DISCLAIMER: Saiyuki belongs to Minekura-sensei- and best wishes for her good health!

Summary: It looked good at first, an isolated town where humans and yokai live in peace, and Sanzo-ikkou is unheard of. But that town is where the Raven's feeding ground, and where he returns to roost.

Warnings: Prostitution, suggestive situations, human fallacy.

This story is labelled an M, but I will not write explicit scenes. They aren't my forte, and I don't want the fic to be too dark. It will have some of the inevitable fluff that comes from the clashing personalities of Sanzo-ikkou, but there will be darkness , gore, adult language, double entendres, sexual situations, bad humour, and mad scientists- all that yummy stuff... so please handle it maturely as the rating implies :)

Not sure on a pairing yet. It'll be a surprise for me as well, once it appears- whatever it may be! I'm fondest of 83 and 53.

Additional credit goes to: Edgar Allen Poe, excerpts from The Raven.

Story takes place after the defeat of Kami-sama.

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary

A white face as round as the moon, with a mouth curved into a perpetual smile. Two eyes as beautiful and black as night. A green silk kimono which fluttered that fluttered with every breath of the man that held its wearer close.

Two long, pink ears and stubby limbs.

"Usa-chan, your dress is sinful." Ukoku crooned, stroking the stuffed bunny's head. "Yaone-san is such a good seamstress, isn't she? And there I was thinking her only specialty was poisons." His smile faltered and vanished, and with a sigh he put the rabbit back down on his desk. Scribbled-on papers crinkled beneath the stuffed animal's weight, but the man didn't seem to mind. "I'm so bored. It was amusing for a while making antidotes for every poison she produced, and vice versa, but things get old quickly when the person you're playing with doesn't know you're playing with them."

He leaned back in his chair and put his booted feet on the desk. They were still muddy from long travel, and splattered with the blood of a dying man.

'Well, dead man.' Ukoku thought frankly. He really couldn't be bothered to go change out of his monk's robes just yet, not during quality time with his rabbit. "Usa-chan... I brought back a souvenir for you~" He reached over and plucked something off of the bookshelf behind him. It was a simple, unadorned, golden crown, with a perfect-circle base and six points. The harsh flourescent light that glinted off of it was transformed into something softer. Ukoku slipped Kami-sama's ceremonial crown over his bunny's head, but to his dissapointment it fell right through and clattered onto the desk. "Hm... what a shame. Well, seems I will have to get a new cloth for it."

Ukoku paused. He tilted his head, causing a few strands of his slicked-back hair to fall out of place.

"What'd you say, Usa-chan?" he questioned lightly. "Ah, the crown. You see, I won this little game I was playing with a student of mine; but the crown was never his in the first place." He fondled the rabbit's long ears and then picked it up like it was a baby. He kicked the desk and sent his rolly chair crashing into the bookcase, jumping off of it with surprising speed just before impact. The ensuing crash brought some books tumbling to the floor. Ukoku frowned, and bent down. He thumbed briefly through an erotic hentai novel before placing it next to a thick tome detailing the skeletons and muscular systems of many races of yokai. Both looked worse for wear. The heretic straightened, stretched with Usa-chan still grasped in one hand, and fixed his glasses.

"Well, that's that!" he said loudly, and then repeated it more quietly. "That's that." His dark eyes flicked toward an open closet, where a nondescript brown tunic hung amongst black robes and white lab coats.

Usa-chan's eyes looked into Ukoku's as he raised the rabbit up to his face.

"How about it, Usa-chan?" he asked it. "I'm running out of test subjects, and there's something I want to study. Do you think I should go back to where it all began?"

Short beginning- to get the muse going and something to set the story by. Longer main chapters; consider this prologue a preview.

Please be informed that I am also working on another fic, though I enjoy both.

Hope you liked and look forward to more :)