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Sukuna isn’t there when he comes home.
The lights are turned on and the television has a commercial cutting to the evening news, but the moment Megumi walks over the threshold, he just…knows, somehow.
The apartment is empty, and Sukuna is gone.
He’s not sprawled on the couch.
(Long legs stretched out to take up all available space as he idly scrolls through the feed on his phone, barely glancing up or even saying so much as a word when Megumi gently shuts the door behind him. Calls out, as usual: I’m home. And yet, moth to flame, omega to Alpha, Megumi goes to Sukuna all the same. Gaze lowered as is only proper and head bowed so that Sukuna can reach up for him, pulling him down to scent - fingers gripping just shy of too tight around the base of his neck.
The heavy warmth of Sukuna’s hand holds him there. Holds him close, holds him steady, so that Sukuna can ghost his breath across raw skin before he lets Megumi go.
“Welcome back,” Sukuna says, and Megumi can finally lean in for a kiss.)
Not in the kitchen.
(Standing over the maple end-grain cutting board that Megumi had splurged on two, maybe three summers ago, a half-finished bottle of beer at his elbow and the wet sound of a bone being wrenched crudely out of its joint, cartilage yielding not long after under the cutting edge of Sukuna’s knife. Megumi thinks he can tell, by now, how it’ll be yet another lonely dinner tonight. Sukuna's clearly in no mood for company.
In that case, all he needs to do in the meantime is stay quiet and keep clear of the kitchen, right? One last glance at the tense line of Sukuna’s shoulders and Megumi swallows his thirst down, turning away to start his quiet retreat to the other end of the apartment so he won’t get in Sukuna’s way.
“Where are you going?” he hears Sukuna ask and Megumi pauses. Frozen in place.)
And not in the bedroom, either.
(Slipping into the cool sheets next to him, hair still damp and skin so warm from the long shower he’s just come out of. “Megumi,” Sukuna murmurs and Megumi had tried to stay awake, he really had. Not that it matters, now. He’s already being pulled out of a dream he barely remembers, body sleep-soft and pliant when Sukuna guides one hand to fit into the space between his legs. Lets Megumi feel the hard swell of his cock there before he ruts against Megumi’s waiting palm, Megumi trying his best to blink the tiredness from his eyes as he does.
It’s not going to be enough.
He knows this. Knows how Sukuna will want to use his mouth instead, soon, and oh, the old ache along the side of his jaw is starting to hurt again at the thought.
“You need to stop clenching it in your sleep,” Sukuna says later as he holds Megumi’s face still to thumb at the sudden wetness under his eyes. In return, Megumi can only swallow. Throat working. “It’s not good for you.”)
On-screen, the newscaster is speaking about the war, the weather. The rising cost of living and initial reports of a building burning on the edge of the city, all black smoke and flickering light. In the background, sirens wail behind the sound of someone reporting from the scene.
He’s going to regret turning the television off, but Megumi does it anyway. Moves as if underwater and finds himself standing in this newfound silence with only the increasingly ragged sound of his own breathing for company.
Has their apartment always felt like this?
Too big and too small, too full and too empty all at the same time?
Megumi holds his breath on the next inhale and tries to let it out, slow, slow. Steady and controlled, exactly like how Sukuna had taught him, one large hand urging calm down his back whenever Megumi used to wake up confused and afraid.
It’s not working today, though. It’s not working because Sukuna isn’t here to make it work, and with each passing moment, the terrifying, seemingly overwhelming feeling that’s suddenly taken root in his heart only grows a little bit more. Here it is now, holding the cavity of his chest open. Blooming like a thing with thorns, the sharp edges of it cutting deep as it presses up along the insides of his ribs.
Sukuna is gone and Megumi can’t say if the pain is from worry or fear or what just might be–
No.
Another breath.
Slow. Steady.
Sukuna will come home.
Are you coming home tonight?
Left dinner in the fridge if you are.
Love you.
Megumi can only sleep if it’s dark, so he leaves the table lamp on Sukuna’s side of the bed turned on late into the night. Angles himself towards where Sukuna’s body would usually be and closes his eyes as he listens, waiting.
Was that the door? Footsteps, maybe? No, it’s just their next door neighbours coming home, the sound of their laughter and easy conversation already on the verge of fading by the time Megumi opens his eyes.
It’s quiet again too quickly, Megumi’s eyes slipping back shut now that the unfamiliar silence has resettled.
