Here are the festive Azula-kitsune and Katara-naga. I'm having a hard time with color, so here are two versions of the image.
____________________________________
I apologize for making Katara white, but please refrain from writing angry comments.
can you pls use the correct tag next time? i mean your art is "gosuku" so can you use it instead of sukugo? (No hate it's just a question, you can ignore it if you want)
I try to use all hashtags)) Maybe this time I forgot to tag “sukugo.” Actually, my favorite tag is “Satokuna,” but for some reason, no one uses it 🥺
art by the perfect @hitsuo of course
Satoru is annoying, doesn't fit in his life and yet, he makes his mother laugh and trains with him whenever he's around. Sukuna sucks it up and promises not to be an ass while trying to figure out what is this strange sensation unspooling under his ribs.
He only comes because Sayo works the desk and his membership rides her employee comp. Without that, he’s not here — no way he’s paying the city’s “youth rate” with what they don’t have.
Wraps in his pocket, homework half-finished in his bag, ink peeking under his sleeves because Sayo let him get tattooed if — and only if — he didn’t drop school.
He almost did
She almost killed him.
The lobby smells like disinfectant over rubber. A box fan hums behind the counter. Sayo looks up and the whole place brightens, she’s all long hair the same soft pink as his — pulled into a loose tail that slides over one shoulder — and eyes the cool, impossible blue people remember.
When she smiles, her nose and eyes wrinkle the way they do when she’s actually happy.
It looks like sunlight.
It also looks like a warning label if you know her.
The tall white haired kid leaning against the counter mirrors the same wrinkle-eyed grin like he was born with it.
“Gojo Satoru,” he tells Sayo’s sign-in sheet, like he’s giving it a commercial. He’s in too-clean trainers, school track jacket, wrists bare except for athletic tape he doesn’t need.
Expensive shampoo.
No gym bag.
“Sampling classes.”
“Put your name on the waiver, sampling boy,” Sayo says, sunshine with teeth. “And wrap your hands right.”
Sukuna signs in, nods at Sayo, ignores the blond. The gym floor is the real room — scuffed heavy bags, a ring that lists a little, timer that beeps too loud. He tucks earbuds away and goes to work — three rounds just to find breath, three more to feel his shoulders stop choking his punches. Elbows in, wrists straight, hips honest. On the seventh he’s warm enough to forget there’s a world outside these ropes.
“Pad work?” the kid says, suddenly there with a pair of mitts like they teleported into his hands. Closer, the details line up — eyes too blue to be contacts, hands with old callus in the right places, stance that says he’s held pads before even if he’s pretending he hasn’t.
He’s taller by a head, reach for days, balance decent.
Annoying.
“Hold them still,” Sukuna says.
He doesn’t.
The first combination skates off a drifting mitt, the kid laughs like he enjoyed getting it wrong and sets his feet better. Sukuna gives him the numbers again, sharper. The third time the left mitt stays, Sukuna buries a hook into the body to say thanks.
The kid oofs, breath punched crooked, and then laughs through it, eyes bright like this is the best part of his day.
“Okay,” the kid says, grinning around air he’s trying to catch. “You hit for real.”
“No kidding.” Sukuna mocks.
Sayo is already circling, nurse-brain on. She takes the mitt off Satoru’s hand, checks his knuckles, tightens his haphazard tape, fixes a twist he didn’t know he had.
“If you’re coming back,” she says, tone sweet, instructions exact, “you come back wrapped.”
“I’m coming back,” he answers, and he’s looking at Sukuna, not the tape.
Sukuna rolls his eyes and throws the next combo. The kid holds steady this time, the catch is solid, the return tap lands right in Sukuna’s palm.
Not stupid, then. Just loud.
Between sets, Sukuna clocks the other tells because that’s what he does, the kid’s shoes have soles without a day of real road on them, his jacket is school-issue but the fabric is better than the public school gets, his mouthguard is new in the box but he hasn’t boiled it, his smile is careless in a way you can only afford if you never had to price out bus fare vs. dinner.
