Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

In hindsight, the situation could have been handled better. 

Shoko isn't quite sure how, because it was bound to be a shit show regardless, but that's Yaga-sensei's job to figure out and she feels only marginally bad for him. 

Best she can do is abide by the don't make it worse look Yaga sends her. 

/// 

"I need to talk to you three," Yaga says with a heavy sigh at the end of their class. 

Shoko's eyebrows rise in interest and she looks over at the usual suspects at her side. Satoru looks vaguely annoyed at being held up and Suguru has his 'I look like I'm listening but I'm silently kicking Satoru under the table' smile on, with no trace of guilt on either of them. Suguru offers her a shrug when she catches his eye, Satoru slumping down further on his chair when she looks at him. 

Official business then. Shoko barely suppresses a sigh. That's far less interesting.

"There's been new orders, the higher ups want to test how well your under-classmen would do against stronger curses in order to potentially regrade them." 

"So," Satoru interrupts, "What's that got to do with us?" 

Yaga glares at him. "If you would let me finish, you'll know." 

Satoru leans back on his chair with a groan, throwing an arm out on Suguru's shoulder for balance. Yaga's scowl deepens and Shoko wishes he would just get to the point already. 

"To do so, you're being reassigned. Gojo, you're to partner with Nanami on missions for the foreseeable future. Geto, you're with Haibara. Ieiri, you're on standby to make sure they can handle the increased workload. Geto, Gojo, both of you are to assess how advanced their combat skills are and step in if required. Your higher level missions will be seen as tests to see how they cope in the presence of more powerful curses. I trust both of you to be competent enough to exorcise the curses on your own, if required." 

Shoko blinked at him disbelievingly. 'They're separating the boys?' And then, 'Oh boy'.

Said boys have a far more explosive reaction than she does. 

Twin scrapes echo in the classroom as both of them stand up, chairs clattering behind them. Satoru looks ready to leap over his desk, finger pointed at Yaga, and Suguru appears only marginally calmer. Shoko isn't sure if the hand he places on Satoru's shoulder is to hold Satoru back or to ground himself. 

"You can't be serious-" 

"Yaga-Sensei-" 

"Suguru's my partner-" 

"Satoru can't-" 

Their voices overlap, each protest louder than the previous one. Yaga raises a hand to rub at this temple, looking entirely unsurprised at the reaction the news got him. Both  the boys seem to have ignored everything aside from the reassigned part of Yaga's explanation. Shoko would usually poke fun at them for it if, she wasn't also convinced this was a monumentally terrible idea. 

"The decision is final, there's nothing I can do," Yaga finally sighs out, voice projecting to be heard over the protests. 

"Like hell it is," Satoru immediately retorts, "I'm not wasting my time babysitting the under-classmen, they can handle themselves." 

The hand on Satoru's shoulder is definitely there to hold him back. Shoko's at least 70% sure. 

"Satoru and I have been mission partners since first year, I can't see how splitting us now would benefit anyone," Suguru adds with a furrowed brow. "Nanami is going to struggle keeping up with Satoru, it's an unnecessary risk. For both of them." 

Shoko certainty falls by at least 20% on the back of that. Suguru's focus on Satoru being reassigned over himself isn't lost on her. 

"Like I said." Yaga gathers his materials. "The decision is final." 

"You can't do this," Satoru shouts after his retreating back, Suguru collapsing back into his chair with a sigh. Satoru follows suit shortly, and Suguru throws an arm around him, using it to tug him closer until Satoru was resting his head on Suguru's shoulder. 

Shoko sighs as she watches them, getting up to hoist herself on their desks so she's facing them. "This sucks," she says flatly, because neither one of them look like they're going to say anything. 

Satoru huffs, but otherwise doesn't move, and Suguru's arm tightens around his shoulders. 

"This is the worst thing that's ever happened to me," Satoru mutters. 

Suguru snorts. "I don't like it any more than you do." 

Satoru groans and shifts so that he's leaning more of his weight against Suguru, the other boy's arm hooking comfortably over his front. Shoko has a vague notion of third wheeling, but she's never been one to be deterred so she stays put. 

"I mean, it's not permanent is it? Just until Nanami and Haibara can be assessed properly?" Shoko says, aiming to at least lift one of the boys' spirit up. If she can get one of them to perk up, the other will follow suit - she just has to figure out which one's the easier target right now. 

"I'm sure our precious little kōhai could handle that without us." Okay, not Satoru then.

Shoko sighs and lightly kicks at Suguru's extended leg, trying to get him to reign Satoru in a little. By the scowl he gives her, he isn't feeling particularly charitable. She slides back to her feet with a huff. They're both as stubborn as each other, she doesn't know how Suguru manages to convince anyone that he's any better than Satoru. 

"You'll be fine, couple weeks with the babies won't kill you. Before you know it, you'll be free to go back to your non-dates." 

She leaves them with a departing flick to both their foreheads, ignoring the spluttered denials and protests behind her. 

/// 

"I got my first assignment." Satoru barges into Suguru's room, unannounced. 

Suguru barely looks up from the book he's reading, well accustomed to Satoru entering as he pleases. He would call him out on it if it wasn't a habit he picked up himself. Hypocritical, and all that. 

Satoru huffs, not getting the attention he came here for, and throws himself down on Suguru's bed, close to where Suguru sits cross-legged. He huffs again, unnecessarily loud in the quiet dorm, and when that doesn't get a response either, he starts shuffling until his head is in the way of the book Suguru's trying to read. Operating word, trying. 

"I said," Satoru repeats, still entirely too loud. "I got my assignment." 

Suguru sighs, and then places his open book on Satoru's face. "Yes, Satoru, I'm enjoying the book, you should give it a read." 

Satoru drags the book off his face, careful not to lose Suguru's spot as he places it next to him. The irritated look on his face makes Suguru's lips tug up into a smile, a reaction that only makes Satoru pout. 

"You're not taking this seriously," he accuses him. 

"We've had separate missions before, how is this any different?" Suguru sighs, trying to reason with Satoru, even if he knows well it's a lost cause. 

"Because," Satoru whines. 

When no further explanation comes, Suguru sighs again, and shuffles so he's leaning against the head of his bed. Satoru wastes no time and scampers up to him, winding his arms tight around Suguru's middle and resting his head on his shoulder. 

"Needy," Suguru chides fondly, even as his own arm comes up around Satoru's shoulders. 

"This sucks." The same petulant tone. "I don't wanna go." 

"Satoru, you've never once refused a mission," Suguru says with a laugh. He knows well the itch that coils under Satoru's skin, strength demanding strength, demanding challenge. To see him so unwilling to go and seek out just that is odd.

"But missions without you always suck," is mumbled into his shoulder.

Suguru takes a deep breath, relatively unwilling to keep teasing Satoru in the face of his petulant honesty. "Then get done fast, and we'll do our usual post-mission run." 

Cerulean eyes peek up at him in interest and Suguru smiles in hopes of alleviating some of Satoru's annoyance. He would feel slightly bad about sending off a pissed off Satoru for Nanami to deal with. Slightly. 

"Really?" The slight note of suspicion in Satoru's voice was not lost on Suguru. 

"Of course," Suguru affirms. "Just because we're not going on the actual missions together doesn't mean we have to break our routine. We've had separate missions before, that's never stopped us."

That seems to perk Satoru up, and Suguru smiles, ruffling his hair. "Nanami's grumpy enough as it is, don't add to it." 

Satoru lets out a long-suffering groan and flops onto his back, star-fishing halfway on top of Suguru. Suguru shoves at him half-heartedly, but it's not like their dorm beds allow both of them to sprawl out comfortably, so he accepts his fate without any further complaint. He gropes blindly for his abandoned book, careful not to lose the place Satoru saved for him, and props it up on Satoru's shoulder. 

"Suguru," Satoru whines. "I don't wanna go." 

Suguru sighs into a helpless laugh, making it through the entirety of three whole pages before Satoru's patience ran out. "Satoru," he chides, laughter still caught in his voice."What even is the mission?" 

"I don't know, some shitty Grade 2," Satoru mutters, looking like he's considering moving for all of two seconds, before realising it would disturb Suguru's book and settling into a scowl instead. 

"You're not throwing a fit over a Grade 2," Suguru states, disbelief a faint note because Satoru absolutely is throwing a fit over a Grade 2. 

"Suguru," Satoru draws his name out.

That's as much self-awareness as I'm going to get, Suguru thinks. 

He folds his book closed, bonking the top of Satoru's head with it. "You'll be done in an hour, tops, and be back in time for dinner. You weren't going to do anything aside from nap in my bed today, anyway." 

"Very important plans, Suguru, they're ruined now!" Satoru exclaims, rolling away from him, clutching at his head. 

Any further argument is interrupted by three sharp knocks at the door, and they exchange a look, suddenly alert with the same thought. Shoko. 

"Nanami's waiting for you in the common room, lazy ass," she calls through the door. 

Satoru yelps and immediately tries to bury himself in Suguru's duvet. "Hide me," he hisses, bright eyes and messy fringe the only visible parts of him. 

"Shoko already knows you're in here," Suguru replies, entirely unimpressed. "The faster you go, the faster you'll get done." 

"If I didn't go, I wouldn't have to worry about that in the first place," Satoru grumbles, but reluctantly, with the help of several pointed jabs, climbs out of his cocoon. 

"He's coming," Suguru calls out for him, ignoring the suggestive grin Satoru sends him. Nanami is going to decide to leave on his own at this rate, and unfortunately Suguru's confidence in Satoru's ability to deal with a Grade 2 doesn't extend to their grumpy Grade 3 kōhai.

Satoru starts a series of stretches in the middle of his dorm room, and Suguru stares at him, desperately wishing that he didn't see this coming. He gives him ten seconds to drop the act before he sighs and stands up, shoving Satoru forward. Satoru yelps and barely manages to stop himself from face-planting into the door, immediately turning around to glare at a snickering Suguru. 

Suguru, of course, ignores him and sweeps past him to leave his room, Satoru huffing to make his displeasure known, but otherwise following without a word. They find Nanami and Shoko in the common area, Shoko leaning against their kitchen counter with a cup of coffee in hand barely hiding her amused smirk, and Nanami sitting awfully stiff on their couch. 

"Satoru, you can't take Suguru with you," Shoko calls out. 

"Says who," Satoru mutters, sweeping past them all to reach his shoes. 

"Nanami-kun," Suguru inclines his head towards him with a smile. Satoru clearly internalised none of his advice about making this easy on Nanami. 

"Geto-san," Nanami replies, rising from the couch. Suguru had to stifle a laugh at how stiff and uncomfortable Nanami looked. It's unusual to find him in the company of their entire year group without Haibara, much less for mission related reasons. On top of having to deal with Satoru, one on one. 

He's not sure who's more displeased with this arrangement, really. It's a true toss up between Satoru and Nanami. 

"Okay," Satoru claps his hands loudly from near the front door. "Let's get this over with, come come, Nanamin."

"Please don't call me that, Gojo-san," Nanami sighs, dragging his feet to join Satoru near the door. 

"Satoru, behave." Suguru meets his eyes from where his shades slid down his nose. The warning was more for posterity than anything. 

Satoru blows a raspberry his way, and with a wave, the two of them make their way out of the door to meet their axillary manager. 

Suguru sighs as the door closed, busying himself with cleaning up the little mess left in the common area. He feels Shoko's eyes on him, but refuses to meet her gaze just yet, already knowing whatever he's about to find himself on the receiving end of isn't any good. 

"You two are awful," Shoko states plainly into the silence. 

Suguru squints up at her. "I'm positive I have no idea what you're on about." 

"Sure you don't," Shoko snorts, raising her mug in a half assed salute. "I'll be in my room if you find yourself needing a distraction from missing the idiot too much." 

The offer might've been nice if it wasn't presented with a shit eating grin and a tone filled with mockery. But it was, and so Suguru decides to side step it entirely. 

"I'll be enjoying the silence for once, thank you all the same." His fakest smile, just to really sell it. 

"Suit yourself." 

An hour tops, he told Satoru. He's quite capable of surviving an hour without Satoru, thank you very much, Shoko. 

/// 

Turns out it wasn't an hour. Suguru should've seen it coming, really, but he also got  entirely too invested in the book he was reading and had high hopes of not being disturbed. 

The disturbance in question came in the form of Haibara tentatively knocking on his door, some time after Satoru and Nanami left, informing him that they received a mission, a Grade 2, a couple of hours outside of Tokyo. 

Suguru blinks at him, fighting the somewhat childish impulse to respond with, 'But Satoru's supposed to be back soon,' before giving the other boy a smile and telling him that he'll meet him outside in a couple of minutes, if he could take a moment to get ready. 

Haibara, reliable as ever, grins at him and agrees, already dashing out of the second year dorms to get ready himself. Or so Suguru hoped. 

Suguru stares at the book he was just reading blankly for a moment, feeling slight remorse at how he treated Satoru earlier. He was unfortunately right, and this did in fact, suck pretty bad. 

He sighs and gets up, grabbing his uniform to pull it on. He grabs his phone as well, and as he leaves the dorm, he flips it open to text Satoru. 

> To: Blue Eyes White Dragon 
        Got a mission outside Tokyo, rain check? 
        
> From: Blue Eyes White Dragon
        suguruuu, how could you
                                            
Before Suguru could even make an attempt at appeasement, his phone buzzes again. 

> From: Blue Eyes White Dragon 
        is it overnight 
        wait don't tell me
        actually do i need to know 
        i can't believe they're doing this to us    
        
Suguru lets out an amused huff at the barrage of messages, already typing a response, knowing Satoru is probably going to run out of steam by the time he manages to type one out.

> To: Blue Eyes White Dragon 
        Nah, not overnight, but it's a couple hours out so it's going to be a late one
        
> From: Blue Eyes White Dragon 
        i'll just crash at yours then done deal
        i'll be the perfect picture of a heartbroken wife waiting on her husband to come home
        a husband who stays at work late leaving me all by my lonesome 
        SOUND FAMILIAR SUGURU 
        
Suguru made an executive decision to ignore the majority of whatever that was. 
        
> To: Blue Eyes White Dragon 
        Don't you always? 
        
> From: Blue Eyes White Dragon 
        you almost threw me out the window last time 
        this is a warning 
        for my own safety 
        if you don't got me i gotta got me 
        
> To: Blue Eyes White Dragon 
        That doesn't make any sense 
        
Suguru can see Haibara waving at him from the top of the stairs, the sleek black car already waiting for them at the bottom, so he sends out one last text before pocketing his phone. 

> To: Blue Eyes White Dragon 
        I'll see you later 
        
"Geto-San," Haibara beams at him. "Was that Gojo-san?" 

Clearly watching Suguru cross the campus grounds firmly focused on his phone has piqued Haibara's interest. "It was, I was just letting him know we have a mission." 

Haibara nods as he hurries to catch up to Suguru's stride. "I guess he'll let Kento know as well. This works out quite well, if you think about it!" 

"Maybe," Suguru allows, entirely unconvinced. Satoru did not sound like this was working out for him quite well, whatsoever. 

Suguru wasn't all that convinced, either. 

///

Satoru knew that Suguru was going to be out when he made his way back to the dorms, but that didn't do anything to improve his mood when he confirmed it himself. Still. "I'm back," he calls out into the presumably empty dorm. 

A head pops out from one of the rooms down the hall, surprising Satoru enough to drop his scowl. 

"Shoko," he says, quietly pleased. "Thought you'll still be down in the morgue." 

"Welcome back," she grins at him. "Figured you'll get all mopey if no one's here to greet you." 

"I don't get mopey." 

Shoko makes her way to the common area, stopping to ruffle Satoru's hair as he drops down on the couch. Satoru lolls his head back, watching her trek to the kitchen with narrowed eyes. 

"That much caffeine cannot be good for you," he points out, distinctly remembering Shoko drinking coffee when he left for his mission, not enough hours ago. 

"Caffeine or nicotine, you can't bitch about all my vices," Shoko says. "And I don't wanna hear shit from you, your blood sugar levels are a national cause of concern." 

"Your face is a national cause of concern," he mutters. "And I wouldn't have to worry about my blood sugar levels if you just taught me RCT," Satoru points out. Slam dunk, he thinks. No coming back from that one. 

"I've been trying, you're just stupid."

Satoru makes an offended noise, deciding right there and then that whatever warm and fuzzy feelings he felt towards Shoko waiting for him to get back were a dupe and he would quite like Suguru to be back now, please and thank you. 

Shoko sat down next to him, patting his head like an errant puppy. It felt significantly more condescending coming from Shoko than whenever Suguru did it. 

"You did well, Satoru," she teases, shoving a mug filled with something that smells suspiciously like hot chocolate into his hands. To think she was on his case about sugar levels moments ago, the audacity honestly. "Couldn't have been that bad, no?"

Satoru takes an unnecessarily loud slurp of his drink just to be annoying. Mission accomplished, he settles more comfortably against the couch, throwing his legs over Shoko's lap. She pinches his calf, face lined with annoyance. 

"I'm not Suguru, you are not lap sized." 

"Am too." Satoru sticks his tongue out. He makes no attempt whatsoever to move; he's sure Shoko could shove him off if she really wanted to. 

But, Shoko is far snappier and her patience could use some work, and it's not like Satoru is actually trying to piss her off. That would be too easy. Plus, Suguru isn't even here to mediate which means he's in danger without his usual Special-Grade-Shoko-Shield. 

So. He settles down. 

"It's just babysitting," Satoru mutters sourly. "I didn't even get to fight, I just used blue to drag the curse off whenever Nanami left himself open." 

"So no injuries then?" Shoko double checks. The first years aren't exactly a rare sight in the medical wing. 

"Nope," Satoru confirms, dragging the word out in an impressive sign of petulance. He's glad that Nanami is unscathed, really, but taking care of curses that pose no threat whatsoever is so boring. Satoru prefers a challenge. And if this mission is anything to go by, the next several weeks is just going to be a lot of standing around and making sure Nanami doesn't get himself killed. 

Shoko hums, satisfied, and clearly not sharing Satoru's annoyance with the new mission assignment. He wonders if he wasn't clear enough about how much he hates babysitting.  

"I know you don't like being separated from Suguru," Shoko tells him, which, okay, that isn't what this is, at all. The knowing glint in her eyes does nothing to comfort him. "But this is good for the first years, and you two will be back to your usual missions as soon as they get their grades." 

Which is true. And something that Satoru failed to consider. Maybe the faster he trains Nanami to take on tougher curses, the faster he can go back to his missions with Suguru and get this whole ordeal over and done with. 

Shoko flicks his forehead, as if she read his mind. It's not the first time she's shown this propensity of hers, and the suspicious squint Satoru levels at her is familiar enough to make Shoko roll her eyes. 

"I can't read minds, you just think too loud." 

"I think at a perfectly acceptable level." 

"You have never done anything at an acceptable level in your life." 

"You're right, my thoughts are clearly superior to everyone else's and therefore stand out. No wonder you keep picking up on them."

"I was aiming below, not above, but you keep telling yourself that." Shoko pats his knee, and Satoru, pacified for the moment, shuffles his legs off her lap and lets her get up. He doesn't want her company if she's going to keep being mean, anyway. 

He wonders how far Suguru's mission took him. Maybe he should text him. 

Shoko ruffles his hair again and Satoru blinks up at her, interrupted from his reverie. "Get some rest," she orders him. "Suguru will probably be back soon." 

"Doubt it," he mutters, going straight back to pouting. "Got a mission outside of Tokyo." 

"Why do I even bother," Shoko sighs, accompanied by the sound of her retreating footsteps. 

///

Unsurprisingly, the Grade 2 mission was insultingly easy. Well. Maybe that's not entirely fair; the mission was to test Haibara's skill, and to that extent it was successful. For the most part, Suguru got to sit back and watch Haibara fight, sending in curses more for defensive purposes than offensive, and that too wasn't entirely unfamiliar. But watching the back of his Grade 3 kōhai was a far cry from watching the back of his powerhouse of a best friend.  

Suguru sighs as Haibara finally took the curse down. It was good practice for the young sorcerer, but surely there's Grade 2's closer to campus. 

"Take that," Haibara shouts with a fist pump. "Did you see that Geto-san?" he aims a beaming grin at Suguru. 

Suguru smiles back at him wearily, clapping Haibara's raised palm out of habit. One too many reprimands from Satoru about being left hanging. 

"You did great," Suguru says with a smile of his own. "But keep in mind these curses are going to be more intelligent than what you're used to - they're going to take advantage of any openings you give them." 

