Borrowed Light

On December 4, winter had already set in. Yu Haibara was injured during training.

During a cursed energy control exercise, the sphere suddenly went out of control. The blast knocked him to the ground and cut a gash across his right palm.

By the time Suguru Geto ran over, Haibara had already gotten up. He held his right hand with his left, his expression one of frustration rather than pain.

"I had it under control," Haibara said, resentment in his voice. "I don't know why it fell apart at the very end."

Suguru Geto examined the wound. It wasn't deep, but it had bled quite a bit. He took the first-aid kit Shoko had given him out of his pocket and bandaged Haibara's hand. Haibara hissed as the gauze wound around it, but didn't pull away.

"You've been training too hard lately," Suguru Geto said.

"Not hard enough." Haibara lowered his head. "I'm still not strong enough."

Suguru Geto looked up at him.

"Haibara," Suguru Geto said, "do you know what getting stronger is for?"

Haibara froze for a moment.

"To protect others." Suguru Geto finished wrapping the gauze and secured it with tape. "Not to prove anything, not to catch up to anyone. Just so that when someone needs you, you can stand in front of them."

Haibara was silent for a long time. Wind swept across the training field, kicking up loose snow that struck their legs.

"Geto," Haibara said, "what did it feel like when you stood in front of me?"

Suguru Geto remembered the underground space in Zama. The instant that special grade cursed spirit lunged at Haibara, the moment he rushed over to shield him. He remembered the impact against his chest, the pain of the cursed spirit's remnants burrowing into his body, and the ceiling Satoru Gojo had blasted through, which he had seen while lying on the ground.

"It didn't feel like anything," Suguru Geto said. "I just knew I couldn't let you die."

Haibara pressed his lips into a thin line. He said nothing, only lowered his head and looked at his right hand, swathed in gauze.

"Geto," he said, "I'll become someone you won't have to shield anymore."

On December 7, Satoru Gojo knocked on Suguru Geto's door.

He carried a bag of mandarins, which he set straight on the table before dropping into a chair and propping his legs on the edge of the bed. He wore his black Jujutsu High uniform under a thick coat, his hair tousled by the wind.

"Yaga said there's a mission next month that needs both of us," Satoru Gojo said.

"What kind of mission?"

"A special grade cursed spirit over in Kyoto. The association says one person won't be enough. They want two Special Grades to take it on together. Personally, I think I could handle it alone."

"When?" Suguru Geto asked.

"January 15." Satoru Gojo picked up a mandarin, peeled it, and handed half to Suguru Geto. "A little over a month away."

Suguru Geto took it, pulled off a segment, and put it in his mouth. It was sour. The juice burst across his tongue, making him squint.

"Satoru," he said, "do you think I can still fight a special grade?"

Satoru Gojo spoke indistinctly around a mouthful of mandarin. "Yes. But once you're done, that egg inside you will have grown a lot."

Suguru Geto didn't argue. He knew Satoru Gojo was right. Every time he used a large amount of cursed energy, the egg absorbed some of it and grew a little. Fighting a special grade cursed spirit required an enormous amount of cursed energy, and the egg would seize the opportunity to grow wildly.

"Then what do we do?" Suguru Geto asked.

"Two options." Satoru Gojo tossed the peel into the trash. "First, I fight it alone and you watch from the sidelines. Second, we fight it together, but you sort out that egg before the fight's over."

"How do I sort it out?"

Satoru Gojo looked at him, his eyes expressionless behind his sunglasses. "That's for you to figure out."

"I want to take the egg out," Suguru Geto said.

Satoru Gojo's fingers paused as he peeled another mandarin. "Shoko said it can't be removed. It's fused with your cursed energy core."

"I know. But there might be another way."

"What way?"

Suguru Geto was silent for a few seconds. "I don't know. But I'll find it."

Satoru Gojo stared at him for a few seconds.

"All right." Satoru Gojo stood. "Take your time looking, then. Tell me when you find it."

He walked to the door, pulled it open, then stopped.

"Geto."

"Yeah?"

"Eat the mandarins. Don't let them go bad."

The door closed. Suguru Geto looked at the bag of mandarins on the table, took one, peeled it, and ate it segment by segment, sweet and sour.

On December 10, Suguru Geto went to an old archive room on Jujutsu High's second basement level. No one had used the room in a long time. A layer of rust covered the lock, and the key had long since gone missing. Suguru Geto broke the lock with cursed energy. When he pushed the door open and stepped inside, the dust made him cough several times.

The room was small, with metal cabinets lining all four walls, stuffed with yellowed folders and moldy cardboard boxes. The records here were older than those in the archive upstairs. Some dated back to Jujutsu High's founding, or even earlier.

Suguru Geto had come here to find one thing.

In his memories of the next ten years, he had once heard of an ancient jujutsu that could separate two beings fused together. He didn't know whether it truly existed, but if it did, its records had to be somewhere in this old archive.

He began a long search.

On the first day, he went through two metal cabinets and found nothing. Most of the documents were mission reports, personnel rosters, and supply lists. None contained anything about separating fused beings.

