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callhercarlisle · 15 days ago

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kitty | sukuna ryomen ★ ╰►you should fear him. and maybe you do—but not in the way you should. after nursing you back from the brink, sukuna becomes something far more dangerous than your captor: your master, your alpha, your everything. you lose your mind slowly, beautifully, under his touch—until submission becomes survival, and pleasure becomes prayer. you were weak when he found you…now you’re nothing but his. 19.8k words

a/n: I was originally going to post this on my sfw account @carlislefiles because there's no explicit smut or sex in this, but ultimately I decided that it just fits better here. this is sukuna with a kitty!reader basically. plus, the idea of having an evil, brute of a man soft for me and me alone is like porn, but better. so yeah. warnings: yandere!sukuna, kittyhybrid!reader, a/b/o dynamics, mentions of blood and murder, cussing, toxic behavior, etc. sukuna calls her pet a lot, absolutely disturbing amounts of drool...no I will not elaborate. subspace fears me, i.e. probably innacurate depictions of subspace in here. to be honest, this is really fucked up ^.^ enjoy <3 p.s. I'm thinking of adding to this/doing a part two, so let me know your thoughts on that. mdni 18+ only please.

for centuries—no, longer than that—sukuna had moved through the world as a blade moves through flesh. sharp. inevitable. unapologetically cruel. not merely feared, but understood to be beyond change, beyond mercy, beyond reason.

they had written songs about his violence. built rituals around it. etched it into stone and memory and blood. they called him demon, deity, disaster. but he preferred the silence that followed his name. the reverent hush. that was the only honest sound humans ever made.

nothing softened him. not sex. not praise. not the endless parade of sycophants and sacrifices. pleasure bored him. submission disgusted him. he had no use for the fragile rhythms of mortal affection. love was a leash he had long since burned to ash.

and yet. and yet—you.

he found you in the wreckage of a cursed hideout, crumpled in a corner like trash someone had forgotten to take out. hybrid, he’d realized immediately. not fully human—too delicate for that. the ears atop your head flicked once in agitation, then flattened. your tail was curled tight around your legs like it could keep you safe. pointless.

there was blood caked under your nails, streaked down your arms, dried to a crust at your temples. your eyes were wide, but unfocused—owl-like, too large for your face, too hollow to sparkle.

the other curses had fled before him. as they should. but you didn’t run. didn’t scream, either. no hysterics. no begging. no bargaining. you just looked at him.

and in your gaze, he found something he hadn’t seen in a very, very long time. indifference.

not to pain. no, you feared pain—he could smell it on you, woven into your scent like rot. could taste it in the air like copper. your body trembled with it, delicate muscles seizing and releasing in pathetic spasms. your legs wouldn’t move. your ears twitched erratically, then stilled. your arms gave a single, spastic jerk and then nothing.

you were terrified of what might come next. the agony. the defilement. the slow, grinding misery. but you were not afraid of him.

not of his size. not of the four arms hanging at his sides like weapons. not of the second face leering over his shoulder, its lips curled in a grin carved by a cruel god. not even of the thick ropes of muscle beneath his skin, the sprawling ink that marked him in divine geometry.

you’d seen worse. you’d survived worse. he could see it in the folds of your clothes—stained, shredded, soaked in fluids that weren’t all yours. he could see it in the slump of your shoulders, the unnatural angle of your wrist, the bruises blooming like flowers around the base of your tail. and beneath all of that…you were still breathing. that made something in him tighten.

he watched you from across the room. unmoving. unreadable. he watched the way your chest hitched on every inhale. the way your lips parted around nothing—no sound, no words, just breath. just trying to survive. he wondered what would happen if he took one step forward. if you would flinch. cry. crawl away. claw your own face off.

but you didn’t move. you just stared. like he was nothing more than the next inevitable horror in a long line of them. not special. not holy. just next.

he considered killing you. not out of anger. not even out of curiosity. just habit. a swift motion. a clean split. he’d gutted stronger things in less time than it took to blink. and yet, he didn’t.

instead, he stepped forward. slowly. the ground didn’t shake beneath him—it yielded. the room seemed smaller, thinner, like the space bent to make room for him. his presence devoured oxygen. his shadow cast angles that didn’t obey geometry. his body moved with the weight of myth. and still… you didn’t move.

he towered over you. you looked like a corpse someone had forgotten to bury. little more than bones in the shape of a girl, with twitching ears and a tail curled tight as a fist. you just looked at him—four arms, two faces, all jagged teeth and divine desecration—and blinked. slowly. hollowly. so this is how I die, your eyes said.

his hand closed around your arm—fingers curling entirely around your bicep, overlapping slightly. your skin was cold. clammy. soft in a way that irritated him. your tail uncoiled slightly, brushing against his leg in some primitive, unconscious reflex.

you let out the smallest sound—barely audible. not a cry, not even a word. just a fragile breath caught at the edge of consciousness. and then you collapsed. he caught you before your head hit the ground. not because he cared. because it would’ve made a mess.

your body dangled like a rag over one of his shoulders. too light. barely there. he could feel every ridge of your spine pressing into him like little pieces of glass. your thigh was limp under his palm, and he could cup it in his full hand—engulf it, practically. absurd.

your tail had curled instinctively around the crook of his elbow, limp but still moving. seeking contact. warmth. safety. a joke.

“what a nice pet,” he muttered, just loud enough for the second face to hear. it was a lie. he said it to himself. to justify the decision he was already making.

because the truth was much uglier. you were not pretty. not desirable. you looked like something dying, clinging to breath out of spite. but there was a stillness to you. a kind of brutal honesty in your brokenness. no dramatics. no whimpering praise. he admired that. he would never admit it.

a nice pet, he told himself. that’s all it is. a toy. a decoration. a thing to command.

he did not want to admit to fascination. did not want to admit to the twitch in his stomach when your breath hitched, or the way his second face twitched at the sight of your ears flattening against your skull.

at some point between the hobble he found you in and his gargantuan estate, you regained some pathetic semblance of consciousness. without understanding, without thinking, you traced one of the black lines carved into his back before you left the land of the waking again. just a single swipe of your fingernail, trembling and bloodied, across the skin stretched tight over his shoulder blades. like you were reading him.

he shuddered. the second face scowled at nothing. his grip on your leg tightened for half a second too long. he did not like how that felt.

—

you were treated differently. not softly, not gently. not with tenderness or affection. but with care, in the oldest sense of the word—attention, observation, possession. and by sukuna’s standards, that meant better than anything else under his roof. you began to mark your space without realizing it, brushing your shoulder against door frames, trailing your fingers along polished corners—scenting, claiming, familiarizing.

he did not strike you. did not belittle you. did not toss you to the ground when he was in a foul mood or dripping blood from someone else’s neck. in fact, he didn’t even let you sleep where the others did. you were not thrown to the servant’s quarters with the nameless masses who scraped and bowed and hurried.

you were placed in your own chamber. small, but clean. warm, but sparse. it smelled faintly of lavender and old wood. the door latched from the inside. the mattress didn’t have fleas. your tail thumped once in quiet approval.

it didn’t occur to you to be surprised. you were not familiar with the legends. you didn’t know what it meant to be “kept” by the king of curses. you thought perhaps this was normal—just another shape servitude took. and so you quietly circled the room once. twice. three times. before settling down, tail curling at your side.

when uraume asked you your role, sukuna answered before you could. “she’s mine,” he said, bored. “my personal servant.” uraume raised an eyebrow. they’d seen him crush people for less. slit throats for looking him in the eye. and now he was—what? employing someone? you didn’t ask questions. you simply nodded, folded your hands, and waited for instruction. and sukuna liked that. your ears twitched slightly at the sound of your name in his mouth, but you made no other movement.

he sent you for things he could have summoned. wine, books, food, silks. he sent you to fetch them, instead of barking at uraume. if he needed his kimono brought to the bathhouse, it was your footsteps echoing down the stone halls. not the bath attendants. you, always you.

you carried folded linens and steaming bowls like they were scripture. silent. obedient. when you handed him a towel, your fingers didn’t shake. when he looked down at you, you looked back—not up, not down, just back. he hated it. he loved it. your ears were always alert when he spoke—flattening at his displeasure, perking when his tone dipped into amusement. it annoyed him. it endeared him.

once, he made you cook for him. human food. a simple meal—rice, something stewed. you handed it over with a quiet, “for you, lord sukuna.”

he took one bite and made a face. “this tastes like dirt.” you didn’t defend yourself. didn’t apologize. just tilted your head slightly and said, “shall I try again, my lord?” he waved you off with a sneer. but he finished the plate anyway. your tail flicked once behind you as you turned away, unreadable.

he used you. not cruelly. not with the intention to harm. but he did use you. made you carry things that weren’t yours. made you stand at his side when the room filled with blood. made you watch while he destroyed. you never protested. you didn’t weep. didn’t scream. didn’t flinch. and that infuriated him.

you were supposed to break. that was what humans did under pressure—they shattered. you didn’t. you bent at the waist, nodded, said “yes, lord sukuna,” and returned to your duties like it wasn’t his enemies’ bones cracking underfoot. maybe that’s what this was. an experiment. how far could he take the little hybrid before she snapped? before she unraveled and bled silver or flame or whatever strange ichor sang through her veins.

he liked that you didn’t call him master. the others did. a title spat with trembling reverence. but from you, it was just “sukuna.” sometimes “lord sukuna.” always spoken plainly. never with fear.

well—not never. your fear showed up in odd places. averted eyes at open wounds. flinches at the sound of steel drawn too fast. shivers when the cold sank in through the stone floors and you were too polite to ask for extra blankets. you’d curl tighter into yourself at night, tail tucked over your feet, ears pressed flat against your head when the wind howled through the cracks.

he watched you more than he wanted to. and that was the problem. because sukuna had never been good at lying to himself. not really. not when it counted.

he liked you. favored you. enjoyed the smallness of your form. the way you moved soundlessly. the way your presence calmed his temper in subtle, infuriating ways. he noticed how your ears tracked his footsteps, even when you pretended not to hear. how your tail flicked when you were annoyed, though you never said a word.

but lately, he found himself craving more. not obedience. not usefulness. you. your voice. your thoughts. your company. he wanted to speak with you. converse. learn you. but you barely spoke at all. you were quiet, like a dying fire. soft around the edges. your gaze drifted more than it locked, like your mind was always somewhere else. and when he touched you—accidental or not—your tail curled, ears twitching with visible conflict.

and sukuna—monstrous, divine, terrible sukuna—missed you, even when you stood beside him.

so he brought you along. to villages. to battlefields. to bloody demonstrations of his rule. he brought you, tucked just behind him, a pale thing in dull robes, watching the carnage with silent resignation. he didn’t ask if you wanted to go. you didn’t say no. your tail stayed low, ears pinned. your silence, somehow louder than screams.

he noticed the way you looked away when the burning began. the way you swallowed hard when blood soaked through the seams of his robe. so before he returned to you, he washed his hands. every time. scrubbed the gore from his fingers with mountain spring water. cleaned under his nails. wiped the smears from his chest and arms. he would not have your little eyes stained with more horror than necessary. and still, your nose wrinkled when the copper scent clung too tightly. he filed that knowledge away.

uraume grew suspicious. they weren’t stupid. they had served him too long not to see the change. they cornered you one afternoon, half-casually. voice almost pleasant. mild. “what exactly do you do for lord sukuna?”

you blinked. "I serve him.” your ears tilted back, uncertain.

uraume nodded slowly. “do you…serve him with your body?”

you shook your head. “no.”

“does he hurt you?”

“no.”

“then what is the purpose of your…employment?”

you looked down at your hands. they were clean. for once. "I don’t know,” you said softly. you don’t ask those kinds of questions. uraume studied you. studied your face. your posture. your blank tone. they didn’t understand it. neither did you. your tail gave one small, tired twitch.

you weren’t beautiful in the typical sense of the word. you weren’t skilled. you didn’t fight. didn’t flirt. didn’t flatter. you offered him nothing but obedience and quiet company. and yet—he kept you. and you, foolish, trembling thing that you were, had no will to stop him. and when he called, you came. ears alert. steps light. heart already his.

—

you rarely left his side. not by rule. not by chains. there were no shackles around your wrists, no locks on your door. but still—you lingered. orbited him like a dying star around a black hole. your tail flicked nervously when he was angry, your ears pressed flat when blood hit the walls. he never told you not to wander, but something in you knew: to stray too far from sukuna was to tempt fate.

and whenever you did stray, fate answered cruelly. this time was no different. you accompanied him to the razing of a sorcerer clan estate. he'd brought you along, as he often did. not as a soldier, not even as a spectator. just… as his shadow. his little pet. his human kitten. he didn’t tell you why. maybe he liked seeing you tucked in the corner of a burning village. maybe he liked how you wrung your hands when the screams started. how you flinched when limbs hit the ground like meat. or maybe—just maybe—he liked pretending you were untouchable, simply because he was untouchable.

but rumors had begun to spread. they whispered of a hybrid girl trailing the king of curses. of soft footsteps behind war drums. of the wicked little thing that he kept near his throne, fed with his hands, bathed with his eyes. the creature with ears that twitched at whispers, with a tail that curled close to her hip when she knelt beside him. his pet. his toy. his spoiled little plaything. and where whispers bloom, predators follow.

you didn’t see the strike coming. neither did he. he was distracted—ripping a man’s spine from his body, painting the earth with crimson pride—when the sorcerer slipped through the smoke and drove a cursed blade through your side.

the sound you made was so soft. a gasp, barely even a cry. a ragged yelp of pain. the huff of a wounded animal. and that sound—that tiny, pitiful sound—nearly drove sukuna mad. he was at your side in seconds. tore the sorcerer apart, atom by atom. turned him into nothing. reduced him to less than memory. but you were the problem. you were bleeding. collapsing. eyes glassy with pain. your tail twitched once—then dropped limp. your ears folded back with a slow, broken flutter.

he had never known fear, not really. not the trembling, gut-twisting kind. but something—something like fear—rose in him then. sharp. poisonous. choking. you were too fragile. too soft. too easily broken. he carried you back to the estate himself. cradled you in all four arms like the most precious, pitiful thing in the world. he snarled at uraume to move, to clear the halls, to prepare his bed. not yours. not the servant’s chamber. his. the same bed he hadn’t used in months.

he placed you there gently—too gently. hands that once crushed bones now trembled as they laid you among velvet and silk. he healed you, of course. he was not without power. he could knit your wounds shut, refill your veins, take the death from your lungs. but he could not erase the image. you, gasping. you, bleeding. you, dying. your claws had retracted halfway, like your body no longer knew what it was supposed to defend. your breathing came in soft, irregular huffs—punctuated by the occasional involuntary purr. broken. pain-laced. involuntary.

you slept for days. rose once or twice to mumble nonsense, then slipped back under. you didn’t even stir when he tucked you closer to his chest in the middle of the night. didn’t twitch when he traced the shape of your face, the fragile dip of your collarbone, the pale scars that told stories he hadn’t yet heard. he should have returned you to your chamber. should have resumed some semblance of distance. but he couldn’t. he wouldn’t.

you’re still unconscious. slumped, barely breathing, small in a way that makes sukuna restless. you shouldn’t be. not with those claws. not with that tail. not with a mouth full of fangs made to rend and tear. but you are.

the weakest thing he’s ever seen. and still—you twitch. ears flick faintly against the pillow, a low tremor that betrays your instincts. even asleep, your body is listening. and it ignites something in him. some molten, primal thing that coils behind his ribs and burns slow. you’re different. fundamentally different. not cursed, not human. something else. his. and the moment he noticed that tail of yours curling around his wrist like it had always belonged there—that was it.

you don’t even know you're doing it. the slow, rhythmic way your tail wraps and releases, threads itself over his hand like it’s seeking something familiar. something grounding. some proof that you’re safe. he lets it happen for a while, unmoving, then closes his fist around it. tugs. just enough to see what you’ll do. your body shifts—soft, pliant—and your lips part in a soundless gasp. ah. so that’s how it is. he tugs again, slower. watches you respond in your sleep like some overbred little thing made for exactly this. not pain. not pleasure. just stimulation. and from him, no less. he clicks his tongue and mutters something cruel. it sounds like pity, but it's not.

your mouth twitches. he zeroes in. he presses his thumb past your lip. pushes down until he can see them—those fangs you hide in your pretty, pitiful mouth. sharp. evil looking. they glint, wet and wicked, like they were carved from bone and hunger. a predator’s teeth. what a fucking joke. because lying beneath him, all wrapped in bandages and soft little breathy sounds, you’re not even close. you’re not a predator. you’re not even prey. you're something below that. something tame. something his. he presses his thumb against one of the fangs, testing the point. lets the sharp edge break skin. watches blood bead red, then drip onto your chin. you don’t even flinch.

“pathetic,” he murmurs, voice so low it’s nearly a growl. but there’s no heat in it. just curiosity. wonder. possession. the kind of curiosity a god has for a new toy—a new worshipper. a new creature to mold. he wonders what kind of sounds you’ll make when you wake up in this state. what kind of instinct will rise in you first. will you snarl at him? snap your pretty teeth and act like they mean something?

when you finally woke, it was not gentle. you startled awake like you’d been pulled from a nightmare, eyes wide and wild, heart in your throat. and for the first time, he saw it—real fear. not the quiet, confused obedience you wore like perfume. not the polite tremble of a servant in the presence of something greater. fear. of death. of pain. of power. your ears flattened. your nails dug instinctively into the sheets. your body went small. smaller than usual. smaller than seemed possible.

your eyes found his first. through the haze. through the ache. through the gauzy film of almost-consciousness. “s-sukuna?” you breathed, voice raw, more breath than sound. you weren’t afraid of him. you were afraid, and you wanted him. the pride that coiled through him was dark and honeyed—shameful and selfish and sweet. he could taste it, thick at the back of his tongue. yes, he thought. yes. look at me. know me. need me. he didn’t speak. he didn’t ask. he simply pulled you forward.

you made a small, stunned noise—half-startled, half-relieved. but you didn’t fight. you never really did with him. your battered limbs went pliant, curling into his lap like they belonged there. like you’d done this a thousand times before, even if your body was just now remembering how. your tail flicked once, then wound itself loosely around your ankle like a tether. your ears twitched, searching, and then stilled—anchored by the sound of his heart, slow and thunderous beneath you. steady. unbothered. unmoving even in the face of your unraveling. you folded into his chest, the shape of you softened by the shape of him. back against his sternum, head cradled loosely against his shoulder. and suddenly, your bones didn’t ache so much. your breath didn’t hurt to draw. you didn’t resist. didn’t ask why. you were too tired for either.

he was holding you like something already his. “soft little thing,” he murmured into your hair. voice low. not mocking. almost reverent. one of his hands ghosted over your cheek in slow, idle circles. another followed the bend of your arm like he was reading your body like a script. his thumb grazed your ear—it flicked once, then stilled again. “so weak. so fragile.” the words should have cut. but they didn’t. he said them with awe. you trembled—not from cold, but from something worse. something better. exhaustion. confusion. that horrible, honeyed realization that this—this—was how he cared for you. not with kindness. not with tenderness. with possession.