He’s tired. The pills always make him so tired.
Despite Sukuna not being around to remind him, he’d still taken them anyway: Two white and one blue, right before bed every single night. The only difference is he's had to swallow them dry this time, because for all his remembering, Megumi had somehow managed to forget that Sukuna wouldn't be here with his usual glass of warm water. Waiting, so patient, for Megumi to finish it so he can press a kiss to the side of Megumi's head right after.
This is often the gentlest Sukuna ever is. Eyes gone softer. A smile on his handsome face, sometimes. The quiet domesticity of it always makes Megumi lean into the touch - chasing the connection, the roots of his teeth aching from the sheer yearning of it.
It’s just not the same without Sukuna here.
The routine is almost clinical, especially when he has to tuck himself in under the covers without the warmth of Sukuna’s palm cradling his cheek, his quiet murmurs of approval once he’s checked the blister packs. He does that, often. Megumi lets the memory of it fill the emptiest parts of him as he drifts, fighting sleep. Sukuna takes care of him even though he doesn’t need to. Doesn’t mind keeping track of how many doses Megumi has left, or putting in a new prescription on Megumi’s behalf.
It’s all quite sweet, really. An Alpha caring that much about the little things?
Megumi opens his eyes to watch the ceiling. The warm cream of it, bathed in light.
He can’t go to sleep yet.
Sukuna hasn’t come home.
And besides, he needs to show Sukuna that he’s almost out.
I’m going to work
Let me know if you want me to pick anything up on the way back, okay?
Love you.
The apartment is still too dark, far too quiet when Megumi returns from his shift. Nevertheless:
“I’m home,” Megumi calls out of habit.
It rises out of him, lifting into the air with something that might be construed as hope. That’s what this feeling is, right? The reason why his heart is beating that much faster than before?
Maybe Sukuna is smoking on the balcony with the door closed. Maybe he’s trying to sleep it off in the bedroom.
Megumi toes his shoes off in the genkan to the sound of his own words echoing back at him, hollow, and even though Sukuna rarely responds, an unhappy knot twists in his stomach at the thought that he’s speaking to an empty apartment.
He puts one foot in front of the other all the same. Walks deeper into the dark, carried by the knowing that everything is still exactly how he’d left it.
There, on the kitchen table in particular: the konbini receipt from yesterday afternoon hasn’t been touched or moved. It’s nothing more than a habit these days – Sukuna just wants to see where he’s been, having taken to teasing him about the recent hojicha addiction that he's developed – but now, it’s akin to casting the most obvious of lures.
From where he’s standing though, Megumi can already see that he’s come up empty handed. The receipt’s edges remain perfectly parallel to the table’s edge. The thin paper of it in the same, neat square that Megumi had folded it this morning, hiding the slightly extravagant ¥880 he’d spent for lunch.
Seeing it like this, the confirmation of Sukuna’s absence rushes up at him unexpectedly fast. Crashes into the unnamed thing that’s taken up temporary residence in Megumi’s gut and makes him ill from the contact, Megumi needing to brace an unsteady hand on the wall for a long moment before he can take another step.
Sukuna isn’t just gone.
He hasn’t come home at all.
Sukuna’s not here and he hasn’t come back in almost a whole day at this point. He’s left, he’s really left, he’s gone and Megumi should–
No.
A deep breath. Slow. Steady.
It’s fine. It’s all fine.
He tries to find a sense of normalcy in the rest of his routine. Dropping his house keys into their designated little wooden bowl, first, and hearing them clink noisily against the spare change, the other random detritus that has accumulated in there over the course of the week. Taking his wallet out of his pocket next. Opening it up so he can draw his registration card out to hold in his hand.
Sukuna isn’t that kind of Alpha, but Megumi had done it anyway during those first few months. Wanted to, because it had felt like the right thing to do then.
There’s only the smallest of tremors in his hand (it’s exhaustion, he’s so tired, he hasn’t slept) when he lays his card down on the table, same as every day. Face up. The bright green of it glaringly visible from almost anywhere in the apartment.
Sukuna isn’t that kind of Alpha, but it doesn’t feel right to stop.
Is everything okay?
I miss you.
Love you.
It’s not that Megumi isn’t used to sleeping alone.
Sukuna leaves on business trips sometimes – only two or three nights at most, which isn’t long at all, but he usually lets Megumi choose something of his to scent-mark before he goes. An old tee, material gone soft and colours fading from having gone through too many washings. One of the threadbare sweatshirts that he wears to go running in whenever the weather’s cool enough.