"Yeah, that side sweep would've gotten me if you weren't there, I wouldn't have seen it," Haibara grins at him ruefully. "Really shows how much I have left to learn. Especially from such a talented sorcerer as you, Geto-san!" 

"Satoru's the talented one." Suguru resists the urge to pat Haibara on the head. He reminds him of a puppy. "I'm afraid the rest of us have to rely on good old hard work." 

"I'm sure Gojo-san works hard as well!" Haibara exclaims. 

Suguru laughs softly. To think Haibara feels to need to defend Satoru to him, of all people. Nanami really must've left an impression. "He does," Suguru agrees easily. "He just happens to have a very annoying tendency to be good at everything."

"Must be nice. I haven't really found any of this easy." 

"I didn't either, at first," Suguru admits. It was mostly because his two classmates happened to be the prodigy of the Gojo clan and the laziest genius he's ever met; kind of hard to excel against that type of odds. But, Haibara doesn't need to know that. Suguru's well aware that their year group isn't exactly standard. "But you'll get the hang of it, just have to keep working hard." 

"I will," Haibara beams at him. Suguru doesn't think he's seen anyone smile this much in his life. And he's the one that bought Satoru his DS. 

"We should head back." Suguru inclines his head towards where the car is already waiting for them. 

Haibara nods, already somehow three paces ahead of him and Suguru shakes his head, starting the trek back to the car himself. 

/// 

Suguru gets out of the car with an alarming amount of cracks, and he groans as he stretches, finally free of the confinements of the car. Turns out that hours long car rides in the dead of the night are far less enjoyable and comfortable without Satoru's shoulder to nap on. Go figure. 

Haibara rounds the car from the other side, already starting up the stairs and honestly Suguru is probably one night of bad sleep away from demanding answers. No one has this amount of energy naturally, not even Satoru. He's carried him up these stairs one too many times for him to ever be able to claim that. 

Haibara does an aborted half stumble ahead of him, and Suguru gets two entire seconds of celebrating not being the only one dead on his feet before a beaming smile is aimed at him. Oh, Haibara was just turning around. Fair enough then. 

"Do we file the report now? It's kinda late..." Haibara trails off, a thoughtful look on his face. Suguru hasn't even thought about the report. It's two in the morning, he's no more inclined to write one than anyone would be to read one. 

"I think we can leave that for the morning. I don't think anyone is going to be chasing us down at this hour." 

"You're probably right," Haibara nods, and apparently Suguru has been dragging himself up these stairs far too slow because the other boy waves at him, bounding up the stairs and leaving him behind. "I'll see you in the morning, Geto-san, have a good night!" 

Suguru returns the gesture, more than a little bemused, and entirely on autopilot. 

He somehow drags himself to the dorms, feels a little ridiculous for peeking so carefully into his own room, and feels decidedly less so when his suspicions are confirmed and he sees a figure in the dark sprawled out on his bed. If Suguru was under any illusions, they dissipated at the sound of the familiar snores that fill the room. 

'I don't snore, my ass', he smiles to himself, throwing his uniform on top of where Satoru threw his and tugging his pyjamas on. There's no real way of getting into the bed without having to bully Satoru's sprawled limbs into some sort of order, so Suguru doesn't even try. The beds are tiny, if Satoru wanted his precious sleep undisturbed, his bed was right next door. 

Somewhere between shoving Satoru into the wall and then promptly dragging him right back up against Suguru's chest he manages to wake him up, and Suguru squints into the slight blue glow of Satoru's eyes as his technique activates. 

Which is rude, honestly, because who else would be trying to sneak into Suguru's own bed at two in the morning if not Suguru. 

"S'guru?" Satoru mumbles, eyes already dimming and closing again. He's settling back down now, happily replacing the pillow he was sleeping on with Suguru's shoulder. Suguru had the full intention of repaying Satoru's invasion of his room with sarcasm, but it's harder to cling to that thought with his chin resting on soft, messy hair. 

"Who else?" Suguru murmurs, hand petting that messy hair. "Go back to sleep." 

"Kay." The answer is delayed by long enough that Suguru is relatively certain that Satoru is just sleep talking at this point. 

And because if anyone is to ask him he gives excellent advice, he follows Satoru's lead, sleep taking him all too easy. 

///

Shoko's pretty sure that there isn't anyone with less of a compatible sleep schedule than their trio. So when she gets up in the morning, she makes sure to sneak by Satoru's and Suguru's room. Satoru is a toss up, but Suguru is definitely asleep, and entirely too grumpy if woken up even a minute early. 

Shoko can't really relate, but she's also not dealing with all that without Satoru, so. Morning quiet time. 

Suffice to say, she was not expecting a knock at the door to come halfway through her very involved process of making instant coffee. She keeps stirring, somewhat hoping that her mind is playing tricks on her and no one was trying to invade their dorm at six in the morning. 

Of course, a second knock came. 

Shoko sighs and grabs her mug, making her way to the door. Swinging it open to find Haibara  smiling sheepishly, she half considers swinging it right shut again. 

"Good morning." Shoko had to fight the urge to smile at the half wave that accompanied the greeting. "Geto-san said the other night that we'll work on the mission report in the morning, so here I am!" 

Shoko steps out, leaving the door open by a crack. Chances are Satoru got woken up by Haibara appearing at their door, but there's still hope for the other one. 

"I don't think he meant quite this early." Shoko was, in fact, entirely certain that Suguru did not mean this early. Six in the morning for a mission report sounds like something he would only do to piss Satoru off. 

"Ah," Haibara appears a little more sheepish now. "He didn't really mention a time, so I thought I'll play it safe. Do you think he'll be up soon?" 

Shoko purses her lips, knowing the answer but not knowing how to break it to the eager first year. The chances of Suguru being up soon are zero to none. 

"I don't think so," she offers, and then because Haibara is already starting to look crestfallen. "You can come inside and wait if you want. Fair warning, we believe in morning quiet time in this dorm." 

Haibara brightens up and walks in behind her. Shoko waves her hand in the general direction of the kitchen. "Make yourself at home, mugs are in the top shelf, tea's right next to them." 

Whatever he decided on was lost on her as her attention was caught by the figure currently making a very poor attempt at sneaking out of Suguru's room. Her lips tilt up into a smirk, and she knows Satoru is fully aware he got caught when his pace hurries. 

What a loser, she snickers to herself. It's not the first time, and it wouldn't be the last. 

By the time Satoru makes it to the kitchen to join them, Haibara is nursing a cup of tea and Shoko is on her second cup of coffee. She raises an eyebrow at him when she notices he's already fully dressed in his uniform. 

"Mission," he answers the silent question unhappily. 

"Good morning, Gojo-san!" Satoru winces slightly at the volume and Shoko eyes the curtains she didn't bother fully drawing, assuming Satoru won't be up for at least another hour. He's always so sensitive in the mornings. 

"Morning," Satoru gets out, before a sharp knock disturbs the peace once again.

Shoko starts considering how likely it would be for the three of them to move out without anyone noticing. If they don't tell anyone, no one can disturb their morning quiet time this thoroughly. 

Her fingers tap on the mug in her hand. Buy us an apartment? 

Done. Satoru's fingers drum on the table. 

Shoko hides her smile behind another sip, offering a wave to a stiff Nanami as Haibara leads him to the kitchen. 

"Gojo-san, I assume you have the mission details?" 

Not bothering with pleasantries, Nanami learns quick. Shoko is almost impressed. 

"Yeah, yeah," Satoru waves his hand dismissively. "Overnight mission, Grade 2, you'll do great and if you don't, I'll be there to document you getting your ass kicked." 

Nanami simply scowls at the response, which. Fair. There's a reason Shoko only tags along on missions when there's two of them, and only half of it is because the berth people give her when they see her being flanked by two entirely too tall delinquents is objectively hilarious. 

We should get around to piercing Satoru's ears, she muses idly, tapping the spoon against her lips. 

Only after that does she register what Satoru actually said and she shoots him a slight glare. Suguru is not going to be happy waking up to you gone, she taps out. 

Satoru has the decency to look the least bit chagrined. It's not like I'm happy about it either. He's pouting now, and Shoko sighs. The point of a silent conversation is for it to remain silent, but Satoru is entirely incapable of keeping a single emotion off his face. Nanami is giving them both a weird look. 

"Sounds like you should get going then," Shoko says flatly. The only thing worse than Suguru waking up to Satoru gone, would be Suguru waking up to Satoru leaving. And, as established, Shoko is absolutely not dealing with all that. 

"You can't throw me out of my own dorm!" 

"Watch me." 

Haibara laughs, clearly not realising how serious Shoko is being. She's done it before, and she'll do it again. These Special Grades have nothing on her. 

Satoru, well acquainted with said throwing out, only puts up a reasonable amount of fuss over it. Shoko allows it, if only to avoid coming across as a tyrant to their juniors. Some things are better eased into. 

"The car is already waiting outside," Nanami agrees. Shoko was starting to warm up to him more every time he opposed Satoru. Maybe Suguru could take notes. 

"No one loves me here," Satoru laments, hand to his chest. "They just want me gone." 

"The only one that does is still asleep," Shoko notes. 

"I don't want you gone, Senpai!" Haibara exclaims over Shoko, and she sighs. 

Satoru grins and shoots playful finger guns at him, glasses sliding down. "I knew you were my favourite for a reason, Haibara-kun." 

Haibara grins back, pleased with the compliment. Shoko eyes Nanami wearily, his scowl a little more genuine than it usually is. Satoru turned his back on her during his exchange with Haibara, which given Shoko's perch on the counter, gives her the perfect opportunity to plant her foot on his lower back and give him a very pointed push towards the door. 

Predictably, Satoru half stumbles forward and spins around to face her immediately, glare in place. She hasn't managed to entirely trip him yet, but she's getting close. Only a matter of time now, really.  

"I can take a hint, I know when I'm not wanted," Satoru pouts. 

Shoko wordlessly points to the door, knowing far better than to indulge him further. At this rate he's going to pout and whine until Suguru wakes up, and then they'll both be whining. 

Satoru sticks his tongue out at her, but dutifully walks out, helped only slightly by an already vaguely annoyed Nanami right behind him. The door shuts behind them, and Shoko lets herself relax minutely. Maybe the morning can still be salvaged. 

"So when do you think Geto-san will be up?" 

Shoko sighs. 

Chapter Text

Suguru was not happy when he woke up. The dorm sounded and felt emptier than it had in the last week, which was fine, but there was a distinct lack of Satoru, which was less fine. He turned over, hoping to ignore the situation and catch the remnants of sleep still clinging to his consciousness. He was assaulted by the pillow Satoru slept on, instead. It still carried the scent of his shampoo and Suguru threw the pillow down on the floor in annoyance. He closed his eyes, hoping to ignore the morning for a little while longer but he was down a pillow, both human and otherwise, and very much awake and it took him about thirty seconds to accept that there was no salvaging this. 

"Fucking bastard," he mutters, swinging his legs over the side of the bed. There's a note on the bedside table and he snatches it up, scowling as he reads it. 

Don't miss me too much, you grump is scrawled out in Satoru's inexplicably elegant handwriting. It's accompanied by a crudely drawn dick in one corner, and a sketch of what Suguru can only assume is supposed to be Satoru in the other; it looks more like a hedgehog with sunglasses. He folds it up and tosses it into the drawer with all the other notes Satoru's left him. It's not a particularly small pile. 

He grabs a discarded hoodie from his desk chair, idly noting the smell of Satoru's cologne as he tugs it over his head, and throws his hair up into a messy bun. Maybe caffeine is what he needs to save this morning. 

When he walks into the kitchen he's forced to come to the rapid realisation that this morning is, in fact, not salvageable. What he expects is maybe coffee already made, and some sort of breakfast left out for him by one of his bastard friends that he's now considering disowning. Instead, What he gets is half filled mugs in the sink and a surprise Haibara sitting at their kitchen table. And no breakfast. 

Traitors, the both of them, he thinks sourly. 

"Morning, Haibara-kun," Suguru clears his throat. There's morning scratchiness stuck at the base of his throat, and he eyes the empty kettle with distaste. 

Haibara startles at the sound, but then whirls on him with a bright grin. The action almost sends him sprawling out of his chair, and Suguru has to fight back a smile. "Good morning, Geto-san!" he exclaims. 

Suguru winces slightly. There's a whiteboard on the wall near the front door with a set of rules they haven't as much agreed on as much as they haven't found good enough reasons to disagree on. No shouting before 11 A.M. is underlined three times, once by each of them, on different days, at different levels of annoyance. 

"I assume you're here about the report?" he asks, making his way to the counter to start on his own cup of coffee. He has to do everything around here, honestly. 

"Ah yeah, you mentioned the morning, but I wasn't sure when, so I figured it'll be easier to come by early..." Haibara trails off, rubbing a sheepish hand to the back of his neck. 

"I hope I haven't kept you waiting too long." Suguru offers him a smile over his shoulder. 

"No, no, not at all," Haibara is quick to reassure, slight pink dusting his cheeks. 

"I'm surprised Nanami hasn't kept you company," Suguru digs a little, turning around to lean against the counter and taking a sip of his coffee. Don't miss me too much didn't exactly give him much to go of off. 

"He was here earlier." There was a smile in Haibara's voice at the mention of the other boy. "He and Gojo-san got sent out on an overnight mission, so he had to leave early." 

"Really?" Suguru asks flatly. Overnight mission, he thinks. Satoru, you shithead. "Give me just a moment, please," he sends Haibara a tight smile, digging his phone out of his pocket. 

> To: Blue Eyes White Dragon 
      Now who's abandoning who? 

> From: Blue Eyes White Dragon 
      i told you not to miss me 
      what more do you want from me 

> To: Blue Eyes White Dragon 
      You didn't even wake me up! 
    
> From: Blue Eyes White Dragon 
      don't cry
      i'll bring you souvenirs 
    
> To: Blue Eyes White Dragon 
      If you eat them all on the train again, I'll kill you 
    
> From: Blue Eyes White Dragon 
      you're so cruel to me suguru 
      you know i love it when you talk dirty to me 
    
Suguru snaps his phone shut, taking a deliberately deep breath and hoping the heat under his collar isn't visible on his face. Satoru has a way of making him regret ever bothering to talk to him in the first place. 

"So, about that report?" Suguru asks, trying to push thoughts of Satoru out of his head. 

It's a bit of a lost cause. 

/// 

Nanami is not doing great against the Grade 2. And Satoru isn't surprised as much as he's disappointed. At least the curse is a little cool; a scarecrow looking ass born from what Satoru can only assume is some fear from the farmers. He's a little bummed about not having Suguru around to absorb this one; it would've made a great curse to scare people with. 

The curse is decidedly less cool with the reminder that it won't be one of Suguru's at the end of the fight. 

He blows a raspberry into the open air, tilting his head back with a groan. Satoru could've exorcised the curse three times over by now, but having to play defensive and watch Nanami fumble instead has him bored and restless. Taking photos of Nanami getting his ass beat lost its charm twenty minutes ago. 

"Nanami," he calls out. "Kill the thing already." 

Suguru would've, if Satoru asked as nicely as he just did. 

"I'm trying," Nanami shouts back through gritted teeth. There's a cut on his temple that's bleeding and making him look more injured than he is.

Regardless, Satoru throws the curse back into a wall for the fifth time with a careless flick of Blue. Maybe a breather is what Nanami needs to pull himself together. 

"Try harder," he calls out encouragingly. 

Nanami seemingly does not try harder. Satoru slides his glasses down, squinting at the curse and actually paying attention the flow of information Six Eyes has been feeding him since the curse showed up. And honestly? He's not impressed. 

"Do you want me to kill it for you?" he asks, raising his voice above the sound of rubble collapsing. Maybe the question comes out a little more condescending than he intended.  

Oops. 

Not like Suguru is here to tell him off for it, anyway. 

"Some help would be appreciated," Nanami shouts, sounding like help would not be appreciated. 

Satoru shrugs, because it's been long enough that he doesn't care much what Nanami wants any more, as much as he just wants the curse dead. It's letting out mocking cackles, attributing its own survival in the presence of the Six Eyes to its strength rather than to Satoru letting it live, and it's grating on his nerves. 

He flicks infinity into reality as he finally steps into the battle. The curse's attention immediately diverts, drawn to the appearance of a more powerful well of cursed energy like a moth to a flame. It rushes at him, hoping to catch him off-guard. 

Satoru hasn't been caught off-guard in his life. 

He sidesteps it easily, planting his foot on its back to send it sprawling. Before it can get up, he drags it back towards himself with a flick of blue, the curse flailing to find its sense of balance under an unfamiliar gravitational pull. It fails, and Satoru lets cursed energy coalesce into his fist as he meets the curse halfway. Unstoppable force meet immovable object. 

Only one can ever exist. 

Satoru does not yield. His fist connects, and the curse lets out a deafening shriek before bursting apart, purple blood exploding outward. Infinity stops any of it from reaching him, but Satoru steps back and brushes his shoulders off out of force of habit, regardless. 

He turns to look at Nanami and can't help snickering. Nanami was not so lucky, and he's more or less covered, bangs all but dyed purple. Satoru snaps a picture for posterity, and immediately sends it off to Suguru for safe-keeping. 

Nanami, clearly aware of what Satoru is up to, scowls at him and does his best to pull himself into some sort of order. It's a nice thought, but this curse was particularly explosive and Satoru doesn't care enough to discourage him from his hopeless endeavour. 

"I wouldn't have bothered if I knew you'll just exorcise it in the end," Nanami glares at him. 

Satoru shrugs. "You were too weak to kill it on your own." 

"I would've been able to if you weakened it." 

"If you need me to weaken it, you're not strong enough to exorcise it." Satoru tilts his head. "That would just be letting me do all the work and then taking the credit." 

Nanami looks like he wants to snap something back, but reigns himself in. Instead, he turns on his heel, heading back to the car waiting for them, the veil dropping the second the curse got exorcised. 

"I saved your ass, at least say thank you!" Satoru calls out after his retreating back, snickering to himself and following close behind. 

/// 

Suguru wakes up with half his mobility and a quarter of his lung capacity. A cursory hand exploration clues him in on the fact that he has in fact fallen asleep on the couch, and the reason for it has fallen asleep on top of him. He squints his eyes open to confirm and finds that not only has Satoru splayed out between his legs, using his stomach as a pillow, but Shoko as well, who has jammed herself between the couch and Satoru, legs thrown over his, head resting against the back of Satoru's shoulder.

He must've fallen asleep waiting for Satoru to come back from his mission; Satoru and Shoko have clearly taken it as an invitation. But, there's worse ways to wake up, so Suguru can't even be too upset about the fact that he's currently more or less being held hostage under the weight of his friends. 

For the lack of having anything better to do, he buries his hand in Satoru's messy hair, running his hands through the soft strands. Satoru lets out a content sigh, nuzzling further into Suguru's shirt and Suguru has half a mind to keep Satoru right here with him, cozy and content and safe. 

Unfortunately, the action eventually rouses Satoru and he grumbles something incomprehensible. When that doesn't get a response, his hand shoots out towards Suguru's face and he grabs it before he loses an eye, guiding it to rest on his cheek. He promptly gets his cheek pinched for his efforts, and Suguru tugs on a white strand in retaliation. 

"Stop flirting." Surprisingly, it's Shoko that breaks the silence. "S'too early." 

"He started it," Satoru mumbles petulantly, and any annoyance Suguru might've felt immediately evaporates at the sound of his sleep-rough voice. 

Staying annoyed with Satoru would be so much easier if he would just stop looking and sounding like that. 

"I didn't do anything," Suguru feels the need to defend. 

"Don't care," Shoko's voice could not sound flatter. Suguru is somewhat impressed they're all managing to still sound half-asleep, despite the arguing. "Back to la la land, you need your beauty sleep." 

Suguru's not quite sure which one of them she's referring to, but she doesn't seem to feel the need to clarify. The morning light barely filtering in through the blinds in their common room is also doing a bang up job of adding onto Shoko's argument, and admittedly it does seem a little early. 

Satoru seems to agree as well, and Suguru lets himself relax, closing his eyes and hoping to catch a couple more hours of sleep. 

It turns out to be a mistake. 

There's a sharp elbow suddenly jammed into his side and Satoru - who was quite happy to just be dead weight on top of him until now - is suddenly trying to shuffle upwards. Suguru hisses a breath between his teeth, more for effect than a real sign of pain, but not even that's enough to garner any sympathy from Satoru. 

