by Sukuna’s standards. Simple metal, chain looped around his fingers. Engraved with 優勝者, that reads Yūshōsha. Champion, in Kanji. And beneath it, the number 49.

Sukuna looks at it. For a moment, he doesn’t know what to do with his face.

Yuuji’s grin turns nervous around the edges.

“It’s the number of your plate. Well, what it should be. You don’t have to use it or anything, I just thought—”

“It’s a shitty tag,” Sukuna says.

Yuuji laughs immediately, relief breaking through because he knows the translation of Sukuna’s cruelty better than anyone.

“Yeah, okay.”

“I can get better gifts than this.”

“Then win the biggest championship you can and I’ll consider an upgrade.”

Sukuna snorts, closing his fist around the dog tag.

“Sentimental brat.”

He never tells Yuuji he keeps it. Never tells him he fights to keep the plate number in every contract after. Every brand, every sponsor, every negotiation that tries to polish, rename, reframe, or own him because it's a bad number, brings a bad omen, it's tabboo, has superstition, meets resistance on that point. 優勝者. 49. Nonnegotiable. People assume it’s ego, and that suits him fine. Ego is easier to understand than a cheap dog tag from his brother stored like a relic in a drawer, later moved to a case, later carried with him more often than he admits.

At twenty-four, he starts whatever Kenny becomes.

Not dating exactly. Dating is too precise and clean a word for it. Too ordinary. Too full of expectations Sukuna has never trusted. Kenny approaches him after an afterparty following another victory, dressed like they know cameras might exist in any corner and want to be ready to punish them with beauty. They are gorgeous. Not soft. Not warm. Gorgeous in a whetted way, experienced in rooms Sukuna still finds half-irritating because the rules shift under designer lights and expensive alcohol. Kenny doesn’t make him guess long. They flirt directly. That helps.

Their hand on his arm, their mouth near his ear, their eyes moving over him with open want. Desire he can read. Desire tied to his win, his body, his reputation. It makes sense.

He makes out with them in a hallway that smells like perfume, liquor, and electrical heat from too many lights.

The situationship forms without needing a name.

Kenny loves that he is great. They say it often, in different ways, always with that purring voice that turns admiration into a hand around his spine. They love that he wins. They love that people fear him. They love the way cameras chase even his refusal to smile. They love tantrums at media, the aggressive interviews, the brand growing around him like a blade. When he behaves badly, Kenny laughs and rewards it with attention, with touch, with stories posted just vague enough to create speculation. When he insults a reporter, Kenny calls it iconic. When he storms out of a sponsor dinner, Kenny says everyone will talk about him more now. When he turns cruelty into spectacle, they glow beside him.

Behavior. Reward.

Perfect sense.

Victories make Kenny thrive. Fancy dinners. Fancy events. Luxury suites. Sponsorship parties where Kenny takes pictures of their drink near his hand, their shoes beside his gear bag, the edge of his jacket over their shoulders, never too much unless they want the speculation to sharpen. They ask for things in that voice, jewelry, trips, expensive pieces he does not care about, and he gives them because giving is another clean exchange. He brings glory, money, access. They bring admiration, sex, company, a mirror that reflects the version of him everyone pays to see.

Kenny knows how to play him like a tool. He doesn’t know it then. Or he knows and doesn’t care because tools have purpose.

Yuuji dislikes Kenny.

He says so when he is eighteen, old enough to be direct and young enough to still believe directness can save people who don't want saving.

They are hanging out in Sukuna’s apartment, or trying to. Yuuji sits on the floor with takeout while Sukuna checks messages from Kenny, half-listening. Yuuji watches him for too long.

“You’ve been angrier since you started seeing them,” Yuuji says.

Sukuna looks up slowly.

“What?”

Yuuji doesn’t back down, though his fingers tighten around his chopsticks.

“Kenny. Since you started dating them or whatever this is. You’re moodier. You act like an ass even to people who are nice to you. Not just reporters or sponsors. People who actually care.”

Sukuna’s first reaction is offense. The words aren’t entirely false, though he tells himself they are. Because Yuuji is looking at him like he is doing something wrong while Sukuna is visibly succeeding. Winning. Achieving. Being recognized. Getting richer, more famous, more wanted. The world is finally reacting correctly. People want him in rooms. Brands want his name. Fans scream. Kenny looks at him like victory makes him irresistible.

How can that be bad? It makes no sense.

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Sukuna says, voice flat.

“I think I do.”

“You think too much for someone who still needs help filing taxes.”

Yuuji’s face tightens, hurt flashing before he steadies it.

“I’m not saying this to attack you.”

“Could’ve fooled me.”

“I’m saying it because I love you, and I don’t think they do. Not in a way that’s good for you.”

That word lands wrong.

Love.

Sukuna stands, takeout forgotten, irritation becoming something hotter because Yuuji has no right to bring love into this like a weapon. Yuuji, who was loved by existing. Yuuji, who didn't have to build a throne out of broken bones and trophies to receive concern. Yuuji, who can say love as if it is not a system with requirements.

Kenny later tells him Yuuji is jealous. They say it gently at first, then with confidence when Sukuna does not reject it hard enough.

Of course he is, they say. Yuuji was always the favorite, wasn’t he? Now Sukuna has the attention. The spotlight. The money. The world. Maybe Yuuji does not like not being the sun anymore. Maybe he is trying to drag Sukuna back into that little family role where he exists to protect and provide and never outshine.

Deep down, Sukuna knows that is not it. Yuuji is not capable of that kind of jealousy. Not in that shape. Not with that intention. Still, the lie offers him permission to be angry instead of uncertain. So he cuts contact down.

Yuuji doesn’t let it fully happen. But Sukuna gives less, replies less, stops inviting him around Kenny, stops answering calls when he knows Yuuji will ask how he is in that tone that makes honesty feel like standing naked under a knife.

At twenty-six, his knee forces the world smaller.

It’s not one crash. More accumulation. Overuse, bad landings, ignored warnings, a particular practice where something twists and heat flashes so sharply through the joint that even Sukuna cannot insult it away. Shoko is already his doctor by then, sharp-eyed and unimpressed by every attempt to minimize damage. She examines him, reads imaging, and tells him he is done for months.

He laughs once. She does not.

“If you ride on this, I’ll make sure every person with authority over your body knows exactly how stupid you are,” she says. “And if that fails, I’ll sedate you myself and tell the board you became hysterical.”

“Malpractice.”

“Prove it while tied down.”

No events. No luxury circuit. No cameras. No Kenny.

That last part reveals itself quietly.

At first Kenny sends sympathetic messages with pretty little sad faces and complaints about how awful timing is. Then fewer. Then none unless Sukuna initiates. When he asks if they are coming over, they say he should message when he is back on track so they can do something nice again.

Something nice.

He stares at the message with an ice pack over his knee and the television off, apartment too quiet around him.

Choso comes by. He brings technical notes, parts research, new ideas he thinks Sukuna will call stupid before asking to see the data. He sits in the living room without needing entertainment and talks about bike geometry while Sukuna pretends not to appreciate the company.

Nanami, newly hired then, appears too. Not yet the fixed figure he becomes later, but already precise, already carrying competence like a moral obligation. He is quieter than most, respectful without being submissive.

Naoya exists around the garage as well, though Sukuna does not understand his exact specialization until he learns the bastard is related to one of the team’s co-owners. Nepotism with a wrench, though not entirely useless. Naoya knows enough technical work to justify keeping him, especially in a team always hungry for able hands.

Shoko sees him often because physio is hell and she has no mercy. Yuuji checks in despite the distance.

Kenny does not.

Choso is the first person after Yuuji to say it plainly.

It happens after a physiotherapy appointment that leaves Sukuna sweating through his shirt, jaw clenched hard enough to ache. He sits on the edge of the table, knee throbbing, irritation crawling under his skin because pain without motion feels like punishment. Choso stands nearby, arms crossed, watching him with that heavy, unreadable expression.

“I may be overstepping,” Choso says.

“Then don’t,” Sukuna grunts, upper lip pulling in a sneer already.

“I’m going to.”

Sukuna glares. Choso accepts the glare as weather.

“Kenny isn’t good for you.”

Sukuna’s mouth curls.

“You know them now?”

“I know enough from what you’ve said and what happens when you can’t provide the things they enjoy.”

“Careful.”

“I am being careful. That is why I’m saying it directly instead of waiting until it gets worse.” Choso’s voice remains even, not accusing, not pleading. “They like the fame and money. The access. The version of you that opens doors. I don’t think they like you as a person.”

Sukuna looks away first, which irritates him enough to make his voice cruel.

“You people keep saying that like it’s a revelation.”

Choso pauses. Sukuna feels the shape of his own mistake too late.

You people.

Yuuji. Choso. The ones who check when he has nothing immediate to offer. The ones who keep appearing in the useless months, when he is not winning, not performing, not glittering under lights. Shoko threatening him into healing. Nanami bringing paperwork and updates. Choso talking bikes. Yuuji sending food, dumb messages, offers to come by. Naoya even, though Sukuna suspects his presence has more to do with garage obligation than care.

Still.

People appear.

Kenny does not.

The equation should be easy.

It’s not, because Sukuna’s mind supplies a different rule — Kenny leaving makes sense. He’s not riding. He’s hurting. Recovering. Useless. No spectacle, no moneyed rooms, no victory heat. Why would attention stay when the thing attracting it is inactive? That’s fair. That’s logical. That’s how the world has always worked when stripped of sentimental lies.

Choso looks at him for a long moment, as if something in Sukuna’s face has explained more than he intended.

“If you’re not sure,” Choso says at the next appointment, “test it.”

Sukuna is sweaty, angry, exhausted, and in no mood for riddles.

“Test what now, for fuck’s sake?”

“Tell Kenny you’re not riding anymore. Say you’re stepping back and taking care of your health. See what they do.”

“That’s childish.”

“Maybe. It’s also informative.”

Sukuna tells him to stop reading psychology forums and do something useful.

He does it anyway that night.

Back at the apartment, ice pack on his knee, body dulled by pain and medication, he lies in bed with his phone in hand. The room is dark except for the screen. He types the message three times before sending the simplest version.

I’m probably done. Not riding anymore. Retiring from that life before it finishes ruining my body.

Kenny reads it within minutes. The typing bubble appears, disappears, appears again. Sukuna watches with a strange tightness under his ribs, already angry at himself for waiting.

aw that sucks

Nothing else. He stares at the words until the screen dims.

Aw that sucks.

He waits. Minutes. Hours. Days. A week. Two.

No call. No visit. No real question. No anger, no grief, no attempt to convince him otherwise, no curiosity about what he will do, who he will be, whether he is okay. Just absence.

Then the garage gives him the rest.

Naoya is talking too much, as usual. Rival team techniques at first, then riders, then gossip because Naoya likes information best when it can rot in someone else’s mouth. Sukuna is seated with his knee braced, pretending not to listen while Choso works nearby. Nanami is there too, checking something on a clipboard.

Naoya mentions his friend dating the opponent’s current champion, some guy named Satoru Gojo.

“Who?” Choso asks, frowning at the half information given.

Naoya laughs.

“Sukuna’s ex babe.”

Something snaps inside.

Ex? Kenny didn’t wait a fucking month.

They ghosted him and moved to the next champion like changing venues.

Sukuna texts them once.

What the fuck is that about?

Read. No reply.

The next days are broken in his memory. Pieces.

Pain medication. Knee swelling because he overdoes something stupid and Shoko nearly kills him verbally for it. A glass shattering against a wall. His phone in his hand, then across the room. Choso’s voice. Nanami’s silence. Naoya wisely absent from whatever room Sukuna enters. Sleep that doesn’t rest. Anger so constant it becomes a second skin, then cracks to reveal something underneath he doesn’t know how to survive.

Yuuji comes over one night not knowing the full story.

Sukuna doesn’t remember what Yuuji asks first. Maybe about Kenny. Maybe about whether he ate. Maybe about the knee. It doesn’t matter. The wrong word enters the wrong wound and Sukuna crashes out so hard the apartment seems to tilt.

He remembers shouting. He remembers Yuuji’s face changing. He remembers trying to stand too fast, his knee failing, pain exploding white-hot enough to turn rage animal. He remembers knocking something over, maybe a chair, maybe the low table. He remembers Yuuji grabbing him before he can do something worse, pinning him down on the couch with more strength than Sukuna expects from his little brother, though pain and medication dull him enough to make the advantage possible.

“Stop,” Yuuji says, voice strained. “Sukuna, stop. You’re going to hurt yourself.”

“I’m already hurt, you stupid brat!”

“I know.”

“No, you fucking don’t!”

Yuuji holds him there, forearm across his chest, not choking, not attacking, just anchoring. Sukuna bucks once out of fury more than intent, teeth bared in an angry snarl, hands gripping at the collar of Yuuji's shirt. His knee screams. His body gives up before his anger does.

Then the anger breaks wrong.

He hates that memory so, so much. Hates it more than some injuries.

Because he cries.

Viciously. Angrily. Not soft tears. Not the cinematic kind grief gets in stories. His face twists, his breath rips out of him, and the sound that leaves his throat is so raw it doesn’t feel like his. He cries like his body is trying to expel something poisonous lodged there since childhood and failing because it has roots in every organ.

“Why is it so fucking hard?” he hears himself demand. “Why is it so hard for people to like me when I’m not killing myself for it?”

Yuuji goes still. Sukuna can’t stop.

Words pour out with no discipline, no strategy, no pride left to arrange them. They come out hot, like accusations, because that’s how Sukuna can handle vulnerability.

“Why is it so hard for people to stay when I’m not performing? Why do they want me only when I’m entertaining them? Winning for them? Hurting for them to cheer at? How did you do it? How did you get loved since you were a baby? Why don’t people like me unless I’m bleeding? Unless I’m great enough they can justify even touching me? What were you born with that I missed? Why am I unlovable? What the fuck is wrong with me?”

The apartment becomes too quiet after.

Yuuji’s grip loosens enough to stop being restraint and start being contact. Then, he pulls Sukuna into a hug. A tight one.

It hurts because Sukuna is bruised, injured, full of swelling and badly managed pain. He almost snarls at him to get off. He doesn’t. His hands grip the back of Yuuji’s shirt instead, fingers curling hard into fabric like he can still pretend this is aggression.

Yuuji’s voice breaks near his ear.

“You don’t need to perform to be loved,” he says. “You don’t need to hurt yourself or kill yourself for it. You’re loved. I love you. Your friends love you. Some people are just fucking stupid, and I’m sorry they made you think that means something about you.”

Sukuna presses his face harder into Yuuji’s shoulder because if he lifts it, the world will see him. Yuuji holds on.

“I’m always going to be here,” he says. “Even when you’re an asshole. Even when I’m mad. Even when you don’t answer me because you think disappearing is a personality trait. I’m here.”

Sukuna doesn’t know how long they stay like that. Long enough for his body to shake itself empty. Long enough for the ice pack on his knee to melt warm. Long enough for Yuuji’s shirt to turn damp where Sukuna’s face is pressed against it.

In the morning, Yuuji says nothing about the crying.

That may be the kindest thing he has ever done.

He cooks breakfast badly. Eggs overdone, toast too dark, rice reheated in a way that makes Sukuna question whether Yuuji has taste buds. Sukuna insults all of it. Yuuji grins and eats his share.

He goes with Sukuna to physio. Then to the garage. He bonds a bit with Choso, Nanami, even Naoya in the way Yuuji can talk to almost anyone if given enough time. Choso gets visibly animated explaining the new bike he is working on for Sukuna, the additions, the adjustments, the reasoning behind them. Yuuji listens like every technical detail is sacred because it belongs to Sukuna’s world.

Sukuna doesn’t contact Kenny after that. He doesn’t reply when Kenny eventually circles back after he becomes champion again.

A recurring one. A better one.

When the victories stack higher, when the brands grow larger, when his name becomes harder to avoid, Kenny’s messages return with compliments and little hooks. He leaves them unanswered. Not because he’s healed. Because pride and pain have finally aligned on the same side for once.

Until now.

Until all of this.

Until the dinner.

Until Naoya’s toast splits open the beginning of you.

Until Sukuna follows you into a parking lot and lets shame use his mouth.

Until he breaks your heart and stands there watching you leave because going after you feels like reaching with hands covered in glass.

Until he answers Kenny’s message because he has rebuilt everything except the part of him that knows what to do when someone loves him without demanding spectacle.

Now another year has passed.

January again.

Monster renewed. Opening events coming. The world ready to receive him in grand style.

And Kenny is lying beside him while he thinks constantly about you.

The entire line of his life sits in the dark between one breath and the next with such clarity it disgusts him.

He has spent decades mistaking reaction for love.

His parents reacting to milestones until milestones became expected. The drunk man clapping at a bike trick. Crowds roaring because danger made him legible. Sponsors smiling because he converted pain into profit. Kenny purring because victory opened doors and made them beautiful beside him. Even his own brand, his Champion name, his plate, his entire empire built around being undeniable enough that no one could withhold attention without looking foolish.

Then there was you.

You, who looked at him injured and did not brighten because the champion was useful. You, who worried when risk crossed into self-destruction. You, who saw him without the right eye, scarred and altered and furious inside his own skin, and called him beautiful when there was nothing to gain from it. You, who stayed in hospital rooms, bathrooms, kitchens, couches, the unmarketable hours. You, who wanted him to take care of himself as a person.

He didn’t know what to do with that, so he ruined it.

Kenny’s fingers trace his side again, impatient now.

“Sukuna.”

His name in their mouth used to feel like being admired by the room through a person. Now it feels like noise.

He turns fully onto his side and looks at them. Kenny’s brows lift.

“There you are. I was beginning to think you’d died with your eyes open. Should I be offended, or is this one of your brooding champion things?”

Something in him, old and tired and finally bored of the same wound, goes still.

Not numb, at least. Clear. Almost vitriolic.

He thinks of Yuuji at six drooling on his shirt, trusting him without conditions. Yuuji at eighteen telling him Kenny made him worse. Yuuji pinning him down at twenty while he cried himself into humiliation and then cooking terrible breakfast in the morning like love could be burnt toast and silence. Choso telling him to test it. Shoko threatening him into survival. Nanami’s steady loyalty. You pushing his shirts back into Shoko’s hands because keeping them would hurt too much. You removing him from your life with more dignity than he deserved. You probably somewhere in the city with people who are allowed to know how you are.

Your birthday is soon.

He can’t send a message as he is. Not like this. Not with Kenny in his bed and old patterns rotting under fresh contracts.

Kenny’s eyes narrow slightly as they read the shift in his face, not the cause, only the consequence.

“What?”

Sukuna sits up.

The sheet falls to his hips. Cold air touches his chest, the scarred side of his face tightening faintly. He reaches for the lamp and turns it on. Warm light cuts the room into honesty too crude for Kenny’s preferred shadows.

“You gotta go,” he says.

Kenny blinks. Then they laugh once, short and disbelieving.

“Excuse me?”

“You heard me.”

“It’s the middle of the night.”

“Then better move faster.”

Kenny props themself up on one elbow, expression sharpening past beauty into something more familiar. Calculation.

“Is this a tantrum? Because if you’re upset about something, you can use your words like a big boy instead of throwing me out because you got bored staring at the ceiling.”

Sukuna looks at them for a long moment.

He could fight. The old way. Cut deep, make it ugly, enjoy the immediate relief of cruelty landing where aimed. Kenny would return it. They are good at that. They could spend an hour tearing each other open in ways that feel almost intimate if one mistakes familiarity for closeness. Then maybe they would fuck again just to prove the damage has somewhere to go. Then he would wake up emptier, and Kenny would take a picture of coffee near his hand and make the world think proximity means possession.

He’s tired of wasting time.

“I’m done,” he says.

Kenny’s mouth closes.

“Done.” Something dangerous flickers through their eyes, not heartbreak, not exactly. Offense. Loss of access disguised as injury. “With me.”

“With this.”

Their gaze moves over his face, searching for leverage.

“Did something happen?”

“No.”

“Don’t lie. You’re worse at it when you’re trying to be noble.”

Sukuna’s jaw shifts. Kenny smiles slowly, but there is no warmth in it.

“Ah. Is this about your little teacher?”

The air changes. Not enough for someone else to notice, maybe. But Kenny notices because danger is another form of attention and they have always enjoyed standing close to it. They sit up fully, pulling the sheet with them.

“I wondered how long we’d pretend you weren’t looking over your shoulder for someone who wasn’t coming. Does she know you mope like this? Or was that reserved for me?”

He gets out of bed. Not fast. Not explosive. That would give Kenny too much. He stands, reaches for his sweatpants, pulls them on with controlled movements while his pulse beats hard enough to be irritating. His knee doesn’t hurt tonight. His scar does. Or maybe he is simply aware of it because Kenny once wanted to cover it and you once did not look away.

Kenny watches him dress with growing disbelief.

“You’re serious.”

“I said go.”

“You are unbelievable.” Their voice rises, not into shouting, but into something more polished and cruel. “You crawl back when you’re lonely, use me until you remember you have a conscience, and now I’m supposed to leave because you’re having some delayed emotional awakening? How touching. Should I clap?”

Sukuna picks up their clothes from the floor and tosses them onto the bed.

Kenny stares at the pile, then at him. He meets their gaze evenly. For once, he doesn’t need them to understand. That’s new. Maybe that is what makes Kenny angriest.

They dress sharply, movements clipped, beautiful even in fury because they can't bear not to be.

“She isn’t going to take you back because you throw me out, you know.”

It hurts because it’s true in the part that matters most.

He doesn’t throw Kenny out as an offering to you. He’s late for that kind of proof by more than a year, and you owe him nothing for cleaning a room he dirtied. You may never know. You may never care. You may be sleeping beside someone else right now, safe and warm and loved in a way that doesn’t require translation through disaster. The thought presses under his ribs with enough force to make his next breath slow, but it doesn't change the decision.

“Yeah, I know.”

Kenny pauses, thrown perhaps by the absence of denial. Sukuna continues, voice rougher, steady.

“This isn’t about buying my way back. It’s about being done wasting my life on someone I should’ve left in the past.”

Their face hardens. For the first time that night, something like real anger strips the aesthetic off them.

“You’re still so easy to play when you’re hurting.”

“I know that too.”

That stops them again. He almost laughs, but there is no humor in him.

How much of his life has been spent defending lies other people used because admitting he knew would make him responsible for leaving? Kenny liked him as access. His parents liked him best when he required least and produced most. Crowds liked him when he risked enough to entertain. He knew more than he let himself know, over and over, because knowledge without action is another kind of cowardice and he would rather be called cruel than cowardly.

Kenny grabs their bag. At the doorway, they turn back, one hand on the frame, eyes bright with the kind of malice that used to excite him because it felt like being with someone strong enough not to need softness.

“You’ll get bored of being decent,” they say. “Men like you always do.”

Sukuna stands in the middle of his bedroom, bare chest cold, one eye fixed on them.

“Maybe.” He admits and Kenny’s mouth curves, but he's not done. “But I’m already bored of you.”

That lands properly at least. Good.

Kenny leaves without slamming the door, because slamming would be too honest. The apartment goes quiet after the lock clicks. Not peaceful. Not healed. Not absolved. Just quiet.

Sukuna remains standing for a while.

The bed is ruined with warmth that now feels alien, sheets twisted, Kenny’s perfume lingering where it should not. He strips the bed mechanically, gathering fabric in both hands, carrying it to the laundry like removing evidence from a crime scene no one will investigate.

His body moves with the efficient discipline that has saved him from thought a thousand times. Pillowcases. Sheets. Blanket. Window cracked open despite the cold. Trash collected. Glasses taken to the sink. Kenny’s forgotten hair tie thrown into the bin after a second of staring at it.

When the room is bare, he sits on the edge of the mattress.

The apartment feels… bigger perhaps. Not better in any way. Larger.

Space returns, and with it, memory.

He leans forward, elbows on knees, hands clasped loosely. The scarred side of his face pulls faintly as he looks down. In the half-open drawer of his bedside table, under a case, under documents, under things with actual monetary value, the dog tag sits where it always has when not around his neck.

優勝者.

 

Yuuji’s cheap, stupid gift. Now bent a bit, scratched, but recovered and given back after the accident.

Sukuna reaches for it before deciding not to. His fingers stop against the drawer handle.

Your birthday is soon. He still can’t send a message.

Not yet, maybe not ever. He doesn’t know what he would say that would not be another demand placed at your door. Happy birthday from the man who humiliated you by omission. Hope you’re well from the man who made you feel suspected for loving him. I miss you from the man who filled your absence with the exact person his brother once had to help him survive. I love you from a man who learned too late that love is not proven by suffering loudly enough for someone to stay.

The words are useless if they arrive only because he’s lonely.

They need a body behind them. A life. Evidence. Not spectacle.

He rubs both hands over his face, careful near the scar out of habit. For once, the thought of the upcoming season doesn’t give him the familiar clean burn of purpose. It’s still there, the hunger to ride, to win, to open the year in grand style and make the stadium remember why he remains the best thing danger ever failed to kill. He loves that. He will not pretend otherwise. He loves the bike, the noise, the violence of precision, the worship when it crests and breaks over him.

But it can’t be the only place he’s real. It can’t be the only reason anyone stays.

And if he keeps making it that, then losing you was not a tragedy. It was the most predictable consequence of his life.

He stands eventually and goes to the kitchen.

The hour is obscene. The city is dim beyond the glass. He makes tea because coffee would be stupid and because the motion reminds him of you in a way that hurts without destroying him. Water. Kettle. Cup. No sugar. He leans against the counter while it steeps, feeling the ache of a body that has survived too much of its own pride.

His phone sits on the counter. He looks at it.

For a moment, he thinks of calling Yuuji.

Then he thinks of how long he has ignored him again. How many messages he left unanswered after the dinner because Yuuji remained connected to you, because Kenny made old cowardice convenient, because shame gets easier to maintain when dressed as anger. He thinks of Yuuji at six, asleep against his side. Yuuji at nine, protected from bullies he never knew existed. Yuuji at eighteen, telling a truth Sukuna punished him for. Yuuji at twenty, holding him while he broke.

He picks up the phone. The message takes longer than it should.

You awake?

He stares at it, then sends before pride can interfere. The response comes after several minutes.

yeah. u okay?

Sukuna almost types yes.

Deletes it.

No.

The typing bubble from Yuuji appears instantly, disappears, appears again.

Want me to come over?

Sukuna looks around the apartment. The stripped bed. The open window. The tea. The absence of Kenny. The presence of every year that made this one.

He types, then stops.

He doesn’t know how to ask his little brother to come without making it sound like an order, a weakness, an accident.

Another message arrives before he decides.

I’m coming.

Sukuna exhales once through his nose.

“Sentimental brat,” he mutters into the empty kitchen.

But he doesn’t tell him not to.

He drinks the tea standing up, its heat bitter on his tongue, and looks toward the city where you are somewhere beyond his reach. The night doesn’t forgive him. The year doesn’t reset him. The past doesn’t soften because he finally looked at it long enough to name the pattern.

Still, for the first time in months, his apartment no longer contains someone he is using to avoid himself.

That’s not redemption. It’s not enough.

It’s only the first honest space he has made.

I'm in a winter mood, dreaming of spring now Burning myself down Burning myself down, burning

I feel like something that's been stretched out over and over again Until I'm creased and I'm about to break down the middle Split me right down the middle, right, right down the middle, yeah

The stars are the same as ever But I don't have the guts to keep it together Stuck in the permafrost Stuck in the permafrost

Life is just a game maybe I'm stuck in a lonely loop, my baby

So much for stardust We thought we had it all, thought we had it all Thought we had it all, thought we had it all, thought we had it all So much for stardust We thought we had it all, thought we had it all Thought we had it all, thought we had it all, thought we had it all

I need the sound of crowds or I can't fall asleep at night I can't take my thoughts and I Can't take my thoughts and I am awake Another year of possibilities left unwrapped Like gifts the day right after Christmas past And I'm pretty positive my pain isn't cool enough, pain isn't cool enough

Like a sledgehammer to a disco ball Crushing all my low low low lows, ache it till you make it Ache it till you make it

I think I've been going through it And I've been putting your name to it

So much for stardust We thought we had it all, thought we had it all Thought we had it all, thought we had it all, thought we had it all So much for stardust We thought we had it all, thought we had it all Thought we had it all, thought we had it all, thought we had it all

In another life you were my babe In another life you were the sunshine of my lifetime What would trade the pain for? I'm not sure

In another life you were my babe In another life you were the sunshine of my lifetime What would trade the pain for? I'm not sure

I used to be a real go-getter I used to think it'd all get better

So much for stardust We thought we had it all, thought we had it all Thought we had it all, thought we had it all, thought we had it all So much for stardust We thought we had it all, thought we had it all Thought we had it all, thought we had it all, thought we had it all

So much for stardust We thought we had it all, thought we had it all Thought we had it all, thought we had it all, thought we had it all So much for stardust We thought we had it all, thought we had it all Thought we had it all, thought we had it all, thought we had it all

So much for stardust We thought we had it all, thought we had it all Thought we had it all, thought we had it all, thought we had it all So much for stardust We thought we had it all, thought we had it all Thought we had it all, thought we had it all, thought we had it all

@mischivana @kunaskult @mako-sea @oranoyaora @dogggggggblog-kaye @inlovewithpsychos @onlykuna @cheam-creems123 @ravenraa ♥

[belimah]

15. Flu Game art by mblydez

You make it past the parking lot before your body starts to understand what your mind has already done.

That’s the first cruelty of it.

Anger keeps you upright. It’s a clean kind of anger while you are still close enough to the restaurant to feel watched by its windows, close enough to imagine Sukuna standing in the parking lot behind you, breathing hard, one eye fixed on your back like he can pin you there by looking. Anger puts your shoulders straight. It keeps your steps even. It tells you not to turn around, not to let him see the full damage of it, not to give him the relief of watching you break in front of him and mistake your pain for proof that he still has some kind of right to reach for you.

For a few minutes, movement carries you. Your legs know how to walk. Your hands know how to hold your phone, even when your fingers feel too cold and too clumsy around it. Your eyes know how to stay forward because if you look back, if you catch even the shape of him under the restaurant lights or near the entrance or beside the cars, you are afraid some desperate, loyal, humiliating piece of you will betray everything you just said.

So you walk.

The night air is cold enough to make your throat sting. It slips under your clothes, finds the dampness at the back of your neck, presses against the heat still crawling across your face. Your breathing is uneven, not yet crying, not properly. It is worse than crying at first, this horrible stuck thing in your chest, the way each inhale feels like it drags over something torn. Your eyes burn. Your mouth tastes like metal because you have been biting the inside of your cheek without noticing, a small pain to keep the larger one from swallowing you whole. You keep walking until the first sob almost comes out of you in public, and you press your knuckles to your mouth so hard your teeth sting.

It’s not graceful or composed. It’s not the kind of heartbreak that lets you look beautiful under streetlights, tragic and cinematic and perfectly wounded. It’s ugly in the way the body is ugly when it realizes something before the mind is ready to translate it. Your stomach twists. Your throat closes. The skin under your eyes feels hot and tight.

You could call a car.

That’s the sensible thing. You know how to do that. Open the app, confirm the address, stand somewhere safe, keep breathing until a stranger arrives and takes you home. You could call a cab too. You could even walk a little farther, find a convenience store, hide under too-bright lights and buy water you will not drink. There are so many reasonable options, all of them lined up in your head with the terrible clarity of someone who is trying not to fall apart in public.

Instead you stop by the edge of the sidewalk, your thumb hovering over Maki’s name.

It takes you too long to press it.

Not because you doubt she will come. That’s not even a question. Maki will come. Maki would leave dinner, leave sleep, leave work, leave a minor crime half-finished if you called her with that unsteady little breath already betraying you before you managed a word. She is that kind of friend. The kind who does not need explanation to arrive. The kind who has seen life rough you up in different shapes before and has never once made you feel ridiculous for needing her.

That is what makes it hard. Calling her means it’s real.

Calling her means you didn’t just have an argument. You didn’t just need air. You didn’t just walk away to calm down before going back inside, before Sukuna’s hand finds your wrist again, before his voice goes low and rough and stupidly vulnerable under all that anger, before you let yourself believe that this is another ugly thing the two of you can survive because you have survived worse around him.

Calling Maki means you have left.

Your thumb trembles.

You almost hate yourself for how badly you still want him to come after you.

Not because you would go back. You don’t think you would. You hope you wouldn’t. But there is a weak, wounded part of you that wants to hear fast steps behind you, wants to hear him say your name like it matters more than his pride, wants him to fight for you with something other than anger. Something clean. Something honest. Something that does not make you feel like an intruder in his life after spending two years learning how to fit beside him without asking him to carve out a place for you.

But the street stays open behind you.

No heavy footsteps.

No rough voice.

No hand reaching carefully this time, stopping before it touches because he remembers you told him not to grab you.

Nothing.

You press call.

Maki answers on the second ring.

“Where are you?”

The sound that leaves you is not language. It is barely a breath. Your fingers curl around the phone so tightly the edge digs into your skin.

For a second, you can’t say the address. Your throat locks around it because giving her the location means admitting you need rescue from a place where you arrived with him. From a night where you should have been eating dinner, tolerating Naoya, squeezing Sukuna’s knee under the table when his patience thinned, maybe rolling your eyes at him in the car after, maybe going home with him, maybe falling asleep against his side as if the world had not just split open and shown you the rot buried under the beginning.

“Send me your location,” Maki says, voice already changing. Not softer exactly. Maki is not soft when frightened. She becomes flat, precise, dangerously ready to act. “Don’t move from wherever you are unless you feel unsafe. If you feel unsafe, go inside somewhere with people and call me again. I’m getting my keys.”

“I’m sorry,” you manage.

“Don’t apologize. Send it.”

You do.

Your phone becomes too heavy once the message goes through. You hold it in both hands and stare down at the screen as if there might be instructions there for how to survive the next ten minutes. Maki stays on the call. You hear movement on her end, the muted thud of a drawer, keys, a door, her breathing. She does not ask what happened. She does not ask why Sukuna is not driving you. She does not ask whether you are hurt. Maybe she already knows the answer is yes and that the type of hurt does not need to be triaged over the phone.

“Talk to me if you can,” she says eventually. “Anything. Not about what happened if you can’t. Tell me what’s around you.”

You lift your head.

A narrow street. Parked cars. A restaurant window glowing warm behind a curtain. A man smoking near a doorway half a block away, not looking at you. The faint reflection of yourself in dark glass, pale and still, like someone waiting outside her own body.

“Cars,” you say, and your voice cracks so badly you close your eyes. “A tree. There’s a sign with half the light broken. Someone’s smoking.”

“Good. Keep looking around. I’m coming.”

You nod even though she cannot see it.

The tears do not fall yet. They keep gathering, burning, blurring the streetlights into hazy lines. You hate that too. You hate how your body is trying to delay the collapse because it knows you are still outside, still visible, still a woman alone at night with a broken heart and a phone in her hand. You hate that you are thinking about practical danger while emotional damage is chewing through your ribs. You hate that some part of you is still worried about Sukuna. About his face after you said what you said. About his shoulder, his knee, the tension in his hands. About whether he drove home angry. About whether he will do something stupid because pain always seems to become a dare inside him.

You press your free hand to your sternum.

That’s the worst of it.

You still understand him.

Even now, even with your insides folding in on themselves, you understand too much. You know he has the hardest time trusting anything that doesn’t come with conditions. You know love confuses him when it’s not tied to use, spectacle, victory, need. You know he does not know what to do with being cared for as a man instead of as a champion, a body, a violent investment, a living myth people can cheer for as long as he keeps surviving in entertaining ways. You know he panics when concern feels like pity. You know tenderness lands wrong in him sometimes, like a language he learned by memorizing patterns but never fully believed belonged to him.

You know the bet was not the truth after the first night.

You know that.

You know the way he looked at you afterward, in the bath, exhausted and bruised and less guarded than he wanted to be. You know the way he texted. The way he showed up. The way he gave you a drawer without naming what it meant. The way he learned your schedule, your coffee, your silences, your anxiety around privacy. The way he did not post your face because he asked and listened. The way he brought you into his life in all the ugly, ordinary, intimate ways that could not have been part of some old cruel game.

But knowing that doesn’t fix the fact that he let you be the only person who didn’t know.

Knowing that doesn’t fix the humiliation of Naoya’s voice, the toast, the laughter around the edges of it, the sick little click of realization inside your mind as the beginning of something precious changed shape in your hands.

Knowing that doesn’t fix the way Sukuna followed you outside and still managed, somehow, to make his shame sound like suspicion of you.

You wanted access.

You liked the show.

You wanted the champion.

Maybe not in those exact words, maybe not that simply, but close enough to carve.

You can’t throw your self-respect into the fire just because you can see exactly why he’s burning.

Your breathing falters again.

You did like the sport. You still do. You liked the violence of precision, the physics, the noise, the impossible beauty of bodies and machines doing something that looked careless only because skill had hidden the labor. You liked watching him ride because he was glorious at it, because he looked most alive when danger had to negotiate with him and lost. You liked the VIP access, sure, because you are not a saint and the view was good and your friends deserved the experience. You liked the adrenaline. You liked his grin after. You liked his hand on your knee in the paddock, his sweat, his heat, the way his eyes found you even when the stadium wanted him.

But you didn’t stay in a hospital for access.

You didn’t sit beside a bed listening to machines because you wanted a famous man.

You didn’t learn the language of his pain because you liked the glamour.

You didn’t love him because he was useful to your fantasies.

You didn’t even choose to fall in love with him, not properly. It happened slowly, stupidly, through injury and teasing and mornings and food containers and his terrible moods and the private, startling gentleness that appeared in him like something he hated anyone seeing. It happened while you were trying to be sensible. It happened while you told yourself not to expect too much. It happened while you respected every unnamed boundary he left around the two of you because pressing him felt cruel when he was already trying in the only warped ways he knew.

Maybe it would have been easier if he had just fucked you that first night and ditched you in the morning.

The thought arrives so violently that the first tear spills.

Maybe that would have hurt. It would have bruised your pride, made you feel foolish, made Maki curse him out while you pretended not to care. Maybe it would have become a story you told with a bitter laugh later, the superstar rider who was very damn good at making you flustered and very bad at being anything other than a passing disaster. You would have recovered. You would have watched events with some residual embarrassment. You would have seen his face on banners and felt a pinch, not this.

This is not one night collapsing.

This is his key turning in your lock. His helmet on your cabinet. His hand on your thigh in the car. The drawer he gave you so you would stop living out of a bag. The way he let you put ice on his shoulder and pretended he was tolerating it when his body slowly, grudgingly relaxed under your hands. This is the hospital chair, the smell of antiseptic, the first hoarse hi after surgery. This is his mouth at your wrist, his hand refusing to let go when Yuuji walked into the room. This is the first time you told him you loved him and the way he did not say it back but asked you not to leave.

Now you are mourning a non-relationship that somehow had the weight of a life.

Grieving a drawer.

Sitting on a sidewalk with your heart breaking because a man who never asked you to be his still became someone you arranged your hope around.

You wipe the tear too hard. Another follows immediately. Then another.

Maki stays on the phone until her car turns the corner.

She does not hang up until she pulls in close, hazards blinking, her face visible through the windshield. The sight of her does what Sukuna’s absence did not. It breaks the last thin structure holding you upright.

You open the passenger door and get in. For a second, neither of you speaks.

The car smells like Maki’s perfume, coffee, old receipts, the mint gum she keeps in the console. Familiar. Safe. Your body recognizes it before your mind does. Your bag slips down your arm into your lap, your phone still clutched in your hand, and your breathing turns jagged enough that Maki reaches across you without a word and pulls the seatbelt over your chest.

The click is absurdly gentle. That is when you start crying properly.

Not pretty tears. Not even controlled ones. It pours out of you with a force that bends you forward until your forehead almost touches your hands. You try to hold some of it back because part of you is still embarrassed, still trained to make grief smaller when another person is trapped close to it, but Maki makes a low sound under her breath and puts the car into drive.

“Don’t do that,” she says. “Not with me.”

So you don’t. You cry until your throat hurts, until your nose clogs, until the city outside becomes nothing but smeared light and motion. Maki drives without filling the silence. Her jaw is locked, one hand tight on the wheel, the other occasionally leaving it to touch your shoulder, your wrist, your knee, small points of contact that do not demand anything from you. She lets you shake. She lets you make ugly sounds. She lets you be exactly as destroyed as you are.

Your phone buzzes while you are halfway home. You flinch so hard Maki’s eyes snap toward you.

“It’s not him,” you whisper, though you do not know that.

You look anyway because you are weak and human and still waiting for the knife to twist.

It’s Shoko.

