Chapter Text
Ever since Amanai, there had been a tension tighter than a rope in between the strongest. All he could think about was how empty he felt. He unlocked power transcending the heavens, but for what? He felt like hands were toying with his neck, suffocating him until he would eventually snap. There was nothing he could do for Suguru, nothing for himself, nothing for Amanai.
Amanai was dead in body, the strongest were dead in spirit. There would always, always be curses. Ready to be slaughtered, with the screams of the wretched still on their lips. Ever since Amanai, there had been no rest. All he wanted to do was to go back and take the lives of the people who called for the death of a 14 year old child. He hated everything. How dare the grass still sway, the sun still set? He had taken more showers than he could count in the past 2 weeks, and he could still see the blood on his hands, the guts on his cheek.
Nothing would ever change. Selfish, selfish, selfish. All that you could ever do was erase the lives of curse users, destroy the body of a spirit. And they would never truly be gone. They'd come back, with a vengeance.
The side of his foot dragged against his bedroom tile.
What was even the point of all this? Was there a point?
Why shouldn't he end it all.
His fingers slipped down scarred arms, himself slumping against a bedframe older than Tengen.
He didn't want to die.
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Every minute drawing past was it's own personal hell. Sapphire eyes glanced up at doorways, and lingered at a broken picture frame of him, Suguru and Shoko. Taken 3 weeks prior, it was devastating to witness the horror of the thoughts littering his head. The back of his nose tinged with the sharpest scent of tears. But he couldn't, he couldn't. There was never any excuse for crying, and c'mon, he was the strongest, right? Tears? A waste of time.
A smirk forced itself to trembling lips as Satoru shifted himself up to his feet. Yaga had given him and Suguru a couple of days without the pack mule treatment to recover. The higher-ups had obviously persisted, as he distantly recalled a conversation relating to Amanai, Yaga talking about a few weeks. He didn't need that.
But he might as well check on Suguru. At least he might be in a better state. He scoffed at the thought the second it formed. The look in his eyes as he so calmly held a still-warn corpse in his hands would've frightened even the clan that made him to be such a monster. He had known the burden he had to shelter since he could walk. But seeing it fully realized, seeing himself fully realized, he walked with a new mind. And that mind was a fucked-up place - of which was unraveling every piece of string they had thread together so perfectly. The one thought that remained stable was Suguru. An anchor, a pillar. Sort of like a lost puppy chasing after any sort of owner it recognised.
His foot stopped dragging when he came to notice it was bleeding. The floors were rough, after all. He didn't own a first aid kit in his dorm, he was the strongest even before RCT. Suguru was right next door, and he must own one. Another reason to go ahead, then? It didn't make sense, but he almost felt like it he just crossed that doorway, everything would crumble.
Everything had fallen apart anyways. Why not just see if it could do anymore.
Walking through the doorway wasn't nearly as dramatic as he had hoped, still as attention-seeking as ever. Suguru was sitting in his desk chair, asleep.
Surely, he wouldn't mind if he slept in his bed? He wasn't using it, after all, and man was he overcome by tiredness. The hanging plant tickled his hair as he sat on the bed that really - he had no right to - why was he - what was wrong with him?!
The bleeding had finally stopped, at least.
His legs were on his best friend's bed. Without him knowing.
His head was against his pillow. And Suguru was unaware.
His glasses had slipped off his head and onto the floor. Sleeping men are as oblivious as dead ones.
He was asleep. In his best friend's bed, closed eyes flickering lightly.