“soft.” “weak.” “mine.” you try not to let it go to your head. you try not to let it settle under your skin. but his touch doesn’t help. the way his claws drag feather-light along your face like you’re breakable. precious. sacred. and despite everything—despite the wound, the fear, the exhaustion—your body reacts before you do.

a purr. soft. instinctive. embarrassing. it crawls from your throat uninvited, your tail twitching once, twice. you melt into him without meaning to. sink against him like you trust him. maybe…maybe you do. he hears it first. then he feels it.

the sound vibrates softly through your chest, and into his—the low, thrumming pulse of contentment radiating from where your body presses into his. and something shifts in him. no—ignites. possession, yes, but also something older. he feels it like a mark being branded under the skin. the tiny, pitiful sound you made has the audacity to claim him. he should be annoyed. disgusted. but instead, he wants more.

his arms tighten—barely, but noticeably. enough to make your purr deepen just a little. enough for the rumble to roll through him again. and that’s when it hits him: this isn’t just something you do. it’s something he draws out of you. something you don’t even try to hide anymore. this sound—this trembling, helpless little noise—it’s his. you’re his. and the thought, the proof of it, sends a ripple of satisfaction down his spine. it’s not lust. not really. it’s something crueler. holier. the way a dragon might guard its hoard. the way a god might watch a mortal kneel.

he still hasn’t said another word. he doesn’t need to. he simply holds you. letting your weight collapse into his with the kind of patience you’d never expect from him. one arm cradles you beneath the knees. another wraps gently behind your back. a third curls protectively around your middle. and the fourth? it stays loose, resting against your ribs like a shield. like a cage. like a comfort.

he shifts, just slightly. just enough to rock you. a slow rhythm. deliberate. soothing. disarming. you breathe in sync with it before you even realize. not quite asleep. not quite awake. suspended in that thick, golden place between consciousness and surrender. and still, he doesn’t speak. because for once, this says everything.

his kitten was too weak to be awake yet. he knew it. knew it in the slowness of your breath, the tremble in your lashes, the way your pulse fluttered—shallow and sluggish—against the palm resting on your ribs. your body ached for stillness. pleaded for peace. and sukuna, cruel though he was, wasn’t heartless. not with you. not like this.

you’d already fought hard. harder than your little body should’ve had to. just to wake. just to look at him. so he lulled you. soft circles down your spine—barely there. the backs of his knuckles trailed the length of your thigh like wind. his thumb dragged slow and rhythmic across your ribs, in perfect time with each shaky rise and fall of your chest. touches as light as whispers. he mapped your body by feel alone, studied it by texture and heat, each new detail committing itself to memory.

you were so delicate. so terribly soft. he hadn’t let himself touch you like this before. not fully. not openly. never without a layer of restraint between the urge and the act. it had been...dangerous.

but now? now you were in his arms. not dragged. not cornered. you chose it. you stayed. because you were tired. because, somewhere in that flickering little brain, you’d decided—against all logic and reason—that he could protect you. that you were safe with him. it hit him harder than he’d ever admit.

his eyes drifted—hungry, reverent. your ears were slack with exhaustion, folded like wilted petals, trembling slightly with every shift of air. velvet-soft and warm. he reached a hand—slowly, deliberately—and touched one between two fingers.

you purred. not a tentative, half-hearted noise. a full, rich sound that rolled out of your chest like silk. your lips parted slightly, shaped by instinct into something almost obscene—a moan that never came, replaced only by breath. soft and shivery. pleasure too primal to name. and sukuna felt that pleasure like it was his own. you nuzzled into his hand. hands—no, paws—curled into his chest with all the defenselessness of trust. no claws. no tension. just open hands. sleepy and willing and his. he did it again. stroked the base of your ear with his thumb. the sound you made nearly unraveled him. you liked that. too much.

your body said yes before your mind could. even limp and half-lost in fatigue, you responded. tail coiled tightly around his wrist, like you were anchoring him to you—or maybe the other way around. he didn’t know. didn’t care. he was already sunk too deep into it, caught in the pull of your small, instinctive needs and the way you looked at him like he was everything.

a low huff escaped his chest. amused. smug. dangerous. his mouth ghosted the crown of your head. “you’re going to regret letting me find that out.” but he didn’t stop. he kept petting. kept stroking. kept soothing. his hand moved in careful repetition, learning the shape of your calm, your comfort, your surrender. he held you through it like you were the most precious thing in the world—not breakable, but sacred.

and slowly, slowly, you melted. your breath evened. your tail slackened. your ears twitched once, twice—and then went still. your purring faded into something faint and low, the sleepy motor-hum of a creature loved too well, soothed too much.

sukuna didn’t speak again. he only watched you—quiet, calculating, in awe. not with desire. not even with victory. but with a fascination so complete it bordered on reverence. because it wasn’t beauty he was drawn to. it wasn’t charm. it was your nature. your instincts. the feral softness that surfaced only when you felt truly safe. the way you leaned into affection without hesitation. the way you gave in the moment you were touched with care. like a stray that had finally found home. his fingers tightened ever so slightly at your waist. mine, he thought, but not as possession—as truth.

—

things aren’t the same after that. his nature towards you shifts. pet has taken on a new meaning; no longer a thing he could call upon to please him, but a thing he called upon to please. but the care you receive from him is strange. twisted. you chalk it up to history—you’ve never known love, never known softness. only obedience. only pain. so when he bathes you, when he scrubs each inch of your skin with claw-tips and kisses the water down your spine, you don’t flinch. you don’t even question. you accept it. like you accept everything from your king. your tail flicks, ears tilted back—not in protest, just in overstimulation. his claws rake through your hair, and your shoulders twitch like a drowsy feline in the sun.

you told yourself it was still service. you were serving him by allowing it. by accepting the pet names, the possessive touches, the low, affectionate murmurs in the dark.

he wants to dress you? he does it. he wants to touch you? he does it. he wants you quiet? you go still. you curl in close, nuzzling his chest instinctively, like a housecat lulled into silence by warm hands. he wants you talking? you try. and he listens. really listens. not like others, who tolerated your words for sport, for cruelty. he hears you. stores it away. asks questions. laughs in that low, amused way of his, as if your memories are stories from another life—a shorter, sadder, simpler life. which they are.

he speaks more, now, too. more than he ever has. it’s never much, never loud. a comment here. a hum of agreement. you didn’t know what it meant to be cherished. but he was learning. and you, trained by gentleness the way strays are tamed by patience, find yourself purring. not aloud, not always—but with your body. the tilt of your head into his hand. the soft brush of your cheek against his shoulder. the flick of your tail when he praises you.

he made uraume cook for you. tried recipe after recipe until you gave the smallest nod of approval. made sure your blankets smelled of lavender. made sure your robes were clean and soft and worn thin at the sleeves, because you liked that texture. he watched you nap like a housecat sprawled across warm stone—limbs loose, mouth slightly parted. kissed your forehead sometimes, when no one was looking. fed you sweets with his fingers, and you took them daintily, eyes half-lidded, lips brushing his knuckles in a way that made his breath hitch. he laughed at your stories—your childhood, how pitiful and short it sounded compared to his centuries.

you told him about puppies you used to feed behind a shed. about a brother who sang lullabies. about a girl who once gave you a flower and then moved away. he listened. mocked you, gently. called you foolish. called you silly. but he listened. and then he pulled you back into his chest and murmured against your hair: “you were always meant to belong to someone stronger.” you rubbed your cheek against his shoulder when he said it. not because you agreed. but because you liked how his voice rumbled through you. liked the feel of your body curled into his like a cat returning to its chosen patch of sun.

you don’t know how to categorize this. what name to give the weight of his arms around you, or the way he murmurs good girl against the crown of your head when you drift off in his lap. the way he feeds you sweets with his fingers and watches the shape your mouth makes when you chew. how he never lets you lift a finger, even to pour tea. how your tasks have disappeared entirely. you curl your tail around his wrist without thinking. you knead your fingers into the fabric of his robes like a kitten into a blanket. he lets you.

you don’t do favors anymore. he does them for you. not out of love—no. that word is too small, too mortal. this is something else. this is ownership. this is a kind of calm only the monstrous are capable of. he watches your face when you drifted off to sleep—always in his arms, now, as though your body had been trained. it had. he’d done it himself. he had four arms, and he used them all. to hold. to trace. to remind you, physically, tangibly, that you belonged to something greater than yourself. that you weren’t yours anymore. sometimes, when you’re especially sleepy, you roll onto your back and offer your belly—not knowing what it means, but doing it all the same. he notices. he praises you for it.

his marks proved it. bite-marks at the nape of your neck. hickeys at the curve of your shoulder. the faint indent of his teeth where your throat met your collarbone. you never wore your hair down anymore. he liked seeing what he’d done, his good work.

you smell like him. sleep in robes scented by his soap, in blankets he ordered from the corners of the world for you. you sleep in his bed, now. you sleep in his lap, now. sometimes you barely make it five steps without being reeled back into his embrace like a wayward pet. and that’s all you are, really. a treasured, beloved pet. you’ve belonged before. to cruel men. to indifferent masters. to women who treated your body like a broom. you know servitude.

but this? this is something else. this is comfort. this is safety. this is something so warm it borders on sedation. he’s trained you to fall asleep in his arms. trained you to associate his touch with calm, his words with obedience, his scent with rest.

you sleep like a newborn. often. deeply. shamelessly. you sleep because he allows it. because he wants it. and you tell yourself that’s why it feels good—because it’s his will. but the truth is simpler. you feel safe. and it terrifies you. because this kind of care—it’s not gentle. it’s not soft. it’s consuming.

he says when you eat. when you sleep. when you speak, when you bathe, where you go, what you wear. and you obey. because you always thought love would be sweet. but this isn’t love. this is devouring. this is possession. this is being wanted by a god too old and too powerful to know the difference. and still—still you return to his arms like they’re home. still you fall asleep to the murmur of mine, mine, mine.

because there’s something about being claimed that feels a little like being kept.

and when he tires of the throne, of the temple, of the halls that reek of his own power, he carries you out into the gardens.

the air is warm. fragrant. the trees sway just so. there is no one here but the two of you—and even if there were, they wouldn’t dare breathe too loud.

he sits, legs spread lazily across the blanket laid out and you, his delicate little thing, settle into his lap like you’ve always belonged there. your head finds the bend of his calves, turned sideways slightly, exposed to him, vulnerable how he wanted you. your ears twitch once, adjusting to the breeze. your tail loops around his ankle. he watches it with pride.

you sigh. and sleep finds you in seconds. like it always does, in his presence. you sleep in the deep, mindless way that he has never known. like there’s nothing left to fear. like your body trusts the warmth around it, the hands smoothing lines beneath your eyes, the claw-tips tracing the curve of your mouth. you twitch slightly when he brushes your cheek. he soothes the motion with a scratch behind your ear—and you still. a low, rumbling breath escapes you.

he brushes his fingernails across your lips, again and again. light pressure at your temples. he watches how your body responds. how your mouth parts, just slightly. how your breath evens out. how you go stiller with every pass of his hand—like he’s lulling you deeper, guiding you into slumber. and he wonders—what if he could keep you like this? forever soft. forever weak to him. asleep in his arms, vulnerable to his touch, pliant and warm. not dead, no. he could never bear that. but docile. unthinking. his. one day, he thinks, one day I’ll get her there.

you already belong to him—every scar, every breath, every inch of skin bathed in his soap, clothed in his silks. you smell like him. you speak like him, sometimes. echoing his phrases. looking to him before anyone else. and yet it’s not enough. he wants more than ownership. he wants control. he doesn’t like it when you look at others. even when it’s nothing. even when it’s harmless. your devotion is the center of his universe. and he will not share it. not even with your memories.

his eyes close. not in sleep—he doesn’t sleep. never has. never needed to. but this is something close. meditative. indulgent. dangerous. he sinks into the quiet. into the lull of your breathing, into the weight of your sleeping body across his thighs. his fingers keep tracing you—under your chin, behind your ear, down your throat. just barely. your tail flicks. your ears twitch once, then relax again. safe. still.

you don’t stir. you never do. and he thinks, with something close to greed: mine. asleep or awake. forever.

—

you’d convinced yourself this was just another duty. another costume. another role to play in the grander machinery of someone else’s power.

you’d been many things in your life—servant, stray, shadow—but never someone’s kept thing. and so you told yourself, in those first weeks, that this too would pass. that even this—his warmth, his shelter, his overwhelming, doting control—was temporary.

but that was weeks ago. now you live in sukuna’s care. his ownership. his world. and you’re terrified. not of him, not really. not of his claws or his wrath or his sharpened teeth. no—what petrifies you is the care. the kindness. the quiet, awful gentleness that coats every inch of you like honey and silk and poison. sukuna has made a home for you in his arms, and it is warm and safe and utterly unbearable.

you curl when he nears you. not in fear, but reflexively, small as a kitten in a thunderstorm—knees tucked, spine curved, hands pressed between your thighs like paws tucked under your chest. it’s an animal’s instinct, not a woman’s. a sheltering in his shadow, not a retreat from it.

because he knows. he always knows. he can smell your fear like blood. and this fear is a flavor he hasn’t tasted in ages—sweet, sour, sinking. the fear of love. of peace. of goodness. he recognizes it instantly.

"what frightens you so?" he asks, voice soft enough to smother. he’s toying with you, but only a little. his smile is curved, cruel. his fingers brush your cheek, and you flinch, not because it hurts, but because it doesn’t.

your ears feel hot. your eyes shine too fast. you try to laugh—high and shaky, a broken little mewl in your throat—but you can’t. nothing comes out. I'm afraid this is real, and sometimes, I'm even more afraid that it isn’t. you’re afraid of what this means. of how permanent it feels. the way he doesn’t hurt you. the way he holds you when you sleep. the way he presses his lips to your spine without a single demand. you’re afraid he’ll leave. or worse, that he’ll stay. and you’ll forget who you were before him entirely. you don’t know what to do with love that doesn’t punish you.

you curl in his lap like a baby animal unsure of its place—your spine rounded, body shivering faintly, paws—no, hands—trembling against the fabric of his robes. you can’t look at him when he speaks. your chin dips down, head low like a docile creature awaiting command. and he watches you shrink back into yourself, sees the shift in your shoulders, the tremble in your breath.

you’ve started flinching again, jumping when he raises his hand too fast—even if it’s just to pet your hair. your body folds in on itself, even in his lap. especially in his lap. you sit there like an offering, too stiff, too afraid to enjoy it, and he hates that.

he’s never been a patient man. so when you begin to drift away—pulling back, eyes dulled with fear, walls crawling back up your spine like old parasites—he tightens his grip. literally. bruises bloom where his hands hold you. he marks you harder, more frequently, more possessively. he makes you watch it happen now, makes you look at him as he takes what he wants. if he must force the overthinking out of you, so be it.

but he doesn’t really want to hurt you. not you. he just wants you still. quiet. curled in his lap with soft breaths and slower thoughts. so he changes tactics.

you don’t get time to spiral anymore. no space to let fear take root. he overwhelms your senses constantly, leaves you no room to think. you wake in his arms. bathe in his presence. eat under his eyes. sleep under his breath.

you nest more, now. curling against cushions he’s placed for you. slipping into his robes when he’s not looking. dragging a blanket behind you with your teeth one night when your arms are too tired. you seek warmth like a kitten seeks milk—blindly, instinctively. always toward him.

his hands are always on you. unrelenting, never idle. brushing your hair behind your ear, dragging down your spine, curling around your waist. not demanding. just constant. just there. just his. and he knows you’re too tired to keep fighting. he can feel the way your body sighs when he touches you, how your tailbone goes weak, how your head tilts just enough for him to kiss your temple without resistance.

you want to stop thinking. want to go quiet, soft, still. you want him to do it for you. and that’s the part that thrills him most—not your fear, but your exhaustion. because exhaustion, to him, is surrender. and kittens like you always curl into the hand that feeds them.

he molds the fear like soft clay—presses it into something smooth, something tame. something his. it used to flare up in you, animal-wild and sharp, but he’s worn it down with quiet words and steady hands. now it curls like your tail when he strokes your spine—low and slow, thoughtless. your instincts respond before your mind does. eventually, the walls fall, not with a crash, but a sigh. they dissolve like fur in firelight.

you go blank when he speaks to you. that voice—low and rough, rumbling through his chest like a growl—settles in your bones. your ears twitch, and your breath stutters. he doesn’t even have to say anything meaningful. nonsense will do. soft, warm syllables, murmured into your hair like heat. and still your eyes flutter back, overwhelmed.

“you don’t need to think, kitten,” he purrs, palm cradling your jaw. “thinking’s for people who need to survive. you don’t. you’ve got me now.”

you mewl. you mewl. a high, pitiful sound, born from relief, not fear. it escapes before you can think to be ashamed. your tail coils, claws flex. it’s the kindest thing anyone’s ever said to you, and you melt under the weight of it.

he doesn’t ask to touch you. he doesn’t need to. your stillness is permission. your folded ears, your curled spine, your lack of escape. he reads your body better than you do. and you like it that way. you were pulling away once, all bristle and flight—but now you melt under his hand the way you're supposed to. loose and warm and needy.

you twitch when he pets you—shoulders jumping, eyes glassy. not because it hurts. because it doesn’t. because it’s too gentle. too much. his touch flattens you, turns your muscles to liquid. he grooms you without shame—smoothing your hair, scratching behind your ears, dragging claws lightly over the base of your tail. your breath hitches every time.

he won’t let the fear rot you. the second it flares—he catches it. scents it like prey-blood. and he drowns it. not with cruelty, but with affection. overwhelming, suffocating care. attention so constant it bleeds into control. he wraps around you like a nest. like instinct. and you forget how to run.

you make the smallest noises now—whines, chirps, soft gasps—and he listens like they’re music. like they were sung just for him. your tail trembles when he kisses the top of your head. your ears flatten when he whispers to you. and when he praises you—softly, cruelly, kindly—you can’t help but purr. low and broken and involuntary.

he floods your senses with himself. always touching, always talking, always near. you wake in his lap. eat under his gaze. fall asleep under his claws. his scent is on everything—your skin, your clothes, your nest. him, him, him. it’s the only truth your animal brain remembers. the only word that matters.

your fear doesn’t scare him. it amuses him. you think he’d let you go? think he’d lose you? don’t be ridiculous. he’s trained you too well to be his. you nod when he tells you to. smile when he orders it. sit still and mindless as he pets you, worships you, watches you like a god watches a chosen disciple.

you used to flinch. now you purr. you used to resist. now you rest. you used to think. now you don’t. he has what he wants: a kitten with soft eyes and an empty head, curled up and trembling not with fear, but with need. you were once a stray, all instinct and fear. but now? now you're a kept thing. you sit in his lap like a good little creature—docile, soft, dependent. made for him. you tremble, not from fear, but from need. need for his scent. his approval. his weight against yours.

if you thought he was overbearing before, you hadn’t even begun to understand what obsession looks like when it has claws. sukuna becomes the center of your world. not metaphorically—biologically. your hybrid senses recalibrate to him. his voice overrides your instincts. his scent calms your panic. he is not your captor. he is your alpha. your keeper. your environment. your gravity. and you stop fighting it. not even surrender now. just absence. of mind. of will. of past. you’re his creature. his kitten. his.

he keeps you close because you function better that way. and by "function," he means still, dumb, content. you’re not meant to think. he watches too closely for that. watches every little twitch in your brow, every hesitation in your breath. and if he senses the tight pull of a thought stringing together in your head? he cuts it. no questions. no mercy.

