sukuna is the best possible option, given the circumstances.
i believe this chapter is dead dove do not eat. tw for graphic depictions of decapitation & light cannibalism<3 enjoy!!
divider by @/saradika-graphics
| playlist for this chapter | masterlist (this is part 5)
The sunlight is a hazy, bloody mess in the sky. Sukuna rides his horse proudly, Thousand Miles, towards the town. It is his horse now, there are no more fairs and he has spent so long practicing. Saddled with him, tied in a grotesquely tight noose, is the head of a man named Jeffrey, drained of blood and blue from mortis. The head bounces rhythmically with every step the horse takes. He holds the reins of Thousand Miles in confident hands, body swaying with the easy walk that the horse has.
Beside him, Uraume walks. He holds a bag, filled with gifts for the townspeople. Today had to be the day– otherwise it would have had too much of a stench. Electronic refrigerators are a thing of the past.
Toji rides too, on Split Soul. He holds his rifle up against his shoulder, at parade rest. He looks more like a knight carrying his lance before he goes to a joust, so comfortable on his horse. Behind his saddle, tied up and frantic, is a man named Holden, who makes pathetic noises, twisting and trying to free himself.
Sukuna turns around at the sound, resting a hand on the back of his saddle.
“What are you going to do? Inch away like a worm?” He asks Holden. “Should we have killed you instead?”
Holden muffles a bit more, fear over his features. Sukuna looks over at Toji. “Shut him up.” Then, he’s facing straight again.
Toji knocks the butt of his rifle against the man’s forehead. He cuts skin. Holden falls silent, droplets of blood hitting the ground with every pulse of his heart.
“Don’t know what he thought,” Sukuna says, shaking his head and adjusting the brim of his hat, a black spare Stetson that Toji had. “Can’t even form proper words.”
You look away from the show of violence. How despicable. You keep your eyes trained on the horizon. It was too dangerous to leave you at the farm. Who knows who might come by looking for shelter, looking for food, looking for women…
As you approach the town, you pass through a small residential area, which has cute, historical townhouses that are pressed together with lawns that were once manicured, but are now gray and thirsty. Perhaps at one point, little families lived in these townhouses. There are toys outside some of them still, Fisher Price cars made of thick, faded, red-and-yellow plastic.
Each house is contained by a little brick half wall meant to serve as a fence, with large, black iron gates. One yard is simply filled with perfectly smooth little yellow-and-cream stones, which contrast minimally to the painted white brick of the town house.
You look at the houses with longing. Once upon a time, you dreamed of having a cute little historical townhome that you could take perfect care of with a rose bush and a magnolia tree. Maybe you’d have a little table and two chairs, wrought iron, under the tree to have breakfast and happy hour under. With a lover– all visions of your future include a nondescript lover.
Now, that dream is dead. Dead as the men being ferried into the town center. The horses' hooves clop as the asphalt turns to neat stone. The townhouses turn into cute little shop fronts and restaurants, advertising flowers and consignments and jewelry. How quaint. A long time ago, you could have probably lost yourself in these streets.
The well-planned roads lead to a town center, where the Sheriff– a lanky, thin man– seems to be trying to give directives through a megaphone to the people gathered around. Maybe fifty people, sixty. There appears to be unrest of some sort. Your heart speeds in your chest at the sight of so many people– being in your small company has dwindled your social anxiety and suddenly, it’s spiking again.
The Sheriff trails off as he sees the approaching horses. He lowers his microphone, truly taking them in, and what a sight that must be: three riders, faces shaded by wide brimmed hats, someone walking alongside them with a sack in their arms.
He stands on the steps of what must be the city council building, or the town hall. The steps are miraculously white and glisten in the bloody sun. The build itself is a grand thing, a sight to behold. Roman columns, writing at the top where a frieze should be. Maybe you should have really gone to the eye doctor before it all went to shit, maybe your vision really is that bad…
Sukuna rides through the crowd, which part for him like the Red Sea, gasping and murmuring to each other. Uraume walks still by his side, handing out little parcels of neatly wrapped meat to the townspeople, with Toji right behind him. He keeps a wide berth of the fire that simmers in the center of the square, this pyre of humanity. There’s a cooking rod drawn across it, but no pot hangs from it.
You linger in the back, unarmed and trying your best to stay out of sight. You don’t want to see this. You know exactly what is going to happen– at least, you can imagine it: Sukuna’s crimes, the screams, the smell of pork the following morning.
Sukuna grins at the Sheriff, charming and boyish. He remains atop Thousand Miles while he talks to him. The beheaded Jeffrey is eye level with the Sheriff, whose eyes bounce back between the dead eyes and the deadly eyes above him.
“I heard you had a thieving problem,” Sukuna says. “I handled it for you.”
