Chapter Text
Shibuya • October 31, 2023 • 11:00 PM
He shifts forward an inch.
Megumi shifts back.
He looks at the sharpened remnant of Playful Cloud in the man's hand. And then at the man, himself.
He swallows.
The void brews at his heels - blackness bubbling; weapons at the ready.
Time has frozen.
Something - Megumi doesn't know what - but something had changed with that last attack.
Something had shifted the world ever so slightly off axis.
The man is watching him now - has been watching him for an entire minute - wide-eyed.
Megumi should take advantage of this chance. He should attack. He needs to attack.
Common sense and Satoru would demand he take the upper hand, gain the higher ground, reach for victory while this man just stood there. Staring.
But nothing about this situation is remotely within the realm of sense, much less common sense.
So he waits.
Seconds pass. Tick-tock. Tick-tick.
And then, the man's lips are parting.
“… You.” He says.
Megumi flinches.
“What’s your name?”
"F ...," gravel grinds beneath Megumi's soles as he pulls another few inches back. "... Fushiguro-?"
The man lips twitch.
Megumi blinks. In that seventh of a second it takes for his eyes to reopen, the man has moved. No longer does he stand at the other end of the alley, no.
He's - Megumi stops breathing - right in front of him now.
His rabbits react; bouncing, bounding, battling. But he just stands there, stock still. Paralyzed.
He stands there as the man's hand comes up to his face; as his index slowly trails over the apple of his cheek.
They continue - those fingers of his, rough; nostalgically coarse. They continue - tracing Megumi's jaw.
“… She was right.”
They slide down with a certain reverence, slipping beneath his chin - studying; stroking.
"You did grow up beautiful."
Again, Megumi blinks. He's struck by the contrast; how soft the man sounds now; how gentle he is with him relative to the sheer power with which he'd absolutely decimated him just moments earlier.
"She always said you would."
Megumi closes an eye as the man's thumb drifts over his lashes.
He feels the oxygen returning; feels himself beginning to breathe again.
"She loved you," he opens the eye again as the man leans in, pushing their foreheads together, "... more than you could ever know."
This close, Megumi can see the black film over the man's eyes beginning to fade.
“I love you," the whites of his eyes resurface, "... more than you will ever know."
They're a shade of green Megumi's never before seen - deep. And dark. Almost black.
"Never forget it." The man smiles down at him now, eyes entirely clear. "That in a world of curses," there's a wet sound, “you,” he whispers, “were a blessing.”
Iron fills the air; a rusty scent - nauseatingly thick. “Our blessing."
Warmth suddenly floods over Megumi's shoulder.
It's followed by an even warmer weight - the man, collapsing bonelessly against him.
He stumbles beneath the dead weight. "Wait-," he gasps.
"Wait-," he grasps around blindly, heart pounding; slamming up into his ribs; crushing his guts.
Iciness blooms in his cheeks as he struggles to find his balance - a sudden chill; wetness on his face, cooling in the wind.
"Wait-." He inhales and his throat closes.
But it isn't enough.
The sob still escapes. "Wai-."
Before he realizes what's happening, he's on the ground, clinging to a corpse, crying his heart out.
Tokyo Metropolitan Curse Technical College • December 8, 2023 • 9:26 PM
They're sparring.
It isn't something they do often. Maki usually handles the training for close quarters combat.
But Megumi had specifically asked for him this time.
Megumi very rarely asks for things. So Satoru's quick to comply.
But something's off. With Megumi.
It's been off for a while. But in the moment, it's worse. There's ...
There's something else ... something extra beneath the surface; something unseen taking place behind the scenes as they clash.
It isn't tangible; nothing he can feel or touch. Something he can't quite understand.
Megumi's trying to hurt him - really hurt him.
Granted, they're training. Hurt comes - should come - with the territory.
But Megumi had always pulled his punches.
By conscious or subconscious design, he'd always pumped the brakes when he'd felt his blows becoming just this side of fatal.
For years, Satoru had tried to push him beyond that stupid self-imposed boundary.
For years, he'd failed.
What's changed tonight, he can't say.
But there's this ... anger, in Megumi's eyes now. A certain rage behind his fists. Fury so thick, Satoru can almost taste its gritty metal on the back of his teeth.
"Megumi-?"
Mahoraga's Eight-handled Wheel hovers behind him, spinning.
It's a partial manifestation.
He hasn't summoned the entire thing. Not yet. Because he needn't.
What little he's called forth is more than enough to circumvent Satoru's Infinity; more than enough to make each blow land with devastating power and precision.
"Megumi-?!"
He's going after his weak points; all the scars - those ghosts of pain - he's aiming for them. With a vengeance.
"M-!" Satoru's flung to the mats; oxygen absolutely punched out of his guts when the boy comes down on him - fingers closing around his neck.
"Megumi-," he wheezes. "Megumi-," he frantically taps at his wrist. "Yield-," he chokes, "-yield-.” He outright grabs his wrists and tries to pull them apart now. "Yie-!"
His throat's beginning to swell.
"I c-."
His field of vision's shrinking.
"I can't-."
There is no green in Megumi's eyes when he looks up into them - none.
No soft seaglass blue; no fondness, love, or affection.Sheer black wrath burns in its place.
It's turned his gaze glassy and blank. Absolutely haunted.
