Dr. Shoko had been trying to explain what happened to me, not that I could bring myself to care. Though I was glad to have my arm fixed. We had been sitting here for what felt like hours. Her lips were moving, but the words weren't registering.
"-production of cursed energy output means-" Her voice drifted in and out, like a television left on in the next room. Distantly, the murmuring of her voice morphed into the sound of the last movie I had watched with my mother. I stared down at my hands in my lap. I could almost still see the stains of her blood on my fingers. My throat tightened, the air felt like it was thinning as the room seemingly tilted and swayed. Dr. Shoko's voice filtered back in again.
"-Gojo certainly did what he could, but something like this needs regular treatment, so you'll have to come back here-"
"Stop."
One word from me cut through everything so quickly, but I hadn't been talking to her. There was a buzzing in my ears, an electrical hum that wouldn't quit. My hands covered my ears, and the buzz persisted, deep inside, against my skull—a wasps' nest. Hadn't she just healed me? Every inch of skin was writhing along my muscles, like I was coming apart. The firm press of my fingertips into the side of my head wasn't enough; the length of them curled around the tangled locks, and pulled.
"Breathe, Vaca."
Dr. Shoko's voice sounded farther now, the room narrowing and lengthening to place me at one end, far from her. The pale light above me dimmed, and my breathing picked up. Ama, she was- Fuck, why was I feeling like this?! The sting of my scalp wasn't enough, it had dulled. Hands rested on my shoulders, but I couldn't remember whose for a moment.
Her blood on my hands.
"Stop it!" I hissed. There was a burning in my throat, acid eating away at the soft flesh within. With a hard yank, I tried to feel something else. This body, this stupid broken husk, was failing. The faint snapping of hair was in the back of my mind, and my grip loosened ever so slightly by the strands pulled from their follicles. The sight was branded beneath my eyelids, every blink brought me back. Her ribs opened, a still heart sitting atop her lap. Sightless eyes that looked through me.
"Reyna, breathe!" Her voice was sharp, cleaving into my mind with a force I hadn't expected. My head snapped up. The room was as it was before. Cold hands held my wrists, tight, as I tried to suck in more air through my mouth.
Her eyes hardened as they met mine. I tried to speak, but no sound escaped my lips. My jaw snapped shut with a soft click. The acid was spreading, making every twitch burn. It made me maddeningly aware of every part of my body. How could I stop being, stop burning?
"This is the seal! Just keep breathing, in through the mouth and out through the nose." Those were commands, my mind grasped them and pulled a stuttering breath into my desperate lungs. Warm air was pushed through my nose, and the cycle was repeated. "The seal that you got put on you—it's making you feel this way."
"B-burning!" I croaked, voice strained and cracking as I tried to push through. Her hands released me, and a glass of cold water was shoved into my hands. I drank the entire thing as though I had never drunk anything in my life. My shoulders protested my hunched posture as I choked on the last bit of the cold liquid.
The sensations ebbed as breathing became easier, and less involved. I no longer had to will myself to drag unwilling oxygen into my lungs. Dr. Shoko stood patiently at my side, busied by the cigarette pack in her hands, tapping it against her palm to pack the tobacco. Placing a dart in her mouth, the orange filter sat between pale lips and remained unlit.
"The seal put on you, I don't know what it was meant to do, but I'll tell you what it is doing." Her unflappable demeanor was far different from what I remembered of Gojo's. Each word bounced the cigarette between her lips, its presence having no effect on the clarity of her voice. "It's disrupting your retention of cursed energy. With Gojo slapping a barrier around it, you're retaining ambient cursed energy. Before, you were passively absorbing it all the time, and in return, you leaked some out, like a non-sorcerer."
There was a pause, and I knew it was my cue to ask questions. Cursed energy, negative emotions that birthed curses. I had been soaking it up like some rag, and now it was going to poison me from the inside out. "What kind of treatment do I need?" Was there some kind of cursed dialysis I was going to have to do?
"First, I have to figure out how it works, or at least someone has to. It's tied directly with your nervous system, and to remove it without paralyzing or killing you, I have to unravel it. You'll see me regularly for observation and to slowly work on the seal." This woman fully admitted to not knowing how the seal that branded into me even worked. I had willingly given my life to these people. There wasn't a clear answer who was more stupid.
