A little background info here; these events are straight from the Saiyuuki manga, so if your only exposure is the anime prepare for a small shock. I think you'd be pretty pissed too if somebody told you you didn't understand when you did, and I believe Cho Gonou understood pretty damn effin' well.
Disclaimer: Saiyuki is not mine. However, the translations, Hachimura's name and the Gonou angst ARE. *hugs poor Hakkai-sama*
No Understanding
Your voice, so harsh and barking, is grating on my ears like sand now as I ask for an explanation.
"No choice...we had no choice!"
The ONE time I come home late, and I find my home turned upside down and 360 degrees, my sister gone and the smell of demonic energy all over. You HAD to have another choice. A choice which screamed and smoked and spat metal fire at its opponents. Or are all those guns in your house just waterpistols and decorations, Hachimura-san? Didn't you fight to save one of your own?
I would.
"If I hadn't sent Kanan to them they would have taken my daughter! I think you know as well as I do it was one of the Hyakugan Maou's 'Woman Hunters' that came to this town!"
Yes, I know. I know that the Hyakugan Maou's lust has increased daily. I daresay he'd fuck anything under the sun as long as it was female. Yes, I know he has a team of Woman Hunters who grant him his newest toys. I say that in the broadest sense because I know after he has his fun he eats them. Not pretty. And I know you love your daughter.
But I also know I loved Kanan more than anything in the world.
"So...you made Kanan her substitute..." My voice sounds water-thin and faint. The anger and sorrow I feel is hardly expressed within my words.
Now you're smiling. Just bloody great. Your eyes are dancing with the madness I cannot reveal in myself. "Aa, that's right. Do you think I'd just give my precious daughter to that creature? But then, I suppose orphans like you two wouldn't understand..."
Wouldn't understand? *Wouldn't* understand?!
So you think I don't understand the undying love of a father and mother, do you? You think I don't know what it means to love, do you?
I understand, all right, and I remember.
I remember, albeit faintly, my mother's slender hands that tucked me in at night. I remember my father's smile, deep and gentle and pulled straight from the heart. They tore the two of us apart, Cho Kanan and Cho Gonou, and raised us separate from each other after our parents died. I remember also that my father's smile never appeared once on my face after that, not until Kanan brought it back when I found her in town one day. I thought she was just another woman, but something about her made me feel...whole. Complete. Not lost any longer. I understand completely the deep bond that was formed between us, overlapping the ones that had faded, worn away and died with our separation. I and she had another understanding after we compared lives and found out the truth--we would tell no one that we were tied by the Cho bloodline.
The one who does not understand is you, damn it, Hachimura! You would not understand the depths of our loves, springing from a sudden fount deep within a parched, crumbling heart. The love that binds us together since the day of our reunion. The loves that is both carnal and mental. The love that binds you to the one real thing in your possession.
You and they would not understand us. Perhaps couldn't or didn't want to, either. And here I am being accused of the same crime. Ironic.
But that tears it. You know, that just damn well tears it.
Before, I thought of you all as apathetic. Living in a world of fear just because the Hyakugan Maou's castle was nearby. I could live with that. I and Kanan pitied you. Maybe you DID have no choice today.
But you stood by and let them take her instead of your daughter, who is weeping by your side as you speak. You let them take one of your own without a fight. You acted through cowardice and self-preservation, putting it over the heart of another. I feel no more pity. I feel nauseating, undeniably selfish disgust.
I remember what I taught the children today. My words, unweighted with the cares I feel now, echo softly in my ears.
"Class, today we are going to learn about the early shogunates. I've brought a longsword to show you what weapons they used to have. But don't touch it. It's not a toy. It's very sharp."
My glasses fall. Let them. They're in the way.
For every drop of blood they spill from you, I will take a thousand from the villagers. Ten thousand from those demon bastards.
My sword is drawn, the sharp blade glinting. Why, Hachimura-san, what big eyes you have. Don't worry, this won't hurt.
Compared to what you've done to me, it won't hurt one effin' bit.