He makes Megumi hold onto it, after he's done. Watches from the mirror with darkened eyes as Megumi buries his face in the fabric and muffles every aching moan into it, breathing in the woodsmoke scent of his Alpha even as Sukuna leaves other reminders behind:
Bruises, pressed into the softest parts of Megumi’s body so that they’ll be slow to fade over the next few days. His seed, pumped so deep into the warmth of Megumi’s cunt so that it’ll still be seeping out of him in the morning.
Megumi turns onto his side, hunched in on himself in quiet misery.
He misses it. Misses Sukuna and the comforting knowledge that he’s not alone in here. It’s only the most simple of things, really:
The domestic sounds of Sukuna moving around outside their bedroom, working late. Their bed creaking under Sukuna’s solid bulk each time he shifts in his sleep, restless. The comforting scent of him all around and the broadness of his back, the sight of it making Megumi want to reach out for him when he wakes up lonely in the middle of the night.
He always knows better than to try, though.
Sukuna hates being touched when he's asleep.
Come home soon please, I’m worried
Is there anything I can do?
Love you.
Megumi can only go through the motions when he comes home to an empty apartment again.
“I’m home,” he says and it’s swallowed up by the dark.
No matter.
It’s okay. It’s going to be fine.
In the meantime, though: House keys, dropped back into their bowl. Wallet laid on the table and registration card in hand, Megumi slowly brushing a thumb over his name and designation, the string of government-issued numbers below it.
Sukuna really is one of the good ones, isn’t he?
How many other Alphas would let their omegas run wild like this? Have a job like Megumi does?
Megumi had actually offered it to him, early on. Had gotten tired of waiting for Sukuna to ask for it and held it out to him instead, but Sukuna had merely covered Megumi’s open hand with his own. Turned it down and pushed it away from him, trapping it right under the cradle of Megumi’s heart as he stepped in to kiss him, full of longing. Almost gentle enough to be tender, if not for how he had marked Megumi again and again after that, only growing more vicious with each new bite.
He didn’t need it, he’d said in the end.
And yet, Megumi leaves it out anyway. It’s the right thing to do. He knows it is, because he's seen Sukuna looking at it, sometimes. Looking for it even, eyes flicking towards it on the days that he thinks Megumi isn’t watching.
It’s yours, Megumi wants to tell him. He’s not sure why he doesn’t, actually. I offered it to you so it’s yours, all of it.
Why, then, is he still standing here with his card in hand? If Sukuna is one of the good ones and Megumi knows this is the right thing to do, why is is he suddenly struck by the sickening thought of not letting it go?
A shudder passes through him and he puts the card back down where it belongs.
He’ll have take another one of the white pills tonight, he thinks. Maybe risk sneaking one of Sukuna’s shirts out from the wardrobe for good measure so he can curl around something other than Sukuna's absence in the dark.
It should be fine. He can always bury it with the rest of the laundry in the morning and pretend that it had always been there.
Sukuna hates it, too, when Megumi touches his things without his permission.
Sorry, I figured you were busy.
Can I call you back later?
Love you.
He’s in the shower when he hears it. The front door slams shut with a kind of loud finality that makes Megumi jump under the warm spray, the sound of it followed by the thump of Sukuna’s footsteps through the apartment. There’s a heavy silence that settles in, after, and in that moment, Megumi knows.
Sukuna is angry.
It’s instinct that makes him blindly reach out for Sukuna’s shampoo. Something close to fear that makes him lather it quick, so he can get it through his hair as fast as possible. Sukuna usually likes it when Megumi smells of him. This should be fine, right? Sukuna won’t mind.
Everything is going to be just fine.
By the time Megumi gets out, Sukuna is waiting for him in the kitchen. Leaning against the counter as he tilts his beer bottle back and takes a long drink from it, Megumi suddenly feeling unusually restless as he watches the movement of Sukuna's throat. He must have gotten it out the moment he came home; Megumi can see the small beads of condensation sliding down its sides as Sukuna sets it back down.
This isn’t Sukuna’s first of the night. Megumi can tell, easy as reading words off a page – how Sukuna's gaze is razor sharp and how he's holding his body dangerously still, save for his fingers tapping a slow, syncopated rhythm where the label is starting to peel from the side of the glass.