I didn’t know. I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry for the way you were treated. I’ll understand if you don’t want to see any of us again, but I appreciate your friendship, and I’d be happy if you decide to continue it. You don’t have to answer me now.

The words blur.

You make a sound that is almost a sob and almost a laugh because of course Shoko would be honest, direct, careful enough to give you an exit and warm enough to make it hurt.

Maki glances down.

“Who?”

“Shoko.”

“What did she say?”

You read it aloud, barely.

Maki’s expression changes in a way you cannot fully read through tears. Anger first. Not at Shoko, you think. At the situation. At the number of people now standing around your hurt with their own degrees of guilt and apology.

“Give me your phone,” she says.

You look at her.

“Not forever. Just now.”

“I should answer.”

“No. You should breathe. You can answer tomorrow when you aren’t bleeding all over a screen.”

You almost argue. The habit of being considerate tries to rise even now, ridiculous and exhausted. Shoko deserves a reply. Shoko deserves to know you are not angry at her. Shoko has been your friend, not just Sukuna’s doctor. You want to keep her. You want to keep something from the life you just walked out of.

Maki holds out her hand. You put the phone in it.

She slips it into the side pocket of her door, then picks up her own at the next red light and texts something quickly with one hand.

You do not ask. You have no room left to ask.

At your apartment, Maki doesn’t ask for instructions. She moves through your home like someone who has earned the right to know where everything is, because she has. She puts your bag on the chair, takes off your shoes when your fingers can’t handle the straps, brings you water, then changes her mind and makes tea because water looks too cold for the state of you. She turns on warm lamps instead of the overhead light. She closes the curtains. She starts the shower and places your robe in the bathroom. You hear the soft clatter of your mug, the kettle, the cabinet where you keep the tea you forget to drink unless someone makes it for you.

You stand in the middle of your living room, useless.

Your eyes drift to the poster on the wall.

The old motocross poster. The one from before everything truly became yours and his and then not yours at all. The one he once told you to put back up. The one that used to feel like proof that you had loved the sport before him, or maybe around him, or maybe because of the event where he became impossible to ignore. You can’t separate it tonight. The rider frozen midair looks suddenly obscene, like the wall itself is asking you to remember the crash, the helmet, the screens cutting, your hands trembling with water bottles and hospital forms and helplessness.

You don’t say anything. Maki follows your stare. There is no conversation. No question. No gentle proposal about whether you want it removed.

You press a hand over your mouth as she unhooks the frame, and carries it away from the wall. She does not throw it out. She does not make a show of it. She leans it face-down in your closet behind a suitcase, somewhere you will not accidentally see it tomorrow and collapse before breakfast.

That is when you understand that she knows enough.

Maybe not the details. Maybe not the bet. Maybe not Naoya’s disgusting toast or Sukuna’s defensive self-destruction in the parking lot. But she knows that if he were safe for you tonight, he would be here, or he would have taken you to her himself, angry and quiet and present. She knows his absence is not neutral.

After the shower, you come out in your robe with your skin flushed and your head aching. Maki has heated a little food. Something plain. Something you can swallow without thinking. She sits near you while you eat three bites and then stop. She doesn’t comment. She gives you the tea. You drink because she made it.

Later, when you are in bed, she curls behind you like she did when you were younger and life had found other ways to be cruel. You feel her arm come around your waist, firm and warm, anchoring you to the mattress. For a long time you stare at the wall where the poster used to be, now blank except for the faint rectangle left by time and light.

“I’m glad you came,” you say eventually. Your voice is barely there.

Maki presses a kiss to the back of your head, then your temple when you shift.

“Always.”

You cry again, quietly this time. She holds you until you sleep.

Morning does not fix anything.

It’s offensive, really, how the world continues with its ordinary arrogance. Sunlight presses against the curtains. Somewhere below, a car door shuts. Your phone exists. Your kitchen exists. Your body exists, sore from crying, eyes swollen, mouth dry, head heavy. The wall still has an empty rectangle. Maki is already awake beside you, scrolling through her phone with the brightness low, one hand still resting against your arm as if she decided in her sleep that you might vanish if not monitored.

You want, for one small second, to wake up in Sukuna’s apartment.

You hate yourself for it immediately.

Not because wanting him is wrong. Because it’s inconvenient. Because it comes before thought, before dignity, before anger. Because your body remembers his bed, his warmth, the weight of his arm, the rough sound he makes when dragged out of sleep too early. Because heartbreak has not yet informed your nervous system that love is no longer a safe route home.

Maki notices your face before you speak.

“Bathroom first,” she says. “Then breakfast. Then you tell me or you don’t.”

You listen because it’s easier than deciding.

Breakfast is toast, eggs, coffee you barely touch, and Maki sitting across from you in your kitchen like a guard dog with eyeliner. You look at your own hands around the mug and begin with the dinner because you can’t begin with the first night. That would require too much. You tell her about Naoya’s toast. The bet. The way it was apparently something Sukuna used to do, picking someone from the crowd, proving he could have them by the end of the night. You tell her how Choso knew. How the air changed. How the beginning of everything became suddenly humiliating in retrospect.

Maki goes very still. That is more frightening than shouting for you, because you know her.

You keep going because if you stop, you might not start again. You tell her about leaving the table, Sukuna following, the parking lot. You don’t repeat every word perfectly. You can’t. Some of them are too sharp. Some of them have already fused into the feeling they caused. But you tell her the shape of it. That he said it was stupid and from the beginning, that it was not like that anymore. That he got defensive. That he acted as if you loved the access, the sport, the champion, as if the year of care was somehow suspect because he can’t imagine being loved without performing for it.

Your voice breaks when you tell her you said he was precious.

Maki’s mouth tightens.

“I don’t regret saying it,” you whisper. “I just hate that I had to say it like that.”

Maki exhales slowly through her nose, looking down at her plate as if considering whether throwing it would help.

“I’m going to run him over.”

Despite everything, a wet little laugh catches in your throat.

She looks up.

“I’m not joking.”

“I know you’re not.”

“I’ll make it look accidental enough. Not legal advice, just optimism. I won’t tell you when, but you need to visit me in jail if someone gets me.”

You laugh again, and it hurts your chest, but it’s real enough to make your eyes sting with a different kind of gratitude. Maki watches you with the grim satisfaction of someone who has managed to pull a living sound out of wreckage.

“I’m tired,” you say. “I don’t want revenge. I don’t even want him punished. I just want to go back to normal, or something close to it. I want to wake up and work and see you and not feel like my chest is collapsing because some man with emotional constipation decided love was a conspiracy.”

Maki reaches across the table and squeezes your hand.

“Then we do normal. And when normal fails, we do something else until it works.”

You nod. It sounds simple when she says it.

It’s not simple.

That morning, you remove Sukuna from Instagram.

Your finger hovers over his profile longer than you want to admit. There is not much there, not personally. Sponsor shots. Controlled images. Things Mei Mei approved or tolerated. Your connection to him was never really public through the app, not in a way people could easily find. But he had access to your small locked world. Your flowers. Your dead leaves. Your event angles. Your occasional photos from school corridors with no students visible. Your stray cats. Your rain. Your quiet, boring, private things.

You remove him because keeping him there feels like leaving a window open.

You remove his other, hidden account too, with the one picture of the cat.

Then you remove Choso.

That hurts differently.

Maki sits beside you through that one. She does not tell you what to do. She only watches your thumb hover and your face twist with guilt.

“He knew,” you say.

“Yeah.”

“He was kind to me.”

“Both can be true.”

“I don’t want to punish him.”

“You’re not punishing him. You’re choosing who gets to see you.”

The sentence settles. You remove him too.

Deleting Sukuna’s number takes a week.

You tell yourself it’s practical at first. There might be logistics. Things at his apartment. Some emergency. Maybe Shoko needs something. Maybe Yuuji. Maybe keeping the number does not mean anything if you do not use it. People keep old numbers all the time. It’s just data. Digits. A contact saved as Champion because that first night he had been arrogant and amused and too pleased with himself when he typed it in.

By the third day, you know you’re lying.

By the fifth, you open the contact and stare at it for so long your screen goes dark twice.

By the seventh, Maki is not there. That matters. You do it alone because some parts of dignity have to be private. You sit on your bed, take one long breath, and delete the contact.

The phone doesn’t become lighter.

Nothing dramatic happens.

But your hands shake afterward.

You answer Shoko that same week.

You rewrite the message six times because everything sounds either too formal or too desperate. In the end, you tell her the truth. That you appreciate her friendship too. That you believe she did not know. That you do not want to lose her, but you might need moments where the conversation does not orbit him or the team. That you are hurt, and you are tired, and you do not know exactly how to be normal, but you want to try.

Shoko answers with a steadiness that makes you cry again, though not as violently.

We can do that. And we can never talk about him unless you bring him up. I’m sorry again. Also, for the record, I do have malpractice fantasies now.

You laugh into your sleeve.

The following week, you invite Shoko, Nobara, Kirara, Mai, and Maki over because your apartment has become too quiet and your thoughts have started echoing in it. You don’t call it a girls’ night. That feels too cheerful at first. But Nobara arrives with snacks and a face that says she is ready to verbally execute someone. Mai brings drinks and pretends not to be concerned by criticizing your glassware. Kirara compliments your hair and your nails because she’s an angel. Shoko brings cigarettes she smokes on your balcony and a bag of pastries from the bakery near your street. Maki brings herself, which is the most essential thing.

For a few hours, it works. Not… completely. There are gaps. Moments where everyone laughs and you laugh half a second late because your mind wandered toward an apartment with a gray drawer. Moments where Shoko’s phone lights up and your stomach tightens before you remember she’s not here as his doctor tonight. Moments where the conversation gets close to the edge of motorsports and everyone silently swerves away from it so fast it would be funny if it did not make your throat ache.

Still, it works.

You drink. You eat. Kirara complains about a coworker with such theatrical hatred that you almost forget your own pain for ten minutes. Mai and Nobara bicker over nothing until Maki asks if this is foreplay and both of them tell her to shut up at the same time, which makes you laugh hard enough to wipe tears from the corners of your eyes.

Later, when Nobara and Mai are arguing in the kitchen about music, Shoko sits beside you on the couch.

“I can retrieve your things,” she says quietly. “From his place. You probably have stuff there you like.”

Your fingers tighten around your glass. For a second, the room blurs around the edges.

Your things. In his apartment.

The drawer opens inside your mind with horrible clarity. Clothes folded there. A toothbrush. Amenity pouch. Hair ties. The domestic proof that you had existed in his space long enough to leave pieces of yourself behind.

“I thought about leaving it,” you admit.

Shoko’s gaze stays on you, not pitying, not pressing.

“You can. I’ll support that too.”

“I don’t want him to think—” You stop, frustrated by yourself. “I don’t know what I don’t want him to think. Maybe I don’t want to care what he thinks.”

“That would be… convenient.”

You huff a broken little laugh. Shoko gives you time.

You look toward the kitchen, where Maki is threatening to ban both Nobara and Mai from touching the speaker and Kirara is watching them like they’re actors of a sitcom. Your apartment is loud in a way that is saving you. You think of your clothes in Sukuna’s drawer and feel something squeeze hard behind your ribs.

“I have things there I like,” you say eventually. “And I don’t want to lose my own things because he hurt me.”

“Then I’ll get them.”

“Thank you.”

She nods, then leans back like the matter is settled because, with Shoko, practical care is often the gentlest form of loyalty.

When she brings the box a few days later, you make coffee.

You do it because your hands need a task. Because accepting a plastic box full of your life from Sukuna’s apartment feels too bare without the normal ritual of offering a drink. Because Shoko has come over after work and looks tired, and because you can’t just stand in the entryway and take the box like a delivery.

The box is clear with a gray lid. Of course he chose something sturdy.

That thought arrives before you can stop it, and it hurts in a stupidly tender place. He could have shoved everything in a bag. He did not. You hate that your mind notices. You hate that even now, some part of you is collecting evidence that he cared. Gods, you want to cry.

Shoko accepts coffee and sits at your table while you open the lid.

At first it’s fine. Not good, because your eyes may be holding back bravely but you still feel your body buzzing. Nothing about this is good. But manageable. You take out your clothes, fold them again because they shifted in the box, place them in piles. Your pouch. Your socks. Your toothbrush, which makes you pause with a humorless little smile because a toothbrush should not look tragic and yet here it is, a small domestic corpse in your hand.

Then you reach the shirts.

His shirts.

The black one first.

Your fingers stop on the fabric.

Everything in you goes quiet.

You know the texture before you fully lift it off. Soft cotton, washed enough times to lose any stiffness, familiar in the way skin becomes familiar. You have slept in this shirt. You have padded around his kitchen in it while he leaned against the counter and watched you pretend not to notice. You have worn it after showers, after long days, after nights when you ended up at his place with no plan. You have pressed your face into the collar when he was not looking because it smelled like his detergent and him and the apartment where you somehow learned to rest.

Your eyes fill so fast it is embarrassing. Shoko notices immediately.

“Hey,” she says, quietly enough not to startle you. “Are you okay?”

You nod. It convinces no one, least of all yourself.

The second shirt is worse because it is the old team one, collar stretched, ugly in a way that made it perfect. You remember making fun of it. You remember him telling you to take it off then, if you had so many opinions. You remember not taking it off. You remember the look he gave you.

Your lower lip catches between your teeth painfully. Shoko stands slowly, coming around the table. She does not touch you right away. You appreciate that more than you can say. She looks at the shirts, then at you.

“Do those go back?”

Your throat works. You nod. Saying yes aloud would break something open.

Shoko waits, giving you a chance to change your mind.

You want them.

That is the most miserable truth in the room.

You want them so badly your chest hurts. You want to put one on and crawl into bed and cry until you sleep with his scent around you, even if the scent is mostly detergent now, even if the shirt no longer belongs to what you had. You want the comfort. You want the wound. You want the private, pathetic relief of holding onto something he wore because missing him has nowhere to go inside your body and the shirts would give it shape.

Which is exactly why you can’t keep them.

They would make you worse. They would make every night a temptation. They would make it harder not to check event channels, harder not to open old pictures, harder not to rebuild him from cotton and memory until your self-respect went soft at the edges.

You push the shirts toward Shoko with both hands.

It feels like surrender.

It also feels like survival.

“I can’t,” you manage, voice strained thin. “They’re not mine.”

Shoko takes them with more care than you expect.

“Okay.”

“I do want them,” you say, because lying feels suddenly unbearable. “I really do. I just… can’t do this to myself.”

“I know. You don’t need to give me a reason.”

You wipe your cheek with the heel of your hand.

Shoko folds the shirts, not perfectly but gently, and sets them aside.

“For what it’s worth, I would have made his medical life miserable if I had known earlier. Not enough to lose my license, probably. But enough that he’d suspect.”

A wet, broken laugh jumps out of you before you can stop it.

It hurts. It’s real as well.

Shoko looks satisfied in the smallest way.

“You are terrible,” you say.

“I’m a girls’ girl.”

You laugh again, then cry, then laugh because crying and laughing have become embarrassingly close neighbors in your body.

When Shoko leaves, you hug her at the door. It’s not the easy kind of hug you used to give her after girls’ nights, tipsy and loose and affectionate. It’s tighter. More careful. Full of gratitude and pain and the strange relief of not losing everyone attached to him.

“Thank you,” you whisper.

Shoko’s arms tighten around you.

“Anytime.”

Weeks go by. Then months.

At first, time doesn’t heal anything. It only creates more opportunities to notice what is missing.

Monday mornings no longer carry the chance of a text from him saying he is picking you up after work. Your backpack slowly stops containing spare clothes for accidental overnights. The corner of your bathroom sink looks too clean. Your evenings become yours again in a way that should feel freeing and instead feels, for a while, like being returned to a house after someone has stolen all the furniture.

You work.

That helps because work doesn’t care about heartbreak. Students still need explanations. Papers still need grading. Meetings still happen with their usual ability to drain life from your body. Teenagers still manage to be dramatic about things that are both enormous and ridiculous. You find comfort in that. In the way their lives keep demanding your attention. In the way you can still be useful without being consumed.

Some days you are almost normal.

You drink coffee with Maki before school and complain about administration. You buy groceries. You answer messages. You clean your apartment. You go out with the girls. You laugh when Nobara tells a story too loudly in public. You watch Mai and Maki pretend they are not taking care of each other. You sit on your balcony with Shoko while she smokes and you drink tea, and sometimes neither of you says anything for twenty minutes.

Other days, grief ambushes you over nothing.

A motorcycle passing too fast outside your building. A Monster logo on a convenience store fridge. A student doodling a dirt bike on the corner of a worksheet. Your own hand reaching for a shirt that is not there.

You still like the sport.

That becomes one of the more complicated losses.

You miss the maneuvers. You miss understanding the choices. You miss the rhythm of watching a rider approach a section and knowing, with growing confidence, where the risk sits. You miss the small satisfaction of seeing a good correction before a commentator says it. You miss being able to enjoy something loud and dangerous and strangely elegant without your body remembering the screen cutting after the crash.

You try once. Not a live event. Not even a full race. Just a clip online, some other rider, a clean jump with no relation to him beyond the sport itself.

Your chest tightens before the bike leaves the ramp.

By the landing, you have closed the app and are sitting on the edge of your bed with your hand pressed to your mouth, breathing through a panic that makes you furious.

It’s fucking pathetic, you think.

The thought is immediate and cruel.

He has you in a chokehold without even being there. Without texting. Without showing up. Without breaking your door down or making some dramatic gesture that would at least give your pain a fresh reason. He’s simply absent, and the absence still manages to shape what you can watch, where you can go, what your body believes is safe.

You’re glad he doesn’t reach out.

You tell yourself that often because it’s true.

You’re glad he understood. Glad he respected the closed door. Glad he didn’t use his force of will, his money, his fame, his terrible ability to fill any space he enters, to make your healing harder. You knew he could understand instructions when they mattered. You knew he was not stupid. You knew, maybe, that the last thing you said in the parking lot landed somewhere in him deep enough to stop his worst impulses.

Still, sometimes, late at night, some less dignified part of you wonders why he didn’t fight a little more.

You hate that part.

It sounds too much like longing.

It sounds like wanting him to come hurt you again just so the love has movement.

You don’t feed it.

Yuuji reaches out after some time.

Not immediately. You appreciate that, too. A rushed message from him would have felt like another person trying to manage the damage around Sukuna. Instead he waits long enough for the first violent wave to pass, then sends something careful and unmistakably Yuuji.

Hey. You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to. I was wondering if maybe you’d want to grab coffee sometime. Not to talk about him unless you want to. I just miss my friend.

You stare at the message for a while.

Then you cry because you miss him too.

Yuuji had become your friend before you fully noticed. That happened often with him, you think. He entered lives with so much open warmth that by the time you realized he mattered, he was already sitting comfortably somewhere near the heart. He had been tied to Sukuna, yes, but not only through Sukuna. You liked him. You liked his kindness, his clumsy honesty, the way he made affection feel easy without making it shallow.

You agree.

When you meet him at the coffee shop, seeing him is a little stunning.

He has clearly made an effort not to look like Sukuna.

That should not be funny. It is, slightly. His hair is styled differently, less like its natural resemblance might betray him. His clothes are softer, more layered, almost too neat, like he asked someone for advice and then followed it with great seriousness. He looks a little like an elderly man’s idea of a nice young person going to brunch. It’s so Yuuji that your chest squeezes with affection before grief can take over.

He stands when he sees you. You hug him first.

His arms come around you with careful strength, and for a second you feel him exhale like he had been holding his breath since sending the text.

“I’m really glad you came,” he says when you pull back.

“Me too.”

You both talk about safe things first.

Work. His errands. A movie he watched and hated but finished because the dog in it was cute. A student of yours who called a historical figure “that old messy guy” and was not entirely wrong. Yuuji laughs in all the right places, maybe a little too hard at first, both of you building a bridge with small ordinary planks before stepping anywhere heavy.

Eventually Yuuji looks down at his latte, thumb rubbing against the cardboard sleeve.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “For what my brother did. For the fucking disgusting bet, for the fact I didn’t know beforehand so I could beat him into being a decent man before he got anywhere near you. I know that’s not how responsibility works, and I know apologizing for him doesn’t fix anything, but I need to say it because not saying it feels worse.”

You manage a small smile, tired and fond and sad.

“You don’t need to apologize for him.”

“I know. I just hate that he keeps making people carry pieces of him they didn’t ask for.”

That sentence sits between you. You don’t know what to do with it.

Yuuji looks at you carefully, then asks,

“Did he ever tell you anything about when we were kids?”

“No,” you say. “You told me some things. Little bits. He didn’t.”

Yuuji nods like he expected that.

For a while, he does not speak. The coffee shop keeps providing its ordinary mundane little sounds around you. Cups, milk steaming, chairs scraping, quiet conversations. Your fingers stay wrapped around your drink, even though it is not really warm anymore.

“He sucks at social cues,” Yuuji says finally, with a soft, humorless little laugh. “You obviously noticed. It’s impossible not to notice when you’re close to him.”

Despite yourself, your mouth curves.

“He’s disastrous when he doesn’t know what’s expected of him.”

“Yeah. And he hates not knowing, so he pretends he doesn’t care.”

You look down. That sounds too familiar.

Yuuji breathes in slowly.

“I’m six years younger. That matters because my childhood was not his childhood, even though we had the same parents in the same house. For a long time I thought he was just older, you know? He was the older brother, so of course he cooked. Of course he knew where things were. Of course he handled stuff. Of course he didn’t cry or ask for help or get sick unless he was basically collapsing. I thought that was what older brothers were like because he made it look normal.”

Your grip tightens slightly around the cup.

You work with kids and teenagers. You already feel something in you paying attention in that quiet, professional, aching way. Patterns. Behaviors. The familiar shape of a child becoming too self-sufficient because no one has made helplessness safe.

Yuuji keeps looking into his latte.

“I was normal,” he says, and the word makes his mouth twist. “That’s how my parents said it. Normal. Happy, loud, easy. I made friends. I brought home soccer trophies and class prizes and drawings and whatever else kids bring home. They smiled at me. They hugged me. They showed up for things, not always, but enough that I didn’t know they weren’t doing the same for him.”

Your throat tightens.

“Sukuna was a good student,” Yuuji continues. “Really good. Disciplined in a way that looks impressive until you remember he was a kid. Good grades, karate prizes, chores done, no trouble at school unless some other kid started something and he ended it too hard. But none of that was celebrated. It was expected. When he did well, our parents acted like he had simply met the baseline. When he struggled, they treated it like inconvenience. He was quiet. Weird to them, I think. Too observant. Too serious. Too unsure how to act like a child, and instead of helping him, they just… stepped back. Or maybe they never stepped close in the first place.”

Your coffee is cold now. You don’t drink it.

You see Sukuna as a child unwillingly. Pink hair, sharp eyes, too still, learning the shape of a room before deciding how to move through it. A boy who doesn’t cry because crying produces nothing. A boy cooking because food doesn’t appear otherwise. A boy caring for Yuuji because the baby needs someone and the adults are not reliable enough. A boy praised less for excellence than Yuuji was for being lovable in ways their parents understood.

It doesn’t excuse anything.

You hold onto that like a railing. Explanation is not absolution. His childhood doesn’t erase the bet, the omission, the way he wounded you because he couldn’t tolerate feeling ashamed. It does not make you responsible for fixing what his parents broke.

But something clicks softly inside your head anyway. A key in a lock you did not know you were carrying.

Yuuji glances up and seems to read some of it on your face.

“I’m not telling you so you forgive him,” he says quickly, voice rougher. “I wouldn’t ask that. I don’t even know if he deserves it. I just… you loved him. I think you deserve context he was probably never going to give you because admitting any of this would kill him, apparently.”

You let out a small breath that almost becomes a laugh and fails.

“He really never told me.”

“He barely tells me. Most of this I noticed too late. Or guessed. Or remembered differently as I got older.” Yuuji’s expression shifts, guilt settling over his features. “There were things I thought were normal because he made them normal. Like him making breakfast when he was eleven. Or staying up with me when I was sick. Or knowing how to talk to teachers like a parent. As a kid, I thought he was amazing. As an adult, I realized no one was taking care of him while he was taking care of me.”

Your eyes sting. Yuuji rubs the back of his neck.

“Sorry. I’m talking too much about myself and someone you probably don’t want to hear about.”

“No,” you say softly. “It’s okay. I’m listening.”

And you are.

After that, the conversation slowly moves elsewhere. It does not become light, exactly, but it becomes survivable. Yuuji tells you about something Megumi said that was accidentally devastating. You tell him about school. He apologizes again, less formally this time, and you tell him again that you want him in your life if he wants to be there.

His relief is visible enough that you have to look down for a moment.

Your life continues in ordinary ways after that.

You go to work. You return home. You spend time with Maki, Mai, Nobara, Shoko, Kirara. Girls’ nights move outside more often because your apartment still feels too associated with waiting. You go to restaurants, bars, cafés. A few clubs, even. Places with bass in the floor and lights over bodies and enough noise to make thinking optional for small windows of time. You dress up because you want to remember that being seen can be fun when it is your choice and not a camera stealing context. You let Nobara choose lipstick for you once and regret it only because she is unbearably smug when it looks good.

You let yourself be flirted with.

At first, it feels like theater. An act. Too fake even though it’s not.

Men approach. Some are boring. Some are too confident. Some are polite enough that you feel bad for having no interest. You accept drinks only when they come straight from the bartender, because you are wounded, not stupid. Maki watches with the intense neutrality of someone prepared to commit violence if necessary. Nobara rates approaches under her breath. Mai pretends not to participate and then delivers the harshest judgments. Shoko suggests, after one man fails spectacularly to understand that “I teach” is not an invitation to make a schoolgirl joke, that maybe humanity has not evolved as far as medicine would like.

Eventually, one of them makes you laugh.

Kashimo is not what you expect to want. Maybe that helps.

He is sharp in a different way from Sukuna. Less heavy, less consuming, less like standing too close to an engine and feeling your bones take on its rhythm. He has long hair you immediately want to touch and a smile that appears like he is slightly surprised by his own amusement. He is curious without pushing. He has a habit of trying things simply to find out whether he likes them, which makes him strangely easy to bring into your world because he does not pretend expertise where he has none.

You give him your number after what you learn was a few hours of conversation. Maki smiles at you like she is proud and tries to hide it behind her drink. You see it anyway.

Dating him is gentle in the places you need gentleness.

Not boring. That surprises you too. Kashimo can be intense, competitive about ridiculous things, dryly funny, occasionally reckless in small social ways that make you stare at him before laughing. But he doesn’t overwhelm you. He doesn’t turn silence into a test. He notices when you avoid certain topics and lets them remain avoided. When he asks about your past relationships and you give him almost nothing, he doesn’t pry around the edges looking for blood.

After two months of dates, walks, dinners, a few nights where he stays over and you learn that running your fingers through his long hair before sleeping soothes something restless in you, he asks you to be his girlfriend.

Actually asks.

The word lands strangely inside you and you blink at him, surprised.

Not because you don’t want it. You do. You like him. You like the clarity. You like that he doesn’t make you guess whether wanting a place in his life is too much.

You say yes.

Later you cry in the shower, quietly, because happiness can apparently hurt when it steps into rooms grief has not finished occupying.

You tell him only a little. That you dated a motocross rider. That you really like the sport. That it ended badly. You don’t say Sukuna’s name at first. It feels too large, too recognizable, too heavy to bring into something still new. Kashimo listens, nods, and doesn’t make you perform pain for him.

The bad days still come.

Sukuna’s face returns to the city before you are ready.

Champion Reborn. Monster banners. Outdoor ads.

A massive image near a shopping area you pass by accident after work. The first time you see it, your body locks so suddenly that someone almost bumps into you from behind. There he is, larger than the street, scar visible, one eye severe, his body turned in a way that makes survival look like aggression. The branding is clean and brutal. It knows exactly what it’s doing.

Your stomach flips.

Not attraction first. Not grief first.

Fear.

Your brain rewinds the crash with such vivid cruelty that for a second you smell hospital antiseptic under exhaust fumes. The screens cutting. The crowd noise shifting. The helpless, animal terror of not knowing whether he was alive. The surgery. The coma. His hand in yours. His voice when he woke. Don’t leave.

You grip the strap of your bag and force yourself to breathe.

He’s back. Actually back.

Not just training. Not just healing. Stunts. Races. Shows. The thing he loves and the thing that nearly took him from the world.

You are glad. You are terrified.

The two feelings collide so violently inside you that you have to step into a store you don’t need just to stand under fluorescent lights and pretend to look at shelves until your pulse stops battering your throat. You are not together anymore. You have no claim. No place beside his recovery. No right to ask Shoko whether he is being careful. No right to ask Yuuji whether he is listening to doctors. No right to do anything except hope from a distance that he remains whole, alive, well, able to do what he loves without destroying himself for applause.

You don’t ask Shoko. You don’t ask Yuuji. You swallow your feelings because they belong to you now, and you have nowhere to put them.

A few months later, while mindlessly scrolling, you see him beside someone else.

It’s not even a private post. Not something you sought out. Just an event photo shared by an account you forgot to mute because the algorithm is cruel and patient. Sukuna stands after a race, once again the champion, sweat and scar and black sponsor gear, mouth set with that familiar arrogance sharpened for cameras. Beside him is someone who looks like they belong there.

Beautiful. Poised. Made for flashbulbs and expensive rooms. The kind of person who knows how to stand beside fame and make it look like mutual enhancement.

Your chest hurts so suddenly you put the phone face-down on the couch.

For a while you just sit there.

The pain is not clean jealousy. That would almost be easier to hate. It’s grief first, then humiliation, then a tired little understanding you wish you didn’t have.

Maybe he found someone who fits the life he wanted. Someone who can stand beside him under lights, smile at cameras, take the edges of glory without flinching. Someone who does not have to be hidden because she teaches teenagers and values privacy and freezes when reporters get too close.

You wouldn’t have been there.

You know that.

Even if you had stayed, you wouldn’t have taken his side on podiums or sponsor carpets without negotiation. You wouldn’t have given interviews. You wouldn’t have wanted your face attached to his career. He knew that. He respected it.

Your mind, cruel from old hurt, asks whether respecting your wishes was the whole truth.

Maybe he didn’t want to be seen with you.

No.

You stop that thought before it grows teeth and mauls you.

He asked. He listened. He never posted because you said you wanted privacy. He let you decide. You have to be fair even when fairness hurts. Especially then.

You still have photos.

Silly ones. Private ones. Two years of small captures that never became content. Sukuna half-asleep with a scowl because you took a picture before coffee. His hand covering the lens too late. You wearing his shirt, cropped at the mouth, laughing. His bike from angles you loved. A blurry photo he took of you in his kitchen that you complained about because the lighting was awful and he said the lighting wasn’t the point. None of them posted. All of them living in your gallery like a sealed room.

You don’t delete them. You also don’t look.

Almost eight months pass before you learn the person beside him is Kenjaku.

Kenny.

Yuuji is the one who tells you, though not intentionally at first. He comes over because he had errands near your school and you offered dinner after he complained dramatically about having eaten convenience store food three times in two days. Kashimo is not there that night. Maki is busy. It’s just you and Yuuji in your kitchen, chopping vegetables and talking about nothing important until his phone buzzes and his face changes.

You recognize the change because grief makes you observant in ugly ways.

“Sukuna?” you ask before you can stop yourself.

Yuuji winces.

“You don’t have to tell me.”

“No, it’s not—” He sighs, putting the phone down. “It’s just another picture. With Kenny.”

The name lands with old context attached. You remember Yuuji mentioning Kenny once, long before everything broke. Not great, he had said. The only relationship-like thing Sukuna ever really talked about. You had not pushed then because Sukuna’s past was a locked cabinet and you were trying not to pry it open with your teeth.

“Kenny is Kenjaku?” you ask.

“Yeah.”

“Oh.”

Yuuji’s expression tightens with obvious distaste.

“I despise them.”

You return your attention to the vegetables because looking too directly at him makes it harder to keep your face neutral.

“That bad?”

“Worse in boring ways. The kind of bad that’s hard to explain without sounding like you’re just bitter because someone made your brother act worse. But that’s what they do. Or what happens around them. I don’t know. Maybe Sukuna chooses it because it’s familiar.” Yuuji leans against the counter, arms crossed. “He’s basically ghosting me, so I can’t do much except watch through other people’s posts like some pathetic fan account.”

You cut slower.

“Do you think he’s doing that because you’re still in contact with me?”

Yuuji actually thinks about it. You appreciate that he does not immediately rush to reassure you.

“No,” he says finally. “I think he would like having that as an excuse, maybe. But no. He acted like this the first time too. When he was with Kenny before. Pulling away, acting like anyone who questioned it was stupid, like the chaos was proof he was alive or whatever dramatic bullshit he’d never admit to thinking.”

“And afterward?”

Yuuji’s mouth flattens. You regret asking before he answers.

“Afterward was bad. Not because he cried on my shoulder or anything normal and a bit human. Because he was unbearable and reckless and furious at everyone except the person who actually hurt him. I spent months keeping him from crashing out. Sometimes literally.” He drags a hand over his face. “I hope it’s different this time. I do. I want things to work out for him because he’s my brother and I’m tired of wanting better for someone determined to chew through anything good. But Kenny coming back feels more like a relapse than a relationship.”

You don’t ask what happened.

You want to.

The want sits in your mouth like a hot coal.

You don’t ask because that is not your place anymore, and because knowing more will only give you new shapes to worry about.

“I’m sorry,” you say. “For the way things turned out between you two.”

Yuuji gives you a small, sad smile.

“Me too.”

You file the information away and spend the next few weeks trying very hard not to think about it.

You focus on Kashimo.

That sounds unkind, but it’s not. He deserves your attention, and you give it honestly. You enjoy him. You enjoy his dry little comments, the way his eyebrows lift when Nobara says something insane, the way he lets Kirara’s boyfriend Hakari rope him into conversations that seem to have no beginning or end. You enjoy kissing him. You enjoy the warmth of him in your apartment, the different rhythm of another person moving through your kitchen, the fact that his presence does not erase Sukuna’s ghost but does give your body new memories to stand beside the old ones.

When you tell the girls he might stick around long enough to introduce properly, Kirara lifts her glass and says if you need someone to beat him up, her boyfriend is always available.

Hakari, from across the room, hears his name and says,

“For you? Absolutely.”

“You don’t even know why,” Kashimo says, amused.

Hakari shrugs.

“Details make cowards of us all.”

Shoko says, “If he misbehaves and you break up, you can always try girls. They seem less destructive and complicated.”

“You wish,” Mai and Nobara say almost in unison.

The silence after is perfect for half a second. Then you start laughing.

Mai points at Nobara. Nobara points back. Shoko raises her glass like a scientist pleased by confirmed data. Maki mutters that all of you are exhausting and refills your drink.

Kashimo asks later if your friends are always like that.

“Yes,” you say.

He nods solemnly.

“That’s good. They’re funny.”

Nine months after the breakup, Kashimo suggests the stadium.

He has done research on motocross because you mentioned liking it, and you found that adorable until the suggestion makes your stomach turn with something more complicated than fear.

“There’s a race and a show,” he says, showing you the event page on his phone. “Not one of the huge ones, I think. I know nothing, which is embarrassing, so you could explain everything and I could pretend I understand at least forty percent.”

You stare at the screen.

Monster sponsor.

Of course.

Your pulse shifts. Kashimo notices. His thumb pauses before scrolling.

“Too much?”

You breathe in.

Maybe it’s time. Maybe avoidance has made the fear larger than the thing itself. Maybe you can go back to the sport you loved in your own way, in common crowd seats with friends, no VIP, no paddock, no access, no old rituals. Maybe seeing him from a distance will hurt, but hurting is not always dying. Maybe you want to prove your life didn’t lose an entire world because one man broke your heart.

“Do you want it as a date,” you ask, “or can I invite the girls?”

His answer is immediate in the best way.

“Your call. I just want to go with you and hear you explain why everyone is doing what they’re doing before I make a stupid assumption and embarrass myself.”

You smile before you can overthink it. That is one of the things you like about him. He does not need to be the expert in the room.

You go with Maki, Nobara, Kirara, Mai, and Kashimo.

No Shoko, because Shoko is working, and part of you is relieved. Having her there would make the invisible line back to Sukuna feel too direct. Yuuji does not come either. That would be worse. You want this to be yours if it can be. Yours and your friends’ and Kashimo’s curious eyes.

You dress soberly. Fan clothes. Nothing attention-grabbing. No lilac silk. No carefully chosen outfit meant to catch the gaze of a man behind a barrier. Your hair is in a ponytail, which you rarely use, and the difference helps. You know how to be seen. You also know how to blend. Tonight you choose blending with almost academic precision.

The common crowd feels strange after so long in VIP.

Not worse. Different. More cramped, more alive in a collective way, less curated. People press around you with drinks, jackets, merch. The air smells like fried food, dirt, fuel, sweat, cold metal. The stadium lights create that familiar artificial brightness that used to make your skin prickle with anticipation.

Your body remembers. For a while, that is good.

You explain things to Kashimo with growing ease. Starts. Lines. Why a rider takes a rut instead of avoiding it. What makes a whip controlled rather than reckless. Why one landing looks clean and another makes you wince though Kashimo cannot yet see the difference. He listens, occasionally asking questions that show he is actually trying to understand and not just waiting for you to finish talking.

Nobara keeps giving him false information.

“That flag means everyone has to do a trick or they lose points,” she says confidently.

Kashimo looks at you.

“Really?”

“No,” Nobara says before you can answer. “I made that up.”

Mai snorts. Kirara laughs into her drink.

After the third time, Kashimo stops believing anything Nobara says, which only encourages her to become more elaborate. You laugh more than you expect. Maki bumps her shoulder lightly against yours now and then, not enough to interrupt, just enough to remind your body that she is there.

Then Sukuna comes out.

You know before the announcer finishes because the crowd changes.

Sound thickens. People rise. Phones lift. The screens take his face and make it enormous. Scar, one eye, mouth set, gear black and green under Monster branding. The stadium loves him with the hunger of people who came to witness proof that catastrophe can be survived beautifully.

Your fingers go cold.

Kashimo glances at you but says nothing.

At first, you manage. The controlled lap is fine. Mostly. Your throat tightens, but you keep breathing. You watch him the way you used to, because your mind still knows how to read his body on the bike even if your heart would rather not. He is different. Not lesser. Different. His head movement has changed. His timing is adjusted. He rides with a precision that looks more deliberate than before, and that hurts too because you can see the work in it. The months of rebuilding. The stubborn, vicious discipline.

You are proud.

The feeling is so sudden and unwanted that tears prick your eyes.

Then the high jumps begin.

Fear crawls up slowly.

At first it’s just discomfort. A tightening in your stomach. Your hand pressing against your thigh. The sense that the air has become harder to swallow. You tell yourself you are fine because nothing has happened. He has done this in practice. He would not be here if Shoko had not cleared him. Choso would have set the bike. Nanami would have calculated risk. Mei Mei would protect the investment if nothing else. Sukuna is not careless when performance truly matters, not in the stupid way people think. He’s hungry, yes. He’s reckless with himself emotionally, yes. But on the bike he understands consequences better than most.

He takes the ramp.

Your body stops believing logic.

The stadium disappears into a tunnel of sound.

You see the crash again.

Not with your eyes. Worse. Inside your body. The wrong angle. The other rider. The hit. The bike. Screens cutting. Your hands useless. Hospital. White walls. Yuuji’s face. Shoko’s voice. Sukuna’s face bandaged, his body too still. Don’t leave.

Maki’s hand closes around your forearm. She squeezes once. You turn to her like you are underwater. She’s frowning.

You try to smile and fail.

She waits one minute. Maybe two. Long enough to see whether you return to yourself. Long enough not to embarrass you by reacting too quickly. Then she leans closer.

“Come with me to get some air.”

Kashimo straightens.

“Are you okay?”

Maki answers before you can lie.

“She’ll be alright. We’ll be back soon.”

Kashimo looks at you, not Maki. His concern is quiet, searching, not possessive. When you nod faintly, he lets you go.

You don’t realize how badly your hands are shaking until Maki gets you outside and puts a water bottle between them.

The air beyond the stadium seating is cooler, less saturated with noise. You sit on a low concrete edge away from the main flow of people. Your knees feel weak. Your fingers tremble around the bottle cap. Maki crouches in front of you, one hand on your knee, eyes sharp with worry she is trying to keep practical.

“Your face went too pale,” she says. “And your eyes got glassy when he started performing. Not sad glassy. Gone glassy.”

You swallow.

“I thought I was okay.”

“I know.”

“I was okay until he jumped.”

“I know.”

Your breathing catches, then steadies under the pressure of her hand.