—

you spend hours in his baths. steam wraps around you like silk, curling through your hair, warming your lungs until breathing feels like sipping honeyed air. the heat should blister—but it doesn’t. it perfects you. because sukuna knows your body better than you do. knows exactly how high your temperature can go before you melt. and he likes to watch you melt.

your tail floats, weightless. limbs gone loose, ears twitching at every ripple in the water like they’re listening for him. always him. you lie between his legs—spine against his chest, body bracketed by muscle and magic and the heavy, patient rhythm of his breathing. all four hands roam. unhurried. knowing. claiming. there’s no escape. you wouldn't want one.

within minutes, your muscles relax into nothingness. purring escapes you without thought, deep and constant, like your body is singing him a secret. you’re so heavy. so warm. every inch of you reduced to sensation. and sukuna learns something. it’s not just touch that undoes you. it’s pattern. repetition. the way his thumbs press into your shoulders in time with your exhale, the way one hand circles your hip in sync with his own breath. the more consistent he is, the more your mind lets go. he maps it. memorizes it. because of course he does. of course he would. he doesn’t just know how to shut you down—he knows how to keep you there. quiet. floaty. obedient.

he washes your hair next. not gently. that word is too innocent for what he does. it’s slower than gentle. it’s ceremonial. possessive. one hand tilts your head back, another lathers your scalp, fingers spreading heat and foam through your roots. a third hand keeps you still. the fourth traces the line of your collarbone, like punctuation—mine. every stroke of his fingers is a vow. every rub at your scalp a whisper: stay here, stay mine.

your ears fold down. your head tips. you don’t mean to submit—but you do. you always do. his touch asks for nothing and takes everything. and you let it. you close your eyes and lose track of the room, of the hour, of your name. only his remains.

you make noises, sometimes. embarrassingly small ones. not pain. just the soft, stunned hums of being overwhelmed. overstimulated. overcared for. and he feeds on it. he murmurs against your temple, low enough to buzz in your bones. “my pretty little kitten… there’s not a thought left in that head, is there?” “look at you. good girl. good little thing…”

every word melts deeper than water. every syllable curls around your spine like smoke. his lips graze your skin with every phrase—never kissing, just brushing, branding you with his breath. and you arch. you arch, like something under spellwork, like your body needs to be closer even when you’re already inside his lap.

your tail coils around his thigh. you don’t realize you’ve done it. but he does. oh, he feels it.

the lazy, possessive loop of it—soft and slow and thoughtless, like your body made a decision your brain wasn’t fast enough to catch. like he’s the gravity now. the anchor. not the bathwater. not the heat. him. and something in him burns with it.

that’s the whole point, isn’t it? all of this—every finger, every whisper, every stroke of reverent cruelty—was leading to this. to you clinging. reaching. not to escape, but to stay. to hold on to him like a lifeline. like he’s your shelter. your instinct. your home.

his hand on your collarbone stills for half a second. the one in your hair tightens—just a little. as if to remind himself that yes, this is real. that you chose to wrap around him, with no command, no coaxing. just need.

a pulse of quiet satisfaction moves through him. not smug. not even proud. something deeper. something older. yes, he thinks, with a rumble so low it could be mistaken for the bath itself. that’s right.

one of his hands slides lower, slow and indulgent, tracing the curve of your waist. another brushes along your thigh where your tail curls, almost reverently, as if to pet the part of you that reached for him. “that’s it…” he breathes, lips grazing your temple. “good little thing. you know who you belong to.” and when he says mine this time, it isn’t a claim. it’s a confirmation. you’ve already proven it.

and when your breath stutters—just slightly—when your lashes flutter and your mind starts to slip, really slip, like the world is too far away to reach? he smiles.

then it’s his lap. always his lap. that’s where you belong. he tells you stories there—not because he expects you to remember, but because he likes the way you look when you listen. all wide eyes and parted lips. your cheek against his chest, your body curled like instinct, like it was shaped to fit the hollow of him. and it was. your ears twitch at his voice. your tail sways with his breathing. you’re nothing but animal in his hands—something soft and trusting and perfectly unaware. one hand cradles your nape. the others pet, stroke, explore. not sexually. not yet. like he’s fascinated. like he still can’t believe you let him have you.

sometimes you mewl. sometimes you drool. sometimes you fall asleep mid-sentence, lips against his throat.

he never stops talking. if anything, it spurs him on. and when he tilts your face up—doesn’t ask, just takes—you don’t resist. you blink once. twice. your eyes are glassy. blown wide. nothing left in them but worship.

he drinks it in. he studies the way your breathing shallows when he holds your face. the way your ears fold again, the way your lips part. he sees how close you are to dropping completely—how you keep dragging yourself just barely back to the edge of consciousness. but it won’t last. he knows it. you’ll fall.

you always do. you nuzzle into his throat. he rumbles. this—this—is what he wants. not your sharpness. not your fight. just this. the quiet. the calm. the total, helpless surrender.

you never sit anywhere else now. why would you? he likes the weight of you there—pliable, warm, easily moved. and you like being moved. being handled. as if your body belongs more to him than it ever did to you.

you eat only with him. never before, never after. uraume brings food, but sukuna feeds you. even when you’re capable of holding the chopsticks yourself, he insists. his hands are large but skilled, and he enjoys the helpless little sounds you make when he presses a bite to your lips. your ears wiggle with each offering. he doesn’t allow mess—any drop spilled is licked clean. every bit of food you consume is hand-selected, tasted by him first. he spoils you, in the most perverse way: not with freedom, but with control. and then, back to the bath. then, back to his lap. back to his bed. back to him. and still, he wants more.

he parades you sometimes, but only when you're exactly the way he likes you: glazed, slow, loose in his hold. your tail sways sluggishly, flicking at the hem of his robe. freshly marked by his lips with purple marks and the raw indentations of his teeth. he brings you to the shrine and sits you on his throne, right on his lap, his arms caging you in while his followers kneel. your eyes are barely open. your limbs dangle, more decoration than person. and he loves that. loves the weight of you on him, mindless and obsessive, too far gone to even feel the adoration cast your way.

the servants don’t know what to make of it. uraume stares sometimes, watching as he coos at you, brushes your hair from your face, whispers things that make your lashes flutter. you’re not embarrassed much these days. not capable of it anymore. sukuna’s presence strips the shame from you like everything else. all that’s left is domesticated gratitude.

some evenings, he takes you into the garden. just because he knows you like it. and though your eyes widen at the beauty of it, the wonder in your gaze fades quickly into that same blank contentment. your ears perk briefly, then relax. he wraps an arm around your waist to keep you upright as he tells stories of blood and conquest, voice deep and smooth and oddly soothing. you lean your head to the side and he kisses your neck without pause in his tale. and when your knees begin to buckle and your words begin to slur, he takes you to bed.

you don’t sleep in the traditional sense. you collapse. into him, into his arms, his robes, his scent. he arranges your body on his chest like a doll, arms tucked in, head nestled beneath his jaw. other times, he spoons you, all four limbs tangled with yours, chin hooked over your shoulder, breath slow and deep. he never sleeps. but he watches you like he might.

—

he keeps you close because it’s where you belong. not to move. not to speak. just be. and by that, he means quiet. folded. tucked. a presence, not a participant. he watches you constantly—watches for tension in your tail, twitching in your ears, any hint of thought behind your eyes. and when he senses it? he snuffs it out. no words. no questions. no chance. just a palm on your head, a whisper in your ear, and his scent wrapping around you like a cage made of silk. just you, in his arms, trembling with instinct, with submission, with peace. just his.

he fulfills the need your body’s always been aching to satisfy. you didn’t even realize it before him—that you were searching for an alpha. for someone to soothe the restless hum in your blood. someone to anchor the ache behind your claws, to settle the frantic flick of your tail. and sukuna may not be a hybrid himself, but your muddy little animal brain can’t tell the difference. not when he smells so good, not when that scent fills your lungs and coats your tongue and numbs your mind until the only thing you can feel is him.

sometimes, it’s too much. his presence—his dominance, his scent, his touch—hits you like heatstroke. exorbitant. invasive. paralyzing. you go still. limp. brainless. what you don’t realize is that it’s not entirely your cat-like senses that caused this. sukuna forces you into it. puts you on the ground, sitting before him, traces lines akin to the ink on his skin, on your face, whispers and coos until you’re sleepy and your thoughts are muddled. it’s not that he’s your alpha, because biologically he’s not. it’s because he owns you, and because he’s able to do this to you in a way no one and nothing else can. make you pliable and achy and soft. make you submit.

you sit there, trembling in his lap, eyes wide and unseeing, body limp from the sheer volume of him. the hybrid in you has never been this awake. never this synced, this tuned in. your ears twitch at every breath he takes. your tail curls around his wrist like a plea. your pupils dilate so wide they swallow the color whole. it’s instinctual. helpless. perfect.

he lets it happen. encourages it. sits you in front of him, keeps you close, watches the way you blink up at him with soft, unfocused eyes—your entire world condensed into his face, his scent, his breath. he doesn’t tease when you get like this, even weaker than usual, if that’s possible. he wouldn’t dare. why would he mock the one thing he loves most?

he praises you instead. murmurs little affirmations under his breath, so low you barely catch them. if he could purr, he would. just from the sight of you like this—pliable and purring, broken open by nothing but his presence. you're more feline than human now, and it thrills him.

he holds your jaw like it's fragile, precious, his. thumbs pressed to your lips, gently coaxing them open—like he's unfolding petals that bloom only for him. your eyes are glossy, brainless, already adrift in the thick fog of submission, and he adores that. he dips in further, thumbs rubbing slow and firm across your gums—not rough, not cruel, just enough to tease the fangs from hiding. they emerge slick and gleaming, painfully sensitive. too sharp for your soft little mouth, too pretty for anything but him.

and oh, he touches them like a believer touching relics. greedy. devout. devoted. drool slides around his thumbs, thick and warm, trailing down his knuckles. it should be degrading, but instead it feels like worship—your body helplessly offering whatever it can, aching to please. he watches it all, unmoved and unbothered, like this is exactly what you’re supposed to do. like you were made to slobber for him.

you blink, dazed, tears already gathering at the corners of your eyes—not from pain, not even shame, but from sheer, unbearable anticipation. you know what’s coming. you always do. he’s going to keep touching you like this, pressing and coaxing and playing until your body can’t take anymore, until you fall apart just from the feel of him. until the overstimulation reduces you to nothing but a trembling, dripping mess.

he leans in. presses a soft kiss—a kiss—to the first tear that slips down your cheek. “don’t be scared, pretty,” he murmurs, voice all velvet cruelty, mock-gentle, mean. “s’gonna feel good. doesn’t my pretty little kitty want to feel good?”

you keen at the sound of it, humiliated by how it makes your stomach twist, how it makes your hips twitch. his voice drawling and velvet-smooth, carries that same unbearable certainty it always does. like he already knows how easy it’ll be to ruin you. like he’s already done it.

and then he presses just a bit harder. spreads your jaw wider. pushes his thumbs deeper, rubbing that delicate patch of gum right where your nerves sing and fire. you drool harder. it drips down his wrist, patters into your lap. your eyes roll. fuck. your body loves this—loves being opened, being studied, being used for his fascination.

why does it feel so fucking good? why does he know exactly how to touch you like this? why does he insist on torturing you with it? you don’t have the answers. you never do. all you have are these sensations, these soft little tears and helpless noises. this humiliation. this pleasure. this alpha.

he watches you fall apart without even thrusting, without even fucking moving his hands away from your mouth, like he’s testing a theory, and you—sweet, stupid you—you prove it right every single time. your fangs pulse against his fingers. your throat arches for more. your body begs for it without a single word.

and then he goes deeper. his grip tightens, fingers spreading your jaw open wider, wider, until your mouth trembles with strain. a whimper escapes before you even know you’re making it. not pain—never pain, not when you're like this—but the pressure is immense. intimate. your jaw aches; your fangs throb. his fingers rub wet, deliberate circles into your gums like he's trying to open a lock, like he knows the exact way your body likes to be touched even when you don’t. and he does. of course he does.

your thighs clench. your tail flicks helplessly. your ears twitch with unbearable pleasure. it's humiliating—how wet your mouth is, how you can’t stop drooling for him, strings of it dangling off your chin, pooling in your lap. your legs are trembling. your skin’s hot. it’s too much. too much stimulation, too much attention. and he hasn’t even done anything. he hasn’t even started.

“look at these,” he murmurs, almost to himself. not to you—about you. like you’re not a person. like you’re a beautiful, twitching, stupid little thing he’s proud to own. “fangs sharp enough to kill, and yet all they do is drip.” his voice is heavy with satisfaction. thick with praise disguised as condescension. “what a useless little kitten you are.”

his hand trails down your throat, lingers over your fluttering pulse, thumb dragging slow along your jaw. your lips twitch around the intrusion of his fingers, still aching and full. and you feel it—not just in your mouth, but in your belly, your spine, everywhere.

“soft mouth,” he says, almost purring, “sharp teeth. made for me.”

you close your eyes. you never close your eyes around him while awake. but you do now, spent and surrendered, lost in the strange stimulation, the weird bliss of being inspected, exposed. you're a puddle in his lap, and he knows. he knows he's melted you down to the bone, stripped you of thought, of dignity, of pride. and you’ve never felt safer.

he presses down at the top of your fangs, thumbs dragging slow, deliberate circles against the sensitive ridges above them—those nerves alight with fire and want, a heat that blooms behind your eyes and burns down your spine. and it becomes too much.

your claws curl into his chest like you’re trying to anchor yourself to something—anything. nails scrabbling at his robes, desperate, clumsy, frantic. you can’t stop hiccuping and gasping, tears slipping hot down your cheeks now, not from pain—but from pleasure so dense your body can't hold it. it bubbles up, overflows, floods you.

you beg. it slips out as a stammer, a breathless gasp. “please—s’kuna, I c-can’t—” but you don’t really want him to stop. he knows that. I can’t take it, you think. but you want to. but you will. you want to survive it. he wants to break you open. so he doesn’t stop.

he kneads into the gums again, deeper this time, until your jaw trembles. you twitch in his lap, thighs jerking uselessly. your tail has long since gone slack, limp over his leg. you’re pawing at his chest with all the coordination of a kitten freshly born—too weak to fight, too desperate not to.

then, with infuriating care, he moves to your bottom fangs. they’re smaller. blunter. less carnal. less fun. but he gives them the same attention, the same obsessive devotion, because he knows you. knows your soft heart, your kitten mind—how you wilt if any part of you feels ignored. you moan—soft, pitiful—and your head rolls back away from him, but he always pulls you back, eyelids fluttering like you’re seconds from sleep, from unconsciousness, from death by bliss. because it’s not just stimulation. it’s suffocation. it’s sensory obliteration. you’re flooded. brainless. feral.

so when his fingers return to your top fangs—pressing, rubbing, slow and methodical—you unravel again. right there. in his lap. you can’t think. can’t breathe. you don’t even try. you’re high on him. not metaphorically. not romantically. clinically. the best drug in the world is four-armed and fanged and obsessed with your mouth. and oh, how he watches you. his head tilts. his tongue drags slowly along his bottom lip as he looks down at you—your mouth hung open helplessly, your thighs twitching, drool pooling over your chin like you’re melting.

“that’s it, kitty,” he mutters, not into your ear, but into the open air, voice soaked in satisfaction. “taking it all. so sweet. so good for me.”

he knows your phases like the shape of your throat beneath his palm. knows the moment the ache begins to throb—when something in you shifts and turns liquid, molten, desperate. when you go soft. clingy. needy in a way that is neither dramatic nor loud, but quiet and shivering and small. a phase where nothing satisfies except him. not sleep. not food. not the sun or wind or water. just him. his scent, his skin, his hold, his voice.

and he gives. oh, how he gives. not because you demand it—but because you can’t. not like this. not when you're reduced to a quiet, nuzzling thing mewling into his chest, all pride liquified into salt on your lashes. not when you rub against him helplessly, your fingers twitching and clawed, not attacking, just grasping. asking. begging. folding yourself smaller and smaller until you vanish into his arms, until there's nothing left but a pulse and a need he was born to answer.

he wraps around you, two arms engulfing, encasing, keeping. one hand cupped to the back of your head, guiding you to remain upright, so your neck doesn’t fall back uncomfortably. another hand rubbing small circles on your hip bone. the last two remain in your mouth—fingers curled over your tongue, still kneading those hypersensitive gums, lazy and slow and merciless. you writhe, twitch, melt all at once. the stimulation is unbearable. it’s perfection.

he watches you go—blinks down at you with that lazy, possessive awe, like he’s watching candlewax melt over an altar—slow, beautiful, irreversible. you’re still crying, still drooling, still trembling like your bones are sugar-glass and he’s already halfway through the shatter. he likes this. likes how you’re sagging now, not from fatigue but from surrender. you’ve abandoned yourself entirely. you’re not even there anymore—not really. your eyes are open, barely, but your mind has been turned to velvet and vapor. your world narrowed to the taste of his fingers, the sound of his voice.

"that’s it," he thinks. “that’s it, my little pet. gone for me. gone because of me.”

you make some weak little sound—between a sob and a purr. your claws catch on his robes again, tugging at him with the last dregs of your strength, as if being buried in his chest might erase you completely. and he’d let you. if you begged properly. he’d tuck you inside his body if that’s what it took to make you feel whole.

his fingers return to your upper fangs again from where they’d been pointlessly massaging your tongue, rubbing the raw nerve endings there like he’s playing you—some precious, pathetic instrument. your hips twitch violently. a hiccupped moan slips past the fingers in your mouth. he doesn’t stop. not even when your legs spasm or your eyes roll back, not even when you sag so hard against him he wonders if you’ve gone boneless entirely. good. better. you don’t need your body right now. you don’t need anything but this.

he keeps you there for hours. possibly days. time means nothing to him. but to you—sweet, heat-drunk, hollowed-out thing—it must feel like a dream. or a punishment. or both. you shift positions rarely—sometimes on your knees facing him, arms loose around his neck, head lolling against his collarbone. sometimes you curl up sideways in his lap, one cheek pressed to his thigh like it’s a pillow made just for you. most often, you stay upright only because he’s holding you there, molding you like clay, his grip steady, like he’s shaping something precious and fragile.

you’re pliant, melted. his kitten made of wax. and he sculpts you like art. brushes your gums until your fangs peek out and your mind slips further, then whispers things—dark and saccharine—into your temple while you’re too far gone to comprehend: “you’ll never leave.” “you’re mine now.” “you don’t need to think. I'll do it for you.” “you were made to be kept.”

you nod. sometimes. other times, you’re so soft and sunken into that kitty-brain you don’t even realize he’s speaking. but your body reacts anyway—a twitch of your ear, a tail flick, a breathless exhale like a purr. you’ve never felt this safe. this small. this far gone. warm, yes—but not like a blanket. more like being poured into something golden and thick. like being steeped. saturated. drenched in a calm you didn’t know you could feel. his hands keep you upright—two holding your jaw wide open, the other two anchoring your hips, like if he lets go for even a second, you’ll drift right out of your body. and maybe you would.

your head lolls. your mouth stays parted. his fingers never stop. they just rub and circle, caress and press, until you forget how to speak, how to sit up, how to be. you blink at him. barely. eyes drooping, wet and unfocused, pupils wide as moons. your gaze flickers across his face. his markings. his fangs. the thick muscle of his chest where your cheek often rests.

"don’t even remember your name, do you, kitten?"

and you don’t. not in any meaningful way. you know he has one for you—something carved into him, recited like a compulsion—more reflex than affection. your real name is a noise he makes with his tongue when he’s amused. your real name is kitty, kitten, good girl, mine. he says it like scripture. like a reminder. and every time he does, your spine curls into yourself and your pupils widen again and your throat trembles with a noise that can’t be classified as human.

you used to resent it. used to scowl when he cooed it into your hair, like he was playing with his food. now it just makes you feel safe. small. beloved. owned.

because that’s what he’s done to you. worn you down, hour by hour, kiss by kiss, stroke by stroke. not cruelly. not even forcefully. but thoroughly. entirely. lovingly. he’s stripped away every sharp edge, every human instinct. what remains is something simple. something soft. something his.

and when you finally do come to—hours later, days maybe—it hits like cold water. the shame is suffocating. the memories are sticky and embarrassing. you remember the drool. the broken noises you couldn’t stop making. the pawing. the fact that you forgot words for a while. the fact that you loved it.

but he never mocks. never scolds. never shames. he holds you tighter, kisses your temple, and says:"we’ll go even deeper next time, kitten." and you—shaking, humiliated, secretly aching—you nod. because you know he will. because you want him to. because no one else can peel you open like this. no one else can make you feel this soft. this stupid. this kept. no one else knows how to ruin you into nothing. and still treat you like you’re everything.

he leans in close, breath fanning over your cheeks, the bridge of your nose, your tongue that lolls slightly past your lips. "you feel that, little hybrid?" he asks, softly—like he’s coaxing a dream out of you. "nothing but me. no past. no future. no thoughts left in that stupid little brain."

you whine in response, high and desperate. it isn’t pain. it’s not even pleasure. it’s the vast, drowning heat of everything, all at once. the warm press of his scent in your nose. the weight of his hands on your face. the slow way he rubs circles into the pads of your fangs, like he’s tuning you to a lower frequency, one where nothing exists but this, him. and when you mewl again, voice cracking into a tiny sob, he smiles.