“Welcome back,” Megumi says as he forces himself over the threshold and into their kitchen.
He's pitched his voice softer than usual without even thinking about doing so. Shoulders held deceptively loose, nevermind how every muscle feels tense enough to snap. Coming up closer to him, Megumi can tell that there’s something deeply wrong with Sukuna’s scent.
Sukuna’s been angry before, of course.
Sukuna’s been angry many, many times, in fact, but…not like this.
Never like this.
The bitter displeasure of it is acrid. Astringent like fuel that’s been left to burn for too long, the smell of it harsh and hostile. This isn’t the warm scent of birch and applewood in midwinter – it’s the suffocating smoke of a forest fire. Hot ash and scorched earth, nothing but charred remains left twisted in its path.
And it’s burning, still. Uncontained.
When Sukuna finally looks at him, Megumi can only stand there in terrified silence. Bare feet rooted to the floor and head already bent a bit lower than it had been a moment ago.
“You know,” Sukuna says almost conversationally, as if he isn’t gripping the bottle tight enough for the bone of his knuckles to show white through the skin. “I’ve always wondered who almost managed to claim you before I did.”
A chill runs through Megumi, and if not for the weight of Sukuna’s gaze pinning him there, moth to a board, he knows he’d do something stupid like raise his hand to touch the side of his neck. Press the pads of his fingers to where Toji–
He swallows instead.
“Yours is the only one that matters,” Megumi eventually says.
It’s the right response. It has to be, because it’s the only one he can ever give.
Sukuna stands up a little straighter at this and Megumi automatically takes a small step back. Ends up regretting it almost immediately, because oh, god, the look on Sukuna’s face.
Wrong.
That was wrong, he shouldn’t have done that.
“You said it was from an assault.”
Sukuna's voice is deceivingly flat. Too calm, for what's happening.
“It was," Megumi says immediately. It’s the truth, after all. “Sukuna, I–”
The rest of the sentence withers in his throat when Sukuna starts to advance towards him, Megumi wanting so badly to move another step back, and another, and another. He really shouldn't, though. Can't and won't, doesn't even dare to move a muscle, especially if-
Sukuna must see the idea of it flicker in his eyes all the same, because he's shouting at Megumi now. Yelling at him to not move one fucking inch unless he knows what’s good for him.
“I’m sorry,” Megumi hears himself say despite not really knowing what he's sorry for - only that he is. “I’m sorry, Alpha, please, I don't-”
The look on Sukuna's face is an ugly one, Megumi swallowing his words back down again.
“You’ve been lying to me, haven’t you?" He’s standing close enough that Megumi can smell the alcohol on him. "Because the way I see it, it sure doesn’t look like a fucking assault.”
“I–”
It happens in slow motion then, Megumi feeling as if he’s watching all of this from somewhere outside of his own body:
Sukuna, grabbing Megumi’s trembling hands so he can press his phone into them.
The still frame of the video, familiar enough to make Megumi’s stomach turn.
“Play it,” Sukuna snarls.
He’s going to be sick. He knows what this is. Though he’s never watched it in its entirety, Toji has sent it to him enough times over the years for him to recognise the concrete floor, the dark shadows cast onto it.
Why, though? It doesn’t make sense. He’s been good, he’s been trying, managing to somehow keep it together from year to year, paying each quarter’s amount with no fuss, so why did Sukuna–.
“Sukuna,” Megumi whispers. “Please, I–”
Sukuna hurls his bottle at the wall and the sound of glass shattering is the loudest thing that Megumi’s heard in a long while, the sudden violence startling a whimper out of him. It's bad enough to make him want to sink to his knees and bare his throat. Hunch into himself so that he’s curled up tight, made as small a target as possible.
And yet, he can’t move. Megumi can only stand there, frozen like a rabbit cowering in the grass, tiny heart racing and so afraid.
He's crying now, he realises. A delayed reaction to the shock and terror of it all, only drawn out because Sukuna is looking at him like this - like he’s disgusted by it all.
“Sukuna,” Megumi tries again despite himself. “Alpha, I can explain, please just–”
Even in the midst of his begging, Megumi has to wonder:
Please what?
Please don’t hurt him? Please don’t look at him like this?
Please don’t leave again, please, oh god, please don’t leave, please–
The first strike lands heavy enough for Megumi's mouth to fill with blood.
