Disclaimer: Gensomaden Saiyuki and its characters belong to Minekura-sensei. We've done nothing to gain profit from this little fic. Well, nothing financial that is, just the rippling warmth in our hearts when we set these guys in yaoi scenes…..
Warning: Before you read it, please be warned that this fic has a very dark tone with twisted angsty plot and sexual abuse content. Don't read if you don't have a heart to read these kinds of stuff or to see the characters in distress and pain.
Heal the Healer
A fanfiction of Gensomaden Saiyuki
Plotter: Yoong
Writer: Sumeragi Sakura yami_no_tsubasa@otakumail.com
Part VI: Sin
The next morning, Sanzo woke up feeling very much peaceful at heart. The morning light had seeped through the cheap cotton curtain --property of the inn-- hanging at the window. The light, warm and soothing, stroked his sleeping face with such comfort he couldn't remember any traces of his irrational anger last night. He opened his eyes and slipped out of his drugged sleep.
The morning air felt incredibly fresh and cool after the damp, hot night last night. He could barely feel any pain from his wound, he almost believe that it was probably had completely healed.
Groaning in contentment, he rolled his body comfortably to the side, facing the entire room. Aah… he felt really good today. Perhaps he should sleep a little more…
He suddenly noticed a mount of spiky, brown hair by his bed. He leant more to the side of his bed, to see Goku sitting on the floor by his bedside. He sat hugging his knees in his arms with his face bent down. Sanzo couldn't see much of that face from where he was leaning from, but he did notice a trace of misery on it.
That was not a sight Sanzo wanted to look at in such a fine morning. Well, to tell the truth, that was not a sight Sanzo wanted to look at anytime. It always irked him so to see the usual hyperactive Goku to look so crestfallen, however often and loud he threatened Goku to shut up or to be calm. Discreetly, not wanting to alert the boy, Sanzo reached for his holy fan that was lain on the bedside table. He took a stance, raising the fan high in the air, before plunging it right to Goku's spiky head.
"What are you doing sitting there like a lost puppy?! The kitchen stopped serving breakfasts anymore?!" shouted Sanzo, though sounded irritated, he was actually feeling in a good mood.
Goku yelped, crouching on the floor while holding his bumping head. He turned to shot Sanzo a wounded look.
"It hurts, Sanzo…. It really hurts……"
The boy went silent for a while, which surprised Sanzo. He thought the boy would respond usually, with a loud whining or an angry shout. But right now, Goku didn't seem like…..
Sanzo's eyes widened in shock.
Tears were streaming in thick drops down to Goku's cheeks. The boy seemed like he was fighting hard a sob from being choked out of his mouth. Sanzo stood up abruptly, staring at Goku in disbelief.
"O….oi…, Goku…. I don't think I hit you THAT hard….," said the confused monk.
Goku shook his head, a soft sob escaped his throat. He looked down to the floor, while his shoulder trembled with his occasional ragged sobs. Sanzo was even more surprised. Something had definitely gone wrong. Of all the things he considered as Goku's annoying traits, being a crybaby was not one of it. In fact, it was not very often that he saw Goku cried.
Something had definitely gone wrong.
"Oi.. Goku… What's wrong?"
Hearing Sanzo's worried voice, Goku couldn't help but to explode. He began to cry uncontrollably, letting out loud chokes and sobs, much to Sanzo's fear. The boy couldn't stand it anymore. He jumped on Sanzo's bed and into Sanzo's arms. He hid his face on Sanzo's chest. His fingers dug and clawed into Sanzo's naked shoulder. Wincing from the pain the boy caused him, Sanzo awkwardly returned the hug.
He stroked --still awkwardly-- Goku's hair. He patted Goku's trembling shoulder gently. Damn it… He was not very good in comforting distressed people! He had never had anyone to come to him for comfort before, so he considered it was understandable if he was now at lost at what to do.
"Goku…., what's going on?" he asked the boy softly.
Goku just shook his head and continued to cry.
Submitting to his protective instinct, Sanzo let himself hug the boy tightly in his arms.
Damn it! What the hell had happened?!
+ + + + +
Sanzo was not the only who woke up in tranquil comfort that morning. Hakkai's eyes opened slightly, while his mind hadn't even registered his surrounding yet. Floating between reality and unconsciousness, he felt as he was drowned in a pool of warm fuzziness. So warm and nice. It felt liquid. His whole body felt as naked as an infant inside a womb, because the warmth sheathed his entire figure like a second skin.