You understand then. Not with some sudden revelation that fixes anything. Just a quiet, miserable comprehension that your body has been waiting for an accident since the moment he came out. That it doesn’t care about months, about clearance, about technical skill or sponsor calculation. It remembers almost losing him before it ever processed losing him emotionally. It braces because once, the worst happened under lights while everyone was screaming, and your nervous system learned the stadium could turn into a hospital without warning.

“I’m not ready,” you say.

Maki’s expression softens in the tiny way it does only when she trusts you to see it.

“That’s okay.”

“It’s been nine months...”

“It’s trauma, not a fucking work deadline.”

You laugh weakly, then press your fingers to your eyes.

“I hate this.”

“Yeah. It sucks.”

“I still like it. The sport. I don’t want him to own that too.”

“He doesn’t. But maybe your body needs more time to separate them. Or maybe watching him is different from watching anyone else. That doesn’t mean he wins. It means you’re human.”

You look at her. The simplicity of that almost undoes you.

She asks if you want to go back or go home.

The event is almost over. You could force yourself. You could return to your seat, prove a point to no one, sit beside Kashimo and pretend your hands are not still shaking. Part of you wants to do that because leaving feels like failure.

But you are tired of making pain into proof.

“I want to go home,” you say.

Maki nods immediately.

No disappointment. No persuasion.

Kashimo appears a few minutes later with your bag and jacket. You realize Maki must have texted him. He looks worried but calm, and that makes you want to cry all over again.

Maki tells him,

“Take her home. She’s not feeling too good.”

He nods.

“Of course.”

His arm wraps carefully around your waist when you stand, not gripping, just supporting. You lean into him because your legs still feel unreliable. He walks you to his car without asking questions in front of everyone. That restraint matters more than any grand gesture could.

In the car, he asks once,

“Do you need a hospital?”

“No. I’m okay. Just not feeling too well physically. Resting should help.”

He accepts that for the moment.

At your place, he makes chamomile tea.

You sit on the couch feeling wrung out and embarrassed, still dressed in your sober stadium clothes, ponytail loosening, body heavy with the crash of adrenaline. Kashimo moves through your kitchen with the careful uncertainty of someone who knows where enough things are but still wants to respect the space. When he sits beside you, he lets you arrange yourself first. You rest your head on his shoulder. His arm comes around you, and his fingers stroke lightly along your forearm.

Not demanding. Not asking your skin to explain before you are ready.

Eventually, words come.

“I think I had something like an anxiety attack,” you say. “At the stadium. I’m probably a bit traumatized.”

His hand does not stop moving.

“Do you want to tell me about it,” he asks, “or would that make it worse right now?”

You lift your head enough to look at him.

He waits.

You tell him the simplified truth.

“The motocross rider I dated was involved in a really bad accident a few years ago. He almost died. My body still doesn’t know how to react properly, apparently. When I see high-risk maneuvers, I think I’m waiting for the worst.”

Kashimo is quiet for a moment. Thinking.

“The rider announced as the champion tonight,” he says. “The Sukuna guy?”

You close your eyes briefly, then open them.

“Yes.”

He nods once.

You remember him saying he had researched motocross before coming with you. It had been adorable then. It is still adorable, even now, in this strange context.

Kashimo doesn’t ask what happened between you. He doesn’t ask if you still love him. He doesn’t ask whether watching Sukuna specifically made it worse. You can feel the questions he could ask, and you can feel him choosing not to turn your vulnerability into information extraction.

“Are you feeling better now?” he asks instead.

“A little.”

“Would watching it on TV make you anxious too? Because I don’t mind doing that with you from here instead. Couch, blanket, popcorn. You can explain things, and if it gets bad, we turn it off. Stadiums are loud anyway. I don’t know why people voluntarily pay to have their bones vibrate unless they are already emotionally unwell.”

You stare at him.

Then you kiss his jaw.

His cheek.

His lips.

The kiss is gentle at first because you are tired, then warmer because gratitude has weight in your body and he is close and alive and kind. His hand comes to your waist, careful, and you feel affection move through you in a way that is real even if it does not erase anything else. You don’t need it to erase anything. Maybe that’s one of the things you are learning. Love is not a single occupant room unless you force it to be.

“I’m still finding out how I react to things,” you murmur against his mouth. “But I’ll let you know.”

“Okay, I’ll wait for you.”

“Thank you for being so understanding. And for being here.”

He kisses the tip of your nose, which would be cheesy from someone else and somehow feels sincere from him.

“It’s the minimum I can do for my darling.”

You groan softly because the pet name still gets to you. He smiles against your forehead.

The end of the year approaches.

Your friends refuse to let it become a shrine to old pain.

They organize things around you without making it obvious enough to feel suffocating. Maki fills your December with practical errands, movie nights, complaints about work. Nobara keeps finding holiday markets to drag everyone through and then insults half the merchandise. Mai pretends she doesn’t care about festive things and buys small gifts with alarming thoughtfulness, then she smiles when people say they like the gifts. Shoko appears with pastries and medical horror stories toned down just enough for dinner. Yuuji comes around when he can, always checking the room before mentioning anything close to his brother. Kashimo stays steady, warm, patient in a way that never feels passive.

Christmas passes with noise, food, gifts, too many inside jokes.

New Year’s is at Kirara’s place.

Hakari is there, of course, loud and bright and delighted to host chaos by association. Kirara’s apartment has access to the rooftop, which becomes the main reason everyone agrees to gather there instead of anyone else’s place. The night is humid in that end-of-year city way, warm bodies, cold drinks, food spread over every available surface. Someone brings champagne. Someone brings too much dessert. Nobara and Mai bicker over music. Maki tells Hakari his decorative lights look like a casino had a panic attack, and he thanks her because he takes it as praise.

Yuuji comes. So does Shoko. So does Kashimo.

You notice, at some point near midnight, that you are happy.

Not perfectly. Not without undercurrents. But happy enough to stand on a rooftop with a plastic cup of champagne in your hand, Kashimo’s arm around your waist, Maki beside you, Yuuji laughing at something Hakari says, Shoko smoking near the edge while Kirara scolds her about ash. Fireworks begin, and the city lights itself in bursts. Everyone cheers. Nobara grabs Mai’s hand, pretending it’s for balance. Maki rolls her eyes and smiles when she thinks no one is looking.

You don’t think about the crash at midnight.

You don’t think about the dinner.

You don’t think about the years by Sukuna’s side when the countdown ends and everyone shouts over each other.

Kashimo kisses you at the turn of the year.

It’s sweet. Firm. Familiar now. His hand cups the back of your head, fingers brushing your ponytail, and you lean into him with a warmth that is not forced. When he pulls back, he looks at you like he is glad the first thing he saw this year was your face.

You smile honestly.

No one drives drunk. That becomes the rule and the joke and then the actual logistics of the night. Futons are dragged out. Blankets appear. People arrange themselves across Kirara’s living room in varying degrees of comfort and intoxication. Nobara ends up tangled with Mai on the couch, both denying responsibility even while neither moves away. Maki sleeps on a futon with Shoko sprawled near her side, one arm flung dramatically over her eyes. Yuuji sleeps on Maki’s other side after insisting he’s not tired and then proving himself wrong within three minutes. Hakari and Kirara vanish somewhere down the hall after loudly declaring themselves excellent hosts.

Kashimo blacks out on the futon beside you because he’s not as used to drinking as he claimed. Poor thing.

You lie on your back next to him and stare at the ceiling.

The room is full of breathing.

Soft, uneven, human. The aftermath of celebration. The city outside still cracks occasionally with distant fireworks. Someone mutters in sleep. Kashimo’s hand rests near your hip, not quite touching, palm open against the blanket.

This is a good life.

You know that.

You have friends who love you fiercely. A boyfriend who treats you gently. Work that matters. A home that is yours. A body that, despite everything, kept walking. You have laughter again. Plans. New rituals. You are not ruined, and maybe that should feel like victory.

Still, at two in the morning, with the new year barely begun, you think about Sukuna.

You don’t choose to. You don’t expect it to happen.

He’s simply there.

You wonder if he’s awake. If he performed tonight. If Kenny is with him. If his knee hurts in cold weather. If he is reckless when people praise him too much. If he ate something decent or let Uraume bully him into it. If he thought of you at midnight, or if the life he rebuilt has finally grown loud enough to drown out the year you shared.

Your eyes sting.

You are so tired of still loving him in ways that don’t ask permission.

It doesn’t mean you don’t love Kashimo. You do. The feeling is different, but not false. You wouldn’t hurt him. You wouldn’t use him to punish a ghost. You wouldn’t let your unresolved grief become his problem if you could help it. You care about him too much for that.

But not thinking about Sukuna didn’t make the love leave.

Avoiding races didn’t make it leave.

Deleting his number didn’t make it leave.

Returning the shirts didn’t make it leave.

Seeing Kenny beside him didn’t make it leave, though it twisted into something uglier for a while.

You think, with a quiet shame you can’t confess to anyone sleeping around you, that you still don’t know what would happen if Sukuna reached for you.

Not because you would run back easily. You aren’t that version of hurt. You have self-respect, and you bled too hard for it to be ornamental. You know what he did. You know what he would have to understand. You know love without accountability is just another way to be consumed.

But you also know yourself.

If you saw him, truly saw him, if his voice said your name with all that rough restraint and his one eye looked at you like he had been starving somewhere no one could feed him, you would cry. You know you would. The tears would come before pride, before strategy, before any speech you might rehearse. You would cry because the body remembers who it loved even when the mind has built walls around the memory.

You turn your head slightly.

Kashimo sleeps deeply beside you, hair loose, face softened by alcohol and exhaustion. You reach out and touch a strand near his shoulder, careful not to wake him. He is here. Warm. Kind. Yours in a way that has a name.

The ceiling above you remains unfamiliar enough that your thoughts do not stick to it.

You wish you had started the new year thinking only of the man beside you.

You wish the past had the decency to stay behind the line of midnight.

Instead you lie there between old love and new warmth, between grief and gratitude, between the woman who walked away in a parking lot and the woman who laughed under fireworks with champagne on her tongue. You don’t know yet whether that makes you cruel or simply unfinished.

Maybe unfinished is kinder.

Maybe it’s also more true.

Your breathing slows eventually.

Sleep approaches in uneven waves, pulling at the edges of thought. The last thing you remember before it takes you is not the crash, not the dinner, not the poster coming down from the wall.

It is Sukuna’s hand in yours in the hospital.

Then Kashimo shifting beside you now, alive and gentle in the dark.

Then Maki breathing somewhere nearby, your best friend still close enough to save you from any year that tries to take too much.

You close your eyes.

The new year begins with your heart still divided in ways you do not understand.

But it begins.

And for now, that has to be enough.

I guess to you now, I'm just a face in the crowd Oh God, kinda please would you kill me now? Late at night in my room, lie awake, think of you And all your little dooms

Last night I dreamt I still knew you You I carved out a place in this world for two But it's empty without you

I've got all this love I've got to keep to myself All this effort to make it look effortless All this love I've got to keep to myself All this effort to make it look effortless

Confront all the pain like a gift under the tree Oh please, I can't be who you need me to be I grind in the sunshine, grind in the rain So real that I feel fake

Last night I dreamt I still knew you You I carved out a place in this world for two But it's empty without you

I've got all this love I've got to keep to myself All this effort to make it look effortless Got all this love I've got to keep to myself All this effort to make it look effortless

One day every candle's gotta run out of wax One day no one will remember me when they look back I can't stop, can't stop till we catch all your ears though Somewhere between mike tyson and van gogh

You You I carved out a place in this world for two But it's empty without you

I've got all this love I've got to keep to myself All this effort to make it look effortless Got all this love I've got to keep to myself, myself All this effort to make it look effortless All this effort to make it look effortless All this effort to make it look effortless

@mischivana @kunaskult @mako-sea @oranoyaora @dogggggggblog-kaye @inlovewithpsychos @onlykuna @cheam-creems123 @ravenraa ♥

[slloofyart]

Rougamy is so underrated omg

[belimah]

11. Death Valley art by mblydez

As the end-of-year event approaches, Sukuna becomes almost reasonable.

Almost.

it's not enough to make him easy. You are not sure there is a version of Ryomen Sukuna that could ever be called easy without insulting the foundation of his personality. He doesn't suddenly transform into a man who fears injury, and he certainly doesn't start treating his body like something fragile, precious, or mortal. Sukuna still rides like the ground wouldn’t be able to hurt him if it tried. He still takes jumps with enough force to make your lungs forget what they are for. He still looks happiest when there is dirt on his gear, sweat darkening his collar, a bright, vicious gleam in his eyes that only appears when he has bent speed into submission and come out laughing under his helmet.

But he stops being stupid about the aftermath.

He still argues with Shoko when she tells him to stop treating recovery like a dare to fuck himself over. He still calls warm-ups “ritual humiliation” when Uraume makes him do the longer mobility sequence. He still makes faces at the protein-heavy food pushed into his hands before practices, and sometimes he texts you a photo of whatever meal they have set in front of him with a caption that says, simply, prison.

But he eats it. He warms up. He stretches. He lets Choso check things twice. He lets Nanami tell him no without turning it into war every single time. He even stops pretending that pain is irrelevant when the pain might threaten December, and that is the part that keeps catching you off guard.

it's not exactly fear. You don't think Sukuna would name it that, even under torture. Fear is a word he would bite in half, chew and spit before allowing it to sit on his tongue. But there is calculation in him now that has less to do with arrogance and more to do with possession. This opportunity is his, and now that he has it, he refuses to let anything take it out of his hands.

Not another rider. Not a bad landing. Not his own pride.

He tells you that once with his face turned away, standing in your kitchen with an ice pack strapped against his shoulder after a smaller presentation event. He has one hand braced on the counter, head lowered slightly, pink hair still damp from a shower. The edge of his jaw looks tight, his mouth almost annoyed by the honesty before it even leaves him.

“I’m not losing this because I was stupid two weeks before it happens.”

You pause with the towel in your hands. The sentence is so plain that it takes you a moment to understand the size of it.

“You’re admitting there are things you do that are stupid?”

His head turns slowly. You try not to smile and you fail badly. His eyes narrow, but there is no real bite behind it. Not tonight. he's tired, muscles still hot under the skin, pulse not fully settled from the show. His body has that post-performance density to it, all impact and adrenaline finally coming down. Usually, the crash makes him restless or hungry or infuriatingly handsy. Tonight, beneath the usual heat, there is focus. He keeps looking at his shoulder like it's an employee he doesn't trust.

“You want to be funny or useful?” he asks.

“I can multitask, thought you knew by now.”

“You’re worse than Shoko.”

“Impossible. She’s my inspiration.”

His mouth twitches, and he looks down again, fingers flexing once against the counter before relaxing. The ice pack shifts against his shoulder. You step closer to adjust it, and he lets you without complaint. That is new too. Not the letting. He has been letting you touch him for a long time. it's the absence of the reflexive challenge, the way his body knows your hands now and doesn't prepare itself to be defended against them.

You secure the towel wrapped around the ice pack, your knuckles brushing the warm skin near his collarbone.

He watches your face and you pretend not to notice until his attention becomes too heavy to ignore.

“What?”

“You get really pleased when I listen,” he hums.

“You say that like it’s suspicious?”

“it's.”

“It’s not suspicious to be relieved when the man who keeps throwing himself into the air decides he prefers having working joints.”

He snorts, but the sound is softer than usual.

“This is the opportunity of a lifetime,” he says, and there it's again. The words without ornament. The thing he wants, spoken plainly enough to make the room feel different. “I’m not fucking it up.”

You look at him for a little too long.

“What now?”

You step close enough that your toes touch his.

“Nothing. I like when you say what matters to you.”

His expression tightens in that almost embarrassed way he would rather die than acknowledge. it's not exactly shyness, it’s more like he's unused to being seen in the second after wanting becomes visible, unused to someone meeting that wanting without trying to use it against him.

He catches your wrist before you can move away.

“Don’t make it sappy.”

“You’re the one saying vulnerable things in my kitchen.”

“I said I don’t want to crash before December.”

“That is vulnerable for you.”

He gives you a flat look. You kiss his jaw before he can insult you.

His fingers tighten around your wrist, then loosen. The shift happens so quickly anyone else might miss it, but you know the way he receives affection now. Not softly at first. Never softly at first. His body takes it like impact, assesses the angle, decides if it's allowed to stay. Then, when he realizes it's only you, he either pulls you closer or makes a rude comment so he doesn't have to admit he wanted that.

Tonight, he pulls you closer.

The ice pack is still between your hand and his shoulder when his other arm slides around your waist. He bends, pressing his mouth to the side of your neck with the slow intention of someone choosing distraction. You tilt your head without thinking, and his lips pause there, warm and slightly chapped, before he kisses once, then again, each one placed lower until he reaches the spot that makes your fingers curl into the towel.

“You’re supposed to be resting,” you say, but your voice doesn't sound really convincing.

“I‘m resting.”

“Standing up?”

“Mhm, multitask or whatever shit you say,” he mutters against your skin, not even trying to fool you.

“You came here for ice.”

“I came here for you. Ice was your idea.”

That is another thing he does now.

He says something too direct in the middle of being ridiculous, and it leaves you without protection for a second. He doesn't look at you afterward. He presses another kiss near the hinge of your jaw, as if he can hide the sentence under his mouth. You feel his body against yours, broad and hot, the chilled edge of the ice pack brushing your forearm. He smells like your soap now, clean sweat, and the faint metallic note that always seems to cling after events.

“You’re ridiculous,” you murmur.

He hums like agreement doesn't offend him if it comes from you.

By then, you have become part of his maintenance.

You think that with some embarrassment at first, because it sounds too mechanical, too unsentimental, but there is intimacy in it that catches you in places romance never prepared you for. You know how he feels after a race, after a practice, after a show, after some sponsor presentation where he performs less with the bike and more with his face. You know when he wants cold and when heat works better. You know when his shoulder needs careful pressure, when his lower back has tightened from repeated landings, when his thighs are exhausted enough that he becomes quiet in the car.

You know the bruises he ignores until they bloom. You know which ones make him breathe differently. And, increasingly, he lets you know.

Not by telling you everything — he doesn't hand you pain in a neat list, but he at least stops hiding the smallest tells when you are alone. He shifts his weight and lets you see it. He winces without immediately turning the wince into a scowl. He lies down on your bed or his and waits for you with a patience that feels staged for the first five seconds, then becomes real when your hands touch him.

The massages start because he says his back is tight.

You believe him the first time.

The second time, you are suspicious.

By the fifth, you are certain Shoko did not recommend half of what he's requesting.

You suspect, with increasing certainty, that Sukuna simply likes having your hands on him.

You say so while sitting astride the backs of his thighs one night, your knees braced on either side of him, hands slicked with oil or lotion working slowly down the thick muscles along his spine. He lies on his stomach beneath you, shirt discarded somewhere near the bed, wearing only loose sweatpants, arms folded under the pillow. His face is turned to the side, eyes half closed, lips parted slightly as he breathes through the pressure of your thumbs pressing into a knot near his shoulder blade.

“I don’t think Shoko said you needed this.”

“She did.”

“She said you needed me to sit on you and massage your back?”

“She implied it,” he lets out a soft groan of pure relief when you press a specific point along his shoulder blades.

“Doesn’t sound like her,” you squint, but you keep kneading his muscles.

“You calling me a liar?”

“Yes.”

His mouth curves against the pillow. You dig your thumbs in a little harder.

A low sound leaves him. Not pain, not pleasure either, though it's close enough to make warmth move through your stomach. His back is beautiful like this. You know that is a simple word, maybe too soft for him, but it's the only one that fits when you let yourself look without pretending you are only helping. His body is built for impact, for display, not accidentally aesthetic but deliberately maintained, muscle layered with purpose beneath skin mapped in ink. he's strong because he must be. he's visually striking because he knows the show starts before the engine does.

You used to think that kind of awareness would make someone vain in a boring way.

With Sukuna, it feels like part of the discipline.

His body is not only his instrument. it's also a warning, a performance, a promise that what happens on the bike begins long before the first jump.

Sukuna may act like he rides only for himself, and maybe at the most private core of him, he does, but he's still a showman. He understands the line of a body in motion. He understands what it means to be watched. His physique reflects that — power sharpened into form, muscle built to absorb impact and create control, tattoos following hard lines and shifting whenever he moves beneath your palms. His back is a landscape of tension and discipline. Thick shoulders, strong spine, old scars you have learned by touch, the slow flex of muscle when your thumbs find a knot and press until he exhales.

Your palms slide over the hard lines of his back, thumbs following the edges of muscle, fingers moving across tattoos you have memorized in fragments but never fully. Some parts of the ink disappear under your hands, reappear when his shoulder shifts. You lean down to press your mouth to the nape of his neck, where the hair has grown a little softer from being washed earlier. His breath catches, barely. You feel it under your thighs more than hear it.

“You’re doing that on purpose,” he says.

“Massaging?”

“Getting me hard.”

“Maybe Shoko implied that too.”

He huffs, then sinks deeper into the bed when you press into a knot near his shoulder.

“You’re learning.”

You kiss him again, slower this time. His skin is warm, clean, faintly salty where heat has gathered under your hands.

You love pressing kisses to his nape while you massage him. At first, he used to make a sound like you were being ridiculous. Now he tilts his head slightly to give you better access.

It’s one of those little things that would sound insignificant if explained to anyone else and enormous if you allowed yourself to feel it all at once. The tilt of his head. The offered skin. The way his shoulders loosen when your lips brush the back of his neck. He likes it. He likes your mouth there, warm and soft after your hands have been firm. He likes knowing you want to touch him even when he is sore, exhausted, bruised, difficult. He likes care when it does not ask him to become smaller.

He returns the habit differently.

Out of nowhere, when you are going out with him, when you are trying to appear normal in a hallway or near a parking lot or beside the team area, he bends and presses his mouth to your nape just to make you lose track of your own sentence. He does it while talking to someone else. He does it while one hand rests at your waist, fingers firm enough to hold you in place, mouth touching the back of your neck with slow, deliberate heat. Sometimes he barely kisses. Sometimes he lets his lips stay there until your skin warms and your shoulders tense, then he smiles against you because he feels exactly what it does.

You hate him for that. You also lean back into him.

He likes all of this more than he admits.

You know because his body becomes heavier when he trusts the pressure. Because the tightness in his neck releases gradually instead of fighting you. Because sometimes, when you shift higher on his body to reach his shoulders better, his hips press into the mattress with the smallest restless movement and then go still again, as if he caught himself wanting too openly.

You like it too much as well.

There is something addictive in having this much of him beneath your hands with no audience, no gear, no roaring crowd. You love the broadness of his back, the deep movement of his breathing, the way his arrogance quiets when pleasure is slow and earned. You love making him feel good in a way that doesn't require him to perform. You love when he stops making remarks and simply exists under your palms, trusting you with the ache he refuses most people the right to notice.

You press the heel of your hand down beside his spine, careful not to touch bone, working through a stubborn patch of tension.

His voice comes rougher when he speaks again.

“You always get quiet when you’re staring.”

“I’m focusing on the work,” you half-lie.

“You’re staring holes into my back.”

“You have a nice back.”

“Nice.”

“Do you prefer beautiful?”

He opens one eye. You grin before you can stop yourself.

His hand moves before you expect it, reaching back just enough to grip your calf where you are kneeling over him. His fingers wrap warm and firm, thumb pressing into the soft skin behind your knee. it's a small touch. It still changes the air.

“You already called me beautiful once,” he says.

“I’ve called you beautiful more than once.”

He closes his eye again, but the corner of his mouth stays lifted.

You lean down, lips brushing the shell of his ear.

“You looked like you might malfunction the first time.”

His grip tightens. You laugh softly, and he turns his head just enough that his mouth catches your cheek instead of the pillow. it's awkward because of the angle, almost clumsy for someone so physically precise, but that makes it sweeter. He kisses where he can reach. Your cheekbone. The corner of your mouth. You bend lower, giving him what he's silently demanding, and he takes your lips properly for a few seconds, still lying under you, still half pinned by your weight.

It should feel ridiculous, but it feels like a year condensed into one strange shape — your hands on his body, his mouth seeking yours, care turning into heat without losing tenderness, his refusal to ask and your willingness to learn his language anyway.

A whole year.

You think about that more as November folds into December.

The first time you truly talked to him was last November. Before that, he had existed as motion, as reputation, as the man your eyes followed before your body had any right to understand why. Then there was the first conversation, the first ride, the first night, the first time he did not send you home, the first morning, the first injury you were allowed to tend, the first drawer, the first toothbrush, the first time he came to your apartment with no excuse strong enough to hide what he wanted.

One year of kissing. Talking. Fighting over music. Sleeping beside each other. Going to events. Texting in the middle of the day. Having sex in ways that still leave your body warm when you think about them at inappropriate times.

One year of being together without calling it that.

Maki calls it couple shit. She says it often enough that the phrase becomes a household object, dragged out whenever you pretend that something obviously intimate is casual.

You make soup for him after a rough practice? Couple shit.

He buys the exact brand of pens you like because he noticed yours running out? Couple shit.

You keep one of his hoodies at your apartment and he keeps acting offended if you wear any other sweatshirt? Couple shit.

He has a key to your place? Maki nearly chokes on her drink when she learns that one.

“That is advanced couple shit,” she says, pointing at you with chopsticks. “That is not entry-level couple shit. That is graduate research.”

“You say that like I joined a cult.”

“You might have.”

“Maki.”

“What? It has motorcycles, branded merchandise, a terrifying leader and emotional devotion.”

“It’s… practical,” you say, trying to hide a laugh.

Nobara laughs so hard she drops her phone. Mai looks at you with pity, which is worse. Shoko, who is sitting on your rug with a bowl balanced on one knee during one of the dinners that somehow became girls’ night, raises her eyebrows in a way that suggests her medical license has prepared her for many forms of denial.

“It can be practical and still emotionally damning,” she points out.

You throw a napkin at her. She lets it hit her shoulder without blinking.

The girls’ nights happen because life has become strange and you apparently collect people now.

Not in a loud, intentional way. You don't decide one day to host everyone. It starts small — Maki coming over after work, Nobara appearing because she and Mai are either on good terms or aggressively not on good terms, Mai bringing expensive snacks she pretends she bought by accident, Shoko arriving once after a brutal event day because you invited her to eat instead of drinking dinner alone.

Then it keeps happening.

Sometimes you cook. Sometimes everyone brings something. Sometimes the food is an excuse and everyone spends more time sprawled over your couch and floor talking about work, bodies, men, women, bad coffee, worse parents, students with surprising emotional insight, sponsors who behave like demons in business casual, and whether Mai and Nobara are currently dating.

They never answer clearly. Maki stops asking clearly too. She starts asking with dates attached.

“So as of tonight, are you two broken up or being annoying?”

Nobara says broken up. Mai says being annoying. You and Shoko exchange one glance and wisely say nothing.

Shoko becomes easier to talk to than you expected. At events, she's blunt enough to frighten grown men into hydration. In your apartment, with her shoes off and her hair loosely tied back, she's still blunt, but the edges sit differently. She talks about the team with the tired affection of someone who has seen too many injuries and too much stupidity to be impressed by either. She's a doctor, actually licensed, which you knew in a vague way before she explained the details one evening while peeling an orange with surgical precision.

“Hospital work was noble and underpaid,” she says. “This is morally irritating and pays better.”

“That’s fucked up,” Nobara says from the couch.

“Yes.”

“But understandable,” you add.

“Also yes.”

She doesn't romanticize it. That is one of the reasons you like her. She doesn't pretend any part of the system is less ugly because she benefits from one corner of it. She works where she can keep riders alive and solvent, and if corporate money pays better than exhausted hospitals, that is not her individual sin alone. You understand more than you want to. Teaching is full of systems held together by people doing more than they are paid for and pretending burnout is a personality trait.

By now, Nanami and Choso also have your contact saved.

First, for practical reasons. Event schedules. Emergency updates. VIP access. Shoko sending a blunt message after one race telling you to make sure Sukuna iced his knee because he would lie if asked. Then it became less practical. Choso sending you a picture of a bike part because he thought you would appreciate seeing the adjustment you had asked about. Nanami messaging to confirm how many people you wanted to bring to an event. Shoko asking whether your girls’ night included food or just wine and insults because she would only attend if there was food. You, Maki, Mai, Nobara, Shoko.

Sometimes Kirara joins, bringing makeup and stories and the kind of commentary that makes Nobara cackle. Sometimes the night is loud. Sometimes it’s lazy, everyone half-sprawled around your living room, eating, drinking, gossiping, pretending not to check phones. They become comfortable in your apartment, which makes the place feel fuller than it used to. Not crowded, just lived in.

You become friends with them. Real friends, not only people attached to Sukuna.

Your interest in motocross makes conversation easy at first. You can talk to Choso for an hour about suspension changes if no one stops you, and sometimes no one does. He is quieter than most people, but his silence is never empty. He thinks before answering. He explains without making you feel foolish for not knowing.

Nanami, you learn, used to work as a bartender. That also makes sense, though in a different way. The controlled calm. The ability to read people before they speak. The polite refusal to be impressed by chaos. He has the air of a man who has seen too many versions of human stupidity under bad lighting and learned to pour drinks without absorbing anyone else’s crisis.

You also learn, at a weekend lunch when the conversation drifts from engines to jobs, that Choso used to teach before he turned fully toward motorcycles and manual labor. Not university-level, not long enough to build an identity around it, but enough. He talks about it quietly, almost cautiously, as if he expects people to misunderstand the switch.

“I liked parts of it,” he says, fingers curled around a glass of water. “The students, mostly. Explaining things. Watching someone understand something they thought they couldn’t. But I didn’t like the rest. The paperwork, the meetings, the performance of caring in forms that don’t actually help anyone.”

You stare at him. He looks faintly alarmed.

“What?”

“That’s exactly it.”

Nanami nods once, grimly.

“Institutional structures have a talent for turning meaningful work into administrative punishment.”

You point at him.

“Yes. That too. That’s the most accurate teacher-to-mechanic pipeline explanation I’ve ever heard.”

He smiles faintly.

“Students were kinder than engines, though.”

“Not always.”

“No. Not always.”

Sukuna, sitting beside you, looks between the three of you with visible distaste.

“You’re all depressing as fuck.”

“You date a teacher,” Shoko says.

He doesn't correct her, the table doesn't freeze, no one makes it obvious — but the sentence lands inside you and stays.

You date a teacher.

Not “sleep with.” Not “hang around.” Not “bring to events.” Date.

Sukuna continues eating as if nothing happened, jaw moving, eyes lowered to his plate. If he notices the word, he gives no sign. If it bothers him, he doesn't show it. If he accepts it, he doesn't reveal that either.

That’s the problem.

Your life with him is full of action and absent of labels, and most days you can live with that. Most days, you trust the shape of what exists more than the word that might be stapled to it. He comes back. He lets you in. He takes you places. He sleeps beside you. He wakes with you. He gives you a key and uses yours. His team has your number. His life has room with your name carved into it, even if no one announces the carving.

Still, there is a locked place in you that reacts.

You don't open it often because you know what lives there.

Want.

Not desire. Desire is easy now. Desire has language and history and a hundred memories attached to his hands, mouth, voice, and the heat of him. This want is more dangerous. It's the wish to be named by him in a way that cannot be brushed aside. The wish to know, without building a case from actions, that he sees you as something real.

Not temporary. Not convenient. Not only the woman who learned the sport and stayed.

You know it's unfair to think that way for long.

He proves seriousness in every way he can tolerate. He's not a man built for public confessions, and you don't want to force him into a shape that would humiliate him or make him flee into cruelty. You don't need a performance. You don't need a social media caption. You don't need him to kneel in the emotional language of people who have had easier lives.

But sometimes, when the apartment is quiet and he's asleep beside you, your mind touches the question anyway.

What are we?

And a worse one beneath it.

What am I to you?

You never ask.

You also never tell him you love him.

Even though you know.

By December, you know in the same way you know the route to work, the sound of his bike, the exact place on his shoulder that tightens first, the way his eyes change when he's about to say something honest and hates it. You love him. It's no longer an event inside you. It's weather. Constant, sometimes calm, sometimes violent, but always there.

You don't say it because love is a risky word to hand to a man who treats big feelings like exposed wires.

You have seen him confused by simple happiness for him. You have seen tenderness stun him harder than pain. You have watched him process care like a foreign language he understands only in context. Love might not scare him in the obvious way. He might not run out. He might not be cruel.

But it might close something.

It might make him feel trapped.

Or worse, obligated.

You cannot stand the idea of him hearing your love as a demand.

So you keep loving him through actions, which he understands better anyway.

You bring ice. You cook. You learn the schedule. You watch him. You kiss his helmet when he asks without words. You let his life sit inside yours without forcing a title over it. And when he uses his key during girls’ night, you pretend not to love that too.

It happens on a Friday when everyone is too comfortable.

Maki is on the floor with her back against the couch. Nobara is stretched diagonally across most of the cushions like a territorial cat. Mai sits in the armchair with her legs crossed, wearing an expression of long-suffering elegance despite holding a cheap canned drink. Shoko is at your small dining table, picking through a container of takeout and listening more than speaking.

You are in the kitchen washing your hands when the lock turns.

No knock. No warning. Your door opens, and Sukuna steps in like the apartment pays rent to him.

He's wearing black sweats, a dark jacket, and the expression of someone who has already decided whatever conversation was happening is less important than his arrival. His hair is still slightly damp from a shower, pushed back carelessly. He kicks the door shut behind him, spots the room full of women, and doesn't look surprised enough.

Nobara props herself on an elbow.

“Wow. So he does just invade.”

“It’s my key,” Sukuna says.

“That doesn't make it less invasion-like.”

He ignores her and looks at you, the whole reason he came.

Not that he would say it. Not in this room. But his eyes move over you once, measuring distance, mood, whether you are tired, whether he has gone too long without touching you by whatever private standard he refuses to share. You dry your hands slowly because if you go to him too fast, Maki will never let you live.

He comes to you instead. Of course.

He crosses the apartment, one hand sliding around your waist as if there are not four witnesses with functioning eyes. His mouth presses to the side of your neck, low enough to make you stiffen and high enough to be deniable if everyone were very generous, which they are not.

Your face goes hot.

“Sukuna.”

“What?”

“We have company.”

“I see them.”

Nobara makes a fascinated sound. Mai hides a smile behind her drink. Shoko looks like she's mentally adding a symptom to your chart. Maki looks, unfortunately, inspired.

“Do you ever intend to ask her out properly, champion?” she asks.

The room changes. For you, it's immediate. Your body goes still beneath Sukuna’s hand. The warmth of his palm against your waist suddenly feels too exposed. Your pulse jumps, then seems to stop somewhere high in your throat.

For one second, you cannot even look at him.

You don't know what expression he's wearing. You don't know if he's annoyed, amused, cornered, blank. You only know you are not ready for the answer in a room full of people.

Before he can speak, Mai sighs.

“Maki, they are already something. Not everything needs a title stapled over it to become real.”

“Titles can be useful,” Maki says, but less sharply than before.

“They can also be clumsy,” Shoko adds, reaching for another piece of food. “Especially around men with poor emotional range.”

Sukuna’s head turns.

“You want to say that again?”

“No, once was enough,” taking a bite before continuing. “Engine didn’t damage your hearing this much. I would know.”

Nobara sits up further.

“I think the question is whether the title changes anything or only makes everyone else less annoying.”

“It makes people less annoying,” Maki says.

“It would not make you less annoying,” Mai replies.

The sisters catch on that thread and pull the conversation away, as if by accident or mercy. Nobara joins them happily. Shoko lets it go. The subject dissolves into argument, snacks, someone’s terrible ex, Nobara accusing Mai of weaponizing ambiguity because she enjoys drama, Mai saying Nobara confuses directness with emotional vandalism.

The room moves on.

You don't.

Sukuna’s hand is still at your waist. After a moment, his thumb moves once over the fabric of your shirt. Small. Nearly hidden.

You finally look at him.

His face is not defensive. He's watching you closely, not the room, not Maki, not the conversation.

You wonder what he sees.

The freeze? The way you tucked something back behind your ribs before it could show too much? The almost-flinch at the possibility of being asked for aloud?

His jaw shifts. He doesn't say anything. Neither do you.

But later, when everyone leaves and your apartment is quiet again, he stays.

He helps badly with the dishes, mostly by standing close behind you and taking things out of your hands whenever he decides you are moving too slowly. You are tired, restless, and too aware of the unasked question filling the kitchen like steam.

He reaches past you to set a glass in the drying rack.

“You got quiet.”

“I was listening.”

“You’re a bad liar with me.”

Only with him, perhaps.

You rinse a plate longer than necessary.

“It was just a question.”

“Maki asks too many.”

“She cares.”

“She annoys.”

“That’s how she cares.”

He makes a low sound, neither agreement nor dismissal.

You turn off the tap. The sudden silence leaves the room too bare.

Sukuna shifts behind you. He doesn't crowd you, but his presence is large enough that your back feels him before he touches you. His hands settle at the counter on either side of your body, bracketing you. You stare down at the sink.

“I don’t need you to say anything because someone asked,” you say.

The words come out steadier than you feel. Then you add, because the locked place has cracked open just enough to let honesty bleed through,

“I don’t want you cornered into giving me something.”

He's quiet. His breath moves against your hair. He's close enough now that the heat of him gathers along your back.

“You think I’m cornered?”

“No. I think you don’t like being pushed.”

“You’re not Maki.”

“I know.”

His mouth brushes the back of your neck, not quite a kiss. The contact is light enough to make your eyes close.

“You want something from me?” he asks.

There.

So direct it hurts.

You could say it.

Not the biggest word. Not love. But something. A title. A real answer. A hand reaching into the shape between you and outlining it.

Instead, you breathe in through your nose and choose the safer truth.

“I want you to keep choosing this because you want to. Not because I forced you to define it.”

His hands tighten against the counter.

For several seconds, he says nothing. You feel him thinking in the silence, or not thinking exactly. Feeling first, perhaps, in the reluctant, physical way he seems to experience things before he makes them into thought. His chest rises behind you. His mouth touches your nape again, firmer this time.

“I wouldn’t still be here if I didn’t want it.”

It should be enough.

It's enough.

It's not enough.

Both truths sit inside you without canceling each other.

You turn in the cage of his arms and face him. His expression is guarded but not closed. That distinction matters for you. You lift a hand to his jaw, thumb brushing the sharp line there, tracing the ink, and he lets his eyes drop to your mouth as if the conversation has become too difficult and your lips are a better translation.

You kiss him. Slowly.

Not to avoid the subject. More to accept what he can give tonight without making the gap bigger by naming it. His mouth answers with restrained heat at first, then deepens when your fingers slide into his hair. He grips your waist, lifting you onto the counter with the ease of habit. You laugh softly because he always puts you there as if your kitchen counter exists for this purpose more than food preparation.

He stands between your knees. Your legs wrap around him.

“Still here,” he murmurs against your mouth, voice rough enough to make the words feel dragged out of him.

You hold his face and kiss him again, because if you speak, you might say something more dangerous than either of you are ready to survive.

December has arrived bright, cold, and monstrous.

The end-of-year event is everywhere before it happens.

Posters. Clips. Sponsor teasers. A sharp new media campaign wrapped in black, green, white, and metal. Sukuna’s number, 49, appears in edits alongside the Monster logo so naturally it feels like someone designed the combination specifically to flatter the worst parts of his ego. You see his face on screens, banners, event posts, behind-the-scenes reels. The first time you pass a large advertisement with him in full gear, helmet tucked under one arm, grin vicious and eyes lit with violence, you stop walking in the middle of the sidewalk like an idiot.

He looks so good.

Not simply attractive.

Vibrant.

Claimed by the moment in a way that makes your chest tighten with happiness and worry tangled together. The gear suits him almost too well, the color combination cutting against his body with aggressive precision, sponsor branding layered into the design without dulling him. He doesn't disappear under the logo. He makes the logo look like it came to him.

You tell him that with a pic of the outdoor.

He sends back:

Obviously.

Then, ten seconds later:

Send picture.

You do. A selfie taken from above with a peace sign and a soft smile.

He saves it.

You know because he says:

Bad angle. You’re short.

You almost block him on spot.

He's busy enough in the final week that you barely see him.

You get fragments. A late-night call where he sounds exhausted but wired, speaking with you for twenty minutes while someone in the background calls his name twice before giving up. A single breakfast where he arrives at your apartment before your alarm, lets himself in, and brings coffee but no explanation. Two photos from fittings. One video of him revving the bike in new gear with the caption loud enough for you? as if your answer could ever be no.

The night before the event, he doesn't come over.

He calls instead.