"there we go," he insists, and finally—finally—lets your mouth close. not all the way. just enough for your lips to cover his fingers, fangs still bared like a little predator trying so hard not to fall apart, fingers still rubbing at that soft spot just above them because he can tell you like it. he cups your cheek, strokes your temple, lets you sag into his palm like you were built for it. like you’re not a girl at all, just some beast born to kneel.

he slowly removes his fingers from your mouth, and your head drops forward like a marionette with its strings cut, jaw undone, lips parted, spit-webs catching the light as they stretch and break. the moment his touch leaves the inside of your mouth, it’s like the world loses structure—like you’re falling in slow motion through something formless. there’s a faint sense of relief, a break in the constant, unbearable flood of stimulation—but it’s hollow, unsatisfying. the absence of his fingers feels wrong, like something precious has been taken. like breath being stolen from your lungs.

but he doesn’t let you fall far. never does. he pulls you back instantly, with the surety of someone who owns not just your body, but your gravity. he lifts your face with one hand, palm slick with your drool, and his fingers spread across your jaw like a vice sculpted for bowing and praying. his other hand stays firm on your throat—not squeezing, not threatening, just present. just possessive. it grounds you, and if he weren’t holding you there—anchoring you with those thick, possessive fingers—you’d surely float off again. drift into some half-living stupor where all you know is him. and maybe that's exactly where he wants you.

he removes only one arm from your waist—only one, because even a whisper more distance and you’d dissolve into a flaccid sprawl, limbs too loose to hold form. he handles you like that. not gentle, not exactly, but measured. he knows your limits better than you do. he cups your jaw like you’re breakable, like you’re his. like you're made for this. his hand on your neck shifts slightly, not to choke—but to remind. remind you who holds you up, who made you like this, who controls the threshold between pleasure and madness.

and he knows—god, he knows—that if no one ever came to stop him, if the sun set and rose and set again without interruption, you would stay just like this. putty. pliant. lost. you’d waste away happy in his lap, drooling and moaning and twitching, your brain reduced to static and heat and surrender. he could keep you suspended in that sweet purgatory for eternity, and you would thank him for it with every slack-jawed sigh.

you’re already slipping back into it. whining softly, breath hitching, clinging with weak fingers to whatever part of him you can reach—his shoulder, his chest, the thick column of his wrist. your body is humming with need, low and constant like a fever. you don’t even realize how desperate you are for more until he denies you it. because he pauses.

his fingers had left your mouth and you mourned their loss, but you hadn’t stopped to wonder where that one free hand would go. what it would do. you were too far gone to think. too occupied with staying tethered to the sound of his breath, the warmth of his skin, the iron scent of him filling your lungs. he pulls you from the soft grass into his lap, legs crosses so you’re gazing up at him, little hands stilled fisted in his robes. you’re floating now, suspended somewhere soft and dangerous, and you’d be asleep if not for him.

you don’t even hear your own purring at this point. it pours from you like instinct, like prayer. his name isn’t on your lips, but he’s written into every sound you make. you vibrate with it, purring like you’re a creature born only to be touched by him, handled by him, kept by him.

and sukuna watches you with dark eyes, hungry and knowing. like he’s about to pull something apart—not with cruelty, but with precision. because you thought the worst was over. you thought you could rest now. but he knows better.

if there was anything worse than that overwhelming, mind-breaking pleasure of him playing with your pretty fangs—anything crueler, sweeter, more perfectly tuned to your weakness—it was this. this quiet, unassuming thing. this shift in his touch. this unbearable, maddening softness.

and sukuna knows it. he doesn’t rush. never does. he brings his fingers up with purpose, his movements so subtle you barely register them. you’re too far gone, too soft and pliant and dizzy, eyelids fluttering, lashes damp with unshed tears. your mind is nothing but blank static, floating somewhere above your body like fog. you don’t think anymore. not really. you just purr. and purr. and purr. the low, contented noise pours from your throat, a helpless, instinctual melody that speaks for you when language has long since left the building.

you're tethered to him, barely. not by logic or thought, not by restraint or reason—but by the weight of his hand still anchored at your throat and the gravity of his presence. he's everything. he's all. and then—you jolt.

your whole body seizes when he rolls your soft ear between his fingers—slow and purposeful, the way a butcher might admire the finest cut before slicing deep. he rubs, presses, kneads the delicate flesh between forefinger and thumb. it’s not rough. it’s not violent. it’s worse. tender, affectionate, precise. your back arches without permission, your legs trembling as fire threads through your spine. your skin goes tight with hypersensitivity. you're not just purring now—you're mewling, keening. sounds that don’t belong to you, not the you that used to exist before this. this version of you belongs entirely to him. to this.

if you were pawing at his chest before—mindless and needy, fingers weak and grabbing—you're clawing now. desperate. frantic. like the only way to survive the onslaught is to grip something real. and he is the only real thing in your world.

if he were a regular, pitiful man, maybe it would hurt. maybe he’d wince at your nails digging into his flesh, at the way you scrabble and twitch in his lap like you're trying to escape the pleasure itself. but sukuna doesn’t flinch. doesn’t even blink. your struggle is nothing to him. less than nothing.

and that’s what makes it worse. because you are struggling. against bliss. against the white-hot bolt of ecstasy he’s wringing from you with just two fingers on a soft, secret place. and he knows it. watches it unfold like a performance crafted just for him.

he likes it. loves it. delights in the way your breath catches, in the sharp little gasps that leave you too full to sob properly. you’re choking on the feeling—choking on the intensity of something so delicate. it’s obscene. it’s humiliating. and it’s not even close to over.

your ears were one of the few things you ever denied him. one of the few boundaries he hadn’t yet torn through with calloused fingers and honeyed menace. and maybe that’s why he’s savoring it now. rubbing that fragile skin like he’s trying to brand you from the inside out. your protests—once firm, then pleading—are forgotten. burned away by the way he touches you like this. and what it does to you…

you don't know why it feels the way it does. why this, of all things, unravels you like sinew pulled taut then sliced. his fingers are just flesh and bone, and your ears are just—just ears. but it doesn’t matter. your nerves sing. your bones hum. every part of you is set on fire. molten-hot pleasure courses down your spine, down your thighs, up your chest in spirals. you could scream. you want to scream. but all that comes out is a high, broken murmur and a deeper, darker purr.

if you were droopy before—soft-limbed and weeping, lulled into mindless bliss like a cat in the sun—you’re wide awake now. wide-eyed. feral. a live wire sparking against his palm. the second his other hand comes up to cradle your untouched ear, a helpless jolt runs through your spine, short-circuiting your limbs and gutting your brain like a fish. you go rigid. twitch. flinch away—but only barely, only as far as his hands allow you to go. and he doesn’t let you go far. no, no, no. he keeps you right there, anchored in his lap, locked down in his hold like the sweet little pet he knows you to be.

your eyes beg for mercy. they shine with salt and shame, locked to his—pleading, beseeching, trembling with desperate comprehension of what’s coming next. “aagghh, no no no no no no, n-no, no, n-no, please, y'can't—can't—can't—can't—” it’s not even a protest. it’s a mantra. a prayer. a helpless spill of breath meant to convince someone—anyone—that this isn’t happening.

aww, but you can, he thinks. and you will. you thought you couldn’t take his hands on your mouth. his thumbs dragging down your fangs, pressing into the sensitive spots just beneath your tongue. you said it was too much. but you did it. you took it so well. your little mouth opened for him, your throat opened for him. you purred and drooled and cried for him. you endured. and now?

now you’ll endure this too. you’ll take it. you'll drink it. every ounce of sweet, molten pleasure he pours into you. because you were meant for this. made for his hands. made to come undone under the weight of his touch. if you deny yourself the pleasure, he’ll just force it on you. and that’s fine. he likes that, too.

besides, you’re not really saying no. not that kind of no. not the one that means stop. not with your body singing for him. not with your thighs twitching, your hands clawing at his chest, your cries so sweet and wet they sound like moans in disguise. no, you don’t mean it. and even if you did—he knows better. he always knows better. better than you know yourself.

but this? this is horrific. exquisite. it’s something beyond the body, beyond thought. something primal and surreal. the worst thing you’ve ever felt. the best thing you’ve ever felt. the kind of stimulation that breaks reality open like a fruit rind. it’s not pain and it’s not bliss—it’s both, melted into something sticky and devastating and deep.

you don’t know why it feels like this. why your ears—your ears—of all things, make you feel like you're being spiritually dissected. it’s too much. too much. it’s pure euphoria, lightning-strike pleasure without the warning rumble of thunder.

sukuna doesn’t know either. doesn’t care. they’re just ears. just another part of your soft, sensitive little body. but no part of you reacts like this. no part of you gives like this. no part of you offers up screams and tears and silence and purring and drool in one horrifying, intoxicating cocktail like this one does.

his other hand—once steady on your waist—leaves its post. you sag immediately. you’re held up now by his grip on your jaw, his fingers at your throat, his fists at your ears. and with that second hand now rubbing, pinching, and soothing your other ear with the same maddening gentleness, you break.

you choke on a sob. gag on a cry that never fully forms. it clogs your throat and leaks from your nose. you’re a picture of devastation—noiseless, pitiful, beautifully ruined. your chest heaves, and with every breath you suck in more of him. his scent. his heat. his want.

drool spills from your mouth like honey. worse than before. slicker. constant. soaking both your chin and his hands, sticking to the ridges of his fingers like something obscene and holy all at once. you think you’re going to die. no—you know it. this must be the end. you’ve reached the edge of what your body can hold. you’ve passed the line.

"s’too much, s’too much, ah-ah," you hiccup, sobbing softly, voice wet and high and broken apart by the tremble in your throat, and to anyone but sukuna, it’s practically unintelligible. not loud. never loud. you’re too far gone to scream. too soft, too sweet, too spun-out. and sukuna—he just smiles.

no, he thinks. not too much. not nearly. this is perfect. this is just enough. exactly what you need. and sukuna is always good at knowing what his kitty needs. always good at giving her what she really wants, even if she can’t name it herself. even if she thinks she doesn’t want it. even if she begs for mercy through tears.

he thought you were far enough gone—deep enough in the floaty, dumb haze—that you wouldn’t be embarrassed by his touch here. that you’d given up all shame, all self-preservation. but no. you’re humiliated. shaking and sobbing in his lap like you’re being punished, not pleasured. you’re unraveling. a spool of yarn split open by touch alone. and he adores it.

the weight of his thumbs on your fangs? child's play. an amuse-bouche compared to the main course. because this—this gentle torture—sets fire to every inch of your body. your belly coils, your chest aches, your throat burns, your hands twitch. even your eyelids feel too sensitive, like they might spark just from blinking.

and then—something snaps. you don’t know what. some tether inside you. some inner coil, some defense mechanism. it breaks clean in half. your jaw trembles. your thighs twitch. you’re crying again, violently this time. heaving sobs that don't even make it out of your mouth. your whole body shakes like a leaf in a storm. and sukuna just tightens his grip.

he’s so proud. he’s relishing every second of it. sukuna drinks in every cry, every sob, every whispered plea for reprieve like it’s sacrament. your trembling is a gift. your tears are precious. he catalogues the pitch of every tremulous sound, the way your chest heaves in shallow little hiccups, the glaze that clouds your pupils. he watches like a collector discovering something priceless. untouchable. divine.

he tuts when you whisper that it’s too much, lips parting in mock disappointment. "tsk, tsk, my poor little thing," he murmurs—not cruelly, but fondly. as if your suffering is something sweet. something tender. and maybe, to him, it is. because nothing in the past thousand years has moved him like this.

he’s not quite himself right now—not king of curses, not the devourer of cities or slayer of gods. he’s something else. a creature whose entire world begins and ends in the twitch of your thighs, the collapse of your breath, the shameless, slurred sounds of your mouth as you soak him in spit. not quite monstrous. not quite man. something far more dangerous.

because he loves this. not idly. not passively. he lives for this. in all his centuries, he’s kept playthings before—pets, worshippers, willing sacrifices. but none like you. none who unravel quite like you do. none who make him feel high just from watching you fall apart. he’s keeping you forever.

you're heaving in his lap, reduced to nothing but gasps and liquid tremors. but his voice is soft. impossibly soft. a coo so gentle it doesn’t feel real. like silk being pulled slowly through your ears, too delicate for a beast like him. he's whispering things you’ll never remember—sweet little praises you can't even register through the roar in your skull. it doesn’t matter. the sound is enough. his hands never stop moving. one stays at your jaw, the other at your ear, but they loosen. barely. enough to keep you tethered. not enough to let you slip away. not yet.

he shushes you, slow and syrupy, thumb stroking where your jaw trembles beneath the weight of everything he's made you feel. the sound curls into your ears like velvet smoke, not so much heard as absorbed—it settles over your skin, heavy and warm, until your body can't tell the difference between his words and his touch. “so good,” he murmurs, like he’s in awe of you. “my sweet thing, my perfect girl, taking it so well…” his voice drips between your gasps, slips into the seams of your whimpers, but you’re not taking it well, not at all. you’re taking it because you don’t have a choice. “look at you…made for this. made to be held, touched, loved like this. like I do. only I do.”

he chirps, practically purrs his praise, and it sloshes around in your already melting head. your thoughts are pudding—wet, lukewarm, flavorless—and he keeps spooning in more. “such a good kitty…doing so good for me…my pretty little doll,” he hums, almost too sweet, like poisoned honey. his words, his tone, the scrape of his thumb, the twitch of his fingers around your neck—it’s too much. everything is too much. the pulse in your gums, the phantom touch still echoing in your ears, the soreness blooming at every point where he grips you—it’s everywhere, he’s everywhere.

you twitch again, a soft little jolt of your hips that you don’t even mean, and he tsks so gently it breaks you. “aww, baby…it’s okay, I’ve got you,” he coos, almost mockingly tender, like you’re some poor thing flailing in a storm you asked for. “keep taking it for me.”

but his reassurance burns. it’s supposed to ground you, but it cracks you wide open. the more he says you’re okay, the more you’re not. your limbs are limp but buzzing, your mouth hanging, releasing fractured noises, eyes overflowing without blinking. every cell in your body is overstimulated, electric. your skin can’t hold it all. your muscles shake under the demand to exist. and all the while, his voice keeps pressing into you, his touch unrelenting, his praise so gentle it’s cruel. you’re unraveling in his lap, a livewire sparking and fizzling out in real time, and he’s just there—petting you through it, coaxing you further down into that empty, pulsing bliss.

you can’t look. you can’t do anything. he tsks again when you shudder, clicking his tongue against his teeth like it pains him to see you like this—but not enough to stop. “s’alright, baby. it’s all okay. you’re okay. you’ll be okay. alpha’s got you.”

and it’s that word. that word—"doing so well for your alpha."—it cuts through the fog like a lightning strike, and your whole body convulses.

he might as well have slapped you across the face. dumped you in cold water. split your soul open. the word roots in your chest like a brand, like something primal. something deep. your mouth falls open. your head jerks. you nod—desperate and involuntary—like it’s all you can do to exist under the weight of that command. and with that single movement, you overdo it. your brain short-circuits from the extra stimulation—the movement of your head, the pressure of his hands, the echo of alpha in your ribs. your pupils roll. your body flinches. you’re already overstimulated—but now? now you’re ruined. he says it just to see what it does to you.

he’s an evil, evil thing—and he knows exactly what that word will do. it’s not a slip, not an accident, not a term of endearment that rolls off his tongue without thought. no, he chooses it. slices it into the silence like a dagger honed for this exact purpose. he watches you freeze. watches your eyes dilate and your throat bob as if you’re trying to swallow down the tremor that overtakes you. the reaction is instant. explosive. everything in you shatters with a single syllable and he loves it—lives for it. the chaos, the collapse. the power. the way your body obeys before your brain even catches up. he murmurs alpha like a spell, like a weapon, like a divine right he’s always known he had, and now you know it too. and he grins. not sweetly. not kindly. no, sukuna grins with teeth, with malice, with triumph. he planned this. waited for it. for the perfect moment to deliver the killing blow—not to your body, but to your will. and it works. oh, how it works. you nod like a little doll, desperate and obedient, like it’s all you can do to survive the command. and he sees it—sees you drowning in it—and it makes something vile and victorious twist in his gut. his grip tightens, just slightly, a reward. he watches the tears spill faster, the breath hitch harder. you’re his now. fully, utterly his. the title fits him like a crown, and your submission fits you like a collar. he hums, pleased. not satisfied, no. never satisfied. but pleased. because now, you’ve heard him. now, there’s no going back.

sukuna drinks it up like liquid gold. lapfuls of you twitching, gasping, disoriented, begging incoherently for a mercy you don't understand. you’re trying to take it now. trying your best. his best girl. and you’re failing. but oh, you’re so good at failing. so beautiful in your collapse. if this is what it means to be good for alpha, you'll die trying. and die, you might. it's too much. it’s all too much. your limbs are jelly. your belly feels hot and sharp and empty all at once. your brain has stopped forming thoughts. you're dizzy—unmoored, unraveling. seconds from falling unconscious but clinging with some raw animal instinct to the warmth of him. you don't know anything. can't think. can't think. can't think. and still, he holds you. he won’t let you go. his grip stays firm—one hand on your jaw, one at your throat. not choking, no. never choking. just owning.

he holds you like that for minutes—long ones. eternal ones. a private collection of memories he’ll never, ever let fade. he’ll think about this daily. hourly. replay it in perfect detail until the end of time. you’re humiliated. you’re bawling. twitching. silent mostly, because your voice doesn’t work anymore. all you can do is mewl and tremble and soak him with your tears, your sweat, your drool. and he watches you—his perfect little thing—relishing every second of your ruin.

but when he finally relents, it's slow. his fingers soften, loosen their hold. he releases your ears by degrees, the way a storm slowly lets the light return. now it’s just soft, shallow pets. sweet nothings against tender skin. and then—not even that. the stimulation ceases. but your body doesn’t stop. you twitch with the aftershocks. tiny spasms that roll through your limbs like ripples from a stone dropped into water. every nerve still screams. your blood still thrums. you don’t even notice he’s stopped. not really. not consciously.

your eyes are full of tears—you can’t see. your mouth’s still open—you can’t speak. you’re gone. he’s stripped you bare. emptied you. filled you up again with nothing but touch and voice and unbearable pleasure. there’s no room left for you anymore. you're perfect. good. his. protected. drooling. droopy. and utterly gone. your body is just a vessel now. a shell made of nerve endings and alpha's words. and even if he stopped touching you forever—you know this is where you’d stay. right here. in his lap. home.

but eventually, the world intrudes. a servant knocks. uraume calls him for lunch. someone shifts too loudly down the hall. and just like that—you're pulled back from the edge. not far. never far. but enough. your ears flick. your pupils shrink. your eyes focus, just slightly. and he hates it.

he’s cursed out enough servants for it. snapped at them, snarled, driven them away for disturbing you. they don’t understand—they never will. this time with you is holy. and they’re ruining it. dragging you back into your thinking body, into your conscious skin.

he watches as you blink, disoriented, slowly reassembling yourself into something human. he doesn’t allow you to come all the way back. no. his fingers stay curled around your chin, anchoring you. his scent still clings to your clothes, your hair, your skin. his lap still cradles you.

and as soon as the world quiets again, he begins the process all over. soft voice. warm hands. steady scent. and the slow, inevitable unraveling of the kitten you try so hard to hide. you don’t stand a chance. not when you were made for this. not when he was made to find you. not when everything in your trembling, hybrid body screams mine back at him. and he agrees. you are.

except, not today. he’s so lucky. and you’re so not.

he almost laughs when he realizes it—how no one’s come. no cursed spirit clawing its way into his domain. no pestering brat barging in to drag you back to your senses. no pathetic interruptions or accidents or mercy. not today. the universe, it seems, knows better than to interrupt sukuna mid-devotion. because that’s what this is, to him. a ritual. a slow, precise act of gratification—you as the altar, he as the god. no blood required this time. only drool. only sobs. only the sound of you coming undone in his hands.