"So, you don't know how to remove it without killing me, and if it's left untreated, it's probably going to kill me." I placed my feet on the floor, the weakness in my legs warning me of an impending fall. The protest of my body hardly mattered; if I wanted to stand, I would. My left hand braced my weight on the bedframe, body leaning to one side as I maintained my upright position. I was fine, or I would be.
"Pretty much." Seeing me stand must have been her cue that her job was finished. "Gojo will meet you here soon. So don't wander off." Her warning trailed off as she exited the room, and my heavy feet took slow steps forward to follow her out. She was much faster and was gone without a trace by the time I got into the hall. My shoulder now took the brunt of my weight as I leaned on the wall to drag my carcass along. There were no windows, the walls were wood-paneled from the middle down to the floor, and the top half looked to be some sort of plaster. The place looked ancient, like rural hospitals pre-tuberculosis.
The only thing modern in the place was the lights, which illuminated the long rows of closed doors with no identifying markings on them. This could have been an asylum for all I knew. Suddenly, my lifelong fear of being stuffed into the loony bin meant nothing.
Ignoring Dr. Shoko's orders, I walked down the hall, the dull vibration in the back of my mind threatening to roar to life once more if I gave it my attention. My hand ran along the small bumps and dips within the plaster, the feeling of them was like pressing my skin against sharp stones. Even my clothing, still covered in dried sick and other stains I couldn't stand, was sandpaper on my skin. My brows furrowed, attempting to shield my eyes from the spotlights above me. There was something here, I couldn't pinpoint it, almost as if the air was different.
My eyes closed as I continued walking, the feeling of something beneath my feet persisted. Within my mind's eye, the sense of a presence was there. I stopped moving, trying to see if I could feel it clearer, the buzzing in my head increasing in intensity. A sharp pain flared behind my eyes and I clutched my head in shock, my legs crumpling beneath me. "Fuuuck." My knuckles pressed ionto my temples, air hissed from between gritted teeth as I tried to ket the pain to retreat.
"Not much of an escape artist, are you?" A voice rang out, much closer than expected.
"Pinche hijo de tu puta madre!" I cursed, scrambling away from Gojo, who was crouched way too close for comfort. Amusement practically radiated off him. He looked more or less the same as the first time I saw him, except the blindfold was replaced with bandages wrapped around his head. The blindfold had made him look insane. The bandages? They just made him look ridiculous.
"I don't know what that means," he said, grinning. "Nice to see you again, Reyna-chan!" He added a goofy wave for effect, his voice lifting when he said my name. Great. Exactly what I needed. His energy was the last thing I could handle right now. Even if I was glaring daggers, Gojo didn't seem to care. Not that I expected anything different from him.
"I was just looking around. For all I know, you could've had me committed." Standing up was harder than it should've been, but there was no way I was staying on the floor while he was around. Gojo's unnecessarily long legs straightened as I got to my feet, making me crane my neck just to keep him in sight.
"So mistrustful," he teased, as if I was being unreasonable. "I did come to your rescue, after all." He gave a shake of his head, the ever-present smile still there.
He walked past me, moving down the same path I had been following. At least now I knew I was heading in the right direction—to the exit.
"Hey, wait, you've got some explaining to do!" I snapped, trying—and failing—to match the pace of his long-legged stride. It would've been hard enough even if I didn't feel like complete shit.
"Oh, do I now?" Gojo replied, turning to face me with a lazy grin, still walking backwards like it was nothing. "Well, what do you want to know? I'm an open book!" The casual way he said it tightened my jaw. He really wasn't taking me seriously.
"Why am I dying?" I demanded, skipping to the point. "Shoko told me about your little patch job." I quickened my pace to keep up as he walked, stairs and all. He didn't even turn around to navigate them. Of course not. Show-off. "You think I would've agreed to your offer if I knew I was gonna kick the bucket right after?"
"You're only technically dying," he said, tone infuriatingly cheery. "You're not dead and you're not gonna die." He gave me a look like it was no big deal. As if that made it better. Gojo wasn't exactly the most reliable source. He was about as serious as a Saturday morning cartoon character. "I'll have the seal figured out like—" He snapped his fingers with a grin, "that!"