You are in bed, lights off, phone against your ear, listening to the low noise around him. Not a crowd. Team movement. Tools. Someone walking past. A door shutting. His breathing sits close to the microphone.

“You nervous?” you ask.

“No.”

“Liar.”

“Excited.”

That, you believe.

“You sound like you’re smiling.”

“I don’t smile.”

“You grin. And smirk. And you snarl.”

“That I do.”

You laugh quietly, turning onto your side. The shirt you are wearing is his. Again. Still. Always, lately.

“Are you going to sleep?”

“Eventually.”

“Sukuna,” you groan and you can almost feel his grin on the other side of the line.

“I’ll sleep.”

“You need actual rest.”

“I know.”

That answer is too easy. You narrow your eyes at the darkness.

“Shoko is there, isn’t she?”

He goes silent for one beat. You smile.

“Tell her I said thank you.”

“She says stop enabling me.”

“I am literally telling you to sleep.”

“She says you enable me emotionally whatever it means.”

You hear Shoko’s voice faintly in the background, too muffled to catch fully, followed by Sukuna’s annoyed exhale.

“What does that mean?” you ask.

“Nothing useful.”

“It probably means something very useful.”

“It means goodnight.”

You want to say it then.

The word rises so suddenly that you almost don't catch it.

Love.

I love you.

It presses against your teeth, terrifying in how natural it feels, how easily it wants to belong at the end of a call. You sit with it for one unbearable second, phone warm against your cheek, his breathing on the other side, the event waiting like weather.

“Goodnight,” you say instead. “Win tomorrow.”

He's quiet long enough that you wonder if he heard the ghost of what you did not say.

Then his voice comes, lower.

“Watch me, teacher.”

Your fingers tighten around the phone.

“I always do.”

The event is breathtaking.

There is no other word at first, because everything about it's built to take breath away and sell it back as adrenaline. The venue feels larger than any show you have attended with him before. Lights cut through the air in hard beams. Massive screens tower above the track, cycling through rider stats, team visuals, sponsor graphics, slow-motion clips of previous wins and crashes. The dirt has been sculpted into something almost architectural, ramps and lanes and landings shaped under bright light, the whole arena smelling of fuel, cold metal, popcorn, damp earth, and electricity.

You arrive with an entourage. That is the only word for it.

Maki, Mai, Nobara, and even Maki’s friends come along — Yuuta, earnest and bright-eyed in a way that makes him look like he apologizes to furniture when he bumps into it. Toge, quieter, eyes observant above the collar of his jacket. Kirara, glittering with excitement and already taking in the crowd like the whole place is a social organism to be understood.

Nanami is responsible for that, in a way. A week before, he had handed you a set of VIP invitations with the solemnity of a man entrusting you with a delicate operational task.

“I prefer that section filled with people who will not create additional problems.”

You had looked at the stack in your hands, then at him.

“That’s your way of saying you like me and my company?”

His expression had remained composed, but something near his eyes shifted. Almost humor.

“That is my way of saying I trust your judgment more than most available alternatives.”

“So nerds with interesting hyperfixations.”

“That would be ideal.”

You promised to do your best.

Now, standing in the VIP area with your friends pressed around you, you think you delivered.

Maki is already analyzing the track layout under her breath. Yuuta listens with real attention despite not knowing enough to follow all of it. Toge says occasional one-word commentary that somehow everyone understands. Kirara points out sponsor placement and crowd behavior. Nobara wants to know which areas are most dangerous, then immediately gets annoyed when the answer makes her anxious. Mai pretends to care less than she does, but her eyes keep following the ramps.

You grip the rail. The event has not started yet, and your stomach is already tight.

Then you see him.

Not close. On the big screen first.

Sukuna stands with the team for photos, helmet under one arm, new gear fitted to him like armor designed by a marketing department that accidentally understood worship. The 49 on his uniform and plate looks brutally right beside the Monster aesthetic. His hair is vivid under the lights, pink sharpened by the cold tones around him. he's grinning for the photographers, those canines you adore pointing from under his lips, but it's not a smile. Not the private, stunned, beautiful thing you have seen in kitchens and after sponsor calls.

This is a vicious grin.

A predator under flash.

Hyped. Alive. Happy in a way that comes through as threat because joy, in him, has teeth.

Your chest aches with it.

Maki leans close enough for only you to hear.

“He looks like he’s about to maul anyone that gets close.”

“He probably is.”

“Romantic.”

“Shut up.”

The lights drop. The crowd becomes one body.

The announcer’s voice surges through the speakers, polished and enormous, wrapping the arena in hype. Screens flash. Engines answer from somewhere beyond the visible track. You feel the sound before you fully hear it filling the space, vibration moving through the rail into your hands.

Then they reveal the globe.

At first, your brain refuses to understand what you are looking at.

A large metal sphere stands at the center of the arena, lit in green-white beams, its curved lattice shining like a trap. The crowd roars immediately, recognizing it faster than you do. You stare at it, heart slowing for one strange second.

Then the announcer says it.

Globe of death.

Your stomach drops.

“No,” you say, quietly.

Maki’s hand finds yours at once.

You had heard of it in passing, it’s really not a thing that happens in regular events you’ve watched. You’ve seen videos, maybe, long before you cared about the difference between a stunt and a race, between a calculated risk and an insane one. A metal globe. Riders inside. Loops. Crossings. Timing so precise a breath in the wrong place looks fatal.

Of course they start with it.

Of course the sponsor known for insanity wants spectacle before anything else.

Of course Sukuna is part of it.

You see him ride in.

The instant the bike enters the globe, your hand clamps around Maki’s so hard she exhales through her teeth but doesn't pull away. He's helmeted now, visor down, anonymous to anyone who doesn't know the exact language of his body, his number, his fame. You do. Even in gear, even inside a structure built to turn men into streaks of motion, you know him by posture, by the angle of his head, by the controlled arrogance in the way he takes the first circle, not by the obvious visible gear.

The engine sound changes inside the globe.

Sharper. Contained. Violent against the metal.

He moves up, around, down, the bike climbing the curve as if gravity is a rule he has negotiated with personally and won. Another rider enters. Then another. Each addition tightens the noose around your lungs. Timing layers over timing. Paths cross. The announcer narrates with theatrical delight, explaining speed, centrifugal force, spacing, the danger of even the smallest hesitation.

You hear only fragments.

Your eyes stay on Sukuna.

He's vibrating.

Not physically in a way anyone else could parse, perhaps. But you see it. The way his control glows from inside the motion. The way he takes the globe like it's not a cage but a challenge he's enjoying more than he should. His happiness in danger is not reckless tonight. That is what steadies you, barely. There is no sloppiness, no showing off beyond the show itself — as if there ever was. Every line is clean. Every pass is exact. He's not trying to survive the stunt.

He's mastering it.

More riders enter.

Maki shifts closer, bracing your elbow now because your fingers are going numb around hers. Nobara swears somewhere behind you. Mai says something sharp under her breath. Yuuta whispers, “How are they not hitting each other?” and Toge answers with a low, tense sound that needs no translation.

It's mesmerizing.

Agonizing.

Beautiful in the way a blade is beautiful while falling.

You breathe only when riders begin to leave.

One by one, they slow their patterns and exit the globe through the opened section, each departure widening the space, lowering the danger by a fraction. The crowd cheers every exit as if it's victory in itself. You keep waiting for Sukuna to leave too.

He doesn't.

Of course he doesn't.

He remains alone inside.

The announcer lets the tension build until the arena seems to lean forward.

Then the voice booms through the speakers, asking if anyone dares to enter the globe and stand with the current champion while he rides.

You go cold.

Several hands go up in the crowd almost immediately. Mostly men, as far as you can tell from your angle, drunk on adrenaline and spectacle and the fantasy of surviving proximity to danger. The camera sweeps across them, catching eager faces, shouted offers, people laughing, people daring each other.

Sukuna’s helmet turns.

Not to them.

To you.

The spotlight finds your section.

His visor faces your section with such absolute precision that your body reacts as if he has touched you. The crowd is still roaring, the announcer still talking, but inside you, everything narrows to that helmet, that dark visor, the man behind it looking exactly where he knew you would be.

Your hand rises. You don't decide. It simply happens.

Maki makes a strangled sound beside you.

The spotlight hits.

White light floods your face, your shoulders, the hands still raised near your chest. The big screen catches you a half second later, and the arena erupts in a different kind of noise, delighted by the selection, by the pretty woman in VIP, by the apparent drama of the champion choosing someone from the crowd.

Your friends explode around you.

Nobara grabs your arm.

“Girl, are you insane?”

That’s a great question, really. Maybe you are.

Maki, who knows you better than anyone, doesn't ask. She only looks at you with wide eyes and releases your hand when Choso appears near the section barrier with other team members.

Choso’s face is calm, but his eyes search yours carefully.

“You don’t have to.”

That helps more than anything else. Because you know then that this is planned, yes, but not forced. They were waiting, maybe. Sukuna was waiting. The team was prepared. But Choso is giving you the last door.

You swallow. Your pulse is hammering so hard you feel it in your teeth.

“I know.”

“You can say no.”

You look back at the globe.

Sukuna is still watching.

You cannot see his eyes yet, not through the visor and distance, but you know what he's saying. The same thing he said the night before. The same thing he has been saying since the first time he understood you would look at the bike and not only the man.

Watch me.

And beneath it, tonight, something more.

Trust me.

You step toward Choso.

“I’m going.”

Maki curses behind you with feeling. Mai says your name once, sharp and worried. Nobara yells something about haunting Sukuna if anything happens. Kirara laughs nervously. Yuuta looks like he might pray. Toge says a single word that sounds like warning and support at once.

Choso guides you out.

The walk from VIP to the dome feels impossibly long and too fast. The crowd’s attention presses against your skin. The arena lights make it hard to see beyond the path ahead, but you feel thousands of eyes, hear the announcer turning your movement into part of the show. The closer you get to the globe, the larger it becomes, the metal lattice rising above you like the ribs of something that eats sound. Eats breath. Eats lives.

People move around you with practiced efficiency. Someone explains quickly what will happen. You will stand still in the center. Completely still. Sukuna will ride inside the globe around you, up, down, across angles that will make your body beg to flinch. You will wear ear protection. You will keep your arms close unless instructed otherwise. You will not move toward him. You will not step back. You will not try to follow the bike with your body. Your only job is to trust the mark where they place you.

Mei Mei appears with paperwork — of course. Even under arena lights, even with the crowd screaming, she's immaculate, composed, horrifyingly efficient. She has you sign a release acknowledging risk of injury or death, which is not the most comforting phrase to read before entering a globe named after dying.

Your hand shakes slightly around the pen. Mei Mei notices. Her voice lowers just enough that the microphone and crowd cannot steal it.

“He would not have chosen you if he had any doubt in his own control.”

That doesn't erase the fear. It gives the fear somewhere to stand.

You sign.

They place ear protectors over your ears, and the world muffles. Not silence. Nothing here could become silence. But the roar dulls at the edges, engines turning deeper, the announcer becoming more vibration than words. You are guided to the entrance.

Sukuna is there. Off the bike now, standing just inside the opened globe, one gloved hand extended.

The sight of his hand does something to you.

All this machinery, spectacle, contracts, lights, danger, and there is still his hand waiting for yours. The same hand that slides around your waist in grocery aisles. The same hand that catches your ankle on your couch. The same hand that steadies your back when cameras come too close. Gloved now, armored, made part of the show, but still his.

You take it.

His fingers close around yours.

Firm. Unshaking.

He helps you up and into the globe.

The metal floor feels strange beneath your shoes, not like ground, not like stage, but something in between. He guides you to the center, places you exactly where you need to stand. His hand touches your waist once to adjust your position. Even through the glove, even through adrenaline, you recognize the care in the pressure. Not possessive for the crowd this time. Precise for you.

You look up at him.

He leans closer.

Behind the visor, his eyes gleam.

You can see them now, red through the tint, bright with adrenaline and something else that hits you harder than the crowd ever could.

He's smirking — not cruelly and not for the audience.

For you.

There is no way you would hear him if he spoke. No way the shape of words could survive the arena. So he does something you don't expect.

He lifts two fingers and taps his visor twice.

Your breath catches.

For half a second, you don't understand. Then you do, and the realization makes you lightheaded.

A good luck kiss.

Here.

Now.

In front of everyone.

A euphoric little laugh breaks out of you, startled and bright enough that you feel it even if you cannot hear it properly. You place your hands on his armored shoulders, rise just enough, and press your lips to the corner of his visor.

The crowd loses its mind.

They think it's rehearsed.

Of course they do. It looks too perfect not to be. The chosen woman from VIP kissing the champion’s helmet before he circles death around her. It's showmanship. It's romance packaged into danger. It's a sponsor’s dream.

But you know.

You know it's Sukuna stealing the only private thing he can take in the middle of the loudest night of his career.

You know it's him wanting your kiss before the event goes on.

You know it's the only moment he has gotten with you all day.

You know it means I will take you with me to victory.

He steps back.

Mounts the bike.

The engine comes alive.

You inhale once, deep and shaky, then lock your body into stillness.

The first pass tests everything in you.

Even prepared, even trusting him, your instincts riot when he moves. The bike circles low at first, speed building, sound filling the metal sphere until it becomes something physical against your legs. He passes close enough that air brushes your clothes. Never touching. But near enough that your nerves flash warnings your mind refuses to obey.

Don't move.

You don't move.

He climbs.

Up the curve, around, down, diagonally across the globe in a path that makes your stomach drop even though you are standing still. The announcer’s voice surges and fades beyond your ear protection, explaining the angles, the speed, the risk, the control necessary to keep the machine in orbit around a living person. The crowd becomes a distant animal. Lights streak across the metal.

Sukuna rides around you like gravity is something he owns.

From this close, his control is not simply impressive.

It's intimate.

You see details you cannot see from stands or paddock. The minute shifts in weight. The exact timing of throttle. The way his shoulders remain loose enough to adjust and firm enough to command. The bike responds to him like an extension of thought, every change deliberate, every line held within inches of disaster without tipping into it.

Your trust becomes its own sensation.

Not absence of fear.

Never that.

Fear stays. Fear has both hands around your ribs.

Trust stands inside it and doesn't move.

He passes. Climbs. Drops. Circles.

Your eyes follow as much as they can without turning your body. He told you without words to watch, and you do. You watch until your vision blurs with speed and light, until your pulse syncs with the engine in a way that makes your body feel less like an object in danger and more like part of the stunt itself.

Then he changes the act. You don't understand at first.

He drops lower, not slowing enough to seem safe, but adjusting his line until one arm extends from the bike as he circles. Your heart jumps into your throat. The gloved hand reaches toward you.

It touches your waist.

Gentle.

So gentle the contrast almost breaks you.

He circles, hand sliding across your waist, your belly, the opposite side of your waist, then your back as he rounds you without removing contact. The bike continues its path, his body controlling machine and distance while one hand keeps tracing you as if proving to everyone and no one that he can hold danger in one hand and touch you softly with the other.

The crowd roars.

You forget to breathe.

The glove leaves your back as he completes the circle.

A final pass.

Then he slows.

The bike descends out of its impossible rhythm, engine lowering from scream to growl, and finally stops.

Your knees nearly fail.

The globe opens.

The announcer is saying something. You catch fragments through the muffled protection — champion, precision, impossible control, probably traumatized a pretty girl with his ways. The crowd laughs and cheers at the line. You barely process it.

Sukuna dismounts.

He removes his helmet halfway, then seems to change his mind about something. He sets it back on, walks to you, and before you can manage your legs, he sweeps you up.

Bridal style.

In front of the entire arena.

Your shocked sound disappears under the crowd’s roar.

You grab at his shoulders automatically, face burning so hot the arena lights have competition. He holds you with insulting ease, one arm beneath your knees, the other behind your back, grip steady and tight. Possessive in the way that makes the audience scream louder because they think it's part of the show again, part of the champion trying to win over the woman he chose.

The announcer leans into it immediately. You catch enough to understand he's saying something about Sukuna winning hearts as easily as titles.

Little does he know.

Or maybe everyone knows more than you think.

Sukuna carries you out of the globe and toward the paddock as if the attention is irrelevant. His body is still hot with performance, chest moving hard, sweat starting beneath the gear. You can feel the vibration of the bike still living in him. He doesn't look at the crowd. He looks ahead, jaw set, mouth curved slightly, and you realize with dizzying clarity that he's pleased.

Not just with the stunt.

With you.

With your trust.

The paddock swallows you into motion and controlled chaos. Crew members prepare the next part of the show, riders cycle through water and checks, officials move quickly with clipped instructions. The public side continues behind you, the host filling time while the next area is arranged, voice booming and cheerful as if your legs are not trembling.

Sukuna sets you down on a bench.

Choso appears with water, expression calm but eyes attentive.

“Are you good?”

You nod because language seems ambitious.

He unscrews the cap for you before handing over the bottle. That almost makes you laugh, because everyone has decided you are functional only in theory.

You drink. Your hand shakes enough that water nearly spills down your front.

Sukuna takes off his helmet.

His hair is damp already, flattened slightly, face flushed from heat and adrenaline. He crouches in front of you, settling between your legs like the paddock is not full of people and the event is not mid-flow. His forearms rest across your knees, gloved hands loose near your thighs. He looks up at you.

That grin.

Wide enough to show canines.

Bright enough to undo you.

There is sweat at his temple, excitement in every line of him, and beneath the arrogance, a raw, unmistakable joy that he cannot fully hide. He looks like his body is still inside the globe, still moving, still circling the impossible. But his eyes are on you, and the happiness there is not only about what he did.

It's about what you allowed.

You trusted him with your stillness.

You trusted him with your fear.

You stood in the center of danger because he asked without words, and he knows what that means. You can feel how much it means in the way his fingers flex once near your knee and then settle.

You lift the water bottle toward him.

“Drink.”

His grin sharpens. You know that look.

“Drink, Sukuna.”

He laughs under his breath, takes the bottle from your hand, and drinks without standing. His throat works, sweat sliding down the side of his neck, and you are almost offended by how beautiful he's like this.

Alive, brutal, victorious halfway through the night, letting you boss him because he likes the shape of your concern.

When he lowers the bottle, you take the chance the day has barely given you.

You lean down, cup his face, and kiss him.

The first touch is meant to be brief.

It's not.

His mouth opens under yours with immediate hunger, eagerness breaking through the last thin layer of public restraint. He rises as he kisses you, one arm sliding around your waist, pulling you off the bench with him. Your feet find the ground but barely matter because he holds you close enough to take most of your weight. Your hands stay on his face, then slide into his hair, and the taste of him is salt, water, heat, adrenaline.

He kisses you like the globe was foreplay for something neither of you can finish here.

For a few seconds, the paddock fades.

There is only the hard line of his body against yours, the armor and gear between you, his mouth still wild from performance, his hand spread over your back as if he can press your trust directly into his skin. He has to go back. You both know. That urgency makes it worse, makes every second stolen and concentrated.

Naoya’s voice cuts through the moment like a blade dragged across concrete.

“Time’s up. Track needs him.”

Sukuna breaks the kiss with visible irritation.

Then, because he's incapable of leaving like a normal man, he gives you one last quick kiss, turns you slightly, and slaps your ass hard enough to make you yelp.

“Sukuna!”

He's already walking away, helmet going back on, shoulders rolling once as if resetting into champion shape. The crowd’s noise swells again as the next segment prepares. He doesn't look back immediately.

Then he does. One glance over his shoulder. Visor still up. Eyes on you. Then he lowers it and goes.

You stand there stunned, hand still half lifted as if your body forgot what it was doing.

Nanami appears at your side and presses a cold water bottle against your arm.

You jolt.

“Drink that as well,” he says, voice level. “Adrenaline dehydration is inconvenient.”

You turn your head slowly toward him. His expression is perfectly composed, but there is something like amusement buried deep enough that he can deny it under oath.

“He planned that?”

“The globe? Yes.”

“The me part?”

Nanami looks toward the track.

“That was less formally documented.”

“Nanami.”

“He asked if the release forms could be prepared for a specific VIP section.”

You close your eyes briefly. Of course he did.

Nanami guides you back toward the VIP area with the calm authority of someone who has escorted concussed riders, angry sponsors, and emotionally compromised teachers before. By the time you reach your friends, they look like a panel of judges who have already convicted you.

Maki’s eyebrows are nearly at her hairline. Nobara grabs your shoulders.

“How did that feel? Don't say fine. I will bite you.”

Yuuta looks relieved you are alive. Toge gives you a quiet thumbs up. Kirara is vibrating with gossip energy. Mai studies your face as if deciding whether to mock you now or wait until you stop shaking.

You tuck your hair behind your ear. A useless gesture.

“I’m telling you after it’s over.”

Maki stares at you.

“After?”

“If I talk now, I will lose my mind.”

“Fair,” Mai says.

Nobara groans but releases you.

“Fine. But you owe details.”

You grip the rail again. Below, the show moves into its larger arena phase.

Teams compete across the full track now, the globe replaced by ramps, structures, obstacles and lanes that turn the whole venue into a living machine. The host narrates each rider’s approach, the maneuvers, the flaws, the clean landings, the ugly corrections, the risks built into the layout. You understand far more than you would have a year ago, enough that the show is no longer simply spectacle. It has grammar now. You read form, timing, posture, the way a rider enters a ramp too stiff or lands with too much front weight, the way speed is gained or wasted before a sequence even begins.

All the teams are good. They have to be, to be here. You give them that, honestly.

Some are elegant in the air. Some are aggressive. Some rely on showmanship, some on technical precision, some on sheer willingness to make the crowd believe they might die for applause. The host builds narratives around all of them, and the screens help, cutting to close-ups, slow-motion replays, rider stats.

But Sukuna is the best.

Maybe you are biased. You know you are biased.

But bias doesn't explain the exactness of him. The way he adapts without looking like he adjusted. The way his mistakes, when they happen, are swallowed before they become visible to anyone who doesn't know what to look for. The way he rides as if the bike has no opinion separate from his own.

He's dedicated. Competent. Gifted in a way that would mean less if he did not work like the gift was an insult.

High-risk jumps come and go.

Your hands tighten on the rail often enough that your fingers ache.

One rider is launched off his bike after a bad landing near a ramp sequence, body hitting dirt hard enough that the crowd’s sound changes instantly. Medical staff rush in with practiced speed. The announcer’s voice shifts, still professional, still keeping the show alive while making room for concern. The rider moves, eventually. The crowd claps when he's taken out.

Your stomach stays tight.

Another rider miscalculates a jump and lands wrong, the bike kicking sideways, the impact ugly enough that even Nobara stops making comments. Medical again. A stretcher this time. You cannot see much, which is both mercy and torment. The show pauses, breathes, then continues because these events always do. Because danger is part of the contract everyone pretends is fully understood until someone hits the dirt.

You look for Sukuna every time.

He keeps riding. He knows what he's doing.

You repeat that inside your head until it becomes rhythm.

He knows what he's doing.

He knows what he's doing.

He knows what he's doing.

Then he performs the triple jump.

The largest ramps look unreal from your angle, structures lit too brightly, shadows sharp beneath them. When he approaches, the arena seems to inhale. You feel Maki stiffen beside you. Even Nobara goes silent. Sukuna’s speed is perfect, body positioned with that ruthless economy you love, bike aligned like the decision was made three seconds before the rest of the world understood the question.

He launches.

For one suspended instant, he's all height and control, 49 bright under the lights, Monster branding cutting across gear, body and machine held in a clean line above dirt, noise, fear.

Then the second.

The third.

Landing.

Perfect.

The crowd detonates. You scream so hard your throat hurts. You don't care.

He cannot hear you specifically, not through engines and arena and helmet, but you know he sees you when he passes the VIP side after. His helmet turns just enough, a fractional acknowledgment that hits you harder than any wave to the crowd would have.

The racing portion seals it.

He wins.

Again.

Champion.

But this one matters differently. You feel it in the team’s reaction, in the way Nanami’s composure cracks just enough for fierce satisfaction, in Choso’s lifted fist, in Shoko’s exhale when the most dangerous part is done and Sukuna is still upright. You feel it in your own body too, joy and relief colliding so hard that for a moment you can barely stand still.

You want to jump the barrier. You want to run down there and throw your arms around him.

Instead, you cheer with everyone else, screaming his name into the roar, clapping until your palms sting. Your friends are shouting too. Maki’s face is bright, Nobara is yelling things that would probably get you removed from a family section, Mai is smiling despite herself, Yuuta looks swept up, Kirara has both hands in the air, Toge’s eyes are narrowed in delighted disbelief.

Sukuna rides like he knows.

Like he hears you through all of them.

The show doesn't end with the announcement.

There is another performance after the winner is declared, more maneuvers, more flourishes, a final display to close the night with spectacle instead of ceremony. You are less worried now because the highest-risk competitive elements have passed. Sukuna, as champion, has done what he came to do. He rides a little longer, then begins moving off the track, pushing his bike toward the mechanics’ area, helmet coming off as he slows.

You watch him because you always watch him.

He's near the edge, close to where the controlled chaos of the track becomes crew territory. He looks tired now, the kind of tired that comes after full-body brilliance, but upright. Alive. You are already thinking about the paddock, about water, about getting your hands on his shoulders later, about what his face will look like when the adrenaline comes down and the reality of the win settles in.

Then another rider takes the high ramp. You see it go wrong before your mind understands the direction of that wrongness.

The angle is off.

Too much. Too fast. A bad kick from the bike or a misread landing or a fraction of panic — you cannot know. You only see the rider launched out of the safe line, the machine and body no longer belonging to the planned path. The crowd’s sound distorts. The announcer’s voice cuts strangely.

Sukuna is below.

Already near the mechanics.

Helmet off.

You see him turn.

It happens in slow motion and too fast at the same time.

The rider crashes into him.

Not near him.

Into him.

Bike and body against bike and body, impact exploding into dirt, metal, smoke. A black-edged cloud rises where both machines collide, the violence of it swallowing the shapes before you can track where Sukuna goes. For a second, there is no champion, no rider, no 49, no body you know better than you can admit.

Only dirt.

Smoke.

People running.

Your hands leave the rail.

You don't remember deciding to move.

Maki catches you first.

Her arm locks around your waist before you can push away from the VIP section. Nobara says your name sharply. Someone else grabs at your sleeve, Nobara, maybe. You are trying to get down, trying to reach a restricted area that might as well be glass because you can see the medical team rushing and cannot get through.

You hear yourself saying his name. Screaming his name.

Not once.

Over and over.

The announcer doesn't announce severity. The show voice shifts into controlled vagueness, asking the audience to remain calm, praising the medical team’s response, promising updates, returning to the spectacle.

The show must go on.

The screens cut away. That makes it worse. The absence of image becomes a wound. If they are not showing it, it's bad. If they cut away, it's bad. If no one is saying his name, it's bad.

Sukuna doesn't stand.

You wait for him to stand.

He doesn't.

The medical team and Sukuna’s team converge so densely you cannot see him. Choso is down there. Nanami too, moving fast in a way you have never seen from him. Shoko disappears into the cluster. Naoya is yelling at someone, face drained of its usual smugness.

You try to pull free.

Maki’s grip tightens.

“You can’t go down there.”

“I need to—”

“You can’t! You’ll get stopped before you reach him!”

Her voice is close to your ear, hard and shaking beneath the hardness. She's not calm. She's being calm for you because one of you has to be anchored to the earth.

The crowd becomes unbearable.

Too loud. Too confused. Some people cheer when other riders keep moving elsewhere because the show tries to continue around the injury. Some people are silent. Some whisper. Some try to film. You want to scream at all of them. You want every engine shut off. You want the entire arena to stop breathing until you know whether he can.

Two ambulances leave.

You see them because you are already out of the VIP section by then, moving with your friends in a blur of stairs, corridors, security barriers, concrete floors. The public areas are chaos, people trying to understand what happened, staff redirecting movement, official voices keeping things smooth while your world tears open.

You message everyone.

Choso.

Nanami.

Shoko.

Even Naoya.

Your fingers shake so badly you mistype half the words.

Where is he What hospital Is he awake Is he breathing Tell me where the fuck they took him

No answer.

The lack of answer becomes its own answer in your head, and that is when the anxiety peaks so hard your body stops feeling like yours. Your lungs refuse to fill. The hallway tilts. Sound becomes too bright. You are aware of Maki in front of you, hands on your shoulders, forcing you to look at her.

You cannot understand what she says at first.

Her mouth moves.

The world buzzes.

Then her voice cuts through.

“Breathe with me. In. Hold. Out. You’re not helping him by dropping here.”

You hate that she's right. You hate that breathing takes effort. You hate that your body is doing this when his might be broken somewhere you cannot reach.

Mai is speaking to someone. Nobara is beside you, unusually quiet and white-knuckled around her phone. Kirara hovers, eyes sharp, watching the crowd like she might fight anyone who bumps into you. Yuuta has gone pale but steady, helping Toge clear a little space around your group.

Maki takes your phone. You let her because your hands no longer obey.

She checks messages with the terrifying efficiency of someone who will process panic later. Something comes through while she's holding it. You know from the way her face changes. Not relief. Not horror. Direction.

She looks at you.

“We’re going.”

“Where?”

“Hospital.”

The ride is frozen and too full of sensation. Maki drives. You sit in the passenger seat because she puts you there and buckles the seatbelt herself when your fingers cannot manage it. Mai, Nobara and Kirara are in the back. You think Yuuta, Toge and maybe the others are following another way, or staying, or calling; you cannot hold all the logistics in your head. The city outside smears into lights and dark glass, December cold pressing against the windows.

Your phone is back in your hand. No new messages. You stare at the screen until the letters blur.

At some point, Nobara reaches between the seats and grips your shoulder.

Not gently, exactly. Firmly.

“I’m not going to say he’ll be fine,” she says, voice low, controlled in a way that sounds unlike her. “Because I hate when people say shit they don’t know. But he’s the most stubborn man alive, and if anyone tries to take him out with an accident he already won, I think he’ll be pissed enough to come back just to be annoying.”

A laugh tears out of you. It hurts. It almost becomes a sob. Then Mai says,

“That was oddly comforting.”

“I’m emotionally versatile,” Nobara mutters.

Maki drives faster but not recklessly. She knows better. But with purpose sharp enough that every lane change feels like intention rather than movement. Her jaw is locked. She keeps one hand on the wheel, the other occasionally reaching over to touch your arm, your wrist, your knee. Not to comfort with words. To remind your body it's not alone.

You think of Sukuna’s hand tapping his visor.

Your lips on the corner of it.

The glove on your waist inside the globe.

His grin between your knees in the paddock.

The slap before he returned to the track.

You almost throw up.

At the hospital, the lights are too white.

Emergency reception has its own kind of unreality, especially after an arena. The sound is smaller but sharper — wheels, footsteps, phones, distant voices, someone coughing, a child crying somewhere behind a partition. You enter too fast, then stop because you don't know where to go.

For one horrible second, you are only a woman with no official claim standing under hospital lights, looking for a man you cannot name properly.

Choso finds you.

He appears from the side corridor still wearing team clothes, hair disheveled, face drawn. You have never been so grateful to see anyone in your life.

“He’s alive,” he says before you can speak.

The words hit you physically. Your knees weaken. Maki catches your elbow. Choso steps closer, his presence becoming a wall between you and the chaos

“He’s alive. They’re taking care of him. They’re still checking how bad it is.”

You breathe. Not well. But you breathe.

“Can I see him?” Your voice sounds so distant, so far.

Choso’s face changes. There is the answer before the answer.

“Not yet.”

Because you are not family.

Because you are not anything official.

Because a year of bodies and keys and care and love unsaid doesn't open hospital doors.

The thought lands so hard you almost double over.

You see Mei Mei farther back, speaking to a cluster of nurses or staff, phone in one hand, expression colder than you have ever seen it. Nanami is pacing. Actually pacing. The sight frightens you almost as much as Choso’s drawn face. Nanami doesn't waste movement. If he's pacing, something inside the structure has gone badly wrong.

There are people from the other rider’s team too, identifiable by the colors on jackets and gear. One man has his face in his hands. Another speaks rapidly into a phone. You cannot look at them for long. It's not fair, the hatred that rises in you. You don't even know what happened. You don't know whether it was miscalculation, mechanical failure, bad luck stacked at the worst possible angle.

You still hate them for being attached to the impact.

Maki leads you to the benches.

You sit because everyone seems to want you sitting. Mai gets water. Nobara stands near you like a guard dog in a skirt. Kirara makes calls or texts someone, voice low and fast. Choso stays close, not speaking much. He doesn't need to. His quiet is load-bearing. He stands in front of you slightly to the side, near enough that if you bolt toward the doors, he can stop you before security does.

You are half grateful, half resentful, mostly terrified.

Minutes lose meaning.

No one tells you anything useful.

The same is true for Choso, Nanami, Naoya, and the rest of the team. Whatever happens behind the doors belongs to doctors, and perhaps to family, and you are on the wrong side of that word. You sit with your water bottle unopened between your hands, feeling the plastic crinkle whenever your grip spasms.

Maki has one arm around you. At some point, she shifts behind you on the bench, wrapping both arms around your middle and resting her chin over your shoulder the way she has done since you were younger, since before Sukuna, before motocross, before adult life became a series of rooms where fear could find you anyway. The pressure helps. It lowers the panic by giving it a boundary.

She talks. Not about Sukuna at first. About stupid things. About your students. About the time you both got lost trying to find a cafe that turned out to be closed. About Nobara’s terrible taste in convenience store snacks. About how Mai pretends she doesn't like fried food and then eats everyone’s fries. About anything that keeps your mind from building images behind the doors.

You hear half of it. You hold onto the sound anyway.

Then the hospital doors open, and someone rushes in.

For one wild second, your heart thinks Sukuna.

But no.

This man is too young. Less stress around the eyes. Less malice in the mouth. Less violence written into the way he carries his body. Less black ink framing his features. But the hair is the same pink. The face is ridiculously similar once you see it, like someone took Sukuna and removed years, scars you cannot see, and the particular sharpness that makes strangers step back.

Yuuji.

You know it immediately.

He doesn't look around like someone arriving at a normal emergency. He looks like someone who has been called into the only nightmare that can still make him a child. His eyes are wide, breath uneven from rushing, jacket thrown on carelessly. Nanami intercepts him first, says something low. Yuuji nods too fast. A staff member appears. Within a minute, he's taken through the doors.

He vanishes.

Because he's family.

The locked place inside you breaks open, but not with jealousy. With helplessness.

Of course he should be there. He's Sukuna’s brother. He belongs behind those doors. You are glad Sukuna has someone who can go in, someone who shares blood and history and legal access.

You still feel yourself split around the reality that you cannot follow.

Your breathing goes wrong again.

Maki tightens her arms.

“Stay with me.”

“I need to know,” you whisper because it’s either that or you scream.

“I know.”

“I can’t sit here.”

“You can. You are.”

“I’m not anything.”

The words come out before you can stop them. Maki goes still behind you. Nobara turns sharply. Mai looks down. Choso’s eyes close for a second.

You did not mean to say it here. Not like this. Not in a hospital waiting area with his team nearby and fluorescent lights overhead and fear stripping all your careful dignity down to bone.

But the words are true in the one way that matters to the receptionist, the doors, the doctors.

You are not anything they can put on a form.

Maki’s voice comes against your ear, lower now.

“You are not nothing.”

“That’s not what I said.”

“I know what you said.” Her arms tighten. “And I’m saying you’re not nothing.”

You press your lips together until they hurt. Choso crouches in front of you after a moment.

The movement startles you because it's exactly where Sukuna had been earlier in the paddock, forearms on your knees, looking up at you, alive and grinning.

Choso is different, softer, his face open with tired worry.

“He talks about you,” he says.

You blink.

The words don't fit the room.

“What?” The shock is what makes your body almost reset.

“He talks about you,” Choso repeats, carefully, like each word needs placing. “Not in long speeches. You know him. But he does. Enough that we know when he's going to your place. Enough that Shoko knows to blame you when he actually listens. Enough that Nanami gives you invitations because having you there changes him. Enough that he asks about how visible you’ll be before media events because he knows you worry about work.”

Your throat closes. Choso looks down briefly, then back up.

“He's bad at naming things. That doesn’t mean there is nothing to name.”

You cover your mouth with one hand. It's the wrong comfort, maybe. Or the right one at the worst time.

It almost ruins you in ways you couldn’t possibly know if for good or bad.

Naoya stands near the far wall, unusually silent, arms crossed tightly over his chest. His face is pale. For once, he doesn't make a joke. For once, there is no slickness in him. You hate that even he looks scared because it makes everything worse. If Naoya cannot perform cruelty, the world has tilted too far.

Time keeps refusing to move properly.

Mei Mei disappears for a while.

When she returns, she comes from outside, phone still in hand. You can see from her face that she has been making calls. Sponsor calls, legal calls, team calls, perhaps hospital clearance calls. Her polish remains, but the edges are sharper now, colder, stripped of glamour.

She approaches the benches where you, the team, and your friends have gathered in a broken cluster.

Nanami stops pacing. Choso stands. You rise too quickly and sway. Maki’s hand catches your back.

Mei Mei looks at all of you, then at you.

For a second, you think she will soften the words.

She doesn't.

“They will probably put him into an induced coma.”

The room drains of color.

You hear someone inhale sharply behind you.

Maybe Nobara. Maybe you.

“He has a severe concussion,” Mei Mei continues, voice controlled, each word precise enough to cut. “There is head trauma, eye trauma, and he's still in surgery. His brother is inside and receiving the direct medical details. I am working on clearance for team access to the information we need.”

Eye trauma.

Head trauma.

Surgery.

Induced coma.

The words don't become meaning in order. They scatter through you like broken glass.

You try to ask something.

Maybe which eye.

Maybe how severe.

Maybe if he woke up.

Maybe if he knows he won.

No sound comes out.

Mei Mei says something else, and this time the sentence doesn't enter you slowly. It hits all at once.

“The doctor said there is a chance he may not come back depending on how he reacts to the surgery, if he makes it through.”

You stare at her.

For a moment, you don't understand why everyone is suddenly moving strangely.

Maki’s hand is on your arm.

Choso steps forward.

Nanami says your name.

The lights above stretch too long, too white, pulling away from the ceiling in thin lines. Your water bottle slips from your fingers and hits the floor with a dull plastic sound that seems louder than it should.

The last thing you think is absurdly small.

You never told him.

Then the floor disappears.

I wanna see your animal side Let it all out I wanna see the dirt under your skin I need your broken promises

I want the guts and glory baby, baby This town is wasted and alone

But we are alive Here in death valley But don't take love off the table yet Cause tonight, it's just fire alarms and losing you We love a lot So we only lose a little We are alive (We are alive) We are alive

I wanna see your animal side Let it all out Oh there you go; undress to impress You can wear the crown but you're no princess

So put the "D" in dirt now baby, baby Let's get you wasted and alone

Cause we are alive Here in death valley But don't take love off the table yet Cause tonight, it's just fire alarms and losing you We love a lot So we only lose a little We are alive (We are alive) We are alive

We're gonna die It's just a matter of time Hard times come Good times go I'm either gone in an instant Or here til the bitter end I never know What I've got will make you feel more alive I'll be your favorite drug I will get you high I will get you high

Cause we are alive Here in death valley But don't take love off the table yet Cause tonight, it's just fire alarms and losing you We love a lot So we only lose a little We are alive (We are alive) We are alive

[belimah]

The Last Of The Real Ones

You don't really see the appeal of motocross as a sport, but that doesn't stop Maki from taking you in her sister's place to the event she attends religiously. More than that, she wants you to see for yourself how amazing it feels to be so close to them as they play out risky maneuvers for entertainment... And how adrenaline inducing the crashes are.

You have no faith you're enjoying any of that, but you have nothing better to do.

Boredom, loud noises and dirt are all you're getting, but that is until you see the current champion in action. Rider number 49.

And just like that you're obsessed.