It had been so long. So long, since the last time he felt this way.
This was the state of pure contentment. Joyous relief. He felt like he could stay in this soothing warmth for as long as he could. It also felt like a dejavu, though. He had felt this kind of comfort before. When was the last time he felt like this?
In the morning after he spend his last night with Kanan.
When recollection hit him, it was like a ship hitting an iceberg.
Shocking and fast and uncontrollable.
He remembered. In regret. In pain. And most of all, in fear.
He bolted, sitting straight upright. What had he done? What had he done? Could his mind possibly trick him into remembering things he didn't do? He couldn't have done that! He couldn't….
Goku……..
By Buddha….
What had he done?
He turned to the side, finding his bed was devoid of any other occupants, besides Hak Ryu who cooed at him meekly. Yet, traces of his crime confirmed his fear of what had occurred last night. Smudges of blood stained the white bedsheet like a speck of dirt in the middle of snow. In cold disbelief, Hakkai ran his fingers over the stain.
He felt sick. A boiling nausea rose from the pit of his stomach up into his mouth. He tried to swallow it down, but realized he couldn't. He ran to the privy and spilled his purge out of his system.
He couldn't believe this. How did he let his sanity slip away and be eaten with madness? By the green-eyed monster. His demon inside. He felt sick again.
And the fact that he woke up feeling in soothing, warm comfort….
Oh, Buddha……….
He leant on the privy, trying to catch the breath that kept slipping out of his mouth. His whole world swirled, turning him as a spineless slug, worthless, irredeemable.
Goku….
How was he now? How did he feel when he….
Oh, Gods….
He had to find the boy now.
Right now or else he would turn insane with guilt.
Hakkai slammed open the door to Goku's room, expecting to find the poor boy in there. His eyes wildly scanned the room. One brief look was enough to tell him that Goku was not there. He hadn't been there at all last night. The neatly kept bed gave away the fact that Goku hadn't been using it for the whole night.
Hissing with frustration, he decided to go to the only possible place left.
Sanzo was baffled. The boy in his arms was still sobbing, shoulder shaking and all, even though the sobs had missed their violent, uncontrollable traits. The boy was calmer now, yet tears were still streaming down his flushed cheeks. He hated this, really. He felt incredible pain, mental pain, seeing the boy he always thought as a trammel, was now very much troubled. He never thought he would care so much.
His left hand was wrung over the boy's narrow back, clinging him closer. His other hand was awkwardly stroking the boy's scruffy hair. A choked sob softly heard from beneath the hair. He couldn't take it anymore. He gave in to his instinct.
He raised Goku's face with his hand. The boy's watery brown eyes stared at him, the brows knitted in a painful sorrow. Feeling dazed, Sanzo bent his face down and dropped a soft kiss on Goku's forehead.
Then another one on the bridge of his nose, and one on each cheeks. Goku's sobbing had died out thoroughly, replaced by a dazed calmness. Holding Goku's face between the cup of both of his hands, Sanzo leant his forehead on the boy's.
"I don't know what else to do," the monk grunted softly.
Goku blinked a tearful, and broke a feeble smile on his lips.
"That's enough," his whisper was hoarse.
Nothing else needed to be said. Goku understood. That was best way Sanzo would ever do to comfort him and it was more than enough. It was what laid behind the gesture that mattered more to Goku than the gesture itself. They had shared an unspoken bond, so deep and intimate they had passed the need for words to bridge their thoughts. A bond treasured without any covenants, born and grew inadvertently between them.
It was not a master-slave relationship. It was more than friendship. It was more than brotherhood. It was probably love, but even more. Even more. It was their own kind of bond.
A part of Sanzo's pained worry disappeared after he saw Goku's smile, however feeble it was. In a few minutes, the boy would declare he was hungry, as usual, Sanzo expected. But he still couldn't put the matter aside. The reason why Goku broke down and cry.
A small noise was made from the direction of the door. Sanzo looked up, surprised to see the door to his room was already opened, with Hakkai standing at the threshold.
He was even more surprised to see the expression on Hakkai's face.
