Chapter Text
The Lungs
The vehicle for breath and life force, the lungs are associated with the exchange of energy and emotions, as well as with inspiration and the ability to let go.
Imbalance: Suppressed emotions such as, grief over any loss, and unresolved grief can result in respiratory ailments such as asthma, bronchitis, pneumonia etc.
Satoru can’t really remember much.
Only the pain.
That excruciating, crushing pain.
He forgot all about the sticky texture of the blood in his mouth.
It was overshadowed by the pain radiating through his heart.
Something’s wrong, his body seemed to scream.
As reality contorted and collapsed around him, the only thing he could focus on was that agonizing pain as his heart and soul got teared to shreds.
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Beep. Beep. Beep.
Satoru Gojo was surrounded by darkness, swallowed by the silence around him.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
A silence that had now been disturbed by that annoying sound.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
He groans, wincing at the pain in his throat at the noise. Satoru doesn’t want to wake up yet. Something tells him it’s not a good idea to wake up.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
He squeezes his eyes closed but immediately regrets doing so as a sharp pain pierces his brain. Another groan escapes his sore throat, still barely audible.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
“Satoru?”
Satoru doesn’t even register the voice at first, too drowsy to really be aware of what’s happening around him. Somehow, though, he opens his eyes. And now he’s staring at white, a stark contrast to the blackness he’d been drowning in only moments ago.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
His skull throbs and he quickly squeezes his eyes shut again. Slowly, he starts to become aware of his surroundings.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
The light blanket atop of him. The softness of the mattress beneath him. The continuous beeping of the machine next to him. The dull pain in his head. The pain in his chest. Opening his eyes again, he manages to identify the blinding “white” as the ceiling of a room. A room that smells like disinfectants.
Why is he in a hospital?
Beep. Beep. Beep.
“Satoru? Can you hear me?”
Oh, right. That voice. Satoru becomes aware of the presence next to him, seconds before a face enters his view. It takes him a few moments longer than it should have to recognize the person as Shoko Ieiri. Shoko, who’s normally practically unbothered by everything and anything, now looking down at him with concern and grief written all over her face.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
He blinks. Once. Twice. Slowly, questions start to fill his still drowsy mind.
Where is he? What happened? Why does his chest hurt so much? Why does Shoko look like she was crying?
Satoru opens his mouth to speak but only manages a pathetic weak croak.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
“Shh Satoru it’s okay. Don’t overdo it. You’re alright. Just… take it slow, please.”
Shoko’s voice is calm and quiet but strained. Satoru’s brows furrow. This is wrong. Something’s wrong. What happened? Why would he- did he sustain an injury in a mission? Why didn’t he remember? What-
Beep. Beep. Beep.
Suguru.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
The beeping speeds up in time with his heartbeat. His chest feels like it’s about to explode.
He can’t breathe.
Still, he somehow manages to lull out: “Suguru. Where’s Suguru?”
Beep. Beep. Beep.
Shoko just wipes at her eyes. Satoru doesn’t hear her attempts to calm him down. He’s panicking now. Suguru. If Satoru got injured on a mission, then what about Suguru? Who was making sure Suguru was alright while he’s trapped in this room? He had to go and make sure Suguru was alright. He had to find him. He had to-
Satoru’s world plunged into familiar darkness as Shoko put him under again.
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Dark, long hair sticking to damp, glistening skin.
Satoru laughs at the dumb expression on his best friend’s face, who’s coughing violently after Satoru had pulled him into the water with him without any warning.
They had just finished a mission an hour ago and decided to spend some time at the small lake that lays just half an hour away from the dorms. It’s one of their favorite spots to lounge around and relax, had been, ever since they had first met here all those years ago.
Satoru didn’t really attend classes back then, preferring to spend his time doing more interesting things like tanning in the grass by the water. His sensitive skin would get a sunburn every time, but it was still better than having to listen to Yaga’s monotone lectures all day long.
