#that could or not be divergent fist able ti touch the soul?!

[torgawl]

i wonder what this means

we know judgeman's appearance is similar to lady justice, who has a blindfold over her eyes, to represent impartial or blind justice. it's interesting that during sukuna's trial, and subsequent death penalty veredict, the stitches break on one side and that eye opens. something that didn't happen during the first death penalty delivered to yuuji despite both eyes opening up. we know everything higuruma is aware about his own ct, and ce in general, he grasped through reverse engeneering. his surprise about judgeman confiscating sukuna's cursed tool and not the cursed technique highlights that higuruma is only aware of his own technique due to things he was able to experience and deduce from the short time that has passed since he became a sorcerer. it's safe to say he had never persecuted someone who used a cursed tool before and therefore was unaware of this aspect of his technique (similar situations have happened before to characters like geto and even the way mahoraga works). this makes me wonder if judgeman's abilities are something we and higuruma have limited information on and there's something else going on, hinting at a possible outcome for higuruma/higuruma's character.

judgeman's eye opening is especially interesting because that is exactly the stance higuruma decided to take once he lost faith in the justice system. jujutsu kaisen and the concept of cursed energy and cursed techniques are very based in buddhist philosophy, or rather the power system is, and more specifically the concept of suffering. buddha recognised there was suffering in life and started guiding people into following a practice to get rid of that suffering, through the four noble truths the noble eightfold path. which ultimately would result in liberation from the samsara, cycle of rebirth and suffering. a lot of that lifestyle is learning how to properly process suffering in a way that's beneficial to the individual with the goal of achieving enlightment. in jjk suffering directly creates cursed energy and when that suffering sort of accumulates it originates cursed spirits. jujutsu sorcerers are basically people able to process their own suffering and their own ce to fight and exorcise the suffering that's constantly emerging from humanity (tying deeply with the core theme of jjk and a big plot point - the merging). you could even draw parallels between ways individuals cope with their own pain and their cursed techniques, which is very obvious in characters like geto (ingesting curses through cursed spirit manipulation akin to bottling up his own feelings and letting that suffering eat him from the inside out), for example. where am i going with this? i'm not sure (sorry if you read all of this expecting a really cool theory) but what if this is sort of an awakening moment for higuruma? a moment where his technique will finally align with his beliefs? i just don't believe the differences in judgeman throughout the story are a coincidence. not when judgeman also has this form, with both its eyes completely shut.

[sapphicalexaandra]

Your Deepest Desires (4/4)

Pairing: Jace/Alec

Rating: Mature

Summary:  “I know I don’t have to do that, I just wanted to do it!” Jace’s outburst reflected back to him in the form of a star-struck expression on Alec’s face. As they learned at the Seelie Court, one kiss is all it takes...

Notes: A Canon Divergence, rewriting of the Seelie Court kiss (and beyond), but with Jalec. Read tags for further information.

Chapter 4 

“The stars choose their lovers, save my soul

It hurts just the same

And I can't tear myself away”

“I know I don’t have to do that, I just wanted to do it!”

Jace’s outburst reflected back to him in the form of a star-struck expression on Alec’s face.

Jace didn’t know what had gotten into him – or he knew too well what had gotten into him – that had compelled him to ruin such a perfect reunion...by kissing his parabatai. Previously unspoken things and long-held feelings had just been laid out between them, validated and embraced, their bond had never been more secure, and he had to go and do that. A forbidden act in and of itself, but especially in such voluntary circumstances. Not that he had cared.

He had just watched Alec walk away from him, and he hadn’t been able to accept the inevitable step to normality it would bring to. He had been the one advocating for it, and now he couldn’t stand the thought of it.

The inexplicable feelings and desires that had been awakened in him plagued his mind, his body and soul, and he had to know…the truth. Had it all just been an aftereffect of their kiss at the Seelie Court, specifically designed by the Seelie Queen to have them break their sacred Law? It had all been a scheme to hurt - Magnus, he now realized, to turn him against the Shadowhunters...so Jace couldn’t put it past her.

