Usually I keep OC fanfic fantasies in my head and the same scene'll run in my head over and over. I thought I'd put this idea out and be done but more are coming out. Maybe I'll rewrite chapter 1 and add a little more world building. Who knows? We'll see.
A successful hospital usually harbours weak, minor curses. They hang out in the quiet corners, preying on the weary.
Reina avoided them. On occasion, she'd come in contact with the tiny curses and purify them. Petty mosquito-like curses, originating from those bothered by their parking spot taken or a fit of jealousy over a promotion. Inevitably discovering the origins of these minor curses via purification put Reina at an advantage if she ever wanted an upgrade. She knew all the dirty little secrets or- at least, the embarrassing ones.
The effect of eliminating the little curses had a more considerable impact within the system. The get-well roses lasted a tad longer, staff seemed to cooperate better, people called in less often, patient recovery was faster. But it didn't mean people didn't suffer or die. The tough moments were just more peaceful.
The abandoned hospitals are usually the problem. It was inside an abandoned hospital that Reina's older sister Mieko and herself discovered they were little clerics. And the first time, Reina imprinted in herself the equivalent of a snuff film. It took years to get over, countless nightmares, and an overgrown bedwetting issue.
...
21 years before Itadori's consumption of the Finger
5-year-old Reina and 7-year-old Mieko played in a field near their home on a balmy summer day. Their mother, Kira, recently ran away from the city to try her luck at homesteading with her two little daughters.
Where was the father?
We'll get to that another time.
The girls adjusted quickly, excited to run around, pick flowers, and play make-believe with the life that surrounded them.
At the time of the soon-to-be-described incident, Kira ran errands and trusted the girls to stay close. Having just moved, their mother's mind was far away from the abandoned asylum nearby.
The thing about high-grade curses- they could hide even from the most sensitive of noses. Kira's was average at best for curse detection.
Mieko and Reina were remaking a fairy tale their mother read to them at bedtime, sloppily weaving a crown and cape out of pieces of tall grass and stems. They decorated their carefully braided hairdos with wildflowers. They both wanted to be the princess. And for a minute, they bickered on about who was the princess and who was the prince.
Reina, being the youngest, automatically got the undesirable part- the prince. She lost her patience and threw a tantrum. She ran from Mieko and into the nearby forest. Mieko followed, apologizing, begging her not to tell mom.
Reina climbed into some bushes, feeling the branches scrape up against her delicate skin. She didn't care. She'd do anything to find someone else to play with. She was gonna reach the other side of the forest and see another world. Princess and prince were stupid anyway. Mieko was stupid.
Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.
Reina could hear Mieko trailing behind. She crawled faster, going through some metal wire and discovering a trail. It had some old signs, but she couldn't read them well. She was 5.
Some crows cawed.
She stopped.
She didn't feel right. And there was a peculiar smell.
But Reina was determined to find a new friend.
And that she did. A little girl appeared all of a sudden. She looked so much more different to Reina. Fragile, pale, and her hair in a strange hairstyle she'd never seen before. The hairstyle was pinned up in delicate flower-type pins, done perfectly. The girl wore a shapeless pale blue gown. It fit her loosely, nothing tied at her waist. The sleeves could probably fit her head through!
The little girl looked straight into Reina's vivacious gaze, "Do you wanna play?" She asked in a quiet mutter, as though the wind blew through her words.
Reina didn't know the meaning of eerie at the time. The little sunkissed, scraped-up child was just happy she found a new person to play with, "Of course! My name's Reina. What's your name?"
The girl didn't answer, "follow me," she walked further down the trail at what seemed to be a running pace. Reina followed, jogging to keep up.
"You walk really fast!"
They reached the other "side" of the forest to find what Reina at the time could only describe as a castle. Vines dominated the giant grey bricks, tattered windows were protected by metal bars. Some windows were boarded, others smashed. The gardens were overgrown with weeds. Whatever flowers that tried to bloom died at budding.
The little girl stopped at the gates of the so-called castle, and Reina stood by her.
"Do you wanna play fix the castle?" Reina asked, excited to start pulling weeds.