I squinted as we stepped out into the light, throwing an arm up to shield my eyes. "Fine, so why am I technically dying? And what about Matsushita? Is he dead?"
I paused for a moment in the sun, letting it soak into my skin, the strange pulse of something beneath my feet growing stronger, like a heartbeat in the ground. The moment was over as Gojo returned to walking.
"Oh, the guy who put that seal on you? He ran before I even showed up. Who wouldn't, once they knew I was coming?" Gojo's casual tone never wavered as he began leading me down empty pathways. Sporadically, I could feel someone's presence brush past—triumph, disdain, relief flickering at the edge of my senses.
"Matsushita is the man my father sent to—" My knuckles cracked as my fingers curled tightly into fists, a heavy weight settled at the base of my throat. I sucked in a sharp breath through my teeth. "If anyone deserves to kill him, it's me. I'll tear his curse apart... and then him." The heat of anger surged through my veins, hot and fast. I hadn't even realized I'd stopped walking until I felt the weight of a hand on my head.
"Good news, this is just the place to learn how to do that. Lucky for you, you have the best teacher for that, me." He announced, pressing down on the crown of my head until my ears met my shoulders. I swatted at his hand to remove it, only to realize that I couldn't even touch him.
"What the fuck-" My hand pushed, the sensation of trying to stick my hand against nothing was frustrating. I almost couldn't believe it had happened at all. A chill crept up my arm as I gave one more push. This was impossible, I didn't even move despite the amount of strength I used. Admittedly, I felt far weaker than I normally did. I jerked my hand back and scrambled away, desperate to put distance between us. This reminded me too much of the hospital, when he looked at me with those glowing eyes and I knew I was in the room with something that should not be. "You're not human." I accused quietly.
"Oh, so you've learned my secret? It seems you're too perceptive for your own good." His voice was so serious, I felt my heart stop. Gojo's long index finger climbed to the top of the bandages wrapped around his head. The slight breeze passed between the buildings and I could feel it brush against my clammy palms. I tried to take a swallow, but the lump in my throat made it impossible.
"What are you saying…" I whispered in horrified anticipation over what he would reveal to me. He pulled down the bandages and I nearly flinched away. I forced my gaze to match his, only to see a second set of bandages beneath the first. My world grew smaller until all I could see were those white scraps of fabric, mocking me. Gojo began laughing, breaking the tense silence with the obnoxious sound of his joy.
The sensation of every joint in my body weakening to the point of no longer holding me together, crept from my toes to the top of my head. My hand braced myself on the wall of the building, a foreign sound joining Gojo, a high-pitched and choked giggle. This was madness. My life was over before I could properly kill the men responsible for… Nothing made sense and this white haired asshole was laughing. I hadn't realized at first that I was laughing with him. My other hand buried itself in my hair, gripping the base of the strands tightly as the laughter didn't stop. I couldn't breathe, or think. Tears flowed down my cheeks as I laughed, unable to hold them back.
It wasn't long before I was sobbing. My face was twisted into an ugly expression as I took ragged, hitching, breaths. I felt a hand grab my shoulder and the whole world warped. There was a tugging just behind my navel, and everything shifted in the blink of an eye. What was once an outdoor pathway between two buildings, became a hallway lined with doors. This was different from the hospital, and the abrupt change in the scenery snapped me out of my breakdown. My fists scrubbed away the tears and I refused to look at Gojo.
"I'm funny, but you laid it on pretty thick there." Gojo said, to my surprise, I could sense his awkwardness. It seemed even he had a weakness, emotional teen girls.
"You're not funny, I'm just not myself today." My voice was perfectly flat, even if I could feel the hot puffiness in my face.
Gojo didn't respond immediately, the silence stretching between us as he waited for me to piece myself together.
"Well, this is the dorm for Jujutsu High. I'm sure you'll make yourself at home." He drawled, throwing open one of the doors to reveal a barren room. Right in the center was a box, stuffed full of random things.