Sukuna makes him watch it from start to end with the volume turned up. Leaves him in a miserable, shaking heap on the floor to do so, holding the phone in his hands.
Vaguely, he’s aware of Sukuna moving around behind him as he starts the video.
There it is: the sound of the fridge door being pulled open and slammed back shut, hard. The sound of another bottle being opened, metal cap skittering carelessly across the benchtop to land god knows where.
They’re just echoes from an entirely different life at this point. Reverberations from a place that Megumi no longer has a right to. Here, in this long, miserable moment, his eyes fixed on the screen, there’s only this:
The breeding bench is a crude one. Rusted in parts and straps worn in from misuse, the cheap fabric hanging thin and fraying at the seams.
“Go on,” Toji says and Megumi’s face is oh so very young when it finally comes into view – red and blotchy from crying, with traces of baby-fat still clinging stubbornly to his chubby cheeks. His reply is soft enough to be inaudible, but whatever he’s said to Toji is rendered moot because he climbs on anyway, colt-legs fitting awkwardly into each hold.
(“Please,” Megumi remembers saying. “Daddy, please, don’t make me do it.”)
His limbs hang limp. Listless, as Toji straps him in, but a scared mewl manages to escape once the blindfold goes on, Toji only needing to draw his hand back and slap him across the face for the sound to stop. In the wake of the resounding crack, there’s a smattering of laughter from the other men in the room.
“Good boy,” someone calls out, sneering. “That’s it, your old man treats you right, doesn’t he?”
Megumi is panicking now. It’s obvious from the way he’s starting to hyperventilate, breath coming out in a thin wheeze and underdeveloped chest heaving from the effort.
“Stop it,” Toji barks, but it’s no use. He might as well be yelling at an animal to stop being afraid.
And Megumi is so very afraid.
He can’t stop shivering as Toji straps his hands down, fastening each one tight enough for the leather to bite into the delicate skin of his wrists. Can't stop crying either now that he's started, even though he’s trying his best to be quiet about it. For a while, it's obvious that he's trying to at least swallow the sound of each sob before it bubbles out of his throat, but there's not point to it, really. The strip of fabric around his eyes has already gone dark with tears. Saltwater streaking wet and bright down his cheeks.
“I said fucking stop it.”
Toji slaps him again for good measure, the force of it snapping Megumi’s head to the side and jolting a panicked yelp out of him. Megumi doesn’t stop though. If anything, he's only crying with more terror than before, especially when Toji stands between his legs to pull them wider apart, strong hands gripping the back of his thighs so he can gape Megumi’s cunt open.
(He remembers this, too: How he’d presented only a few weeks ago, still too young and inexperienced to slick up properly. How Toji had wrenched his fingers out each day after that, wordless in his anger at the lack.)
The sound of Toji spitting is a dirty one. Right into the small, pink centre of him, footage going wild for a moment as the camera tries to zoom in on the sight. It’s shaky, but it captures more than enough:
The wet shine of it, dripping from Megumi’s folds.
The way some of the filth slowly runs down Megumi’s tiny omega cock, hanging limp and useless between his legs.
Megumi cries harder when Toji slaps at it once, twice. Spits in his hand this time and starts to pump it, harsh and fast and mean until Megumi’s erect, reddened from the overstimulation. And then, only then does Toji let go. Starts to fumble with his belt buckle instead, eventually drawing himself out to the sound of the crowd jeering at the sheer difference in size between them.
“You’re going to feel your daddy right up to your throat, sweetheart,” someone yells, louder than the rest.
More laughter. More mocking commentary, disintegrating into a wall of noise as Toji lines his cock up to Megumi’s hole and slowly sinks into the untouched softness of it, Megumi trying to jerk away with a hopeless wail. It’s no use, though – the thrashing only makes it worse, Toji leaning over Megumi’s quivering frame to hold him down by the neck. Keeping Megumi still as he pushes himself further in, the camera leering at how Megumi’s poor cunt stretches almost white around the girth of Toji’s cock.
By now, whoever is filming has moved close enough to pick up brief snatches of Megumi’s words. He’s choking on them, head tossing blindly from side to side in distress as he pleads for Toji to stop, please.
(“Daddy, don’t.”)
If anything, this only elicits a new wave of laughter from the other men. More taunts, louder than before:
“Breed him, that’s it.”
“Show that little pussy how a man fucks.”
