Disclaimer ~ I do not own Saiyuki
Prompt: Goku realizes he's not alone anymore
It was a cold feeling. Being alone. It felt like hopelessness and despair, wrapped in longing and desperation, then completely frozen in unbreakable ice. Goku hated that feeling. He hated being alone.
He spent five hundred years trapped in that cage. Completely and utterly alone. The only friend he had was a little bird. But the bird didn't live long, and Goku was left alone once again. He didn't know how much time had passed, but while watching the body of his first friend decay until nothing was left, Goku started thinking. Maybe he was cursed. Maybe that little bird would have survived if it had never met him. Maybe the world was better off with him locked away, so that nobody else would be hurt because of him.
Goku used to think he knew what it was like to be warm. To have people who cared about him with their whole being. People who he loved just as much, if not more. But whenever he tried to think of those people all he would feel is a sadness so overwhelming that he almost preferred the cold feeling. Almost.
But then Sanzo found him. He reached out a hand and the chains keeping Goku in the cage withered away. The shackles remained but Goku was free to go with his sun. Because that was the only thing Sanzo could be. He was so warm. Then Sanzo introduced him to Hakkai and Gojyo and Goku felt a kindred spirit in both of them.
Hakkai knew that overwhelming feeling of sadness. The one that left you frozen and all you can do is cry for something just out of your reach. Goku knew that the second he laid eyes on the other demon. That was why he was so insistent to Sanzo that they help him. Goku didn't want Hakkai to feel that pain any longer. Now, Goku tries to get Hakkai to do things he enjoys. Like when he gets to teach Goku new things. Or how Hakkai always feels amused when Goku and Gojyo start fighting over little things. Goku suspected that Hakkai used to be a teacher before his trauma. But he won't ask. He'll wait for Hakkai to open up on his own.
Gojyo knew what loneliness felt like. He was hated for what he was. Something he couldn't control. Try as he might, Goku could always see through the masks Gojyo would put up. That's why he fights with him so often. He wants Gojyo to feel genuine emotions. Even if they were just at little things. Like happiness at having won the last piece of food or at something Goku said that made him smile, even though he really didn't want to so he covers it up by starting an argument. Goku always argues back, waiting for the day that Gojyo will stop hiding his smiles.
It took a long time for Goku to realize that the cold feeling had disappeared. He was sitting in the back of the jeep, watching Gojyo and Sanzo arguing for a change and Hakkai trying to calm them down and not crash at the same time. That was a skill Hakkai had to practice a lot with them. It was when watching Sanzo and Gojyo that Goku realized he didn't feel cold anymore. The sheer realization had stunned him. It was all too easy to get lost in his head, trying to find that specific moment when things started to feel warm. But everything he could think of that might have caused it never felt right. Every memory felt like the warmth was already there
He never noticed when Gojyo and Sanzo stopped their fighting to stare at him with hidden worry, or when Hakkai pulled the Jeep over to see if he was okay. He was too lost in his own head, searching for when exactly his world became warm.
It was Sanzo who pulled him out of his head, crouching in front of him and staring straight into his eyes. Goku blinked as he focused on Sanzo, illuminated by the sun just as he was when he first found Goku. There was his answer. Sanzo. It was Sanzo that had made him feel warm. He was the sun. Melting away the cold and never letting it return.
So I've actually had this oneshot ready to be posted for a couple weeks now, but I've been unsure if I wanted to post it yet because I didn't know if I liked it enough. It's been years since I've watched Saiyuki so I barely remember the series. Its a shame I don't have the ability to freeze time so I can catch up on all the series I want to watch.
I figured that I might as well go ahead an post this chapter. I've changed a couple things, and I genuinely don't know what else I could do to add to this fic. I'm fairly happy with it so I want to go ahead and post it. I have no idea when I'll update this series again, since I don't actually have many ideas for it, but I do have a couple of ideas I can do eventually.
I hope everyone likes the chapter! Please Review, Follow, and Favorite!