He's just about to intervene when Satoru apparently finds a spot he's happy with. Now laying more firmly on top him, head resting on his chest, Satoru appears comfortable while Suguru is left to combat a mouthful of white hair. He uses a hand to flatten it, mostly to allow the free passage of oxygen back into his lungs. If it has the unintended effect of a suddenly boneless Satoru all but melting into him, then so be it. 

Unfortunately, Satoru shuffling means that Shoko also moved and her legs are now thrown over both of theirs. In the span of about 2 minutes, Suguru went from being mildly inconvenienced to being thoroughly trapped. 

No other choice but to listen to Shoko, it seems. 

With the feel of Satoru's chest rising against his and soft puffs of breath against his collarbone, Suguru falls back asleep. 

/// 

The next time Suguru wakes up he's sans his weighted blankets, but they've been replaced by an actual blanket that's making the heat from the sunlight feel stifling. He throws it off his body, content to stay on the couch for the time being. 

Well he was. 

There's an indignant squawk coming from somewhere next to him and when he peels his eyes open, it's to discover that the blanket didn't make it very far and has instead been unceremoniously tossed over the top of Satoru's head, who's been leaning back against the couch. Suguru snickers and makes no attempt at helping the mass of flailing limbs get the blanket off. 

Instead, he stretches and scoots down so he can get up without stepping over Satoru. There's the smell of coffee and freshly cooked eggs wafting in from the kitchen that's been missing from their dorm over the last couple of days, and it draws him in easily. 

Satoru's eyes somehow manage having an even bigger appetite than he does, and the amount of food made would be enough to feed a small army. Or two growing boys and a girl that somehow scarfs down more than both of them combined. He piles on rice on his plate alongside the eggs, aware that there's plenty of food left to go around. There's still faint notes of struggle coming in from the couch, so Suguru takes his time making his coffee. 

He returns to the couch, coffee and plate in hand, to find that Satoru has finally won his battle against the blanket. By the look of things, he seemingly flung it as far away from him as possible. Suguru lets his lips tilt up into a slight smile as he settles himself behind Satoru, bracketing him between his legs. 

"I see you've shown the blanket the might of the strongest, good job," he says, resting his chin on top of Satoru's head, and peering down at the DS in his hands. He stole my shampoo, again, he notes to himself, letting his head rest more heavily on top of Satoru's.  

"Shut up," Satoru mutters petulantly. 

"Are you losing to a wild pokemon? For real?" 

"Shut up," Satoru repeats, louder this time. "I'm under levelled, it's not as easy as I make it look." 

"You're making it look very hard," Suguru notes. 

"You're not helping." 

"I never said I was." Suguru pauses. "Or are you asking for help? Is the great Gojo Satoru admitting to weakness?" 

"Ha, you said I'm great." Satoru's cheer is short-lived, as soon after the telltale defeat jingle plays, Satoru cursing under his breath as the screen fades to black. 

Suguru chuckles and jams his foot into Satoru's side for good measure. Satoru yelps and sends the DS flying. Suguru winces at the sound it makes skidding across the hardwood floor. 

"That was an overreaction," Suguru says, not quite managing to smother his laughter. 

"How do you want me to react to being assaulted?" 

"Who's being assaulted?" Shoko, as always, has impeccable timing. 

"I am!" Satoru shouts from where he's taken to rolling on the floor, clutching his stomach. 

"Ah," Shoko nods at Suguru. "Continue." 

Suguru shoots Shoko a two-fingered salute and then promptly tackles Satoru, digging his fingers into his sides. Satoru gasps as he tries to feebly protect himself, hands doing nothing to deter Suguru's. 

"Stop, stop," Satoru wheezes out between giggles, weakly slapping any part of Suguru he can reach. 

Unfortunately for Satoru, Suguru has no plans of stopping and he continues unrelentingly, laughter easily brought out and spurred on by Satoru's. He doesn't stop until Satoru lets out a loud wheezing snort that resembles the noise a goose would make rather than anything human. 

The sound stops them both dead in their tracks, the two of them staring at each other in silence with wide eyes, before bursting into raucous laughter. Suguru collapses next to Satoru, both their limbs akimbo as they struggle to catch their breaths. 

"You two are the dumbest idiots I know," Shoko drawls from her vantage point on the couch. 

Suguru raises his head to retort but is promptly sidetracked by the sight of the mug in Shoko's hand. His mug. 

"Is that my coffee?" 

"No," Shoko lies blatantly, taking a pointed sip. 

Suguru turns to Satoru just to find that endlessly blue mischievous gaze already on him. He quirks a brow, knowing he doesn't need to say more when an answering smirks curls on Satoru's lips. 

Without a word, both Suguru and Satoru shift into a crouch and Shoko looks at them with narrowed eyes. The mug is carefully set down, and it's all the permission the boys need. 

They pounce. 

Which is all well and good, except Shoko knew exactly what they were up to and is already high tailing it out of the dorm, leaving the two of them to try and extract themselves from a sprawl of limbs on the couch after their unsuccessful attack. 

Someone catches an elbow to the cheek and another a knee into their ribs, but moments later they're sprinting right after Shoko, following the sound of her laughter. 

"C'mon run faster, Suguru!" 

"I am, why don't you just teleport? Oh wait." 

"Shut up," Satoru hisses like an angry cat. "I'm working on it. You know I'm sensitive about that."

Oh, Suguru knows. 

Unfortunately, a full out sprint doesn't lend itself well to a conversation, and Suguru puts off answering in favour of trying to get more oxygen into his lungs. Satoru seems to be on the same page for once, and they catch up to Shoko out on the training fields easily enough. 

Suguru is determined not to make the same mistake twice and Shoko makes a sound that she would later claim was definitely not a squeal as he wraps his arms around her middle and hoists her up. He didn't have much of a plan past that, but thankfully Satoru is there to figure out the finer details, as he usually is. 

"Don't worry, I'll save you!" He exclaims, and then promptly throws himself into the grass in front of where Shoko is struggling to get out of Suguru's grip. 

Ah. Well if he's offering. 

Suguru promptly throws himself, and by extension Shoko, down on top of him; to Satoru's credit, he does cushion their fall quite well. 

"Fuck," Satoru wheezes. "I take it back, I regret saving you, go find a different hero." 

Despite his words, Satoru shows no signs of getting up, sprawled out on his front and looking quite content staying right where he is. It might just be more acceptance than contentment, though; Shoko has now settled cross-legged on his back. 

Suguru's chuckling has evolved into full blown laugher now, and he sprawls out next to Satoru, propping his head up on his shoulder. It sets off Satoru, and Suguru tapers off into softer chuckles as the sound washes over him, bright and joyful. 

Shoko reaches down to ruffle Satoru's hair with a soft grin, and then looks down at Suguru with a look that's far too knowing for his liking. 

With the sound of Satoru's laugher in his ears, he can't quite find it in himself to care. 

///

The break they've been granted turns out to be short-lived. Incredibly so, since Satoru gets back Saturday night, just to get sent back out to another mission immediately on Monday morning.

And Nanami is here too, he supposes. He's probably not any happier about it than Satoru is. 

Satoru barely got one full day with Suguru. They separated for days to no end because of a mission that dragged on for more days than it had any business doing, just to be sent away as soon as the new week started. 

Not happy doesn't even begin to cover it. 

To top it all off, the mission isn't even worth the effort it took to get here; eight entire stops on the metro just for a handful of Grade 3's. He accidentally exorcised two of them when he tried dragging them away from Nanami with Blue, and the proof of their weakness did nothing to lift his spirits. 

"You're doing great," Satoru calls out to Nanami, who was currently busy cutting down the last couple of curses. He pauses, looking carefully at Nanami fighting, and then clicks his tongue in annoyance when his suspicions are confirmed. Something to bring up on the way back to school, considering Nanami wasn't the most receptive to advice mid-fight. He's learned as much.

Satoru blasts the last curse and then waits for Nanami to finish off his, dropping down into a crouch. He doesn't have to wait long, thankfully, and soon enough Nanami is treading his way back to him, visibly out of breath and ruffled. Satoru pops up from his crouch and stretches his arms above his head, quickly reaching over to ruffle Nanami's hair before he could be slapped away. 

"Good job, Nanamin," he coos. 

This only serves to deepen Nanami's scowl as he tries to straighten his hair back out, striding past him to where their car is waiting. 

"Aw, don't be so cold to your Senpai," Satoru easily catches up to him. "I'll start thinking you don't like me." 

"I don't," Nanami deadpans. 

Satoru throws his head back with a loud laugh, easily keeping up with the increased pace Nanami adopts to try and get away from him. And then, because he considers this mission to be done and over with, he decides to bring up his observation from earlier. 

"You should stop throwing yourself into big groups," he tells Nanami. 

Nanami immediately scowls, but to his credit, pauses before retorting. "Why?" he asks, sounding like he would quite like to say entirely different words. 

Satoru throws his arm around Nanami’s shoulders and promptly dissolves any sort of reluctant curiosity Nanami might’ve held. He gets shrugged off just as fast, and Satoru frowns. 

“I’m being serious about the advice, you know,” he calls out after him.

“Then say what you want instead of being annoying,” Nanami snaps back. 

“Jeez, you’re so grouchy,” Satoru mutters, mostly to himself. He’s just trying to help. “Your technique is strong, but you’re not fast enough to use it consistently against a group of curses,” he hurries to explain before Nanami can cut him off. “Your attacks are maiming instead of exorcising. You’ll be faster dealing with each curse individually instead of taking them all on at the same time.” 

Something flashes across Nanami’s face, but then he’s crossing his arms and looking away before Satoru can bring it up. “I’ll take your advice into consideration,” he says stiffly, and that’s probably the best Satoru is going to get, so he accepts it with a shrug.  

He doesn't know what they're teaching the first years these days, but it doesn't seem very useful. 

///

The missions don't let up. 

Which would be great for Satoru's chronic boredom, if only they weren't baby missions meant for babies, and didn't keep him annoyingly separated from his one cure for chronic boredom. 

Speaking of. 

> From: Sugumon
     Done for the day
     When are you getting your lazy ass back

Satoru grins down at his phone from where he's leaning against the wall outside a bakery Nanami wanted to get some bread from. Anything baked and not sweet is a waste of everyone's time as far as he's concerned, so he lost all interest when Nanami stressed that the bakery doesn't offer pastries. 

Satoru flicks his eyes to the time on his phone, smile dimming. It's already late in the afternoon, and Nanami is taking so long. 

> To: Sugumon 
      as soon as nanamin is done doing whatever it is people do in bakeries 

> From: Sugumon
     Buying bread?

> To: Sugumon
     boring 

> From: Sugumon
     Didn't realise you're going out after missions now

Satoru tilts his head slightly, not quite sure what to make of that response. 

> To: Sugumon 
     jealous? 

> From: Sugumon 
     In your dreams

Yeah, probably. Suguru doesn't need to know that. 

> To: Sugumon
     wasn't planning on it 
     nanamin spotted it on the way to the metro and wanted to buy something 
     he abandoned me on the sidewalk 

> From: Sugumon 
     Are you sure he wasn't just trying to get rid of you 

> To: Sugumon
     i'm keeping 3 eyes on him in case he tries 

> From: Sugumon
     Not all 6? 

> To: Sugumon
     not worth the effort 

"Gojo-senpai," Nanami snaps from in front of him, tone indicating that he's been trying to get Satoru's attention for quite a while now. So maybe he didn't manage keeping three eyes on him like he told Suguru. But Suguru texted him first, so it's his fault for distracting him. 

"Can we leave now?" Satoru is now even more eager to return to the school than he was fifteen minutes ago. 

"Yes." Nanami still sounds annoyed with him, which isn't fair considering Satoru hasn't even done anything but let Nanami get his dumb bread. "You could've just gone without me, if you're so eager to get back." 

Satoru isn't a fan of how much that feels like a dig. He decides to keep the fact that Suguru - and by extension Haibara, which still feels wrong to even think - is back at the school already, to himself. 

"And leave you to fend for yourself?" Satoru raises a hand to his chest. "What sort of Senpai do you think I am?" 

"A bad one," Nanami informs him. 

Satoru snorts. He did kind of walk into that one. 

///

"Suguru!" A loud shout into their dorm is all the warning he gets. 

He turns around from where he's been keeping himself busy in the kitchen just in time to catch Satoru barrelling into him. Suguru wraps his arms tightly around Satoru's middle as he feels Satoru wrap his tightly around his shoulders, with enough force that he's surprised Satoru didn't jump on him. He certainly had the momentum. 

Suguru leans back, hoisting Satoru just barely off the ground and revels in the giggle the action gets him. 

Two weeks of non-stop missions made sure that Suguru barely saw Satoru, and the times when he did were mostly reserved to coming back late, just to find Satoru already passed out on his bed. To hug him like this after so long feels like a balm on a wound he wasn't aware of. Like the sting of water on a paper cut he didn't realise he had. 

"I'm back," Satoru mumbles into the shoulder he tucked his head against. 

"Welcome back," Suguru dutifully greets back, lips moving against the side of Satoru's temple. His hand moves up Satoru's back to tangle into the soft hair at the back of his head, thumb brushing against his nape. 

The action gets him the result he was looking for as Satoru all but melts into him, a soft sigh skittering against Suguru's neck as the last of Satoru's usual post-mission jitters bleed out of him. 

There's a part of Suguru that worries about all the tension he knows has been accumulating in Satoru, the thrum of energy that never quite discharges properly. He's not one to usually complain about the quality of missions, but describing them as fodder would probably still be too kind. They're not suited for anyone that's being sent on them. Haibara, he knows, struggles to consistently best Grade 2's, and Satoru told him that Nanami is much the same, which just leaves two Special Grades being tossed at curses far below their pay grade. 

Suguru wants to believe that there's something to be learned in every assignment, that each exorcism has a purpose, but even he is struggling to find much meaning in this. 

He has his assessment of Haibara, and Satoru has his. All this assignment is doing now is separating them. 

And he's finding that he's not all that fond of being separated from Satoru, actually. 

///

Turns out, there's quite a few things Suguru isn't fond of in this situation. 

It's a rare free day for all of them, which is a blessing in disguise since early summer heat has finally rolled into the mountains. Suguru isn't sure if he could stand being separated from the cool floor of his room he's sprawled out on, even if a Special Grade decided to ransack the school. 

Maybe the heat is making the curses lethargic as well. 

"Satoru," he nudges at him with a foot that's currently resting on Satoru's stomach. The dorm is too small for them to sprawl out freely without overlap. They're taking turns on who's getting smothered by the hour. Satoru hasn't really bothered moving in the last two, but that's probably more to do with his position near the fan outweighing the cons of being used as a footrest. 

Satoru makes a vague noise of acknowledgment. 

"Do curses get affected by weather?" 

That gets Satoru to raise his head, and his eyes squint over the top of his glasses, his bangs sticking to his forehead. "What, like rain and shit?" 

"And shit," Suguru confirms. "Heat and stuff." 

Satoru melts back down. Suguru can practically hear the unused cogs of his brain stuttering to a start, even as Suguru's own brain feels more like liquid honey than anything else. 

"I guess," Satoru hums. "There's weather related CT's out there, like lightning and wind. Would be kind of useless if they didn't even work against curses."

"Imagine," Suguru snickers. 

"You have a weather CT you've been dying to use, and then boom," Satoru snorts. "Does fuck all, and now you're just standing there looking stupid." 

Suguru chuckles, but runs out of energy before he can think to continue the dumb line of thought. This fucking heat, man. 

There's a knock on the door that makes them both immediately groan. 

Suguru kicks Satoru's side, and Satoru tickles the bottom of his foot, neither willing to get up and risk exposure to the hot air that's been rising and gathering in Suguru's room. 

"It's open," Suguru shouts once it's clear neither one of them is moving. 

The door swings open revealing a surprise Nanami. He blinks down at them, clearly trying to process the pile of Special Grades melting on the floor. Suguru can practically see some of the hard-earned respect he's fought out of Nanami evaporating. Maybe that's just the heat steaming off of him though.  

"Gojo-senpai," Nanami starts, and Suguru immediately tenses, fighting the urge to hide Satoru. It's much too late for that, he should've thought of it sooner. 

"What do you want," Satoru grunts, and Suguru digs his foot against his side again. 

Manners, Satoru. 

Clearly reading his mind, Satoru swats at his ankle. Too hot.  Which isn't an excuse, regardless of what Satoru thinks. 

"I was wondering if we could go over tomorrow's mission details," Nanami clears his throat. "It's the first Grade 1 I'll be fighting." 

"Aw, are you scared, Nanamin? Don't worry, your super strong Senpai will protect you!" 

Suguru doesn't know where Satoru's sudden burst of energy comes from. The thought Nanami being the cause of it makes the skin underneath his shirt itch uncomfortably. 

Nanami sighs, but there must be some truth to Satoru's teasing because he doesn't contradict him. "I would feel better if I knew what we were facing." Nanami glances towards him, and Suguru tries to smooth his face out from whatever grimace he felt twisting his lips. It's not Nanami he has an issue with. 

And it's not something Satoru will agree to anyway, too warm and uncomfortable to do any sort of thinking, if their day so far is to be believed. 

"Fine," Satoru sighs heavily. "But just because you asked nicely." 

Wait, what. 

Suguru raises his head to look at Satoru in disbelief, numbly letting his legs slide down as Satoru stands up. He wasn't expecting Satoru to agree, much less leave. 

He glances at Nanami, and then Satoru who is already turning to leave. 

"I'll bring us back sodas," he calls over his shoulder. "Don't melt without me." 

"I want a popsicle as well," Suguru calls out numbly, not quite processing what's happening. 

And then he's left starting at Satoru's back, before the door shuts close. 

So maybe he does have a problem with Nanami. 

Suguru suddenly feels a lot colder, and not an ounce better for it. 

Chapter Text

By some miracle, the missions get lighter.

Well. Haibara believes it's a miracle, at least. Suguru thinks that he and Satoru were onto something, and the current heat wave is in fact exorcising the curses for them. There's no way anything can survive in these conditions.

"Suguru," Satoru whines from where he's sprawled out on the floor, shirt bunched up for the meagre relief Suguru's fan offers.

"I know," Suguru replies, equally as miserable.

The break would be nice if either one of them had enough energy to scrape themselves off the floor of their rooms for more than half a second.

They were up a mountain, and still the relentless heat hounds them. It eases up for maybe ten whole minutes in the middle of the night, to the reprieve and relief of absolutely nobody.

Suguru never thought of himself as someone to hold grudges, but he was going to find a way to have words with the weather one way or another. The curses taught him that the intangible can very well be tangible, and his best friend defies impossibility, so Suguru isn't about let himself be discouraged.

The weather? It's on sight.

"Delivery," Shoko announces, dumping a tray of ice behind the fan.

"Shoko, I love you," Satoru shouts with all the energy of a dying battery, doing his best to drape himself entirely over the fan.

He gets about halfway situated before Suguru is shoving at him, feet and elbows jamming into Satoru's side and thighs to get him to move.

"Quit hogging my fan in my room, you selfish prick," Suguru grunts, dragging Satoru away with an arm clamped around his middle.

Shoko uses their tussle to her advantage, and plops herself down directly in front of the freshly vacated fan. All that effort to drag one nuisance off of it, just to get immediately replaced by another.

"Why is everyone in my room, anyway," Suguru says, not quite managing to keep the whine out of his voice but not really caring, either. He should've picked better friends. Where was Yaga to take responsibility for sicking these two on him? He should get Suguru proper air conditioning to make up for it.

"We have a system," Satoru starts his explanation, not for the first time.

Suguru groans, stopping Satoru before can start practising his synonyms again by spouting the same bullshit explanation he's been rewording since the morning. There is no airing out this heat, and it's not Suguru's fault he's the only one with a fan. Satoru's insistence that infinity will keep him cool and Shoko's equally bullheaded claim that the heat never bothered her before lasted all of a half hour before he had two new permanent fixtures in his room.

One technically, but he wouldn't consider Satoru a permanent resident of his room. He's more like a cat, coming and going as he pleases, only staying put when he's being fed (ransacking Suguru's snack drawer) or pet.

"Just get your own fans," Suguru grouses, somehow getting the least out of his own purchase.

"You already have one though," Satoru counters.

"Would be a waste of money," Shoko agrees.

He hates when they team up on him.

Suguru groans again, vaguely slapping any part of Satoru he can reach. The bastard just laughs until Suguru jabs a toe against his side, making a sound that Suguru is too heat addled to make fun of properly. He files it away for the next time he's losing an argument against him.