The Sheriff’s mouth moves– opening and closing like a fish. Speechlessness is written all over his features, down to the way his hand trembles, trembling the megaphone too.
“I– I– I–”
“Fushiguro let me know, and I took care of it,” Sukuna says, nodding his head back at Toji. Toji gives the Sheriff a polite nod, a polite tip of his hat. “You know, you’ve had this thieving problem on your hands for two weeks… how many rations have been lost in that time? Your people are going hungry…” Sukuna directs the horse to walk behind the Sheriff.
“Sheriff, how will you keep this from happening again?” Sukuna asks. He looks to the people. “I know how hunger feels. I have been out hunting. There is still food in the forests, which has been unradiated. I have brought you gifts from my hunt! Please, enjoy.”
His smile is menacing, canines glinting with malice.
“Just know that things… things could be better.”
Sukuna drops from his horse, just as he practiced so many times. He wraps his arm around the Sheriff’s shoulders, lowering his voice to speak privately to him. “How will you keep this from happening again? I’ve brought you the other thief.”
He gestures to Holden, who’s coming to reality on the back of Split Soul. The man’s eyes widen as he realizes he’s in front of his faction, in front of his people. He twists and turns. He can’t speak. He’s gagged, but his tongue has been fed to the hogs.
“What will you do?” Sukuna asks quietly.
“I– I banish him!” The Sheriff says quickly. “You are banished…?”
Sukuna hums. “That feels like an awfully light punishment. He’s made your people go hungry, hasn’t he? Has he not been able to keep his belly full while you ration out what? Stale saltines and canned tuna?”
Looking towards the crowd, Sukuna motions for Toji to take Holden down. The man manhandles him, carrying him until he’s kneeling in front of the crowd, fear in his eyes. Sukuna looks down at him with disdain.
“Should he not be punished more severely?” Sukuna asks the crowd. He needs no megaphone to address them. “Bashishment means that he will be back! What should we do?”
“Kill him!” Someone shouts from the crowd, like the click of flint against steel. Sukuna grins wickedly as the crowd cheers in agreement.
“I think,” Sukuna ventures, looking down at Holden. “That thieves ought to not have hands. Why travel to the afterlife if they can thieve there too?”
The crowd cheers, excited and hungry. Sukuna grins, looking at Uraume. “Prepare his hands.”
Uraume kneels before Holden, taking his hands in theirs. This song and dance is not unfamiliar. Sukuna reaches on Thousand Miles, pulling his machete from the steed’s saddle. He kisses the blade, then raises it up.
In the poisoned sun, Sukuna’s blade glints. He had sharpened it that morning, when you realized where the midnight scream came from. When it dawned on you, with the rising sun, what your morning would have in store for you. How this day would go.
The Sheriff watches in abject horror. You watch in abject horror.
Instead, you remember your conversation with Sukuna that morning, teary eyed as you watched Uraume dutifully cook steak bites on the stove and portion out into little ziplock baggies.
“Don’t worry,” he had said, “We’ll put the other to use too.”
Sukuna bends to whisper to Holden. “You are lucky, my blade is sharp. When I used to do this, I would tie people up and pull their arms off– sometimes their hands would just pop off. Bad joints. But this…” He gently rests the blade against Holden’s bound wrists, against the juncture of wrist to forearm, against the rope binding his hands together. The hairs of Holden’s arms are reflected in the steel. “I’m thinking it will take two, three times to slice through the bone. Let’s find out, huh?”
Oh, he’s so excited he might as well be hard. But he’s not one of those sick freaks that gets sexual pleasure from this kind of pain. No, no, he’s a real man. And a real man loves hunting and butchering and the spraying of blood–
Holden whimpers. Sukuna raises the machete in both hands and brings it down with a sickening slice, cutting through the thick air. Holden cries out in pain as the machete meets bone. Then, Sukuna raises the bloody blade once more, bringing it down even harder. Bones crack. Again. And again. And then his hands are on the ground and he’s wailing and Sukuna is grinning.
There’s blood and gratification splattered across his face, and the crowd is cheering. Holden’s hands fall in opposite directions, one continuing down the steps and one landing straight up and down before slowly falling flat on its palm.
There is so. Much. Blood. It spurts comically and rhythmically, in time with his rapidly beating heart. You pray that he’ll pass out from blood loss before anything worse can happen to him.
“Death?” Sukuna asks the crowd again, gripping Holden’s hair with one hand, holding the machete to his neck. His blood pumps excitedly through his veins, his heart leaping with joy. This is better than sex, and it’s been weeks since he got his rocks off. “Think of the hunger in your stomachs!”