It’s only midway through that Megumi’s body starts to respond the way it should. The camera lingers on it when it happens – picking up in grainy, sordid detail how Toji’s cock comes away increasingly wet on each outward stroke, the glide of it finally slick enough that Toji can really start to fuck the way he wants to. Beneath him, the bench rattles. Megumi’s back arching into an excruciating bow from how roughly Toji is pistoning his cock back in, hard length sheathed right up to where his sac hangs heavy each and every time.
“How does it feel?" Toji asks, close to the shell of his ear. "Does it feel good? Getting split wide open on the Alpha cock that made you?”
It must, because the tenor of Megumi’s pleading has started to change. Voice gone higher, breaths hitching up to sound more and more like a moan until it happens:
His orgasm is a cruel one, the suddenness of it making Megumi cry out with a terrible, broken sound. Thighs trembling and fists clenched as it’s forced out of him, omega cocklet spurting a pitiful amount of watery spend onto the concrete floor below. Toji clearly feels Megumi pulsing around him as well because he groans, low in his throat. A deep rumble that evolves into a full-on growl when he pulls back and sees a gush of fresh slick leak out.
(“Good boy." Praise, pitched too low for anyone else to hear. “There you are. It feels good, doesn’t it? I knew you could take it.”)
When he fucks back in, it’s obvious that he’s close to knotting. The bulge of it at the base of his cock is already starting to catch on the still-fluttering rim of Megumi’s hole, Toji grunting with effort as he puts his full weight into the next few thrusts.
(“It’ll only hurt more if you fight it,” Toji hisses from somewhere above, lust drunk. It hurts, it hurts. He’s not going to fit. “Just be good and let me in.”
“Daddy no, please, I can’t–”)
The sound that Megumi makes once Toji finally forces the initial swell of his knot through is a horrible one. Ringing off the bare floors and echoing up into high ceiling of the room, Megumi’s scream not unlike that of a rabbit with its foot caught in a trap - shrieking and terrified, desperate for the agony to stop.
And yet, it doesn’t.
The camera adjusts. Captures the way Toji pushes himself past Megumi’s abused entrance to makes his cunt take more of his engorged knot. Lingers, voyeuristic, on how Megumi’s whole body goes taut at the stretch of it, fear and panic making his muscles lock up, some animal part of him fighting the intrusion on pure instinct alone.
Toji grunts as he fucks the rest of the way in. Hips jerking in small half-thrusts as he eases Megumi open on his knot, rocking back and forth until he’s swelled enough for it to catch, throbbing against Megumi's strained entrance as he starts to cum. With Toji fully sheathed like this, Megumi can only breathe in shallow, gasping sobs. Hands fisted and head bowed in exhaustion, Toji needing to pull him up by the hair to show his unmarked neck for the recording.
“Do it,” someone shouts, off-screen. “Make him remember it, the little whore."
Megumi's eyes are glassy when the camera zooms in. Unfocused and unseeing, blindfold lying undone somewhere on the ground. He only stirs, limbs weak, when Toji sets his teeth just shy of where a mating mark would be. One large hand curled around the base of his throat to stop him from struggling.
"Daddy?"
Toji pulls his lips back. Bares his fangs and bites down.
(“No one is going to want a marked omega,” Toji tells him in the aftermath. He’s holding the flat of his knife over an open flame and Megumi is still too tired, too sore to move away. Toji hasn’t untied his hands anyway. There's nowhere for him to go. “Now just keep still and let me do this.”
The memory of pain has bled into other wounds, other miseries, but this?
The nauseating smell of singed flesh, burning? The curve of Toji’s hand supporting his head, holding him like he cares?
Megumi remembers it all.)
“It wasn’t just him, was it?”
Sukuna is standing over him, but with his heart beating in his ears and his own frightened face reflected back at him in the dark screen, Sukuna sounds so much further away.
“Answer me.”
Megumi can’t. The words won’t come out. And kneeling there, the bones of his shins aching from how long he’s been crouched on the floor, Megumi can’t move or think or do anything other than start to shake, suddenly too aware of Sukuna’s presence looming above him.
The shadow he casts onto the ground feels large enough to swallow Megumi whole.
“Alpha, I–”
The rest of it is lost when Sukuna kicks him in the side, cruel. Sending him sprawling.
Megumi knows better than to get back up.
“How many did you let fuck you that night?”