But kissing Alec once more had borne no deception, there was no mistaking those same sensations he had felt as well the day before, or the warmth and want it spurred in him…

What it actually did feel like, was that it was no more than the inevitable next step in his bond with Alec. That rightness he had used to describe the entire experience was still there, and he was still trying to wrap his head around it. His heart, as well as his soul that he had already voluntarily knitted with Alec’s, had soared with it a long time ago, it seemed. What took you so long? They now sang to him. 

“What – what do you mean?” came Alec's uncharacteristically high-pitched voice. He was shaking his head, holding himself behind his outstretched arms, as if to put a shield between them.

“Exactly that! I just wanted – to kiss you,” Jace confessed, breathlessly, openly. What was this, amidst all the things Alec knew about him?

“No – no, you, you didn’t, Jace,” stuttered Alec.

Jace could understand his hesitation in believing him. Alec must've had hopelessly dreamed for far too long of something like this…and Jace now felt some sort of euphoria at being able to give it back to him.

“Yes, I did, Alec. I–” he took a few steps forward, slowly, for fear of spooking his parabatai. Alec was already retreating, so Jace impulsively took his hands in between his own. They were cold, yet Jace had never held something so warm. “What if I told that what you feel…I feel it too? In the exact way, you do?”

Alec was still shaking his head, not meeting his eyes. “Come on, Alec!” Jace felt like laughing. He pulled Alec closer to him. “You were the one kissing me yesterday…I wasn’t exactly unresponsive, now, was I?”

“That – you – it might just be that you feel confused and, and feeling things that are just…”

“I know, okay? I was overwhelmed at first too! I was confused…but then, I just couldn’t – I can’t stop thinking about that kiss*.” He felt the need to bite his lower lip at that, as memories of Alec kissing him, both real and fantasized, suddenly overflowed him... “About how you kissed me, and how I kissed you. And I can’t even try to deny it…this,” he put Alec's hands over his heart, whose accelerated beating was unmistakable, “You feel this? It's real. It's the realest thing I’ve ever felt. Remember when I told you about my fear of getting attached to you? It might’ve run deeper than I could, or still can, say...I don't know, okay? I don't know if I'm only feeling this now, or if it was always there and I was just too dumb, or scared, or something, to realize it. But what matters is that, right now, I - want this. I want you.”

Admitting all that felt like a closed fist had just opened from around his heart. And Jace knew then that that was the incontrovertible truth.

Alec was still silent. He was staring at a spot behind Jace's head; Jace could already tell the walls threatening to build all around him. He had to try another strategy...

“I guess, all it took were your fine kissing skill, didn’t it? I didn’t know you had it in you, my parabatai...”

“Don’t…” 

“…or I did, I mean, I was at your wedding, after a–”

“Stop it, Jace.”

He knew teasing him would get a rise out of Alec.

“What?” Jace felt calm. He felt no rush when he could simply keep regarding Alec’s face as Alec still tried to reason himself out of the situation, Jace's affection for the wonderful man in front of him quietly pouring out of his every pore. Alec would have to catch up, eventually; he just couldn't miss the waves of emotions that he must’ve been receiving from his end. Jace had always known that he loved Alec, and this didn't feel much different...yet, it was. He felt different; bare, unclouded, like he was waking up for the first time in years.

In the end, Alec couldn’t escape looking at him any longer. When their eyes met, the world around them seemed to vanish. The war raging behind Alec’s eyes was a marvel to behold, as he drank Jace in, from the hands that were still over Jace's heart, to his lips, to his eyes. His own want was also unmistakable.

“Jace.” His grave, inevitable tone didn’t hurt any less, as it cut the air in half.

Alec had the uncanny ability of turning his name in entire sentences. Jace, even though he would’ve preferred he didn’t, understood immediately what he meant.

This is impossible. This is forbidden. This needs to stop now. 

Jace knew that, he couldn’t deny that either. He was being foolish, he was letting himself be carried away with the full knowledge of how it will have to hurt. Was it wrong of him to still wish he could have this? Alec had raged war with himself over it for years, yet Jace couldn’t even resist one day. But Alec hadn’t had the temptation of his feelings being returned, not until now.