There’s more cheering. Sukuna makes eye contact with you, from across the crowd. And you watch, with wide eyes, as the machete slices along his neck. You imagine he gurgles; the blood gurgles, like it did in the shoe store. The blood pools out of him like shitty Halloween makeup, dripping through his stubble and over his Adam’s apple.
Then, Uraume comes to take Holden’s head in their hands, gripping his hair. Sukuna lops his head off with precision. At the first swing, Holden’s head goes limp, hanging on by his spinal cord. Blood flows from his gaping wound, rushing out of him and down over his tie-dye Grateful Dead t-shirt. Even from here, you can see how red it all is, though it seems that most of his blood left through his arms, pooled in front of him on the dirtied marble stairs. Another lop. At least he’s dead now. Another. Then the spine breaks, and his body falls, and Uraume holds the head.
They immediately offer it to Sukuna. Sukuna takes the head in his hands, gripping it by the hair, and holds it up. Blood splatters, on the ground, on him, from the decapitation.
“You will never be wronged again!” Sukuna announces. “I, Sukuna, will make sure of it.”
Pride wells in his chest and the people cheer. Sukuna looks over to the Sheriff, questioning look on his face. Defy me? his expression inquires.
Sukuna raises his machete to the Sheriff’s face, watching the crowd closely. Their breaths are bated, eyes wide. Well liked, he surmises. He slowly lowers the killing tool, dulled from the constant hacking.
“Make a wise choice,” Sukuna murmurs, slowly sheathing his machete.
The Sheriff nods quickly, dropping his megaphone with a clatter, which tumbles down towards the severed hands, and heads to join the crowd. Sukuna points at you, then crooks his finger to motion you over.
With your heart in your throat, you move through the crowd; commanded. Surprisingly, they part for you as well, giving you a wide berth.
Each step Playful Cloud takes, you match with an easy sway of your body, trying your best to remain calm and collected. Though, you feel your heart in your throat, trying to climb out more and more with each pulse as you near Sukuna.
Blood-splattered Sukuna. Hair-gripping Sukuna. Your Sukuna.
Sukuna comes down a stair, and holds his hand out to you, waiting for you to approach. The head is still in his hand. You stop before him, and Uraume quickly comes over to help you dismount. Then, you’re in Sukuna’s greedy arms. He wraps an arm around your waist, dropping the head to the ground. It hits the stair with a dull thud, then rolls down.
You watch it. Sukuna tilts your chin up to look at him, getting blood on your pretty skin. He leans down– and it’s happening, it’s finally happening– his lips press against yours in a deep claim. He cups the side of your head, tilting his own to deepen the kiss further. He licks his way into your mouth, possessive and demanding. And you find your back arching, pressing yourself to him despite your best interests.
Sukuna pulls away, wildly drunk on his newfound, rightful power. And you can’t help but grin back at him, placing a hand on his chest, right over his excitedly beating heart.
This is the best possible place for you to be right now. This is your safety, your future, your sanity: next to this man, awash in the cheers for his brazen undertakings.
Uraume sets up shop in the center of town, above the pot that’s been brought out to cook pounds of rice in. Town folk are given a paper plate with the fresh rice on it and, if they weren’t handed some earlier, a neatly portioned slice of meat. They’re also given a fork.
You stand beside Uraume, greeting all the survivors. Because that’s the right thing to do– Sukuna is fearsome and you kissed him and you are kind. Behind you, Sukuna sits on the steps of the city building, Toji by his side. The man’s features are unreadable, and Sukuna is simply elated at how things have gone.
“Look at ‘em,” Sukuna says, watching as the townspeople accept their rice and fork, some of their meat as well. “Fuck, we’ve got them.”
Toji sucks at his teeth, at some of the sinew from breakfast lingering there.
“Yeah,” he says softly. “We got them.”
Sukuna beams. He stands up, coming over to your side. He wraps his arm around your waist, making eye contact with the mother you’re talking to as he places a kiss on your cheek.
She blushes and looks away, down towards her son, who can’t be more than six. His skin is so soft, plush cheeks and chubby arms.
“Cute kid,” Sukuna notes. He moves his arm to be slung over your shoulder.
“Thank you,” she says softly, then more firmly, making eye contact with Sukuna, “Thank you for what you’ve done.”
He grins. “Anything for the greater good.”
She wets her lips and nods.
“We’ll make sure your son grows up well,” you say to her, careful to not make any false promises. Then again, it feels like you may have already.
“Thank you,” she says again, then leads herself and her little bundle of joy off to eat.
You turn to look back up at Sukuna, taking him in. He still has some blood splattered on him from earlier, stuck to his clothes, but he’s devastatingly handsome. Maybe it’s the lack of options around you.
If he was to offer you a shot in a dive bar, you’d have a hard time saying no to him.
