They Grow So Fast
Standard Disclaimers Apply.
Goku is still a child.
It's really not his fault. He is more than five hundred years compressed down to eighteen, adult years shoved into a child body and he doesn't remember most of it. Five hundred years of being a child, of being without knowledge, without fun, games, food and the other things little boys thrive off of. He only remembers centuries of existing, shadow, snow, weak light and the rotting corpse of a bird that he cannot bury. The shackles on his ankles and his wrists are heavy, and the cave walls press in, and he curls into himself and tries to drown without water.
The sun, the sun, the sun. Beautiful, bright and warm, where Goku wants to be, where Goku wants to live. Goku is a child of the earth, and what is the Earth without a sun? He dimly remembers the feel of the grass between his toes, the smell of flowers perfuming the air, the tree branches that rustled and seemed to greet him as he stepped into many a sun-dappled grove. The forests welcomed him, and he loved them in return. It is the only think he remembers about his life before the cave, aside from the blood.
Goku is eighteen now, out of the cave and out kicking youkai ass, with the Sun shining down on him from his high perch of holiness. The Sun is really rather abusive, all things considered. But Goku is content with this life, traveling around with this makeshift, dysfunctional family towards the West. And he is growing up.
Growing up is strange for him. He never says a thing about the times after Seiten Taisei is released; it is a private thing, somehow. His other form is full of rage, confused, disoriented; when he comes out, everything is an enemy to be eliminated. Goku understands only a few things aside from that: someone took Seiten Taisei away, stole away his life, his freedom, marked him down for death and annihilation. And after the transformations, every time, after nights of guilt, torn bedsheets and tears, Goku can feel him a little bit more of him in his mind, and slowly, they are beginning to blend.
His body is small and short, though lean and muscular, and he never grows any hair except for the mop on top of his head. He watches Gojyo and Hakkai shave with interest; Sanzo doesn't let anyone see what he does in the bathroom. But he feels things in him shifting, and he feels the power in him that grows each day, and the strange block in his mind is weakening everyday, and he knows that one day he will be able to knock it down. Something tells him not to do it, and he is only cemented in believing it when he notices that his diadem is beginning to lose its bright golden sheen. With every passing day, Goku feels the rumble in the air, the taste and smell of old, washed-away blood thick on his tongue and he knows that his time is running out.
And Seiten Taisei, he slowly becomes aware. They are vicious, vicious headaches, those days where he is trapped between awareness and the cage the diadem has made for him in Goku's head. He rages, spitting things out in grunts and snarls that only Goku understands, and when he no longer can stand it, Goku falls into fitful sleep in the back of the jeep to keep Seiten Taisei company. It must be lonely, Goku thinks, to be misunderstood and frightened every time he is set free. So he approaches warily, allows Seiten to claw him bloody, before reaching out and interlacing their fingers, smiling.
I understand, he says. And Seiten, he cries, and clutches Goku close as the prison bars disappear.
The barrier between them thins and thins, and Seiten begins understand Goku's life, and Goku's his. The others get upset, angry, because Goku's diadem is cracking, and Goku doesn't care at all. But Goku doesn't understand, because he's growing up, Seiten's growing up, and isn't that what they always wanted him to do?
And one day, they find a broken, lustreless diadem resting in an inn bed. They charge downstairs to find Goku sitting at the breakfast table, braiding long, brown hair into a braid at the base of his neck, eyes feral, slitted, golden. With a flick of an elongated ear, Goku turns to face them, smiling with a mouthful of pointy teeth, and in a voice that is a little huskier, a little deeper, he says, "Hey guys, what's for breakfast?"