"You guys are the worst," Suguru mutters, faintly satisfied with his revenge on Satoru now that he's rubbing his side sourly.

"Love you," the other two tone in unison, because they're the worst.

Suguru lets them hang out in his room as long as they want.

///

Suguru knows, theoretically, that they have classes they're supposed to be attending. But it's two weeks out from summer break and they've had missions assigned to them relentlessly the previous month, so practically? He's not too bothered.

Well.

He was bothered. But then Satoru said he isn't going, which gave Shoko the opportunity to dip, and Suguru knew better than to let himself get abandoned. Yaga could live with a little abandonment, he's sure. If anything, he's giving their teacher some reprieve from Satoru's antics. A favour, really. He's being very generous.

The instigator in question brings him out of his thoughts with a muttered curse, and Suguru tunes back into whatever Satoru has been trying to do for the past twenty minutes.

He peers over Satoru's head, leaning over his crouched form, his bent knees digging against the other's back.

"I don't think you're getting your soda, Satoru," he muses.

"Shut up, I almost had it that time. I'm not losing to a vending machine."

"Kinda looks like you are."

Satoru grunts, but otherwise doesn't bother with a proper answer, doing his best to jam his entire arm into the dispenser of the machine. Suguru eyes the red marks on his forearm and hopes that this isn't going to end up with a trip to the infirmary.

Suguru nudges his knee into Satoru's back a little more heavily. "Give it up, we can go grab another one from the vending machine on south side."

"No." Satoru remains stubborn.

Suguru sighs and entertains himself for a while by progressively leaning more of his weight against Satoru to try and unbalance him. It works moderately well, and after the fifth time Satoru is forced to yank his hand out to catch himself from falling flat on his face, he slumps back against Suguru's legs and tilts his head back to glare at him.

He looks ridiculous looking at him upside down and Suguru grins. He flicks Satoru's nose and quietly delights in the smattering of red it gets him across the bridge of it.

Cute.

"Come on." He pokes Satoru's cheek. "My treat, you can even get two." If it's one thing Satoru can't resist, it's using Suguru's wallet for his treats.

His Special Grade stipend might as well just be his Satoru budget with how often he ends up paying for him.

Satoru looks at him distrustfully, and Suguru leans down to slide his sunglasses up to his forehead so he can meet his eyes. He makes sure to block out the worst of the sun glare, not actually wanting to cause him a headache, regardless of how difficult he's currently being.

"Satoru." He taps his cheek with a smile. "Stop being stubborn."

Satoru huffs but concedes, and Suguru steps back to give him some space to stand up, offering his arm for Satoru to haul himself up with. Satoru stays close once he's up, their arms still clasped together, and Suguru knows the imploring look on his face enough to prepare himself for a test of will.

Satoru tilts his head so his sunglasses slide down, offering a peak at the eyes that put the sky to shame and Suguru doesn't know what he's gearing up for, but he's already chanting a steady stream of stay strong in his head.

"A soda and two snacks," he wheedles.

Suguru groans with no intention of actually denying him.

"You're so annoying," he grouses, shoving Satoru away.

Satoru does a dorky half-aborted fist pump as he all but skips ahead and Suguru can't quite temper the fond smile at the sight of him.

Such a loser, he thinks. Then, patting his pocket to make sure he actually has his wallet on him, and thankfully, easily placated.

///

"You know," Satoru starts, and Suguru is already groaning. Satoru's never once started a productive thought with the words 'you know'. "We haven't had a night-in in a while."

Suguru blinks at him. He knows what Satoru's trying to get at, but he's not about to let him get away without asking. It's important he learns how to use his words properly.

"We watched a movie yesterday," he reminds him.

"Yeah but, like." Satoru waves a hand vaguely, clearly wanting Suguru to conjure what he wants out of thin air.

Suguru raises an eyebrow at him. "Words, Satoru. Try again."

Satoru scowls, the petulant nose scrunch that Suguru finds endlessly cute making an appearance. His lips tilt up into a smile.

"You know," he says again. "Drinks, snacks, dumb games, the whole thing. We've been so busy lately it feels like ages since we all just had a night in."

Satoru isn't wrong. But there was also zero chance of him not having an ulterior motive; Suguru can count the number of times Satoru suggested alcohol after that first time on one hand.

He crosses his arms, raising an eyebrow at Satoru in a wordless demand for a proper reason.

"I really wanna see Nanami shit-faced," Satoru folds immediately.

Suguru snorts and cuffs Satoru upside the head. "Alright, let's get Shoko on board then, she'll get us the alcohol if we give her your card."

"Why do I always have to pay for everything?" Satoru whines. "Why does no one ever pay for me?"

"Because you're rich, and this was your idea," Suguru tells him dryly, and then drags Satoru into a headlock. "And I pay for you, you brat. My entire stipend goes into feeding you."

Satoru, entirely incapable of not being difficult about everything, slumps into his hold instead of fighting it, forcing Suguru into adjusting to better support his weight. He loosens his arm, draping it across Satoru's chest instead and winds an arm around Satoru's middle to stop him from eating dirt.

Annoying, Suguru thinks as Satoru relaxes back into him. He's so annoying.

"Have I told you you're the best, Suguru?" Satoru beams up at him, patting his arm.

So fucking annoying, Suguru thinks, fighting the urge to squish him. He decides to loosen his hold and drop him instead.

Satoru flails for a moment without his support pillar but eventually manages to find his balance without wiping out, even if he's entirely graceless about it. Suguru snickers at his misfortune.

"Come on, we have to go buy cigarettes," Suguru calls, starting to walk away.

Satoru scrambles after him, the sound of his hurried footsteps making Suguru smile.

"No we don't," Satoru says forcefully, falling into step with him. "You're quitting."

Suguru chuckles, slinging his arm around Satoru's shoulders. "Relax, I meant for Shoko. We have to bribe her with something."

"She should quit as well," Satoru grumbles, but relaxes slightly under Suguru's arm.

"You can tell her that after she's done sourcing our alcohol."

"Yeah, yeah." Satoru rolls his eyes.

Suguru smiles, poking his side. Satoru yelps, but by the time he tries to retaliate, Suguru is already running away. He laughs as Satoru starts to give chase, knowing it won't take long for him to catch up.

It never does.

///

Suguru feels light and floaty, happily content in the way he's learned to associate with being tipsy. Maybe though, he thinks tucking himself further into Satoru's side, that can't be blamed entirely on the alcohol.

"Comfortable, Suguru?" Shoko drawls from where she's sprawled out next to the coffee table. They're all sort of sprawled around. He and Satoru were on the couch at some point, but slid down to the floor to better stretch their legs, using it as a backrest instead. Haibara and Nanami occupied the single chair on the side, Haibara repeatedly sliding from the arm he's perched on into Nanami's lap.

Every single instance is met with spluttering and red faces. Suguru idly wonders how long it'll take for them to just give up on trying to sit separately.

Which reminds him.

"Hm," Suguru hums his agreement, slumping steadily against Satoru and letting him take more of his weight.

There's a poke into his ribs, but no complaints, so he figures it's fine, probably.

Shoko snorts, taking another swig of her beer. She extends it out to Satoru, shaking it a little in offering. Satoru scrunches his nose in reply, and Suguru isn't sure if he's declining because alcohol or because the middle of the Venn diagram between Shoko's taste and Satoru's taste is empty space.

He swipes the beer from Shoko's hand, taking a larger drink to cover both him and Satoru. "Stop trying to get him to drink," he mumbles, slumping back down after he's passed the half empty can to Nanami. "He doesn't like it."

"Down, boy," Shoko replies dryly. "This was his idea, and I just offered."

"He is right here," Satoru interjects. He sounds vaguely annoyed in the way he usually gets when he feels like he's not being paid enough attention to, so Suguru reaches up to pat his cheek.

Satoru leans into the touch, and Suguru lets himself grin, moving his hand up to run a hand through Satoru's hair.

An empty can sails through the air, hitting Suguru square in the side and interrupting him from where he was quite happy to just keep petting Satoru. Which, annoying. His hair is always so soft it feels nice to run his hand through. Good texture, good texture.

He twists around, unwilling to separate very far and ending up somewhat lying on Satoru's lap because of it, and aims a glare at Shoko.

Shoko levels him with an unimpressed look in return. Her alcohol tolerance at age sixteen is alarming. "Stop spoiling him."

"No." Suguru winds an arm around Satoru's waist. "I like him spoiled."

"Oh yeah?" Suddenly Shoko is grinning, and not in a friendly way whatsoever. She's also not looking at him any more, eyes instead trained above him at Satoru. Which is rude, because they were having a conversation. But he can understand it, because he also likes looking at Satoru.

He turns around to do just that, peering up at Satoru from where he's shoved his face into his stomach.

And Satoru is red. Not too-long-out-in-the-sun red, or been-drinking red, but red red.

Suguru frowns, shoving his face harder into Satoru's stomach as he thinks. Fever, maybe?

Yeah, probably, actually. He's been weirdly tense all evening.

Suguru flops back so he's more splayed out than curled up, and reaches a hand up so he can tug Satoru down with a steady pressure to the back of his neck. A panicked look crosses Satoru's face for a split-second which is dumb, because Suguru would never do anything to cause him panic on purpose if he could help it, and Satoru knows that.

Best intentions, always. Honest.

Satoru still goes easily, and Suguru doesn't let up until he's bent over him, gently letting their foreheads knock together.

"What are you doing?" Satoru sounds strangled. Suguru still has a hand on his neck, so he scratches at the soft hair at his nape to try and get him to relax. He somehow grows tenser, which is not at all what Suguru was going for.

Is it opposite day? he thinks vaguely.

"I think you have a fever," he informs him seriously. They should probably tell Shoko this as well. His forehead's burning against Suguru's, so he's pretty confident in his assessment.

"Huh?" It comes out more as a wheeze than Satoru's usual outrage, which is another point towards Suguru's hypothesis.

"You're burning up."

"I'm not."

Valiant defence, but Suguru is still holding their foreheads together which means he can feel how hot Satoru is running.

"Can you let me up, maybe?"

Deflecting.

He narrows his eyes at him, which is made a little difficult with the proximity and the alcohol, but he can make do. He's not letting him get away so easily.

"Shoko," he calls, loosening his hold ever so slightly. Satoru is already scrunching his nose at the smell of alcohol on his breath like the spoiled little prince he is, but this way he can't complain about it. Satoru can move away if he wants. "I think Satoru has a fever."

He can't really see Shoko, can really only see fucking illegal eyes and blue, blue, blue. But then another can sails towards them, this time deflecting off of Infinity, which tells him Shoko is listening, but also, rude.

Satoru moves away slightly to stick his tongue out at Shoko, who flips him off.

"He's fine," she dismisses. "Maybe let him clear his head. He looks a little faint over there."

Which is true, but Suguru feels a little reluctant about letting him go just yet. Sacrifices have to be made for the greater good, though, so with a heavy sigh he slides his arm back down around his waist.

Satoru pops back up like a spring, as if Suguru was the only thing holding him in place, and he muffles his laugh into Satoru's stomach.

"Told you I'm fine," Satoru all but squeaks, patting his shoulder with enough force and frequency to call it a slap instead.

Suguru peers up at him, and even his ears are red now. But he knows when to concede defeat, and it's currently two versus one and all the drinking is making him sleepy, so he drops it. He winds both his arms around Satoru's waist instead, content to block out his surroundings using him and let the heaviness of his eyelids drag him down.

He faintly hears Nanami's strangled, "Are they always like this?" and Shoko's exasperated "You get used to it," but there's a gentle hand in his hair now, and Satoru's so warm, and he easily succumbs to sleep.

///

Shoko doesn't like meddling. She prefers to avoid it, really.

But desperate times call for desperate measures, and she'll be damned if she doesn't get something out of the display she was forced to witness yesterday. She refuses to watch Suguru stretch out on Satoru's lap like it's his right every time he gets even remotely tipsy, just for him to turn around the next day and call each other best friends.

Satoru, as their self-designated non-drinker, and therefore the only one this morning without a hangover, is out getting everyone breakfast. Suguru prefers fried food after drinking, which is why that is what they're all getting. Shoko gave up on arguing with him on this months ago.

What Suguru wants, Satoru gets, and vice versa. She learned to pick her battles.

It's also working in her favour at the moment, giving her the perfect opportunity to shove Suguru's own feelings down his throat, and hopefully embarrass him enough to stop. She fears she's going to have to surgically separate them sometime soon.

Suguru's miserable waking up, and this gets exacerbated whenever he drinks, so conscious of that, Shoko bangs on his door. Loudly.

She gives him ten seconds.

Once the ten seconds are up, she throws the door open against the wall. "Good morning, sunshine!" she shouts into the room.

An irritated groan comes from the mountain of blankets Shoko identifies as Suguru, and she grins, crossing the room to open up the blinds. This is followed by another, louder, groan and accompanied by a pillow Suguru throws at her, tugging the blanket tighter around himself.

He misses, but A for effort.

Five seconds this time, and she's snatching the blanket off of him, letting it fall to the ground.

Suguru sits up, cross-legged on the bed, and squints a disgruntled glare at her. "What do you want?" he rasps.

Shoko takes her time, grabbing his desk chair to sit down on and resting her chin in the palm of her hand. She hums non-committally, knowing she's just annoying him further. She hates to admit it, but Satoru is right and annoying Suguru is pretty fun.

"Not even a good morning?" she asks.

The glare she gets in return would look more threatening if Suguru wasn't still squinting against the sunlight.

"You broke into my room."

"Your door was unlocked," she waves him away. "And Satoru barges in here all the time, can't I do the same once in a while?"

"No," Suguru answers flatly, giving up on decorum and lying back down.

"I was even considering offering you a cigarette before you decided to be rude," Shoko sighs.

Suguru groans, turning his back to her and dragging a pillow over his head. "What do you want?" he repeats, voice almost entirely muffled by the pillow.

"I'm here to tell you about your crush on Satoru," she grins. She knows she holds the highest ranked hand, and she's not above using it for her entertainment.

Yaga's golden boy needs to be bullied once in a while. It's good for the ego.

Her statement sends Suguru upright again, pillow now joining the rest of his bedding on the floor.

"My fucking what on who?" He splutters. "Shoko, what the fuck."

Shoko raises an eyebrow at him, resisting the urge to smirk. Suguru's reaction is exactly what she was going for.

"Think real hard on it. And while you're at it, remember your shamelessness yesterday and be ashamed."

Suguru blinks at her, clearly not a single thought in his head. Useless.

"Suguru," she sighs out with great patience. "You've been glaring at Nanami whenever he comes anywhere near Satoru. You're literally always staring and smiling at him. You wrapped yourself around him yesterday like an overly affectionate boa constrictor. It's sickening."

She can't believe she has to spell it out for him. She was kind of hoping he'll be a little quicker on the uptake.

"Well, yeah," he starts, which is how Shoko knows that he's internalised exactly nothing of what she just said. "We don't get to hang out as much with separate missions, I don't think it's unreasonable to be annoyed about our free time getting interrupted as well."

"And the staring?"

"I-," he stops himself and clenches his jaw. "I don't stare."

"Uh-huh," she tones, unimpressed. "You wanna try that again?"

Suguru clears his throat. "I don't stare at Satoru," he says forcefully.

"Not what I meant, but okay," she snorts. "And your drunken adventures yesterday?"

The look he levels at her makes Shoko want to throw something at him. She doesn't, but it's only because she doesn't have anything reasonably projectile shaped within arms reach.

"Come on, Shoko," he waves his hand. "We're always like that. You know Satoru, he'll die if he has to bear his own weight for more than a minute without leaning on someone. I don't see why I'm being singled out here."

Suguru was doing a lot more than just leaning on Satoru, but sure.

"Right." This isn't clicking. She's starting to think Satoru might be the more hopeful of the two to approach this with. "So Satoru's touchy, and that's fine. And you're touchy, and that's also fine, because so is Satoru."

Suguru nods, looking entirely too satisfied with his senseless logic repeated back to him. "Yeah."

"So, if that's fine, and Satoru being touchy is fine, if he started to, I don't know, hang off of Nanami frequently, that would also be fine?"

Shoko mentally apologises to Nanami, who's done nothing wrong but does unfortunately have to be thrown under the bus for the sake of her sanity. He's a gentleman, he'll understand.

"No," Suguru frowns.

Shoko feels like throttling him. Genuinely. She's laid out all the puzzle pieces in front of him, in order, and he's just refusing to connect them. It has to be on purpose at this point.

"Why?" she asks flatly.

"Because that's not-. It's not-," Suguru interrupts himself with a groan. "That's our thing. He wouldn't. I'm the only one he fully lets infinity down with."

"And if he started dropping infinity around Nanami?" Shoko is being so patient. It's like explaining 2+2 to a preschooler.

"He wouldn't." There's a note of petulance in Suguru's voice that Shoko would put good money on rubbing off of Satoru.

"Suguru, think real hard about why the idea of Satoru doing those things with Nanami is annoying you."

Suguru opens his mouth to reply, and if it's just for more stupidity, Shoko can't be blamed for her actions. Some dormant form of self preservation must've kicked in because he snaps his mouth closed, frowning instead as the rusty cogs of a brain Shoko can't vouch for him possessing start to turn.

"Oh my god," Suguru stares blankly in front of him. He slowly lowers his head into his hands. "Oh my fucking god," he repeats in a mumble. "I have a crush on Satoru."

"Congratulations," she says flatly. "You're the last one to know."

"Am I gay?" he turns panicked eyes to her. "I think I'm gay. Oh my god, I'm gay. I'm gay for Satoru."

Okay so a sexuality crisis and a crushing-on-my-best-friend crisis. Shoko was sort of hoping he would have figured at least one of those out by now. She would feel worse for causing this at seven in the morning, if she wasn't forced into the front row seats of the train wreck between the two. As far as she's concerned, she owes him some mental scarring in return.

"Yeah, probably," she says mildly.

"What the fuck do I do?" Suguru scrubs his hands across his face. "I can't tell him. He can't know."

Which, no, actually. The only thing worse than oblivious pining is conscious pining.

"No, you're going to," she informs him.

Whatever retort Suguru had ready is interrupted by the problem in question.

"Six months!" Satoru yells into the dorm.

Shoko and Suguru exchange a glance, conversation momentarily sidelined as they try to figure out what conversation Satoru was having with himself before he decided to get them involved.

They come up blank.

"For six months," Satoru seethes as he walks into Suguru's room. He doesn't seem surprised to see Shoko there, but he probably knew from the moment he walked into the dorm anyway. "You let me water a plastic plant."

Ah, yeah, they did do that.

Suguru lets out a helpless laugh, burying his face into his hands. Shoko doesn't feel a shred of sympathy for him.

He's the one that fell in love with an idiot. That's on him.

///

When they're both at the college, Suguru likes to think that he has an approximate knowledge of where Satoru is at all times. It makes him easy to find, and makes Suguru less likely to fall for one of his pranks.

That is to say, the advantages of knowing where Satoru is at any given moment are immense.

Which is exactly why he's maybe, slightly, moderately, on edge because it's approaching noon and he hasn't seen Satoru since the morning. He's resorted to wandering the grounds in order to find him, the text he sent half an hour ago going unanswered.

"I have made a mistake!" comes a shout from his left.

Suguru turns on his heel, just in time to catch sight of Satoru rounding the corner at full tilt. His eyebrows climb up as his mind supplies Satoru's whereabouts as nowhere good.

"What?" he calls out belatedly.

Satoru comes to a stop next to him, leaning on his shoulder as he tries to catch his breath. Suguru pats his back for the lack of anything better to do.

"I had a great idea, with not so great consequences."

That's a summary of approximately 70% of Satoru's ideas, and doesn't come as a surprise whatsoever.

"Who did you piss off this time?" Suguru asks, unimpressed but already faintly amused.

"Nanami." Satoru takes a deep breath. "I need you to point him in the wrong direction when he comes looking."

"Right, that's exactly what I'm not going to do."

"Yes you are," Satoru dismisses him immediately. It pisses Suguru off that he's right. "We'll reconvene in your room."

"Why does it always have to be my room?"

"Nanami respects you too much to break into your room, I'm in active danger if I hide in mine. You wouldn't want me getting hurt, would you Suguru?" Satoru flashes his dumb fucking eyes at him, as if Suguru ever needed convincing to go along with one of his schemes before.

He sighs, which is as good as agreeing with how Satoru lights up.

"Okay, remember, your room!" Satoru shouts as he starts jogging away.