When the pad round ends, he bounces on his heels like he could go another five. He probably can.
He’s built like someone the world made space for on the first try.
Satoru peels the mitts off and offers a glove bump like they’ve already agreed to something. Sukuna taps it because refusing would be more dramatic than he feels.
The tall idiot grins like he won anyway.
“Hydrate,” Sayo says, passing Sukuna his bottle before he reaches for it, passing Satoru the gym’s communal towel he absolutely does not deserve.
“And, Gojo? Check the sign by the clock. Shoes off on the ring. If Coach sees you scuffing canvas, he’ll feed you to the mop.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Satoru says, delighted to be managed.
He reads the sign out loud just to make Sayo laugh. She does, nose scrunching, eyes crinkling — same pattern as his, which puts a strange pressure behind Sukuna’s sternum he doesn’t examine.
Round timer screams. Sukuna goes back to the bag because he knows what he becomes if he stops moving. He doesn’t look to see if Satoru watches.
He feels it anyway — the attention like a hand on the back of his neck, curious, not hostile. It puts a burr under his focus and makes him cleaner, which pisses him off a little, which helps.
By the time he strips his gloves, Satoru’s at the front again, trading dumb jokes for a spare lock.
Sayo hands one over and points at the whiteboard, Teen study hour 7–8:30. No excuses.
Her ponytail swings. The blue of her eyes softens when she looks at Sukuna’s hands — checking for fresh splits, checking for the story of his day.
“How was school?” she asks, and it’s a code more than a question.
“Still there,” he says. Code back, I went.
“Good,” she says. “History test Friday. If you pass it, I’ll stop pretending I don’t see the new line of ink.”
He tugs his sleeve down out of reflex, blackwork edges wink at his wrist anyway.
“It’s healed,” he says.
Satoru notices the ink because of course he does.
“Sick,” he says, equal parts admiration and invitation to explain. Sukuna doesn’t take the invitation. Satoru doesn’t sulk when it’s not taken. He just smiles like okay, later and taps the counter twice with a knuckle like he’s ringing a bell only he can hear.
He signs the waiver. His handwriting is neat and fast. He lists a home number, pauses, erases, writes a mobile.
He doesn’t look at either of them while he does it. Sukuna files that without deciding why.
“Come back wrapped,” Sayo repeats, sliding him a roll of cheap tape and a look that says I will be checking.
To Sukuna,
“Bus in ten. Don’t miss it.”
He won’t. He never does when she asks like that.
Satoru lifts two fingers in a lazy salute at both of them and backs toward the door. “Tomorrow?”
Sukuna should say no. He hears himself say,
“If you hold them still.”
The grin gets bigger, if that’s possible.
“Copy that.”
Door chime, night air, he’s gone.
The lobby feels normal again.
Sukuna hates that the quiet is less interesting.
Sayo leans on the counter and levels that mother-voice that isn’t quite scolding.
“Don’t scowl so hard. Your face will stick.”
“He’s annoying.” Sukuna says.
“He’s sunshine,” she says, exactly like the boy was five minutes ago, eyes crinkling, nose wrinkling, weaponized warmth. “Also — sugar?” She pops a lemon candy into his palm without waiting for an answer.
He doesn’t say thanks. He unwraps it, tucks it under his tongue, and shoulders his bag.
The paper sticks to his fingers, her blue eyes flick to the trash, he drops the wrapper in.
Right is repeatable.
On his way to the door he checks the big wall mirror the way he always does — to make sure the posture is his and not the one the day gave him. The reflection shows a kid who looks older than eighteen and exactly eighteen at once — ink-edged, wrist taped, jaw set, alive.
Behind him, Sayo waves with that ridiculous pink waterfall of hair and the kind of smile that keeps a city lit.