Thank you for the request, @mako-sea, this is being very damn fun to write! 🌑: THE LAST OF THE REAL ONES PLAYLIST

Champion

Irresistible

Love From The Other Side

Hold Me Tight Or Don't

So Good Right Now

Heaven, Iowa

7 Minutes in Heaven

W. A. M. S.

Alone Together

Of All Gin Joints In All The World

Death Valley

TBA

TBA

TBA

TBA

TBA

TBA

The Last Of The Real Ones

Fall Out Boy · MANIA · Song · 2018

[beaniesayshi]

the lamb: chapter 6

Sukuna is reincarnated into the modern world, only to realize that being a villain is actually kind of a bore. Now a teacher at Jujutsu High by pure technicality, he’s decided being a “good guy” is way more entertaining, mostly because it still lets him do whatever he wants while everyone thanks him for it. Unfortunately for you, that also means you get assigned to him as a specialist, since your technique is one of the very few things that can smooth out the jagged, overwhelming nature of his cursed energy after he uses it. The problem is… you’re absolutely terrified of him. Every second in the same room feels like your body is trying to shut down, and the idea of having to touch him to do your job makes it even worse. Sukuna, on the other hand, finds that fear hilarious and treats you like the funniest toy he’s ever been gifted.

pairing: sorcerer sukuna x sorcerer f!reader

wc: 17.4k

content: mdni, slow burn, kinda enemies to lovers, objectification, toxic dynamics, power imbalance, manipulation, coercion, possessive sukuna, violence, murder, blood, gore, dubious consent vibes, true form sukuna, yuji's not his vessel (...and probably smut at some point)

a/n: m'kay, i'm doing some serious worldbuilding here. don't kill me for how long this chapter is

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“Hey, Shoko, what the actual fuck?” The words tear out of you the moment you step through the infirmary door and it slams shut behind you. The heavy click of the latch behind you feels like a flimsy barrier against the rest of the world, but it's all you've got.

Early afternoon sunlight filters through the tall windows in pale, dusty strips across the beds, making the room look almost peaceful. It's too quiet in here, while your pulse is still drumming a frantic rhythm against your ribs.

She’s slumped at her desk near the back, with one hand curled around a chipped mug of coffee that looks like it's seen better years and a pen in the other, hovering over some unfinished notes. A cigarette dangles from her lips, the smoke curling lazily toward the ceiling. She doesn't even get the chance to blink before you're already unloading everything in a chaotic, breathless stream of consciousness.

“No, because you need to tell me if I’m losing my mind,” you plead, your hands shaking as you point toward the door. You're staying on your feet because sitting down would require your body to accept that the danger has passed, and the adrenaline’s currently screaming that it absolutely hasn’t. “He was in my office, like always, and we finished weaving, and then he stayed there for another hour like that was normal—which it apparently is now—and I was trying to work because he’d already interrupted my class and I had actual things to do—so I got up for one binder. One binder, Shoko. That’s all. I checked that his eyes were closed, I walked around the couch, I grabbed the binder, and when I turned around, he was just there. Right behind me.”

Shoko’s pen lowers slowly, but she doesn't say a word. Her silence only pulls more words out of you, faster and more frantic, as the panic swells, filling every bit of space it can find and crowding out any semblance of reason left in your head. You're pacing a tight circle now, with the binder wedged under your arm, while your free hand gestures wildly in the air, trying to map out height, proximity, the suffocating geometry of your office. Each sentence makes the whole thing sound more ridiculous than it felt in the moment.

“He trapped me against the shelf, and I asked him to move, which obviously did nothing. Why would Sukuna respond to a normal request like a normal person? Then he reached for his sweatshirt, and I thought he was doing some intimidation thing, or another stupid proximity power play, because he does that all the time, but then he started taking it off.” Your voice catches slightly, and you immediately hate yourself for the betraying sound that makes your face burn. Shoko’s eyebrow rises by the smallest amount, and you shoot her a glare before she can even open her mouth. “No. Don’t. I know how that sounds, but it isn’t the point. The point is that he took it off, and then he was looking at me, and I was looking at him for… for long enough to become a joke. And then he smirked, and for one horrible moment, I thought that maybe he was doing something else, which was stupid, because this is Sukuna.”

Shoko takes a slow sip of coffee, not even bothering to interrupt. Her expression barely changes, but she’s tucking that detail away for later, and humiliation crawls up your neck in response. With eyes squeezed shut, you breathe through your nose, trying to wrestle the conversation back toward the actual problem before it collapses under the weight of your own embarrassment.

“And then,” you continue, forcing your eyes open and pushing the words out before your nerve fails you completely, “he changed. One second he was standing there shirtless, being the worst person alive, and the next he was getting bigger. His shoulders broadened, his face changed, there were extra arms, and then there were four eyes. Four. Eyes. Shoko, I mean, I thought I saw them the first day, but I convinced myself I was just hallucinating from the panic, because people don't just have four fucking eyes, and here we are! I know this makes zero sense, but you have to believe me. He was huge. Like—he was almost touching the ceiling. And he just stood there mocking me because I was flustered, and then he broke the couch when he sat down—” For the first time, Shoko’s calm expression cracks and one of her brows lifts slightly in genuine surprise. “—got annoyed, turned back into himself, and just left. He literally just pulled a stupid party trick out of his ass to ruin my afternoon and then went home.”

Eventually, you run out of breath, cutting yourself off and staring at her with wide, pleading eyes. The panic has begun to ebb, but you’re still rattled, thrown off by the stupidity of the whole thing. You need her to say something that makes it make sense, to tell you whether that was a real threat or just another monstrous whim you’re supposed to ignore.

Shoko takes a long drag, letting the smoke curl lazily toward the open window before tapping the ash into a glass tray. For a moment, she just watches you over the rim of her mug. “The couch broke?” she asks finally.

You stare at her, genuinely frustrated. “No, Shoko, that’s really not the important part here!”

She doesn’t even blink, keeping her expression maddeningly placid. “Then why’d you bring it up?”

“Because it broke!”

"That does sound like a problem," she murmurs, more to herself than to you, as she taps more ash into the tray.

“Shoko, please. I’m having a crisis here.”

Her hands rise in a half-hearted surrender, but the corner of her mouth twitches as she reaches for her coffee again. That tiny movement's almost worse than outright laughter, almost like a silent admission that she knows exactly how absurd this conversation has become, and she’s perfectly happy to let you squirm through every second of it. The binder is still pressed uselessly to your chest, your cheeks burning hot with humiliation. Shoko watches you with the tired patience she usually saves for students faking injuries to skip training.

“Four eyes, four arms, bigger body,” she says after another sip, sounding so terrifyingly unbothered that the hair on your arms stands on end. “True form.”

“That’s… that’s a thing? Not just a hallucination?" You're hoping for a no, even though you know better.

Shoko peers at you over the rim of her mug. “You didn’t know?”

“No, Shoko! Somehow, nobody thought to mention that the man squatting in my office can turn into a mythological horror whenever he's bored!” Your voice cracks on the last word, and you hate how small it sounds.

She hums softly, the sound caught somewhere between sympathy and amusement, and sets the mug down, leaning back until her chair creaks. “That explains the way you walked in.”

You stare at her, waiting for a real explanation. When she doesn’t immediately offer one, frustration boils over, winning out over the lingering panic. “I don’t know what that means! Is it a technique? Is it some kind of trick he uses to be an asshole in a new and creative way?”

“No,” Shoko answers.

The simplicity of her answer is terrifying and leaves a bitter taste at the back of your throat. You hate it.

“No?”

“That’s his body.”

The infirmary falls strangely silent around you. Outside the windows, campus life drifts on in its usual, oblivious rhythm, suddenly feeling impossibly far away.

“That’s his… what?” you manage, barely a whisper. “His actual body?”

“Yeah,” she replies, resting her knuckles against the worn wood of her desk. “So technically, he didn’t turn back into himself. He turned into the restrained version. The human one is the restrained version.”

“The restrained version,” you repeat slowly.

You sink onto the nearest chair when your legs finally give out. Shoko’s eyes track the movement, a flicker of concern ghosts across her face, but she doesn't offer any empty comfort. Somehow that restraint is both grounding and deeply unsettling. She knows better than to pretend Sukuna is harmless. Everyone here does. The only real difference between you and Shoko is that she’s had more time to build up whatever internal wall lets her talk about this without sounding like she’s standing at the edge of a breakdown.

“More convenient,” she says, exhaling a plume of smoke. “Four arms are better for combat and technique efficiency, but they’re… terrible for hallways.”

"Terrible for hallways?" you echo, staring at her in disbelief. "That's what you're focused on right now?

"It matters more than you'd think when you're that big."

“Seriously, I’m begging you to stop being so practical about this.”

“Think about it, though,” Shoko says, gesturing with the glowing cherry of her cigarette, smoke trailing above her hand. “Buildings aren’t really designed for someone that tall or that wide or… with extra limbs. The human form causes less collateral damage, lets him fit through doorways and move without constant spatial awareness. It’s just less inconvenient. Plus, it keeps the higher-ups from bothering him every five minutes.”

Lifting her mug, she drains the last of her coffee, not the slightest hint of discomfort crossing her face as she describes all of this like it’s just another Tuesday.

“Look on the bright side,” she adds casually. “He’s actually significantly easier to deal with like this.”

The words hit hard, freezing you in place. Instantly, your mind loops back over the suffocating weaving sessions, the destroyed documents, the heavy, oily cursed energy, and the relentless, bone-deep exhaustion of managing his presence every single day. The Sukuna who sprawls across your couch, blocks your shelves, snaps your pens, leans in too close, and prowls through Jujutsu High like the halls were built for him alone… you thought that was the hard part. 

Pressing the heel of your hand into your eye socket, you drag in a slow breath, fighting the urge to laugh, knowing it would come out far too close to panic and turn into a sob. “Great. Wonderful. Very comforting.”

“I wasn’t trying to comfort you.”

“I noticed.”

Shoko lets out a short, breathy sound that might be a laugh, though there’s no humor in her eyes, just a flicker of weary understanding for the hell you've just gone through.

“Shoko?”

“Yeah?”

“What the actual fuck do you mean that's the easier version?”

She shrugs.

“Four arms means better combat efficiency and zero limitations with hand signs. He doesn't have to stop his technique to punch you. Significantly higher cursed energy output. If you're building the ideal sorcerer's body from scratch, that's pretty much what you'd end up with.”

You listen to her break down the anatomy of a living nightmare as if she's reading some boring report, suddenly wishing you’d never asked.

“If he actually cuts loose like that, most sorcerers wouldn’t survive five minutes. There's a reason most people on campus have only ever heard stories. Gojo's seen it, Yaga's seen it, I have. Maybe a handful of others.”

“Yuji?”

“Probably stood next to it more than all of us combined.”

The answer makes sense, but it doesn’t help one bit. You sit with that, staring down at the binder in your lap without really seeing it. The vinyl cover is still creased where your fingers dug in too hard. Your hands look normal against it, which suddenly feels absurd. They shouldn’t. After a month of touching Sukuna and his cursed energy, smoothing out residue inside a body that was never what you thought, after being pinned by four arms while he laughed at you—your hands should look different. If not them, then something should.

“He chooses to restrain himself,” you mutter, the realization settling heavily in your chest and making your voice sound oddly small. “He actively chooses to look human most of the time.”

She looks at you, a faint, dry tilt to the corner of her mouth. “When he uses that form publicly, it usually means he’s irritated enough to stop caring. And honestly? Sometimes he just finds it funny when people start forgetting what he actually is. So showing it to you like that? Completely deliberate.”

A hollow, deadpan exhaustion seeps into your bones as you glance at the sterile white cabinets. You feel like you've aged ten years in ten minutes.

“Deliberate? Sukuna? He would never.” The sarcasm slips out, sharper and more bitter than you intended, masking the tremor in your voice.

Shoko ignores the bite in your tone. “You know that he just wanted to see the look on your face.” Her tone is annoyingly knowing. “And judging by how fast you ran down here, he got exactly what he wanted.”

That, unfortunately, sounds like the most believable thing you've heard all day.

“Still not comforting, Shoko. I might actually hate you a little bit right now.

She stubs her cigarette out, the embers dying instantly. “Still not trying to.”

Despite everything, a weak, tired sound escapes you—half-laugh, half-sob. Shoko’s mouth softens just a touch, though she doesn’t quite smile. She just watches you through the fading light, waiting for the panic to fully drain away.

——————

Officially, the report says one Grade 2 curse has settled in an abandoned warehouse near the edge of the industrial district. Unofficially, Sukuna knew the second they stepped out of the car that the report was completely wrong. He can feel all six from the street.

All six signatures knot together somewhere inside, buried under rusted metal and the stale, heavy residue that lingers after years of human neglect. Not a single one is impressive on its own. Their cursed energy is coarse, dull, and irritatingly common to Sukuna, grating against his senses. It’s filth that only ever unsettles sorcerers too weak to crush it beneath their heel. He’s met curses like these a hundred times before, and it never gets less irritating.

Naturally, he keeps that to himself. There’s no reason to correct the report, and even less to warn the first-years. If he spelled everything out, it would ruin the only worthwhile part of dragging them out here in the first place.

The three students trail behind, already knowing better than to expect a normal mission from him. Yuji fills the air with chatter because the brat can’t seem to keep his mouth shut for more than a few minutes. Nobara answers him sharply, and every word is edged with irritation, making it clear she’d rather be anywhere else. Megumi walks half a step apart from both of them, silent and watchful, which Sukuna finds marginally less aggravating. The boy’s gaze sweeps the street, the chain-link fence, the boarded-up windows, and the shadows pooling inside the loading bay. 

At least one of them is paying attention. The other two will catch on once the curses start moving, which is later than ideal, but still sooner than most useless kids manage.

Ahead, the warehouse’s roofline sags where years of weather and neglect have gnawed at the supports. Old delivery bays line one wall, most sealed tight, but one loading door hangs crooked on its track, leaving an opening. Sukuna stops just past the fence, waiting for the students to catch up.

The talking dies almost instantly. Yuji’s head lifts, locking his attention onto the building as the pressure finally hits him, and Nobara’s mouth draws tight. Megumi’s eyes narrow and shoulders shift almost imperceptibly as he adjusts his balance. They’ve learned by now that when Sukuna goes quiet, it means the situation is already in motion, and they’re just late to understand it. That lesson took longer than it should have, but at least it stuck.

There’s no additional briefing from Sukuna—the one they received from Ijichi was wrong, though that’s hardly his concern. The warehouse is in front of them, curses are inside, and the kids have bodies, cursed energy, techniques, and the bare minimum of survival instinct to make the next few minutes interesting. Anything more would be coddling, and Sukuna’s never considered hand-holding a meaningful form of instruction. If they need someone to explain danger before they feel it, they deserve whatever comes next.

Megumi’s attention flickers to Sukuna just in time to catch his shoulder move as a hand snaps back and clamps onto the collar of Megumi’s uniform. His eyes go wide and his body tenses as if he’s already resigned to whatever’s coming. Nobara gets even less warning. Her protest barely makes it out of her throat before Sukuna’s other hand closes around the back of her jacket.

“What are you—”

He lifts both of them off the ground effortlessly and almost gets kicked by Nobara’s boot as her legs lash out in reflex. Megumi’s hand shoots up toward Sukuna’s wrist and freezes halfway—he knows better than to waste precious seconds and energy struggling when he could be bracing for impact. Sukuna almost respects that.

“Figure it out,” he says flatly.

Then he throws them through the opening in the entrance with enough force to send both first-years hurtling into the dim interior of the warehouse. The crash echoes beautifully, and Sukuna can’t help the smirk that tugs at his mouth as he shoves his hands into his pockets.

Metal shrieks as someone slams into a shelving unit. Dust billows out the open door in a pale, choking cloud. Something heavier crashes down a second later, followed by Nobara’s hacking cough and the frantic scuff of Megumi’s shoes as he scrambles to his feet. The curses notice instantly, and all six signatures converge on the chaos like insects drawn to a sudden flare of light.

Yuji stays at Sukuna’s side for three whole seconds after Megumi and Nobara disappear inside. That’s already three seconds longer than he should. His face cycles through alarm, anger, disbelief, and finally settles into that stubborn, indignant glare Sukuna’s learned to recognize as a warning sign that words are about to happen.

“What the fuck, Sukuna?” he snaps, stepping closer instead of farther away, which immediately makes the situation more irritating than it needs to be. “We’ve been through this! You can’t throw my friends like that!”

Sukuna doesn’t even bother to pull his hands from his pockets. His head tilts, eyes dragging down the tense, shaking line of Yuji’s shoulders with a look that radiates nothing but contempt. For a moment, he doesn’t dignify the outburst with a response—it barely registers as worth his attention. The complaint is so clumsy, so poorly put together, that it takes real effort to decide which part is more pathetic and deserves to be mocked first.

The whole objection is pointless anyway. He can throw them if he wants—he just did—and the racket echoing from inside is proof enough they survived the landing.

The rest is even more irritating. My friends, as if tossing that in somehow changes the mission. Like proximity, attachment, or whatever sentimental rot Yuji’s decided to drag into this should matter to Sukuna when there are curses inside and two students already doing exactly what they’re supposed to.

The real problem is that Yuji’s still standing right next to him. The other two are already tangled up with the curses, but Yuji, for reasons known only to whatever defective corner of his brain handles self-preservation, has decided to stay within arm’s reach and start an argument about how the mission started. It’s such a spectacularly stupid decision that Sukuna’s irritation almost tips over into genuine confusion.

“You’re still here?” he asks flatly.

Before the teenager has time to answer, something slams into a stack of crates inside so hard it splits old wood, while Nobara shouts something unintelligible and Megumi’s divine dogs snarl.

Yuji points toward the sound without looking away from Sukuna. “They’re fighting more than one curse in there!”

“Yes.”

“You said it was one.”

Sukuna’s mouth curves faintly, though there isn’t a shred of real amusement in it. The brat is still standing next to him, arguing while Megumi and Nobara are already adapting to reality without a second thought. That’s the difference between them, and maybe the reason Yuji manages to be so uniquely grating. Megumi lands in a bad situation and starts solving it. Nobara lands in a bad situation, insults everyone involved, and then starts solving it. Yuji sees the bad situation, whines that it exists, and wastes time expecting Sukuna to explain himself.

“When did I say anything?”

That actually shuts Yuji up. It’s infuriating how every argument with Sukuna ends with him getting tripped up by wording, and that’s all it takes for the man to dismiss anything Yuji says. Yuji glares at Sukuna, mutters something under his breath, and bolts for the warehouse.

Before he crosses the threshold, he looks back once more, still angry enough to make the gesture seem involuntary. “This conversation isn’t over!”

Sukuna’s stare flattens. “Tragic.”

Inside, Megumi rolls through the last of the impact, coming up on one knee with one hand already raised. The warehouse is even worse from within. Broken shelves tilt across the floor, half the old machinery has rusted, and long strips of plastic sheeting hang from the rafters, stirring in the draft that slips through shattered windows. Cursed energy clings to everything, crawling over the concrete and support columns like a living thing.

The curse slips out from behind a row of stacked pallets, its thin limbs bending at too many joints to count. Megumi lets out a slow breath, snapping his hands together to form the shadow puppet for Divine Dogs. One Grade 2 shouldn’t be a problem for the two of them. Annoying, maybe, depending on how it moves, but nothing they can’t handle.

“I hate him,” Nobara mumbles from under the knocked-over shelf.

Another shape drops from the ceiling. A third drags itself out from beneath a conveyor belt. By the time the fourth crawls into view near the loading bay and the fifth steps out from the shadow, Nobara’s pushing herself up with blood at the corner of her mouth and murder burning in her eyes. The sixth curse skitters across the far wall, clinging there with all six limbs splayed wide, making a wet, clicking sound that scrapes at their nerves.

Nobara stares at it for half a second before her expression goes flat with rage. “You've got to be kidding me! I really fucking hate him now.”

Megumi doesn’t bother agreeing, though the thought passes through his mind too. Of course Sukuna knew and threw them in anyway--it isn’t even surprising at this point. He despises Sukuna’s methods, but irritation won’t help, so he lets it burn out before it can take root. Survival instinct takes over, recognizing that hesitation means death, and he focuses on measuring distance, exits, and the narrow space they have to work without getting separated.

That lack of hesitation is exactly why Sukuna tolerates Megumi more than the others. The boy isn’t obedient, even if Sukuna thinks he should be, but he never wastes a second being surprised.

“I’m going to kill him,” Nobara snaps, reaching for her hammer and nails.

“Focus.”

“I’m perfectly capable of focusing and hating him at the same time, Fushiguro.”

The building itself works against them, with narrow paths winding between rows of abandoned shelving and broken equipment scattered everywhere. Every support column creates another blind spot, giving the curses plenty of chances to slip past with unsettling speed and spread out instead of attacking directly.

They lack intelligence or strategy but have just enough instinctive cooperation to be a nuisance. Individually, each would pose a serious challenge rather than an easy exorcism. Megumi could handle one, but not without effort, and Nobara would struggle much more than him. Together, they keep the pressure on, never letting Megumi settle into any kind of rhythm. Whenever he adapts to one threat, another comes from a different angle. Openings vanish almost as quickly as they appear. It isn’t dangerous yet, but it’s irritating as hell, demanding every scrap of his attention, forcing endless tiny adjustments and split-second decisions instead of allowing him to control the pace.

The first curse suddenly springs from the top of a rusty conveyor without warning. The old metal shrieks and then collapses as the creature leaps down. Megumi catches the blur of movement at the edge of his vision, just in time to twist aside, as a tangle of claws tears through the air where his head had been a split second before. The curse crashes into the concrete, cracking the floor and sending a cloud of dust swirling up. The reckless lunge should have left it wide open, but Megumi barely has time to take advantage of the opportunity before another curse barrels in from his left, forcing him to drop the thought and move.

Before Megumi can even think, the dogs run across the warehouse, slamming into the oncoming curse, sending it skidding through broken pallets and rusted metal that screeches against the concrete. The noise grates in his ears, distracting him for a second, and by the time his focus snaps back, the first curse has already shaken off its fall and is charging toward him again, all gnashing teeth and wild fury.

"Left, Kugisaki!" Megumi barks.

"I see it!" Nobara yells back, her chest heaving as she drops into a low crouch.

Somewhere behind him, a sharp whistle slices through the warehouse din. A nail whips past Megumi’s shoulder, and then a second follows, just as quick. Both hit their mark.

“Hairpin!”

Cursed energy surges through the nails, detonating deep inside the curse. It jerks, and its whole body convulses. The force tears one of its arms free, sending the limb spinning across the filthy floor while the creature reels, barely managing to stay upright.

“Move!” she shouts to her classmate.

Megumi quickly sidesteps as Nobara barrels past him. She snatches up the severed limb, slamming it onto the straw doll she’s just dropped, and drives a nail through, striking it with a hammer.

“Resonance.”

Black spikes burst from the curse’s chest, stopping it cold. It collapses mid-stride, hitting the floor with a heavy thud.

She barely gets a breath before the third curse drops from the rusted pipes overhead, its pale, hairless torso swelling as it aims to crush her beneath its weight. Throwing herself sideways, she skids across a sheet of rusted metal and swings her hammer. The iron head slams into the side of the curse’s jaw, the impact ringing up her arm.

Black fluid splatters the rotted cardboard boxes behind her, but the thing refuses to go down. Too many legs, all of them wrong, and three gouge deep into the concrete, anchoring its bulk. Along its neck, a cluster of bulbous eyes twitch, every single one locked on her.

"Get off me," Nobara mutters through clenched teeth as she digs into her pouch and pulls three nails free, lining them up between her fingers. "Gross.”

Off to her right, shadows on the warehouse floor ripple and churn, pooling into a dense, ink-black circle. Out of the dark, one of the dogs lunges, its white fur stained grey with dust as its jaws snap shut around the throat of a third curse sneaking up behind Nobara’s blind spot. The creature lets out a shrill, wet shriek, clawing uselessly at the dog's snout while it thrashes.

"Kugisaki, don't back up!" Megumi shouts, eyes darting toward the high rafters where three more shapes are clicking their teeth, waiting for an opening. "The space behind you is a blind spot! Move toward the loading bay!"

"I’m moving!" Nobara shouts back, driving a nail straight into the center of the curse’s chest.

At the same time, Megumi summons Nue, grabbing its leg as the shikigami sweeps him up and carries him toward the curse pinned beneath the white dog. Nue lifts him high enough to clear a pile of rusted metal pipes before they dive straight at the struggling creature.

As they descend, he lets go and lands next to the curse. Nue lashes out with its electro-shock wings, sending a jolt through the creature and forcing its flailing limbs to seize up and every muscle to go rigid. With the monster paralyzed and the white dog’s jaws still locked around its throat, Megumi drives his knee into the back of its neck, and the dog tears back, ripping through the creature’s throat.

"That's two," Nobara mumbles, watching as Megumi finishes it off. "Four more of these stupid things to go."

When Yuji finally bursts through the warehouse entrance, Nobara’s getting slammed into a stack of wooden crates. The impact sends splinters scattering across the warehouse floor as she crashes through the debris. The sight alone is enough to make him curse under his breath.

”Fushiguro! Kugisaki!" Yuji shouts, launching himself at the nearest target.

His fist crashes into the curse with enough force to rattle the entire warehouse, the shock echoing through the steel framework and sending loose debris skittering across the floor.

The creature lifts clean off the ground when Yuji’s fist slams into its torso, its body folding around the impact. For a split second, the curse seems to hover in the air, before momentum carries it back across the warehouse. It smashes into a tall shelving unit, bending the metal supports and bringing the whole structure down. Metal screeches against metal as shelves twist and tear free, boxes and debris spilling everywhere, and the curse vanishes beneath the wreckage.

Nobara’s been waiting for this moment since the fight started. “About fucking time,” she snaps, her irritation sharp and obvious.

Yuji winces at the greeting, fully aware of how much trouble his late arrival has caused. “Sorry,” he manages, sincerely apologetic despite the chaos raging around them.

“Later,” Nobara fires back, gaze locked ahead. Under the heap of collapsed shelving and metal, something alive is forcing bent supports aside. The curse, half-buried and furious, claws its way back into the fight. “Much later.”

High above, where the roof sags under the weight of years of rain and rust, a sharp metallic clang slices through the chaos below. Not the sticky, wet clicking of a curse this time—just Sukuna, landing on the battered iron catwalk.

Perched on the rusted railing of a maintenance platform ten meters above the floor, Sukuna lets one leg dangle lazily over the edge, folding his arms across his chest. The instant Yuji burst into the building, he'd vaulted up there to observe the inevitable disaster without having to wade through the filth below, which he has no intention of touching. From there, he can see everything.

Of course, seeing everything means being forced to watch every mistake. A low, grating scoff scrapes down from the platform, cutting through the damp air.

"Pathetic." The word rumbles out of Sukuna, thickening the warehouse air until it feels twice as heavy as before.

Down below, the curse launches itself from a vertical support beam, aiming straight for Yuji’s head. He throws a heavy right punch, cursed energy flaring a heartbeat after the impact. The blow lands square in the creature’s torso, and the delayed surge of power tears through flesh, hurling it back into a stack of rotted shipping crates.

Sukuna lets out a loud, deeply irritated click of his tongue.

“Tck. Too slow, idiot,” he mocks, his voice bouncing off the corrugated tin walls with clear contempt. "Your timing is a joke. If that thing had any sense, it would have taken your hand off before your energy even left your knuckles."

Yuji drags the back of his sleeve across his forehead, frustration darkening his face as he moves to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with Megumi. "Shut up! I hit it, didn't I?"

Not even bothering to lean forward, Sukuna lets his gaze crawl down the line of students with a look of bored, unfiltered disgust. "You're wasting output on a target that should have been dismantled with a single movement."

Off to their left, a pale and twitching form skitters out from behind the forklift, making a beeline for Nobara’s blind spot. Megumi snaps a command to Nue, trying to yank her out of danger, but he’s a second too slow.

"Kugisaki, drop!" Megumi barks.

Nobara doesn't drop, but pivots sharply on her heel, flinging a nail at the curse and chasing it with a swing of her hammer. The strike misses by an inch, and the curse's pale, hairless torso swings around, catching the sleeve of her uniform in its long fingers and tearing the fabric off.

A sharp, mocking sneer drifts down from the catwalk, slicing through the noise below.

"Look at you," Sukuna taunts as he watches her stumble backward into the dust. "Wasting your stance on a swing you couldn't guarantee. You're letting your irritation dictate your movements, girl."

"Go fuck yourself,” Nobara mutters under her breath, swinging at the curse again with a force that’s all frustration. Then, without looking up at him, she calls out, “Why don’t you come down here and help us instead of sitting there?”

That question grates on him, scraping at the same flaw he finds in every student. They always expect help to be part of the lesson, as if warnings and corrections are owed before a mistake can bite. Survival, to them, is something a teacher should hand out, not something they have to earn. Sukuna’s never understood that kind of weakness. For him, a lesson ends the moment the outcome is obvious. If they survive, the method worked. If they die, it still worked, because it proved they never belonged here in the first place.

The only real failure is being so useless that he has to step in personally and clean up a mess they should have handled themselves. Getting saved isn’t a win. It’s proof they failed before the fight was even over.

“Help?” A short, raspy chuckle rattles out of Sukuna, vibrating through the iron catwalk and echoing above their heads. “If Grade 2s are enough to make you ask for help, then dying here would be the first useful thing you’ve done today.”

Her jaw clenches until it aches, but she refuses to answer. Every bit of focus she has gets poured into the curse looming in front of her, as if ignoring Sukuna might make him disappear.

The fight continues, and so does Sukuna's commentary as he watches everything with growing annoyance. He tracks every little thing they do, every wasted flicker of cursed energy, every stumble or hesitation that slips through their defenses. The longer it drags on, the more mistakes he notices accumulating throughout the fight. It’s not even that the students are weak—weakness can be fixed. What gets under his skin is how they keep falling into the same mistakes, again and again, despite having plenty of chances to learn.

Yuji hurls another curse backward with a punch enhanced with cursed energy, sending it crashing through the twisted remains of a shelving unit. Metal shrieks and buckles under the impact, the creature tumbling through the wreckage before scrambling back up.

The attack does what it's supposed to do—the curse loses ground, and the students get a little more breathing room. To anyone else, it would look like a pretty solid exchange. But Sukuna scoffs, unimpressed.

"There you go again."

His voice carries easily across the warehouse, making Yuji's shoulders tense the moment he hears it. The brief distraction is all the curse needs to claw its way back up before Yuji can finish the job.

Sukuna’s grin stretches wider, watching the scene play out exactly as he knew it would. There’s a flicker of amusement in his eyes, like Yuji’s just proven a point for him without realizing it.

The curse doesn’t waste a second, snapping forward, claws slicing through the dusty air as it lunges back into the fight. Yuji barely manages to react in time, raising his arms to block the blow head-on. The impact slams into him, shoving him backward across the concrete, shoes screeching against the floor as he fights to stay upright.

"One more second and it would've been dead,” he says, sounding almost pleased by the demonstration, and gestures lazily toward the curse, almost like this is nothing more than a mildly interesting show put on for his entertainment rather than a situation that could actually hurt someone. "Most people struggle to create openings. It's genuinely impressive how often you struggle to keep them."

Before Yuji can even catch his breath, the curse attacks again with its claws flashing toward his face. He ducks, slipping to the side just in time, and it misses him by inches. He counters, driving a punch straight into the creature’s torso, cursed energy crackling at his knuckles. The blow sends it reeling back, limbs flailing as it scrambles to stay upright.

Sukuna clicks his tongue sharply, the sound unmistakable even amid the chaos. His gaze stays locked on Yuji as the curse staggers back, battered but still breathing. From Sukuna's perspective, the opening had been right there, clear as day, just waiting to be taken. And somehow Yuji let it slip through his fingers again.

“Instead of finishing it, you keep fumbling it."

Yuji grinds his teeth until his jaw throbs. The criticism lands at the worst possible moment, when his muscles are already burning and his patience is frayed by the pressure of the fight. He knows he should have finished it and that he missed the opportunity. Hearing Sukuna point it out just twists the knife deeper.

"Because you distracted me!"

Every word comes out edged with irritation as he shoots a glare up at the catwalk. Between dodging attacks, coordinating with Megumi and Nobara, and trying not to get overwhelmed by multiple opponents at once, the last thing he needs is Sukuna’s running commentary.

Mocking laughter spills from Sukuna, filling the space with nothing but contempt. There’s not a shred of sympathy in his voice when he finally rasps, “That's your excuse? Pathetic.”

Yuji’s face darkens, the insult hitting a nerve Sukuna knows all too well. Watching the reaction, Sukuna’s satisfaction is unmistakable as he drinks it in, eyes glinting with mean delight.

"If me talking is enough to distract you, then you were already screwing up."

To Sukuna, distractions are meaningless. If a few words are enough to break your focus, then you never had any to begin with.

"Easy for you to say!" Yuji wipes dust from his face with the back of his hand, keeping his eyes on the curse circling in front of him. "You're not the one down here fighting!"

Sukuna throws his head back and lets out another bark of laughter. The answer only confirms exactly what he already thought. It’s so predictably reckless, stubborn, and so painfully straightforward it’s almost funny. That’s exactly the foolish confidence he has come to expect from him, and watching it play out never gets old.

Meanwhile, Megumi flicks his attention toward Nue, sending the shikigami diving at one of the last curses. The sudden swoop carves out a narrow opening, herding the creature right into the black dog that’s blocking the path. The white dog immediately runs from its hiding place on the side and instinctively gives chase, driving it toward Nobara. For a second, everything works exactly the way Megumi intended, giving them some breathing room instead of letting the curses overwhelm them.

Trying to keep track of every shikigami at once, Megumi barely catches the flicker of movement at the edge of his vision. He twists away just in time, but claws still rake across his shoulder. The cut isn't deep, but the fact that it lands at all is enough to make Sukuna’s disapproval practically radiate from above as he watches with visible disgust.

“Remarkable. You've managed to turn your own technique into a distraction,” he calls down.

Megumi doesn't even bother answering. By now, he's learned that responding to Sukuna only encourages more of his commentary. Though staying quiet doesn’t help much either.

"Maybe summon a few more. I'm sure that'll fix everything," Sukuna adds dryly.

The comment gets an involuntary snort out of Nobara, even though she's still busy dealing with another curse a few meters away. The sound barely leaves her lips before the curse lunges, claws snagging the edge of her jacket and nearly yanking her off balance. She jerks free at the last second, but Sukuna’s eyes still narrow in annoyance.

"Case in point," he remarks.

Nobara bounces back fast, slams two nails into its torso, and uses resonance. The curse lets out a sharp shriek as cursed energy rips through its body. Normally, that would count as a textbook recovery: she avoided serious injuries, landed a clean counter, and got the fight tipping back in her favor. Sukuna, of course, couldn't be less impressed.

“All of you keep celebrating successful recoveries," he says, his gaze drifting lazily between all three students as they continue fighting below. "The impressive part would've been not screwing up in the first place."

That earns nearly identical flat, irritated looks from Yuji, Megumi, and Nobara. All three of them are completely united in their opinion of him right now, which only makes Sukuna’s annoyance deepen.

After that, the fight drags on for almost another fifteen minutes, with the opponents refusing to drop, stubborn to the last. The students wear them down through a nonstop cycle of pressure, mistakes, quick adjustments, and increasingly frustrated teamwork.

Yuji keeps throwing himself at every problem the instant brute force looks like the answer when a smarter approach would have saved time and energy. Megumi still tries to do everything at once, splitting his attention across the entire warehouse while coordinating his shikigami and keeping track of enemy movements until exhaustion starts messing with his focus. Nobara keeps letting frustration and impatience affect her decisions, leaving openings that a sharper opponent could take advantage of, but she still manages to pick up the slack whenever she can while making sure everyone knows exactly how much she despises this mission.

Meanwhile, Sukuna never shuts up, criticizing every missed opening, dismissing every successful exchange as nothing more than the bare minimum expected of them, and calling out every mistake with enough contempt to make the curses seem almost friendly by comparison. By the time the sixth curse finally drops, the students are left panting, covered in dust, sweat, and minor injuries, while Sukuna somehow manages to look even more irritated than when the mission started.

He jumps down from the catwalk without any sense of urgency, landing lightly on the warehouse floor despite the height. The mission, as far as he’s concerned, ended the instant the last curse died. The students survived, the objective was met, and there’s nothing left worth talking about. With that, he turns for the exit, already halfway gone in his mind, the warehouse and everything in it fading into the background.

Unfortunately, Yuji opened his mouth again.

"You can't keep doing this."

Sukuna keeps walking without so much as slowing down. His footsteps ring out across the battered concrete, each one echoing through the wreckage as he threads his way past splintered beams and shattered glass.

"You threw them into a building without warning them!"

Still nothing. Sukuna doesn’t so much as flick an eyelash in Yuji’s direction, not a single sign he’s heard a word, though everyone present knows he has.

"You keep throwing people into dangerous situations and acting like it doesn't matter."

Finally, Sukuna turns, fixing Yuji with a stare that gives nothing away. Across the ruined floor, Yuji stands his ground, stubbornly clinging to the idea that if he just argues hard enough, if he can find the right words, maybe Sukuna will start to care about the same things he does. It’s almost painful to watch how he refuses to see what’s right in front of him.

The persistence might've been admirable if it wasn't so damn infuriating.

"They could've gotten seriously hurt!”

“And?” Sukuna asks flatly.

The utter indifference of it makes Yuji’s jaw tighten. “And you’re supposed to be teaching us! You don't get to treat people like they're expendable!”

Up to this point, Sukuna’s put up with the endless complaints, but now, as Yuji circles back to the same tired arguments yet again, that irritation in him calcifies into something colder. There is a growing sense of disbelief beneath it all, a real, honest confusion at why the kid keeps dragging out a conversation that should have died ages ago.

Sukuna doesn’t break eye contact as he starts forward, each step slow, but steadily erasing the space between them. With every pace, the warehouse grows quieter, the faint clatter of debris fading until all that’s left is the tension hanging in the air. Yuji stands his ground, oblivious to the warning implicit in Sukuna’s approach. That, more than anything else, is predictable. The brat has always possessed an extraordinary talent for failing to recognize danger until it’s right in front of him with its hand already around his throat.

"What exactly are you trying to accomplish here?"

The question isn’t sarcastic or mocking. If anything, it sounds genuinely puzzled. Sukuna’s face doesn’t change as he studies Yuji, like he’s staring at a puzzle that refuses to make sense no matter how many times he turns it over.

Yuji blinks in confusion. "What?"

“I’m asking why you're still speaking," he says, taking another step forward, and the distance between them shrinks further. "You have repeated the same complaint for nearly ten minutes. The curses are dead, the mission is over, and yet somehow you’re still trying to start an argument."

“Because what you did was reckless,” Yuji answers with a frown.

At that, Sukuna's patience runs out.

"Oh, for fuck's sake."

The words rumble out as a low, irritated growl. Before Yuji can even blink, Sukuna’s hand shoots out, bunching the front of his uniform in a fist and yanking him forward so hard his toes barely scrape the ground.

"Listen carefully."

Sukuna’s voice stays calm, but it’s the kind of calm that comes right before a storm breaks. Crimson eyes lock onto Yuji’s face, unblinking, stripped of any sympathy. There is no anger in them now, no amusement, no irritation. Somehow that blank, chilling absence feels worse than any rage could.

"If your friends died in there, I wouldn't lose a second of sleep."

Yuji’s jaw snaps tight, hands curling into fists at his sides, knuckles going pale beneath the grime and sweat. For a moment, it looks like he might spit out another protest and try to argue again, but this time nothing comes.

"If you died in there, I wouldn't lose a second of sleep either."

A flicker of hurt or maybe anger flicks across Yuji’s face before he forces it away. Behind him, Nobara goes rigid, her spine straightening with tension, while Megumi drops his gaze, already knowing better than to get involved.

Sukuna's grip tightens, wrinkling the fabric beneath his fingers. Hairline cracks spiderweb through the concrete beneath his feet as cursed energy unconsciously leaks into the floor. His expression remains cold and utterly unmoved.

"I don’t care."

The words land with harsh, undeniable certainty. Sukuna yanks him closer as he says it, making sure Yuji can’t miss a single syllable. There’s no threat in his tone, no effort to intimidate, not even a flicker of guilt—just the plain, unvarnished truth as he sees it.

"I don’t care about your feelings. I don’t care about your opinions. I don’t care about your friends."

For once, Yuji’s mouth refuses to cooperate. The words he wants to spit back at Sukuna get stuck somewhere between his chest and his throat.

"And if you keep trying to explain morality to me, I'm going to throw you through another wall just so I don't have to listen anymore."

The threat hangs in the air between them. For a brief moment, neither of them moves. Yuji remains frozen in Sukuna's grip while the others watch from the side, eyes wide and hands shoved deep into their pockets, smart enough to keep their distance.

Then Sukuna decides he's finished talking. With a single motion, he hurls the boy. Yuji flies across the loading bay, crashing into a solid concrete support column with a heavy, dull thud. The impact rattles the dust loose from the ceiling above him, knocking the breath completely out of his lungs. He slides down the rough surface, coughing as his heels dig into the dirt and his fists clench while he scrambles to find his balance again.

From the base of the column, Yuji shoots him a glare, teeth bared and chest heaving as he fights the urge to push himself back up and throw a punch. The words he wants to spit out—another desperate argument about how wrong this all is—die before they reach his tongue. Sukuna’s presence presses down on him, pinning him in place just as much as the concrete at his back.

