Stay of Execution - 1.1

Her stomach felt like it was trying to eat itself.

Not even harassing the flyheads distracted her enough to forget. Instead, Ara slumped bonelessly against the concrete. "Nigi," she groaned, "I think they poisoned me." After a few seconds of no response, she continued. "Nigi, I'm dying."

She felt a hand rest on her shoulder for a moment, then Nigi replied, "Fortunately, that doesn't seem to be the case—though you are clearly suffering from some malady I cannot discern, you are not dying." The other curse paused, humming to himself in thought.

"The boba gods hate curses." She twisted onto her side, and the mask scraped like talons against the ground. "Go on without me."

"No, no. That will not do at all, Ara." The smaller curse yelped as she was picked up and slung over her companion's shoulder in one motion. "I will not be leaving you to suffer—much less unsupervised! I can scarcely fathom what mischief you might get up to while alone and—"

"I do not get up to mischief," she said flatly, "I haven't done that once."

Nigi looked at her, unimpressed.

"...I haven't done that once this week." she amended. Ara squirmed, trying to get him to drop her.

The taller curse sighed. "Regardless of the frequency of your mischief-making, the point stands." He reached up and set her back down on her feet. "Now come along; I planned to visit one of those temples of the sick this eve, and there will surely be mindless curses with which you might ease your stomach."

"Yeah, well, you're a boring old man," she muttered. "Now I don't wanna." Nonetheless, she followed—making sure her feet scraped the ground as loud as possible with each step.

"You know very well that I am bare minutes older than you, Ara."

"Practically vintage."

Nigi pursed his lips. "Please tell me you don't plan to keep this up the entire trip."

She absolutely did.

Nigi endured Ara's barrage of frankly ageist name-calling with a quiet sort of acceptance. Thankfully, she seemed to grow bored of the practice by the time they reached the stark white building. After leaving Ara outside with a gathering of flyheads to keep her occupied, the grey-skinned curse entered the white temple, passing beneath the scarlet sigil that marked this place: two intersecting bars, one vertical and one horizontal.

He passed many a weary, ill supplicant who waited patiently for their turn to receive succor, as well as the priests and priestesses who attended them—each marked by their curious white overcoats and turquoise habits. None he passed spared him so much as a glance, but that was expected, given his nature.

As Nigi navigated the temple's pristine hallways, he heard a loud, piercing noise from through an open window. He paused mid-stride, frowned, then shook his head and moved on.

It was nothing.

Finally, the curse found what he was looking for. He entered a room, empty save for a single supplicant. The old, withered human was laid out upon a bedlike that Nigi suspected doubled as an altar, numerous ritual implements attached to their face and arms as they slept. Their breath was weak and ragged, punctuated by the slow, consistent beat coming from one of the boxlike totems that surrounded the sleeping man.

Nigi let out a sigh as he silently looked at the dying human, an emotion he lacked the knowledge and vocabulary to describe welling up inside him as he approached the altar and took a seat beside the supplicant. Gently, the ashen-skinned curse took the man's hand in between his own, and bowed his head.

Another jarring noise rang out, this one further away than the last, but Nigi ignored it. It was nothing.

Unwilling to let himself become distracted, Nigi turned his attention inward, as he ever did when using his jujutsu. As expected, the dying man was positively seething with regrets and negativity—when he passed, there was no doubt that a curse would spawn.

Abruptly, the hairs on the back of Nigi's neck stood on end, and he realized that he was being watched. Rather than react, though, he continued focusing on his jujutsu; with extreme delicacy and extreme gentleness, he teased the nascent curse from the dying human's essence and drew it into himself. His own cursed energy swelled ever so slightly, even as the sickly supplicant's raspy breathing became ever so slightly calmer.

The human was still dying—Nigi had no way to fix human illnesses or age, after all. Nonetheless, his ingestion of the old man's regrets and rage would ease his passing, if nothing else.

Finally, Nigi raised his head, and turned his gaze towards the one watching him, standing as he did so. It was another human, a one with stark white hair and wearing a blindfold just as he was. Despite this, the man's stare was palpable. Even more palpable, though, was the searing light that made up the stranger's cursed energy. Whoever he was, he was a jujutsu sorcerer, and a truly mighty one at that.

"You're a strange one, aren't you?" the sorcerer asked rhetorically, strolling forward and rubbing his chin thoughtfully.

Nigi tilted his head to one side quizzically. "Am I? I am afraid I do not follow, sir…?"

The man chuckled and let his hand drop to his side. "And now you're asking for my name. I guess you're the one my students called Nigi, then?" At Nigi's slow nod, he continued, "The name's Gojo."

The curse nodded, head still tilted in confusion.