Immediately, I recognized some of the items. They were things from my home. I hadn't thought about home. Not that I'd ever want to go back. It wasn't home without…
My hands held onto the photo that had been sitting atop. My mom at my middle school graduation. Her smile was beaming, arms wrapped around me, while I scowled. She always looked like she was expecting something great to happen. I remember she wouldn't stop talking about all the friends I'd make in high school. She was such an idiot, a hopeful idiot. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Gojo milling around, finding random things to busy himself with.
"Thank you." My words were muttered and flat, but he didn't make a big show of things, surprisingly.
"I don't know what you mean. I had some assistants gather some things for you since you wouldn't be able to go back while they cleaned." He waved me off, and I didn't push the small flicker of gratitude the gesture had left me with. "My condolences. Things are tough now, but they'll only get tougher. You will too."
"What now? I'm here, I'm losing my mind. Now I just go to school and pretend it's all normal?" The frame dug into my hands as my knuckles went white.
"It is normal. You can't save everyone, not even the people you want to save more than anyone." The was a flare, a stabbing blade made from bitter emotions sinking into my chest for a moment." His voice was unusually somber. The sight of his expression made my skin itch. As much as I hated his childish attitude, the feeling of discomfort his sobriety gave me was much less welcomed.
I shook my head. No answer would satisfy me, not the way destroying Matsushita would. For that, I needed to improve and make use of him. "It doesn't fucking matter. Just make me strong enough so I can start taking out curses."
"Now, that's the kind of enthusiasm I like." The goofy smile was back, which was almost a relief, I couldn't stand the idea of him trying to comfort me. I didn't need anyone's pity. Every limb felt heavy with exhaustion. "You'll be out there exorcising curses in no time. In fact, I have a great idea for class tomorrow. So, get plenty of sleep." He seemed in a rush to leave, his emotions a tangled web that lingered at the edge of my senses until he disappeared.
The room felt impossibly empty. Nothing but a box of whatever was in arms reach from my home, a bed, and a nightstand. If I had been given a chance to pack, I doubted I would have taken much anyway.
"Nothing, I'm nothing! It's all gone." squealed a voice, I felt a disgustingly familiar weight settle around my neck. A smooth, cold, pressure pressed into my cheek. The thing was back and it was nuzzling me. Revolting. My hand curled around its long body as I yanked the curse off. It squirmed and screeched, the soft body squishing as I tightened my grip. A singular eye, that overtook its face, blinked at me. The mouth opening to reveal rows of sharp teeth, as if that would intimidate me.
"What the fuck are you doing here, you little shit?" It didn't answer, I gave another squeeze and the curse made a noise a bit like a squeaky dog toy as its collar flared out. For a moment, I thought about trying to exorcise it on my own, I had managed it once. Just a little bit of power and it would be gone forever. The curse seemed to sense my thoughts as it went from handing limply in my hand to writhing again, an almost panicked expression on its face.
As much as the tiny thing deserved to be destroyed, I couldn't bring myself to do it. I just wanted to sleep, and escape the nightmare I was in. Even if just for a few hours. Getting rid of it now wouldn't do much. Though, it would maybe make my neck feel lest strained.
"Sleep forever, never wake up." It crooned, I made a noise of distaste and threw the curse across the room. Seeing it bounce against the wall it slammed into with a surprised shriek gave me some small amount of satisfaction. It might make a decent punching bag.
"Shut the fuck up, you better make yourself scarce. There's tons of people around here who would exorcise you without a second thought." My warning seem to convince it that I was trying to protect the thing. It eagerly returned to me and wrapped itself around my arm. "Myself included, idiot." The curse didn't stir, just thrummed with the collection of grief and despair that made up its form.
It didn't leave as I crawled into bed, pulling the cold sheets over myself as I tried to will my mind to shut off. My eyelids felt like lead, but the bed was too foreign to provide any comfort. The room was still new and strange around me.
"Sleep forever, never wake up." The curse purred into my skin, its body vibrating as it found contentment in my presence. I could feel it soaking in the turmoil that laid within me. Hearing the thoughts, that I didn't want to acknowledge, parroted back at me did nothing to make the transition into sleep any easier. I got there eventually, my mind turning to blissful nothingness.