He tells himself that’s why he catches his bus on time and shows up tomorrow.
He knows it isn’t only that.
He hates that it isn’t only that.
He goes anyway.
Round 2 — First Snag
He tells himself the kid won’t come back. Rich boys like to sample and vanish. Then the door chime goes and there he is — white hair even in the bad lobby light, eyes that stupid bright blue, tape already looped around his fingers like he actually practiced.
Sukuna is halfway through jump rope when Satoru waves at Sayo like they’ve been friends for years. She grins back — nose and eyes wrinkling — and tugs his tape to tighten it, long pink hair sliding forward over her shoulder.
It lands wrong in Sukuna’s chest.
He drops the rope, grabs his wraps, heads for his bag. Satoru shadows him without asking.
“Round pads?” Satoru says. No mitts in his hands yet, just that expectation in his voice like the answer’s already yes.
“What do you even want here?” Sukuna asks, not bothering to hide the edge. “Tour’s over.”
Satoru blinks, then smiles like he’s been handed a trick question.
“To get hit less than yesterday. Ambitious, I know.”
Sukuna stares. Most rich kids want a selfie, a spar to post, a story about the scary tattooed guy.
This one brings tape and bad jokes and attention that doesn’t feel like a camera.
He doesn’t know what to do with that.
He hates that he doesn’t know.
They glove up. Satoru holds the mitts better — feet set, elbows soft, eyes on the shoulders. He’s listening without showing it. Sukuna gives him the numbers, adds speed, buries a hook when the mitt drifts. The kid absorbs it, breath hitches, smile stays.
Annoying.
Between rounds Satoru raids the vending machine and drops a lemon candy on Sukuna’s gym bag like yesterday.
An “offering.”
Sukuna flicks it back without looking. It skids to a stop at Sayo’s sneakers.
“Rude,” Satoru calls.
Sayo picks it up, pops it into Sukuna’s hand anyway.
“Sugar crash is real,” she says, then softer to him, “Homework before night session. Deal?”
He has the wrong answer ready. He swallows it.
“Deal.”
Satoru leans on the counter, talking to Sayo while she scans in new members. She laughs at something dumb he says, nose wrinkling, eyes creasing. They look related that way and it scrapes at Sukuna’s nerves.
He doesn’t want the kid near her.
He doesn’t want to be the guy who says that out loud either.
Satoru comes back with a mouthguard, still stiff from the box.
“Boil it for me?” he asks Sayo, shameless.
“Sink’s for staff,” she says, already taking it.
She drops it into the kettle behind the desk, taps a timer with a knuckle, hands him a bowl and a towel like he belongs here. Sukuna changes directions on the bag, angry at the bag for being there.
What does the kid want.
He has nothing to give him here except violence and the patience to do it right.
It should send him away.
It doesn’t.
Back on the floor, Satoru’s phone hums through his jacket.
He ignores it, then doesn’t.
A preview lights, Come home. We don’t mix with —
He locks the screen too fast. Smile returns, cheaper around the edges.
“Everything good?” Sayo asks, casual on purpose.
“Perfect,” he lies, bright.
Sukuna says nothing. The heavy bag takes it for him.
They run another pad round.
Satoru’s timing improves enough to be interesting.
He drops his left when he chases the cross.
Sukuna taps the mitt against his wrist.
“Left higher,” he says.
Satoru obeys without a joke. It throws Sukuna off more than the jokes do.
Water break. Satoru stands too close while Sayo presses the mouthguard into his teeth and pinches the sides to form it.
He jokes around it, she swats him, still smiling.
Sukuna watches her hand on the kid’s jaw, the way she checks his bite, the way she does when he gets new headgear.
Heat crawls up his throat, stupid and fast.
Sayo glances over like she heard it.
“You’re scowling,” she says. “That better not be a grade report face.”
“It’s a face,” he says.
“Jealous?” she teases, light as air.