The little girl stared at the gate, transfixed a blank expression. A single tear slid down her cheek.
A sudden tap on her shoulder made Reina scream. She turned around to face her least favourite person at the moment—stupid Mieko.
"We shouldn't be here. Let's go home."
"But Mieko, a new friend!" Reina pointed to the little girl, who was now gone. The closed gate creaked open, "she's probably inside the castle! We need to fix it, and there's probably enough room for two or three princesses!"
Mieko looked up at the building. Honestly, it gave her the creeps. But Reina was right. It was big enough for the both of them to reign, "Let's go in!"
They pushed the heavy, rusted gate over and ran towards the entrance. There were signs everywhere citing foreclosure and to be demolished. They couldn't read all that well.
Double metal doors graced the entrance to this old castle, and they creaked open as if to welcome the two girls. Reina and Mieko looked over at each other with determination and nodded. They went in.
Immediately, they entered the reception. First thing to view was an old wooden desk with the cabinets ripped apart as if the place had been looted before. The metal doors slammed shut through a gust of wind, startling the two. It was too dark for them to see. Mieko felt the walls for light switches but found they didn't work.
"Reina let's get out of here. I don't think this is a castle. Castles don't have desks!" This was sound enough logic for Reina to agree. The girls tried to pry the doors open, but they weren't strong enough. "We're stuck! And I can't see a thing..."
"I learnt a new trick!" Reina chimed in, "I can make light with my hands!"
"No you can't."
"Yes I can!" Reina cupped her hands together and made light. What she didn't know was that this was her blessed energy manifesting. Mieko, in awe, tried to touch it. It wasn't hot, it wasn't cold, it didn't hurt her eyes, "see!"
"How do make light like that? I wanna do it too!"
"I don't know? I put my hands together when I was washing my face like mom, and it came out!"
"Like this?" Mieko cupped her hands together.
"Yeah."
"It's not working."
"That means I should be the princess."
"Whatever. Let's find a way out of here."
Mieko linked arms with her sister. She was terrified, brows furled and frowning, holding back tears. Reina kept a brave face.
The little girl reappeared, as though she was glowing, as she ran off into another direction.
"That's her! Our new friend!"
Mieko stopped for a second. The light that girl had was different from Reina's light. It felt colder, "Reina, I don't think she's our friend. I think she's a ghost."
"No she talked to me! Ghosts don't talk. Maybe she knows the way out!"
Mieko sighed, "Maybe."
They followed the little girl, leading them down some stairs to a windowless basement. The light of Reina's blessed energy grew brighter. They found themselves in a hallway, doors neatly lined the halls. The ceilings were low, the walls dingy. The air felt colder and colder. Reina could feel Mieko's skin get rough with goosebumps.
"There she is!" Reina announced.
The little girl was standing in front of a doorway. Her pale, sallow, fragile face produced two more streams of tears, falling at the same rate. The girls faced her. Mieko felt terrible for her, "Don't cry," she unlinked arms with Reina, keeping the light and tried to hug the girl, who vanished as Mieko went in for the embrace, "ghost," Mieko muttered. Terrified, Mieko wet herself. Reina stood in shock, keeping the same brave face.
The door, with the number 1078, creaked open. What seemed to be a shadow crept up to Mieko and grabbed her.
"Sister! No!" Reina let out a blood-curdling scream. The door flung open, the light Reina carried revealed a grotesque, four-armed man-like creature. It held Mieko bridal style. It's other arms caressed her legs. Reina charged toward the creature, "let go of Mieko!" She pushed the light into it's legs to try and trip him. It dropped Mieko. She landed somewhat harshly on her bottom but was still okay. The creature slowly dissipated into white sparks. Mieko felt her fears melt away as the firefly-like rain floated onto her skin, healing the scabs she got from climbing the bushes while following Reina.
Mieko stood up to hug her little sister tightly, now kneeling. Reina whispered, "I'm sorry, all my friends, you hurt them. Why did you hurt them? I don't wanna see it anymore..." Reina fainted.
The lights flickered back on. Mieko tried to lift Reina, but she couldn't.
"Girls!" Kira yelled.
