Floating Like a Lilo ── Itadori Yuuji (✓)

26 REST IN PEACE

Sukuna stares back. "You are a human not a worm. And yet you're slippery, gross and stupid."

What is this feeling? And did he just call me a worm?! Desolation rattles in your ribcage, desperate to break free. You cannot bring yourself to meet what hides behind salmon lids, dull eyes shrouded in contemplation and deep thought, like you're drowning in a past memory, something distasteful that hangs on your tongue at all times.

"No response?" He arches an eyebrow, almost interested by how frightening the stoic, stone-faced expression seemed on your features. "You're normally more loose-lipped. Eh, that gives me more room to talk about myself," He folds one of his legs over the other.

You watch the light-coloured kimono crease across the folds, Sukuna's hands tucked into the billowness of the material, a gentle, soothing cream, almost a smiling purity. And then, the black edges that taint what little humanity dwindled inside him. 

You are not giving up, per se. But alas, it is overwhelming. You scrunch your nose and squeeze your eyes shut before burying your face in your arms, a bitter, resigned longing haunts your expression. 

"I hate you," The words cut against the slippery escape it had from your tongue. They clamber out, like bony fingers prying open the casket in which they had been sealed. It scratches deep inside you, a bubbling agony that froths across your chest. You hate that Sukuna-like expression of godliness, the one which hugs his eyes, as if he determined you so quickly and completely. You had been hollowed out, a complete annihilation of the self, and now what remains is a crisp, thin veil of pity, an obsolete jewel that a swallow would tighten in it's beak. 

And now, eyes rich with cardinal, lacking the cathartic grin to bring meaning to it's life, spin like he had figured you out like a puzzle, a weak lock to a bobby pin. Once done, you will be discarded. But not entirely, as if that was bad enough. You'll lose who you are because what's left is just skin and bones, tied together as if you were some Christmas present being left on a doorstep. 

Sukuna's eyes observe the changes in your expression, almost feeling your own thoughts. He's an invasion of poison, with rivets of curses crawling into the very veins you'll stare at for too long in the dim, crackling bathroom lights back at Sendai. "You are too naïve to confront what you did, so you fool yourself into thinking it was the work of others."

You stagger forwards and the horrible, guilty anchor of being a human is lodged in your chest and it heavies as you struggle further. And you bite back the torment just enough to see Sukuna at his throne, and how detailed the skulls he sit on actually were.

"Stop lying to me," A barely audible whisper slither out, as if you were on the verge of collapse. You know this feeling wasn't because you were upset, it came from a place buried underneath an untouched horror. You had planted this truth where her grave was, as if digging into the dirt and keep it covered would hide it forever, as if you could forget your own role in this. You, [L/n] [F/n] are not the person you try to be, and you'll never be that person: popular, friendly, loved. 

You are addicted to things you can't have and you'll run after the fire that Prometheus shared, even if you will curtail the wrath of some higher deity, even if said god was just a roseate man that was more complex that your own past. 

Sukuna's lips twitch like a finger behind a loaded gun, and as if he fires the fatal shot, his tongue moves quicker than his thoughts, viperous. "Should I pity you?"

"If I wanted to be pitied, I would have just gone to therapy," Your remark is childish but expected. 

He presses further, ignoring the words of spite. "You are my vessel. It is not those human opinions but it is something written long before you were born, before I was created. Your mother understood this, even her diary showed you the truth but I wonder if you boiled your eyes in water to blind yourself from this. She was a puppet, a means to an end for my return."