Suguru waves him off, irritated with himself. Saying no is a valuable life skill, he tries to convince himself.

Just as Satoru predicted, moments later Nanami turns the same corner, noticeably redder and more out of breath than Satoru was. It takes Suguru one glance to realise what Satoru has done.

Nanami's once blonde hair has now turned hot pink.

"Hello, Nanami," Suguru greets, fighting to keep his lips from twitching up.

"Geto-senpai," Nanami greets him stiffly. "Did you see where Gojo went?"

Satoru, he's going to have your head, he thinks.

"I think I saw him run over there." He points to the opposite direction of where Satoru disappeared to.

Unfortunately for Nanami, Suguru's allegiance is unwaveringly to Satoru, for better or for worse.

"Thank you," Nanami bows stiffly, pink bangs ruffled by the wind.

Suguru waits well until Nanami is out of earshot, before throwing his head back with a laugh, strolling back to the dorms.

He finds Satoru on his bed, probably messing up his Diamond save if the DS in his hands is anything to go by.

Satoru looks up at him as soon as he enters the room with a bright grin. "Fucking hilarious, isn't it?"

Suguru curses Shoko for pointing out what the warmth he feels when that grin is directed at him means. He could've lived happily in ignorance. Still, he can't help grinning back. "Yeah it is."

He refuses to think too hard on the fluttering feeling in his chest when Satoru perks up with his approval, sitting up to launch into an explanation of how exactly he did it.

He just settles down next to him, content with listening to him talk.

///

Suguru knew that logically, the break they've gotten from their missions is temporary. He also knew that he and Satoru weren't back to being assigned joint missions yet, either.

But knowing these things and internalizing and accepting them are, in fact, two fairly separate things. Satoru agrees, probably.

"I can't believe they're sending you back out," Satoru whines as they make their way back from Yaga's office.

Suguru sighs, no less annoyed about it. It's not fair. He just figured out he's crushing on Satoru, and now he has to be separated from him, again. Which is a big issue, because Suguru recently found out that he quite likes looking at Satoru. It was a revelation, really.

He knew, conceptually, that Satoru was attractive. Pretty. Gorgeous, if one didn't mind inflating his already overinflated ego. What he didn't know before was that Satoru was attractive to him. But now he does, and Satoru's hot, and Suguru is overly aware that he's a teenage boy with hormones. He should be allowed to enjoy this revelation, instead of having to go hunt curses in places Satoru isn't.

So it's bullshit, and Satoru agrees with him, which should be enough to call this whole thing off, but it wasn't when it started and it sure as shit isn't now.

"They can't keep this up for too much longer," Suguru tries to reason, for the sake of his own sanity if nothing else. "Once the Grades are decided, it'll be over. Sorcerers only get partnered a maximum of one Grade higher, so it's not like they'll keep us partnered after the fact."

"What if they get promoted to Grade One?" Satoru decides to create new imaginary problems.

They're not, that much Suguru is sure of, and even if they do, Suguru doesn't need to be partnered with a Grade One, because he already has a Special Grade partner. Even if said partner is doing his best impression of a cynic. It doesn't suit him. He needs him to be a little more optimistic here.

Suguru shrugs. "Then we go back to doing missions together anyway."

That seems to be enough for Satoru as he nods, even if the frown on his face doesn't dissipate. Suguru can't blame him for being in a mood, but he reaches out to ruffle his hair in an attempt to take his mind off things anyway.

Satoru glares at him, swatting at his hands as he tries to pat his hair back into order.

"Race you to the dorm?"

Satoru grins, never one to back down from a challenge. Suguru pats himself on the back for a job well done.

Doesn't mean he's going to go easy on Satoru, though.

"Okay, go," he calls out, already running.

"What the fuck, Suguru," Satoru cries after him, spurred into action a second after him. "That's not a countdown, that's cheating. Come back, you bastard!"

Suguru laughs, evading Satoru's attempts to grab him. "Try and get me then."

Satoru groans as he scrambles after him, Suguru laughing almost all the way back to their dorm. It doesn't take long, and soon he's sliding down the wall opposite their door as he tries to catch his breath. Satoru is right behind him, and decides to throw himself down on the ground between his splayed legs instead.

Which, okay. Suguru would maybe prefer him not to do that, actually. He has hormones and a recently discovered Satoru shaped hair-trigger.

Haibara and Nanami round the corner to find them in that exact position, which isn't great but also isn't the end of the world considering what they've seen during their adventures in teenage rebellion. Suguru being an affectionate drunk makes so much more sense in hindsight. He has to thank Shoko for opening his eyes to so many facets of himself. Or maybe thank Satoru.

He glances down.

On second thought, maybe Satoru can live in obliviousness a little while longer.

"Uh, Senpai?" Haibara addresses them with some trepidation.

Which is fair. Nanami stands next to him looking unimpressed, which is also fair, considering he's picked up a knack for running into them when they're not outsiders-ready.

"I take it you heard about the new assignment?" Suguru asks, brushing his bangs off of his face. There's sweat gathering at his temples, and he reaches down to wipe his hand of it against Satoru's shirt.

Haibara nods, relaxing slightly when it doesn't seem like he was interrupting something. Suguru kind of wishes he was interrupting something. He'll like to have an interruptible something with Satoru.

"We have one as well," Nanami aims the statement at the floor.

"Of course we fucking do," Satoru mutters from said floor.

Suguru sighs, but stands up, hauling Satoru up with him. He makes it as difficult as possible for Suguru to do so, and he doesn't give Satoru a second to get his bearings before dragging him into a headlock.

"Senpai, please," Nanami sounds pained.

Satoru shoves him off once Suguru loosens his grip, and he sighs, ignoring Satoru's grumbling.

Back to work, it is.

Chapter Text

Suguru is starting to think he should start bringing a notebook with him on these missions. He's spending so much of them not fighting and just observing, that he's creating a system to decide if the curse is worth adding to his arsenal. He never thought of himself as a particularly picky eater, but he might just have to reconsider. 

This Grade 2 is not particularly appetising. 

None of them are really, but this one in particular is making Suguru's stomach revolt before the fight is even over. 

Surely no one would question him if he simply claimed that Haibara exorcised the curse before he could activate his technique? 

Yeah, good plan. 

"Geto-san, I think the curse is close to dead," Haibara shouts as he dodges another one of its attacks. 

"I think it needs a little more," Suguru calls back. 

Haibara doesn't reply, but he does jump into the fight with renewed vigour. Suguru summons two more of his curses to distract the one Haibara's fighting, and give him more openings. He twirls the blade in his hand idly, returning to his mental pros and cons list. 

The cons are currently far outweighing the pros. 

it's very hard to summon the same excitement for curses that Satoru usually has. 

Pro: adding curses to his inventory increases his CE output and makes him stronger. 

Con: it's a Grade 2, so can it really make that much of a difference? It's practically a drop in the ocean compared to the Grade 1's and semi Special Grades he's used to fighting. 

Yeah, no, fuck this. He'll pass on this one. 

The curse is on its last legs now, Haibara panting opposite to where it's trying to crawl away. Decision made, Suguru's arm arcs forward as he throws the blade in his hand, a mere whistle in the air before it buries itself in and through the curse's middle. It explodes in a flurry of purple goop, his curses recalling to shield him from most of it. No such luck for Haibara, though. 

"You good?" he calls out, pocketing the blade that gets deposited in his hand by one of them, before it dissipates back into his reserves. 

"Peachy." Haibara sends him a double thumbs up. 

Suguru is so used to Satoru answering that sarcastically, that he struggles for a moment to read the honesty in the answer. He still squints at Haibara with slight suspicion. It doesn't sound right. 

Haibara gives him a bemused smile. "Everything alright, Senpai?" 

"Peachy," Suguru answers, tasting the answer on his own tongue. Okay, there's the sarcasm. Something realigns at the confirmation. Suguru isn't sure what, but it's good, he's sure. 

Haibara laughs, and Suguru is thankful, not for the first time, for his easy-going nature. Rolling with the punches is going to get him far as a sorcerer. 

He still kind of wants to hear Satoru say it. 

Before he can talk himself out of it, he's already dialed Satoru, phone pressed against his ear. 

"Yo, Suguru," comes moments later. 

"Satoru." He can't help his smile. "You good?" 

Satoru lets out a startled laugh on the other side. "Fucking peachy." Suguru can hear the grin in his voice. He bets his dimples are showing. "Oi, Nanami," gets shouted directly into the microphone, and Suguru has to move his phone away before Satoru can inflict further hearing loss on him. "You good?" 

Satoru must've moved his phone away as well, because Suguru can now hear faint noises of fighting, concrete on concrete and angry wheezing noises that must come from a curse. It's what allows him to hear Nanami's shouted, "Fucking peachy." 

Satoru cackles straight down the microphone again, the noise loud enough to come across distorted, and Suguru can't help his own answering laugh. Haibara comes to stand next to him, shouting his own "Hi, Kento," into Suguru's phone, despite the sounds of struggle coming from the other end. 

"He says hi," Satoru says, blatantly lying. Suguru isn't sure if Nanami can hear Satoru, much less his phone over what he can only assume is a demolition derby on the other side. 

He doesn't think it matters, with how Haibara beams. 

"Dinner later?" Suguru asks, trying not to sound too hopeful. He likes to think he succeeds. 

"Yeah, yeah," Satoru pauses. Bad idea incoming. "Whoever's last one back pays." 

Never mind, great idea.

"I want the expensive soba," Suguru says immediately. No curse balls means his taste buds are full steam ahead, and he intends to make good use of it. 

"Well, okay," Satoru scoffs. "You can pay for it yourself then."

"You're still fighting yours," he reminds him. 

"Yeah, well, fuck you." 

"Thanks for dinner," Suguru says, and hangs up on him. 

His phone starts to immediately buzz with messages, but Suguru ignores it as he pockets it, turning to Haibara. 

"Let's head back, yeah?" he smiles. 

Free food always tastes better, and he intends to cash in. 

/// 

Suguru has developed a foolproof method of determining if Satoru is currently at the college. It involves yelling his name and then waiting for Shoko's reaction. If he's met with a 'Not here' he knows Satoru's out and has been for a while, if he's met with any version of 'Thank fuck' then he knows Satoru's been back for a while. 

The method doesn't really leave a whole lot of room for deviation, which is why when Shoko offers him nothing more than a shrug, he's left a little aimless. He had a plan A for when Satoru is in, and a plan B for when he's not. He didn't really get as far as a plan C to account for a maybe. A half-in, half-out Satoru. A Schrödinger's Satoru.

Which is dumb, actually, because there is probably more people than just Shoko who would know about Satoru's whereabouts. 

So. Plan C. Ask someone else. 

He doesn't really want to. 

Going to Shoko to ask where Satoru is is embarrassing enough, he doesn't need other people knowing that the first thing he does when he gets back is look for him. 

Which, he can lie, probably. 

He finds Nanami and Haibara at one of the outside training areas, using it as a lounge area rather than for its intended purpose. Suguru can't blame them, and he's not about to reveal all the hidden spots he and Satoru found around the campus, either. 

"Yo." He waves with a friendly smile. "Do you happen to know where Satoru is? I need to ask him something." 

There, no need for suspicion. 

Haibara shakes his head, but it's Nanami that answers. "He ran off to his room. I wouldn't bother with him, he's being even more annoying than usual." 

That... raises some alarm bells. "Annoying how?" 

Nanami shrugs, clearly nowhere near as bothered as Suguru is. "The curse was stronger than reported and he got caught off guard. His glasses broke, and then he just started getting pissed off at everything and snapping at everyone. All that over a stupid pair of glasses." He shakes his head. 

That tells him everything he needs to know, even if Nanami's delivery could use some work. He knows Satoru, he doesn't get off-guard. The only variable here is Nanami, and he's clearly not going to admit any fault. "I'm sure it's not entirely on the glasses," he says lightly. And then, because he was unfortunately raised with manners, he nods at them. "Thank you, I'll go find him." 

He's already striding away when the other two wave him off, a single goal in mind. 

Satoru's mission wasn't particularly close, he knows as much, and if his glasses broke during the fight, that means he would've spent an unfortunate amount of hours with his eyes exposed. Between Satoru's mood whenever he gets overstimulated, and Nanami's general lack of patience, it's not hard to imagine that the results weren't great. 

He gathers the usual supplies, soaking a hand towel in cold water and letting it drip, grabbing the mochi ice-cream he was hiding from Satoru from the back of the freezer, and a coke from the good vending machine.

He grabs some painkillers from his room as an afterthought. Chances are Satoru already took some, and if he didn't, will refuse to take them entirely, but it never hurts to be prepared. 

He doesn't bother knocking, or otherwise announcing his presence, knowing that Satoru would've noticed him by the door. He slips in quietly into the dark room, curtains drawn to block out any possible light from entering. That's fine, he knows Satoru's room well enough to navigate it without his eyesight.

The tray he was holding gets deposited on the desk and Suguru sits on the bed, trying not to jostle Satoru too much. It's a bit of a lost cause, and Satoru lets out a drawn out groan. He lets Suguru shove him around until he's lying on his back, his eyes uncovered but closed. 

"Hey,'Toru," he murmurs, brushing Satoru's hair back. He can see his eyes moving rapidly underneath his eyelids; he doesn't remember the last time it got this bad. 

Once Satoru's hair is out of the way, he gently places the cold towel over his forehead, his own shoulders relaxing minutely alongside Satoru's. 

Satoru reaches up to circle his wrist, squeezing once in wordless thanks. Suguru smiles, carding a gentle hand through his hair. He isn't flinching, so Suguru takes it as a green light to keep talking. 

"There's mochi and a coke on the table, once you're up for it," he says quietly. "I also got you painkillers, if you want them." 

Satoru shakes his head, almost imperceptibly, and Suguru clicks his tongue in slight annoyance. So stubborn, he thinks. They have this disagreement every time. 

Satoru's hand on his wrist becomes a little more insistent, and Suguru obligingly shuffles onto the bed until he's sitting back against the headboard. Satoru shuffles with him and waits until Suguru is situated before he curls around him, hiding his face in Suguru's stomach, and effectively blocking out any remaining light. 

Suguru picks up the dropped towel, draping it on the back of Satoru's neck instead, and rubs his back. 

"You can rest," he says softly. "I got you." 

There's no response from Satoru, other then the slow deepening of his breathing. 

///

The thing about instinct, is that it's hard, if not impossible, to teach. And the thing about instinct, is that Suguru relies on it heavily. 

Fights that he's used to happen too fast for him to be able to take a moment, regroup, plan an angle of attack, and only then move. The curses are driven purely by instinct, and to fight them effectively Suguru has to be able to do the same. 

Which is why when Haibara turns to him and asks, "So what's the plan?" he doesn't have much of an answer. 'Satoru usually has one', isn't an appropriate reply, no matter how correct. 

So maybe he was a little too used to having the Six Eyes by his side, and Satoru rattling off all possible information about the curse before he could so much as look at it. He doesn't think that's his fault. 

It's fine, though. So he has to think before jumping into a fight, big deal. 

The energy output of the curse is higher than what they've been dealing with in the last few weeks. Not quite a Grade 1 yet, but slowly getting there. It's leaking miasma, the entirety of the veil's cover painted dark. 

Might be a defence mechanism, he notes. He has curses that blot out the light in order to confuse its opponents, and this feels similar to those techniques. And if it is controlling it, that means we can't trust the darkness to stay consistent. It could change at any moment, he thinks, eyeing the smoke that's pouring out the windows of the scarce buildings around. 

"Senpai?" Haibara's tentative voice breaks him out of his thoughts. 

Suguru hums in acknowledgment, straightening up from the crouch he fell into and rolling his neck. He reties his hair, preferring to tie it up properly now than have it come loose mid-fight. When he focuses back on Haibara, he notices he's blushing and he quirks an eyebrow up in amusement. 

Haibara coughs, waving him away and Suguru shrugs. 

"It's definitely stronger than what you've faced before. I want you to stay on the outskirts of the fight, taking advantage of any openings when the curse's guard is down; it's too risky for you to fight it directly." 

Haibara nods seriously, seemingly over whatever had him flustered. Suguru doesn't want to isolate him from the fight entirely, but he would like to avoid as many injuries as possible, and this isn't an appropriate fight for a Grade 3 sorcerer. This is more along the line of missions Suguru is usually sent out on, but it's not lost on him that having to protect an additional sorcerer is going to make this harder than usual. 

"I'm going to post several of my curses with you, they'll warn you if something outside your perception is coming at you," he instructs Haibara. Splitting his focus like this will limit his output, but it's a necessary step if he wants both of them to come out unscathed. He never shied away from going hand to hand with a curse, and this is no different. "You'll be my eyes on the outside, so make sure you don't get yourself backed into a corner." 

It'll be just the two instead of six, but he chooses not to dwell on it. 

Haibara nods seriously, looking two seconds away from bringing out a notepad to write everything down into. Suguru shoots him a what's hopefully a reassuring smile, conscious of the fact that this is probably the most powerful curse Haibara's faced. 

Once he's sure Haibara's hiding alongside his curses, he unsheathes his katana, letting his cursed energy flow through it. Just as he predicted, the release of energy is enough to lure the curse out, and he dodges it easily as it comes flying at him. He steadies himself, looking over the curse. 

His earlier suspicions are confirmed; the miasma is artificial, smoke coalescing around the curse's shape, making it look like a mirage rather than anything corporeal.

Oh, this one he wants. Satoru would think the smoke's cool. 

Close combat is going to be a little tricky, but nothing he hasn't dealt with before. 

It'll be fine. 

He's a Special Grade for a reason, after all. 

A deep breath in and out, and he lunges. 

/// 

"Kento," Haibara shouts, heedless of the fact that he's seemingly interrupting a spar. He's running towards the field, and Suguru considers for a moment shouting a warning, but Haibara skids to a stop on the outskirts before he can. 

Nanami looks away from Satoru at the call of his own name, and Suguru winces slightly. 

Bad move.

Satoru takes immediate advantage, sweeping Nanami's legs from underneath him. He goes down in a heap, sending dust flying around him as Satoru snaps the bō in his hands underneath his chin. 

Nanami coughs as he tries to wave away the dust kicking around him and Satoru's bō at the same time, not accomplishing either objective successfully. 

Satoru snickers as he rights his staff upright, leaning most of his weight on it. He makes no attempt to help until Suguru clears his throat pointedly, and after rolling his eyes, he reaches a hand down to Nanami to help him get back to his feet. 

"I probably should've waited until you were done, huh?" Haibara asks, rubbing the back of his head sheepishly. 

Any irritation Nanami holds seems to be entirely aimed at Satoru as he shakes his head. "It's alright." 

"All part of the learning process," Satoru says cheerfully. 

Nanami glares at him. "I haven't learned anything since we started." 

"Sure you have," Satoru grins. "You've learned how to lose over, and over, and over..." he trails off when Nanami throws an empty water bottle at him, laughing as he dodges it. 

Suguru chuckles, coming to stand next to him and nudging Satoru's shoulder with his. "I've been trying to get you to weapon train with me for weeks and I leave for a couple hours and find you doing exactly that?" 

The question leaves an unpleasant taste in his mouth, and he eyes where Nanami is talking to Haibara. He does admittedly look properly beat up, and as much as Satoru was aiming to tease, there was probably more than an ounce of truth in it. 

"You're annoying to fight," Satoru grumbles, cheek squished against the top of the bō. Suguru has to fight the urge to pinch the other one. It would be just like mochi, he's sure. 

"I just think you're scared to lose," he remarks, idly kicking his foot against the bottom of the bō and making Satoru stumble as his support staff is suddenly taken away. Annoying to fight is Satoru-speak for hard to win against, and Suguru takes great pride in being very annoying to fight. 

Satoru is also very easy to bait. 

He smiles, quietly besotted at the annoyed glare that gets shot at him. Satoru's probably scary to most, but all Suguru can think is cute. 

"I can take you any day, any time," Satoru glares at him. 

Okay, well, that's easily misconstrued. He could do with being a little less thoughtless with his words. For Suguru's sake. 

"Oh yeah?" he challenges, crossing his arms. 

Satoru's words seem to catch up to him and he flushes, the tops of his ears burning red. Suguru wants to bite them. He's discovering so many things about himself.

"Shut up," he mumbles looking away, and sounding far less happy about being on the receiving end of being teased. 

"Come on, Satoru," he grins. "Fight me." 

Satoru narrows his eyes at him, his grip on the bō tightening, and Suguru knows he's got him. He would never back down from a challenge. 