However, Alec was still right. This could end up in literal flames; deruning, exile, separation. The last option was the one Jace was sure he would never allow to happen, or that he wouldn’t survive if it happened...he could, he would take the exile if he could stay with Alec, but Alec - Alec had just been appointed Head of the Institute, as he had always dreamed! Jace would never take that away from him, or take him away from the family he had spent all his life trying to protect. In the end, if it would’ve been enough, everything to Jace, he couldn’t be all Alec needed.

Jace felt himself let go of Alec’s hands.

For a moment, for a blissful moment, it had felt like something in his life was finally falling into place. Like a ship lost at sea, he had seen the light coming from the shore, the long-yearned-for harbor miracously within reach…

Instead, the cold reality that was slowly sinking in now felt like a boulder tied to his leg, reminding him of his rightful place at the bottom of the ocean. It had been there all along, in the form of a rune drawn on his side, he had made sure of it…he was simply being stupid and naïve enough to try and forget about it. He thought, ironically, how he had originally meant for his bond with Alec to be an anchor, to keep him grounded, not on the ground.

The feeling that he was starting to regret that very same bond - his one certainty amidst all the mess and confusion that was his life - set dreadfully on Jace more than anything else. It felt like he had just committed a blasphemy...he wouldn’t have been surprised if the sky had opened up to strike him right then and there.

Alec, surprisingly, didn’t step away. Jace’s eyes widened for a moment as he saw him raise his arms, to come cradle his head as he had done at the Seelie Court, gently starting to caress his face with his thumbs. Jace could've melted under that touch: he was shivering, his heart clenched painfully. Then Alec laid his forehead against Jace’s, only that. They both fell still, breathing themselves in, as Jace tried as hard as he could to keep himself from falling apart.

“Facilis descensus averno,” Alec whispered.

I’m here. We’ll get through this together. We can’t be broken. Jace knew, that was what Alec meant.

What an ironically poetic ending to their beginning.

“Will I recover that broken piece?

Let it go and unleash all the feelings”

To truly break a man, you need to give him hope, then take it away from him**.

Alec didn’t feel broken. If he felt sad, it didn’t matter. If the brief glimpse to a life spent loving Jace in all the ways he wanted to, had first filled his heart and then shattered it in half, it wasn’t of much importance. He had known better, while Jace had just been plunged into this kind of sweet, unyielding torture – by him, no less. If he had let himself be pulled into the dream for one, blessed, second, staring at the man he loved with his entire being…he only had himself to blame.

Smoothing the skin on Jace’s face with his thumbs, pressing their heads together, breathing Jace’s familiar scent in, he could almost mistake the emptiness that was creeping inside of him as calm. He would not break.

“Facilis descensus averno,” he whispered softly to him, knowing Jace would understand.

They wouldn’t be broken.   

After this last moment of indulgence, they would go back to their lives, to being parabatai, to loving and supporting each other like they should, and, eventually, it would all be alright again. Right then, Alec didn’t even find it in himself to resent the Seelie Queen for what she had, quite purposefully, done to them. A taste, no matter how bitterly he'll have to rethink of it in the future, was still something. When he thought of a life where he still didn't known what it felt like kissing Jace, versus one where he did know...Alec couldn't help but prefer the latter. It might've ruined everyone else for him...he would now have an even harder time trying to get over him...but, after all, he was a selfish, pitiful being. 

A small eternity passed, until Jace, taking a small step back from him, raised his head and looked into his eyes once more. Alec would truly miss that look, directed at him and only him. 

“What do you think…of a kiss? One last kiss,” Jace said, positively begging him.

And Alec could only nod. Knowing he would regret it later. Not regretting it now in the least.

Now that they were both aware, both willing participants, both entirely conscious of what was about to happen in the privacy of that isolated rooftop, they took their time to savor every single moment.

Alec was the first one to move; slowly, tentatively, he brought his hands forward to have them hold Jace by the hips, over his shirt. That contact alone still caused shivers to pass through him, and he used that grip to pull Jace closer towards himself. As the space between them became less and less, they didn’t waste any time to start drinking in every inch of each other.

The way their bodies, as Jace raised his arms to circle them around Alec’s neck, were falling into place like two puzzle pieces…

The way, like magnets, their lips found each other with precision, inexorably, unescapably, the fire under their skin ignited at every new touch, engulfing them with its heat, its warmth, its burning desire to touch, to taste, to have more...