no one saves you. and if they tried? sukuna wouldn’t let them. this is his moment. his masterpiece. but the worst part, the most delicious part for him, is that he doesn’t even need to touch you anymore. he’s not pushing you now—not like before, not with that violent, unrelenting pressure. not forcing your body into pleasure so intense it burned through thought and reason. he’s not choking you, not pulling your hair, not overwhelming your mouth or your poor, overworked nerves. that part's over. for now.

and yet you float. weightless. thoughtless. untethered. you’re suspended in the aftermath, soft and hollowed out, your mind fogged and sweet and submissive. there's no anchor, no rope pulling you back. no reality clawing at your feet. he’s let go of your throat—so gentle now, isn’t he?—his fingers no longer curled around your neck like a collar. instead, both hands settle at your waist. not even gripping. just resting. but even in stillness, they own you.

he wipes the drool from your chin, lazily, like it's an afterthought. sneers at the mess. but there's no heat in it. only amusement. only victory. and when you don’t even blush—don’t twitch, don’t cry, don’t try to hide—he knows just how deep he’s taken you. you're not here anymore. not really. shame doesn’t exist where you are. nothing exists where you are, except for him.

sukuna. sukuna. sukuna. no—alpha. you don't think it. you don't even form the word. it lives in you now. in your bones. in the phantom ache in your jaw where his fingers had kept you open. in the soreness of your gums, where his thumbs had pressed down on your fangs like he was checking the sharpness of a weapon. in your ears—your poor, throbbing ears—that still twitch from the echo of his touch.

you feel him everywhere. he’s in your blood, buzzing beneath your skin. in your lungs, thick and hot, making it hard to breathe. in your muscles, which have long since gone slack. in your brain, which doesn’t work anymore—because what’s the point of thinking, when all that matters is him?

this is what he does to you. not just with hands, not just with words, but with presence. with patience. with power. he overwhelms you, saturates you, floods every corner of your body and mind until there’s nothing left but sensation. until the only thing you know is alpha. until even pleasure is just another way he cages you.

and you let him. no—you want him to. because here, in this empty, fog-soft, bone-deep submission…you're not scared. you're not confused. you don’t have to think or speak or move. you just float. and he watches. all the while, he watches.

he moves you slowly. not out of kindness. not out of mercy. but because he knows how fragile you are like this—pliable, yes, but more than that. delicate. breakable in a way that even he hesitates to push too far.

he tries not to jostle you, not to shake you from the docile haze he’s so expertly cultivated. you’re limp in his hands, a ragdoll carved from heat and obedience. and he likes you like this—loves you like this. not even resisting. not even thinking. the tension in your body is long gone, your limbs yielding to whatever positioning he decides. you’re putty molded in the hands of a god.

he could do anything to you now. anything. and you wouldn't stop him. not because you couldn’t—though that’s true. but because you wouldn’t want to. you’d beg for it. because he’s done more than dominate you—he’s emptied you, carved you out and filled you up with pure need. you’re swollen with it. aching for more. for him. for whatever cruel, sacred pleasure he decides to bestow on you next.

and he knows it. he sees the way your lashes flutter when he shifts beside you, the subtle way your body leans toward him without even realizing it. you want to be near him like a moth wants the flame—knowing it’ll burn you, knowing it hurts, but needing it anyway.

he lets you stare up at him for a while. because you need it. because right now, his presence is the only thing keeping your mind from shattering under its own softness. you’ve drifted far, so far, and he’s the only tether left—your alpha, your god, your gravity. and he knows better than to sever that tether. he’s never left you like this before, floating in that vulnerable, fog-heavy space. and truthfully? he doesn’t know what would happen if he did.

he worries it might break you. and though he'd love to see the exact shape of your fracture, he won’t test it. not yet. not when he’s worked so carefully to drag you this deep. not when you’re finally exactly where you belong—under him, beneath him, totally and utterly his.

so he stays. right there in front of you, crouched like a beast pretending to be a man. holding you upright with one arm wrapped around your waist, keeping your gaze where he wants it. and you look up at him like he hung the stars, like he built your very purpose into the shape of your body.

he grins. not kindly. never kindly. it’s the grin of something cruel, something triumphant. domineering and patronizing, so unbearably smug. he knows exactly what he’s done to you. and he’s proud of it. proud of the stupid little mess in his arms. proud of the dumb, brainless kitty he’s reduced you to. and oh, how you look it.

your ears droop now—no longer twitching from his relentless teasing, no longer perked with warning or want. they’ve fallen limp with exhaustion and surrender, folded back in quiet, boneless compliance. your tail lies heavy around his thigh, not swishing, not tense, just draped there like another part of you that’s finally given up. even your fangs, once bared in some poor mimicry of defiance, have retracted. there’s nothing sharp left in you. nothing but softness.

he lays you down like a possession—one that’s been used, thoroughly, purposefully. not discarded. not dismissed. just placed. like a weapon returned to its sheath. like a trophy. like something precious and ruined. your head settles on the muscle of his crossed calves, and the moment your body shifts, instinctively recoils from the motion, a sound leaks out of you—soft, cracked, helpless. it’s not even a whimper anymore. it’s a breach. something involuntary and quiet that only comes from the hollowed-out core of you that no longer knows how to protect itself.

he coos. of course he does. gentle mockery wrapped in velvet. a parody of comfort. a lullaby sung by something monstrous. his fingers stroke over your scalp, through the mess of your hair. he shushes you, murmuring that condescending little praise into your ear like he’s talking to a pet who doesn't know better. and you don’t. not now. you don’t know anything but him. not the floor beneath you, not your own weight, not your name. just him. your alpha.

he knows you better than you know yourself. he always knows. what you need. when to give it. how much to take. at first, you’d needed to be dragged down, slammed hard into the dark, empty headspace that lives beneath submission. he'd forced you there like a fist through silk. had scraped the resistance out of you with patience and precision, until you forgot how to fight.

and then? then he’d given you pleasure. searing, white-hot, overwhelming—stimulation so complete it felt like suffocation. he hadn’t touched you to tease. he hadn’t touched you to please. he touched you to break. to wipe you clean. to make sure your body remembered what your mind had already forgotten: that you don’t exist without him.

but now—now you’re shaking. now you’re burnt out, reduced to twitchy, raw-nerved nothingness. and like always, he knows. you need rest.

you’re barely breathing, little chest fluttering like a dying bird’s, your body still vibrating from aftershocks that haven’t finished burning out. he could keeping going, keeping up his ministrations on your ears…could keep going until you sobbed for real. but there’s no art in that.

he’s not done sculpting you. so instead, he soothes. strokes. he presses his fingers to your temples and rubs circles there, not to comfort you, but to control you. guides you into unconsciousness like he’s closing your cage for the night. he watches your eyelids dip, then touches them—closes them himself, as if you’re too useless to even sleep without him giving you permission.

his claws ghost over your lips. his favorite part of you, maybe. still sticky with the remnants of drool and surrender. they twitch under his touch. not in want. in memory. because they remember what he did to you. every part of you does. he maps your face next. slow, indulgent strokes over the softness of your jaw. your nose. your cheek. memorizing you again, like he didn’t already own every inch.

and finally, the sound. soft. deep. rumbling. purring. you’re not even awake for it. he’s worked you so thoroughly into submission that your body sings for him in your sleep. and he watches you. silently. unmoving. no longer man, no longer monster—just alpha. eyes burning, lips curled, gaze never once leaving the lovely, mindless thing passed out in his lap.

—

he knows they watch. the servants. the guards. uraume. even some of those pathetic, posturing followers who call themselves loyal but can barely keep their eyes down when you enter the room—dazed and slinking, with sukuna’s scent bleeding off your skin like a brand.

they watch, disturbed. but fascinated. terrified. but entranced. they don’t understand. they whisper about how you aren’t scared—how you don’t even flinch when the king of curses strokes a clawed hand down the back of your neck and murmurs into your ear like a lover. how you melt when he calls you good. how you purr.

because when he has you like this—low to the ground. tail twitching with overstimulation. ears folding inward, eyes glassy. too tired to speak, too wired to rest. needing. aching. desperate to be close to your alpha—you’re beautiful. ruined. dumb. his. and he loves it.

coos at you like you’re a good girl, and you exhale like you’ve been blessed. like his praise is sacred. like your entire world hinges on the curl of his tongue. and in a way—it does. it always has. you were made for this. for him.

you're fulfilling your purpose. not just as a hybrid. as his hybrid. his kitten. his pet.

they all watch. and they don't get it. but he does. sometimes he lets them stare—just long enough to make them sweat. just long enough for them to witness how utterly undone you become for him. how you curl at his feet, breath shallow, hips shifting with every low syllable he whispers. how you can barely eat when he’s beside you because the weight of his gaze devours you faster than the food. and when they watch for too long? he rips their eyes out. banishes them. kills them. sometimes both.

because no one—no one—should get to see you like this. this soft. this stupid. this ruined. this his.

he keeps you in that headspace for as long as your little body can manage. watches with ruthless patience as you mewl for him, whine when he so much as shifts away. and when he has to leave, even just to speak to someone across the room—you let out the saddest sound he’s ever heard. a low, keening plea that makes him return instantly. drags him right back to you like gravity. he never stays gone for long. he can’t.

you’re too sweet like this. too warm. too far gone. he’s not shy about it at all, says it to tease you or to anchor you, whereas, you are embarrassed of it. it’s instinctual, messy science, and you don’t want to let it overcome you, but sometimes, when you're especially floaty, you can’t deny it anymore and it slips out: "alpha…" not sukuna. not king. not kuna. just alpha. raw. real. instinctual.

your whole body locks up when you say it—ears pinned back, shame crackling through your skin. your voice trembles, even your tail tries to hide. the humiliation is unbearable. you didn’t mean to say it. it’s just…the word that lives in your bones now. he hears it. every time. and every time, he smirks. never scolds. never corrects. why would he? it’s the truth. and more importantly—it’s proof. proof that you’ve accepted your place. proof that the part of you that once resisted is dead.

and when you're purring too loud during dinner—when he drags a single finger down the column of your throat and you nearly choke on a moan in front of everyone—you try to bury your face, try to disappear. and he won’t let you. he growls, low and disapproving. presses two fingers beneath your chin and tilts your face up so you can look at him. so everyone can look at you.

"no hiding," he murmurs, voice silken steel. "show them how perfect you are for me." you shudder. he doesn’t want you thinking with your human brain. he doesn’t want logic. he wants instinct. need. obedience so deep it bypasses thought altogether. purrs instead of sentences. whines instead of questions. fangs bared not in anger—but in pleasure. in submission. he likes when you look at him like that. with pupils blown wide. with your breath caught. with trembling submission. with awe. like he's your world. your alpha. your god.

he wants to see it more. demands it. forces it. even in front of others—especially in front of others. because it’s harder for you that way. which means it’s purer. and when you do it—when you manage to obey even through the trembling, even through the embarrassment—he rewards you. his voice goes low and sweet, whispering praise that turns your spine to jelly. his hand curls around your throat and he kisses your temple so softly you nearly cry. "that’s my girl," he purrs. "so good for your alpha."

you don’t just hear it—you absorb it. like heat curling around your spine. like liquid slipping down your thighs. like his voice echoing straight into your bloodstream, coiling there, sweet and brutal and impossible to ignore. the word falls from his lips like it costs him nothing—because it doesn’t. but to you? it detonates. alpha.

you seize around it. blink once, then again, then forget how. it lodges itself in your body like instinct, like inheritance. like your soul just found something it had been waiting for.

your knees buckle. your mouth parts. your head tips back against his chest and you exhale like you’ve been saved. your body goes limp in stages—shoulders, wrists, jaw—until you're boneless and dependent, clinging to the fabric of his robes like it’s the only tether keeping you in this reality. and maybe it is. because this—this word, this claim, this suffocating, holy heat—is everything. it’s your air. your rhythm. your only language.

he watches it take you apart. knows what it does to you. that word means nothing to him in the traditional sense—he’s not a hybrid, not a pack leader. but he says it because you are. and because it makes you his. he purrs it sometimes now, deliberately, softly, as if dropping a match onto oil. just to see you shudder. to see your pupils blow wide, your tail go still, your legs twitch.

you’ve stopped trying to hide it. that part of you—the hybrid part, the one that wants, craves, submits—it’s no longer buried. it’s awake now. always alert to him. always begging. you don’t know how to contain it anymore. and you don’t want to.

he’s rewired you. ruined you. maybe you could’ve survived without him before. maybe. but not now. not after this. not after he’s taught your body the sound of his voice, the cadence of his touch, the safety of his scent. you’ve found your alpha. and you will never, ever be able to live without him again.

“look at you,” he breathes, brushing a thumb under your eye, catching the tears you didn’t realize were slipping free. “you were made for this.”

you mewl. a tiny, broken sound. your tail stutters and resumes its wagging, your fangs peek out, your ears twitch—not there, not really present anymore. he’s pulling you under. he knows it. you know it. and you don’t want him to stop. because he’s not just calling himself alpha. he’s become it. for you. for your body. for your needy, trembling hybrid soul.

he’s not a hybrid. but he’s yours. and when he uses that word, that title, in that voice, it doesn’t matter what kind of blood runs in his veins. your brain doesn’t know the difference. all your body knows is that your alpha is speaking. and you listen.

“every little instinct in you,” he whispers, guiding you back onto his lap, “wants me.” you nod, frantic. dazed. “wants to serve. to submit. to belong.” your breath catches, back arching to get closer to him, throat bared without realizing it, like the good kitty you are. “and you do. you belong to me. to your alpha.” and you break. right there.

everything inside you, every tension, every thread of resistance, snaps—too fragile to survive this level of gentleness, of precision. you sink into him like he’s gravity itself, like he’s the sun and you’re a flower turning toward him, stupid and starved. he holds you through it, arms firm but loving, petting you slow, soft, deep.

“you don’t need to think,” he murmurs, lips pressed to the top of your head. “not when I'm here. I'll do the thinking for both of us.” and god, that does something to you. the security. the comfort. the unbearable sweetness of not needing to fight anymore. not needing to run. not needing to figure it out.

he’s your alpha. he’s got it covered. and all you have to do is sit there, and look pretty, and purr.

so you do. you curl up in his lap, limp and blissed out, heart fluttering behind your ribs, every inch of you purring—body, soul, scent. he hums his approval, low and pleased. presses kisses to your cheek, your temple, the sensitive tips of your twitching ears. “that’s it,” he murmurs. “just like that. that’s my perfect little thing.”

you could die from how good it feels to be seen like this. loved like this. used like this. and when his hands begin to roam again, slow and praising, your tail curls up in contentment, your mouth relaxed and breathy, your mind blissfully blank. your alpha is pleased. you are perfect. and you don’t need anything else.

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callhercarlisle · 18 days ago

Text

nanami my pookie, my beloved, my bae, my lovergirl, my everything <3

someone to come home to | nanami kento ╰►for the first time in a long time, nanami had started to imagine a future. something domestic, something soft. you, in his kitchen. your socks on his floor. it wasn’t a dream he spoke aloud, but he felt it growing roots. it’s not that nanami can’t survive without you—he’s survived many things. it’s that everything is worse. food doesn’t taste right. his bed is cold. the silence is heavier. but when you stir, when you lean into his touch even in sleep, he knows: things can be good again. not easy. not painless. but better. and he will do whatever it takes to keep you here, with him, where life still makes sense. 13.8k words

a/n: about halfway through writing this, it dawned on me that there is genuinely no point to it...but one of the joys of writing is getting to force your selfships to dote on you, so that's exactly what I did hehehe hopefully you like it as much as I did :]

it hadn’t been a grand decision. there were no dramatics, no cinematic declarations, no final straw. just a morning like any other, a quiet sip of coffee in his overpriced penthouse, and a soft ache in his chest that had never quite gone away.

the corporate world was never meant to last. nanami had always known that. he wore the suits because they fit, not because he felt at home in them. the meetings blurred together, the deadlines grew stale, and even the money—once a seductive whisper—grew tired in his hand. he had clung to it for a while, hoping it could buy the life he wanted: breakfasts for two, slippers by the door, children’s laughter trailing through the halls like wind chimes. a wife with flour on her cheek and perfume on her wrists. nothing extravagant. just...quiet. love. stability. but the office lights were cold, and his apartment colder. the money sat untouched, meaningless without someone to spend it on. without someone to come home to. so he left.

he called gojo. begrudgingly. got reinstated. he didn’t tell anyone right away. there was no party, no “welcome back,” just the low hum of cursed energy pulsing through his fingertips again, like remembering a language you never truly forgot.

for a while, it helped. there was purpose in fighting. there was clarity in the blood and the bruises, in the moment a life was saved. sorcery was cruel, but honest. he had missed that. gojo and shoko took him out once a week—drinks, food, a movie if they could convince him. nanami went, mostly to humor them, partly because he was afraid of what he might do if he spent another evening alone. sometimes, he brought someone home. they never stayed. their perfume clung to his sheets longer than their presence ever did. it was transactional, fleeting, and each time he swore it would be the last. eventually, he stopped trying. the dates dried up. the hope did too.

he began teaching again. missions during the week, lectures on the weekends. ino became his apprentice—rough around the edges, eager, the kind of good-hearted idiot nanami begrudgingly admired. he didn’t say much. he wasn’t one for pep talks or hand-holding. but he showed up. he always showed up. when missions went south, when curses hit harder than expected, when ino needed backup—nanami was there. silent. steady.

for the first time in years, he felt useful. not just as a blade, but as a blueprint. gojo, naturally, took credit for this too. and then you arrived.

it was supposed to be ijichi giving you the tour. the man had a laminated itinerary and everything. but gojo, in all his loud, sunglasses-clad glory, intercepted halfway through and declared himself your “unofficial orientation guide.”

nanami had a list of things to do that day. a stack of mission reports to read, a student evaluation to file, a meeting with the kyoto branch. but he stopped. he stopped because he saw you. you weren’t extraordinary in a way that could be easily described. it wasn’t one thing. it was everything. the warm way you tilted your head when gojo spoke, eyes wide and curious. the color in your clothes—soft, rich tones that made the hallway seem less gray. the way you smiled, like it cost you nothing. you glowed, and nanami, long accustomed to shadows, stared longer than he should have.

later, in the teacher’s lounge—a place he rarely entered—you sat alone at the corner table, sipping tea and annotating what looked like lesson plans with pastel pens. he introduced himself. stiff. too formal. awkward, even. you smiled at him like he’d told a joke. he hadn't. “you’re nanami-san, right?” you said. “I've heard about you.” you sip your matcha.

“have you?” he asked, bracing for whatever disaster gojo had likely shared.