Sukuna lingers, eyes fixed on Yuji, as if daring him to try again. When Yuji stays silent, jaw clenched in a stubborn line of fury, Sukuna lets out a low, dismissive grunt and turns his back. He steps out through the rusty iron shutters and back beneath the curtain's manufactured night, utterly unbothered. The three students are left behind in the hollow quiet of the warehouse, nursing bruises and resentment in equal measure.

The drive back passes in blessed silence that feels unnatural after the chaos in the warehouse. Yuji, for once, has exhausted himself complaining. Megumi stares out the window, resting his temple against the glass as he watches the scenery blur past, while Nobara scrolls through her phone aggressively, still mentally insulting Sukuna between every swipe of her thumb.

Sukuna, however, pays none of them any attention. Their presence fades into irrelevance the moment the mission ends, their thoughts and grievances dismissed as easily as the task itself. By the time the car rolls to a stop within the school grounds, they are no longer his concern in any meaningful sense. The students gather their things and head toward the dormitories, their voices gradually fading into the distance as they disperse.

He goes in the opposite direction. His residence lies farther from the main buildings than most of the faculty housing, tucked away in a quieter corner of the campus where the usual bustle of students—and Gojo—rarely intrudes.

He changes out of his uniform without much thought, trading it for looser, more comfortable clothes suited to the remainder of the afternoon. For a while, he allows himself to do absolutely nothing, settling into the quiet of his space without distraction. The silence suits him.

Eventually, somewhere between one idle thought and the next, he decides he's hungry.  That hunger isn’t one that can be ignored or postponed, and it’s very, very specific. The memory of grilled skewers from a particular restaurant in the city comes to mind with irritating clarity—the taste, the texture, the precise way they had been prepared. 

Without hesitation, Sukuna reaches for his phone. The line barely has time to ring once before it is answered, a testament to the efficiency he has come to rely on.

"Daichi speaking."

"Busy?" he asks as if that mattered to him.

On the other end, Daichi’s gaze shifts briefly toward the report spread open across his desk. For the smallest fraction of a second, he hesitates, because he is, in fact, in the middle of something important. Still, he closes the folder without complaint, pushing it aside as he straightens in his chair.

"No, Sukuna.”

"Good. Drive me to that restaurant with the grilled skewers," Sukuna simply says, offering no further clarification, fully expecting Daichi to understand exactly which place he means without needing it spelled out.

There is a brief pause before Daichi responds, "The one you liked?"

"If I hadn't liked it, I wouldn't be calling," Sukuna replies, his voice carrying a faint edge of impatience, as the question itself was unnecessary.

"I'll be there in ten minutes."

The line disconnects immediately after, leaving no room for further conversation.

Exactly ten minutes later, a sleek black sedan pulls up in front of Sukuna’s residence, with its engine idling quietly as it comes to a stop. As the sorcerer slides into the backseat, Daichi doesn’t ask why he hadn’t simply asked Ijichi to stop by the restaurant earlier, when they had already been in the city following the mission. Experience has taught him that Sukuna doesn’t provide explanations unless he feels inclined to, and today is clearly not one of those times. Sukuna, for his part, offers none.

An hour later, Sukuna makes his way back across campus, but the sweltering heat of the late afternoon does nothing to slow his stride. In his left hand, he carries a takeout bag with containers of grilled skewers, while the faint scent of charred pork fat, scorched green onions, and sweet tare sauce lingers in the air around him. His right hand is wrapped around a chilled can of an energy drink, condensation forming along its surface.

Crossing the grounds toward the main building, he barely gets halfway before a voice slices through the air—airy, gratingly cheerful, and intrusive enough to make his jaw tighten.

“Heading to the office again?”

Sukuna glances sideways, his brows drawing together as his crimson eyes narrow slightly at the sight of Satoru rounding the corner of the low stone wall bordering the courtyard, a thick, messy stack of folders tucked beneath one arm. The sight of Gojo actually carrying paperwork is rare enough to make Sukuna falter for half a step. Somehow, with the two of them, the universe always finds a way to dump administrative hell on someone with considerably less authority to suffer through it.

“And?” Sukuna replies flatly.

Not bothering to slow, he steps over a crack in the pavement that undoubtedly split open from his own residue after a mission, but he couldn’t care less. Even though he’s still surprised, his posture stays loose and unbothered, shoulders squared beneath the drape of his clothes.

“Nothing,” Satoru says, a breezy, bright grin plastering itself across his face. “Just noticed.”

"Congratulations. Your eyesight still works."

A short chuckle escapes Gojo, and without so much as asking or an invitation, he easily falls into step beside Sukuna’s massive frame, matching his long strides effortlessly. Hands buried deep in his pockets, he lets the stack of folders shift precariously under his elbow, loose sheets fluttering as they move.

They continue walking side by side, the hush of the afternoon stretching out around them. Gojo’s gaze drifts, lingering on Sukuna’s hands and the paper bag swinging from his grip. The corners of his mouth twitch, that grin spreading wider as he takes in the sight, amusement flickering in his eyes.

"I just didn't know you liked paperwork so much," Satoru teases, flicking a glance toward the entrance of the main building ahead.

"I don't," Sukuna answers dismissively, one of his black nails tapping slowly against his energy drink can.

"Could've fooled me," Satoru shoots back, clearly entertained by the sheer absurdity of the sight.

Ryomen Sukuna, a thousand-year-old sorcerer who painted the Heian era red, has somehow developed the habit of making regular trips to that one particular office. Today, he's even carrying dinner.

A rough snort shakes through the King of Curses, shoulders shaking with the sound. For Satoru, it’s just another excuse to poke at him, to see if he can wring a reaction out of a calamity and see whether the pattern means anything at all. Modern sorcerers always seem convinced there's meaning hidden behind every decision he makes, as if every step he takes must point toward some grand plan. Truth is, he does whatever he wants, whenever he wants, and the opinions of everyone around him have never even registered.

“You know, you spend an unhealthy amount of time thinking about me,” Sukuna rumbles, his eyes lazily sliding sideways to catch Gojo’s profile.

"Can you blame me?" Satoru responds. He stops walking for half a second, his grin sharpening as he tilts his head slightly toward Ryomen, his posture leaning into the space between them with almost dramatic flair. "You're exactly my type."

Sukuna rolls his eyes, exasperation edged with a kind of weary familiarity. He handles Gojo with the same slow, heavy tolerance he reserves for every modern annoyance, utterly unmoved by the implications.

"That explains a lot, actually," he replies smoothly, his voice dropping to a dry, deadpan register.

"See? This is why we work," Satoru adds, popping his tongue against his teeth with a loud, clicking sound. He starts walking again, his chin lifted, clearly pleased with himself, as if Sukuna's total lack of an argument has just proven him right.

That earns Satoru another flat, unimpressed glare from those crimson eyes, but Sukuna doesn’t waste a single breath on a reply. Thankfully, Gojo lets it drop, turning his attention back to the path ahead while the campus hums quietly around them, the two of them still moving in step.

Their footsteps echo softly over the stone path, weaving between the buildings. Up ahead, a group of assistant managers and a pair of junior auxiliary staff cross the courtyard, arms full of clipboards and plastic crates full of equipment. They’re tangled in a low, muttered argument about vehicle allocations, at least until the sound of approaching footsteps cuts through.

The chatter dies instantly the moment the two men approach. No one says a word or even looks up; the staff just press themselves against the hedges, clearing the center path long before Sukuna and Satoru get close. Sukuna doesn’t spare them a glance as he passes through the gap, treating their panicked retreat like nothing more than a shift in the air—utterly beneath his notice. He doesn’t look at Gojo either as they reach the main building’s threshold.

Sukuna adjusts his grip on the bag, turning his back to the white-haired sorcerer and stepping into the main corridor toward your office, pace never faltering.

“Have fun with your paperwork!” Satoru chirps behind him.

Sukuna stops, looking over his shoulder. “I'd tell you to find a better use for those eyes of yours,” Sukuna rumbles, “but I doubt you'd listen.”

Gojo lets out a loud, genuine laugh that echoes off the empty corridor. “You know me so well.”

A scoff rumbles out of Sukuna, his hand tightening around the cold can before he flicks the tab as he nears your door. "I wish I didn’t, believe me."

—

If there’s one thing Yuji and Sukuna share aside from the pink hair, it’s their complete disregard for knocking on your office door. True to form, the doors slide open without warning, and Yuji steps inside with his backpack slung carelessly from one shoulder, hair still damp from a shower and sticking up in wild, uneven tufts.

He probably doesn’t realize you notice the careful way he shifts his weight as the door clicks shut, or how a faint bruise disappears beneath his collar, or the fresh scrape stretched across one knuckle when he lifts a hand in greeting. That usual bright, warm spark is still there, but today it’s dulled by exhaustion, dragging at his steps as he crosses the room.

The backpack thuds to the floor beside the chair he’s claimed as his own three times a week. With a drawn-out, dramatic groan, he collapses into the seat across from you, letting his forehead fall flat against the smooth stack of paperwork on your desk.

“I am dead,” he mumbles into the grain of the desk, his voice muffled by the sleeves of his hoodie. “My spine’s completely shot. Pretty sure it’s still lying somewhere in that warehouse by the docks.”

“I take it the fieldwork didn’t go well,” you say softly.

Blinking through the spiky fringe of his hair, Yuji lifts his head. That wide, earnest grin you’ve come to expect cracks through the fatigue, startling even him for a second before relief settles in, his shoulders sinking even lower as he leans back into the chair.

Letting out a short, rough bark of laughter, he reaches out automatically toward the bottom shelf of your side cabinet, yanking a stack of blank scrap paper to himself. He knows exactly where you keep it, moving with a comfortable familiarity that’s settled into his muscles over the last weeks of these quiet afternoons.

“He kept clicking his tongue, like, a million times, called us all pathetic, and then literally just chucked me into a concrete wall. And it’s not even like I did anything! I just told him, hey, maybe don’t launch my friends into a freaking curse nest without warning. Seriously, what’s his problem?”

You watch him for another moment, waiting to see if he’ll say more, but the answer’s already written across his face. If Yuji wanted to talk about the mission, he’d be spilling every detail by now. Subtlety has never been his strong suit, but he’s always known how to decide where to stash whatever’s bothering him, and today, he pours it all into the empty space on the worksheet in front of him.

You let him have that choice, reaching for your own stack of papers instead. “Tea?”

“Yeah, please,” Yuji mutters. “My throat feels like I ate half the drywall from that stupid warehouse.”

Reaching past you, his hand drifts toward the small shelf behind your chair where the spare mugs wait in a neat row. He picks out the heavy, oversized ceramic one with the faded blue glaze he always chooses and sets it on the edge of the desk. His thumb moves in slow, absent circles over the rough surface while his gaze drops to the paper.

For Yuji, your office is a sanctuary in the simplest, most literal way: his uncle isn’t here. No looming shadow, no threat of a sudden blow hanging in the air—just quiet, the soft rustle of textbook pages, and the gentle hush that settles over everything. For you, though, the relief is a different animal, filtered through your technique. The air here doesn’t carry that suffocating weight Sukuna drags with him everywhere, none of that oily, ancient pressure that crawls under your skin and makes your teeth ache before he’s even near the door. Here, between the neat stacks of folders and the low, steady hum of the kettle as it starts to simmer, everything feels almost shockingly normal.

Leaning in to tug his battered math textbook from beneath his arm, your palm brushes his skin for just a second. Even so, your senses catch the faintest trace of his residue. It’s nothing like Sukuna’s—nowhere close, really—not that you’d expect anything else given the difference in their power.

Still, that brief contact is all your technique needs to map out the tiny fractures left behind by his mission, each one traced beneath your fingertips. Where Sukuna’s jagged residue grinds in endless, shifting layers, Yuji’s feels almost harmless—small, blunt, and so fleeting it’ll smooth itself out after a single night’s sleep. Even so, it’s proof enough he came straight from the bathhouse to your office, not even letting his muscles a chance to stop aching before showing up.

“All right,” you say, drawing your hand back and pressing the open textbook flat between you both, the pages crinkling softly under your palm. “We left off on polynomials.”

“Man,” he groans, dragging his fingers down his face until his lower eyelids tug down. He catches your eye, his mouth twisting into a weary, lopsided smile that’s completely free of any embarrassment. “Honestly, algebra is so much worse than fighting. With curses, you just hit them until they stop moving. But with this? If you mess up even one tiny negative sign, the whole page just turns into garbage. How is that fair?”

“Your intuition for the answers is sharp, Yuji,” you remind him, tapping the tip of your pencil against the desk to pull his attention back to the worksheet. “But your mind always leaps for the finish line before you’ve even set up the track.”

Fingers raking through the hair at the nape of his neck, he lets his face settle into that same genuine, sheepish look you remember from your first meeting—open, a little uncertain, but honest all the way through.

Sliding the textbook closer until it nudges his knuckles, you flip to a fresh page of untouched quadratic equations. “We’re not rushing. Take a look at the first one. What do we know about it before we even start changing the signs?"

Yuji blinks at the numbers, his thumb absently clicking the eraser of his pencil against his knuckle. “Uh. It’s got a squared variable? So... it's a curve?"

"Right. It's a parabola," you nod, leaning in just a little closer, the edge of your sleeve brushing the desk. “And if it's a parabola, what's the first step to finding the vertex?"

Yuji’s brow furrows, and he glances sideways, as if the answer might be hiding somewhere off the page. “We... move the constant?” He blurts it out before you’ve even finished the question, his mind racing ahead, hunting for shortcuts. His hand darts to scribble a number in the margin.

You lay your hand gently over the top of his page, halting the pencil before it can do any damage. “Why did you choose that step? Don't jump. Look at the brackets. What's inside them?”

He stops, staring at the line. His jaw clenches, and he pulls his lower lip between his teeth, struggling to suppress the old, impulsive reflex to act first, think later.

“Yuji,” you say, voice soft but insistent, before he writes anything.

His pencil hovers a millimeter above the paper. “I didn’t do anything yet.”

“I know.”

A sigh slips out, heavy with resignation. “Then how am I already in trouble?”

“You aren’t in trouble. I’m reminding you to write the steps down.”

His gaze drops to the worksheet, lingering for a moment before flicking back up, his brows drawn together in that careful, almost pleading way, like he’s measuring out a rule that’s tripped him up more times than he’d ever want to admit. “What if I know the answer?”

“Then writing the steps should be easy,” you reply, fingers curling around your mug. “The real issue isn't finding the answer. It’s that sometimes you know it, but not how you got there, and then the next question changes one detail and suddenly your method fails.”

The eraser end of his pencil digs into the worksheet, his expression so earnest it almost distracts from the way his mouth twitches, caught between protest and stubborn hope. “But sometimes my method works.”

“Sometimes guessing works too.”

“It’s not guessing,” he says, offended enough to sit up a little straighter. “You said so yourself. It’s more like… my brain gets there before I can explain it.”

“And that’s exactly what we are trying to fix.”

For a moment, Yuji just sits there, weighing your words, then collapses over the worksheet with a sigh so theatrical it could’ve won him a medal if you hadn’t already seen him walk away from things far nastier than polynomials. He writes the first line neatly, pauses, frowns, and then hesitates, frowns, and skips straight to a version of the expression that seems to have materialized out of thin air.

Whatever happened in the invisible space between those two lines, you're left to imagine. Letting him finish, you reach across the desk and tap the pencil gently against the offending step.

His eyes dart to where your pencil lands, and even before you say a word, realization crashes over him, shoulders sinking in quiet defeat.

“I skipped something,” he mutters. When you confirm, he glares at the page, as if sheer force of will or maybe embarrassment could make the missing work appear right in front of him. “I moved the number over.”

A faint smile tugs at your mouth. “You did.”

He rolls his eyes, making a show of it, but his hand still hovers uncertainly over the next step. “And then I divided.”

“Right.”

He ticks the steps off on his fingers, brow furrowed in concentration, as if the gestures themselves might coax the logic into place.

You lean in a little, keeping your tone gentle but pointed. “What happened to the sign?”

Yuji freezes, mid-gesture, fingers still half-raised, and his eyes dart from the equation to the answer and back again. For a heartbeat, you see a flicker of understanding, but then uncertainty wins out. He chews at the inside of his cheek, glancing at you, searching for a lifeline, before poking at the page with the pencil. “The sign came with it.”

You let out a slow breath through your nose, fighting the urge to give the answer away. “Did it?”

His expression shifts, a sheepish smile flashing before he tries to cover it with bravado. “...Maybe?”

You arch an eyebrow. “Yuji.”

A quiet laugh slips out of him, small but real, and the tension he carried into the room finally starts to unravel, if only a little. Turning the worksheet just enough to write beside his work without taking the page from him, you mark the missing operation in the margin, drawing a neat arrow back to the original equation. Correcting the answer immediately would be quicker, but with Yuji, speed is the enemy, so you set the pencil down and slide the worksheet back into his space.

“Start again from this line,” you say, pointing with the pencil for emphasis. “Slowly. Say each operation before you write it.”

Yuji draws back as if you'd asked him to perform on stage, giving the paper a wounded look.

“Out loud?” His voice is incredulous, but there’s the faintest trace of a smile tugging at his mouth, like he can’t decide if this is torture or a joke.

Yes.” You meet his gaze, your tone both reassuring and unwavering.

He hesitates, shifting in his seat, then leans forward again with exaggerated reluctance. “What if I sound stupid?”

You suppress a chuckle, shaking your head. “You won’t.”

He squints, playing up the drama. “But what if I do?”

“Then I’m the only one here to hear it,” you say, offering him a smile.

That answer seems to reassure him more than you’d expect. Leaning in, he props one elbow on the desk, the other hand gripping the pencil so tightly his knuckles pale. He starts again from the marked line, voice dropping to a near whisper—not out of embarrassment, but because saying each step aloud forces him to slow down and see each piece before moving it. He subtracts from both sides, hesitates when the sign changes, and for a second, you catch the flicker of old habits. This time, though, he catches himself, grimaces, and scribbles in the missing step before you can even lift your hand.

“Good,” you say.

Yuji’s head snaps up, eyes brightening with the speed betraying just how much he craves praise, even if he tries to play it off a second later.

“Really?”

“Yes. Keep going.”

You let him work through the rest without stepping in, and when he finishes, he nudges the worksheet your way with more caution than pride, as if the latter’s still a luxury he can’t quite afford. You scan the final answer, then trace your way back through each step, and for once, every operation is accounted for.

“Well?” he ventures, voice straining not to sound too hopeful.

You take the pencil and circle the final answer, then tap the first line where he restarted.

“That’s much better.”

Relief hits him instantly, impossible to hide. He sinks back in the chair, shoulders sagging as a long breath escapes. “Oh, thank god.”

He grabs one of the snacks from the plate you always set out before tutoring, eating it in two bites while his eyes fix on the next problem. Shuffling a few papers aside to clear more space for him, you stack your own reports in the corner and pull a fresh sheet from the pile.

He studies the equation for a few long seconds, eyes narrowing in concentration. The first line appears with deliberate care, but then his pencil picks up speed, the second line materializing almost out of nowhere, and by the third, he’s landed on an answer that looks neat, confident, and just a little too perfect to trust.

Your eyes flick to the page, then to Yuji, and for a moment, neither of you says a word. Before you can get a single syllable out, he slides the worksheet back toward himself, his gaze glued to his calculations. “I did it again.”

“You did.”

“I felt so sure.” A hand drags over his face, and he lets out a laugh that carries more frustration than amusement. “Why does it keep working in my head?”

Yuji’s brows knit so tightly that his eyes nearly disappear beneath his bangs, the eraser working so violently across the page that the paper crinkles and threatens to tear under the friction.

“...Wait.” His eyes go wide as he retraces his own steps back to line two and checks the signs, fingers flipping the page to the textbook example you worked through last week. He blinks once, twice, and then his spine snaps upright, posture suddenly rigid in the chair.

“Oh. Oh, wow. If I group them like that…” he mutters, trailing off as he quickly scribbles three short, consecutive lines down the center of the sheet. "...I think I get it," Yuji breathes out, his voice dropping into a quiet, sudden realization. Filling in the missing steps, he circles the parabola’s final coordinate pair before glancing up at you.

A broad, infectious grin spreads across his face, eyes narrowing into joyful slits and erasing every trace of exhaustion. He slides the paper across the desk toward you, tapping the circled answer with a triumphant little bounce. The pride on his face is unmistakable this time, and it isn’t just because he nailed the answer, but because he followed every step, refusing to skip a single one, proving to himself that his thinking process actually works.

"Look," he beams, his voice booming just a little in the small room as he shifts restlessly from foot to foot in his chair. "I figured it out!”

A massive spike of pressure slams into you, unmistakable and suffocating, the exact second Sukuna sets foot into the building. It lands in your body like an anchor dropped straight through the school’s foundation, dragging everything down with it. Even the air seeping under your office door turns thick and oily, clinging to your skin and setting your nerves jangling, just like always.

Your lungs cinch up, breath coming shorter and tighter before you even realize it, your body already bracing for the automatic survival routine it’s learned to run whenever he’s near. The freeze hits hard and fast, a raw, unfiltered jolt of memory snapping you straight back to the last time he had you pinned against the shelves, hands trembling for hours after he finally let you go.

A glance at the boy across from you, still blissfully oblivious, forces you to swallow the dry lump crawling up your throat. For Yuji, nothing in the air has changed, but you can feel that old, heavy pressure seeping into every corner of the building.

The wooden door slides open without so much as a knock, and Sukuna steps through the threshold, sleeves shoved up to his forearms, his gaze snapping to you. It’s an immediate, unthinking reflex, the first thing he does whenever he enters this room. Those crimson eyes lock onto yours, heavy and entirely unbothered, stripping away whatever professional composure you were trying to project.

Before your eyes can even adjust to the version of him standing in the doorway, the memory of his true form crashes back into your mind. It isn’t some distant blur, either—it’s sharp and insistent, overlaying itself on top of what you’re actually seeing. The contrast between that monstrous body and the human shape he’s wearing now is so stark it almost makes your stomach twist, a quiet, instinctive unease curling in your gut before you can even process it.

By the time your thoughts manage to catch up and remind you he isn’t standing there like that anymore, your body’s already moved on its own, every muscle tense and ready.

Without thinking, your hand nudges the mug farther across the desk, just enough to keep it out of the way if he decides to lean over your paperwork again. The habit is so ingrained it barely even registers as a choice anymore. By the time you notice, your attention’s already snapped back to him, pretending the adjustment never happened at all.

The human is the restrained one. That single sentence loops in your mind, echoing alongside everything Shoko described so matter-of-factly. Now that you’ve seen it for yourself, pretending it doesn’t exist isn’t even an option.

He catches the way your posture stiffens, fingers pinning your paperwork to the desk, your body shifting to the left to leave a wide, clear path between the doorway and the seating area. His gaze lingers, drinking in every bit of discomfort he’s managed to stir up before he’s even decided whether to be a menace today. The satisfaction is obvious, his mouth curling into the start of a smirk.

His eyes flick to the right, and the smirk dies on the spot. All that heavy, lazy amusement drains away, replaced by a cold, flat line of pure annoyance as his gaze lands squarely on Yuji. He stops dead in the center of the room, paper bag crinkling in his grip, chest rising and falling with an irritated breath as he takes in the sight of the boy slouched in the chair by your desk, cheap grey hoodie, messy pile of scrap paper, and yellow pencil clenched in his hand.

He hadn’t bothered to track the boy’s cursed energy on campus after the drive back from the city, assuming that the nuisance had scurried off to the dorms to lick his wounds. Finding the same brat who’d spent fifteen minutes whining about morality in a dusty warehouse now occupying his preferred lounge, where he'd intended to spend the rest of his afternoon, is enough to sour his mood completely.

“Why are you here?” Sukuna rasps. The question isn’t loud, but it drips with resentment, not a shred of patience left in it, only a flat demand for the universe to justify this inconvenience and explain why the nuisance is still in front of him.

Yuji’s grin falters, the triumphant spark in his eyes shattering in an instant. His back goes rigid as he turns, slow and reluctant, to face his uncle. Whatever comfort had settled into his shoulders over the last hour vanishes, replaced by a tension that pulls his spine taut, fingers clamping around his pencil until his knuckles go white beneath the fresh scrapes. He swallows, jaw locking tight with a stubborn mix of defiance and defensiveness.

“...I’m studying,” Yuji’s voice drops, just a notch lower than before, but he meets Sukuna’s stare head-on, his eyes hard and unyielding.

A sharp, irritated click of Sukuna’s tongue cuts through the room, slicing the air with pure dismissal. His eyes narrow, brow drawing together in contempt as his gaze drags from the open textbook to the scrap paper scattered with your neat, pencil-drawn arrows and margin notes. The very idea of that parasite attempting anything close to cognitive development isn’t just laughable to him—it’s a complete waste of time.

“Why?”

That single syllable drips with so much condescension that Yuji’s jaw tightens, but it leaves both of them unsatisfied. Yuji holds his gaze for a beat, almost as if he’s waiting for the real question, while Sukuna clearly couldn’t care less about whatever explanation the boy might try to muster.

Before either of them can get another word in, your eyes catch on the bag in the sorcerer’s hands. Instinct kicks in, and you reach for the stack of folders perched on the shelf beside your desk, sliding them into the drawer without a second thought. He always puts his food on that same spot, and the last thing you need is grease soaking into your paperwork from whatever takeout he’s dragged into your office this time.

Just as you expected, Sukuna walks past the desk without a word, drops the takeout bag right where you knew he would, and fishes out a plastic container. He sinks onto the half-collapsed couch, sprawling his long legs across the floorboards and taking up an absurd amount of space between your desk and the filing cabinets.

He sets his energy drink on the floor by his boot, then pulls a charred skewer from the container, eating his dinner like he’s the only one here, completely unbothered that you were in the middle of a tutoring session. Still, his crimson eyes stay locked on the back of Yuji’s head, radiating a silent glare that makes the air feel twice as heavy as it did five minutes ago. Only after half the skewer is gone does he finally drop his gaze to the container, attention shifting fully to his food.

Your eyes snag on him, and uninvited memories muscle their way to the surface all over again. The man sprawled across half your office hasn’t changed; that towering body draped over the cushions is just as dangerous as it was yesterday, but your mind refuses to separate the two forms of him at all.

Without really thinking about it, you straighten the pile of worksheets by your elbow and nudge your chair a little closer to the desk, putting just a bit more space between yourself and the path to the couch. Only then do you turn your attention back to Yuji.

Yuji’s gaze darts back to the worksheet, but any hope of focusing is already in shreds with Sukuna looming just two steps away. He scrawls out a variable, hesitates, then drags his pencil across the page to scratch it out, frustration simmering just beneath the surface.

You clear your throat, but the sound barely registers, coming out smaller and weaker than you mean, swallowed up by the heaviness in the room.

“Let’s try a different example, Yuji,” you offer, keeping your tone as gentle as possible while you flip to a more complicated parabola problem near the end of the chapter. Reading the polynomial aloud, you write it at the top of the page, letting the equation do the work of pulling his mind off the couch and back to the numbers.

Yuji stares at the numbers you just wrote, confusion shadowing his face as his mind tries to outrun the process again. “If the leading coefficient is negative... then the curve goes downward, right? So the vertex has to be... it has to be somewhere near the axis, but I don't know how to move the numbers inside the brackets without changing the sign again.”

He stops, throat bobbing as the thread of his thoughts slips away completely. His fingers fidget restlessly on the pencil until a short, dry rasp slices through the silence.

Sukuna doesn’t bother lifting his eyes from his food, his large hand idly turning a wooden skewer between his fingers. Just yesterday, he’d skimmed the notes he found on your desk, and that was all it took for his mind to map out the entire thing behind his eyelids in less than a heartbeat, just from hearing you read it aloud.

“Two and negative sixteen,” he says flatly with certainty that doesn’t even require him to check the page.

Yuji’s pencil freezes mid-stroke, his head whipping around so fast you half expect the eraser to go flying. He glares across the room at the sagging couch, cheeks burning with shock and frustration, mouth hanging open as he stares at his uncle’s profile like he’s just been slapped.

“How did you...” Yuji trails off, his teeth gritted.

Another slow sip from his can, and Sukuna’s crimson eyes finally slide up, meeting his nephew’s glare with a lazy, mean sort of delight.

"I don't get," Sukuna says slowly, "why people need all this just to explain something that obvious. You'd think natural selection would've handled this already. No wonder you’re all so fucking weak."

“It isn’t obvious,” Yuji mutters, clenching his fists on his thighs as the memory of his uncle mocking him from the warehouse catwalk hits him again.

Sukuna’s grin stretches slightly, his gaze holding the boy’s eyes with a chilling, total lack of sympathy.

“To you,” the King of Curses rasps.

It’s impossible not to stare at him, especially when you know, without a doubt, that his answer’s correct. The realization knots itself tight and uncomfortable in your stomach because he hasn’t even bothered to lean up from the couch, hasn’t so much as glanced at the worksheet, but somehow he’s already mapped out the entire problem in his head before Yuji even finished scribbling the first line. It’s unsettling to realize that someone who usually spends his time leveling city blocks and treating human life as an afterthought has a mind that works at a speed just as terrifying as his strength.

Slowly, he brings the wooden skewer back to his mouth, dragging another piece of meat from the stick with his teeth. The sweet, sticky tare sauce catches the light of your desk lamp, glinting on his lower lip, the scent so thick and heavy it drowns out the faint, grassy smell of the green tea cooling between your hands. He chews with deliberate laziness, utterly unmoved by the silent, burning fury radiating off the boy.

“Two and negative sixteen,” Yuji repeats with resentment, rolling his eyes before dropping his gaze back down to the worksheet, tracking the polynomial string you had written out for him. His fingers twitch against the pencil. “You didn't even look at the paper. You're just making things up to mess with me.”

A short, raspy chuckle rumbles out of Sukuna’s chest, the sound low and dry, vibrating through the sagging couch cushions beneath him. He tips his head back against the wall and lets his crimson eyes drag lazily down over his cheekbones, landing on Yuji with pure contempt.

“Mess with you?” Sukuna drawls the words, not hiding how little he cares about the kid’s outrage. The empty wooden skewer clatters into the takeout bag as his hand reaches down, fingers curling around the cold can of energy drink. “Don't flatter yourself. If I wanted to mess with you, you'd be bleeding through the floorboards right now. The numbers are right there. A curve only drops in one specific place, idiot. It doesn't take a genius to see where it bends.”

He takes a slow sip, the tiny click of his tongue against his teeth suddenly sounding impossibly loud in the thick silence.

"Look at you," Sukuna goes on, not even glancing at the boy. "You've been sitting there for five minutes, sweating over a piece of paper like it's about to attack you. It's pathetic." He clicks his tongue. "People spend years getting taught to recognize patterns they should've noticed immediately. Then everyone's shocked when they still can't think. And somehow this idiot is still behind.”

Your gaze drops away from the sofa, landing on the messy sprawl of notes across Yuji’s paper. Every instinct screams at you to stay perfectly still, to blend into the background and hope he forgets you’re even here, while your heart hammers out a frantic, shallow rhythm against your ribs just from the sheer weight of him sitting three meters away. You know your place here: support sorcerer, not referee, and you’re definitely not about to wedge yourself between him and his nephew over some high school worksheet. One wrong word, too much eye contact, and you’ll just hand him another excuse to make things worse. So you keep your posture small, slide your folders closer to your chest, and do your best to disappear.

Eventually, Sukuna’s gaze flicks toward the worksheet still clutched in your hand, his lip curling with open, unfiltered disdain.

“The point should be separating the competent from the useless."

“People aren't useless just because they need to be taught, Sukuna!” Yuji blurts in frustration, his chair scraping loudly against the floor as he pushes off the desk, his pencil nearly snapping in his grip.

His sudden outburst sends a sharp jolt straight to your temples, freezing your fingers against the textbook. He knows exactly what his uncle is capable of, but stubbornness keeps him from backing down, leaving you desperate to reach over and tap his shoulder—anything to get him to drop it and sit back down before things spiral. The weight of Sukuna’s presence shifts in the corner, and you already know that if this turns into a real fight, Yuji’s the one who’ll end up paying for it.

Sukuna doesn’t so much as blink. He tips the can back, draining the last of it with a slow swallow, his throat working lazily, like Yuji’s anger barely registers as background noise.

“Aren’t they? Then why are you still proving my point?"

Letting the files slip from your grip, you force your breath into something steady, desperate not to let Yuji see just how rattled you are by Sukuna’s presence. When you finally manage to speak, your voice comes out flat and quiet, stripped of any of Yuji’s frantic energy. All you want is to shut this down before someone snaps—before Sukuna decides to make an example out of Yuji. Eyes glued to the open textbook, you try to focus on the work, even as your heart hammers so hard it feels like it might crack your ribs.

“It isn't about deciding who's worth teaching,” you say calmly.

Sukuna’s gaze slides back to you, crimson eyes tracing the tense line of your jaw. There’s a flicker of curiosity at the edge of his mouth, amused by your attempt to keep things under control right in front of him.

“That’s exactly the problem,” Sukuna answers smoothly, his deep voice carrying a hint of amusement at you finally gathering the courage to speak up. He sets the empty can down on the floorboards, then leans back. “And you’re trying to fix something that’s already garbage. Look at him.”

He flicks his hand toward Yuji in a careless, dismissive wave, but his eyes stay locked on you.

“He’s sitting here, taking up air, and he still can't trace a basic line without you holding his hand through the process. You’re wasting your time on a brat who’s completely stuck on something an insect could figure out, woman. If he’s too stupid to remember a negative sign, he’s nothing but a total waste of space. I don't know why you even bother with him.”

“Not everybody just knows everything the second they look at it!” Yuji snarls, standing his ground against his uncle’s absolute disregard for him.

“Clearly.”

“He isn’t stupid, Sukuna. He just skips steps,” you add calmly.

Rolling his eyes, he lets out a lazy scoff, "Same difference," before turning his attention back to his food, taking the second container out of the bag.

"Pick up your pencil, Yuji. Next problem." You focus on him completely, tapping your finger against a new polynomial on his worksheet, deliberately not reading it aloud.

For a long, heavy minute, Yuji stays silent, his lower lip caught between his teeth as he forces himself back into the chair. The anger is still hot in his face, but it’s mostly just a habit at this point. After months of enduring every possible variation of 'useless' Sukuna could invent, today's insults barely even register, as none of it surprises him anymore. Watching Sukuna solve the problem instantly just feels inevitable after everything Yuji has seen during training and missions.

But beneath that anger, his face begins to change, with his brow furrowing as confusion takes over and settles in his expression. He doesn't say a word to either of you, just lets his gaze drift sideways, tracking the narrow gap between your desk and the crooked couch.

Months have gone by with Yuji trying to figure out how to exist around his uncle. His baseline for Sukuna is painfully simple: a walking disaster who couldn’t care less about rules, boundaries, or people—Yuji has watched him level a building just because the noise annoyed him. Most days, Yuji ends up on the receiving end of that temper, but just as often, he can’t seem to stop himself from pushing back, unable to turn away even when he knows he should.

Watching the two of you now, though, something feels off. Since Sukuna walked in, Yuji has caught you shifting your folders out of the way every time he passes, always leaving him just enough room. Sukuna, for his part, just takes the space you give him, never pushing for more. It’s strange, almost unsettling even, how mindful you both are of each other’s boundaries.

Glancing back at his uncle, Yuji finds him ignoring both of you, picking up another skewer and settling deeper into the battered couch, perfectly content to do his own thing. Sukuna’s energy is probably acting up, so he only came here because he needs you to weave, or whatever it is you actually do, but what really scrambles Yuji’s brain is that the man is actually waiting. No demands, no tantrums, just killing time with takeout while you finish the math lesson.

Sure, Sukuna’s still being a dick to Yuji, treating him like some annoying bug buzzing in his ear, but he isn’t tearing the room apart. He answered you without that bite he always saves for Yuji, hasn’t barked at you to shut up or threatened you, and he’s keeping himself neatly within the boundaries of that lopsided sofa. If anything, he almost looks comfortable with you here.

And just a minute ago, he even tolerated you correcting him about Yuji. It was barely two sentences, but he didn’t so much as twitch in annoyance. Yuji knows if he’d tried that, Sukuna would have cracked his skull against the floorboards without a second thought.

Looking back down at the problem you pointed to, Yuji swallows hard, drawing his own conclusions. His eyes stay glued to the page, but his mind keeps circling the same thought: Sukuna absolutely hates his guts. He can sit here and act like a halfway normal person around you, just because you’re the specialist he needs, but the second Yuji so much as opens his mouth, Sukuna’s ready to throw him through a wall.

Your pencil taps the page again, and this time Yuji gets the hint right away, dragging the crumpled worksheet back into his space. The office stays incredibly quiet, the only sound the scrape of his eraser as he rubs out a miscalculated step, grey rubber shavings piling up near his thumb.

When Yuji hesitates over a tricky distribution step, you keep silent, just pointing your pencil at the sign he missed inside the parentheses. He glares at the page, jaw set in a stubborn line, forcing his mind to slow down and untangle the formula piece by piece. Subtracting from both sides, he writes a clean variable, working through each step before sliding the finished sheet your way. You scan the rows of calculations, double-checking every sign and distribution line before finally letting out a slow, quiet breath.

“You did a good job today, Yuji,” you say softly, giving him a small, genuine smile.

The praise instantly erases every trace of exhaustion from his face, and a wide, infectious grin splits his features, eyes crinkling into bright, happy slits as he straightens up in his chair. When you close his textbook, letting him know the lesson is over, he drops his pencil into his backpack, yanks it over his shoulder, and his sneakers squeak against the floorboards as he stands, pointedly ignoring the man sprawled on the couch.

With a quick wave, he backs toward the doorway, his voice ringing out just a little too loud. “Thanks! I’ll see you on Thursday!” The wooden door slides open, and he slips out into the hallway, pulling the door shut behind him and leaving you alone completely with Sukuna.

For a few quiet seconds, neither of you says anything. You gather the last of the loose worksheets into a single stack, slipping them back into the folder they came from. Across the room, Sukuna finishes chewing the last bit of meat from his skewer, then lets the empty stick clatter into the plastic container with a careless flick.

"You know... he really does work hard," you murmur, nudging the folder into the far corner of your desk.

Sukuna snorts loudly, not even bothering to look up. "So do ants."

"That's hardly fair,” you say with a frown.

"No," he agrees without hesitation. "It's generous."

Pushing up from the couch, Sukuna moves like he’s about to leave, and for a second, you almost let yourself hope. Instead, his hand lands on the takeout bag perched beside you on the shelf, dragging it over to the desk. You barely glance at it, catching sight of two unopened plastic containers stacked beneath a mess of crumpled napkins. You wonder, not for the first time, if he’s overestimated his appetite again.

One of the containers lands squarely on your paperwork, the plastic lid snapping open under his fingers. He tips it over, and a severed, half-dried tongue slumps out, dropping to your once-neat stacks of reports.

Far larger than any human tongue, its deep violet flesh has dulled after hours in the open air, the cut end darkened and dry. Even so, it hasn’t stiffened, still holding its shape with a sickly, yielding softness. One side is rough, covered in tiny, hooked barbs—row after row of miniature teeth, each one catching the light in a way that makes your skin crawl.

Nausea slams into you sharply, forcing you to swallow hard just to keep it down. Both hands clamp around the edges of your chair, jaw clenched tight as you stare at the thing sprawled in front of you, with every muscle in your face fighting to stay neutral, because you know exactly what he’s waiting for.

A heavy hand settles on the back of your chair, and Sukuna leans in until his chest nearly brushes your shoulder, so close you can feel the heat radiating from him. His eyes stay fixed on your face, vicious amusement flickering in every line of his expression as he waits for you to snap.

“There,” he purrs, eyes drinking in the falter on your face, and you immediately know you failed. "I knew you'd appreciate this one."

“…Sukuna,” you mutter, barely above a whisper, uncertain whether you’re pleading for explanation or mercy.

His head tilts slightly, eyes never leaving your face. “Hmm?”

“Why do you do this?”

“You seemed to like the eye,” he answers, lips pulling into a mean smirk as he leans in a fraction closer, watching for another reaction.

Without a hint of hesitation, he reaches out and pinches the tongue between two fingers, lifting it up for you to see. The tip droops right away, gravity dragging it down so the muscle bends under its own weight, almost obscene in its elasticity.

“Feel this,” he rumbles, holding it in front of your face.

Breath catching in your throat, you spend a mortifying second actually considering whether refusing is even possible, only to decide it absolutely has to be. The real challenge is figuring out how to do it without sounding like you’re outright refusing him. Eyes stay locked on the tongue dangling between his fingers, while every instinct you have urges you to lean farther back in your chair than dignity would ever allow. Not that it would help, with him standing right behind you, close enough that escape isn’t even an option.