He sits there, astride Satoru, arms trembling with the sheer amount of strength he's putting into strangling him; like he wants to kill him; like he's trying to kill him.
(Something's off).
He's whispering.
(Something's been off).
Under his breath, he's saying something as he throttles him.
(Ever since the Shibuya Incident, something's been terribly off with Megumi).
Satoru gasps. His fingers have finally breached the tight space between his carotid and Megumi's chokehold.
"Megumi-," he coughs violently. "Stop-," he rips apart the tight grip. “St-.”
"Did you hav-," warmth hits Satoru's cheek - once. Twice. Thrice. Little pinpricks of wetness.
He looks up, panting, as he holds those deadly hands apart.
Something catches the moonlight as it falls from Megumi's jaw - an instant of brilliance; like a shooting star.
"Did you have,” more follow; flashes in the dark, "to kill him ...?"
A moment passes. And then slowly, he raises his head.
“Did you have to 𝘬𝘪𝘭𝘭 him ...?" He whispers.
Satoru stares at the teartracks, stunned.
Megumi has never once cried in front of him. Not once.
Not when Hanami's rose roots had torn open his guts. Not when he'd thought Yuji had died.
Not even the night his sister had gone to sleep, never to see the light of day again.
Megumi had never once shed a tear in front of him.
And yet— Satoru stares up at him; at the tears rolling down his cheeks now - one after the other after the other. So many, so fast. Each crystalline drop splashing against his face.
He stares and ... he doesn't know what to do. Satoru doesn't know what to do. He's never—
"In a world of curses," he flinches when Megumi speaks again. "You were a blessing."
His voice is broken. Raw. Like barbed wire being torn up through his throat - bladed words caught between sobs and edged with sheer pain.
"He ...," all the fight seems to drain out of him right then. "He used to say that to me ...," his fingers go weak around Satoru's throat.
He sways.
Satoru immediately goes to catch him.
But Megumi still collapses against the wall beside them with a dull knock.
He sinks against it, laughing.
"Every night." His hands come completely undone.
One falls slack against his leg.
"Every single night." The other is loose around Satoru's throat; fingers just barely touching his skin. "In a world of curses," he closes his eyes.
"... You," he exhales, "were my blessing."
Satoru stares up at him; breathing too hard, too fast. His own hands are shaking.
"He'd wake me up.” Megumi's eyes drift off. "Just to say it."
“He'd call if he couldn't make it." Nostalgia hangs off his every word - a dreamy sort of thing; distant and soft.
"Text, if I didn't I pick up." Thousands of miles away, he is; entire light-years into the past, immersed in memories.
"I kept ...," Megumi's eyes drop. They hang hazy and suspended, vaguely fixated on something beyond Satoru's shoulder.
"It was so embarrassing," he murmurs, "I kept telling him to quit it."
He's blind. Unblinking. Unseeing.
Whatever it is that's caught his gaze - it's non-existent.He's staring at things unseen.
“Stop being so cringe.” He mumbles. “Stop.” There's no light in his eyes. “You’re annoying.”
”You’re so annoying. Stop.”
His tears continue to run - steady, silent streams. “Just stop. Stop. Stop. Over-," his breath shakes.
"And over," he lifts a hand - presses it to his chest, right over his heart, "and over," he breathes faster; becomes increasingly breathless, "and over and over and over and over again until-," he takes a sudden, choppy breath. His knuckles go white.
Stitches snap in his fist as he curls it into his shirt.
"One night ...," his lips twitch.
“… He did.”He smiles weakly.
”He stopped.”
It's a sad thing, that smile. A desperately sad thing.
"For good.”
“He never ...," Megumi's still lost; eyes unfocused, gaze distant.
Minutes pass like that, entire minutes.
In that pause, the silence echoes; loud and damning. It drags on and drags out - goes from ribbon-thick to thread-like to spiderweb-thin. It drags - on and on until it snaps.
"I wanted ...," Megumi trails off.
Another few moments pass.
Then his eyes shift.
They're blank. Black. Lightless and lifeless as they sink and their gazes align once more.
"I needed him." He whispers. "I needed him, Satoru."
The hand he'd had lying idle over the man's neck shifts.
Again, his fingertips are wrapping around his throat - pressing; pushing; circling - tighter. Tighter. Tighter. Satoru lets it happen; doesn't try to fight it this time.
"How could you just," he lies there, still, staring into those empty eyes, “take him from me ...?"
Megumi's left hand joins his right.
"He was everything to me." He whispers, leaning in. "He meant the world to me."
Satoru doesn't look away - faces his worst fear head-on.
"I needed him and you just-." The chokehold tightens.
The oxygen— the oxygen begins disappearing again.
"Why?"
The lights flicker. One after the other, Satoru's six eyes blur before blacking out.
“Why?”
Megumi's tears are warm on his cheeks this time.
He's close. Too close for those falling stars to cool before they hit Satoru.
“Why, Toru?”
Wave after wave after teary, teary wave - he's crying so much more this time.
It isn't just streams now. It's entire oceans washing down Satoru's cheeks - oceans. Oceans-worth of despair. Pain. Regret. All of it. Flooding down his cheeks until he doesn't know if it's his tears or Megumi's that're pooling on the ground.
“… Why?”
”… Why couldn’t it have been you …?”