On the second day, he searched three cabinets. He found several experimental reports on fusion with cursed spirits, but they all recorded failures. The jujutsu sorcerers who attempted to fuse with cursed spirits had either gone mad or died. There was no method of separation.

On the third day, Satoru Gojo appeared in the archive doorway.

"You've been holed up here for three days." Satoru Gojo leaned against the doorframe, looking at the dust-covered Suguru Geto. "What are you looking for?"

"A jujutsu." Suguru Geto continued searching a cardboard box without looking up. "One that can take the egg out of my body."

Satoru Gojo came in and stood beside him, looking down at the yellowed pages. "Does a jujutsu like that exist?"

"I don't know. But I need to make sure."

Satoru Gojo said nothing more. He bent down, took a document from the box, and began leafing through it. They stayed like that, one seated on a stool, the other standing beside him, going page by page through old papers no one had touched in decades.

An hour later, Satoru Gojo's hand paused.

"Geto," he said, "look at this."

Suguru Geto leaned closer. Satoru Gojo held a set of handwritten notes. The pages had yellowed and grown brittle, and the writing was somewhat blurred, but still legible. At the beginning were the words: "Some Thoughts on the [Soul-Splitting Technique]."

[Soul-Splitting Technique].

Suguru Geto's heart beat faster.

He took the notes and began reading from the start. Their author was an unnamed jujutsu sorcerer, probably from several decades ago. He had recorded a theoretically possible jujutsu that would separate fused souls, like filtering water out of sand.

But the last few lines read: "This technique exists only in theory. In practice, the practitioner must possess the ability to 'see' souls. No currently known jujutsu can accomplish this."

Suguru Geto's fingers stopped on that page. The ability to "see" souls. The Six Eyes.

He looked up at Satoru Gojo.

Satoru Gojo was reading those same lines. His expression hadn't changed.

"Satoru," Suguru Geto said, "can you see souls?"

Satoru Gojo was silent for a few seconds. "When Riko died, I saw her soul leave her body. But that was the light of a soul leaving the flesh. I can't see souls that are still inside a body."

"The notes say you have to be able to 'see' souls. Not the light when they leave, but souls still inside a body."

"I'd have to be stronger." Satoru Gojo's voice was low. "I'm not at that level yet."

Suguru Geto closed the notes and put them back in the box. He leaned against a metal cabinet and closed his eyes for a moment. He had found a lead, but it pointed to a condition they couldn't meet yet. Satoru Gojo's Six Eyes weren't strong enough. How long would he have to wait? Ten years? Twenty? He couldn't wait that long.

"Geto," Satoru Gojo said, "what are you thinking about?"

"You, ten years from now."

Satoru Gojo tilted his head. "What about me ten years from now?"

Suguru Geto opened his mouth, wanting to say, "Ten years from now, your Six Eyes will be strong enough to see everything," but he didn't. He couldn't tell Satoru Gojo about the future. Not because he didn't trust him, but because those things were too heavy-so heavy he wasn't sure Satoru Gojo could bear them.

"Nothing." Suguru Geto stood. "Let's go. That's enough for today."

When they left the archive, the corridor was pitch-black. Night had fallen, and this old building had no lights.

Satoru Gojo walked ahead, with Suguru Geto following. Their footsteps echoed down the empty corridor like two heartbeats, one fast, one slow.

"Geto," Satoru Gojo said without turning around, "if I can help you ten years from now, then we'll wait ten years."

Suguru Geto faltered for a step.

"I can't wait," he said.

"Why?"

Because ten years from now, I'll already be dead, Suguru Geto said in his mind. Because by then, I'll have become a curse user. Because you'll kill me with your own hands in Shinjuku. Because ten years from now, I won't be the Suguru Geto you know anymore.

He didn't say it aloud.

"Because that egg can't wait ten years," he said.

"Then make it wait," Satoru Gojo said. "It's inside your body. You call the shots."

Suguru Geto looked into Satoru Gojo's eyes and said nothing, only nodded.

They continued forward.

When they left the old building, snow had begun falling again. Fine grains of snow landed on their hair and shoulders, quickly melting from their body heat.

Suguru Geto stood in the snow and tilted his head back, letting it fall on his face.

"Satoru," he said, "have you ever borrowed anything from someone?"

Satoru Gojo thought for a moment. "Yeah. Shoko's lighter. I still haven't returned it."

Suguru Geto couldn't help laughing a little. "That's stealing, not borrowing."

"She knows I have it. She hasn't told me to give it back, so it counts as borrowing."

The snow fell harder, the fine grains turning into tiny flakes. Suguru Geto held out a hand and caught one. It rested on his palm for a second, then melted into water.

"I borrowed something," Suguru Geto said, "but I don't know how to return it."

"Then don't," Satoru Gojo said. "Keep it."

Suguru Geto looked at the drop of water in his palm, then closed his fist and slipped his hand into his pocket.

"Let's go," he said. "Back."

He remembered those four lines of verse from the poetry collection.