“all good things,” you said with a teasing grin. “though gojo says you wouldn’t know a good time if it bit you.” nanami didn’t respond. but your laugh stayed with him for hours after.

you were…bright. unapologetically so. you decorated your classroom within the first week—posters, cozy lighting, a snack drawer that gojo discovered immediately. you knew all the students’ names before your second monday. you asked megumi about his dogs, even though he never gave you more than a nod in response. you watched horror movies just to talk to yuuji about them, even though they made you cover your eyes half the time. you didn’t just teach. you cared.

nanami didn’t understand you. not at first. you were a capable sorcerer. strong. your cursed technique was subtle but deadly. yet you kept your distance. you only went on missions when asked, and even then, you preferred ones with low risk. gojo told him why, eventually. your entire family—gone. friends, colleagues, all eaten up by the same world you refused to let consume you. you had known loss. you had learned to live beside it. and still, you smiled.

nanami began to linger more. he’d bring you your exact matcha order from the shop down the street, even though he hated the place. pack an extra snack in his bento, just in case yours got eaten. offer to accompany you on missions you didn’t need help with. you didn’t notice. or pretended not to.

gojo teased him endlessly. whispered conspiratorially about “love blooming in the rubble of battle,” earning a tired glare each time. but nanami didn’t mind. because something in him had shifted. something old, buried beneath years of quiet despair, stirred again. he didn’t know it yet—not fully—but something had begun the moment he saw you. something soft. something permanent. it would take time. of course it would. nanami was patient. and you…you were still healing. but that first day, in the fluorescent glow of the teacher’s lounge, with tea in your hand and sunlight catching in your hair—nanami allowed himself the thought. maybe I won’t end up alone.

the life you and nanami built together was something like art. it was beautiful, you were beautiful. for fear of them becoming sorcerers, you may never have a big family, but that isn’t something nanami’s terribly concerned with. you love him and that is truly, genuinely all that matters.

nanami changes. he shifts. he’s never quite the same man he was when you met him—tired and alone, barely clinging to a sense of purpose. there’s a lightness to him now, subtle but perceptible, like steam rising from a fresh cup of tea. he starts accepting invitations to faculty dinners and weekend brunches with gojo and shoko, not because he enjoys the noise, but because it means he gets to walk in beside you, hand on the small of your back, watching people do double takes. is that nanami kento with a soft smile? yes. yes, it is.

he’s still himself—structured, composed, fiercely principled. but the edges of him are rounded now, sweetened with you. he compliments ino’s performance during missions more readily, even high-fived yuuji after a particularly clean exorcism. the memory haunted him for a week. gojo was insufferable about it, miming high-fives every time he walked into a room. but even that—gojo’s endless teasing—bothers him a little less than it used to. you’d kiss his cheek, hide your smile behind your hand, and he’d let it go.

everyone at jujutsu tech knows. they talk. the whole school’s in on it, really—the way nanami hovers in the doorway of your classroom like he’s forgotten how to leave, always showing up with a fresh cup of your favorite drink or a new book you mentioned once in passing. they know how he drives you to work, how you never seem to carry your own lunch, how your coffee somehow always arrives in your hand, still hot, without you ever having to ask. they see the way he brushes your hair from your face like he’s scared to disturb a masterpiece. how his eyes soften—really soften—when he looks at you.

and you, in your bright clothes and warm perfume, your always-full candy jar and open door—you adore him right back. you leave notes in his bento box, each one folded into a little origami shape. “remember today is takuma’s birthday. <3” or “come see me on your break—I miss your face.” he keeps them. every single one. he tucks them into his desk drawer and pretends not to read them during meetings.

he’s not particularly expressive, not publicly. but when he slides your heels off at the end of the day, kissing the slope of your ankle, pressing his forehead against your shin like he’s praying—that’s when you know. when he carries your exhaustion like it’s his to bear. when you come home with a fresh bruise and he can’t stop pacing the kitchen, can’t stop thinking about how close he came to losing you. that’s how you know. he worships you, yes. but he also worries. deeply. constantly. it’s love. big, dangerous, real love.

he hates when you come back from missions hurt. even small things—cuts on your knuckles, a limp in your walk—rattle him. he bandages your wounds himself, always. his fingers are deft, precise. he takes his time with it, methodical as ever. but his mouth is tight, his eyes a little too wide. you try to make jokes, to lighten the mood. he never laughs at first. but later, when you’re curled up on the couch and he’s got you tucked beneath his arm, when he’s kissed your temple and your shoulder and your wrist, he’ll whisper something like, “don’t scare me like that again, sweetheart.” and you’ll kiss him back and promise nothing, because you both know better.

you tell him once—offhandedly, a passing comment—that you’re worried about dying young. that you’ve lost too many people, that sometimes it feels like a curse in and of itself. he doesn’t respond right away. just looks at you with this quiet devastation in his eyes, like he wants to rewrite the world just to make sure it keeps you safe. that night, he holds you tighter than usual, arms wrapped around your middle, chin resting on your shoulder. he murmurs, “you won’t die before me. I won’t allow it.” and he means it.

sometimes, he wakes up in the middle of the night just to watch you sleep. you’re soft in sleep, peaceful in a way that hurts him a little. he touches your cheek with the back of his hand, marvels at how lucky he is to have found you—you, of all people. he kisses your forehead and thinks, this is what I was working for. this is what I was waiting for. this is it.

the other teachers notice the change in him. even ijichi, who’s too polite to comment, lets it slip once: “nanami seems…different. happier.” gojo, of course, never shuts up about it. claims full credit for your relationship, as if he didn’t find out about it from shoko, three months late, after walking in on you both sharing lunch in the faculty lounge like teenagers. he was offended that you hadn’t told him. said something like, “I'm the whole reason you two eve met, dammit, I should’ve officiated the first date!” you threw a paper cup at him. nanami looked like he wanted to crawl under the table and die.

still, gojo’s theatrics don’t matter. not really. not when nanami comes home and sees you curled up on the couch with a blanket around your shoulders. not when you wrap your arms around him like he’s the best part of your day. not when he gets to press his mouth to your pulse point and feel you exhale into his neck, like being with him is a kind of peace. and maybe it is. you made him soft, in all the best ways. and in turn, he gave you strength again. taught you to trust. to hope. to live in the present and not just the past.

some nights, after dinner, he’ll rest his head in your lap while you read aloud from whatever book you’re working through together. he closes his eyes and listens to your voice, calm and certain. your fingers card through his hair. he sighs like he’s found the meaning of life. other nights, he cooks. you sit at the kitchen counter and sip wine, kicking your feet like a kid, and he lectures you about knife safety like you haven’t survived two decades of cursed spirits and exorcisms. you smile at him and say, “yes, chef,” just to make him roll his eyes.

you joke that he’s a househusband in training. he tells you you’re not wrong. because the truth is—if he could, he’d retire tomorrow. trade missions and bloodshed for grocery lists and morning walks. he’d do it for you. only for you.

but for now, this is enough. coming home to you is enough. loving you, being loved by you—it’s more than he ever thought he’d have. he keeps waiting for the other shoe to drop, for the world to remember who he is and what he’s done. but every morning he wakes up and you’re still beside him, warm and real and breathing—and that’s how he knows he’s lucky.

it’s terrifying, how much he loves you. but it’s also the only thing in the world that’s ever made him feel truly, unquestionably awake, alive.

……

nanami had been having a good day. which, retrospectively, should’ve been the first warning. it had been one of those rare mornings when the light didn’t feel like an affront to his senses. the sun had slipped through the slats of the blinds in golden slivers, cutting across your sleeping form like god’s own paintbrush. you’d rolled into his side the moment he stirred, still half-asleep, mumbling something unintelligible before nuzzling under his chin like you always did when you didn’t want to get up. and he—stupid, stupid man—had thought this was the kind of peace that could last.

getting you to move in with him had been like negotiating a treaty with a foreign power. every reason you had not to do it came dressed in layers of self-deprecation: I don't want to be a burden; what if you get sick of me; I'm so messy you’ll hate it; you live too far from the subway—“absolutely not,” you’d muttered when he brought up driving you every day. “no way am I just going to let you chauffeur me around like I'm some high-maintenance—” he'd kissed you to shut you up. not for romance. out of frustration. out of please, for once, just let me love you the way you deserve.

and then finally—finally—one perfect day off had melted your resistance. a date that shouldn’t have been special but was: his favorite bakery, a long walk through the city just because you liked watching the people, making dinner together. you’d ended up sated and soft and nestled into him, legs draped across his lap, head buried into the crook of his neck, your fingers fiddling with the hem of his shirt like you always did when you were content. that was when he’d asked again, gentle but firm. offered you pictures of the life he wanted to build with you—coming home together, never sleeping alone, no more duffle bags stuffed with half your life and shoved into school cabinets. and you’d said yes. he had not cried, not jumped for joy, not had some big dramatic reaction, though something deep and vital had cracked open in his chest. happiness, unadulterated, unbridled happiness, the kind he was sure he’d never have, never deserve, never earn, and yet here it was, being offered up on a silver platter to him.

and now—now that life was slipping through his fingers like water. now you were in a hospital cot in the dim, fluorescent-humming basement of jujutsu tech. and nanami couldn’t breathe.

it started that morning. your name had come up during the debrief. a mission restructuring. your class with the students was reassigned—something about gojo being occupied, yaga pulling favors. you were to take a handful of students out instead. nanami had looked up sharply at that. you? on a mission with students? you barely went on missions.

you were backup. reinforcement. a historian of curses and spirits, not a frontliner. you always said there was nothing you could teach the kids in the field that gojo or nanami couldn’t teach better. but you didn’t argue, and that—that—was what left his stomach twisting. you never argued with authority, even when you should. you followed orders like it was a moral code, even if it put you in harm’s way.

and nanami hadn’t fought back. he hadn’t insisted. he had swallowed his concern like always, told himself you were capable—brilliant, even. smart enough not to make reckless decisions.

except when it came to the kids. you would never let a student get hurt. he knew—knew—without needing to be told, that you’d thrown yourself in front of yuuji when the curse blindsided him. you would have done it without hesitation, with no thought of consequence. when the call came, he was still on campus. sparring with ino. a routine day, going through the motions of a job he barely believed in anymore, until gojo appeared, white-faced and solemn. nanami had never seen gojo look like that. not even when haibara died.

he didn’t remember the sprint across campus. didn’t remember the doors he flung open or the hallways he tore through like a man possessed. just—you. there. unmoving. unhealed. pale in a way that you should never be. a sheet of gauze pressed to your side, already browning with blood. scrapes across your cheeks and temple. breathing—yes—but slow and fragile. all that light he used to complain about, the way it used to suffocate him in the best of way, that light—the sunlight in your laugh, the moonlight in your eyes, the firefly glow that clung to you like warmth—gone.

shoko’s voice was distant and cruel. “she’s been unconscious since she was extricated.” “…can’t seem to heal her…” “she’s stable for now, but—”

he didn’t hear the rest. just a buzzing roar behind his ears as his knees went numb and the world tilted sideways. this can’t happen. not to her. not to her. he didn’t speak. couldn’t. just stared. at your body. at your stillness. afraid to touch, afraid to even breathe wrong.

“she’ll stay here until we know if the curse’s residual effects wear off,” shoko said gently, dragging a metal chair to the side of the cot. “you should stay with her.” as if he had anywhere else to be.

he didn’t sit. not right away. he just stood there. rooted. staring at you like if he blinked you might disappear. and then he did sit. cold metal biting into him, grounding him in a way nothing else could. his eyes never left you. not for a second.

he didn’t know how much time passed before gojo came. he didn’t care.

gojo spoke softly, too softly, offering reassurances he had no right to give. said something about how shoko thought maybe you could go home soon. that your injuries weren’t that bad. nanami had heard enough. the growl came unbidden, low and rumbling from the back of his throat. “you can leave now, gojo.” to gojo’s credit, he didn’t argue. he just nodded, offered his help, and backed away.

once he was gone, nanami’s restraint shattered. he leaned forward, took your limp hand in both of his, and pressed your fingers to his lips like he was praying. and maybe he was.

his thumb brushed your cheek. so gently. just under the row of stitches shoko had placed hours ago. "I should have been there,” he whispered. "I should have told them no. I should have—god, I should have fought.” he was drowning. drowning in the “should haves.”

he should have noticed the debrief was off. should have told yaga he’d take the mission instead. should have followed his gut instead of silencing it. should have screamed when gojo dared to suggest your injuries weren’t bad. should have demanded more. but he hadn’t.

and now you were the one paying the price. he looked at you—your perfect face, marred by bruises and dried blood—and he hated himself. you’d been living with him for two weeks. together for half a year. six months of light and laughter and slow, soft love. and he’d let himself believe it was forever. now he could lose you.

nanami had always been composed. stoic. a man of logic. but there was nothing logical about love. there was nothing rational about watching the only good thing in your life bleed out on a cot. so he let himself fall. fell into the grief, into the guilt, into the ache. you cannot die. you cannot leave. you cannot give him heaven just to rip it away.

the tears came in slow, silent streams. he didn’t sob. he just wept, hands trembling around yours, as the weight of every choice he didn’t make crushed him. and still—still—he whispered to you. promises he couldn’t keep. deals with gods he didn’t believe in. I'll make it up to you. I swear, I'll take every mission. I'll train twice as hard. I'll do anything, just—come back to me. I'll never raise my voice. I'll never ask you for a thing you don’t want to give, I'll spend the rest of my life making sure you never hurt again. and then softer, desperate: “you can’t leave me.”

the hours blurred. shoko came back once to check on you. said the curse’s effects were resisting healing, but that it wasn’t worsening. that was the best she could do for now.

nanami didn’t sleep. he couldn’t. he just sat there. hand in yours. bent over your bedside like a man keeping vigil for a lost god. and when he couldn’t hold the silence anymore, he let himself dream.

dreamed of you in his kitchen, dancing barefoot to some ridiculous song. dreamed of you, pregnant—glowing and annoyed, swatting him with a dish towel. dreamed of you kissing his bruises, muttering about how he “had to stop bleeding on the good towels.” dreamed of quiet, ordinary days. coffee. laughter. your hand in his.

he’d spent so long convincing himself he didn’t need these things. that love was a distraction. a danger. but you had made it easy. you’d made it holy. he was never going back. not if you didn’t wake up.

and still—you didn’t stir. so he sat. a man made of grief and guilt and hope. waiting for the light to come back. waiting for you.

it’s during this particularly horrific bout of self-loathing that you come to.

the room is dark—dimly lit by the blue glow of machines and the faint, flickering overhead light that someone forgot to turn off. it’s sometime in the early morning, hours before the sun even considers rising. you feel…weightless and weighted at once. dizzy. the pain is everywhere, dull and throbbing, blooming like ink in water beneath your skin. your body is heavy with ache, but your mind is cottoned over with fog.

where are you? what happened? why does it hurt so fucking bad? you let out a breath trapped in your lungs, and even that small effort sets your ribs alight.

but then—he’s there.

your eyes, fluttering sluggishly open, land on a figure beside you, a familiar silhouette haloed in sterile light. he’s hunched over you in that horrible hospital chair—spine curved unnaturally, broad back too big for something so poorly made. he’s been there for hours. days, maybe. decades, in his mind.

kento. his name flutters in your chest before it can form on your lips. you try to call out to him, but your throat is raw, dry as paper. all you manage is a whisper of breath.

he’s not even looking at you. his head is bowed, forehead resting against your knuckles, hands wrapped tightly around yours like they’re the last real thing in the world. you’re struck by the way his whole frame seems suspended, like he’s carved from tension and silence and guilt. he’s not a religious man. you know this. but in this moment, you would swear he’s praying. to you. for you. with you.

you can’t speak, so you do the only thing you can: you move. just slightly. just enough. your fingers twitch and slowly, painstakingly, your free hand lifts and brushes into his hair. his whole body shudders. at first, he doesn’t move. then he leans—leans into your touch like it’s the first kindness he’s been allowed to feel in years. his breath catches. you watch, silent and still, as his eyes open and lift to you, disbelieving.

“you…you're awake,” he breathes, like a broken hymn. “you’re alive. you’re here.”

his voice cracks on the last word. he says it again, again, again, like if he doesn’t keep speaking it into the world it might not stay true. a chant. a plea. a sacred truth. you smile at him—slow and crooked, soft with pain—but it’s real. so real. you would tell him you love him if you thought the words could make it past the gravel in your throat.

instead, your thumb moves gently to the edge of his face, brushing the damp corner of his eye. you tut quietly at him, coaxing. he leans into the touch again, trembling, blinking furiously. you’ve never seen him cry. not really. not like this.

“don’t—” he chokes. “please don’t do that. don’t be kind to me right now.” your brow furrows faintly. his hands tighten on yours.

"I should’ve protected you,” he whispers. "I should’ve been there.” you shake your head—barely, but enough—and he moves instantly, almost frantically.

“does it hurt?” he asks. “I'll get shoko, i’ll—” but he doesn’t move. he can’t move. his body is rooted beside you, eyes glued to your face like the world might fall apart if he looked away.

you squeeze his hand. “it’s okay, kento,” you rasp. “I'm okay.” you’re not. not really. the pain laces your every breath. but the way his face shatters—utterly, visibly—at the sound of your voice? you’d say it a hundred more times just to undo the devastation in his eyes.

“don’t talk,” he pleads, fussing instantly, voice low and tight. “you’re not supposed to talk yet. your throat—your ribs—darling, please.” he moves quickly but gently, fixing your blankets with shaking hands, brushing your hair from your forehead, lips brushing against your temple. his tie is loosened, his shirt wrinkled, his eyes red-rimmed. you’ve never seen him like this. he looks utterly undone. fragile, like glasswork.

still, he moves like a man with purpose. a man remade by grief and given a second chance. “I'll be right back,” he says finally, reluctant, like the idea of leaving you is a foreign wound. “I'll get her. and some water.” he forces himself away, fingers trailing off your wrist like it pains him to let go.

out in the hall, megumi sits hunched in a chair, face in his hands. yuuji is curled awkwardly in the corner, asleep and snoring softly. nanami pauses.

he doesn’t blame them. but he doesn’t quite not blame them either. which is ridiculously irrational, and he knows that, he parades on and on about it, how he’s the responsible adult and how it’s his job to keep the students safe. that’s your job, too, but this situation is just so fucked up ,the wires are crossed in his mind, and he finds himself absurdly pissed off at anyone that isn’t you.

he clears his throat. megumi bolts upright, wide-eyed. “i-is she—? what can we do—?”

“go find shoko,” nanami says shortly. the boy obeys without hesitation, dragging a bleary yuuji along with him. nanami finds the water cooler, fills a flimsy plastic cup, and walks slowly back. each step aches. everything aches.

when he returns, you’re trying to sit up. his heart nearly stops. “stop,” he says immediately, rushing forward, placing a steadying hand on your chest. “you’ll tear your sutures. let me—just—lay back down, please. please.”

you obey him with a frown and a sigh, lips chapped, eyelids heavy. he raises the cup to your lips. but you brush your fingers against his instead. as if he isn’t already watching you like a dying star. as if he isn’t holding the weight of you in every breath.

“I'm alright, kento. really. you don’t need to fuss.” that smile again. gentle. kind. completely unearned, as far as he’s concerned. it shatters him like glass on tile. he closes his eyes. breathes once, slow and frayed.

you don’t need to fuss.

if only you knew. if only he could explain that he no longer understands how to exist without orienting his every breath around you. that his hands only know peace when they’re on you—soothing your fevered skin, brushing your hair from your face, holding you still and here and alive. that he would gladly make a life of this. of serving you. worshipping at the altar of your continued survival. but he says none of this. he can’t. it would overwhelm you, and worse—it might frighten you.

so instead, he reaches for simplicity. for gentleness. “let me,” he whispers. just that. “please.” your lashes flutter. the silence stretches. then, a tiny nod. and he presses the water to your lips.

shoko arrives a few minutes later. she’s clinical, calm. assesses your wounds with a precision honed by necessity. your injuries are serious, but not critical. you should be okay to go home sometime this week, pending tests. she offers nanami a cot. he doesn’t hesitate.

“I'm fine here.” she doesn’t argue. but you do.

“kento. you can’t sleep in that chair again.” he opens his mouth to protest, but you beat him to it. “please,” you whisper, voice hoarse. “just…hold me. just for a little while.” and that’s it. that one word. please. it crushes him.

“okay,” he breathes, almost tenderly. “okay.”

he climbs into the cot carefully, awkwardly. it’s too small, but he fits himself around you like you were made to be there. he holds you as delicately as possible, arms tucked around your fragile form. his tie brushes your collarbone. his hands shake.

you fall asleep like that. safe. sheltered. he doesn’t. he watches you for hours, memorizing the way your chest rises and falls. the little tremble in your lashes. the blood in your hair, where he won’t touch. the soft exhale against his collarbone. he wants to scream. to cry. to rage. to protect you in all the ways he failed to. but instead, he runs his fingers through your hair. presses kisses to your crown. whispers your name like a benediction.

this will never be okay. but you’re here. and that’s enough. for now.

