"Hey, Hakkai, what do you think the meaning of life is?"
Gojyo and Hakkai were sitting in Jeep, somewhere near a grassy clearing, waiting for their companions to return with supplies. After drawing straws that Sanzo later insisted were rigged, those still seated in the car had come up with the two longest. It had been decided at some earlier point that no one should travel alone in case of an ambush and so, scavenging duty was done in begrudging pairs.
The mercifully un-chosen two had been sitting for quite some time silent with the woods around them. They'd waited patiently, drawing finger circles in Jeep's upholstery, readjusting their seating positions (Hakkai had even tried sitting upside down with his legs stretched past the head rest), and Gojyo had finally lit up, the fresh cigarette lessening in drags between his lips.
Then came the question.
"Sorry? I didn't quite follow what you were saying."
Gojyo hissed a thin beam of smoke and repeated his question.
"The meaning of life. What d'you think it is?"
Hakkai looked into the nearby patches of weeds struggling against the arid atmosphere. Most had lost their flowers, but a few maintained small dense clumps of white or purple blooms, each flower not larger than the head of a pin. Hakkai murmured thoughtfully.
"I'd say it would be to live to do the least harm to others while enjoying the most happiness for oneself."
A cricket sprung from the weeds Hakkai had been examining. Three more hops and it had vanished into another miniature forest. Gojyo waited a moment before suddenly cracking a smile.
"Funny…I was going to say babes…"
Hakkai looked at him crosswise.
"I suppose that could be the same as my answer."
Gojyo laughed.
"Face it Hakkai, you're too much of a saint even for the priesthood."
Hakkai waved his hand off-puttingly.
"Ah, I wouldn't go so far as that. Besides, I couldn't be a priest. Their clothes look far too uncomfortable."
"Yeah, I'd agree with that. I don't envy Sanzo his get-up."
Hakkai chuckled.
"I don't think anyone does."
The first half-inch of Gojyo's cigarette had burnt away as they sat in the remainder of their laughter. Jeep hummed a little and Hakkai closed his eyes and laid his head back on the seat.
"Gojyo…"
"Yeah?"
"Why did you ask me that question?"
Hakkai could feel Gojyo shrug without looking at him.
"I figured you'd have an answer."
Hakkai opened his eyes and saw a little piece of white-blue sky through a few layers of trees. He wondered if there were any clouds hiding in the trees. He spoke.
"Something tells me that you already had an answer for the question."
Gojyo smiled.
"That's the best way to be, isn't it?"
Hakkai lightly etched a finger along the passenger side mirror.
"But then you'd have no sense of curiosity Gojyo."
The kappa flicked the gathering ash to the side before answering.
"I don't need one. I already know just where everything is I like. After that, adventures are more like grocery shopping. Pick up this, avoid that…and death is a big, freakin' line at the check-out counter."
Hakkai laughed lightheartedly and muttered.
"I'd love to see your shopping list."
"I don't think you'd be very interested in it, personally."
"Oh? Why's that?"
Gojyo aimed a meaningful glance at Hakkai.
"It'd probably seem kind of callous to go shopping for people."
Hakkai nodded, stretching and cracking his neck, starting to stare into the sky again, hunting for clouds.
"Maybe."
It had long been an issue of concern, Gojyo's relationships with women and Hakkai's abstinence from the field. One was a glutton, the other practically a skeleton. Hakkai had, over the time he'd known Gojyo, talked with him, urged him, convinced him to avoid flings with local women. The remaining population of this untrusting world would take to strangers more easily if they didn't sleep with them.
Or, that was Hakkai's theory in any case.
Gojyo on the other hand knew well enough what people were like, particularly the people he ended up in bed with. The ones that were happy with their life, satisfied, couldn't ask for anymore, never found themselves in his arms. No one ever did by morning, but for every night, there was a memory to be regretted. It was only the unhappy that became that desperate.
And Gojyo had had enough of unhappy people.
Three-quarters of Gojyo's cigarette had burned through before Hakkai spoke again.
"What do you think the meaning of life is, Gojyo?"
Gojyo flicked his ashes.
"Didn't I already tell ya?"
"I'm not accepting your response as a genuine one."
"Alright then."
He sat up a little, moving his left arm to hang over the car door. It swung lazily from side to side as he pondered a serious question with a half-smile of sincerity. Gojyo never liked to be serious. He figured that the world was serious enough and didn't need anyone else making it duller than it already was. Sanzo did that enough for everyone. In fact, the only times Gojyo could ever remember being serious was when he couldn't find anything to laugh at.
That's when he began to learn to laugh at himself for the sake of it.
"My answer is…"
His cigarette cherry reddened and faded. Near transparent smoke gushed from his mouth as he finished.
"…to learn to accept things without being taken advantage of."
Hakkai looked over.
"Accept?"
"Yep. Life's a bitch when it wants to be."
"I think that's a blanket statement, Gojyo."
"Probably."
In their travels, the four men had discovered atrocities breeding atrocities, horror that defied imagination, cruelty that fell on disbelief and stubborn unfairness that flaunted a rewritten form of justice. The deserts they'd caroused had usually yielded discomfort. The inns they'd stayed in usually concealed assassins. And the people they'd met usually had dangerous agenda. But the quartet of destiny-makers had accepted all of that. It was just their personal lives they had to work on.
Hakkai nudged his car-mate on the arm still in the car.
"Is there anything you haven't accepted yet?"
Gojyo swung that arm in a mock fist to Hakkai's cheek, careful to keep the cigarette pointed away from his friend's face.
"Aw, c'mon Hakkai, we don't have all day for sob stories!"
Hakkai laughed.
"That's not what I asked, you know."
"Yeah, I know."
But Gojyo didn't answer. Instead, he continued making the quiet work for him, lengthening like a deadline. The silence could stretch forever and maybe, just maybe, so could the need for an answer. Hakkai's patience however was finite.
Hakkai quietly broke a topic.
"Have you accepted us?"
Gojyo looked over at Hakkai and then further on into the trees. The sun hadn't quite made its way through the thicker foliage of the forest and a dark shadow crawled along the ground. He refocused his eyes and noted his cigarette smoldering between his fingers.
"Aw, I've got one good drag left on this one."
Hakkai watched as Gojyo put the smoke to his lips. The moment his fingers left the cigarette, Hakkai leapt over and closed his mouth over the lit end of the cigarette stub, shot quickly down and pressed his lips to the pinched ones around the filter. Gojyo jumped surprised as Hakkai emerged from the kiss with a smile and a mouth full of ash.
Hakkai turned and spat, clearing some of the taste. Gojyo examined his cigarette with disdain, realizing that it had gone out. He spoke as Hakkai turned back to him.
"You're a cheeky bastard, you know that?"
Hakkai's ever-present smile widened with a degree of amusement.
"Some things can be a real bitch when they want to. Ah, speaking of which, I think I hear…"
At that moment, there was a heavy rustling making its way through the shadows of the trees. The rustling preceded an angry looking Sanzo and a tired looking Goku, both carrying plastic bags and both wearing an odd assortment of briars and leaves. With barely a look at the two smiling occupants of the car, Sanzo erupted.
"When we draw straws, I'M holding them next time, dammit!"
A/N:
Hi! Thanks for reading. I hope you enjoyed it!
PLEASE REVIEW! Tell me what you thought!
It's been a long time since I've written Saiyuki…
This story sort of grew out of a circumstance. And I hope someone I know likes it for what it is, as I did say I felt like writing some Gojyo/Hakkai.