"...I..." You clear your throat, buying yourself a few more seconds, shifting in your seat, and glancing sideways, desperate for anything to focus on except the thing dangling before you. "I don't think that's necessary."

"Why not?"

The question comes without challenge or irritation. If anything, it carries the same curiosity he always shows whenever you try to tell him no. His brow rises, genuinely interested in whatever reasoning you might offer, almost inviting you to amuse him.

"I..." Your gaze flickers to his face on the side before dropping right back to the tongue. "I believe you, Sukuna.”

"You believe me,” he parrots, the smirk spreading wider, savoring your discomfort.

“Y—yes." Your voice is barely audible, and you can feel the flush crawling up your neck.

Rotating it between his fingers, he studies the hooked barbs along its surface with obvious interest, then angles it toward you again.

"But you don't know. The texture’s unusual,” he murmurs, leaning closer, his breath hot against the side of your neck, his mouth pulling into a wide, satisfied grin as he watches the color drain completely from your face. “It’s still soft. Go on. Touch it.”

With your stomach twisting, you notice the room feels unbearably hot, the air thick and heavy between the desk and the man looming over your shoulder.

"I'm sure it is." You force out the words, struggling to keep your voice steady, eyes fixed on a spot on the far wall rather than the object in front of you.

"You should confirm it." His tone is almost playful, but his gaze sharpens, watching you intently for the faintest sign of defiance.

Your fingers tighten almost imperceptibly around the edges of your chair. "...I'd really rather not."

Silence stretches between you while those crimson eyes track every tiny reaction you can’t quite hide—the tension wound tight in your shoulders, how you’ve frozen yourself from leaning any farther away, the careful rhythm of your breathing, and the stubborn refusal of your gaze to linger on the thing in his hand for more than a heartbeat at a time.

"You find it revolting." His voice is low and certain, and the way he says it makes it clear it's not a question. One brow arches expectantly, daring you to deny it.

You hesitate for just long enough that answering becomes pointless, throat tightening as you struggle to form the word. Heat prickles at your cheeks, but you still force yourself to answer. "...Yes."

For a moment, Sukuna just looks at you, clearly satisfied with everything your face has already given away. Then he lets out a quiet, disbelieving scoff, shaking his head in exaggerated, mock disappointment.

“I bring you a gift…” he trails off, the corner of his mouth curling upward with wicked amusement. “You wound me, princess.”

Only then does he lower his hand, dropping the tongue back into the plastic container with a soft, heavy slap, then snapping the lid shut again as casually as packing away leftovers.

Sukuna straightens with a quiet grunt, reaching for the hem of his hoodie and tugging it over his head. For one ridiculous moment, your pulse jumps, the memory of four arms flickering through your mind, before you realize he’s just shrugging out of another layer, still in an oversized shirt. The heavy garment lands on the back of the couch without a second glance.

Grabbing the takeout bag with the last of the containers, he heads for the door, leaving the wooden slider hanging wide open behind him. Alone at the desk, you sit with your chest heaving, staring at the container with the purple tongue inside, sprawled across your ruined homework sheets.

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[feyrinnn]

my love mine all mine sukuna x f!reader x gojo

୧ synopsis it's not easy, falling in love with someone who is still getting over someone else. sukuna learned to be patient for you, but as his affection for you grows, so does his hatred for the man who made you so scared of love in the first place.

୧ wc 3.9k

୧ content mdni, angst, smut, some fluff too, hurt/comfort, sukuna pov, falling in love, very anxious reader, jealousy, post reader and gojo breakup, sex on the first night, protected piv sex, overstimulation, making out, biting, a little bit of a breeding kink, crying after sex, and a lot of crying in general, aftercare, moving on, posesssive sukuna

୧ a/n this is sukuna's pov of the story, you can find the other parts in this collection! this can be read as part 3 or as a oneshot too. art by @/riyalise & divider by @/diviniyae

"Who is that?"

Sukuna himself was surprised to hear the words leave his lips, but he couldn't help the curiosity.

He found himself sitting on an uncomfortable stool in someone's house party he somehow got convinced to attend, surrounded by the same boring faces as always – until he noticed a new one.

A new girl, sitting on a sofa far ahead, involved in the party but… not really. You had a tight hold on your phone, and you glanced at the screen every few seconds like you were waiting for a message that never came.

It made Sukuna anxious just watching it.

And right now watching was exactly what he was doing.

It wasn't just the fact your face had made his heart skip an awkward beat inside his chest when you walked past, not even noticing him. Nor was it the fact you seemed to prefer sitting alone rather than engaging with the rest of the party, something he could relate to well enough.

No, there was something else about you too. You just seemed so… sad.

Smiling a pleasant smile whenever anyone approached, nodding your head and making conversation as you were expected to, sure – but that odd veil never seemed to lift from behind your eyes.

Sukuna wondered how none of the other idiots here had noticed.

"My friend" Yuki answered his question with a raised eyebrow, in a tone that said she was shocked Sukuna had even noticed anyone else's presence in the room apart from his own.

He was well aware of other people's assumptions of him, so he didn't bother replying to her taunt. "Is she alright?" Sukuna asked instead, after he watched you check your phone for what had to be the tenth time in a single minute.

Yuki sighed, turning to take a look at you with a solemn expression herself. "She's going through a tough time" was all she said.

Sukuna didn't like the sound of that at all.

So he decided he wanted to change that.

He lifted himself up and walked right past Yuki, picking up a fresh bottle of beer on the table while he was at it. The blonde seemed curious but let him be, turning to rejoin the party as Sukuna strode far away from everyone, and towards you.

"This seat taken?"

His voice took your eyes away from your phone, tilting your head up to blink at him in surprise. Your eyebrows scrunched together, and he watched you quickly scan your surroundings, trying to figure out if there was anyone else he could be speaking to.

"No" you replied, almost like a question, but you moved to the side so he could take the seat next to you on the small sofa.

Sukuna sat down awkwardly, his broad frame taking up most of the seat, but you didn't seem to mind. "Here" he grunted, passing you the fresh bottle while bringing his own to his lips.

You were surprised at the gesture, but had no choice in accepting. Not with the way Sukuna was practically shoving the cold glass into your hands and forcing you to drop your phone onto your lap.

"Is that for me?" you asked, as if it wasn't obvious.

"Who else would it be for?" he asked, instantly regretting how sharp he sounded.

But you didn't scoff, or roll your eyes, or call him an asshole like most people seemed to do. Instead, you laughed – only a small chuckle, but some tension finally seemed to ease from your shoulders.

Naturally, his own shoulders dropped as well.

"Thank you" you muttered, hands closing around the bottle, phone now forgotten to your side.

Sukuna didn't know why you were so attached to that thing, but he seemed to understand it was a good thing you had finally let go of it. "Let me" he said, searching for his keys inside his pocket to remove the bottle cap for you.

It was only a favour, something that had no business feeling this intimate. But Sukuna was far too aware of how his thigh brushed against yours when he leaned in, of how close you allowed him to move into your space even if just for a second.

The sound of air escaping the freshly opened bottle matched how his own finally leaving his lungs, he realised.

"Thank you again" you smiled kindly. And then, to his surprise, it was your turn to lean into him – you extended your hand, clinking your bottles together. "Cheers" you said, completely unaware of how you had surprised him.

Sukuna nodded, reciprocating the gesture. He watched you tilt your head back as you drank, followed the curve of your neck and noted the beautiful angle it made with your shoulders. He hid his crimson gaze behind his own drink, but anyone else around would have noticed – Sukuna was fucking hypnotised.

You finally lowered your hand with a satisfied hum, opening the first real smile he had seen the whole evening. "I needed that" you sighed.

Both your hands closed around the cold glass, phone still forgotten.

"Not having fun?" Sukuna asked, tilting his head to meet your gaze. You were close, very close, but you didn't seem intimidated by him like everyone else.

How intriguing, he thought.

"I am" you replied, looking away – maybe because you were nervous, Sukuna hoped, or maybe because you were lying.

"Are you?" he questioned, keeping his eyes locked on your face. You struggled to hold his gaze, blinking towards him and then away, until you finally sighed and understood you couldn't lie to him that easily.

"It's been a long week" you confessed, looking down at your hands.

Sukuna let that hang in the air for a moment, letting the weight of what you said sit with both of you instead of you alone.

"Yeah?" was all he managed to say. He wasn't good with things like that, but fuck if this pretty girl at the party didn't make him want to try.

You only nodded, looking down at your hands. He saw your eyes blink down, then to your phone by your side, then down again, and finally… to him.

You opened a little smirk, more self pitying than anything – and it was right then that Sukuna decided he wasn't giving up until he saw that real smile again.

"Let's change that" he said.

Three hours later, Sukuna had you crying for a completely different reason than whoever the fuck had gotten you that upset in the first place.

"Kuna, fuck– I can't–" you moaned as your legs only pulled him closer, your hands clawing at his shoulders in desperate need, face all scrunched in a mess of delicious tears that he was enjoying kissing away.

"You can" he groaned against your skin, slamming his hips into yours again, earning a loud whimper that sounded like music to his ears. "Taking it so fucking well for me"

You brought your hands to his face again, chasing his lips desperately. He had one hand rubbing small circles against your clit, determined to get a second orgasm out of you before he had even had one himself.

When he had suggested leaving the party together, Sukuna hadn't necessarily expected this was where the two of you would end up. But hell, he wasn't mad about it.

As it turned out, you looked even more beautiful crying from pleasure.

"I'm gonna–" you whined as your back arched, body trembling slightly as Sukuna kept slamming into you through your high, enjoying the way your eyes rolled back and you completely let go, suspended in bliss and relief.

"There you go" he smiled, biting the side of your neck. "Knew you had it in you" he teased, and you let out an elated laugh, bringing him closer.

"You feel so good" you hummed, and Sukuna decided he wanted to push himself up just to see your euphoric face. He brought his two hands to close around yours, pushing both above your head as he interlaced your fingers together, hovering just above you as he admired you like a painting.

"Good" he replied with a sly smile, a particularly harsh thrust punctuating the sentiment. "You're fucking gorgeous"

Too gorgeous, he thought.

"You think so?" you asked, and he hated how surprising that was to you.

He kissed you again, as if to prove a point. Your mouth parted and your tongues danced, with all the excitement of an unexpected night, but far too intimate for a one night stand. "Gorgeous" he repeated, biting your lower lip.

"Th-thank you" you tried to say, and Sukuna laughed against your lips. Who the fuck thanks someone during sex for just stating a fact?

Why would he be sleeping with you if he didn't think you were the most beautiful woman he had ever seen, after all?

"Kuna" you moaned, that stupid nickname you had given him after your first orgasm, but he was beginning to like it. He enjoyed thinking he made you feel so good that his full name was just too much effort.

"Go on, say it again" he rasped to your ear, hips rolling deliciously into you.

"Kuna–" you whimpered, legs closing around him, and your voice was the thing that finally tipped him over the edge.

Your nails dug into the back of his hands but Sukuna didn't let up, pining you with all his weight as you happily took everything he was giving you. Spilling everything inside the protection he was wearing, but he caught himself wishing there was no barrier between you.

Maybe next time, he thought, letting hope slip out in his blissful state.

Sukuna's hips stilled finally, face coming to the crook of your neck. He left a kiss there, followed with one to your jaw, tasting the sweaty mess he had made of you, and then one to your cheek – your salty tears prickled his lips, but when he noticed your chest move up and down far too quickly, he started to worry they weren't from pleasure this time.

Sukuna pulled away from you fast, scrunching his forehead as he watched tears pour out of your eyes; slowly, not dramatic, like you simply couldn't stop them from escaping.

His breathing completely stopped, everything about him going very still.

"Did I hurt you?"

"N-no" you said as fast as you could, shaking your head sideways and attempting a smile. But Sukuna was not happy with your response still.

"Are you sure?" he prodded, not meaning to sound so stern, but everything in him was in high alert. His crimson eyes didn't leave yours, but his hands started roaming the curves of your body, caressing in slow circles to soothe whatever it was that had you crying like that under him.

Was he too rough? Was it too much?

Were you scared of him like everyone else?

To his surprise though, you let out a little wet laugh. "You're sweet" you said, opening a beautiful smile that completely undid him, despite the wetness all over your face.

Fuck, he thought.

Sukuna hoped you couldn't see it, but he was almost certain he was blushing.

"Tch" he grunted, rolling around to settle next to you and pull you into him. "No one else would say that"

"You are" you replied while Sukuna turned you to him without any struggle, resting your head right on his broad chest. He was so warm, you thought, letting yourself sink into him.

"Then why are you crying?" he asked again, unwilling to let it go. Sukuna tangled a large palm on your hair, softly caressing the back of your head, trying to figure out what the hell he could do to help.

"I didn't expect to, I–" you tried to explain, but those crimson eyes were back on you, and his other hand around your waist had you somehow trusting you could just be honest with him.

"I'm scared you'll leave" you admitted finally, voice too small.

Sukuna pulled away from you just slightly, just so he could see your face. "Why would I leave?" he asked, like the notion alone was ridiculous.

You swallowed thickly, struggling to meet his eyes. "You won't?" you asked pitifully, looking anywhere but him.

He wanted to kiss you to prove it. Wanted to hold you all night and fuck you again and again so you'd finally get in your head how much he wanted you.

But he could tell this went far deeper than just insecurities.

"Who made you think like that?"

Sukuna hadn't expected his question would bring more tears to your eyes, and it was almost like he could see you shut him away in real time. Your eyes fell downwards, and your hands played with your own nails instead of gripping him like he wanted – clearly something still too painful hiding just under the surface.

So he didn't let you. "Hey" he called, bringing his hand to your chin now, to force your eyes up. "I'm not going anywhere" he reassured.

It sounded like the right thing to say, and he knew he fucking meant it, but why the hell did he feel like it only made you pull away even more?

"You don't have to do that" you shook your head, hiding into his side and attempting to sound more composed. "Sorry, I'm sure the last thing you want is a one night stand cryi–"

"Stop" he interrupted then, stern. In one swift move, Sukuna was on top of you, taking on the role of cleaning your face with his gruff finger tips, trying very hard to be gentle.

He could see it in your face how surprised you were. How you expected to mean nothing to him. Sukuna was used to people assuming he slept around, but truth was, he didn't – Sukuna didn't really do one night stands. Today had been as an anomaly for you, as it was for him.

So the fact you were crying, thinking he would just dispose of you like that? That pissed him off more than anything.

"I'll get you some water" he announced, leaving a gruff kiss to your forehead. "Then we can have a bath, and then you can tell me. If you want" he completed, far too aware of how serious he was sounding.

The last thing he wanted was to scare you.

But you smiled, surprising him again with a shy nod. "That sounds nice" you murmured.

He could have sworn your hand tried to cling to him as he stood up, but he wasn't even sure you were aware of it.

Sukuna did as he promised, taking care of you for the rest of the night. He cleaned you up, dressed you in his old oversized shirt that looked much better on you than it ever had on him, and held you tight for the whole night.

You didn't want to tell him why you were crying then, but you had time. This wasn't the only night you spend together, after all.

Sukuna hated to admit it, but ever since then, you barely left his mind. What started on that unexpected night turned into something more meaningful, day after day, kiss after kiss – but still, you struggled to tell him what made you so scared.

He tried to figure it out himself, piercing together little bits of information you had given him, mind always conjuring up the worse case scenario.

He just had to understand why it never mattered how often you spoke or how nice your day was – when it was time to say goodbye, he could see the silent fear creep up all over your beautiful face.

You tried your best to hide it, but he didn't want you to.

Sukuna didn't mind reassuring you, not really. Sometimes just an extra hug when you needed. A kiss to your forehead. A promise that he'd call later. He understood you just needed confirmation he wouldn't leave. Needed confirmation that you meant something.

Why the hell did you think you didn't?

That was the part that drove him mad.

And the day you finally decided to tell him, he understood.

It was a grim story about some asshole called Satoru Gojo.

Satoru Gojo. The name alone made him sick.

He didn't even know the guy, but every time you opened up more, his hatred only grew.

It wasn't nice to be falling for someone who was still getting over someone else, but Sukuna learned to be patient for you.

Sometimes you pulled away, talked down on yourself, expected nothing but pain from the unavoidable feelings that were starting to grow; but Sukuna was always there to pull you back. He didn't blame you for it, after all, it wasn't your fault – it was his.

The man who had taken your heart only to step on it with no care for how it left you to take up the pieces.

Satoru Gojo.

Sukuna looked up the asshole everywhere online, like a predator stalking his prey. He had to know. Everything in him was consumed by how much he despised the man that made you believe you were cursed.

He found his profiles easily enough, clearly the idiot enjoyed showing off. He had to admit he was good looking – white hair and blue eyes and a confident smile. Rich too, it seemed. The type of guy who felt entitled to use people, Sukuna rolled his eyes with a scoff.

It wasn't nice to imagine there were probably pictures of him out there that you were in too. With that easy smile of yours – the one Sukuna only saw rarely, only at times you let yourself truly relax.

You probably smiled like that more often before him, didn't you?

He hated imagining the two of you together, but Sukuna wasn't jealous – he couldn't be, when he was the one you turned to. The one you were slowly letting into your heart; and Sukuna was in no rush.

Not jealousy, he reassured himself, heart hammering into his chest as he held you tight in the night, your nails digging into his bicep like you were trying to cling on even in sleep.

Definitely not jealous, he thought again, when your gorgeous smile returned one day and Sukuna caught himself wondering how anyone could have it in them to hurt you.

Not jealous – angry, Sukuna settled on, fantasizing about punching that smug grin right out of Satoru Gojo's face, on a night you had cried when telling him about how you felt disposable.

Who knew opportunity would actually present itself.

That one fateful day, Sukuna had been waiting too long where you were supposed to meet before he decided to walk back and look for you.

What was probably only five minutes had felt like a life time. You were never late. Sukuna was fucking worried.

So he walked back, fast, turning a street corner and then another, until he finally saw you from across the street.

Oh. Maybe he was jealous, he realised.

Because standing on the other side was you, clearly upset, clearly holding back tears – and across from you, the man he had only ever seen in pictures.

With his hand holding yours.

Sukuna's owns instinctively curled into fists as he rushed to your side, vision turning red.

"Hey" he yelled, crossing the street. "The fuck is going on here?"

Your eyes immediately snapped to him, managing to relax him the tiniest bit. You rushed to him, pressing two palms to his chest, pleading with him with your teary eyes. "Kuna, it's ok" you said, and he went over every little detail of your face to reassure himself that you really were ok.

And then, his crimson eyes shifted up.

Now that he was this close, Sukuna could see it clearly. That truth he could only have assumed before.

This Satoru Gojo was pathetic.

With his stupid mouth slightly agape, brows furrowing together like he was confused at what was happening.

Yeah, asshole, Sukuna thought. She's with me.

"Who the fuck do you think you are" he snarled, pulling you into his chest. "Putting your hands on my girl?"

The way the other man's face fell gave him all the satisfaction he needed, that smug face contorting like the words had physically pained him.

Good, Sukuna thought, not a sliver of sympathy.

You had completely hidden your face into his chest now, knowing exactly where safe was. Sukuna could feel how your breathing had changed, could feel the wetness in his shirt. "Please don't yell" you sobbed, and his heart hurt hearing you like that.

"He made you cry?" Sukuna asked, all focus back on you. His beautiful girl. His.

Crying because of this idiot.

His hatred towards Satoru was only outweighed by his love for you; Sukuna was fully focused on wiping each tear away, tenderly brushing his finger tips over your cheeks.

"I'm sorry I was late" you murmured to him, leaning into his touch. It was unfair how you could undo him like this – this was meant to be the big stand off he had been dreaming about. His chance to beat up the guy who had made you so scared of love.

But now, he found himself wanting nothing more than to make you smile again.

"Don't" he replied with a kiss to the top of your head. "Got me worried sick, and then I find you upset and this asshole with his hands on you–"

"We just ran into each other" you shook your head, hands balling into his shirt. The nice one he had bought for your date specifically. "It's ok"

Hell. You sounded so apologetic. As if you had done something wrong by happening to run into the guy.

You looked at Sukuna with those pleading eyes that begged him to forgive you for whatever crime you thought you had committed. Even in this moment, so scared he'd just leave.

Sukuna hated this.

And right there – the man who made you think like that.

So close. So fucking close.

And he had the audacity to try and hold your hand.

Everything in Sukuna wanted to confront Satoru, but all his focus was on you.

Making sure you were ok.

Making sure you were safe.

Making sure you were away from him.

"He the one you told me about?" Sukuna asked you, even though he already knew the answer. He held you right where you were, your back to the white haired man, refusing to let him have another fucking look at you. "Let me get you out of here" he said kindly, helping you walk away.

You followed, standing by Sukuna's side, leaning into him for comfort as you continued forwards with your eyes glued to the floor.

And as you both walked away from him, Sukuna couldn't help another look back.

At his challenger. His rival. The man whose ghost still clung on to you in your darkest moments.

Satoru Gojo.

A man he hated so much, but right now looked nothing but pitiful.

Sukuna wasn't moved by his desperate tears. He was convinced Satoru Gojo didn't care for anyone but himself, anyway.

Part of him did regret not throwing that punch he so desperately wanted.

And as much as he hoped with everything in him that you'd never run into Gojo again – Sukuna hoped he would.

this is very healing to write!

taglist @madamechrissy @septembermoonchild @plaguecxlt @nanamitiddiechomper @kekeanna266 @amazedfor @dogggggggblog-kaye @literallyadarling @dawnsoblivion @chewiebee @iquitfindingausername @valberryboos @pwd54gr54 @raendarkfaerie @bbfawns @itimisu @sapph22 @bornafairy @sukunahs @hatchus2 @sukubusss @pawwwginaaa @b-bitter @poeticrenaissance @winkii @purplehairedfairyxx @bleepybl00p @mruizsworld

[boozehund-blog]

ppl who celebrate fictional character birthdays are annoying pass it on

[wolfprud3-deactivated20170620]

FUCK this post and happy birthday sonic

[bitterblackboricua]

[belimah]

4. Hold Me Tight Or Don't art by mblydez

In the kitchen, Sukuna moves with the efficiency of someone who has repeated the same post-event routine hundreds of times.

The refrigerator is full.

Not takeout containers and energy drinks as you might expect, but prepared food packed into clear boxes. Rice. Grilled meat. Vegetables. Eggs. Containers marked with dates. Electrolyte bottles lined along one shelf. Fruit arranged without care but in impressive quantity.

“Trainer?” you ask.

“Nutritionist.”

“You have someone prepare everything?”

“Some of it, yeah.”

He takes out two containers.

“You cook?”

“When I’m home.”

“What do you make?” You tilt your head, curious.

“Food,” he deadpans, because he's unbearable.

“That answer tells me nothing.”

“It tells you I eat food.”

“Apparently only after strangers remind you.”

“You’re not a stranger anymore,” he scoffs, but you look at him immediately.

Sukuna has already turned toward the microwave, but the tips of his ears are slightly red.

The realization delights you.

Ryomen Sukuna can be embarrassed.

Not easily and not in any way he would acknowledge.

But enough that you notice.

You lean against the counter and watch him heat the food. His movements are slower than they were at the bar. The adrenaline has completely left now. He opens a drawer with his right hand because the left shoulder resists reaching. He rubs the heel of his palm over one eye while waiting.

When the microwave beeps, he startles almost imperceptibly.

Exhausted.

Completely.

He puts both containers on the island and sets a fork in front of you.

“You don’t have to feed me.”

“You're staying. You're eating.”

“That doesn’t mean I need your race-prep chicken.”

“You’re eating,” there's no space left for arguing in that tone.

“You sound exactly like I did ten minutes ago.”

His mouth curves.

“Annoying, isn’t it?”

The food is better than expected.

The chicken is seasoned heavily enough to avoid tasting clinical. The rice has herbs through it. Roasted vegetables hold some actual flavor rather than existing solely for nutritional value.

Sukuna eats quickly at first.

Then slows.

His body seems to remember hunger only after the first few bites. He finishes one container, gets another and drinks an entire bottle of electrolytes. You watch some of the strain leave his face as his blood sugar recovers.

“You do this after every race?” you ask.

“Eat?”

“Come home alone.”

His fork stops briefly.

“Usually.”

“No team dinners?”

“Sometimes. Not a fan.”

“But you prefer this.”

“I prefer quiet, yeah.”

You look around the apartment.

It is quiet.

Too quiet for someone whose public life takes place inside stadiums.

No television playing for background noise. No music. The sound of cutlery against the containers is suddenly distinct.

“What do you do when you can’t sleep?”

Sukuna looks at you.

“How do you know I can’t?”

“You race at night. Your body’s full of adrenaline. Everything hurts. I doubt you come home and calmly close your eyes.”

He takes another bite before answering.

“Watch footage.”

“Of the race?”

“Sometimes.”

“Why?”

“To see what I missed. How to improve.”

“You just did it.”

“I did it from the bike.”

The difference makes sense, when you stop to think.

You see it from afar, he doesn't.

On the motorcycle, everything is immediate. A line. A rut. The rear stepping out. A rival’s front wheel appearing beside him. There is no room for the wider picture. Watching afterward lets him inspect the thing that happened around his body while he was trapped inside it.

“Do you watch with sound?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Don’t need commentators telling me what I felt,” he grouses.

You smile.

“That is the most you answer I’ve heard all night.”

Sukuna leans one elbow on the counter.

“What does that mean?”

“Arrogant. Reasonable. Slightly hostile.”

“Slightly?” He seems offended at the reduction.

“Very hostile. Better?”

“Better.”

He finishes eating and takes both containers to the sink.

You slide off the stool.

The robe opens slightly as you move. His attention drops immediately, fatigue failing to interfere with that particular reflex.

“You’re looking again,” you say.

“I’ve been looking.”

“You’re exhausted and lack self preservation.”

“Not blind.”

He reaches for you when you pass.

His hand circles your waist under the robe and draws you between his knees where he has leaned against the counter. His face rests briefly against your chest, arms wrapping around your middle.

The position surprises you.

He is still taller seated.

Still broad enough that his embrace encloses you.

Yet there is a quiet need in the way he holds you, forehead resting against the warm skin exposed by the robe. He breathes there, eyes closed.

You put your fingers into his hair, carding at the strands, holding back the need to press a kiss on the crown of his head.

“Bed?” you ask.

He makes a low sound that might be agreement. Might be just a grumble, too.

“You’re falling asleep standing up.”

“I’m kinda sitting.”

“Excellent correction. Do I cover you with the dishtowel?”

Sukuna lifts his head.

His eyes are heavy. The sharpness remains, but it has dulled and softened around the edges.

“You talk too much.”

“Do you regret inviting me yet?”

“No.”

He stands and takes your hand.

His bedroom is at the end of a short hallway.

You pass framed photographs along the wall. Most are not posed. Race shots. Dirt flying behind him. His body suspended over a bike at impossible angles. One image shows him much younger, helmet beneath one arm, face unscarred and pink hair longer around his eyes. A smaller boy stands beside him holding a trophy nearly as tall as his torso.

You slow.

“Your brother?”

Sukuna looks over.

“Yuuji.”

“He races too?”

“Used to ride. Never competitively.”

The fondness is almost hidden beneath the rough delivery.

“Is he younger?”

“By a lot.”

“You look happy there.”

Sukuna studies the photograph.

“I won.”

“That isn’t... what I meant.”

“I know.”

He resumes walking.

You follow without pressing.

The bedroom is plain but not impersonal. Dark sheets. A large bed. Blackout curtains drawn across wide windows. A helmet sits on a shelf beside several books, one visor cracked across the center. There is a low chair in the corner with a stack of clean race jerseys over the back.

His phone charger lies precisely aligned on the nightstand.

Everything suggests routine.

Everything arranged so an exhausted man can come in, shut out the daylight and collapse without searching for what he needs.

Sukuna gives you one of his shirts — one that bears the logo of one of his old sponsors.

“You keep your own merchandise?”

“It was free.”

“You could’ve given me something without your name across it.”

He looks at the logo, then at you.

“No.”

The possessiveness in the answer sends a slow thrill down your spine.

He sees it happen.

His eyes sharpen despite his exhaustion.

“Put it on.”

“You’re very demanding in your own house.”

“You noticed.”

It hangs loosely from your body, hem reaching the upper part of your thighs. He watches you put it on with quiet satisfaction. The fabric smells faintly of detergent and something unmistakably his, — sandalwood maybe? a hint of copper — from being stored among his clothes.

“What?”

“Looks better on you.”

“That was almost sweet.”

“Don’t insult me like that ever again,” he grins at you despite his words, wicked man.

He changes into a clean pair of shorts.

You attempt not to stare.

He catches you attempting and failing.

“You’ve seen it already.”

“That doesn’t make it less worth looking at.”

His mouth lifts slightly.

He then sits on the edge of the bed to remove the temporary support around his knee. The red marks underneath have deepened. One area near the inside of the joint looks swollen.

You kneel in front of him.

Sukuna’s hand stops halfway toward the brace.

“What are you doing?”

“Looking.”

“Get up.”

“Why?”

His jaw hardens.

“Because you don’t need to kneel on the floor.”

The statement carries more discomfort than the position warrants. It's not an embarrassment about the injury. Feels like something else.

He does not like you below him in this context. Not while caring for him. Not where it makes the imbalance between the famous athlete and the woman who followed him visible in a way that could be mistaken for servitude.

You sit beside him instead.

“Better?”

“Yeah.”

The answer comes grudgingly.

You touch the swollen area gently and feel his quadriceps contracts under your fingers.

“Does it feel unstable?”

“No.”

“Sharp pain?”

“Dull.”

“Do you ice it?”

“In the morning.”

“Why not now?”

“Because I’m going to sleep.”

“You can ice it while lying down.”

Sukuna gives you a look.

You give one back.

He is the first to surrender.

“Freezer,” he says. “Bottom drawer.”

You return with an ice wrap designed specifically for the knee.

Of course he owns one. Of course it is expensive, shaped around the joint and fitted with adjustable compression straps.

Sukuna lies back while you secure it.

He watches your hands.

The bruises and pressure marks continue farther up his leg, disappearing beneath the shorts. You do not comment on each one. There are too many. Some old. Some fresh.

A body used not simply for sport but against itself.

When the wrap is in place, you climb onto the bed.

Sukuna reaches for you immediately.

There is no hesitation this time.

He pulls you across his chest, arranging you along his right side so the injured shoulder remains free. Your head rests above his heart. One of his arms encircles your back. His fingers slip beneath the hem of the shirt and settle against bare skin at your waist.

The room is cool.

His body is not.

Heat radiates through the thin cotton, steady and enveloping. You place your palm over the center of his chest. The heartbeat beneath it is slower now, deep enough that you feel each pulse rather than hear it.

“Comfortable?” you ask.

“Yes.”

“Knee?”

“Cold.”

“That’s the point of icing,” you say it like you would to a kid.

“Annoying.”

“You’re very brave. Doing really great.”

His fingers pinch lightly at your side.

You laugh and hide your face against him.

Sukuna kisses the top of your head.

It happens so naturally that neither of you reacts for a second.

Then he stills.

You lift your face.

His expression has changed.

The kiss definitely escaped without thought, but he doesn't seem to regret it.

You could tease him about it, he would deserve, probably. You choose not to.

Instead, you kiss the scar near his collarbone.

His arm tightens around you.

“Sleep,” he murmurs.

You close your eyes despite wanting to talk back and tell him he's way more exhausted than you.

The heavy, warm darkness behind your lids is welcome. Your body has been ready to sleep since the bath, but your thoughts resist. This night feels too improbable to surrender to unconsciousness.

You listen to Sukuna breathe.

At first, he does not sleep either.

His thumb moves along your waist in a repeating path. His chest rises and falls, but the breaths remain too measured. Deliberate. Every few minutes, the muscles in his leg tighten beneath the ice wrap. His jaw shifts when the shoulder aches.

“You’re still awake,” you rasp, brain fighting to stay awake.

“So are you.”

“I’m being crushed by very strong arms.”

“You’re lying on me by choice,” he offers, and his arms don't bulge a single inch.

“You’re holding me hostage.”

“Also true.”

You trace one of the tattoos crossing his chest.

“Tell me something.”

“No.”

“Come on... something I don’t know.”

“You know almost nothing,” he huffs a laugh that makes your hair move a bit.

“Then it should be easy.”

Sukuna sighs.

The sound stirs your hair.

“What do you want to know?”

You consider asking about his first championship.

His worst crash.

The scar near his eyebrow.

“What do you feel before the gate drops?” Is what ends up leaving your lips.

He goes quiet.

You wait.

His fingers stop moving at your waist.

“Nothing,” he says eventually.

“I don’t believe that.”

“You asked what I feel.”

“Nothing?”

“It goes quiet.”

You lift your head slightly.

Sukuna looks toward the ceiling, eyes open in the darkness.

“Crowd disappears,” he says. “Mechanics. Lights. Everything. I hear my bike and the engines beside me. Feel the gate through the front tire.”

His hand shifts from your waist to your spine.

“There’s a point right before it drops when every rider is waiting for the same movement. Too early, you hit the gate. Too late, they’re gone. You can’t think. Thinking takes too long.”

“So what do you do?”

“Know.”

The answer sounds arrogant until you understand.

His body has repeated the start so many times that knowledge no longer requires language. The clutch. Throttle. Weight. Rear brake. The machine held on the edge of motion. His entire nervous system narrowed to the instant metal falls.

“Are you afraid then?”

“No.”

“When are you?”

Sukuna turns his head toward you.

City light edges one side of his face.

“You keep asking that.”

“You keep avoiding it.”

His hand moves to the back of your neck, not threatening now, only holding.

“When I stop,” he says.

The words are barely above a whisper.

You remain still.

He looks away again.

“On the bike, there’s always something to do. Correct. Accelerate. Pick a line. If it goes wrong, you handle it or hit the ground.” His thumb presses gently beneath your hair. “Afterward, there’s time to know how close it was.”

The image forms clearly.

Sukuna in the corridor after the show, hand flexing uselessly over the handlebar.

Sukuna in the dressing room, shivering once the heat leaves.

Sukuna alone in this apartment, replaying footage without sound, watching his own front wheel land crooked and calculating what could have happened.

“You were afraid tonight,” you say.

His jaw tightens.

“After the final landing.”

“Not afraid.”

“What, then?”

“Angry.”

“At yourself?”

“At the shoulder.”

You do not challenge the distinction.

For him, perhaps anger is fear made useful.

“Did you think you’d crash?”

“For half a second, yeah.”

Your fingers pause over his chest.

Half a second at that speed is enough to contain an entire disaster.

“Isn't it a bad decision to go look for a random woman after contemplating a major risk like that?”

Sukuna’s eyes find yours.

“I knew where you were. I waited for you. Here we are.”

“That isn’t an answer.”

“It is mine.”

You smile faintly.

His mouth softens in response.

You lower your head back onto him.

“I’m glad you didn’t crash.”

“So am I.”

The honesty seems easier in the dark.

His breathing finally changes.

It becomes less controlled. Longer. Heavier. The hand at your neck loosens and slips down to your shoulder.

You think he has fallen asleep when he speaks again.

“Don’t disappear, annoying girl.”

Your heart tightens.

You do not lift your head this time. You know he would regret seeing the effect of the request.

“I won’t. I'll stalk you closely.”

His fingers close in the fabric at your back. A tired huff of laughter leaves him.

“That’s unsettling.”

“You like it.”

“I do.”

Sleep reaches him slowly.

You feel the exact progression.

The weight of his arm increases. The tension around his knee eases. His mouth relaxes, and the line between his eyebrows smooths.

His body still reacts to pain.

A twitch in the injured shoulder.

A small tightening through his abdomen when he breathes too deeply.

But he does not wake.

You remain on his chest until the cold wrap warms beneath the blanket. Carefully, you remove it and place it on the floor. Sukuna shifts when you return, arm searching over the mattress.

The motion is blind.

Instinctive.

You move back against him.

His hand finds your waist and pulls you close without waking fully.

The reaction sends a quiet ache through you.

For all his arrogance, all his fame, all the confidence with which he handled your body earlier, he sleeps like someone accustomed to reaching into empty space.

You lie facing him now.

His features are softer without awareness. The scars remain, the slit through his eyebrow, the hard architecture of his face, but the hostility is gone. One strand of pink hair lies across his forehead.

You move it aside.

Sukuna murmurs something you cannot understand.

His brow tightens.

Then his whole body jerks.

The shoulder shifts beneath him.

His eyes open violently.

One second he is asleep.

The next he is ready to fight.

His hand locks around your arm. His breathing comes hard. The crimson of his eyes looks black in the dark, pupils wide as he stares at you without recognition.

You do not move.

“Sukuna.”

His grip tightens once.

Then he sees you.

The change is immediate.

His fingers release and he hisses.

“Fuck.”

He turns onto his back and covers his face with one hand.

You sit up beside him.

“What happened?”

“Nothing.”

“Your shoulder?”

He exhales sharply.

“It slipped.”

“Again?”

“Not out.”

“Can— can you move it?”

Sukuna lowers his hand.

He attempts to roll the shoulder.

The joint catches.

His face goes pale beneath the tan.

You feel fear before he names the pain.

“Stop.”

“I need to set it.”

“Is it... dislocated?”

“Partially.”

“You should go to the hospital.”

“No.”

“Sukuna,” you plead again, knowing it will lead nowhere at this point.

“No.”

The refusal is so absolute that arguing now will only make him move too quickly.

You force your own panic down.

“What do you normally do?”

“Move it back.”

“By yourself?”

“Yes.”

Well, that's horrifying.

“How?”

He sits up.

Sweat has appeared along his hairline. His breathing is controlled but too fast.

“Hold my arm.”

The request terrifies you.

“I— don’t know what I’m doing.”

“I do. I’ve done this before.”

“I don't want to hurt you—”

His eyes meet yours. The vulnerability there strips the last sharpness from his voice.

“Please.”

You move.

Sukuna positions your hands, one supporting his forearm, the other near his elbow. His skin is hot and slightly damp. The muscles around the shoulder are rigid, guarding the joint.

“Slow,” he tells you. “Lift when I say.”

You nod, you can't speak.

He braces his other hand on the mattress.

His jaw clenches.

“Now.”

You raise the arm carefully.

A tremor runs through him.

“Higher.”

You continue.

His breathing breaks.

“Stop.”

You freeze.

Sukuna adjusts his body, turning slightly. His face has tightened completely, eyes closed shut, teeth bared for one second.

Then he moves.

There is a dull, sickening shift beneath the skin.

His body goes rigid.

A harsh sound tears from his throat.

You nearly drop his arm— but then, the joint settles.

Sukuna collapses forward against you.

His forehead lands on your shoulder. His good arm wraps around your waist as though holding on is the only instruction his body remembers.

You lower his injured arm carefully.

He is shaking.

Not the fine post-adrenaline tremor from the bathroom.

This is raw pain.

Deep and involuntary.

You circle him with both arms.

His breathing comes hot and uneven against your neck. He refuses to make another sound, but you feel each one held in the tension of his jaw.

“I’ve got you,” you whisper.

The words come naturally.

Sukuna’s hand grips the back of your borrowed shirt.

You hold him through the worst of it.

Minutes pass.

Perhaps fewer than they feel.

His heartbeat pounds against your chest. Sweat cools along his spine. The tremors gradually lessen, leaving exhaustion so complete that his weight becomes difficult to support.

You ease him down against the pillows.

He allows it.

That frightens you more than the pain did.

Sukuna does not allow things as far as the day let you know. He decides them. Resists them. Turns every offered kindness into something he accepted on his own terms.

Now he lies where you place him, eyes closed, face drained.

You get out of bed.

His hand catches your wrist.

“Where?”

“Bathroom. Pain meds.”

He releases you slowly.

You return with water, the tablets from the counter and a cold pack wrapped in a thin towel.

Sukuna takes the medication without argument. You place the pack over the shoulder. He flinches at the first contact, then settles.

“Hospital in the morning,” you say.

“Absolutely not.”

“Doctor, then.”

“I have one.”

“You’ll call them.”

“Yeah.”

The agreement is suspiciously easy.

“You promise?”

His eyes open.

The word affects him.

You feel the ugly answer rising behind his teeth. He owes you nothing. He doesn't need to promise you anything. But those never come out.

He takes a moment, though, before answering. Because promises require more than the present moment. Because no one asks him for them.

They ask for results, podiums, appearances, signatures. Things he can deliver through discipline and money.

A promise asks him to be accountable to you.

“Yes,” he says. “I promise.”

You lie beside him again, careful not to jostle the shoulder.