……

he’s awake well before you are. the lights are dimmed now, not the piercing fluorescents from the first night, but softer—still institutional, still cruel in how they flatten every warm color into gray, but gentler than before. still, they make your skin look paler than it is. waxy, he thinks. too quiet. too still. he’s already adjusted the blanket three times by the time your fingers twitch faintly in your sleep. it’s your blanket—the pale blue one with worn edges, the one you drag over the two of you on the couch, toss across your lap when grading late into the night. you claim it smells like safety, like lavender and faint detergent, but nanami suspects it just smells like home. like you.

he sent gojo for it—reluctantly, because trusting gojo with tasks that required subtlety was usually a mistake. but miraculously, gojo had returned with the blanket, one of your pillows, and—unprompted—a change of clothes for nanami himself. slacks, a soft sweater. even socks that matched.

nanami hadn’t thanked him. hadn’t said much of anything, really. just took the items with a quiet nod and disappeared into the staff bathroom to change, where the man in the mirror looked like someone else entirely.

he sits now, hunched awkwardly in that cold metal chair, the blanket tucked up to your chin. he checks your iv. again. and again. then your temperature, his hand on your forehead as though his own skin could tell him something the machines couldn’t. then your pulse, two fingers against your wrist, breath catching in his throat each time he feels the gentle thump beneath your skin. still there. still beating. still with him.

you make a soft sound in your sleep—half a whimper, half a sigh—and he’s immediately on his feet. “sweetheart,” he breathes, crouching beside the cot. “is it the pain? are you awake?” you aren’t. or maybe you are, but the drugs make it impossible to tell. your brow furrows. your lips part. but no words come.

he presses the back of his hand to your cheek. warm. too warm? he stands again, checks the drip. still flowing. still steady. he makes a note in the small spiral-bound notebook shoko left by the bed. she told him it wasn’t necessary. told him she’d be tracking your vitals. but he takes notes anyway. writes the time down every time he changes your iv, every time you so much as murmur. every breath you take feels like a gift he might forget to be grateful for.

if you were awake enough to speak, you’d probably tell him he was being ridiculous. dramatic, even. maybe you’d call him your mother hen. and when you were less loopy, less pain-stricken, he’d grumble about that. but secretly, he’d like it. secretly, he’d wear it like a badge of honor.

you shift again. a wince this time. a full-body tremor. and nanami’s fingers twitch helplessly at his sides. he’s becoming something else in these days—less man, more machine. more caregiver than combatant. he hasn’t thought about curses since the moment he saw you lying in that cot. hasn’t checked his phone. hasn’t gone outside. he doesn’t remember the last time he slept. or ate. or exhaled fully. his hair is a mess—no longer parted neatly, no longer combed back in that careful, corporate way. he’s raked his hands through it too many times. it clings damply to his temples now, sweat gathering at the nape of his neck. he hasn’t noticed. he doesn’t care.

the rings beneath his eyes are deepening, blooming into something almost bruised. his hands shake when he pours water into your cup, when he tries to spoon soup into your mouth. but he does it anyway. asks if you're alright every fifteen minutes. asks if you need shoko, though he never knows what for.

you tell him you’re fine. over and over. that he doesn’t need to hover, doesn’t need to worry. but the very suggestion makes him laugh—quietly, bitterly. not at you. never at you. just at the absurdity of the thought.

leave you?

you’d nearly died. you'd almost—he doesn’t finish the thought. because he had. he had left. had let you out of his sight. and when he’d found you again, the light was gone from your eyes, your body broken open like a thing discarded. he can’t let that happen again. he won’t. still, you try to reason with him. always so damn calm. even when you’re pale and shaking. even when you can barely lift your head.

“kento,” you rasp, “you need to rest. please. just for a little while.” he only strokes your hair back from your face. presses your knuckles to his lips and says nothing.

when you manage to talk him into sitting for longer than a moment, into actually sitting, into letting the stress coil itself out from his spine for even half an hour—he’s the man you remember. your kento. warm and quiet. attentive, dutiful. he feeds you slowly, spoons broth to your lips like it’s the most sacred ritual of his life. he helps you sip from the straw. he adjusts your pillow, your blankets. always touching you like you’re made of porcelain. like something fragile and irreplaceable. and when he finally sees you close your eyes, when you aren’t grimacing, when your breathing is even—he reads to you.

your book had been in your school bag. he doesn’t know what it is, doesn’t really care. he just opens to the bookmarked page and reads in that soft, even voice of his. and you listen. not to the words, not really. but to him. to the cadence. to the sound of him here. you ask for distractions when the pain is too much. you ask about high school, about gojo, about silly things. what his part-time jobs were like, if he ever failed a class, what music he listened to when he was your age. he always answers. always.

but when shoko walks in, or you make a soft sound of pain, he forgets mid-sentence. snaps upright. abandons the story to check your iv, your pulse, your temperature. always cycling through the same desperate checks, always one step from panic. you try not to show how much it hurts. you try not to wince. but you’re not a good liar. not with him.

……

the first visitors arrive the next morning. yuuji and megumi come in with their shoulders hunched and their eyes wide, like boys walking into a funeral. megumi holds a bouquet of grocery store flowers that looks like it’s been clenched in a death grip the entire way down the hall. yuuji fidgets with the hem of his hoodie, eyes darting from you to the floor and back again. neither of them says a word at first. just stands there, a little awkward, a little guilty, like they’re waiting to be scolded.

nanami stiffens in the chair beside you—protective, alert. he doesn’t say anything either, just watches them with careful eyes as you blink up from the bed, tired but curious.

“stop looking at me like that,” you joke, but they both immediately avert their gaze to another part of the room. you laugh with a wince. "I didn’t say you had to completely look away.” your voice is chastising and painfully kind, all at once.

yuuji flinches. “we almost let you—”

“don’t,” you cut him off, voice firmer now. “don’t you dare.”

his mouth opens again, some sweet, stupid apology on the tip of his tongue, but you hold up a hand—shaky, weak, but still commanding enough to silence him.

“this wasn’t your fault,” you say. “it was a bad mission. things went sideways. it happens.”

“but we—” megumi tries, probably to apologize.

“stop,” you say again, softer this time. “I'm okay.” you aren’t. not really. your body is aching and heavy and every breath feels like dragging yourself uphill, but you’re alive, and that has to count for something. and you won’t let them carry the guilt for something they couldn’t have stopped. they’re kids. brave and powerful, sure, but still learning. still vulnerable. you love them too much to let them carry this kind of weight.

they settle beside your bed eventually, yuuji on the floor, megumi in the stiff plastic chair in the corner. yuuji babbles about a new manga release, megumi interjects with his usual deadpan corrections, and for a moment, it feels normal. like any other afternoon at school. like you're not half-broken in a cot in the bowels of jujutsu tech.

nanami doesn’t say much, but he watches you. watches the way you soften when yuuji says something funny, the way your hand drifts toward megumi’s arm when he speaks. like you’re trying to remind him you’re still here. still real. they leave reluctantly, but only after you promise—three times—that you’ll be okay. nanami walks them out. thanks them. tells them it’s not their fault, though his voice is tight when he says it. he’s trying.

gojo shows up two hours later. he’s loud, of course. drops his sunglasses on your bedside table like he owns the place, immediately helps himself to the chair yuuji had used. he talks nonstop—about the mission he just got back from, about the girl he met last night, about a new limited-edition dessert he insists you have to try when you’re better. nanami scowls at him. visibly. but you laugh. not much, just a huff of air through your nose. but it’s something. you let gojo ramble, let him paint the room in noise and distraction. for a little while, you don’t have to think. don’t have to feel. it helps. more than you want to admit.

ijichi comes by later with a clipboard in hand, looking entirely too official, but his voice is gentle when he asks how you’re doing. you thank him with a small smile, and the blush that covers his face is laughable.

nobara and maki arrive together just before dinner. maki brings snacks—nothing healthy, all crunchy and salty and deeply frowned upon by any real medical professional. nobara pulls a nail polish kit from her bag and insists you need a color change, saying something about how healing faster is all about aesthetics. nanami sits quietly in the corner while they laugh, while nobara holds your wrist delicately in her hand and paints soft, even strokes of polish onto your nails.

he watches you the whole time. eyes heavy with something like awe. this, he thinks. this is who you are. this is who the world sees, who they love. you, bright and stubborn and brave. you, with paint on your fingers and gossip in your mouth. even in a hospital bed, even pale and stitched and hurting—your light is blinding, and somehow, that light has chosen him. he doesn’t understand it. never has. never will. but he feels it, deep in his chest. like something precious cupped between trembling hands.

nights are harder. the chatter dies. the hallways go still. the beeping machines fill the silence, and nanami can feel the weight settle again, heavy and thick in the space between heartbeats. you don’t sleep well. too much pain. too much nausea. but you try. and he won’t speak, not at night. not when he thinks your body needs rest. instead, he holds you—gently, reverently. like he’s afraid he’ll break you if he moves too quickly. his arms cradle you, his hand moves slowly up and down your back, or across your brow, soft and methodical.

every time you grimace, he shifts. sits up. checks your forehead, your pulse, your expression. murmurs little comforts into your hair. brushes strands away from your cheeks. you grumble that it’s not so bad. insist you’re okay. but your hands clench the sheets. your body flinches when the pain creeps in, and he sees it. he sees all of it.

you try to talk, one night. try to explain. “I'm really okay,” you whisper. “it was just a mission. they go bad sometimes. it’s not going to happen again, I—”

but he doesn’t let you finish. his hand finds yours, squeezes gently. and then he shushes you—softly, but with a finality that surprises you. that shakes you. he never interrupts. never. you can count on one hand the number of times he’s spoken over you. but he does now, because he can’t bear to hear it. can’t bear to let the words form. because he knows what you’ll say, and he can’t take it. not tonight. not like this.

because yes, maybe it was just a mission. maybe you are going to be okay. but he’s not. he’s still seeing you on that cot every time he blinks. still tasting the copper in the air. still hearing shoko say she couldn’t heal you, like the world was unraveling in real time. and if he lets you talk like it was nothing—if he lets you shrug it off like you always do—he’s going to break.

he wants to march to yaga right now. wants to demand you be benched indefinitely, wants to argue that he can protect you better if you never leave the apartment again. wants to keep you wrapped up in his sheets, feed you with his hands, watch over you until the end of time. but he knows you. he knows that kind of love would undo you.

you’re already skittish with affection. always have been. you flinch when it’s too much, not because you don’t want it, but because you don’t know how to carry it. because you’ve always lived like it could be taken away. so he swallows it down. all of it. every desperate, all-consuming plea to keep you tethered to him. every vow that he’d sacrifice everything just to make sure this never, ever happens again.

he just shakes his head instead. spoons another bite of soup toward your lips. says, “we’ll talk about it later. when you’re better.” and you hate it. hate how gentle he is. how good. you don’t know what to do with that kind of love. you’ve never been allowed to keep it. but he gives it anyway. over and over again. like he doesn’t know how to stop.

you hold his gaze for a long time after that. say nothing. just breathe. and then, because you don’t know what else to do, you go back to picking at the skin around your nails. he notices. of course he does. he doesn’t speak. doesn’t scold. just reaches out, warm and slow, and takes your hands in his. thumbs brushing over each knuckle, each tiny wound. his eyes fixed on your palms like they’re scripture.

and when he lifts your fingertips to his lips, presses a kiss there like a promise—you feel something in your chest give way.

……

“you need to go home,” you tell him one afternoon, voice hoarse but insistent.

it’s been a few days. three, maybe four—it’s hard to tell in the basement infirmary with its flickering lights and recycled air, the sterile scent of antiseptic clinging to your hair.

he doesn’t say anything, and you know that the silence is his answer, that he’s not going anywhere. a sigh pushes out of you as you sink back into the pillow. you’re exhausted. not just from your injuries, though they still throb with a vengeance, but from the sheer weight of his concern. the way he hovers. how he hasn’t left your side. not once. it’s sweet, it’s grounding, it’s everything you love about him—but it’s also starting to crush you.

“kento,” you murmur. "I need space.”

his shoulders jerk, just slightly, like the words sting more than they should. and they do. god, they do. because he knows what you mean. he does. you’re tired. you need a real bed, a real shower, a moment where someone isn’t watching your every move in fear that you’ll fall apart. and he knows, in the rational part of his brain, that giving you that space is necessary. healthy, even.

but still—it feels like a blade slipped beneath his ribs. he says nothing at first. just stands there, silent, hands flexing at his sides. he looks like he’s preparing for battle, though the only thing he’s fighting is his own instinct to keep you within arm’s reach for the rest of time.

you sigh again. softer this time. "I didn’t start dating you so you could be my personal nurse. you know that, right?” he does. but that doesn’t stop him from wanting to be.

you reach for his hand—his big, calloused hand that has held yours through so many quiet storms—and give it a squeeze. “just a few hours,” you say. “go home. change. breathe.” he doesn’t move. you groan. “please?”

he nods, eventually. relents in that quiet way he does, where he’s clearly still calculating every possible outcome in his head. he checks your IV drip again, frowns at the number even though he knows it's fine. he checks the fluid levels, reads the monitor three times. he asks shoko a half-dozen questions she doesn’t even blink at.

“are you sure she’s okay?”

shoko gives him a look. tired. unimpressed. “if she wasn’t, I'd say so.”

“but her temperature—”

“nanami.”

he shuts up. lets her finish. but not before you have to reassure him again. again. again. until your voice is dry and your throat hurts from repeating I'm fine and I love you and you need to take care of yourself, too.

he finally leaves. you should’ve timed it.

the drive is quiet. unsettlingly so. no radio, no traffic, not even the sound of his own thoughts, really. just a dull, buzzing pressure in his ears and the thudding of his heartbeat against the steering wheel.

he pulls into the parking garage like a ghost. unlocks the door without thinking. steps inside.

and that’s when it hits him. the silence. real silence—not the kind you learn to live with on solo missions, or in hotel rooms between red-eye flights. this is the kind that aches. the kind that used to feel familiar. comfortable, even. but now—now it just feels wrong.

he walks into the kitchen. everything is where you left it. your tea mug beside the sink, your sweater folded over the back of a chair, your shoes tucked haphazardly by the door. you’ve been here. you live here. but the apartment feels hollow without your voice bouncing off the walls, without your laughter slipping down the hallway. how did he ever live like this? how did he ever live without you?

he thinks back—tries to. and he can’t. not really. not in any meaningful way. there were years here, entire years he spent alone in this space, eating bland takeout in front of the television, sleeping in a bed that felt like a coffin. he was alive, sure. working. moving. but he wasn’t living.

you changed that. you came in with your books and your perfume and your endless capacity for love and you woke him up. and now that he’s tasted that life—with you in it—he doesn’t know how to exist any other way.

he showers. doesn’t remember turning the water on. scrubs his skin until it’s raw, trying to rinse off the smell of fear clinging to him like smoke. he eats something. probably. he finds a leftover container in the fridge, heats it up, eats it with a fork he forgot to wash first. it doesn’t matter. it doesn’t taste like anything.

and then, before he can stop himself—he’s grabbing his keys again. maybe an hour has passed. maybe. he doesn’t remember the drive back. doesn’t remember parking, or walking in, or passing ijichi on the way down. he just remembers the moment he sees you again. you’re still there. right where he left you. pale, bandaged, bruised—but smiling. and it guts him.

“there you are,” you whisper.

he crosses the room in three long strides, drops into that metal chair like it’s magnetic. his hands reach for yours on instinct, gathering them in his own, cradling them like something precious. his thumbs press over your pulse points—feel the steady beat.

you’re alive.

you smile at him, warm and soft and devastating, like you’ve been waiting for him all day. like it hadn’t only been an hour. like you’d missed him more than you knew what to do with. that smile—so familiar, so disarming—it nearly floors him. again.

nanami drops back into the metal chair like he never left it. like it had always been waiting for him. his body moves without thought, instinctively reaching for you, palms engulfing your hand with a kind of desperation that he tries—fails—to mask. his grip is careful but firm, a tremor running beneath his touch. his thumbs glide over your knuckles, back and forth, over and over again, like if he stops, you’ll fade away. you don’t tease him for it. you just squeeze back. reassuring. grounding. real.

shoko is across the room, calm as ever, flipping through the chart at the end of your cot. she’s unreadable, as usual, her brow furrowed in clinical concentration. nanami watches her with held breath. as if every movement of her pen might rewrite your fate.

“good news,” you say, voice light but steady. it carries in the sterile stillness of the room. “tell him, shoko.”

shoko glances up, eyes darting between the two of you. you, bruised but smiling; nanami, rigid and terrified.

“clean bill of health,” she says. “more or less. tomorrow afternoon, you can take her home.” there’s a beat. and then the sound that escapes nanami is closer to a laugh than a breath, except it’s dry and trembling and half-choked in his throat. the weight doesn’t fall off his shoulders—it shifts slightly. just slightly.

your smile widens. you look over at him like you're not covered in bruises and fatigue, like you're not stitched up and held together by borrowed time. and he wants to crumble. because you shouldn’t be the one smiling. he should be. he should be smiling for you, beaming, cheering, crying with joy—but all he can manage is to hold your hand a little tighter, like that’ll be enough to convey everything roaring inside him.

relief. guilt. love. so much love. he still doesn’t feel like enough.

rationally, nanami knows better. he knows he did everything he could. he knows this wasn’t his fault, that you’re a sorcerer just like he is, that danger comes with the job. he knows. but logic doesn’t live in the same place that love does, and right now, they aren’t even speaking.

he follows shoko into the hallway the second she closes the chart.

“is she really okay?” he asks, voice low. urgent. “completely stable?”

shoko exhales slowly, leaning her back against the wall. “she’s banged up. but stable. her vitals are consistent, scans look clean. no internal bleeding, no residual cursed energy.”

“but the side effects from the curse—”

“will pass,” she cuts in gently. “it’ll take time. but she’s on track. nanami, she’s going to be fine.”

he nods, barely. stares at a spot on the tile like it might blink back at him. but his hands are still shaking. and his chest still feels like it’s full of broken glass.

he doesn’t answer. just looks through the window, where you’re sitting upright now, sipping water slowly. when your eyes meet his, you tilt your head, confused by his absence. he nods once and steps back inside.

it’s later now. hours, maybe. the lights are dim, and the hallway is quiet. he’s sitting next to your cot again, more calm than before, watching you pick half-heartedly at your dinner, coaxing you into at least a few more bites. you humor him. he praises you like you’ve moved mountains. you sip water. he adjusts your blanket. he takes the empty cup from your hand and sets it on the side table, brushes your hair from your eyes. all small things. but they keep his hands busy. keep his panic at bay.

when you’re settled again, tucked and warm and vaguely annoyed by how tucked and warm you are, your hand starts to move. you don’t even realize you’re doing it. your fingers are pulling at the skin around your nails. little tugs, soft scratches. it’s old muscle memory. you’ve done it for years—since school, since grief, since the first time someone you loved didn’t come home. it’s a nervous tic. you’re not even in pain right now, not exactly. but your brain is louder than your body.

nanami notices instantly. he always does. he doesn’t say anything at first. just reaches for your hands and gently pulls them into his lap, turning them over, inspecting the little raw spots forming at your cuticles. he rubs his thumb over the worst of it.

“what’s wrong?” he asks quietly.

your throat tightens. because of course he knew. of course he always knows. you swallow. blink down at your hands in his. his grip is so warm. so steady. your hands look small there. like they couldn’t possibly do the damage they’ve done.

“kento,” you start, voice cracking a little. you don’t know where you’re going with it. you just have to say something. he waits. doesn’t rush you. never rushes you. "I don’t want it to be like this,” you say eventually, the words halting. "I know this was scary for you. but...we’re sorcerers. this isn’t new. it’s going to happen again. you can’t—” you don’t get to finish.