"Nanami," he calls out, not taking his eyes off of Satoru. "Could you pass me your bō, please?" 

He can see Nanami eyeing the two of them wearily, but he passes the staff along dutifully, and Suguru grips it just in time to block Satoru's attack. He grins as he shoves him back, falling into an open stance. Satoru reads the snub in it correctly, and Suguru quietly delights in the annoyed tick of his jaw. He shuffles forwards slightly, giving up his reach advantage, and it's Suguru's turn to furrow his brow in annoyance. 

"Are they gonna do anything?" he hears Haibara whisper shout to Nanami. 

Suguru quirks an eyebrow at Satoru, but he only tilts his head up in reply, knowing better than to attack when Suguru's expecting it. 

That's fine, Suguru has no problem leading. 

He fakes an attack, letting Satoru fall back into a defensive position, feinting another attack in quick succession. He doesn't attempt to get a real hit in, and knows that Satoru notices. 

The thing about fighting Satoru that's unlike fighting anyone else, is that it's not enough to match him hit for hit, he has to fight the awareness of the Six Eyes at the same time. A feint that would work on just about anyone is never going to work on Satoru, because he'll see it coming before Suguru can even fire the correct neuron from his brain to his muscles. 

It's what makes Satoru his favourite sparring partner. There's no one else that challenges him more, forcing him to think as fast as he's attacking. No attack goes unanswered, no opening left unguarded. 

Rely on instinct, and get outsmarted. Rely on strategy, and get outpaced. 

A dance on a knife's edge, and it makes Suguru's blood sing. 

And Satoru is good. But Suguru is better. 

There's a reason Satoru keeps avoiding sparring with weapons. His biggest advantage is his speed, and in hand-to-hand he uses every ounce of that advantage to his benefit. But weapons slow him down, additional calculations required to compensate for weight, reach, difference in air resistance. 

Suguru knows all this, his knowledge of Limitless just missing practical application to match Satoru's. And he knows how to take advantage of it, better than anyone. 

Satoru strikes, but the bō sails through the air for a fraction of a second longer than he's anticipating, and Suguru ducks under it to exploit the opening it creates. His own bō cracks against Satoru's side, who barely flinches, but it lets Suguru get close enough to unsettle his centre of gravity, knocking his feet out from underneath him. 

Satoru lands on his ass, and Suguru follows him down, settling one knee by his side and the other on his chest. He holds the bō horizontally against his neck, forcing Satoru's jaw up. The angle makes him look up at Suguru through his lashes, momentarily distracting him. 

Pretty, he thinks dazedly. 

He's brought out of his reverie by clapping coming from the side, one set overenthusiastic, and the other barely qualifying as clapping at all. He doesn't really have to look away to see which one's which, but he does it anyway for the sake of his sanity. 

He stands up, not bothering to brush off before reaching for Satoru's hand, snagging it and hoisting him up despite his grumbling. 

"I can get up myself," he grouses, just like he does every time, despite still holding onto Suguru. 

"Okay," Suguru agrees, and tries not to be too obvious about the way he's enjoying holding Satoru's hand. 

Callouses different from his, thinner and slightly longer fingers, it fits perfectly into his own. Suguru wonders what it would be like to interlock their fingers. 

He coughs, stepping away before doing something stupid like exactly what he was thinking. Thoughts are fine, actions not so much. Those might tip off Satoru, and that's a definite no. Suguru would quite like to just ogle Satoru with his newfound hormones in peace. 

"That was amazing!" Haibara shouts from the side. He jostles Nanami's shoulder, grinning at the both of them. "I couldn't even keep up with what was happening." He turns his attention to Suguru. "Senpai, do you think you could teach me how to fight like that?" 

Suguru laughs slightly at the puppy dog eyes being aimed at him. "I can try, but a lot of  it is just practice. You and Nanami would probably be better off sparring together." 

Satoru huffs from where he came to stand besides Suguru. "And who am I meant to spar with then?" He aims a teasing look at Haibara, grinning at him slyly. "You trying to take Suguru away from me, Haibara-chan?" 

Haibara flushes and starts waving his arms around defensively. Suguru is a bit too distracted by the casual possessiveness in Satoru's tone to really pay attention to what Haibara's saying. Which, okay. He didn't even know he's into that. It's an alarming trend. He might just have to accept that he's cursed with finding anything Satoru does attractive. 

He tilts his head, thinks Satoru and mine in the same context, and alright. Cool. Cool, cool, cool. That's a nice thought. 

He might have to rethink not telling Satoru. 

And also excuse himself, promptly. 

///

Suguru is more than used to the kickback from his technique; as much as someone can get used to it, at least. The nausea, the vile taste he can't get out of the back of his throat, they're all familiar side effects. However, it's been a while since he consumed a stronger curse, and the Grade 1 he swallowed isn't very happy about being swallowed. 

Which, tough luck. It's his now. 

The cool window against his temple is barely registering as is, but it's enough to  distract from the rolling in his stomach at least slightly. He just needs to make it back to the college. 

It's a little up in the air at the moment, with the way it feels like the driver is going out of their way to hit every single pothole on the way. 

"Geto-san, are you alright?" Haibara's voice comes hesitantly from his side. His hand hovers in the air between them unsurely, and Suguru tenses slightly, his skin prickling uncomfortably with the idea of anyone touching him at the moment. 

He tries to give him a reassuring smile, carefully waving him away. "I'm fine, the curse is just taking its time to settle in." 

"I guess that makes sense," Haibara nods pensively. "I never thought much about how your technique works." 

Suguru tenses again, uncomfortable with the idea of anyone thinking too hard about the intricacies of his technique. He doesn't need anyone thinking how the curses merge with him, their cursed energy becoming his, or his becoming theirs... 

He barely stifles a groan, leaning more heavily against the window. He could do with a little less thinking about his technique, as well. 

"I think we're close to the school now." 

Suguru lets himself groan at that. He fucking hopes. 

/// 

Getting back to the school doesn't prove itself to be the relief Suguru was hoping it would be. He splits from Haibara, preferring to head to his dorm on his own and be miserable in peace. He tries to be a little louder than usual, dropping his stuff and stomping around, hoping that Satoru, or maybe Shoko, is in, but no such luck it seems. 

He makes his way to the kitchen, feeling a little aimless as he grabs his mug from the top shelf. He stares down at it when he puts it down, struggling to remember what he wanted to do. 

Coffee? Tea? One of those, probably. 

That feels like too much effort. Boiling the water, looking for the tea, letting it steep... 

Suguru turns around, leaving his empty mug on the counter, and heads to his room instead. He reaches over to knock on Satoru's door just in case, but at the lack of reply just slumps into his own room. He chucks his uniform off, grabbing the pair of sweatpants hanging on the back of his chair, but not bothering with a top. Raising his arms feels like an insurmountable task right now. 

He collapses on top of his bed, shoving his face into a pillow and curling his arms around his middle as tremors wrack his body, the curse seemingly deciding it has the green light to fully revolt now. If he wasn't lying down he would probably throw up. At least this way he doesn't have to taste bile on top of curse. 

His throat feels scratchy, and he knows there's lozenges in his bedside table, but they've never seemed further than they do right now. No amount of brief relief seems worth the effort. 

Satoru would make him chew on one, he knows. Probably force him to drink the tea he gave up on and make him eat, as well. 

But Satoru's not here, probably on his own mission, and Suguru doesn't even know when he'll be back. His phone buzzed at one point on the ride here, but he was too tired to check it then, and now his phone lies abandoned in the pocket of his uniform somewhere on the ground. It might have been Satoru, but it also might have been someone else, and Suguru doesn't think he could stomach the disappointment at the moment. 

He already feels weak enough as it is, the kickback from his technique always bringing its own unique form of miserable with it. He doesn't want to need Satoru to deal with it, doesn't want to force Satoru into taking care of him because he can't even deal with his own technique. 

He knows its unfair, and he feels even worse about that. Satoru deserves more than having Suguru's self-loathing reflected back at him. 

He still kind of wishes he was here. 

I miss you, he thinks. 

He falls into a frightful sleep, mind turning against him and miasma clogging his throat. 

/// 

Suguru wakes up at what feels like far too early and far too late simultaneously. He's disorientated and still faintly nauseous, and it takes him a moment to identify that there's a hand gently carding through his hair. He tenses, squinting his eyes open. 

The hand stops, retreating, and Suguru blinks as the person in front of him comes into focus. Bright hair, brighter eyes.  

Satoru. He relaxes, eyes closing again as he thumps his head forward to rest against Satoru's crossed arms. The gentle hand returns, and Suguru hums slightly. 

"Morning." Satoru breaks the silence, voice quiet despite its teasing tone. 

It's not morning, it's dark out, he's not going to let Satoru trick him with this again. 

"I made you tea," Satoru says quietly. "But you should have this first." 

Something gets pressed against his lips and Suguru opens his mouth, letting the lozenge dissolve on his tongue. 

Satoru pats his head. "Good boy, good boy." He can hear the grin in his voice. 

Suguru grunts in annoyance, wishing he had enough energy to bat Satoru's hand away. 

"We can stay here as long as you need, but I'm making you eat something before you go back to sleep." 

The thought of food is enough to send his stomach revolting again, but he knows better than to argue with Satoru right now. "Are you inviting yourself over?" he manages to croak out. 

"Duh," Satoru says cheerfully. "Now scooch, I'm not sitting on the floor."

Suguru feels like arguing with him, but his body doesn't seem to be currently listening to his brain as he obligingly shuffles to the side, letting Satoru slip in next to him. 

He feels gross, and his brain helpfully reminds him that he hasn't showered after he returned from his mission. Satoru doesn't seem to mind as he forcefully tucks Suguru against him, arms and legs tangled and wrapped around him like some dumb octopus. 

"I'm also making you put on a shirt," Satoru adds petulantly once they're settled. "You're gonna freeze, you exhibitionist." 

He doesn't think not wearing a shirt in his own room counts, but okay. Satoru almost sounds flustered and Suguru wishes, again, that he had enough energy to do something about it. 

Instead, he tucks his head against Satoru's neck, breathing in the clean smell of him. He must've just showered. Basil, he notes, exasperated. That's his body wash. 

Suguru tries to squeeze Satoru in some form of revenge, but he can't quite muster up enough energy to do it with his usual strength. 

"That's pathetic." Satoru seems to agree. "We really need to get some food in you." 

Good luck with that, Suguru thinks, already halfway back to sleep. A sharp tug on his hair wakes him up again and he grumbles, pinching at whatever part of Satoru he can reach, entangled as they are. 

"I told you, no sleeping until you eat." The smug bastard sounds far too happy about Suguru's displeasure. 

"I'm not getting up." 

"Okay, you aren't sleeping either." 

"Fucking-" Suguru huffs. "Fine," he bites out. 

Stubborn. So stubborn. 

"Fantastic, dinner later then!" 

Suguru sighs. 

This is, unfortunately, exactly what he wished for. 

/// 

Suguru wakes up in the morning, feeling a million times better than he did the night before, and hates every single second of it. 

He didn't want the dinner Satoru sat him down for, or the shower he forced him into, or the fresh clothes Satoru took from his own closet. Satoru hadn't cared one bit about his feelings during this, and Suguru is practically seething at how much better he feels after doing all the things he didn't want to do. 

He practically stomps into their common area. 

"Feeling better?" Satoru calls out, not even looking up from where he's sitting on the couch with his DS. 

Which is rude, because he knows Satoru is looking at him, just not with his physical eyes. Stupid Six Eyes, stupid know-it-all. 

"No," he bites out, just to be contrarian. 

"I'm glad, you looked rough last night." He's still not looking up. Suguru is going to throw something at him. 

"I was fine." 

"Uh-huh," Satoru tones. "I'll be sure to remember that the next time I have to pull a here-comes-the-airplane." 

Suguru scowls for a lack of a better response, moving 'throw something at Satoru' from maybe to definitely. Coffee first, though. 

He barely gets his mug down before Satoru is shouting at him again. 

"Eat something first!" 

He ate yesterday, was that not enough? 

"No," he calls back, frowning. "I'm not hungry." 

"No coffee then." 

Suguru can tell from the way his voice carries that he's still buried in his DS. 

"You're not the boss of me." Suguru tries to cling to rationality, and not just start growling at Satoru. "I want coffee and I'm not hungry, so I'm making coffee." 

"You get sick whenever you have caffeine on an empty stomach, eat something first. Stop being stubborn." 

Stubborn? Him? Fucking pot, kettle, black. 

Also, what the fuck? Why does Satoru know that? How does he know that? 

"Why do you know that?" he echoes out loud. He's not expecting an answer. 

He doesn't get one, either. 

Shoko walks in from her room, apparently feeling the need to join them after hearing their discussion. Which is unnecessary, because Suguru can do what he wants, and he wants coffee. so he's going to make his coffee. 

"Morning, Shoko," Satoru greets, still not looking up. "Suguru's decided he's having coffee on an empty stomach." 

"That's stupid," Shoko replies mildly. She turns to him, and he's glad that at least someone has some form of manners here. She looks decidedly unimpressed though, so maybe she could do with less looking at him, actually. "Eat something, you'll get sick if you drink coffee on an empty stomach. Satoru, do my maths homework." 

"Sure," Satoru agrees easily. It's like he's not even here. 

"Why do you know that?" Suguru asks loudly, exasperation now warring with his earlier frustration. Why is this something that apparently everyone knows about him. He didn't tell them any of this. "Why do you both know this!?" 

Wordlessly, Satoru and Shoko both point at the board with No shouting before 11 A.M. scrawled on it. Satoru is still preoccupied with what is probably a disaster save, anyway. 

"I left you an omelette on the stove," Satoru adds. 

Suguru groans, loudly in protest, and then takes a deep breath. These are his friends, these are his choices, he needs to remind himself. Shoko's studying to be a doctor, so it's probably reasonable for her to know this. It seems like something a doctor would know about him. The other bastard he's in love with, so he very unfortunately gets a free pass to be as annoying as he wants. 

Satoru finally, finally, looks up, and okay, so he's just not going to wear his glasses today. That's fine, Suguru can totally deal with his stupid illegal eyes. 

Satoru grins at him. Stupid dimples. 

Suguru sighs. 

He eats his stupid omelette. 

Chapter Text

Satoru knows that, logically, the focus of a mission should be on exorcising the curse. That makes sense, generally. 

But Yaga didn't tell him that his new assignment is going to be out near where Suguru's took him. Which means, that Yaga is to blame for getting him distracted, really. This could've been avoided if only he was briefed properly. 

"Gojo-san, is this necessary?" Nanami sighs from next to him. 

"Yes," Satoru says, typing on his phone as he tries to coordinate with Suguru. He could be here already if he wanted to, but 'No, Satoru, we're near a village, I can't just take out Rainbow Dragon'. Coward. The villagers would only be so lucky to see Fruitymon, but Suguru never seems to agree with him. "It'll be a learning opportunity for you both!" 

Nanami mutters something, but Satoru's too busy texting to pay him much mind. 

> To: Sugumon  
     just steal a car or smth   
  
> From: Sugumon   
     No? I can't drive?   
     Also it's illegal
     
> To: Sugumon
     figure it out then?
     it can't be that hard 
     one pedal is go and the other is stop 
     just like mario kart 
     you know how to play mario kart 
    
> From: Sugumon
    No 
    
He's being so unreasonable. Satoru's sure that driving can't be all that, people do it all the time. If most adults can manage it, then surely Suguru can too. Lack of incentive, that's what this is. 

> To: Sugumon 
     come on i'll give you anything you want 

> From: Sugumon 
     Anything? 
    
Oh no, Suguru has something in mind. Never mind, abort mission, captain first off the ship. 

> To: Sugumon 
     i'll give you a little kiss 
    
There, suave and unassuming. Crash course diverted. 

> From: Sugumon
     You can't see me, but I'm flipping you off 
    
Satoru grins and pockets his phone. "They're on the way," he informs Nanami. 

True to his word, less than twenty minutes later Satoru spots the coiling body of Rainbow Dragon backlit against the sky. He stands up and dusts himself off, grinning as he waves the dragon down. The road is good as abandoned, one too many unexplained disappearances scaring away the locals, so he's not worried about anyone seeing. 

"Baby!" he exclaims as soon as they touch down. 

Suguru looks like his brain is blue-screening for some reason, so Satoru lets him deal with that as he approaches Rainbow Dragon, scratching beneath her chin as she bumps her head against his chest. He hears Suguru mutter, "the dragon, right," and he looks over said dragon's head to raise an eyebrow at him. 

Suguru waves him away, which does nothing to sate his curiosity, but Fruitymon is bumping her head against him again and he needs to make sure she gets enough scratches to last her a while. Who knows when the next time Suguru decides to bring her out will be. 

Which reminds him. 

"Suguru," he calls out. "Will you take me for a ride later?" 

He's glad Haibara got to fly on Rainbow Dragon, but that's his favourite curse, thank you very much.  

Suguru blinks at him, cheeks a little too red. Which is weird; was the weather really that different a couple kilometres out? It's overcast here.

Regardless, Suguru is still apparently booting his brain back up, so Satoru decides to be helpful and dumb it down for him.

"You, me, ride later?" That should do it. 

Suguru flushes further, and oh. He's blushing. That makes sense. Maybe he should involve his brain in his the words currently coming out of his mouth. He's not going to, but the thought is there. 

"What, you don't want me to ride?" Okay, maybe taking a second to think before saying something wouldn't go amiss. Satoru is desperately hoping he's not blushing. Some inside thoughts should stay inside thoughts. 

"Shut the fuck up," Suguru hisses at him. It's the first full sentence out of him, so he'll take it. 

"Do we have to be here for this?" Nanami sighs from behind them. 

"Your dragon," Satoru tacks on, far too late. "I meant ride your dragon." Which isn't much better, actually.

"Please," Suguru sounds in pain. "Please, for the love of everything, please stop talking." 

Satoru decides to listen, just this once. 

/// 

Satoru gets the entirety of their walk to the curse's whereabouts to break the awkwardness he's only partly the cause of. It's plenty of time, and the fact that Haibara either didn't hear his exchange with Suguru, or decided to blank it out of his mind entirely, helps a ton. 

Suguru might even be willing to look at him again by the time they reach it. Satoru honestly think he's overreacting a little. It's not like what he said was even that bad. It's not his fault Suguru can't take a little teasing between friends. 

Which is what they are. Undoubtedly. He's sure everyone feels the way he does about their friends. Regardless of what Shoko says; she doesn't know anything. 

Satoru is not ruining the one thing he's allowed to have because of some dumb crush.

Even if he wanted to say something at one point, Suguru's reaction right now is enough to discourage him forever. If something even mildly suggestive between them is enough to get him ignored for an entire afternoon, then he's good just never bringing it up, ever. 

"And all the guides are so difficult to find," he explains to a bemused Haibara, "since it only released in Japan. Which don't get me wrong, I'm thrilled about, but it really cuts down the player base." 

"Is he complaining about Digimon Adventure again?" Suguru finally joins the conversation. 

He's asking Haibara, so he's still ignoring him, but he's asking about what Satoru's talking about, so it's only partially. Progress! 

But, he knows better than to assume that Haibara internalised a single word of what he was saying, so the burden of answering falls on him. He doesn't trust Haibara enough to convey the depths of his frustration. 

"I can't increase the relationship, I don't know what I'm doing wrong," Satoru says, irritation welling inside him again at the reminder. "I've tried every single choice in the game, but I still can't unlock the extra episodes." 

"Have you tried just sticking to one choice?" Haibara tilts his head. Bless him, he thinks Satoru already hasn't tried everything. 

Suguru is shaking his head before Satoru can even try to answer. "Don't bother, he won't listen to reason." 

Satoru splutters, unsure if he's more annoyed about the suggestion that he hasn't tried everything, or that he's somehow missing the obvious. "The game doesn't make it clear," he starts, already forgetting about his previous resolution and shoving himself close, so that Suguru is forced to look at him. 

Nanami interrupts them before Satoru can really get started. "I think we're here." 

Satoru blinks and finally acknowledges the beacon of cursed energy that Six Eyes have been yelling at him about for the past half hour. And, okay, yeah, that's decisively not a Grade 2. 

He exchanges a glance with Suguru, the same realisation in his eyes. Upper Grade 1, which means their precious little kōhai have no business being here. Sending them away now might just prove to be more dangerous, so they'll have to work around them. 

"Can you see where it is?" Suguru asks him quietly, as they pace slightly away from the first years. 

