Amaunet slowly drifted back to consciousness from the depths of sleep, roused by the rumbling of the jeep beneath her and the bickering that was going on just above her head. Like she expected, it was Goku and Gojyo at it again, with Sanzo joining in by threatening them with either his gun or his Paper Fan of Doom.
She yawned, and stretched, sitting up slowly so as to avoid the swing of Sanzo's fan as it struck Gojyo and Goku into silence. "Morning, everyone."
Hakkai smiled at her from the driver's seat. "Actually, good afternoon."
Eh? Amaunet glanced up at the sky, and noticed that, indeed, it was already afternoon. The sun was starting to dip lower beyond the horizon, and it painted the sky in crimson and gold. "Oh yeah, you're right." She was about to say something more, but then, her stomach grumbled at being deprived of nourishment for so long.
Gojyo burst out laughing then. "Looks like Goku isn't the only one hungry."
Amaunet blushed, and patted her stomach. "Well, I HAVE been asleep since early this morning…I guess you can understand why I'm hungry right now…"
"Iie, I was just teasing you," Gojyo said, winking. "At least you don't eat as much as the saru. And you don't complain every ten minutes or so."
Amaunet's stomach rumbled again, and in response, Sanzo threw a package into her lap. Amaunet unwrapped it, and found two bread buns inside. She glanced at Sanzo, and smirked. "And what's up with this? You trying to poison me or something?"
"If you don't want to eat it then that's fine with me. You can starve to death for all I care," Sanzo answered without glancing back, though through the rearview mirror Amaunet could see he was looking annoyed.
Amaunet smirked, and shook her head. I just LOVE it when he gets mad. In any case, she knew that the buns weren't poisoned, so she ate them. She took them in slowly, so that they would fill her up more and she wouldn't get a bad case of indigestion later on. They were a little chewy, but had a sweet red bean filling, and that took her mind off the toughness of the bread.
Goku turned to her, his eyes all shining and hopeful. "Ama, could I please have the other one? Please, please, please, please???"
Sanzo glared at him through the rearview mirror. "Shut up with your complaining, saru. You're always hungry."
Amaunet shrugged in response, ignoring Sanzo's comments. "Here ya go." She picked up one bread bun, and handed it to Goku. She grinned. "Enjoy!"
Goku grinned as he accepted the item of food. "Sank yuu, Ama!" And then, he scarfed down the whole thing with nary a pause for breath.
Amaunet sighed, and rolled her eyes. I wonder sometimes if Goku's stomach has worms in it or something, that's why he's always hungry and never gains weight. She had just finished eating her bun when Hakkai stopped the jeep. He glanced at them, and announced, "The ground here is too rocky for Hakuryuu to pass through. We have to walk from here."
Amaunet shrugged, and jumped out of the back seat. She didn't really mind walking through rocky terrain, and she knew that if she really had to, she could scale a rock face without too much trouble. Fortunately, there was a clear path that wended its way between the crags, and that meant her rock-climbing skills would be saved for another day.
In the meantime, she watched as the jeep disappeared in a puff of smoke and light, and reappeared as the white dragon, Hakuryuu. After this happened, she joined the four guys in a game of rock-paper-scissors to decide who would carry the bags. Unfortunately for Goku, he threw a scissors against the rock that they played, and that meant he had to carry the bags. Feeling a little bit of pity for him, Amaunet walked over to their pile of luggage, singled out her backpack, and slipped it on.
Goku stared at her as she adjusted the straps of her backpack, securing it on her shoulders. "Ama, aren't you going to let me carry your bag?"
"No, I won't. You have enough to carry already as it is." Amaunet grinned at him as they set off with the others. "And besides, I'm used to carrying my own pack up and down mountains. God knows how many times I've done that with my father."
Hakkai glanced at them over his shoulder. "And why would that be, Ama?"
Amaunet sighed, nostalgia filling her tone and her eyes as she spoke. "My father is an archaeologist, someone who digs up old tombs and lost cities and looks for artifacts that point out to the existence of ancient civilizations."
"Something like a treasure hunter, then?" Gojyo queried.