“Of you?” He snorts.
It’s safer than answering the real question. She rolls her blue eyes and lets it go.
They get back in the ring. Satoru’s a quick study and a show-off when he thinks no one is looking. Sukuna hates that combination and respects it. He gives angles that force Satoru to move his feet.
Satoru adjusts, stumbles once, laughs at himself, gets it right the next time.
He learns. That’s the problem.
After cooldown, Satoru lingers at the desk again, fingers tapping a private rhythm against the laminate.
Sayo slides him a spare lock and points at the whiteboard, Teen Study Hour 7–8:30. No excuses. He reads it out loud like yesterday just to make her laugh again. She does.
Sukuna swallows another lemon he didn’t eat.
Locker room is loud and tiled and safe. Sukuna finds a cheap tiger keychain hooked through his vent — plastic, dumb, exactly his problem.
He should throw it away. He leaves it. Not for Satoru. For later.
When he comes back out, Satoru is testing the mouthguard fit, talking around it.
“Thish ish good,” he says. Sayo bumps him with her hip, tells him to enunciate, hands Sukuna a bottle and, like she can’t help herself, checks his knuckles for splits.
He wants to say stop fussing over him, and don’t fuss over me, and get him out of here, and don’t go, all at once.
None of that makes sense.
He closes his mouth on all of it.
Satoru clocks the look, tilts his head like he’s trying to solve a puzzle he likes.
“Tomorrow?” he asks.
Sukuna hears himself answer before he decides to.
“Don’t be late.”
“Copy,” Satoru says, unreasonably pleased.
The phone hums again. He finally checks it, thumb hovering. He doesn’t reply. He locks the screen, tucks the phone away, and meets Sukuna’s eyes with something steadier than a grin.
“Later.”
Sukuna shrugs, which costs less than nodding. Satoru leaves.
The noise of the gym fills back in around the space he took up.
Sayo leans over the counter, chin in hand.
“He’s good for you,” she says, reading him like only she can. “You’re clean when he’s there.”
“He’s loud.” Sukuna says.
“You’re loud inside,” she answers. Then she softens it with a smile that could power a street. “Eat something before study hour. And think about what you actually don’t like, him, or that he makes me laugh, or that you don’t know what to call this.”
He glares at the floor because it’s easier.
“It’s annoying.”
“Accurate.” she says, amused. “Go wash your face.”
He does.
In the mirror the teenager looking back is irritated, taped, alive. He doesn’t know what he feels about Satoru. He knows he doesn’t like not knowing.
He dries off, pockets the lemon candy this time, and heads for the study table because Sayo asked, because the kid will be back, because he is not going to be the one who flinches first.
Round 3 — Oh, We’re Doing This
Sukuna decides before dawn to stop being a jerk — at least for a day.
Sayo asked for “nice,” and when she asks, he bleeds to make it happen. She won’t let him quit school to work nights, so he makes her life easy in the ways she’ll allow — on time, no fights, pass history, keep the gym clean, don’t mouth off to staff.
If being decent to Gojo is on that list, he’ll try.
Satoru is waiting outside with two paper cups and that winter-bright hair.
“She said you take sugar,” he says, breath fogging. “So. Sugar.”
“Thanks,” Sukuna says.
The word tastes weird in his mouth.
Satoru blinks like he just got handed a rare animal, then smiles smaller, realer.
Inside, Sukuna sets cones for footwork and wipes yesterday’s chalk off the ring apron before Coach sees it.
He does the chores fast so Sayo won’t have to.
Satoru trails him, not in the way of it, just… there.
Sayo arrives in a too-big puffer and sunshine. Long pink hair down today, blue eyes bright enough to make the lobby less tired. She clocks the cones, the clean apron, the way Sukuna’s wraps are already tight.
Her smile says she noticed.
“Warm-up,” she calls. “Then mitts. Sukuna — show him the wrist wrap I like.”