Mieko called back. Kira ran down the stairs with a policeman to find her tattered children close together. One asleep, another shaking.
"Momma, there was a scary man, and Reina made fire with her hands and burned him, and there was this little girl..." Kira embraced Mieko, caressing and kissing her forehead as if to say it was alright.
The policeman carried Reina out while Kira helped Mieko with a change.
The first curse Reina purified was the soul of a man who was cursed by many. He hurt children while dealing with his own harsh upbringing. A powerful curse of cyclical nature and Reina relived all the gruesome details as the policeman carried the listless child out the old asylum. He noticed new rose blooms in the unkempt garden as he brought the child into his car.
Reina's first purification altered the course of her development drastically. The image of a brave, smiling little girl shattered. She was reduced to a shell, spending a week in bed after the incident. She wasn't doing much better after being bedridden. Kira was fortunate to never come across a spirit of that calibre in her Priestess career, but she didn't know how to reach her little girl.
She decided to find her a therapist.
Reina didn't take to therapy at first, utterly untrusting of adults. Kira had to be present, and eventually, she let out every gruelling detail. Kira was mainly devastated yet felt a sliver of pride. Devastated Reina experienced extreme trauma but proud her child could be a Priestess of a certain calibre.
...
"How are your dreams?"
"Still bad." Reina replied. The man nodded, acknowledging her. Reina continued, "Well last night I dreamt I was in the body of this woman who was then kidnapped and uh, violated. And I felt every single burn, lash, and finally, strangulation. Then I woke up."
"You've never experienced anything like that before?"
"No."
"It's okay if you did," he scribbled something on a piece of paper, "this is a safe space."
"I haven't."
"Do you watch graphic media?"
Reina rolled her eyes, she'd gotten that question so many times before, they always meant pornography, "No."
"Books?"
"I'm a nurse, I see things all the time."
"How do you cope?"
"I cry a lot, drink sometimes, call my friends. I try to tell myself it isn't real," it's not your real, it's someone else's real, "sometimes I dance, meditate. I take my meds." Reina hated her meds. They made her feel like a zombie. But on the nights she didn't take them, she'd relive a curse's origin. Think of it like an all star episode.
"What's the worst part of the dreams?"
"There's a lot of pain, and every time I think I get used to a certain kind of pain, emotional or physical. My body conjures up another kind of dream and I have to work all over again."
"What kind of meds do you take?"
"Tranquilizers. Something for nerves, and something for sleep. I don't like how I feel the next morning though."
"Is it any better than after a nightmare?"
"I don't know... It's hard to balance the physical and mental aspects of the nightmares. It's either feel great but be sluggish, or be anxious but physically able to get up in the morning."
"What about another way to view the options? What if there was another way?"
Reina flinched, finally looking at the man in the eye, "what other way?"
"To be honest, I'm not entirely sure, it's up to you. Maybe have wakes for the people that die to calm the anxiety? You'd still feel it, but it's kind of like closure."
Her lips pensively curled upward, "I could try a couple mini wakes."
It was though a lightbulb went off in this guy, "I know you're very spiritual, so try some rituals that you're not familiar with or used to. These nightmares will continue, but you could switch the narrative from being scared of them, to carrying them. It's not your experience, but you're responsible for making sure they rest easy."
"That's... Actually really helpful."
Reina felt new motivation sprout, excited to carry the weight of the souls she purified.
She had to see their experiences as a privilege to view, not a burden. The purification part was not the end, it was what the Priest did to carry on their lesson and experience. Reina needed to show she understood. And she was ready to do just that.
She stopped by a florist and collected sweetpeas- goodbye, bluebells- gratitude, and white chrysanthemums- truth and death. She carefully set out a white and blue-purple arrangement and placed it on her table. Satisfied with the bouquet, she lit a candle and prayed for the first little girl ghost she met.
Thank you for sharing your tears.
Okay I'm depleted. Will see where this goes another day. Feel free to tell me what you think. Also I NEED THEORIES. Do you think Yuuji will die? What about Gojo? Ughh I consumed everything JJK with so much fervor. Also WTH is Megumi?