This time Sukuna does not pull you onto his chest. He turns his head toward you and reaches with his good hand. You move close enough for him to rest it at your waist.

“Thought you'd panic at least a bit.”

“I panicked internally.”

A faint smile touches his mouth.

“Couldn’t tell.”

“I’m very impressive,” you say with a small, shaky laugh now that it's done.

“You are,” he says immediately, tired, honest. His eyes are already closing.

“Stay awake a minute.”

“Why?”

“I want to make sure you’re all right.”

“I’m not dying.”

“You went very, very pale,” you murmur, trying not to let show how scared you really got.

He opens one eye.

“Pain does that,” he deadpans quietly. "And somehow you're still here."

“Of course I am.”

“Most people would leave. Kinda the common thing.”

“Most people wouldn’t abandon someone after helping put their shoulder back. What kind of people you're hanging out with?”

“They'd not even pop my shoulder back in the first place, the fuck?" He seems to believe that genuinely. "They would call someone,” he scoffs lightly but the bitterness of his words linger. 

“Your doctor?”

“My manager. Trainer. Anyone whose job it is.”

The distinction is clear there.

Anyone paid to care.

Anyone obligated.

Not someone who remains because leaving feels impossible to them.

“Well, I popped it back. Now I'll make sure you at least get checked in the morning.” you tell him.

Sukuna watches you for several seconds.

Then his hand moves from your waist to your cheek, thumb passing gently over your skin.

The touch carries no teasing.

No heat.

Only a quiet, exhausted wonder he does not have the strength to conceal.

You turn your face and kiss his palm.

Sukuna’s breath catches.

His hand remains against you as he falls asleep.

This time, the pain medication pulls him under more completely. Quickly, too.

You stay awake longer.

Watch his breathing.

Adjust the cold pack when it slips.

Feel his fingers twitch against your cheek in dreams.

When dawn comes, it begins as a thin grey line around the blackout curtains.

By then, you are still beside him.

Still wearing his shirt.

Still held by the hand of a man who spent months believing a barrier was the only distance between you, when the real distance was everything he had never allowed anyone to see.

When you finally sleep, your forehead rests near his.

His breathing warms your mouth.

His injured shoulder lies protected between pillows.

And even unconscious, Sukuna keeps one hand tangled in the fabric at your waist, as though your promise not to disappear is something his body intends to enforce until morning.

[bemycherrynow]

Has tumblr always been so pro life? Why is every other x reader fic about the reader being pregnant or being a parent??? Like omg enough!!!

[jugumpuppet]

ACT4: The Heart Never Lies Prev. < Page 85 > Next

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[belimah]

The Last Of The Real Ones

You don't really see the appeal of motocross as a sport, but that doesn't stop Maki from taking you in her sister's place to the event she attends religiously. More than that, she wants you to see for yourself how amazing it feels to be so close to them as they play out risky maneuvers for entertainment... And how adrenaline inducing the crashes are.

You have no faith you're enjoying any of that, but you have nothing better to do.

Boredom, loud noises and dirt are all you're getting, but that is until you see the current champion in action. Rider number 49.

And just like that you're obsessed.

Thank you for the request, @mako-sea, this is being very damn fun to write!

Champion

Irresistible

TBA

TBA

TBA

TBA

TBA

TBA

[belimah]

1. Champion art by mblydez

You only go because Maki refuses to waste the ticket.

That is the embarrassing truth of it, and she repeats it three times while you stand in your bedroom deciding whether an outdoor motorsport event deserves the good boots or the pair you do not mind ruining.

“They’re not cheap,” she says from your bed, stretched across the duvet with her phone held above her face. “And Mai was supposed to come, but she decided getting back together with the same woman she blocked last week is somehow more important.”

“She’ll block her again tomorrow,” you comment, raising a brow.

Mai is not really the best when it comes to choosing girlfriends. The one before Nobara tried to stab her. Twice. And they got back together after that but it didn't last. She got the audacity to wonder why.

“Exactly. Which is why you’re coming with me.”

You hold two tops against yourself and look at her through the mirror.

“Do people dress up for motocross events?”

“Some people barely dress at all,” she offers but that really doesn't help you.

“That doesn’t answer my question.”

“It means nobody cares, come onnnnn.”

You care.

Not about fitting into the crowd, precisely. You have never needed the safety of looking like everyone else. But walking into a place you know nothing about while dressed as if you belong there feels easier than walking in uncertain. You choose dark jeans, a fitted black top, and a jacket that sits neatly over your shoulders. The boots lose in the end. You wear something sturdier, though the compromise annoys you until Maki points out that the event grounds are largely composed of dirt.

You have heard of motocross through Maki and Mai. You know motorcycles go fast, riders jump them, people crash with alarming regularity, and there are several companies whose logos seem to appear on half the clothing teenage boys wear. That is where your knowledge ends. You don't see how that appeals to anyone, but you're giving it a chance. It's free, you got nothing better to do.

Maki spends the drive attempting to educate you, but she is a poor teacher because she keeps skipping through songs and shouting at traffic.

“It’s not technically just motocross,” she tells you after changing lanes with unnecessary aggression. “There are different competitions today. Qualifying, races, demonstrations. They’ve got a freestyle presentation between classes. Sukuna is doing that too.”

The name means nothing to you.

“Who?”

Maki nearly misses the exit.

Her head turns so quickly you reach for the dashboard.

“Do you live under a rock?”

“I have a mortgage worth of useless information in my head. Forgive me for not knowing every athlete from a sport I don’t even watch.”

“He’s not every athlete.”

You give her a look because you know she’s about to start.

“He has pink hair,” she says, as though that should clarify everything. “Factory-backed. Four-fifty class. Multiple championships. Completely insane.”

“That sounds promising,” you say, not really interested in that many words you don't quite understand, but she goes on.

“He’s an asshole too.”

“Even better,” you deadpan, looking at your reflection on the little mirror in the sun blocker.

“I’m serious. He hates interviews. He fought with a reporter last year.”

“Physically?” Now she grabs your attention.

“No. I think his manager stopped it from becoming physical.”

You settle back in your seat.

“So you’ve brought me to watch an angry man with unusual hair throw a heavy machine through the air. There’s dirt and loud noise and overpriced food.”

“Yeah.”

“Fine. Great program. Loving it already.”

“You’ll understand when you see him.”

You don’t expect to.

The venue is already crowded when you arrive. Cars line the dry grass beyond the parking area, and people move toward the gates in groups wearing branded jerseys, caps, boots, sunglasses. Children carry miniature number plates. Men who look old enough to have grandchildren argue over tire compounds beside a food truck. The air smells of sun-warmed dirt, sunscreen, fried food and exhaust before you are anywhere near the track.

Maki has more than ordinary tickets. Mai had bought a package that includes afternoon access to the paddock, and this is apparently enough to improve her mood despite Mai’s romantic relapse.

A staff member scans your passes and loops laminated credentials around your necks.

The sound changes the farther you walk.

At first it is distant, a low mechanical agitation beneath the crowd. Then an engine fires somewhere beyond the transporters and the noise travels through your ribs before it fully reaches your ears. Another answers. A third rises abruptly into a high, violent note that makes several people turn.

The paddock is larger than you imagined. Team transporters form polished walls along temporary lanes. Beneath branded awnings, motorcycles rest on stands with both wheels lifted off the ground while mechanics move around them. There are spare tires stacked in racks, tool cabinets, fans, coolers and cables laid with the neatness of an operating room. Everything looks expensive, controlled and strangely clean despite the dirt coating the surrounding world.

Riders pass in partial gear, boots striking heavily against the ground. Some stop for pictures. Others keep their heads down and follow team staff through the crowd.

Maki walks with purpose and you follow because you have no better plan.

“You’re taking this very seriously,” you observe.

“I want to see him before practice.”

“Your charming asshole?” You coo at her with a grin.

“He’s not my anything. I just admire his work and his temper.”

“Your parasocially cherished asshole, then.”

She elbows you without slowing.

The line of people becomes denser near one of the largest team setups.

Black, bone-white and dark red dominate the awning. A stylized emblem stretches across the transporter, something between a shrine and an open jaw, though it is abstract enough to avoid being either. Merchandise hangs on temporary walls.

The number on almost every shirt around you matches the one printed across the motorcycle beyond the barrier.

49.

A mechanic leans over the bike, checking something near the handlebars. Another crouches by the rear wheel. The machine itself looks smaller than it did in clips Maki showed you while waiting to enter, although that impression vanishes when a team member rolls it off the stand and the seat reaches nearly to his waist.

Then you see the man beside it.

You know immediately which one he is.

He stands behind the metal barrier with one boot planted on a low case and the other on the ground, tall enough that everyone around him appears reduced. His jersey is fitted across his shoulders, sleeves pulled close over thick arms. The dark design of his gear follows the same severe palette as the team, broken by sponsor logos and the hard angular shape of his number — 49.

Protective pants sit heavy at his hips. A knee brace changes the line of one leg beneath the fabric. His hair is pink but not very soft-looking. It is unruly from sweat and the helmet he must have already worn, pushed back from a face built around sharp bones and a deep expression of boredom.

There is tape around both wrists.

A member of the crew tightens one strap while a mechanic speaks close to him, using short gestures toward the bike. Sukuna gives no sign that he is listening. His attention moves over the crowd instead.

Not searching.

Assessing.

He signs a jersey held over the barrier. Then a poster. A child offers him a small plastic number plate and receives it back with a rough pat to the head that seems almost impatient, although the child beams as if he has been blessed. Sukuna does not smile for photographs. He does not bend toward the fans or ask their names. His public performance appears to consist of standing there and allowing the public to be near him.

People seem to love him anyway.

Perhaps because of it.

Maki says something at your side.

You do not hear her.

Sukuna’s profile has caught your attention. There is a slit through one eyebrow, too straight to be natural. Small scars interrupt the skin near his mouth and one ear, faint marks suggesting piercings that were torn free or removed after injuries. His irises are darker than you expect when he glances toward the open side of the tent.

Crimson.

Not bright red — a deep, warm shade that looks almost brown until sunlight catches it.

The person at the barrier steps away.

For no reason you can identify, his gaze shifts again and lands on you.

It stops.

Not long enough to become an interaction. Perhaps no more than a second. Two at most.

But it is not the passing look he has given everyone else.

His eyes move over your face. Lower, briefly. Back up.

Your skin warms beneath your clothes.

Then the mechanic touches his elbow and Sukuna looks away, turning toward the motorcycle as if nothing happened.

“What?” Maki asks.

You realize you have gone still.

“Nothing.”

She follows the direction of your stare and makes a noise of sudden understanding.

“So you liked him, huh?”

“I’m merely observing the… whole preparation. Trying to learn something.”

“You’re observing something alright. Learning how to grab someone’s attention.”

“Do you ever shut up?”

Maki grins.

“You’re blushing.”

“I’m hot.”

“You were complaining about the wind five minutes ago.”

You move away before she can continue, though not far enough that you lose sight of him.

It should be easy to dismiss the moment. He is an athlete at a public event and you are standing among his fans. Looking at people is unavoidable.

That explanation lasts until he swings onto the motorcycle.

The shift in him is immediate.

The boredom disappears before the engine starts.

One moment he is seated with a hand resting loosely over the grip, listening to his mechanic say something near his shoulder. The next he presses the starter, and the motorcycle comes alive beneath him with a hard, concussive sound that cuts across every conversation nearby. Several children cover their ears. You feel it against the front of your body.

Sukuna lowers his goggles.

The man vanishes.

What remains is posture, calculation, purpose.

He rolls away from the team area standing lightly on the foot pegs, hips lifted from the seat. The bike moves under him rather than carrying him. His elbows rise. His knees hold the narrow frame. Even at walking speed there is something controlled in the way he balances it, each small movement precise.

Maki hooks her hand around your arm.

“Come on. Practice is starting.”

You let her pull you toward the track.

The circuit is built across a broad stretch of shaped earth. Natural slopes have been cut and reinforced into banks, jump faces and descents. Temporary grandstands rise along one side, while spectators crowd fences and higher ground elsewhere. Watering has darkened parts of the dirt. Other sections are already drying pale beneath the sun.

You find a place near a fenced corner with a clear view of the rhythm section and a long tabletop beyond it.

Riders begin moving onto the track.

You recognize Sukuna before you see the number 49 of the motorcycle’s plaque.

His riding is different.

You do not have the vocabulary for it yet, but your body understands the distinction before your mind does. Some riders seem to react to the track as it reaches them, motorcycles bucking beneath their weight. Sukuna appears ahead of everything. He is already shifting before the front wheel reaches the next rut. He stands through rough sections, legs absorbing the movement. At the entrance of the corner nearest you, he brakes later than the rider in front and drops into a deep inside groove with his body forward, one boot briefly extended before returning to the peg.

The rear wheel bites.

Dirt erupts behind him.

He is gone before it strikes the fence.

You turn your head quickly enough to follow him into the rhythm lane.

He crosses it in a sequence that looks impossible until another rider attempts the same combination and lands shorter, losing speed. Sukuna clears the next jump low.

Not merely low — sideways.

For one suspended instant, the motorcycle lies almost flat beneath him.

His body remains connected to it at the hands, knees and boots. The rear wheel hangs out across the line of the track. The handlebars turn slightly. It looks wrong, like the beginning of a crash occurring several meters above the ground.

Then he brings the bike back beneath himself and lands on the downslope with both wheels aligned.

The suspension compresses hard.

He accelerates away.

You forget to breathe.

“What was that?”

“A scrub,” Maki says, smug because she knows something you do not. “Keeps him low. Less airtime.”

“That is supposed to make him faster?”

“Yeah.”

“He put the bike sideways,” you know you sound a bit scandalized.

“I told you.”

You stare at the far corner where he disappears behind a rise.

“That thing weighs more than I do.”

“Probably twice as much. Three times, you gotta eat better.”

“And he just—”

“Yeah.”

The engine note rises again before he returns to view.

This time you watch him rather than the motorcycle.

You watch the pressure through his legs. The angle of his shoulders. How he adjusts in the air with movements that are smaller than the result they produce. He lands into the approach of a turn, brakes, lets the rear move just enough, then catches it under power. Dirt and noise and speed surround him, but there is no panic in his riding.

Not even when the bike kicks sideways over a rough patch.

His left leg comes off the peg. The handlebars twitch. For a fraction of a second the machine threatens to turn against him.

He saves it.

Not dramatically — there is no pause for relief. He puts his foot back, straightens and takes the next jump as if the mistake belongs to someone else.

You look at Maki.

She is watching the track with rapt attention, smiling.

“You were right,” you tell her.

She does not even ask about what.

“I always am.”

By the time practice ends, you understand the beginning of an obsession.

Not a romantic obsession, it’s technical.

You need to know how he does it.

On the drive home you search his name. Maki laughs when you begin reading race reports aloud, but she answers every question she can. When she cannot, you find interviews, breakdowns, track maps and slow-motion clips.

You learn that the motorcycle is a 450cc four-stroke, built from a production platform but altered around him.

You learn about suspension settings, gate choice, braking bumps, ruts and whoops.

You learn that the move you cannot stop replaying is indeed a scrub and that Sukuna is known for carrying it lower than most riders.

The clip you find has been edited from three angles.

You watch all three.

Then again.

At home, you tell yourself it is curiosity.

The next event is two weeks later.

Maki does not have to persuade you.

You buy the tickets before she finishes asking.

This time you know where to stand.

You choose a fitted red top under a dark jacket, not because of the team colors, you insist, but because it looks good against your skin. You do your hair differently. You take more care with your makeup than the dust and heat deserve. Maki notices and says nothing for nearly thirty minutes, which is worse than teasing.

When she finally does speak, you are entering the paddock.

“You know he wears a helmet for most of this, right?”

“I’m not dressed for him,” Not even you believe in that.

“Of course not,” she croons.

“I dress well when I go out!”

“You wore a sweatshirt to my birthday dinner.”

“It was cold,” you dismiss her with a vague gesture of your hand.

“It was indoors, fuckass.”

You ignore her.

Sukuna is not signing anything when you reach the factory area. He sits on a folding chair while a trainer wraps his wrist. One boot is off, and the heavy sock beneath his riding pants has been rolled down. There is a red mark circling his ankle where the boot pressed. His mechanic crouches beside him, speaking while pointing at a tablet.

He looks tired.

Not generally tired. Specifically worn at the edges, as if he did not sleep enough and has been carrying the deficit for days. There are shadows under his eyes. His hair falls over his forehead instead of standing away from it.

His attention lifts before yours reaches him fully.

Recognition happens in his face.

It is slight. A pause, then the smallest narrowing of his eyes.

You stop near the barrier.

Maki looks between you both.

Sukuna says something to the trainer without looking away. The man follows his gaze, glances at you, then returns to taping.

You should wave.

Should you wave?

No, that would be weird, you do not know him. So you don’t.

It feels too ordinary for whatever is happening.

So you hold his stare until the corner of his mouth curls up. An acknowledgment of the game.

The trainer finishes and Sukuna flexes his hand. His forearm tightens under the skin, veins pressing into view. He says something to his mechanic, rises and picks up his helmet.

A sponsor representative appears before he can move toward the barrier.

You know she is a sponsor representative because of the branded polo shirt, the headset and the expression of a woman paid to make difficult men stand in designated places. She catches Sukuna by the upper arm and points toward a temporary backdrop where cameras are waiting.

His jaw tightens, eyes narrow, and he goes.

You watch him stand beside two executives, one hand holding his helmet while they smile on his behalf. A photographer directs him to move closer. Sukuna does not. The executives adjust instead.

His eyes find you once more between flashes.

The look holds long enough that the representative notices.

Her head turns.

You lift your chin, refusing to appear embarrassed.

Then someone calls Sukuna’s name, the photograph ends, and the chance is gone.

It happens again at the next race.

And the next.

A pattern forms.

You appear. He sees you.

Sometimes you are close enough to notice the exact moment recognition settles over his features. Other times the track separates you, and the evidence comes through the way his helmet turns after a race while he rolls past the front row. Once, during an indoor Supercross exhibition, you sit close to the landing of a large triple and feel certain he cannot possibly identify anyone beneath the stadium lights.

He does.

After the finish, he takes the final jump with a whip intended entirely for the crowd. The motorcycle rotates sideways, his body loose and controlled over the frame. He holds it there longer than necessary, straightens at the last possible instant and lands cleanly.

The audience surges to its feet.

He rides past the barrier.

His helmet turns toward you.

Not the whole section.

You.

Your stomach drops with the same frightening speed as the motorcycle, the moment lasts a second at most but it plays out in slow motion in your head, repeating again and again days after.

You become shameless about attending.

At first Maki comes with you. Then her schedule conflicts and you go alone, purchasing better seats each time.

You learn how to access presales, which venues offer paddock passes and where riders move between team areas and media obligations.

You learn to recognize Sukuna’s mechanic, a broad man named Choso who rarely smiles but speaks to him without fear.

You identify the trainer who works on his wrists and shoulder after races, blonde tall man who looks too composed for that job.

You know the woman in the sponsor polo is called Mei Mei and that she can make a group of grown men rearrange an entire hospitality tent with a single look.

You learn the details of Sukuna’s riding until admiration becomes information.

He is hard on the bike, but not careless.

Aggressive.

He brakes later than most riders and keeps weight over the front entering corners. He trusts the tire to hold. When the track becomes deeply rutted, he commits to lines other riders hesitate over. In whoops he keeps the front light and drives across the tops until the rear begins to step sideways, then corrects without losing much speed.

When conditions turn muddy, he grows more dangerous.

You watch him race through rain with his jersey plastered to his body and mud covering everything but the narrow clean strip behind his goggles. Other riders lose visibility, tear-offs disappearing one after another. Sukuna takes the holeshot, reaches the first turn ahead of the field and stays in clean air for most of the race.

Late in the moto, the track deteriorates. Ruts deepen. Jump faces become scarred and slick.

His pit board shows a comfortable lead.

He does not slow.

The commentators call it unnecessary.

You understand by then that necessity has very little to do with him.

Afterward, he stands on the podium soaked in mud and rain, a sponsor cap pulled over wet hair. He answers questions with short phrases while the interviewer tries to drag celebration out of him. His left hand opens and closes at his side, forearm visibly swollen.

He is in pain.

You see it because you are looking for it.

His shoulder does not lift fully when he raises the trophy.

You remain near the exit from the podium area while staff and photographers move around you. For one impossible moment, he walks directly toward where you stand.

Your heart becomes painful.

He is close enough for you to see mud dried in the fine lines beside his eyes.

Then Choso intercepts him, one hand coming to the back of his neck while he says something urgent. Sukuna’s expression changes. Not fear, just attention. He turns, and the team closes around him, leading him toward the medical area.

You watch him disappear.

He does not look back.

You tell yourself you are disappointed because you wanted to know whether he was injured or not.

That is only partly true.

The tension grows from all the moments that fail.

A glance through a barrier.

His hand lifting as if he might call you closer before a reporter pushes a microphone toward him.

Your body turning instinctively when his engine starts inside the paddock.

The way he sometimes looks for you after landing, scanning the front rows until he finds the dress, jacket or color you chose specifically to make the task easier.

You know how to be noticed.

This is not vanity.

It is a skill and you excel at it.

You understand lines, fabrics, contrast. You know when a neckline becomes memorable rather than excessive, when a coat shapes your body instead of hiding it, when a flash of gold at your throat catches stadium light. You know how to stand without fidgeting and meet a man’s eyes as if you have every right to hold them.

Sukuna notices everything, that much you can tell.

The more often you appear, the less he bothers pretending otherwise.

Once, he is being interviewed beside the track after winning a heat race. His helmet is off. Sweat has darkened his pink hair at the roots, and his chest rises hard beneath the jersey. The interviewer asks about a pass in the rhythm section. Sukuna answers while looking past the man’s shoulder toward your seat.

You smile at him.

His next sentence stops halfway through.

The interviewer glances back, trying to locate the distraction.

Sukuna drags his attention away and finishes the answer with irritation sharp enough that the man immediately changes topics.

Another time, you are at the paddock barrier when a woman holds out her phone and asks for a photograph. She leans too close. Sukuna signs the case instead of posing. When she protests, he hands it back and looks over her head at you.

You should not feel pleased with that, it’s petty, you know.

However, you do.

Months pass like this.

A period long enough for the people near his team area to begin recognizing you.

Choso gives you an assessing look the fourth time he sees you. By the sixth, he nods. Mei Mei watches with open calculation, gaze moving from you to Sukuna and back. One of the younger mechanics smiles whenever you arrive, as if you are part of an ongoing joke no one has explained.

Sukuna remains unreachable.

Until the night he decides otherwise.

It happens after a stadium event late in the season.

The main race is over. Sukuna wins after a poor start and a violent charge through the field, taking the lead with four minutes remaining. His final pass is made through the whoops, rear wheel skipping hard enough that the bike kicks sideways twice before settling. He crosses the finish and throws one arm up.

The roar inside the stadium becomes physical.

You are close to the floor, standing near the barrier with your hands gripping the rail. He takes the victory lap slowly, helmet turned toward the stands. When he reaches your section, he stops accelerating.

The bike rolls.

His head tilts.

The dark lens of his goggles points directly at you and for you, the time freezes.

Then he revs once and continues.

Your legs remain weak for several minutes. You live in that moment for a whole hour.

The freestyle presentation follows later, after interviews and another class race. Sukuna appears on a separate bike beneath moving lights and smoke, introduced not only as the night’s winner but as the reigning 450 champion.

The announcer builds the crowd with old footage of his biggest saves and most aggressive passes.

He performs two enormous whips, one in each direction, then a no-hander that makes you forget how dangerous confidence can be when attached to skill.

His final jump is lower, faster and more controlled than the others.

Not the most spectacular.

The most like him.

When the show ends, people begin moving toward the exits. You wait because leaving immediately means spending an hour trapped in traffic and because part of you is not ready to let the night finish.

Maki is not with you. You came alone, wearing a short dark coat over a fitted dress and boots chosen for appearance rather than comfort. Your feet ache. Your throat is dry from cheering. Your ears ring despite the plugs you wore through most of the program.

You wander toward the outer concourse, then down a route marked for hospitality access because your upgraded ticket allows it, considering lighting a cigarette just to spend time.

Staff are clearing equipment. Music still plays through the stadium at a lower volume. People with team credentials move between service corridors.

You nearly miss him.

The sound catches you first.

A motorcycle engine at idle, unmistakable for you after obsessing over them for so long.

You turn.

Sukuna is seated on the bike near a gated service lane, one boot planted on the concrete. He is still wearing his gear, though the helmet is off and rests against the bars. His hair is damp and disordered, face flushed from exertion. The top of his jersey has been pulled loose at the throat.

There is no crowd around him.

No barrier either.

Just a security guard farther down the corridor and a team member speaking into a radio near the gate.

Sukuna looks as if he has been waiting.

The thought is too arrogant to trust until he speaks,

“You planning to walk past me?”

You stop.

His voice is deeper than it sounds through interviews.

Rougher too.

Your mouth goes dry for a second time and your eyes widen a fraction.

“I didn’t know I was allowed to stop,” you reply, then beat yourself up for it for the next seconds.

“Hasn’t stopped you from staring.”

You recover enough to smile.

“You stare back.”

He looks you over slowly, with no attempt at politeness. Heat gathers beneath your coat despite the cold draft moving through the service entrance.

“Do I?”

“You’re not subtle, champion.”

“Never needed to be.”

The engine vibrates low and steady beneath him. He keeps one hand on the clutch and shifts his weight on the seat. The movement looks casual until you notice what it does — opens his body toward you, brings one knee slightly wider, allows him to lean closer without standing.

You take a few steps nearer.

The security guard glances over. Sukuna does not acknowledge him.

Up close, the aftermath of the race is visible. Sweat tracks from his temple to his jaw. A faint scrape crosses the skin beneath one eye. His forearms are pumped beneath the sleeves, veins pronounced from grip and exertion. The tape at his right wrist has begun peeling.

“You nearly lost it in the whoops,” you comment, casual, as if you are someone that can comment on an athlete's decision.

His eyebrows lift.

You can see it is not the opening he expected.

“No, I didn’t.”

“Your rear kicked twice.”

“I felt it.”

“You looked like you were about to get thrown over the bars.”

“If I were about to get thrown, I would’ve been thrown.”

“That sounds like something people say after surviving a really bad decision.”

His mouth curves.

Not the false, impatient expression he uses when sponsors expect friendliness.

A real grin.

It shows the edge of one sharp canine and changes him enough that the immediate effect reaches you , low, hot.

“You think it was a bad decision?”

He drawls and the arrogance is there.

“I think passing there was unnecessarily dangerous.”

“I won.”

“That does not improve the logic behind the bad decision,” you raise one eyebrow as you point out.

“It improves everything. I look amazing.”

You laugh despite yourself.

His gaze stays on your face while you do. Something in him seems to ease, though his shoulders remain held with the rigid tension of someone whose body has not yet accepted that the race is over.

“So. How long?” he asks.

You frown.

“How long what?”

“How long have you known enough about motocross to criticize my line choice?”

“A little while,” you offer, feigning innocence.

“That supposed to be an answer?”

“You’ve seen me enough times to know I don’t come only for the fireworks, right?”

“Yeah, I’ve seen you.”

The words are quiet.

Certain.

They strip the teasing out of the exchange for a moment.

The engine idles between you, filling the silence with a dense mechanical pulse. Sukuna leans forward, resting one forearm across the handlebars. The posture brings his face closer. His eyes are still vivid despite exhaustion.

“You were at Foxborough,” he says.

“Yeah.”

“Mud race before that.”

“Mhm.”

“Exhibition in Osaka.”

You had not been sure he saw you there.

Your chest tightens.

“You keep count?”

“Don’t flatter yourself.”

“You just listed them in order, though.”

He studies you for a long second, then looks at your mouth.

The shift is slight.

You feel it everywhere.

A team member approaches from the gate.

“Sukuna, Mei Mei wants—”

“Later.”

“She said now.”

“She says a lot of things.”

The man hesitates, glances at you and seems to understand something.

“Five minutes.”

Sukuna’s expression hardens, still his eyes don’t leave you.

“Ten. Maybe. I'll see her when I see her.”

The team member leaves without arguing.

You look after him.

“You seem easy to work with,” you smirk, looking at the poor staff that will probably be in the receiving end of the woman's fury.

“I’m excellent to work with.”

“Everyone appears terrified of you.”

“Efficient, isn’t it?”

He turns off the motorcycle.

The sudden absence of vibration makes the corridor feel strangely intimate. Your ears adjust to distant music and the rolling wheels of equipment cases.

Sukuna swings one leg over the bike and stands.

You know he is tall.

Knowing does not prepare you for him unfolding to his full height directly in front of you.

The motocross boots add even more. His shoulders are wider than they appeared across the barrier. The gear exaggerates him in some places and constrains him in others. He takes one step closer and the space between you becomes too small for indifference.

“You got somewhere to be?” he asks.

“No.”

“Someone waiting?”

“Nope.”

His eyes flick down to your event pass, then back up.

“Come with me.”

You should ask where. You follow him instead.

He rolls the bike beside him through the service gate, walking with the slight stiffness of someone locked inside heavy boots and protective equipment. The security guard watches but says nothing. A staff member opens another door after seeing Sukuna’s credentials.

You enter a restricted corridor lined with temporary signs, cables and stacked cases. The noise of the public areas fades behind concrete. Sukuna hands the motorcycle to a crew member without explanation.

“Team’s loading it,” the man says. “Choso wants feedback on the rear.”

“Too soft after the heat.”

“He thought you’d say that.”

“He should’ve fixed it before the main, then.”

The crew member rolls the bike away.

You look at Sukuna.

“Was that why it kicked?”

“No. That was me being faster than the section.”

The confidence is unbearable.

His dressing room is not glamorous. You expected something built around celebrity, but it resembles a functional locker room with better furniture. There is a couch, a padded table, a small refrigerator and a rack holding casual clothes. Bottles of water and electrolyte drinks crowd the counter. Fresh towels sit beside a medical kit.

Sukuna closes the door behind you.

Not locks, that would’ve been alarming, — though you doubt you'd try to run — simply closes.

Without the engine and the public space, you become sharply aware of his breathing. It is not as controlled as his voice suggests. His chest still rises more deeply than normal. Fine tremors pass through the muscles of one forearm when he flexes his hand.

He catches you watching.

“What?”

“Your hands.”

He looks down as if they belong to someone else.

“Arm pump.”

“Bad?”

“Had worse.”

“That isn’t what I asked.”

“You always interrogate people you’ve just met?”

“Only the ones who nearly launch themselves into stadium seating before asking me to follow them into private rooms, why you ask?”

His grin returns.

He reaches for the zipper at his throat.

“Private bothering you now?”

The question lands heavily.

You hold his gaze and trust he can't hear your heart thundering inside your chest.

“No.”

“Good.”

He draws the zipper down while maintaining eye contact.

The sound is small, metallic and obscene in the quiet room.

You look away on instinct.

That lasts approximately two seconds.

The riding suit opens over the jersey, peeling away from the breadth of his chest and shoulders. He works one arm free, then the other, pausing when the right shoulder catches. His jaw tightens. He rolls it carefully before tugging the sleeve down.

“You hurt it tonight?”

“Old.”

“Unstable?”

His eyes narrow.

“You a doctor?”

“No.”

“Then stop diagnosing me.”

“You’re the one wincing over there.”

“I didn’t.”

“You did.”

He lowers the suit to his waist and turns partly away to remove his gloves. The jersey clings between his shoulder blades, soaked darker with sweat. You can see the movement of every muscle beneath the fabric. The shirt pulls when he reaches behind his neck, exposing a strip of tan skin above the waistband.

Your attention stays too long.

“You came in here to talk, hm?” he says without looking at you.

“I am… talking.”

“Could’ve fooled me.”

He drags the jersey over his head.

Thought becomes way more difficult after that.

He is not merely muscular in the way attractive men who visit gyms are muscular. His body is built by repeated violence against motion. Thick shoulders, large arms, a chest carved by strength and breath. His waist narrows sharply beneath his ribs, deep V line vanishing under his lowered suit. Dark tattoos cross his skin in bands and angles, following the planes of muscle rather than hiding them.

Scars interrupt the ink.

A pale line near his collarbone. Small marks along one shoulder. A larger scar low across his side. Bruising darkens both hips where gear or impact pressed during the race. Red lines cross his ribs and back from protective equipment. The pressure marks at his waist look almost painful.

He turns.

You fail to look away, enthralled by his image.

His crimson eyes settle on your face, then drift lower as if checking where your attention has landed.

“Like what you’re seeing?”

The heat in the room changes.

It is probably your imagination. The dressing room is warm from the building systems, and you are still wearing a coat intended for the cold outside. That must be it.

That does not explain the dampness at the base of your spine and between your legs, though.

You take off the coat because doing something with your hands seems necessary.

Sukuna watches the movement.

“You asked me in here and started undressing,” you say. “Feels unfair to mock me for looking.”

“Not mocking.”

“No?”

“Enjoying.”

His gaze moves over the dress you chose specifically because it shapes your waist and leaves just enough skin visible at the chest and thighs to be remembered.

Recognition glints in his eyes.

“You always dress like this for races?”

“Only the good ones.”

“Lying already?”

You smile despite the pounding in your chest.

“You think you know me, superstar?”

“I know you choose where you stand in every race.”

His voice lowers.

“Know you wear things I can see from the track.”

You go still and hold your breath.

He steps out of the suit, lowering it over his hips and thighs. The base layer beneath is fitted close, leaving no question about the strength in his legs, nor the... well, you lower your eyes. One knee is enclosed in a brace with articulated supports. He unfastens it methodically while holding your gaze.

“You noticed me, then,” you aim on sounding smug, but your voice comes out too low for that.

“I notice everything on track.”

“That isn’t exactly track, is it?”

“No. Still worth noticing.”

The answer is immediate.

Your pulse becomes almost painful.

Sukuna sits on the edge of the padded table to remove his boots. He has to pull hard at each one, forearms flexing with the effort. When the first comes free, he exhales through his nose and stretches his ankle. A vivid red pressure mark circles the skin. The second boot reveals a scraped shin and another deep line where the protective shell pressed.

You stop trying to hide your concern.

“How much of you is bruised?”

“Enough.”

“That seems unsustainable.”

“So is racing. Hasn’t stopped me.”

He tosses the boot aside and looks up.

The shiver moves through him then.

Quick. Nearly invisible.

His shoulders tighten once, skin lifting with gooseflesh despite the warmth.

Adrenaline leaving.

You recognize it from what you read.

Without thinking, you take one of the clean towels from the counter and hold it out.

Sukuna looks at it.

Then at you.

Something unreadable passes through his face.

“You planning to dry me yourself?”

“You’re shivering,” you comment as if it’s not obvious to him.

“I’m not cold.”

“I know.”

For the first time that night, he has no immediate answer.

He takes the towel eventually, fingers brushing yours. His hands are big, veiny, rougher than you imagined. Calluses sit thick at the base of each finger, skin worn by grips, gloves and years of holding a machine that tries constantly to leave him behind.

He rubs the towel over his hair.

The gesture leaves it more disordered. Charming, nonetheless.

“What was your favorite part?” he asks casually.

You need a moment to follow the change.

“In tonight’s race?”

“Unless you’ve got something else in mind.”

There is enough innuendo in the sentence to make you look at him sharply.

He lifts one slit eyebrow.

You decide not to reward him yet.

“The pass through the whoops.”

“Thought it was a bad decision,” he jeers.

“It was. Still impressive.”

“What else?”

“The left whip during the presentation,” you offer, tilting your head, remembering the maneuver.

“Why?”

“You held the bike flatter.”

“Opposite direction’s harder.”

“I know.”

His towel stills for a moment and you see the doubt flashing behind carmine eyes that narrow as they find yours.

“You know?”

“You drop your right shoulder more on your natural side. Going left, you keep your upper body tighter and pull the bike farther under you before landing,” you nerd out without thinking much about how you’ve really studied him and the sport he excels at.

You're explaining his maneuvers and methods to himself. You may have gotten to the point of looking like a weirdo or a stalker.

Silence.

Not empty silence.

Sukuna looks at you with a focus more intense than any glance across a crowd.

You feel seen down to the choices that brought you here.

“You really did your homework,” he says. "Good girl."

“I wanted to understand what I was watching,” you pretend you didn't hear the praise for your own good and the well being of your heart.

“Most people just want a crash or a backflip,” he deadpans.

“I wanted to know why you look different from everyone else,” you say in a sheepish tone, but really honest.

His expression shifts.

You have complimented him before, indirectly, through your attendance and attention. But this reaches him in a place applause does not. You can see it in the way his grip loosens around the towel. In the brief movement of his throat when he swallows. In how he looks away for the first time since you entered.

“What makes me different, then?” he asks.

The question is quieter than you expect from him.

You lean back against the counter.

“You don’t look like you’re fighting the bike out there.”

“That’s because I’m not.”

“What are you doing, then?”

“Making it do what I want.”

You open a warm smile.

“That.”

He gives you a look that suggests the answer pleases him more than he intends to show.

Then he stands, crossing the room toward the clothing rack.

He is close when he passes.

Too close for accident.

The heat of his bare skin reaches you. His shoulder nearly touches yours. The towel hangs around his neck, and one end brushes your arm. You catch the scent of sandalwood, sweat, leather, the mineral bite of dried dirt and the faint medicinal smell of athletic tape.

He stops beside you instead of continuing.

Your breath catches and you go still like a deer in headlights.

Sukuna reaches slowly past your shoulder for a bottle of water on the counter — his chest inches from yours.

He twists the cap open and drinks while watching you over the rim. Water moves down his throat. A small drop escapes near his mouth and tracks along his jaw.

You look, because how the fuck could you not?

He notices.

Impossible not to at this distance.

“You’re sweating,” he comments.

“Because you’re standing on top of me?” You try your best not to let your voice crack.

“Could move.”

He does not.

Neither do you.

“You invited me to talk, right?” you remind him.

“Talking.”

“Could've fooled me." you deadpan and the corner of his mouth twitches.

“I guess it's your turn to undress then.”

He is teasing you, you know it, and he’s so fucking infuriating you just blink at him.

It should ease the tension.

Instead, the familiarity makes it a bit worse.

Sukuna finally steps away, turning to pull on dark jeans. He dresses without modesty and without making a performance of it, which somehow turns every ordinary movement into one. He adds a black shirt, fitted enough that the shape of his body remains obvious. A thin silver chain follows, the dog tag resting against his sternum. Heavy leather boots replace the motocross ones. He shrugs into a leather jacket last.

The transformation is startling.

The athlete disappears again, but not into the hostile public figure from behind the barrier. This version looks as though he belongs in dark bars after midnight, one hand around a glass and the other resting somewhere perhaps dangerous.

He catches you staring at the jacket.

“Disappointed?”

“That you put clothes on?” You glare at him, but you kinda are.

Your lips curve up slightly.

His grin sharpens.

“Honest, aren’t we?”

“Almost always. Trying my best here,” you shrug.

“You’re really bad at it,” he tilts his head slightly.

“Then why do you look this pleased?”

“Because you’re bad at hiding everything else too.”

He approaches again.

This time he stops far enough away to give you a choice, though his eyes make the distance feel meaningless.

“I’m getting a drink,” he says. “Come with me.”

Your answer is a nod that is more enthusiastic than you wish it was.

The expression that crosses his face is too satisfied for such a small victory.

Champion, champion

I'm calling you from the future To let you know we've made a mistake There's a fog from the past that's giving me Giving me such a headache

And I'm back with a madness I'm a champion of the people Who don't believe in champions I got nothing but dreams inside I got nothing but dreams

I'm just young enough to still believe, still believe But young enough not to know what to believe in Young enough not to know what to believe in, yeah

If I can live through this If I can live through this If I can live through this I can do anything

If I can live through this If I can live through this If I can live through this I can do anything

Champion, champion Champion, champion

I got rage every day, on the inside The only thing I do is sit around and kill time I'm trying to blow out the pilot light I'm trying to blow out the light

I'm just young enough to still believe, still believe But young enough not to know what to believe in Young enough not to know what to believe

If I can live through this If I can live through this If I can live through this I can do anything

If I can live through this If I can live through this If I can live through this I can do anything

Champion, champion I can do anything Champion, champion And I can do anything

Champion, champion And I can do anything Champion, champion I can do anything!

If I can live through this If I can live through this If I can live through this And I can do anything

If I can live through this If I can live through this If I can live through this I can do anything

If I can live through this If I can live through this If I can live through this If I can live through this, I can do anything

If I can live through this If I can live through this If I can live through this If I can live through this

I can do anything I can do anything I can do anything I can do anything!

Champion, champion