Sukuna nods and crooks a finger. Satoru holds out his hand without performing. Sukuna takes it, sets the heel, crosses the tape, anchors the thumb.
“Keep this snug,” he says. “You’re dropping your left because your wrist feels naked.”
Satoru watches like it matters.
“Copy. Thank you.”
Mitts go smooth. Sukuna keeps his tone even when he corrects.
“Weight centered. Breathe. Don’t chase the cross.” Satoru adjusts without jokes. It helps.
Between rounds Satoru’s phone buzzes — Mother — and he kills the screen.
The grin tries to return and doesn’t quite make it. Sukuna offers him the water first.
“Hold pads after? I’ll run.”
“Yes, sir,” Satoru says, teasing the honorific, but he takes the job and does it right. Sukuna runs his laps and watches, in the corner of his eye, Satoru re-stack plates that weren’t his and turn the timer down a notch so it won’t blast Sayo’s ears.
Fine.
Sayo drifts by with the med kit like always. She checks Satoru’s knuckles and Sukuna’s tape, smooths a wrinkle with her thumb.
“Both of you — study hour after. I brought snacks.”
Her look at Sukuna is fond and loaded.
Pass history and I’ll book you amateur night.
“Got it,” he says. He means I’ll pass.
Satoru lingers at the desk while she logs waivers, talking about nothing in particular — bus routes, the vending machine that eats coins — and she laughs, nose wrinkling in the same pattern that used to belong only to him.
It stings less today.
Maybe because Satoru wipes the counter crumbs without being asked.
Maybe because Sayo’s smile cuts to Sukuna as often as it does to the kid, like see? This is better, right?
Back on the floor, Sukuna tries another experiment in “nice.”
“You want rounds in the ring,” he asks, flat “or more pads?”
“Ring,” Satoru says, a little too eager, then checks himself. “Please.”
They keep it light — touch spar, tap and move. Satoru’s fast feet start to make sense. Sukuna praises once, quiet and clean.
“Good angle.” Satoru absorbs it like heat. No crowing. Just work.
Cool-down stretches. Sukuna mirrors Sayo’s routine because she worries when he skips. Satoru follows his lead without comment. The phone buzzes again, this time Satoru turns it face-down under his towel and looks at Sukuna instead.
“Study after?” he asks, like an invitation, not a test.
“Yeah,” Sukuna says. “History.”
Satoru grimaces.
“I’m terrible at dates.”
“Then carry the snacks,” Sukuna says. It lands like a joke and an order both.
Sayo locks the register, flips the OPEN sign, and threads her arm through Sukuna’s for half a second on the way to the staff kettle.
“Thank you,” she murmurs, so soft only he hears it.
“For what?” he says, deadpan.
“For being kind,” she says. “It looks good on you.”
He grunts, ears hot, and takes the kettle to fill it so she won’t have to.
When he comes back, Satoru is setting out paper cups and a banana like he belongs here, careful not to take the last of anything, careful in a way that reads as learned, not innate.
Sukuna doesn’t know what to call the thing that’s settling under his ribs — less anger, not comfort, something like room.
He knows this much, Sayo’s shoulders sit lower when Gojo is around and not being an idiot, and today she looked at him like he makes her day easier.
That’s enough for now.
He bumps Satoru’s shoulder on the way to the study table.
“Left higher,” he says out of habit.
“On it,” Satoru says, and then, like he can’t help himself, “Thanks… for the not-being-a-jerk trial run.”
Sukuna snorts.
“Don’t get used to it.”
“Too late,” Satoru says, grinning with less shine and more truth.
They sit
Sayo drops a lemon candy on each of their notebooks and opens the history packet to the ugliest map on page three.
Sukuna hates maps. He studies anyway. It’s what Sayo asked.
And being decent to Satoru? For today, it’s part of the job.
2087
izzy806
theartofmadeline
discoholicmusic
snowghoul
stormborns