"Now that we've got introductions out of the way, we can fight to the death~" Gojo chirped cheerfully, causing Nigi to tense up before the man continued. "...Is what I would usually do with an unregistered Special Grade curse, but I admit you've got me scratching my head!"

Nigi, still tense, swallowed before replying, "I…I must again ask you for…elaboration. What makes my existence such a conundrum for you?"

"Man, Maki wasn't lying—you really do talk like a geezer." Gojo muttered with a snort, causing Nigi to let out a 'tch' of annoyance as Ara's previous heckling was validated by a perfect stranger. "Aaaanyways," the sorcerer continued, uncaring of Nigi's internal crisis, "the fact that you let my students go without even trying to hurt them, and now I find you…what, sitting quietly with a dying guy and eating his regrets?" Gojo raised his arms to either side in an exaggerated shrug. "You're not acting like any curse I've ever seen, and I've seen a lot of 'em."

Nigi cupped his chin thoughtfully. Before he could reply to the sorcerer's statement, though, two noises rang out at once: another blaring burst of noise from outside, and a peppy little jingle from Gojo's direction. The sorcerer removed a small slab from his pocket, which lit up at his touch. His lips turned downwards as he looked at it.

At the same time, Nigi sighed, finally accepting what part of him had known to be the truth the whole time.

It had not been nothing.

After running out of synonyms for 'geezer', Nigi had dropped her off outside the building with very clear instructions not to move.

She took that to mean 'don't move super far' and decided to start poking around (and inside) the metal contraptions that the humans left unattended. Her stomach had largely settled at this point, but she still felt antsy enough to pace divots into the ground. Whatever these things were, they came in a lot of colors- which she liked. She nearly got hit by one that sported flashing lights and ear-splitting sounds, and she wondered if she could get one of the noisemakers for personal use.

Eventually, she stumbled into another building right next to the one she was supposed to be outside of. It was split into a bunch of layers, each one with little ramps and spaces to put your own contraption. Like a collection, maybe. She wasn't sure why anyone would have so many otherwise.

Fairly universally, they had buttons and levers and whatever else she couldn't discern the purpose of, and their own noise makers that she was able to activate if she phased through the window and hit the circles hard enough. There was other stuff, too, but mostly wires and strings or papers– nothing she wanted to take with her. By the time she'd reached the third floor, she figured she learned all there was to know about hitting human contraptions and decided to try her luck somewhere else.

Nigi wouldn't mind, probably.

As long as she could see the building, she was practically right next to it. She jumped from one of the lofts and looked around. If she wandered a bit, there were more shrines, but none of them looked like the café, so they probably didn't have anything good. Some of them kept pet plants outside the windows; a small human stuck their face in one before being dragged away, so she made the executive decision to see what the big deal was.

They smelled weird.

Not bad weird. Just… Weird.

She spotted a few more contraptions, but these ones were moving. A frown. Did she miss the button that did that, maybe? Ara made her way over to where a few of them were standing still- a couple with humans, a couple without. She leaned inwards to hit one of the noisemakers–

…

And felt a pair of eyes on her back.

One of the closest devices had a human in it who was looking right at her. The illusion took hold with a shiver down her spine, and she decided to meet their gaze head-on.

She made fun of Nigi for looking old, but this guy had actual lines around his eyes. He wore a mask, too, but it was see-through, resembling little windows wrapped in metal. Weird. His face looked more or less the same as any other human, apart from the lines, but his clothes looked a little funny.

Well, if he wasn't going to say anything, she was.

"Why are you wearing a collar?" In case he couldn't hear her, she started tapping on his window. "Are you supposed to pull the bit that hangs down?"

He blinked up at her, and something weird happened to his face. That meant something on humans, she was pretty sure, but Nigi was able to tell more easily. "Huh? A-are you… Please don't." it came out quickly.

Oh. So you were supposed to pull on it, but maybe not with strangers?

"My name's Ara." She leaned over the window, waiting for him to go next. "Now you."

One hand fell to his side, but it probably didn't mean anything. "I-Ijichi." Good. Now they weren't strangers. That meant…

"Can I pull your collar now 'cause we're friends?"

"No. Er… That is…"

She waited patiently for him to continue before sighing. "You're not good at talking, are you? Do you need to practice?" His face changed again, and she decided to keep going. "That's fine, I guess. But it's supposed to make you better, so you should do that." A pause. It sucked that she couldn't pull…

…

She reached forward and her hand was slapped away. Damn. He looked up at her with… Something. "You're weird." she said. What else was she supposed to do, then? Leave? He had one of those weird contraptions, and he didn't look like he wanted to say much. Ijichi could just stay inside. Ara had no idea where he'd been, either, so she didn't feel comfortable just getting in. What if whatever was wrong was contagious?