Alec felt it mounting from the pit of his stomach, and he had no more inhibitions to restrain it.

Inhebriated by the sweetness of Jace's tongue on his, he gripped Jace more forcefully to himself, rising his shirt to feel the hot skin under it, and Alec started walking forward without breaking them apart, pushing, blindly, until they reached a wall. Pressing against it, the full, deliciously harsh and sudden body contact made them both gasp for breath, panting against each other's faces. It took no time for Alec to dive back in, however, and put his open mouth against Jace’s, darting out his tongue to lock it with his. The shivers caused by Jace rising his shirt to touch his skin, made it imperative that Alec took Jace’s lips between his teeth.

When he felt the vibration in his throat, before he heard the moan escape from Jace, Alec realized he was already gone for good. An Angel could’ve struck them right then and there, and he would have barely noticed. When he felt Jace’s fingernails dug deep into his shoulders, and the mere, motionless pressing of their lower bodies became simply not enough, he could already feel they wouldn’t stop. When he put a knee in between Jace’s legs, while the latter started mouthing, lapping, biting at the Deflect rune on his neck, rousing a growl out of him, Alec knew he wouldn’t be the one to make them.

Falling on the floor after that was simple, inevitable. Alec looked up, and the image of Jace, with his wild golden hair and his intense, differently-colored eyes, his face flushed, his mouth delightfully pink and swollen, hovering a few inches away from his, his body pressed firmly against Alec’s, could’ve very well been that of an Angel itself. Jace was indeed the closest thing to heaven Alec could picture. Even if he deserved hell for what they were doing.

The thought, however, only alimented his burning-hot desire further. He was already doomed, so raising Jace’s shirt to remove it, circling Jace's body with his arms, flipping them over...was only the least he could do to cement that. He brought their lips together again, and divine punishment seemed nothing compared to the holiness of what he was feeling.

A circumstance unfamiliar to him, Alec found himself to be the most experienced of the pair in this kind of act. All their clothes soon discarded, Jace let him worship his body to the content of his heart’s desire and Alec had never felt more blessed in his life. He could've drowned forever, buried into Jace, and he would've been thankful. 

“I don’t want to know who we are without each other

It’s just too hard”

“What is my body, when I have already given you my heart and my soul?”

Those were the last words – besides Alec’s name – that Jace uttered, just a murmur between them, before surrendering himself to the sensations.

When Alec took him, almost reverently, in his mouth, Jace could already feel himself step over the edge from the first contact. It was all a whirlwind after that, of climbing and rising then falling back, as well as of stickiness and awkwardness and stifled laughter, which only cemented further Jace’s absolute adoration for the man he had chosen to tie himself to in every possible way. All of this should’ve felt weird, or uncomfortable, or embarrassing, but it never was.

When their bodies were finally, completely, joined, and, from initially tentative and strained, their movements became frantic and passionate, an ecstatic feeling took ahold of Jace’s entire being. As he pawed and clawed at Alec’s back, as Alec made love to him, chills spreading from where Alec's mouth breathed against his neck to where Jace had his legs wrapped around his hips – not even mentioning the unfamiliar yet completely world-rocking, burning friction that was going on inside of him that made him unable to stifle earth-shattering groans – Jace looked up at the stars above him, and he realized for the first time that no other moment like this that he had experienced, could even begin to compare. Or to matter.

This, this was what he had foolishly thought he knew anything about, what he had craved, and rejected, and completely misunderstood. It wasn’t about the bodies…it was about two souls, originally connected, finally meeting and conjoining again, after spending all their lives apart in search of each other...***

What was the Clave doing, trying to restrain and limit the full scale of what parabatai could be to each other, with each other? Cause Jace had no doubts, in that moment, that that had always been meant to happen, and that the bond coursing between them, making it all so much more powerful, beautiful, all encompassing, couldn’t fit into any mortal concept such as Philia, Storge or Eros, not even Agape. It was so much more. There couldn’t possibly be anything taboo, or wrong, or impossible in what they were doing – in what they were feeling, and he couldn't regret the moment of utter neediness that had spurred him to ask for one last kiss. Not if it had brought to this. 

