The Morality of a Curse

2 - Family Betrayal

Maki dashed through the woods, her glasses slipping off her face, she quickly shoved them back up onto the bridge of her nose.

Looking down at the womb in her clutches she continued rushing between brush and tree alike, making a mad dash away from the Zenin's compound.

"MAKI GET BACK HERE!" Shouted Naobito from behind her. She couldn't outrun someone like Naobito or Naoya but she could definitely lose their trail with her lack of cursed energy. The one problem was Aine. The cursed womb had steadily been growing excess reserves of cursed energy.

"Aine it's time for you to shrink, we're taking a page out of that man's book" she whispered to the scaly orb. She watched as the scales shifted and folded in on themselves as Aine shrank from the size of a basketball down to a golf ball.

Maki gulped a bit, before palming the womb and swallowing it whole.

The taste was foul, like a mop that had been sitting in foul water all day. Maki shook off the disgust and began to climb one of the trees, straddling herself around the trunk towards the top.

She pressed herself against the tree and stifled her panting as best she could.

They had found Aine, they had caught Mai, and now they were after her.

Maki banged her head against the rough bark as tears rolled down her cheek. She could never return, the Zenin wanted any excuse they could to get rid of her and for hiding a cursed womb they would surely have her executed.

But she steeled her will, reminding herself of what Mai had told her.

Seek out Jujutsu high and look for the dumbass in the blindfold. He would be able to protect her. Maki had half a mind to go back and try to help her sister, lord knows what the clan would do to her in assisting her escape, but she knew she didn't have the ability to fight back against them... not yet.

She wouldn't let Mai's sacrifice be in vain, and she was at least guaranteed immunity from execution due to her cursed technique.

Maki didn't know what it was but Mai assured her that it was valuable enough to the clan to protect her for the time being at the very least.

The Zenin clan clearly feared whatever potential Aine had as they hadn't pulled any punches. Everyone was there, searching for it, and by extension her.

She stayed perfectly still as she watched sorcerer after sorcerer run by below the tree.

Maki, too busy observing the Zenin's goons to notice anything else, felt a sharp pain in her side.

It took all her willpower to not cry out in pain as she looked down forced to watch as a curse resembling an oversized beetle began digging into her flesh. But she simply could risk moving a hand off the trunk for fear of slipping, because then it would definitely be over for her.

She bit her lip as her eyes welled up with tears of pain. The beetle curse opened its maw and took another large bite out of her side.

"KARMA" Maki felt a rumbling in her stomach, the strange feeling of cursed energy welling up inside her, was this Aine's doing?

"Agh~" Maki tried to keep silent but it wasn't enough. She had let a noise slip and one of the sorcerers had stopped. The boy looked up, his spiky black hair blowing a bit in the breeze as he locked eyes with her.

"Nue"

For Maki it seemed as if the world was slowing down. She had been found, by a ten shadows user nonetheless, she would surely be killed. She watched in slow motion as a birdlike shikigami flew like a bullet toward her.

Maki braced for the inevitable but felt nothing, watching as the shikigami bolted past her, the beetle curse in its clutches. She watched as it was crushed in the talons of the spirit as it flew back toward the user.

The boy pointed off into the woods, still staring up at Maki, "go that way to get to the school. Ask for Gojo" before he put his hands in his pockets and strolled in the opposite direction he had pointed.

She waited a bit, anticipating a trap only to hear the same boy in the distance, "SHE WENT THAT WAY" and with that all the sorcerers came running past once again. The path had been cleared.
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Panda was spread out on the ground, bathing in the sunshine and happy as can be and not a single thing could interrupt today.

Until she showed up.

Panda heard a gagging sound from the other side of the walls around the school grounds he currently resided at, curious at the noise the big lumbering lovable oaf let out a hearty "hup" and hopped over the wall with relative ease.

He looked for the source of the noise only to be greeted by a girl with green hair, covered in wounds and blood. She had her hands cupped and within the dollop of saliva sat a cursed womb, slowly expanding.

She turned her head, panda meeting her gaze while silently observing her thousand yard stare.

"Hi"

"YOU CAN TALK?"
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Megumi cameo
                 -0kHomie