ITSY BITSY SPIDER. ― ( Jujutsu Kaisen )

CHAPTER ONE. curiosity killed the cat

( August 2017 )

"The person you have called cannot be—"

"I can feel it spreading. Stop playing with that goddamn phone and do something about it!"

Sometimes the woman thought something had to be terribly wrong with her; a faulty connection in her neural circuits or damage from all those times her master hit her in the head with training weapons. Because if not, why did she desire so much to release the spider from its cage and let her rip out the head of the spreading problem in her hand? Perhaps the longer she lived, the more she was becoming like the savage beast she shared a subconscious with. Was that how the shikigami completed her reincarnation cycles; by feeding on the humanity of her master?

Jorogumo was pacing inside her enclosure, stabbing all eight of her sharp legs to the folds of her brain, as the mystery object in the little wooden box itched just the right spot on the woman's cerebral cortex. But Arisu wasn't the spider. She couldn't go back to resting in her nest until another helpless animal was caught in her web. It was going to be another ghost for her if she was to give into the beast's urges. She had collected enough of them.

"Stop whining. You're a big guy." What an unpleasant view it was; four fat tumors burgeoned on mottled skin, feeding from each other through a web of pulsating blood vessels. A fifth one was heading under a damp patch of poorly bleached hair. It was spreading faster than anything she had seen before. "It's not spreading. A little reverse cursed technique, and you'll be as good as new."

The number in the parenthesis next to the contact name had already reached double digits. She pressed on it one more time knowing it was going to voicemail again. "Then fix it! Or... or... or I'll shoot you!"

Arisu looked up from the phone, then bursted out laughing; loud and degrading, shaking her entire body as she clutched her stomach and leaned against the hood of her convertible. A kind of laugh that would have made all the heads turn if there had been anyone other than birds and insects to witness their transaction. Even they were mocking his pathetic threat from somewhere far away.

"You're an amateur, aren't you? Do you even have an innate technique? A simple shikigami? Did no one teach you what would happen if you kill a sorcerer without jujutsu? It's Jujutsu 101." A shiny pistol was tucked into the waistband of his washed jeans. A kid who could see curses he had to be, recruited by the wrong people. He couldn't be a day older than twenty despite his appearance desperately trying to prove otherwise. "I can kill you before you even get a chance to reach for your gun. Or I can just wait until the curse kills you and take the box. Oh, by the way, I can't even use the reverse cursed technique for myself."

"What?"

"Do you really think I'd be here alone with you in the middle of nowhere if my life held that much value? Those are pretty rare to find."

"Then what's going to happen to me?"

"You really don't want to know. Trust me." The young man parted his lips, but Arisu raised her hand to silence him. "Lucky for you, I have a friend who can heal others, and she would gladly help a friend of mine if I asked her to. No questions asked. The problem is... Are we friends, Ando-kun?"

The skin around a larger tumor was cracking, revealing more blood vessels underneath. His face had to be itching painfully, just as the inside of her skull. Both of their bodies were waiting for the trigger to be pulled as they neared the limit of their resistance. A little white lie Arisu had told the poor young man, with all good faith and nothing else. Her friend was going to ask a lot of questions. But that wasn't what she was afraid of. Not who she was afraid of.