He catches you staring, and tilts his head down to look at you properly. Delightfully, his skin and tattoos crinkle at the angle.
“What?” He asks.
You shake your head. “I’d love to go on a walk around the town,” you say softly.
He snorts. “A walk?”
“The town seems cute,” you add on. “C’mon, let’s go investigate.”
Sukuna frowns a bit at that. He swishes his lips side to side, pondering through a pout. Then, he relents.
“Yeah, whatever. We can go on a walk.” He turns to look back at Toji. “Hold it down here! We’ll be back.”
Toji gives him a nod, and Sukuna begins to drag you away from the crowd. The two of you head down the street, which is surprisingly still put together. No windows are smashed, nothing’s been stolen with such larceny.
As you pass a restaurant, you tip your head towards the window, cupping your face to see clearly in. You can make out the chairs and tables, the little counter of the bakery. There’s no food left behind.
Maybe on a cute Sunday afternoon, you could convince Sukuna to come get a little bite to eat, maybe even walk here. Get a blueberry scone and a ham-and-cheese croissant with some lattes.
Sukuna leans beside you, taking up the same position to peer in for a moment before righting himself.
“C’mon, there’s nothing to look at in there anyways,” Sukuna says gruffly.
“Let me bask in a little bit of humanity,” you pout, but pull away anyways. “C’mon, don’t you think it’s good that the people here are so civilized?”
Sukuna raises his eyebrow. “Doll, be real with me.”
Huffing, you put your hands on your hips. “What?”
Sukuna chuckles. He gestures back to the town’s center– even though everyone is gathered around, there’s a hush about the area. There’s been a hush around the world for the past few weeks now, anyways.
“You’d call that civilized?” He asks.
Titling your head to the side, you look up at Sukuna. You gesture to the area around you both in return. “Notice how none of the windows are broken? They’re getting along.”
Sukuna tilts his head back and at an angle, so he’s sure to be physically talking down to you. He gazes at you down his cheek, and you wonder if he can see his tattoos that linger along the bone.
“You think they’re getting along? Do you see how quickly they turned on their- on their friends?” Sukuna says, fumbling a bit for the word. It ruins his briefly fearsome demeanor.
“I think peers is a better word for what you’re describing,” you say. Then, you sigh and shrug, sticking your hands in the back pockets of your pants. “Whatever.”
“And they’re all eating,” Sukuna tacks on, dutifully ignoring your suggestion.
“Well, they’re hungry.”
Sukuna grins.
You cross your arms. “Whatever. It’s– it’s not illegal. You know this.”
“It’s desecrating the dead,” Sukuna notes, starting to walk again, he places his crooked finger on his chin, holding it between digit and thumb. “It’s hard to charge someone with, though, if there’s nothing left over.”
You walk alongside him, scrunching up your nose. “It’s fine when it’s for survival, I guess.”
“That’s why it’s not illegal,” Sukuna says, then smiles. “Lots of loopholes, though.”
Your stomach churns. “I’m going to be sick.”
“No, you’re going to be nice and strong,” Sukuna says. He slings his arm around your shoulders and holds you close to his side as you stroll. “Can’t have my wife being weak, can I?”
Screwing up your nose, you huff at him. “Are we going back to the farm tonight?”
“Absolutely not,” Sukuna says. “We’re staying here. We have to make sure that we are dominant.”
You slip out of his arm, which he allows. “And where are we staying?”
“In one of these homes,” Sukuna says, gesturing around. “I’m sure there’s someone who will be nice enough to let the heroes of their hunger problem stay with them.”
“Are you sure it’s safe?” You ask. The farm is safe, it’s just the four of you… those screams weren’t anything of harm to you. They were to your benefit. Your benefit.
“I thought you thought they were civilized?” Sukuna questions.
With a sigh, you nod at your own past words. You did say that.
“And, anyways.” Sukuna reaches to take your hand in his, as if you were two lovers walking the streets on a nice evening. Maybe on your way to dinner at a cute little bistro that you’ve been eyeing for a while, excited to try the truffle fries and caesar salad at. He squeezes your hand, worryingly comforting. “I’ll be there.”
Given the state of the world, perhaps it’s best that your safety lies with the serial killer.
jane austen was right!!!!! i AM half agony half hope!!!!! if i loved you less i COULD talk about it more!!!!!!!! i WAS in the middle before i knew i had begun!!!!!!!
the thing about being a devil fruit user who is with sanji means that he will always join you in the bath - says its to keep you safe should anything happen but its really so he can finger you when you are limp under the water
as a writer you will have a specific deck of vocab words you like using a lot and when you read other peoples' work you will see a very clear spread of different vocab words on their end. this is why you need to read, to collect other writers' words like it's a card game