He dosn't know. He can't remember. The horrible realisation of it lodges in his throat and oh, he needs to tell Sukuna what really happened, why it all happened to begin with. Sukuna deserves this much from him, at least, but looking up at Sukuna moving towards him, he knows there’s no time for it anymore.
Not when Sukuna is already kneeling next to him. Pressing him down to the floorboards by the neck, fingers digging into his throat.
“Alpha–” he chokes out, and Sukuna’s grip only tightens in reply.
“You fucking whore,” Sukuna growls as he leans into the hold. Using his weight to grind the side of Megumi’s face into the ground, similar to how you would push a pup into its own filth.
A lesson, before the punishment.
“Alpha, please, I–” he tries again but Sukuna doesn’t want to hear it. Merely pulls his head up a few terrifying inches and slams it back into the floor, violent enough that Megumi hears something crack with an awful sound.
A warning, before the inevitable.
Megumi swallows the rest of his apology. It’s not going to make a difference anymore, Sukuna already manoeuvring him onto his front and tearing the soft cotton of his pants off his hips, past his ankles. He presents without Sukuna having to tell him to. Face pressed into the crook of his arm and pain blooming in the delicate space just under his eye, something wet sliding down his cheek as he does.
Whatever it is, it's not going to matter to Sukuna either way.
“How much did you gape after they were done with you?” Sukuna demands. He’s holding him down harder, Megumi crying out from how the crush of it is causing fine bones to shift under his skin. “Should have known this was the reason why your pussy is always so fucking loose.”
He feels something cold and rigid held up to his hole then, and Megumi would buck away from the unfamiliar sensation if not for Sukuna keeping him in place.
It’s glass, Megumi realises in muted horror. It’s the bottle that Sukuna had been drinking from, the mouth of it already breaching him as Sukuna shoves the rest of the neck in.
“You’re going to take it,” he spits, and though the glass might be smooth, Megumi’s still too dry for it – the drag and stretch of the bottle inside him hurts when Sukuna pulls it out and thrusts back in, unrelenting. “Take it like the filthy fucking whore you are.”
Megumi thinks he must be whimpering. Making some sort of petrified, almost animal moan of fear because Sukuna is curling his fingers in response, clawing past the skin of his neck to draw blood as he dares Megumi to struggle. Holds the widest part of the bottle flush against Megumi's cunt and tells him that he should be thankul to not have it broken inside of him.
“But that wouldn’t be the worst thing you’ve been fucked with, right?”
Sukuna lets Megumi feel the hideous width of it hold him open before starting to force it in, pushing it past where he’s already stretched agonisingly tight.
He would beg if he could. Ask for Sukuna to stop, please, for Alpha to please stop hurting him, he promises to be better, to behave, but what good will all of that do if the pain is the point?
“It’s what you’d deserve,” Sukuna sneers as he rams the rest of it in, Megumi muffling an anguished scream into the flesh of his arm. “Bet you can’t even feel it in your whore cunt.”
Except he can. He can feel every single intolerable inch of it, the idea of what Sukuna is doing to him – why he’s doing it making Megumi sick enough to dry heave. It hurts in a way that he didn’t think was possible. Brutal and agonising, so much so that the very knowledge has Megumi crying anew and desperately needing to go somewhere else. The safety of a memory, maybe. A recollection. A time and place anywhere other than here, hiding in a dream of only the very best kind:
Sukuna, cradling the curve of his cheek in the early morning light. Holding his hand and leaving quiet kisses on his skin, brushing them featherlight along the tip of Megumi's nose, the sleepy flutter of his eyes. Forehead pressed to his like a promise.
Perhaps it hurts more to know that Sukuna has the capacity, if not always the inclination to touch him in this way. Softly. With kindness.
The hand twisting in his hair could have been the one brushing it out of his eyes, gentle, but no - it's only pulling him up, and the floor is rushing up to meet him again, too quick.
It's not enough.
It hurts so badly and it’s not enough.
“Sukuna,” he hears himself whisper on the tail end of a sob and for a wild, fleeting moment, he has to entertain the possibility that it works. That Sukuna hears the broken desperation of it and somehow deems it enough to make the punishment stop, because he can’t feel Sukuna’s hold on the back of his neck anymore, can almost draw a full breath, but–
“Be quiet,” Sukuna snaps and his hand is back, heavier than ever. Pressed like a brand in the space between his shoulder blades instead, Sukuna holding him down through the burning humiliation of feeling the first signs of wetness start to slick his passage.