"You could say that," Amaunet replied with a nod, "though finding gold and jewels isn't really all he does. He digs up these places to fill in the missing pages of history and lore. It's a pretty noble profession, really, and very hard physically, mentally and emotionally.
"Ever since I was strong enough to walk on my own, Dad was always taking me with him on his trips. Of course, Mum didn't always approve, but then again she came with us anyway, so she didn't have a lot of reason to complain. Always, on those trips, I was urged to do things independently, and that included carrying my own things, even if we had to hike up a mountain. I learned early on that I couldn't always rely on my parents, so I sort of conditioned myself mentally and emotionally to be independent."
"But wasn't it hard on you, moving around all the time like that," Goku piped up.
Amaunet nodded as she clambered over a dead tree that was blocking their path. "Yeah, it was a little hard on me, especially when I was growing up. We were always moving from place-to-place, and we didn't stay in one place long enough for me to make friends who were the same age as I was. All my friends were always 'big people', as I called them when I was a little girl: those who were in their late teens to mid-twenties. I never had a permanent group of friends.
"It wasn't that my parents were bad parents; far from it, actually. They took very good care of me and made sure that I was never lonely, in spite of the fact that I didn't a permanent circle of friends. I had a very happy childhood. Dad was always there for me, and so was Mum. I didn't lack in their love and their care."
She laughed then. "I guess they spoiled me a little bit in their own way. They were always buying stuff for me, like little trinkets and toys from wherever it was we were staying at the time. We might have slept in a tent all the time, but hell, I had lots of toys to keep me busy at the end of the day. And I always had books to read, which I liked the best.
"It was only recently, when I was thirteen, that we finally settled down in Cairo, a city in Egypt. Most of Dad's projects wouldn't last very long in one place, but then he got an assignment that would take quite a long while. It's taken him three years and it was only recently that he got anywhere near to progress.
"So I hung around in Cairo, in Egypt, which is Mum's birthplace, by the way, and I FINALLY got a permanent group of friends, went to a decent school, and actually worked with Mum in the museum as a decoder. After this most recent project, Dad thinks that he'll give up working on the field and go back to London, in England, far up north, to live quietly."
Hakkai chuckled. "But won't that be boring for you? You've been used to living with so much adventure in your life, and then you're going to give it up for a quiet life in a city?"
"Are you kidding?!" Amaunet exclaimed teasingly. "There's nothing quiet about living in London! Not in London, of all cities!! There's so much to see, so much to do… Exploring the museums alone is bloody adventure enough! Then there are the royal palaces, the opera houses, the markets, and the nightlife… Nope, I don't think living in London will be boring."
They continued the rest of the journey in a pretty upbeat manner. Sanzo was ignored, which seemed to be what he wanted, while she, Hakkai, Goku and Gojyo exchanged friendly banter. Amaunet told them about her childhood and all the things her father did, how he had started out as the scion of an extremely rich and titled family in London, how he had gotten sick and tired of the routine followed by the nobility, and just up and left in search of adventure. That only resulted in making him even richer, especially after he made his archaeological discoveries.
While Amaunet was in the middle of telling them about his finding a whole load of treasure in Spain and solving the mystery of the Torre de las Infantas (Tower of the Princesses) in Granada, Sanzo cut in by saying, "Looks like we're going to have to stay there for the night."
Eh? Amaunet looked up, and saw a Buddhist temple standing right in front of her.
Goku grinned as he patted his stomach. "It's about time! Carrying all these bags has made me hungry."
Sanzo smirked then. "Amaunet won't be able to go in."
Gojyo looked up. "Nani? Naze?"
"Buddhist temples don't allow women to come in," Hakkai explained quietly. He sighed, and looked at Amaunet with an embarrassed smile. "This is going to present some problems…"
Won't let women in, eh? Amaunet grinned, and she shrugged. "Not a problem. Though it really bites me that these rules are so bloody chauvinistic, there are OTHER ways of getting in."
"Demo Ama, you won't be able to get in. I mean, you're a girl through and through," Goku said.
Amaunet grinned evilly. "Who said I had to walk in there looking like one?"