As Alec let out a moan that resonated in Jace as if it had been his own, and Alec went that much deeper inside of him, hitting the right spot that made Jace arch against his body, trembling, Jace took hold of Alec's neck and brought their lips together in a desperate kiss. It didn't take long after that for both to reach their climax, inevitably in sync like for everything they did together. They rode the wave of indescribable, exponential pleasure as one, and Jace firmly believed that nothing could ever change the rigthness of that moment.

After, he kept holding onto Alec, still unwilling, and unable, to let him go. Alec seemed to be of the same mind. 

Jace couldn’t have said how long they stayed on that roof, of a building technically inhabited, on a floor questionably clean. He only knew that he wasted no time in kissing, exploring, worshipping, caressing every inch of Alec, and Alec in turn did the same to him.

His parabatai was so trusting, so vulnerable in his hands, that something moved inside of Jace at seeing him like that, with pleasure and abandon softening his features as he had never seen. He was causing that in Alec, he could feel Alec's long-burning love envelop him with all its warmth. At some point - when being inside of Alec for the first time in his life had just been everything - Jace had opened his eyes, and he had noticed that a few tears were falling from the corner of Alec's eyes. Jace had also caused this, a longing and pain so lasting that they were now overwhelming him as well as the man he held in his arms. He had kissed Alec's tears away, hoping that it would at least help heal his wounds.

How had he never noticed just how beautiful Alec was? How had he looked at him all this time and never realized what he had right in front of him? With his big, hazel eyes that seemed to gaze right into his soul, with the lean, strong body that fit so perfectly under his touch…

The more he experienced of it, the more Jace felt his heart grow ten times bigger. And every time he reached that spot on Alec’s abdomen where his parabatai rune was, the one he had drawn oh so long ago, Jace couldn’t refrain from giving it all of his attention, as if it were the most precious thing in the world…which it was. He would never let it be a source of grief, ever again.

Still, it couldn’t help but be a reminder of the impending separation that loomed over them. Every second that went by, the prospect of it only seemed harsher and unbearable – so much that Jace marveled and felt devastated at the same time, thinking of how his life had so severely changed in just forty-eight hours. 

In the end, after being overcome by a new wave of pleasure even stronger than the one before, Jace let himself collapse onto Alec. He placed his head right where Alec’s heart was, so that he could listen intently to his still accelerated heartbeat. Alec circled him with his arms, and Jace closed his eyes as he felt the feather-like brush of Alec's lips on the top of his head.

That, more than anything, almost made him start to cry.  

 “Don’t want to know the other side of a world without you”

Holding Jace tight to his chest, both their bodies slick with sweat, the lingering waves of pleasure still coursing through him, Alec felt like crying.

It was a chilly night, and the floor they were laying over, completely naked, was positively freezing. The exertion spreading sleepiness throughout his limbs made it hard to push the cold away any longer…yet he had never felt so warm. Leaning forward to kiss the top of Jace’s damp head, Alec thought that if he kept his eyes closed a little more, he could believe this was all a dream. The most vivid, the most perfect, but still a dream.

He couldn't last long in that headspace, however, and he didn’t. Soon, the crucial, repetitive, too-familiar questions hovering over them were already making themselves heard in his foggy mind. He was tired of listening to them, and of having to answer to them. How can you let Jace go now that you’ve experienced what it feels having all of him? How are you going to act normal around him from now on? How can you think to resist him knowing that he feels the same? How can you think to hide what just happened when you must have it written all over you? You probably have the marks to prove it all over your skin…so how…how…HOW?!

“Fuck it!”

Jumping, Jace quickly raised his head to look at him, alarmed. “What?!”

“I said,” Alec sat up. “Fuck. It.”

Jace was staring, puzzled, seemingly about to inquire further, but Alec cut him off by diving in for a kiss. He was blunt, too fast, probably too rough, but Jace responded in tow nonetheless. He had meant it to be quick, but they still got lost in it for a while. 

“Mmh…wait, what was that about?” Jace breathed out as they parted. “Not that I’m complaining.”