Then again… The contraption itself was a point of interest.

"Hey, hey." He looked up from his lap. "Do you know how to make this thing work?" She knocked on its metal top.

"...I do."

Good. "What's this button do?" she reached through one of the windows and pointed to one of the big ones.

"T-those are hazard lights." Oh, so they lit up? She pressed it and something started clicking.

Again, and it stopped.

"Cool. And this one–" she slammed the noise-maker, and the human jumped in his seat "-makes noises. So you can do both."

He remained quiet, looking at her with another weird face.

"What do the rest do?"

Ijichi looked down, and she noted a smaller device– one that lit up, apparently?- before he pressed something and quickly stowed it away.

He swallowed.

"T-this one is, er… It turns on the radio…"

Nigi tapped a sandaled foot, staring at Ara with a frown that was visible even past his blindfold. Gojo, for his part, had relaxed once he saw that Ichiji was untouched (albeit visibly rattled). The older curse let out a sigh and asked, "What did I say about mischief, Ara?"

She glanced towards the newcomer, who stared back unabashedly. "You say a lot of things." The younger curse scratched the back of her neck. "I barely moved. It's not that big a deal." She pointed to Ijichi. "Look, I made a human friend. I pressed the buttons on his car and everything." This wasn't spoken with pride; it was clear she was trying to worm her way out of trouble.

Nigi massaged the base of his horn with the tips of his fingers. If he were a human, he suspected he'd have a headache. "You can tell as well as I can that this fellow is practically oozing panic—in fact, you should be able to tell better than I can!"

He turned his head briefly towards Ichiji, an apology on his lips, but quickly thought better of it when he tasted just how much worse even the slightest bit of his attention made the haggard man's emotions. Instead, he sighed again and continued, "Not to mention all of those strange noises I heard from within the white temple, or all those flyheads that you left behind for me to gather."

"I dunno, humans look the same. Maybe his face just does that sometimes." Ara wrinkled her nose. "Don't discriminate."

Gojo let out a chuckle, sipping from a cup he'd procured from…somewhere. "I like her; she's funny!"

"I'm not, and you look like a grandpa."

Gojo snorted, spitting out some of his drink before glibly shooting back, "So do you."

"I do not." She crossed her arms. "And you got outta the place where old people go to die."

"Hey, if they let me leave then clearly I'm not old, right?" The sorcerer crossed his arms with a smirk.

"I bet your favorite drink is glue!"

As Gojo let out a bark of laughter, Nigi gave a groan. "Ara, please." He muttered, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"Shut up, I'm winning."

Gojo raised his arms in mock surrender. "Alright, alright. I can tell when I'm outmatched in a battle of wits."

"Yeah, you'd better," she muttered.

It was obvious to Nigi that Gojo was humoring her, but she seemed to take his response at face-value… as she did most everything.

"Alright, I've decided." The sorcerer clapped his hands together. "I'm not going to kill you here." He talked about their deaths like one would the weather, and the smile did not once part from his face. "I'm technically supposed to exorcise every curse I come across—nothing personal! But I think probation's a better option."

"See," Gojo continued, "I let you live. You keep up the good behavior. And maybe, if I ask you for some teeny-tiny favors down the line…" His smile widened. "No skin off your back, right? Consider it an exchange of services."

Nigi swallowed thickly, glancing briefly at Ara. Her shoulders tensed, and he slammed his hand over her mouth before she could say anything.

"Those terms are…agreeable." Nigi replied haltingly, letting out a hiss of pain as a maw of razor-sharp teeth sank into the skin of his hand. He kept it there nonetheless, knowing she would be screaming expletives the instant he let go. She aimed a vicious kick at his ankles that he barely managed to sidestep.

Gojo watched the exchange with that same pleasant smile, then gave an exaggerated thumbs up. "Great! I'm glad we understand each other!" He brought his hands together, delicately interlacing his fingers. "I'll see you in a few days—don't cause too much trouble before then, hm?"

And with a pulse of cursed energy that hurt to look at and seared Nigi's tongue, the sorcerer was gone.

A few seconds later, he removed his hand from Ara's mouth, mindful of the dark-purple liquid that dripped down his wrist. The first expletive that followed wasn't from his companion, however, but rather the human Gojo had left behind.

He slammed the door of his contraption harder than he needed to, not taking his eyes off either of them, and sped off at a considerably higher speed than any other contraptions passing by.

"Fuck you!" Ara screamed to the air, and Nigi couldn't bring himself to ask if she was talking to him or Gojo. And frankly, either way he couldn't say he disagreed with the sentiment.