"No," Satoru admits begrudgingly. The flow of cursed energy is odd, lapping at the walls, gathering in the corners of the house, no real central well for Satoru to trace and assign to the curse. Unless... 

He squints, mind flying through the types of curses he knows, trying to eliminate all possible options before he settles on what's nothing more than a gut feeling. "I think it might be the house." 

"The whole thing?" Suguru asks, surprise colouring his voice. Satoru doesn't blame him. A curse this big and powerful is unusual, higher grades tend to be smaller, more concentrated wells of energy. Outliers like this are rare.  

"Yeah," he says, already feeling Limitless buzz underneath his skin, the promise of a challenge leaving him eager. "And I think we're gonna have to go in." 

Suguru looks at him, the spark of challenge in the dark eyes Satoru adores a familiar thing. "We figure it out as we go?" 

Satoru nods slowly. "There's nothing that stands out, I need more information before I can figure out a plan." 

"Alright," Suguru says easily. "We'll go in and go from there, between the two of us we can keep Haibara and Nanami safe."

"Yeah, alright," he grumbles, slightly annoyed about not being able to use the information Six Eyes is providing him in a useful manner. "Oi, Flip and Flop, we're going in!" 

"Flip and Flop?" Haibara asks, tilting his head. Nanami is already glaring at him. 

"You know." Satoru waves his hand. "The hair." 

Suguru laughs next to him and Satoru grins in satisfaction. Yeah, as long as he has Suguru next to him, they'll be fine. 

/// 

The plan that Satoru comes up with turns out to be playing into the curse's hands in order to trick it. It's not a great plan, but Suguru has fought enough curses with him to know that it's far from the worst. It's the best they can do with two Grade 3 sorcerers added to the mix. 

"I think it's trying to play with us?" Satoru mutters, looking at the symbols appearing on the floor in seemingly random patterns. Or maybe orders? 

One, two, three four, one, two, three, four, Suguru counts, looking at the same symbols. Always a pause between four and one as it apparently resets. 

"Suguru, stand on one, I'll stand on two. We'll wait until it swaps and see what happens." 

Suguru nods, not surprised he and Satoru came to the same conclusion. 

"What's one?" He hears Haibara mutter to Nanami's quiet, "I don't know." 

He waits until the symbols reset, and then until the first one appears to stand on top of it. Satoru quickly goes to stand on the second symbol, and Suguru watches with fascination as a line of faintly luminescent smoke links them together, a fifth symbol appears on the wall next to Suguru and links to him as well. 

So there's a start condition, he thinks. A start condition and four cycles, probably leading to a conclusion? 

He exchanges a glance with Satoru. This might the opening they were looking for. 

The symbols change, Suguru's remaining first, but the one Satoru was standing on lighting up third. Satoru tilts his head, and just as Suguru was about to ask what he saw, metal spikes fly out at him, whistling through the air. 

Suguru can't help his sharp inhale as the spikes get suspended by infinity. 

"Okay," Satoru says mildly, the spikes shifting with him as they remain suspended. "That's about what I expected to happen." 

The spikes drop down with a loud clatter as Satoru waves his hand, and Suguru breathes a little easier. He knows infinity will protect Satoru from most threats, but he would prefer if things never got close enough to get stopped by infinity to begin with. 

They both step away from the symbols and come to stand next to the first years.

"Senpai, are you okay?" Haibara rushes out. 

"Of course he is," Nanami scoffs. 

Suguru frowns, side-eyeing Nanami even when Satoru waves both of them away. 

"Here's what we're going to do." Satoru claps his hands together. "Four symbols, four of us, four cycles. Everyone gets a number with their place in the order. We step on, step off, and wait for the next set." 

Suguru can see the first years start to get a little restless, Satoru's explanation rapid and not very thorough. He reaches out, clasping a hand to Satoru's nape and tapping the side of his neck. Keep it simple, stupid. 

Satoru exhales, clicking his tongue in annoyance. Suguru gives his nape another squeeze, and he huffs. 

"First and last are gonna be mindless so, Nanami you stand on whichever symbol lights up first, Haibara you'll stand on whichever one's the last. Suguru and I will take care of the rest. When we tell you to run, you run. Got it?" 

The first years nod, clearly unsure about how to react to this more serious side of Satoru. They're unused to it, and Suguru is more focused on making sure no one gets hurt than on smoothing out some of Satoru's edges for the comfort of others. He doesn't really care enough to on the best of days, anyway. 

"I'll do second," he says, more for the sake of Nanami and Haibara than Satoru. He knows Satoru would've already assumed he'll go second. 

"Leaves me to third, alright get ready, we're ending it after this." 

The house - the curse? - creaks and groans, unhappy with their plotting. They're running out of time, he realises. The stench of rotting wood is overwhelming. 

"Wait for it to reset, and go," he instructs. Tries to soften his voice and bring some ease into the atmosphere. "Satoru and I will tell you when to get on, you won't have to fight anything. We'll protect you." 

He gets twin nods, Nanami's hand flexing around the hilt of his flat blade despite the reassurance. That's fine, as long as they don't freeze in the face of the curse they'll be able to get out. Fight or flight, a sorcerer's ability to stay alive is largely dependant on their ability to flee, fight only ever serving the strongest of them.  

"Go," Satoru snaps. 

Nanami hurries to stand over the first symbol, shoulders tense. The same luminescent smoke appears as he's linked to the symbol on the wall. Suguru waiting for the second to light up before doing the same. Satoru and Haibara follow on the third and fourth, and a glowing orb appears behind them as the loop completes. A chime echoes in the house, and they step off, the symbols disappearing from existence. 

"Get ready for the next one," Suguru warns. "We don't know how much time we'll have to complete all the cycles." 

The warning proves to be the correct one, as moments later the symbols start lighting up again as they all fall into place. Suguru and Satoru sidestep each other easily as they follow the pattern lighting up on the floor. The final pattern lights up, and the orb that was slowly transforming with each cycle shifts into a cube - translucent with raised metal edges, there's something inside it that Suguru can barely make out. 

"Remember that thing about running?" Satoru asks, eyes on the cube. 

"Run," Suguru finishes. 

Haibara and Nanami scramble down the hallway, the way out flagged with marks Satoru routinely left in the rotting wood. Suguru starts the opposite way, feeling the swell of cursed energy behind a door that wasn't there before. Satoru grabs the floating cube, a brutal application of Limitless tearing it apart to reveal a key inside it. 

"Go long!" Satoru shouts. 

Suguru turns around just in time to catch the key being chucked at him, the house now groaning as it starts to collapse inwards. Satoru runs after him, infinity leaving planks and torn walls hovering momentarily in his wake as the house tries to stop them from reaching the door. Suguru summons a blanket curse to hover over him, catching any rubble that falls his way, steady hands shoving the key Satoru threw at him into the door. 

It clicks open, and they both stagger inside the room.

Dark. It's the first thing Suguru registers. And not the type of dark one's eyes can adjust to. 

He reaches out just to find Satoru's hand halfway, latching on to his sleeve as to leave his hands free. 

"I hate when curses do this shit," Satoru mutters, confirming Suguru's suspicions. "No light, all cursed energy. It's the darkest fucking light show you'll never see."

They walk further into the room, Suguru's other senses sharpened. There's something about this room that makes him want to relax, to let his guard down, and it only draws the tension down his spine tighter. 

The sounds of destruction cease. Suguru hopes their kōhai managed to get out safely. 

"Duck!" Satoru shouts, shattering the silence. 

Suguru doesn't hesitate, throwing himself on the ground. He feels the disruption of air in front of him, a slight whistle the only thing he can latch on to. 

It's enough. 

The next attack he pinpoints, jumping over the - tendril, tentacle, arm, something, he can't fucking see - and dropping his centre of gravity to prepare for the next attack. The next one comes faster, the curse clearly realising that he's the one more vulnerable under the current conditions, but Suguru is ready. 

Satoru realises what the curse is doing as well, shifting his focus almost entirely to talking through every single one of the curse's actions. Any shift in the wall, a jab from the ceiling, Satoru is ahead of and already calling out. 

Suguru takes a deep breath and focuses, lets his ears guide his movement, lets Satoru be his eyes. It's as easy as anything, the comfort of knowing that all he has to do to win right now is trust Satoru. 

Satoru tosses him a blade, whistling to get his attention, and Suguru catches it, ready for the downswing as the curse comes for him again. He falls into a rhythm, Satoru a steady presence at his back. 

One, duck. Two, swing. Three, jump. Four, switch. 

Satoru does what he does best, and that's apparently coming up with a system on the fly that he expects Suguru to pick up on immediately. He does, but that doesn't take away the fact that the whistles and clicks he's using to convey the curse's attacks would be indecipherable to anyone else. 

This is exactly why he can't trust anyone else to fight alongside him. 

The curse, frustrated and injured after not gaining any ground on Suguru, redirects its attention. Suguru does not like that one bit. 

"Satoru," he calls, standing in what he assumes is the middle of the room, hands raised in defence. 

Moments later he feels the warm line of Satoru's back against his, and he doesn't have to see him to know he's grinning. 

"First one to get hit loses." Yeah, he's definitely grinning. Honestly, screw the curse for robbing him of it. 

"How's that even fair?"

"I'll drop infinity." 

"Maybe don't do that? What the fuck, Satoru." Impenetrable barrier on when a curse is in the vicinity, thank you very much. He'll throttle Satoru himself if he ever gets hurt trying to prove a point. 

"Then don't complain it's not fair." 

"Come up with a-"   
  
He's interrupted by the curse who's clearly grown tired of their squabbling. He can feel the sharpened edge of Satoru's cursed energy in the air, and lets his own reinforce his body as they avoid its attack. 

Play time's over, let's dance. 

The curse was struggling against Suguru, but now with both Special Grades focused on it, it stands no chance. He can feel it losing ground, the oppressive darkness loosening its grasp. It's not long before the creaking noises are back, and moments later light bursts into the room, a cut across one of the walls opening to the outside. 

Gotcha, he thinks. 

"Suguru, stairs!" Satoru shouts. 

Suguru looks up, immediately zeroing in on the narrow stairs in the corner. He makes a run for them, Satoru hot on his heels as they scramble up. The house starts groaning again, walls narrowing down on them as they run, cutting down tendrils as they go. He can feel the curse get desperate, attacks imprecise and wide. He can feel the pull of blue behind him, Satoru drawing all the rubble towards him to get caught in infinity. 

The corridor they're running down narrows down until the only thing Suguru can see in front of him is a window. They're high up, and a sense of foreboding grows in Suguru's chest. They're high enough for it to hurt, but not high enough to give him enough time to summon something mid-fall. The corridor is too narrow for anything more than fodder. 

"Jump!" Satoru shouts behind him. 

He better fucking catch me, Suguru thinks. 

He summons a low-level curse to burst the window in front of him, following it out. He looks down just to confirm that they are in fact high enough for a fall from here to hurt, bad. The wind whistles around him, drowning out any other noise. 

And then he's weightless, familiar arms wrapped around his middle, warm chest against his back as Satoru floats them mid-air. 

A fancy party trick, he called it the first time Satoru came to show off that he can fly now. He hopes he doesn't remember it, bound to be even more obnoxious about it than he was before. 

Suguru's feet touch solid ground, Satoru taking a little longer to let go of him. He doesn't mind, leaning against him as he catches his breath. 

Satoru coughs and steps away. "You want this one?" he asks gruffly. The tips of his ears are burning red. 

Suguru raises an eyebrow at him. Satoru refuses to meet his eyes so the effect is somewhat lost on him. 

"Yeah," he sighs. It's bound to be disgusting, but he does kind of want something that equals to a haunted house. Practical applications are probably minimal, but the potential is there. Plus, it is a Grade 1. 

He looks over to the house that's still collapsing, rendered to a single floor of rubble now, and extends his hand. He pulls, feeling the curse fight back, but it's far too weak in its current state and soon Suguru has a shiny ball of curse matter in his hand. 

"You wanna wait until we're back at the college?" Satoru asks, draping himself across Suguru's back. 

"Yeah, alright," Suguru agrees, warmth in his chest. It's been a while since he and Satoru were in a situation to be considered a package deal. 

They find Haibara and Nanami several paces away, hiding in the tree line. After some reassurance that they were fine, a new problem arises. 

They need a ride back. 

Satoru already got rid of his glasses, staring at him with a pout and his hands clasped beneath his chin, like that's going to do anything, big blue eyes still as dumb as they were the first time he saw them. 

Suguru sighs and summons Rainbow Dragon. 

/// 

Showered and dressed down, Suguru's only plan for the rest of his day was to find where Satoru's hiding and, lovingly, force him into a movie night to get him to relax. Which is why he's a little surprised when Nanami approaches him. 

Training, maybe? he muses. It's still early, bordering between late afternoon and evening, only the faintest brush of a night's chill in the air. 

"Geto-senpai," Nanami greets, bowing slightly. 

Suguru blinks at him, slightly surprised. "Nanami-kun," he replies lightly. "How can I help?" 

"I was wondering if you have a moment to talk?" Nanami shifted, uncomfortable on his feet. "I have a couple of questions I would like to ask." 

"Of course." Suguru gives him what he hopes is a reassuring smile. "Let's go sit," he suggests, gesturing towards one of the outside benches. 

Nanami nods, slight pink on his cheeks. 

Suguru sits down, stretching his legs out in front of him as he waits out Nanami. Wonder if Satoru's up for cooking, or if it's going to be a take-out night, he muses, trying to figure out the mechanics of ordering in and if it's worth it trying to sneak food in from the bottom of the mountain and past Yaga. Might just be an instant ramen night, he laments. 

"How-" Nanami starts unsurely, hands flexing against the edges of the bench. "How do you deal with missions with Gojo-san?" 

Suguru crosses his arms, trying to give Nanami the benefit of the doubt and not tense. "What do you mean?" 

"It's just." Nanami visibly struggles with his words. "He's so flippant during them, like he doesn't care about anything. He just sees the missions as a way to flex his strength, but I can't do that. I don't know how to fight alongside someone like that." 

Suguru tenses, uncomfortable, not for the first time, with how comfortable people are complaining to him about Satoru. He doesn't know what it is about him, if it's because people view him as the more mature one, or if people are under some misunderstanding that he's anything less than Satoru's biggest enabler, but it leaves a bad taste in his mouth. 

I'm going to start smothering him in front of everyone, he thinks sourly. 

"Well," he starts. He has to remind himself that Satoru doesn't want others to see below the surface level of his personality. "None of what you said is really true. But you're not there to match him," he tries to gentle his voice. He doesn't want to put Nanami on the defensive. "You're there to learn from him. No one can match him." 

"Except you," Nanami points out. 

"Except me." Suguru lets himself smile. 

"I don't see how I'm supposed to learn anything," Nanami continues, frustration now clear in his voice. "He's invulnerable, nothing can touch or harm him. He doesn't fight on the same plane as everyone else. I don't see why I'm there at all, I might as well just leave it all to him." 

To watch his back, Suguru thinks, unable to keep the tense clench of his jaw. The last couple of missions have shown that the higher-ups have no issues burdening them with higher grade missions, despite their current assignment. He knows Satoru would've been shielding Nanami from the worst of the curses, taking on the bigger burden to make sure he doesn't come out injured. But that means that Nanami is left to watch Satoru's back, and Suguru has to trust him to do so. 

He doesn't think he can, by the sound of things. 

He doesn’t have it in him to trust someone who thinks of Satoru as invulnerable, above it all, untouchable, to watch his back. He looks at Nanami and thinks, If there was a blade going for his heart would you even try and stop it? The most important part of fighting alongside Satoru is knowing that infinity is perfect but it is not absolute.

Behind infinity is the boy Suguru loves, and he gets tired, and he gets worn down, and the consequences of having infinity on for hours to no end catch up to him. 

Suguru doesn't trust anyone enough to protect him when that happens. 

"The assignment probably won't last for too much longer," Suguru says tiredly. "Just follow his lead to get to the end of it safely." He wants to be done with this conversation. 

He wants to find Satoru. 

"Now if you'll excuse me." He gives Nanami a smile he doesn't want to and stands up, brushing himself off. 

He heads back to the dorms, figuring if he can't find Satoru there, he'll at least be able to grab his phone and hunt him down that way. 

Luck is on his side, and he finds Satoru standing in the kitchen in front of an open cabinet. Satoru hears him come in and turns to him with a pout. 

"I think it's a ramen night," he says mournfully. It's entirely for show, Suguru knows. The more despondent he appears, the more likely Suguru is to agree. He would've agreed anyway, but Satoru doesn't have to know everything. 

He doesn't bother answering, instead just striding towards him and enveloping Satoru in a hug. 

"Huh?" Satoru exclaims into his ear. "You good, man?" he asks, patting his back in what could either be an attempt at reassurance, or alarm. It's fine, either way. 

Suguru places a firm kiss to his temple, tightening his arms around him. "Thank you for all your hard work, Satoru," he murmurs. 

Satoru, chronically touch-starved as he is, melts at the affection, head dropping to Suguru's shoulder. He knows Satoru won't question him like this, too busy soaking in the affection like a cat in the afternoon sunlight. 

Suguru is all too happy to indulge him. 

He tries to ignore the growing fear he feels coiling in his stomach. 

///

It's laundry of all things that brings them together. Shoko hasn't seen either of the boys in what feels like forever, but couldn't have been more than two weeks. The college has been uncomfortably silent in a way that she can't even enjoy. Shutting Satoru up is fun, silence because Satoru isn't there to offer his incessant chatter is not. Smoke breaks aren't even as enjoyable when she can't poke and prod at Suguru.

Which is why when she hears the front door to their dorm open, and hushed voices arguing, she pops out of her room to intercept them. 

"Yo, losers," she calls. "What's all the ruckus about?" 

"Yeah, Satoru, what's with all the ruckus?" Suguru snarks in the way he only ever lets himself when he's tired. 

"Shut up," Satoru hisses. "If you would just help me-" 

"Baby boy hasn't done laundry," Suguru drawls, every word dripping with condescension.  

Satoru flushes and Shoko knows for a fact it's not out of embarrassment. How Suguru remains oblivious to the effect he has on Satoru is a mystery to her. 

"Just do it tomorrow." She's always happy to be a proponent for procrastination. 

Satoru mumbles something that she can't catch, and she raises an eyebrow at him. It's clear that he doesn't want to repeat himself, so Suguru steps in. 

"He already stripped his bed and he's out of night clothes," Suguru explains, cuffing Satoru lightly to the back of his head. 

Satoru squawks in indignation, hand coming up to rub at the spot on his head as if the smack wasn't feather-light. 

"Okay," Shoko says mildly, ignoring Satoru. "Sounds like it's midnight laundry time, then." 

Satoru's eyes light up and Suguru groans, which is how she knows they agree. It's been a while, but it wouldn't be the first and probably not the last time that the college's laundromat would serve as their designated hang-out spot. 

///

"Is that my crop top?" 

"Eh?" Satoru pops out his lollipop, tugging at his shirt. "I thought it was a little short." 

"Your entire stomach is out," Suguru says, voice strangled. 

Poor boy, Shoko thinks. Truly our strongest solider. 

"Yeah? I literally just said I thought it was short." 

Suguru sighs, digging his thumb into his forehead. Satoru shrugs, going back to kicking his feet idly against the washing machine he was sitting on top of. 

"How did you even get it over your shoulders?" Shoko muses out loud. 

Satoru shrugs again, and she eyes the stretched material. She figures the answer involves something along the lines of 'by force'. 

"You wear loose shirts," he says defensively. 

"Not that loose," Suguru says, tilting his head back. He's periodically going from ogling Satoru and looking anywhere but him. Shoko needs them to get their shit together just so she can openly make fun of him. 

Well. More openly. 

"I know you wear Suguru's clothes all the time because of your whole-" she waves her hand vaguely encompassing their whole weird dynamic they've got going on. "But mine are off-limits." 

Satoru blinks at her innocently as if he has no clue what she's on about. She's not fooled, she saw him ingest two drops of alcohol before going off to write sonnets about Suguru's hair five too many times to fall for it. 

"Huh?" Suguru looks between them in confusion. "Our what?"

Poor dumb baby. She's gonna smash their heads together one of these days. 

"Don't worry about it," Satoru says, making grabby hands at Suguru. 

Shoko rolls her eyes as Suguru acquiesces and goes to stand between Satoru's legs, back towards him. Satoru slides his arms over Suguru's shoulder, slumping over him. 