I'm coming for you after this, Kanan, my sister. My love. My light.
And I won't be late. I swear I won't.
Disclaimer: Saiyuki is not mine. However, the translations, Hachimura's name and the Gonou angst ARE. *hugs poor Hakkai-sama*
No Understanding
Your voice, so harsh and barking, is grating on my ears like sand now as I ask for an explanation.
"No choice...we had no choice!"
The ONE time I come home late, and I find my home turned upside down and 360 degrees, my sister gone and the smell of demonic energy all over. You HAD to have another choice. A choice which screamed and smoked and spat metal fire at its opponents. Or are all those guns in your house just waterpistols and decorations, Hachimura-san? Didn't you fight to save one of your own?
I would.
"If I hadn't sent Kanan to them they would have taken my daughter! I think you know as well as I do it was one of the Hyakugan Maou's 'Woman Hunters' that came to this town!"
Yes, I know. I know that the Hyakugan Maou's lust has increased daily. I daresay he'd fuck anything under the sun as long as it was female. Yes, I know he has a team of Woman Hunters who grant him his newest toys. I say that in the broadest sense because I know after he has his fun he eats them. Not pretty. And I know you love your daughter.
But I also know I loved Kanan more than anything in the world.
"So...you made Kanan her substitute..." My voice sounds water-thin and faint. The anger and sorrow I feel is hardly expressed within my words.
Now you're smiling. Just bloody great. Your eyes are dancing with the madness I cannot reveal in myself. "Aa, that's right. Do you think I'd just give my precious daughter to that creature? But then, I suppose orphans like you two wouldn't understand..."
Wouldn't understand? *Wouldn't* understand?!
So you think I don't understand the undying love of a father and mother, do you? You think I don't know what it means to love, do you?
I understand, all right, and I remember.
I remember, albeit faintly, my mother's slender hands that tucked me in at night. I remember my father's smile, deep and gentle and pulled straight from the heart. They tore the two of us apart, Cho Kanan and Cho Gonou, and raised us separate from each other after our parents died. I remember also that my father's smile never appeared once on my face after that, not until Kanan brought it back when I found her in town one day. I thought she was just another woman, but something about her made me feel...whole. Complete. Not lost any longer. I understand completely the deep bond that was formed between us, overlapping the ones that had faded, worn away and died with our separation. I and she had another understanding after we compared lives and found out the truth--we would tell no one that we were tied by the Cho bloodline.
The one who does not understand is you, damn it, Hachimura! You would not understand the depths of our loves, springing from a sudden fount deep within a parched, crumbling heart. The love that binds us together since the day of our reunion. The loves that is both carnal and mental. The love that binds you to the one real thing in your possession.
You and they would not understand us. Perhaps couldn't or didn't want to, either. And here I am being accused of the same crime. Ironic.
But that tears it. You know, that just damn well tears it.
Before, I thought of you all as apathetic. Living in a world of fear just because the Hyakugan Maou's castle was nearby. I could live with that. I and Kanan pitied you. Maybe you DID have no choice today.
But you stood by and let them take her instead of your daughter, who is weeping by your side as you speak. You let them take one of your own without a fight. You acted through cowardice and self-preservation, putting it over the heart of another. I feel no more pity. I feel nauseating, undeniably selfish disgust.
I remember what I taught the children today. My words, unweighted with the cares I feel now, echo softly in my ears.
"Class, today we are going to learn about the early shogunates. I've brought a longsword to show you what weapons they used to have. But don't touch it. It's not a toy. It's very sharp."
My glasses fall. Let them. They're in the way.
For every drop of blood they spill from you, I will take a thousand from the villagers. Ten thousand from those demon bastards.
My sword is drawn, the sharp blade glinting. Why, Hachimura-san, what big eyes you have. Don't worry, this won't hurt.
Compared to what you've done to me, it won't hurt one effin' bit.
I'm coming for you after this, Kanan, my sister. My love. My light.
And I won't be late. I swear I won't.