Looking at his parabatai’s glorious form draped languidly over him, the glisten of his sweat making him almost glow, Alec strengthened his resolve.

“I’m done,” he stated. Before Jace could misinterpret him, Alec smiled at him, with the most wide, genuine, euphoric smile he could muster. Jace widened his eyes at that, confusion written all over him. “I’m done worrying! I’m done bowing down, I’m done living for others and not taking what I want! And I won't do it now either. Jace, I won’t let you – this – go, if you won’t let me go as well.”

His words were slowly sinking in, cause Jace’s mouth started widening, a sparkling, triumphant look paving its way in his eyes. “Are you sure?”

“Yes.” He cupped Jace’s face, and, in that moment, it felt like holding his entire world in the palm of his hands. “I can’t fool myself any longer, can I? I love you. I’ve always loved you, and I always will. Nothing and no one could ever change that, whether I want it or not. And, honestly, I’m fine with it. If you will have me…I am yours, my parabatai.”

Only a few hours earlier, he had dreaded to bare all of his deepest and most shameful desires in front of Jace, the thought of revealing his most vulnerable parts for his parabatai to take and crush at his will making him feel sick, but now that he was literally naked in front of him...he had never felt more confident. After how he had just made love to Jace, with everything he had, pleasuring him as well as himself in too many ways to count, the reactions and wanton desire he spurred in Jace shocking him at the very core (not even in his dreams...).  After how Jace had made love to him, well beyond hope and imagination, so much that Alec at some point had screamed his name till he was hoarse (he had cried, by the Angel)...would there ever be anything anymore that his parabatai didn't know of him? The thought of just how eagerly and desperately he had opened himself up to Jace and melted at his every touch wasn't even a cause of embarassment, but of the greatest joy.

Because what they had, what they felt, couldn’t be measured, couldn’t be restricted, especially without even a legit reason for it…thus, he was done tiptoeing around ancient Laws, driving himself crazy over the possible consequences. His life was his, and he would live it to the fullest. That meant having Jace. 

The man in question was uncharacteristically silent. Alec looked at him, and he noticed how his enthusiasm had faded, his grin turned into a sorrowful frown... “Alec, I–”

Of course, of course he had jumped too high. Feeling like he had just received an electric shock, Alec started drawing his hands away. Jace, however, was faster, and he stopped him by holding his hands with his own.

“Wait. I just mean…I love you, too, Alec. Of course I love you! And I’d like so much to just dive in into this with not a care in the world. But you – we – could lose everything! And I’m not letting you ruin your life – your family, your carreer! – just because of me. Alec, I can’t. Think about it…you already have everything you need. I could talk to Magnus, seriously! I can make him see that this was all a mistake, I’m sure he’ll take you back, he loves you! You could be happy with him, without all the trouble you’d have to go through to be with me…”

“To love is to destroy, and to be loved is to be the one destroyed, isn't that right?” Alec said. He couldn’t mask the severity in his tone.

“Well, yes, but that’s not what –”

“Jace.” That name had always been a prayer in Alec's mind, and he always tried to convey with it more than he could say. Yet, Alec needed actual words to speak for him. “The trouble I’d go through to be with you, wouldn’t be so troubling****...because I’d be with you. I don’t want to lose the rest, but I don’t want to lose this either...We, together, can make it! I believe it! If I have faith in something, it's you. It’s always been you.” 

"But...we'd be breaking the Law." Jace's voice was strained, yet unable to mask the hope in it, which he was obviously trying not to lean into, and failing.

Alec couldn't help but snort. "Since when do you care about the Law?"

Jace rolled his eyes, a bashful look on his face. "I'll admit I have my reservations...but you care."

"I do, but don't you see? I'd break every Law - for you, Jace."

Jace inhaled sharply, slowly, trying to take it all in, his eyes almost glistening. “Alec...I don’t know if I’m worth that much.”

Alec pushed himself closer, his hands still holding Jace’s face. Leaning forward, he put his lips on Jace’s forehead, tenderly, earnestly, trying to convey in his kiss everything he felt for him. Then he moved to his nose, his eyelids, both of his cheeks, his chin…when he reached Jace's lips it was only to softly brush against them.

“You will always be worth it.”