It’s blood, maybe. The last few mouthfuls that Sukuna hadn’t finished. Or maybe it’s just Megumi’s own slick, his body still as traitorous as ever. Sukuna must feel the next thrust go in easier than the last, because he’s soon wrenching the bottle out with a sound of disgust. Throwing it off to the side, Megumi only needing to turn his head ever so slightly to watch it roll away, leaving streaks across the floorboards in its wake.
If Sukuna has stopped hurting him, that means he's not as angry as before, right? Megumi draws in a shuddering breath and feels the warmth of Sukuna’s hand still on him, crushing him into the ground. Hears Sukuna growling low in his throat and the sound of his belt buckle being undone, the wet noise of him spitting into his palm.
He’s slicking his cock up, stroke by stroke.
“This is for your own good,” Sukuna says once he finally sheathes himself in and Megumi can only sob at the revelation of it. Muscles of his back gone tight from being entered so suddenly. “Who do you belong to?”
“You, Alpha.”
He’s almost fully seated, hands coming to settle onto the sides of Megumi’s hips. Gripping him tight and holding him in place, unmoving for the moment just to make sure Megumi feels the thickness of him inside.
"Say it again," Sukuna demands and Megumi does, gasping every word like a prayer.
Only you, I promise. Only you.
Always you.
Sukuna pulls him back onto those last few inches after that, and the sudden fullness of having Sukuna inside him, the pain of it accompanied by that overwhelming, aching pressure – it’s familiar enough to make Megumi want to cry from sheer relief.
Sukuna hasn’t stopped wanting him. Despite everything he’s seen and everything he knows, Sukuna hasn’t left.
He’s here with Megumi, still. Megumi can feel him:
The strength of his body, pressing onto Megumi’s back and bearing down hard enough to bruise. The heaviness of his cock, carving out a space inside between his tender walls. Instinctively, he’s already trying to clench around Sukuna’s shaft. Trying to tighten up the best he can through the searing burn of Sukuna’s thrusts, because if he can’t be good for Sukuna like this, what else does he have left? What else can he give?
Sukuna had snarled at the ugliness of his scars and loved him anyway, shame and all. Marked him again and again and again, just to make sure the right one would take.
He can feel Sukuna leaning more fully over him now. Covering him as he pistons his hips in, hard, the last remnants of his anger making him spiteful, making him cruel. Megumi will take all of it, though. Spread his legs wider and let Sukuna ruin him from the inside out until his body will never be able to know another. Bare the slender column of his throat so that Sukuna can mouth over where his claim stands, victorious over Toji’s unfinished one.
“I knew you were damaged goods,” Sukuna snarls as he grabs a fistful of Megumi’s hair to pull his head roughly to the side. His cock has only gotten harder, the telltale swell at its base already starting to catch on Megumi’s rim. “And still, I took you in. How many Alphas do you think would still want you?”
“None,” Megumi whispers like the unbearable truth that it is.
“Is that all you have to say?”
He’s setting his teeth over where his last claim has only just started to heal, the flesh still raw and tender to touch. There’s barely enough time for the skin there to scar anymore these days.
“Thank you, Alpha.” It always hurts, but that only means Sukuna will always want him, right? "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."
Sukuna has always been one of the good ones.
When it’s over, Sukuna leaves him trembling on the floor. Cum still seeping out from between his legs, dripping thick and warm down his thighs.
He’ll have to get up at some point. Clean himself off and go wipe the stains off the wall. Sweep the shards of broken glass away and retrieve the second bottle, too, from where it’s come to rest against the leg of the coffee table. Empty. Harmless again.
For the time being though, Megumi just lies there and waits for the rest of the room to come back into focus. Just tries to be breathe, in and out. Slow and steady, pushing past the small flicker of panic that flares once he realises he can only see blurry shadows through the haze of his right eye.
It’s okay. It's fine.
It's going to be enough, he can manage.
Sukuna is here, after all.
There he is now, walking across the room. The broad expanse of his back and his shoulders held straight as he stops in front of the table that they keep their things on. Housekeys in their bowl. Wallet on the side. Megumi's card, facing up.
The bright green of it is visible from anywhere in the apartment, remember?
Megumi closes his eyes and feels a shudder run through him the moment he hears something snap, clean in two. When he opens them again, he knows Sukuna will be the only thing he sees. Sukuna is going to be there.
And that's all that matters.
That’s all that matters.