After all, he already was the strongest, so why would he need to attend the classes anyways? They couldn’t throw him out, either, with his clan being one of the top sponsors of the school and all that.
So that’s how Suguru found him that day, laying in the sun, arms behind his head, pale chest already starting to turn red.
The dark-haired teenager had only arrived at the school earlier that day and had been instructed by Yaga to go and fetch Satoru so he wouldn’t have to attend classes alone.
Suguru didn’t expect the blast of cursed energy that hurtled towards him the moment he stepped into Satoru’s vicinity. Caught off guard, Suguru suddenly found himself in the lake, completely drenched and obviously shocked.
The other boy stood at the shore, staring down at him with a calculating, unnarving stare he could feel piercing through the white cloth covering his eyes.
For a few seconds, the two teenagers had just sized each other up. Then Satoru vaguely remembered how Yaga had told him about a new student joining them just a few days ago. Connecting the dots he realized that Suguru was no threat to him.
And to the other one’s shock, Satoru just started laughing at the baffled expression on Suguru’s dripping face.
That had been the beginning of their friendship.
At first, Suguru didn’t really expect them to get along well. He really struggled to keep up with Satoru’s outgoing and loud personality.
Naturally, being two teenage boys with enough issues to fill a mental institution and two personalities that are as different as black and white, they clashed often in the first few weeks.
But Satoru grew on him quickly and within the first year spent together, they were inseparable. They still spend much time at the small lake, like today, years later.
After a tiring mission, Satoru had dragged Suguru to the lake, insisting on “cooling off” in the water. It was unusually warm for early fall, so Satoru had spent the past half hour or so splashing around in the water while Suguru had gazed upon the leaves of the trees which were already starting to show changes in their colors.
At least Suguru had been watching the trees in peace until Satoru had decided it was a good idea to pull his best friend into the water with him.
That’s how Suguru ended up completely drenched staring in shock at Satoru’s endlessly blue eyes while trying to stay mad at him.
He was failing miserably, just like always.
“You look the curse I exorcised earlier with your hair soaked like this!”
Satoru’s still laughing at his best friend’s baffled expression, when suddenly something slimy wraps around his ankle. Before he can react, he gets dragged underwater. It takes the white-haired sorcerer pathetically long to realize that it’s one of Suguru’s curses.
After he manages to activate infinity – he always keeps infinity off around Suguru, even after mastering it - which forces the curse to let go of him, Satoru swims back to the surface, where he breaks into a coughing fit. With their roles reversed now, Suguru is laughing at him.
The sound revibrates through Satoru’s entire being.
Seeing Suguru laugh like this had gotten more and more scarce over the past few months, despite Satoru’s best efforts. So he drinks in the sound, the rare view of his best friend’s smile stretched wide with joy.
Satoru ignores the stale taste in his mouth at that realization.
He only realizes he’s been staring when Suguru suddenly goes quiet and his cheeks take on that pretty flushed color.
Neither of them moves as they just keep staring at each other until-
“Satoru you-”
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“Satoru?”
The sound of his own name rips Satoru out of the darkness he had been lost in and with a gasp he sits up straight on his bed, nearly passing out again from the sharp pain radiating through his side at the unpredicted movement.
The remnants of his memories vanish into the back of his mind the moment Satoru becomes aware of his surroundings. Opposite to when he woke up the last time, his mind feels sharp and clear again and even his six eyes don’t feel as overwhelmed as before.
He turns to look at Shoko, who had woken him up and is now watching him cautiously, as if expecting him to suddenly go batshit crazy on her or something.
Brown hair, not black. Short, not long. One of his best friends, but not the one usually waiting by his side for him to wake up again. Not the wrong friend, just not the one he was desperately hoping for.
Before giving her even the slightest chance to speak up again, Satoru manages to croak out:
“Where is he?”
Shoko’s face contorts, first into pain, then confusion, before morphing into realization and coming to rest on something Satoru can’t identify. He doesn’t have to clarify who he’s talking about.
There is only one person Satoru Gojo would ask about with this urgency in his voice.