The four males stared at her in silence. In the end, it was Hakkai who got the idea. "You…you would…"
"That's right. If I can't get in that temple by being a girl, then I'll just have to hide the fact that I am one." She gave her outfit a quick look. Bush hat, pants, shirt, backpack, and boots…yeah, this'll work. She turned away from the guys, and headed over to a cluster of rocks that would conceal her while she did what she had to do.
"Amaunet!" Sanzo called. "Do you seriously think that you
can get away with what you're going to do?!"
"You want to try me, Sanzo?! Then shut the bloody hell up and let me go through with this!" Amaunet yelled back. "Oh yeah, and if any of you guys comes round here while I'm dressing up I'd be more than happy to kick your sorry arses to the moon!"
With that final warning, Amaunet proceeded to change.
* * *
Sanzo sighed, watching as the monks guarding the walls clambered down from their posts to open the gates. Looks like we've found a decent place to stay.
He had told the guards that he actually had four companions with him, and that he had to fetch the other one, who was still sleeping from the long, hard trip. With that, he went over to the rocks where Amaunet was changing. "Amaunet, are you finished?"
Silence for a moment, and then, "Yeah, almost. Half a moment, okay?"
Sanzo waited a little impatiently on the other side, while Amaunet quickly put her clothes back on. So it's true, he thought smugly to himself. Women really do take a long time to get ready.
"So, what do you think?"
Sanzo turned, and his eyes widened a fraction of an inch in surprise – which is really a lot already, considering that he is a little hard to startle. Kami-sama…what HAPPENED to her?!
Amaunet seemed to have completely metamorphosed. She still wore the same clothes, but as for the rest of her, it was different. Though her chest wasn't as voluptuous as those of other women, there was no denying the fact that it could still be discerned even with her clearly masculine clothes. Not anymore. Her chest seemed totally flat from the front, and from the side, well, what little swell there was could be easily mistaken for a fold in the clothes. Her long hair she had pulled back into a tight braid, and this, combined with the jaunty angle of her hat, now served to make her look even more like a boy.
"Not bad, eh?" she asked, and Sanzo had to blink at the new timbre and tone her voice had taken. She sounds a little like Hakkai, though maybe with a little bit of leaning to Goku's voice. It doesn't sound like Amaunet at all. To cover up his surprise, he smirked again, and said, "About time you woke up…Ama."
Amaunet smirked back at him. "Whatever you say, Sanzo." She walked beside him towards where the others were waiting for them.
The first one to notice was Goku. He turned around to greet Amaunet, but then his greeting fell short when he noticed her sudden change. His gold eyes widened to the size of teacups. "A-Ama?"
"Yo Goku." Amaunet walked up beside him, and muttered out of the corner of her mouth, "Pretend like I've always been like this, okay guys? No need to make the monks suspicious."
Gojyo was the first to play along. "Oi, Ama-kun, about time you woke up! You're always sleeping, you know that?!"
Amaunet laughed, and to Sanzo, even her laughter sounded masculine. "I'm always tired. Big deal. You and Goku fighting all the time wear me out. I need my sleep where the two of your are concerned."
Hakkai sighed, and shrugged. "Well, I guess that solves our problems. Come on, let's go inside before the monks get a different idea and decide not to let us in at all."
AUTHOR'S NOTES: Okay, that's IT!!! I'm forced to cut this in the middle of the chapter. This is supposed to be a longer chapter, but I'd rather cut in the middle than make it too long. I think that this is rather…useless, one of those things you put in just to tell everyone what happened in the middle. Then again, the fact that I put in a little bit of Ama's past should make it interesting enough ^^;
THE PAIRING GAME: Sorry people, I've given up on counting the votes, and ff.net has a ruling that it will pull out all stories that have THAT sort of thing, so…yeah. Still, if you want to keep on guessing, be my guest ^_^. And the prize still stands too; the only thing different is that it won't be so "official" anymore. As of last count, the list is, in order of the one with most votes:
a.) Sanzo
b.) Hakkai
c.) Goku
d.) Gojyo
So there! I'll stop counting votes, but I'll say who's in the lead okay? Till the next chapter, people!