"Can you not hold yourself up for two seconds?" Suguru complains, making no attempt at moving. 

"No," Satoru says cheerfully, happily draped over Suguru.  

"His head's too big, his stick neck can't hold it up," Shoko says dryly. 

"Oi!" Satoru pouts. 

Suguru laughs, shaking Satoru in the process. Satoru's pout becomes more pronounced, and Shoko shakes her head with a grin. 

She can't stand these two. 

///

Suguru wakes up feeling like something is wrong down to his very bones. 

It's a perfectly pleasant day, the sun shining, clear skies, slight breeze. He has the day off, and Satoru's out on a mission near Tokyo that should be done by the afternoon. He left Suguru breakfast on the stove, and Shoko even made extra coffee that morning. 

By all accounts, it should be a good day. 

But Suguru can't shake the feeling, tension building in his jaw all throughout the morning. Haibara asked to spar, but he's too distracted to be of any help, mind too far  to correct Haibara's movements, and muscles too tense to pull his punches enough for anyone but Satoru.

He gives up, Haibara waving off his half-assed apology with a grin, and Suguru trudges back to the dorm, collapsing on top of the couch in the common area. He throws his arm over his eyes with a rough exhale, trying to stem the feeling of bad in his chest. 

"Suguru." Shoko interrupts his spiralling. 

He startles slightly, sitting up. He didn't even hear her come in. 

Shoko raises an eyebrow at him. "You good?" 

"I just-." He shakes his head. "Have a bad feeling today, I think I slept weird." 

"Okay, well, want to put a pause on your whole doom and gloom shtick and take a smoke break?" 

"Is it a break if neither one of us is doing anything?" he asks, even as he stands up to grab his lighter from his room. If Shoko's inviting he can bum a cigarette off of her. 

"Shut up," she calls after him. 

Suguru grins, the familiarity making the weight on his chest feel a little lighter. 

They sneak out the back despite knowing that Yaga knows exactly where they go to smoke. Leaning against the back wall, hidden from view by the overgrown trees no one bothers to trim, he extends his lighter, letting Shoko light up first. 

The first hit of nicotine relaxes him a little, and he watches idly as the smoke get blown away alongside some of his tension. Satoru's going to be on his case later when he smells it on him, but he'll understand. He still has some milk candy stashed away in his room that he can use to bribe him, anyway. 

"You wanna talk about it, or?" Shoko eyes him, sounding like she most definitely does not want to talk about it. Suguru appreciates the sentiment, at least. 

"Nah," he exhales. 

Shoko nods with slight relief. It makes Suguru snicker, and he catches an elbow to the ribs for it. It's nice just standing here with Shoko, and Suguru kicks himself a little for not seeking her out sooner. Just because Satoru isn't around for him to recharge off of doesn't mean he has to close himself off entirely. 

He's broken out of his thoughts by Shoko's phone ringing, and he raises an eyebrow at her. It's obviously not him, and Satoru wouldn't be calling Shoko before him either. Utahime, maybe? 

"Ieiri," Shoko greets into the phone, and Suguru's eyebrows climb higher. Not Utahime then. 

What's a little eavesdropping between friends? 

The sound is faint, but just enough for Suguru to catch bits of the conversation. He gathers that the person on the other side is one of the assistants, and mentally resorts to spending the rest of his morning alone. Looks like Shoko is going to be needed elsewhere. 

He tenses. 

Wasn't the only mission assigned today Satoru's? 

And if they're calling Shoko... 

He swings around, casting wild eyes at her just to find her steady gaze on him already as she finishes the call. 

"Is Nanami-?" 

There's tenseness to Shoko that anyone less familiar with her expression wouldn't be able to spot. Suguru does though, and he barely breathes as he waits for her response. 

It's supposed to be a Grade 1, but even a powerful one wouldn't stand a chance against Satoru. Nanami should be okay, Satoru is more than capable of protecting those weaker than him. 

"It's not Nanami," Shoko says grimly, a slight tick to her jaw. 

It's not Nanami.   

It's not Nanami, because it's-  
  
"Satoru," he breathes. 

And then it feels like he can't breathe at all, lungs devoid of oxygen, mountain air feeling thinner than it ever felt before. 

"Suguru." Shoko's voice sounds like it's coming from underwater. 

But It can't be Satoru because Satoru doesn't get injured. He has infinity, he has Six Eyes, he'll see anything coming before it even has the chance to hit him, Satoru doesn't get injured. 

"Suguru." There's hands on his shoulders. 

And if something ever got past him, Suguru's there... But he wasn't there, Nanami was, and could he trust him? Would he watch his back? No he couldn't, he didn't.   
  
"Suguru!" Shoko shakes him. 

He gasps, too much air entering his lungs and he keels over, a rough cough rattling his frame. Shoko gives him a moment, a steady hand against his back. 

"I need you to bring him to me," she instructs him, voice clipped and steady. "You'll be the fastest one. I'm going to go to the infirmary and make sure it's ready to receive him, you go down the mountain and meet their car." 

"How," he coughs. "How bad is it?" 

He doesn't want to know. He has to know. 

"I don't know." Shoko shakes her head. "They couldn't say. But we have to go." 

She stands up and, oh, when did he sit down? 

"Suguru," Shoko snaps. 

Suguru hurries to stand up. He doesn't let himself think, focusing entirely on the instructions Shoko gave him. As long as he can just focus on that he'll be fine. He'll get Satoru and take him to Shoko and she'll heal him, and it'll be fine. 

He sprints. 

He goes through every shortcut he and Satoru mapped out, barely keeping himself from tripping down the stairs. Halfway down he catches sight of Nanami, holding someone up limply, their arm over his shoulder. 

No, not just someone. Satoru. 

He makes it to them in record time, doesn't let himself think or pause as he goes to Satoru's other side, bending down so he can slip an arm around his back and under his legs. 

"Geto-san." Nanami goes to protest, his voice weak. 

"I got him," he snaps harshly. He doesn't have it in him to care right now. 

When he actually glances at Satoru, he can feel his heart seize, terror shooting ice cold through his veins. 

There's so much blood, soaking through Satoru's once white shirt, on Nanami, on his own shirt now. It's all Satoru's. 

He clenches his jaw, wrenching himself out of his thoughts and summons his manta. It'll be the fastest way to get to Shoko. 

As he steps on it, Satoru lets out a painful whimper as he's jostled. A sliver of blue appears as he cracks an eye open. "S'gru," he slurs, head lolling to rest against his shoulder. 

“I'm here, just hold on, sweetheart,” Suguru whispers, heart in his throat. “Stay with me, you'll be okay.” 

He tightens his hold on him as much as he dares to, dismounting as gently as he can once they're outside the infirmary. Shoko's already there, instructing him to put Satoru down on the bed she's prepared. He walks over holding Satoru, and can't help hesitating, the idea of letting Satoru out of his arms excruciating. 

"Suguru." There's a firm hand on his arm. "I need you to trust me and let me do my job." 

It's okay, he tries to convince himself. He can trust Shoko. 

Satoru lets out another pained whimper and it makes his mind up for him. He lays Satoru down gently, stepping away to let Shoko get to him, the hum of her RCT already sharp in the air. 

"Suguru." She doesn't look away from where her hands are over Satoru's chest. "Out. I need to focus." 

He follows her instructions numbly. 

/// 

"Geto-san." 

Suguru blinks up at Nanami. He hasn't moved at all since Shoko kicked him out, sitting down opposite the room and staring blankly at the door. It's been maybe an hour, but it feels like more, time moving sluggishly through every minute without news. 

Nanami shifts uncomfortably, clearly expecting more of a response from Suguru. He doesn't have one to give him. There's only one person he currently wants to see, and he's behind a door Suguru isn't allowed through. 

Nanami's still standing there, not uttering a word. There's something he wants to say, gearing up for whatever it is. 

"It's my fault," Nanami blurts out. "Gojo-san saved my life." 

I know, Suguru thinks. Satoru doesn't get injured on his own.

He doesn't have anything to say to Nanami. 

"I want him to know I'm grateful," Nanami says with a slight bow. 

Suguru shifts his eyes from the door to Nanami. "Then you should tell him that yourself." 

Nanami nods stiffly, not budging from his position. Suguru really wishes he was being left alone. 

"I will." Nanami hesitates. "I'm sorry." 

"Nanami," Suguru says tiredly. "Please, just go." 

Nanami leaves, and Suguru goes back to staring at the door, his other half so close, yet out of reach. 

///

The door cracks open and Suguru is on his feet instantly, muscles and joints protesting yet given no mind. Shoko walks out, closing the door quietly behind her. 

She looks exhausted. 

"He's sleeping," she says quietly. "He'll be okay. I healed as much as I could but it was a nasty wound; he'll be out of commission for at least the next two weeks." 

Suguru nods, but everything after 'He'll be okay' passes right through him, pure relief coursing through his veins. 

He'll be okay, he's okay, he's okay. 

Shoko nods at the door as she steps aside. "Go on, go see him. He'll be out for a while. I had to cut his shirt open, so you might want to go grab him some clothes - you know how he gets about hospital gowns." 

"Bad texture," Suguru says absent-mindedly, already pushing through the door. 

Shoko closes it behind her as she leaves, but he registers none of it. Satoru's lying on the far bed, machines beeping around him, and thick bandages wrapped around his torso and shoulders. The blood's been cleaned away, hair back to that familiar snowy white. He's still in a way Satoru never really is. 

Suguru crosses the room quietly, feeling like he'll disturb Satoru if he makes too much noise. He comes to a stop next to him, brushing his bangs off his forehead, and leans down to press a feather-light kiss to his forehead. 

He's okay, he tells himself closing his eyes and stroking a thumb across a soft cheek. He's alive, he's okay.

He sits down on the chair Shoko must've left next to the bed and grabs Satoru's hand. 

He settles in for a long night. 

/// 

Suguru wakes up to a gentle hand carding through his hair. He blinks his eyes open, struggling to get his bearings for a second as he adjusts to the light. His back and neck ache from where he fell asleep bent over the bed, but he doesn't bother straightening  up just yet. The hand in his hair feels nice. 

He gives it another minute before he groans, finally sitting up. Satoru's hand falls away, but he doesn't let him get far, linking their fingers as he takes him in. Satoru's gaze on him is familiar, and he feels like it's easier to breathe with that endless blue on him. 

"You look like shit." Satoru breaks the silence, voice raspy. 

Suguru scoffs, squeezing the hand in his. "Have you looked in the mirror?" And then, softer. "How are you feeling?" 

"Like I got ran through by a curse." Satoru tries to crack a grin. 

"That's not funny." Suguru frowns. 

"Too early?" Satoru winces. 

"Way too early," Suguru tries to keep his tone reprimanding, but is too relieved to mean it. 

They lapse into silence, Suguru focused on the steady rise and fall of Satoru's chest, letting the action settle the worry that's been sitting heavily on his shoulders since yesterday. 

"Nanami wanted to talk to you," he blurts out and kicks himself mentally. He doesn't want to talk about Nanami. 

Satoru scrunches his nose up, sharing his sentiment. "He's gonna be weird about it, I don't want to." 

"He said you saved his life," Suguru says watching Satoru closely. He doesn't want to prod too early, but he needs to know what happened. 

Satoru shrugs, visibly uncomfortable. "He had no business being on that mission in the first place. It was a misgraded Special Grade." 

Suguru's other hand clenches against his knee, the fabric of his trousers bunching up. This wouldn't have happened if he was there. 

"The fight was easy, it stood no chance," Satoru continues, oblivious to Suguru's frustration. "I told Nanami to go hide so he wouldn't get caught up. Once it was almost dead he popped back out, assuming it was exorcised. He didn't know stronger curses can rebound after the killing blow. When I felt the curse's energy expand I dropped infinity to shove him behind me and shield him from it." Satoru shrugs as if he isn't describing one of Suguru's nightmares. "I can reinforce my body with cursed energy well enough but he can't; it would've shredded him. Sucked, but I lived. He wouldn't have." 

Suguru takes a deep breath. Satoru was right, Nanami had no business being anywhere near a curse that strong, and it wasn't his fault that he was there. Still, his presence is what put Satoru in danger, and he paid the consequence of having a partner that's not suitable to work with him in the end. 

"I'm going to talk to Yaga." He decides on the spot. "We're done with the assignment. Any mission we get, we take together or we don't take at all." 

He realises that he maybe should've involved Satoru in this decision. 

He shouldn't have worried. Satoru is looking at him with a grin, already nodding to his plan. 

"No more separate missions," he says. 

"No more," Suguru promises, squeezing his hand. 

Then Satoru gets that look on his face, like he's about to say something stupid. "Don't go making promises like that lightly, I'll think you're in love with me or something." 

I am, he thinks. And then realises that Satoru could've died and Suguru never would've been able to tell him, and it's suddenly very important that he knows. They'll be fine, but Satoru has to know that he's loved. 

"Yeah," he says, not allowing himself to second-guess. "That's because I am." 

Satoru freezes, and Suguru is right there with him. Maybe he should've gone into this with a plan after all. Second-thoughts can be helpful. 

He's saved by Shoko entering the room, the door banging open with a sound that's too loud in the deathly quiet room. 

"Oh good, you're awake," she notes, not noticing, or ignoring, the stifling atmosphere. "I need to run some checks." She nods at Suguru. "Go get him some clothes." 

Satoru finally seems to reboot, and he turns bright red. Suguru is all too happy to be given an escape and he slips out of his chair, determined to come back and act like he hasn't said anything. 

"Wait," Satoru splutters behind him. He doesn't turn around. "Suguru, come back. You can't just say that. Come back and confess properly, you fuck!" 

There's sounds of struggle from behind him, lessening somewhat with Shoko's hissed, "Stay still." 

Suguru allows himself a smile as he slips out of the room. Maybe he won't have to pretend, after all. 

/// 

Suguru grabs Satoru's favourite hoodie of his, and stuffs the milk candies he was saving into the pocket for him to find. He would grab one of Satoru's, but giving him one of his seems like something a boyfriend would do. He needs to start making his case, here. 

Is he getting ahead of himself? Maybe. Is he going to stop? No. Satoru looks better in his clothes anyway. 

He makes it back in record time, Shoko only halfway through her checks. Satoru lights up when he sees him, and Suguru tugs the hoodie over his head so he doesn't have to look at him and his dimples. He settles back on his chair, ignoring the looks Satoru keeps shooting him. He does let himself smile when Satoru discovers the milk candies though. 

Shoko eventually steps back, settling cross legged on the second bed to write up her report. Suguru can't blame her for wanting to stay close. 

"Okay," Satoru says through a mouthful of candy. "I'm ready to be confessed to now." 

He's so annoying, Suguru can't stand him. He'll do him one better. 

He stands up, leaning over Satoru and placing a hand on his cheek. He leans down slightly, searching Satoru's eyes for any hint that he doesn't want this. He finds none, and taps Satoru's cheek. 

"I'm not sticking my tongue in your mouth if it's filled with sweets." 

Satoru swallows deliberately and then sticks his tongue out. 

Good enough. 

Suguru finally, finally, leans down and presses his lips softly to Satoru's. It's a gentle kiss, and Satoru tenses up for a second, before melting into it, lips moving unhurried against his. 

It's more than Suguru's ever hoped it would be. His lips tilt up into a smile he can't contain, but it doesn't matter because he can feel Satoru doing the same. 

They part and Suguru relishes in the way Satoru's eyes flutter open, expression dazed. 

"Much better," Satoru says. Or tries. His voice cracks and Suguru snickers, knowing that he wouldn't fare much better if he tried to say anything now. 

Satoru pouts, and Suguru kisses him again, because he's allowed to do that now apparently. 

Boyfriend things. He knew he wasn't getting ahead of himself. 

"Did I really have to be here for this?" Shoko interrupts them. 

Oh right. Oops. 

"You've known for long enough, don't start being precious about it now," Satoru says over his shoulder. 

"Wait, hold on, how long have you known?" Suguru whirls around as well as he can from his position on the bed. 

"The first time you beat Satoru in a fight he barged into my room and told me that he 'thinks he likes men now'," she says flatly. 

Satoru squawks from the side. "Don't fucking tell him that!" 

Suguru throws his head back with a laugh, clutching Satoru's hand close when he tries to pull away. He places a soft kiss on his knuckles in a silent apology. 

Satoru's ears burn red as he looks away. "You're so embarrassing," he mutters. 

Oh, Suguru's going to embarrass him so much. 

///

"Suguru, could you stay behind?" 

Satoru exchanges a glance with Suguru at Yaga's words. He offers him a shrug, and Satoru makes a face, resigning himself to staying behind as well, lest he be called a bad boyfriend. He's up on points and he doesn't intend to lose now. 

He pops a lollipop into his mouth and settles down on top of his desk as Suguru walks to the front of the class. He swats at his ass when he passes him and only offers Suguru a wink when he gets glared at. Considering the near permanent state of his neck, he's owed some retribution. 

Yaga gives him a glance as if waiting for him to leave, which he should know better than by now. He doesn't seem to be getting the memo, so Satoru waves his fingers at him cheerfully, crossing his legs on the desk, settling down comfortably. 

His teacher sighs and Satoru pats himself on the back for another battle of wills won. They're stacking up nicely. Yaga only won once so far, but it was back in first year before he knew he could rope Suguru into all the trouble he gets into, so Satoru doesn't count it as a genuine victory. He had a debuff. 

"You've been assigned a new mission, Grade 1," Yaga says, handing Suguru the mission file. 

Satoru perks up at that, swinging his feet back on the ground. He walks over to hook his chin on Suguru's shoulder so he can read the file alongside him. 

"Where are we going?" Satoru asks eagerly. A break is nice, a medically enforced break is Shoko's current method of torture. 

Yaga gives him an unimpressed look. "It's a solo mission, only Suguru's been assigned." 

Satoru blinks at him, wondering if he's already forgotten about their deal. He wouldn't be surprised, he knows people start struggling with memory as they age, and Yaga is getting up there. 

"Sensei," Suguru starts in that infuriatingly neutral tone of his. It's not aimed at Satoru this time, though, so he doesn't mind it as much. "I thought we made it clear we're not taking separate missions." 

Yaga sighs as if he was expecting this. Which he should've, and Satoru doesn't know why he even bothered starting this argument. 

Satoru winds his arms around Suguru's middle, leaning against him more heavily. He might as well get comfortable if Yaga wants to hash this out again. 

Suguru drops a hand down to his own, stroking a gentle thumb over his knuckles. Satoru can't help the slight shiver, and fights the urge to hide his face in Suguru's neck. The tiniest touches light his nerves on fire and he curses his own sensitivity for betraying him. Suguru has been relentless, it's unhealthy for his poor heart. 

"Boys," Yaga says in his serious voice. It's what he usually sounds like as far as Satoru's concerned, but if the slight lowering of his baritone makes him believe he can get the two of them to behave, then Satoru isn't about to pop his bubble. "The agreement was for joint missions, solo missions were not part of it." 

It sounds like the exact type of loophole the higher-ups would try to go for, so Satoru doesn't even bother pretending that he buys Yaga's argument. He's just parroting what they told him, anyway. 

"Yes they were," Suguru states. "All our assigned missions are to be taken together. That means joint and solo." 

Satoru doesn't say anything, a little preoccupied with fighting the urge to kiss Suguru when he's blatantly standing up to authority like this. He quietly mourns missing out on the initial meeting. 

Yaga grunts and waves them off. Satoru snickers, even as he listens to Suguru's wordless request to let him go. He doesn't want to, but sacrifices have to be made. 

Suguru tugs him back to his side by the waist once they're walking back to the dorm, and he throws an arm around Suguru's shoulders, pleased at the kiss to his temple that he receives. He turns his head to steal a real kiss as well, just because he can. 

Being able to kiss Suguru whenever he wants might just be the greatest thing that's ever happened to him. 

And he wants to kiss Suguru a lot. 

It's kind of the only thing they've been doing during his medical leave. 

"You excited to get back out there?" Suguru murmurs, his lips tilting into a smile against Satoru's. 

"As long as it's with you," Satoru grins, just shy of too sharp. Limitless is practically buzzing underneath his skin at the promise of a fight. 

Suguru laughs, not put off in the slightest. He tugs him in for a kiss in lieu of an answer, and Satoru can't help smiling into it. He drops his bag in favour of sinking his hand into that thick inky hair like he'd wanted to ever since the first time he saw Suguru with his hair loose around his shoulders. 

They'll never get around to exorcising any curses at this rate. 

Satoru doesn't thinks he minds.