Still, Shoko asks in a slightly shaking tone that’s so uncharacteristic for her:
“Who?”
Voice tinged with nervous annoyance, Satoru retorts:
“Suguru. Where’s Suguru?”
His question is met with silence.
No. That can’t be. Satoru tries to remember. He ranks his brain for everything that could give him a clue as to how he ended up here and why his best friend wouldn’t be able to be by his side right now.
But he can’t remember.
Why can’t he fucking remember?
The last thing he remembers is going to sleep, the black-haired sorcerer safely in his arms. Like every night.
How it should be.
Satoru’s brain still feels slightly sluggish and the dull pain in his body has grown into a persistent ache, but still he reaches for the IV he’s hooked up on.
He must go find Suguru.
Shoko tries to stop him.
“Satoru, no. Stop that. Lie back down. I’ll… I’ll tell you, okay? Just… I need you to cooperate with me, otherwise you’ll just black out again, you stubborn dickhead.”
He just shakes his head, dizziness washing over him at the movement.
“Where is he? Shoko where the fuck is Suguru?”
Satoru grips the IV, ready to rip it out of his skin, when suddenly he’s overcome with pain so sharp and blinding that he genuinely sees stars. Agony courses through his entire body, especially his chest and side, and forces him to collapse back into the mattress.
Satoru can only remember one other time he felt such excruciating hurt in his entire life.
His ears are ringing, head throbbing, mind slipping from the pain. He can barely hear Shoko curse to herself before feeling the effects of her RCT soothe at least the worst of his pain.
It takes Satoru a few minutes until he’s able to properly breathe again.
“I’ll bring you to Suguru if you promise me to do as I say for a bit so I can check your lungs, okay?”
No, not okay.
Nothing is okay.
The only thing stopping Satoru from going absolutely batshit and search for Suguru is his weak physical condition and the unnerving fact that he seems to be unable to properly use his cursed energy.
He must have overexerted himself to the point of absolute exhaustion.
Satoru lets Shoko do her doctor things. He thinks she’s speaking with him, but he doesn’t really listen, too lost in his own head. He still can’t fucking remember.
What the fuck happened?
Suddenly he frowns. His voice is all weak and wrong as he croaks out:
“What did you say about my lungs? What is wrong with my lungs? Why are you checking my lungs? I have RCT, they’ll heal on their own eventually. Just have to rest for a bit, like always. So why are you checking my lungs?”
Shoko’s movements stutter for a few seconds.
“Satoru… why don’t you rest a bit more and we talk after, okay?”
“Shoko don’t fuck with me. Just tell me what happened. Where’s Suguru?”
Satoru doesn’t receive an immediate answer. He feels nothing but cold dread in every cell of his aching body. Shoko knows that he’s serious about this when he’s not joking or something.
That means she should also know better than to just stay silent, so why won’t she just tell him?
“Shoko I swear to god if you don’t tell me right now I’ll…”
“You got severely injured at… on a mission. You nearly died. Your infinity was off while you got attacked, which messed you up real bad. You were fucked up when we got to you.”
“Your lung was so severely injured that you should’ve healed yourself with RCT, but you were too drained to do that. We had to get you a lung transplantation to save you.”
The white-haired sorcerer frowns. There is something off with all of this. Shoko isn’t meeting his eyes while talking. Unflinching, brutally honest Shoko Ieiri isn’t meeting his eyes.
There is something she is not telling him.
“I don’t care about all of that. Tell me about Suguru. Where is Suguru?”
Silence.
“Shoko I…”
“Satoru, whose lungs do you think you’re using now?”
Satoru’s heart and mind fracture.
The feeling is somehow familiar.
“No. You’re lying. That can’t- that can’t be. He wouldn’t… why would… no. No.”
He can’t breathe. Or rather, he just refuses to breathe.
How could he breathe?
These breaths aren’t his to take, after all.
“I’m sorry Satoru. Geto gave you his lungs to make sure you’ll life. He’s dead, Satoru. I’m sorry.”