“no,” he says sharply. too sharply. his voice cuts through the room, firm and final. you freeze. eyes wide. he almost never interrupts you. he thinks it’s rude, always listens, always gives you space. but this—this he cannot let pass.

he leans forward, holding your hands tighter, anchoring you both. "I went so long without you,” he says, his voice low and steady but fraying at the edges. “you have no idea. I was sleepwalking through my life. until you. you woke me up. and I can’t—” he breaks off, jaw locking. "I cannot bear the thought of losing you.” your eyes sting.

he swallows, eyes flicking to your blanket, your bandages, your still-pale face. he knows he’s said too much. been too heavy. he’s trying to back off, to keep from collapsing under the weight of how he feels. but you’ve always made it hard to hide anything. “we can talk more about it,” he says, softer now. “eventually. but for now...please. just focus on healing. and let me take care of you.” you try not to look away. you try not to flinch at the devotion in his voice. it scares you sometimes, how much he cares. how much he’s willing to care. and he knows that. he always has.

he sees you flinch. sees your eyes dart to the side. your fingers twitch like they want to go back to their habit. so he tightens his hold. not too much. not too tight. just enough. his thumbs sweep over your palms, over every callus, every scar. he brings your hand to his lips and kisses your fingers. one by one. don’t you know? don’t you know that you hold his heart in your hands, too?

……

the drive home is quiet. not peaceful, not companionable—quiet in the way cemeteries are. dutifu. heavy. nanami’s hand is a vice on the steering wheel, the other resting gently over yours where it sits limply in your lap. your fingers twitch occasionally, the only thing reassuring him you’re still with him. he glances over every chance he gets. not subtly, either. it’s shameless, obsessive, each flick of his gaze a silent prayer—are you breathing? are you grimacing? are you okay?

you don’t say much. not because you’re mad, or tired—though you are both—but because you can feel the tension radiating off of him like a heatwave. his knuckles are white. his jaw tight. and if you opened your mouth now, you might say something cruel. something like, “kento, stop looking at me like I'm going to die.” so instead, you let the silence stretch. you watch the road. you count how many times he glances your way (eleven, just between the hospital parking lot and the first red light). it’s maddening and it’s sweet, and it makes your chest feel too full and too empty at the same time.

when he pulls into the parking garage and shuts off the engine, he doesn’t move right away. just sits there, staring out the windshield like it might offer him answers. you open your mouth to insist that you can walk. you’ve been walking around the hospital fine for a day now, albeit slowly. but before the words can form, he’s already out of the car, door slamming shut behind him with more force than necessary.

you don’t even get the chance to reach for the handle. your door opens, and there he is—silent, suit wrinkled, sleeves rolled, eyes tired in a way that makes your heart clench.

“don’t argue,” he murmurs, already slipping his arms beneath you, “please.” you sigh, weakly, but don’t protest. it’s not worth it. and if you’re being honest—you don’t mind the way he holds you. like you’re something precious. like the thought of putting you down physically hurts him. he lifts you with ease, cradling you against his chest like a bride in an old painting. his suit jacket falls open and brushes your cheek. you press your nose into the lapel. he still smells like the hospital, antiseptic and stress and coffee—but beneath it, there’s still him. always him.

inside, everything feels foreign and familiar at once. the apartment is exactly as you left it—books on the coffee table, your slippers by the couch, a mug in the sink—but it feels changed. heavier. like it held its breath while you were gone. he takes you straight to the bedroom. the sheets are fresh. your blanket—the one gojo retrieved—is folded neatly at the foot of the bed. your pillow is fluffed. the curtains are drawn to keep the light soft. of course it’s perfect. of course he’s thought of everything. he lays you down with the same gentleness one might use to place flowers at a grave. his hand lingers on your shoulder. he doesn’t say anything.

you shift slightly, trying to get comfortable. he straightens the blanket around you automatically. hovers. steps back. starts to turn toward the door. “kento,” you say softly, reaching out. your fingers curl around his forearm. “stay, please.” he stills. there’s a beat. then he nods. he sits beside you on the edge of the bed, hands folded in his lap, body tense like he’s holding himself together by sheer will. you slide your fingers from his forearm to his hand, tuck yours between his like it’s the easiest thing in the world. because it is.

you fall asleep like that—his fingers wrapped around yours, his eyes on your chest, watching every single rise and fall like they might stop at any moment. he doesn’t sleep that night either. he sits there long after your breathing evens out, long after your fingers go slack in his. he watches the way your mouth twitches in your dreams. the furrow in your brow. the half-healed wounds peeking from beneath your collar.

he can’t stop imagining what this room would feel like without you in it. what the sheets would look like untouched, your slippers unmoved. he imagines lying in this bed alone, staring at the ceiling, begging to remember the sound of your voice. and then he gets up—suddenly, quietly—and goes to the kitchen.

he returns a few minutes later with water, your medication, and a bowl of something bland and warm. he sets it all on the nightstand, then brushes your hair back from your forehead, fingers reverent, like he’s afraid to wake you and afraid not to. he stays like that until dawn.

……

the next few days blur together.

he becomes almost a robot. a caregiver. a sentinel. there’s a schedule written on the fridge in his neat, meticulous handwriting—your meds, your meals, your bathroom breaks. he sets alarms. he stocks the nightstand with tissues and hand lotion and that lip balm you always lose. he refuses to let you lift a finger. not for water, not for food, not even to change the channel on the tv. it’s…a little much.

he helps you bathe, too. insists on it, actually, even though you argue that you can do it yourself. and maybe you can—but when his warm hands are on your shoulders, gently helping you out of your clothes, his eyes trained firmly on the tile, you realize you don’t mind. not when he’s this careful. not when his voice is soft and steady, guiding you through it like a dance.

he dresses you in one of his shirts afterward—soft and worn, down to your thighs. it smells like him. he says it’s because it’s easier than your usual pajamas. but the way he looks at you afterward, like he’s trying not to cry or fall to his knees, tells you it’s more than that.

every morning, he wakes you gently for your medication. he tries not to stare at you all the time, though he’s not entirely aware of it. when you grimace at a bite or sigh that you’re not hungry, he doesn’t push. just tuts and says, “try a little more, sweetheart,” and somehow, you always do.

you walk together, eventually. slowly. carefully. once around the apartment, then down the hall, then down the block. you pass a stray cat sunbathing on the curb and you crouch to pet it, smiling as it nuzzles into your palm—only to wince, softly, as pain shoots through your side. nanami is at your side instantly.

“that’s enough,” he says, helping you up. “we’re going back.”

“kento,” you start to protest. he doesn’t answer. just walks you home in silence, one arm around your waist, the other carrying your dignity in both hands.

at night, you curl into his side while he finishes the chapter he’d started in the hospital. you fall asleep to the sound of his voice. peaceful. content.

one evening, nestled against his chest, you murmur, “you’re my favorite version of yourself like this.”

he pauses. “like what?”

“like this. here. home.”

he exhales slowly. presses a kiss to the top of your head. doesn’t say anything. but you feel his arms tighten around you.

you don’t talk about the mission until the fifth night. the light is low. dinner is finished. your stitches itch and your chest aches, and you find yourself staring at the ceiling, heart too full to hold it in anymore. "I went on a mission when I was a teenager,” you begin. “back in school. supposed to be routine. clean. easy. but of course it wasn’t. people died. people I knew. people I…loved.” nanami looks over at you. doesn’t interrupt. “my efforts didn’t matter. not the way I wanted them to. I started taking less missions after that. until I left altogether.”

you swallow, voice soft. "I came back because I wanted to make a difference. for the kids. not for…this.”

you don’t have to say it. he knows what you mean. he’s quiet for a long time. then, "I want to stop you from ever doing anything like that again.” your throat tightens. you’d worried it would come to this. “but I won’t ever hold you back from what you want.” his voice is steady. raw. “it just…seems like maybe this isn’t what you want.” you don’t respond. not right away. not with words. but you know he’s right.

from then on, his care softens. not in quality, but in intensity. he still wakes you gently for your meds. still stocks the fridge with things you like. but the worry that once bled from him like a wound is quieter now. steadier. he’s still yours. but more than that—he’s here. not a sword. not a shield. just a man. tired and healing. loving you in all the ways he knows how. and somehow, that’s enough.

……

after two weeks, you have to come back to the school to get your stitches removed. the smell of antiseptic burns at the back of your nose. nanami is at your side, of course, seated just slightly too close, his knee brushing yours every time he shifts. you can feel the nerves humming off him, like static. it’s almost funny, really. if you weren’t the one getting stitches removed from your stomach and shoulder, you might’ve teased him about it.

“you can sit back, kento,” you murmur, just loud enough for him to hear. “I'm not about to die in shoko’s office.”

he doesn’t look at you. just says, "I know,” like he’s trying to convince himself. his hands are folded in his lap, but you know the tension in them would snap bone if he wasn’t careful.

shoko walks in moments later, clipboard in hand, expression unreadable as always. she gives you a small nod, then glances at nanami. “you look like hell,” she says casually, flipping through her notes. "I thought she was the patient.” you stifle a laugh. nanami doesn’t respond.

“he’s taken to the nurse routine,” you say for him, smiling. “turns out, he’s a natural.”

“not surprised,” shoko replies. “he was the only one in our class who actually read the textbook. alright.”

the process is quick. methodical. shoko’s fingers are deft as she leans in, tweezers catching the first black thread. she doesn’t even warn you before she starts. it doesn’t hurt, not really. the healing has done its work, what little your body could manage. but you feel every motion, every gentle tug. and you feel nanami’s gaze even more—burning into your skin like a second pair of hands. he watches you like he’s memorizing the way you wince. like every flinch carves itself into his chest. you glance at him once, and it nearly knocks the breath from your lungs. he’s all sharp edges and furrowed brows, eyes wide and solemn and worshipful. like this is a religious experience. like watching you be sewn and unsewn is some kind of penance.

you shift your focus back to the ceiling. any longer and you might cry—not from pain, but from the sheer overwhelming weight of his love.

“this curse really did a number on you,” shoko mutters as she leans in to inspect the last row of stitches. “resistant to healing techniques. scarring’s pretty deep. can’t say I've seen many like it, but you’ll be fine.”

nanami exhales. not relief, not exactly. more like a breath he didn’t realize he was holding finally escaping against his will.

shoko steps back, tugging off her gloves. “you’re free to go. rest. move slow. hydrate. try not to fall down the stairs or anything.”

you shoot her a look. “you always make me feel so special.”

"I try.” you both smile.

as you pull your shirt carefully down over the bandaged scar on your shoulder, the door swings open. of course. it’s gojo, followed by megumi and yuuji—all crammed in the narrow hallway like a fanclub waiting to meet their idol.

“hey, you’re alive!” gojo beams. "I mean, obviously. but still. nice to see it with my own eyes.”

you raise a brow. “weren’t you the one who told nanami I'd be fine the whole time?”

“yeah, well, it was mostly for his sake.” he jerks a thumb toward where nanami stands, still silent, hands now clenched at his sides. “he looked like a ghost for two days straight.”

megumi steps forward, subdued but clearly relieved. “we were worried.”

“so worried,” yuuji adds, eyes wide. “like…actually scared.”

you wave a hand. “I'm fine now. all good.”

“when are you coming back?” yuuji asks, all hope and brightness and completely unaware of the way nanami’s whole body seems to still beside you. you pause. feel his breath catch. feel the world stutter.

you smile, smooth and sweet. charming. practiced. “I'm not sure yet. still resting. maybe soon.” soon. you don’t miss the way nanami’s fingers twitch. how he leans ever so slightly forward, like he might be sick. he doesn’t speak. doesn’t breathe. just…sits with that word festering inside of him.

you finish up the visit without issue, fielding more questions, deflecting gently, laughing when gojo starts a fake countdown for your triumphant return. but nanami doesn’t laugh. not once. not even a smile. he stands behind you like a ghost, one hand on the back of your chair, too quiet for someone who usually speaks volumes just by being present. on the way home, he doesn’t hold your hand. not because he doesn’t want to, but because it’s clenched tight around the steering wheel again.

……

he tries to give you space, now. or he thinks he does. it’s laughable, honestly. he still brings you every meal, still insists on fluffing your pillows and laying out your clothes, still stands just outside the bathroom when you shower in case you slip. but he doesn’t hover. not quite. he lets you wander into the kitchen on your own. lets you reheat your tea without intervening. lets you walk the hallway once without shadowing your every step.

you notice the difference. and you know it’s not because he trusts you to be fine. it’s because he’s afraid if he touches you too much, he’ll never be able to stop.

you try to be gentle about it. you appreciate his care—god, you do. but you don’t know how to sit in that kind of love for too long without it feeling like drowning. it’s too much. too deep. you’ve spent your whole life learning how to survive on scraps, and now this man is feeding you banquets of affection and expecting you to know how to digest it.

but still, you take the walks. short ones, under his strict supervision. your bruises have faded from deep violets and angry blacks to a pale, mottled green-yellow. they no longer hurt when you move. the pain that once seized your ribs with every breath is now a dull whisper, easily ignored. the scars remain, of course. thin and pale and permanent. but they don’t ache. not anymore.

you sit beside nanami on the couch one afternoon, feet tucked beneath you, sipping miso he made from scratch. he pretends not to watch you while you eat. pretends not to study your every expression, your every twitch. “I'm fine,” you tell him, softly. he nods. doesn’t answer. you didn’t expect him to. you wonder if he’ll ever believe you again.

……

things start slow. neither of you have the heart or the energy to rush back into the routine like nothing happened. it’s not avoidance, not really—it’s caution. like life suddenly became something delicate, something to be handled with care.

he goes back to work first. it’s inevitable. responsibility clings to him like a second skin, always has. he’s needed—by students, by colleagues, by the job itself. he can’t say no to duty, even if it leaves you tangled in the sheets he’s still warmed with his body. even if it feels like leaving you behind again.

ino asks about you almost immediately. nanami deflects, of course. the usual clipped answers. she’s recovering. resting. none of your concern. we’re not here to gossip. focus on your form. but after an hour of drills and corrections, he finds himself saying something about the way you tried to pet a stray cat last week, even though you winced the whole time. how you laughed when he scolded you. how you called him insufferable and kissed his nose. he tells ino that you’re tough. that you’re smart. he doesn’t say you’re the love of his life, but he might as well have.

you return to work eventually. gradually. not with any big announcement, no fanfare or dramatic entrance. just one morning, you’re there. in your classroom. a mug of tea in hand. your name on the whiteboard in that same messy script. students blinking at the sight of you like they’re not sure if it’s real. they swarm. megumi hides it better than the rest, but yuuji hugs you too tight. nobara demands to paint your nails again. even gojo claps obnoxiously, offers you a homemade coupon for one free dinner “with the sexiest teacher on campus,” which you promptly rip in half. everything, it seems, is exactly the same. but it’s not. and nanami feels it in his marrow.

you’re here, yes. smiling, teaching, living. but he knows the scar tissue you don’t talk about. he knows what your breath sounds like when it catches in your throat as you pass by the infirmary. he knows what your eyes do when you think no one’s watching. and maybe you’re better now. physically. outwardly. but in nanami’s mind, you never fully came back. or maybe he never did. he doesn’t know.

he drives you to work each morning, without fail. waits for you at the front with a thermos of your favorite drink. drives you home every afternoon, listening with something between fascination and devotion as you recount each tiny, ridiculous detail of your day. you once told him you spent fifteen minutes mediating a fight over who took the last strawberry milk in the vending machine, and he’d nodded like you were delivering a lecture on international politics. he needs to hear it all. it makes him feel close to you. tethered to you.

he files your paperwork. reorganizes your classroom supply closet. eats lunch with you in your office every single day, knees bumping under the table. you share a sandwich and he listens to you talk through lesson plans and theory debates and new teaching methods. you say you’re trying to find joy in the little things. he thinks you are joy, and that the little things are only worth anything because they happen with you.

in some ways, it feels like everything is back to normal. but nothing is meaningless now. not a single thing. not the way your pinkie hooks around his in the hallway. not the way he watches you sleep, even when you’re fine, even when he knows you’re okay. not the way his heart clenches when he hears your voice echo down the halls. this isn’t just a relationship anymore. it’s not a phase or a fling or a soft chapter in an otherwise gray book. he’s rooted here. deeply. permanently. and he knows you are, too.

it happens without announcement.

just a quiet meeting behind a closed door—yaga’s office in the early hours of a thursday. you go alone. come back the same way. say nothing.

you fold laundry. skim your book. eat a quiet lunch. you sit beside nanami on the couch like always, lean your head against his shoulder like always. he doesn’t ask. doesn’t need to. he senses the shift—feels it like a change in barometric pressure. the air around you feels...lighter. like something heavy’s been quietly set down.

he doesn’t push. just presses a kiss to the crown of your head and lets you rest.

it isn’t until three days later that he finds out.

he and gojo are leaving a joint training session—ino’s still wiping sweat off his brow, grumbling something about pushups being a war crime—when gojo hangs back, strides lazily at nanami’s side, mouth twisted into a thoughtful frown.

“so,” he says. “she really pulled herself from active duty?”

nanami stops mid-step. turns. “what?”

gojo blinks. “you didn’t know?” nanami stares. gojo raises his hands like he’s warding off a tantrum. “not gossiping. yaga mentioned it in passing. said she turned down a mission this week. asked to be removed from field ops altogether.”

the world slows. a long breath escapes nanami’s lungs, something tight in his chest unspooling so quickly it nearly hurts. the world rights itself, slightly, softly.

gojo keeps talking. "I mean, I get it—she’s good, but that last mission was...rough. thought maybe it was a temporary thing, but she signed the paperwork. she’s out.” nanami doesn’t respond right away. his heart is a strange, uneven thing in his chest. part disbelief, part awe. gojo watches him a second longer, then squints. “she’s okay? like—actually okay?”

“physically? yes.”

“and otherwise?”

nanami’s voice is steady. “she made a choice to protect herself. she’s okay.”

gojo nods, a little softer now. “then good. that’s good.”

and—for once—gojo doesn’t push further. doesn’t crack a joke. just walks a little quieter beside him the rest of the way back. he never asked you to quit. but he’s so glad you did.

that night, nanami gets home before you. he tidies a little, starts dinner. when you walk through the door—hair tousled, cheeks slightly pink from the cold—he doesn’t even hesitate. doesn’t say a word. he meets you halfway, wraps his arms around your waist, and buries his face against your stomach, kneeling there like he’s come home from battle.

you let out a breath of laughter, your hands sliding into his hair. “what’s this for?”

he doesn’t answer at first. just holds you like he’s still afraid to let go. then: “thank you.”

you hum softly, resting your cheek on top of his head. “for what?”

“for staying.” and it’s everything.

after that, the world moves a little softer. you’re still healing in ways neither of you can name, but at least now there’s no pretending that you’re not. there’s only space—made for you, held for you, by a man who would bend the universe if it meant keeping you safe.

each night, nanami pulls you into his arms and murmurs how much he loves you. how perfect you are. how grateful he is that you came back to him. that you stayed.

you used to flinch a little. shrink beneath it. you’re still not used to the weight of being loved like this—unconditionally, unapologetically, all-consuming. but something’s changed. you don’t squirm as much now. don’t duck your head or wave him off. instead, you touch his cheek. you kiss his temple. you whisper back, I love you, too.

nanami notices. of course he does. he always does. he notices how your shoulders don’t tense when he brushes his fingers down your spine. how your breath stays steady when he worships you with words, not just touch. how you let him love you like it’s a given, not a question.

your relationship is different now. deeper. messier. more real. the bubble popped the moment he saw you bloodied on that cot. the honeymoon phase shattered the moment he thought he might lose you.

and he doesn’t miss it. not really. because what you have now is built from something harder to break. something stronger than fantasy. love forged in fire, carried on broken backs and sleepless nights and whispered devotions in the dark.

he hates that it took something so terrible to get here, but he loves you now more than he ever thought possible. and you finally let him.

dividers by @cafekitsune

#jjk #jjk x reader #jjk x you #jjk comfort #jjk fluff #jjk hurt/comfort #nanami kento #nanami kento x reader #nanami kento x you #nanami kento fluff #nanami x reader #nanami x you #nanami fluff #nanami comfort #nanami hurt.comfort #nanami fic #nanami headcanons #nanami jjk #carlislecallsbullshit

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