It was not shock, for Hakkai wouldn't be so shocked to find Goku in Sanzo's arms. Could it be that he was surprised to see the boy was crying? Sanzo frowned. No, it was something else. It was not only surprise. It smelled like terror. A guilty nervousness.
Goku raised his head. He followed Sanzo's gaze and met Hakkai's from across the room. The smile Sanzo had managed to evoke died out of his face straightaway. Goku glared at Hakkai behind a disturbed frown.
Hakkai's expression grew dimmer and paler.
Sanzo noticed this in silence.
Hakkai staggered backwards, as if he was losing his strength. Sanzo thought the man would fall down, but he leant his shoulder weakly against the door's threshold. His face was as white as a corpse, if not transparent. The expression on his face, which Sanzo still couldn't define, had grown worst.
The two stared at each other with strange emotions flashed across their eyes. Sanzo frowned, feeling very much at loss, and disturbed, with the whole situation. The tension hung thick in the air, as if it would congeal into something solid and drop to the floor between them.
Something had gone wrong. Something had definitely gone wrong, and it involved the two of them. Was it the reason why Goku ran to him and cry? Would it be wise to ask them, or should he be himself and stay out of other people's business instead?
He decided he couldn't see Goku's tears anymore. He opened his mouth to speak, before Gojyo appeared at the door, shouting his loud good-morning.
The oblivious Gojyo draped his arm around Hakkai's shoulder and cheerfully greeted everybody.
"Oosu! (Read: Osh! ß an abbreviation of Ohayou Gozaimasu, usually said by men) Everybody wakes up early today! This is a rare occasion. I guess the crisp, shiny weather has a hand in that, eh? Oh, even you look so much healthier, Sanzo! The wound doesn't hurt anymore? Hey, what do you say if we go downstairs and taste that delicious meal the waitress had boasted to me last night?"
Hakkai bent his face down. Goku did the same. All of this hadn't been missed by Sanzo's observing eyes.
The only one who was missing everything was the once again lark-happy Gojyo.
"Hey, come on! Are you guys still sleepy? I'm starving here! Hey, Goku, didn't you hear me? I'm talking about food here! The prospect of eating a super-delicious food! Aren't you excited? Come on, Guys!"
Even though the weather had grown friendlier today, the tension of last night's conflict didn't fade all too soon, Gojyo assumed. The supposedly blithe breakfast didn't go as cheerful as he thought it would. His simple logic didn't apply, after all, which was whenever the sky shines, the heart sings.
He snorted.
Who the hell made that stupid proverb anyway?
Upset, he eyed his silent companions who sat around the dining table. Their quiet self-withdrawal was in high contrast with the background of the busy inn's tavern. He wondered if his friends were all still in bad temper because of yesterday's unbelievably killer weather.
Huh, he would never let something as trivial as the weather to ruin his whole day. A lousy sex might do, but not the weather, by Buddha.
A waitress dropped by to their table to deliver a basketful of breakfast buns. The warm, tempting-looking buns were shining golden, a sign of their freshness. Gojyo raised his brows, eyes widen with hunger. He was practically drooling over the sweet-smelling buns.
It was Goku's breakfast. But he decided to try his luck, despite of knowing the danger of taking away Son Goku's food. He quickly took one and threw it into his mouth with a loud "Hups!"
"Hmmmm……. Wan Chai was right. The cook here makes the most delicious bun! Hmmm…. I can feel the soft bread melted in my mouth. Gods… my mouth is already watering for more, even though I haven't swallowed this one yet!" said Gojyo almost incoherently because his mouth was filled with Goku's breakfast.
Gojyo took a glance at Goku. He deliberately said that out loud purely to spite the greedy monkey, even though the bun was actually mouth-watering. But he didn't get the reaction he expected from the monkey.
Confused, if not upset, he raised one brow.
"Oi, Goku. You're not mad with me for stealing your food? I said, FOOD, Goku… TASTY FOOD. I stole it from you."
Listlessly, Goku stared at his basket of bun. Gojyo thought the boy would burst with fury the next second. But it seemed like today Gojyo wouldn't be getting the usual reactions from Goku. The boy pushed away his breakfast and stated something incredibly shocking.
"I'm not hungry."
If it were possible, Gojyo's jaw would've hit the floor.
In utter surprise, he stood up and pointed at the boy. He turned to look at the other guys and screamed in disbelief.
"Did you hear that? Did you all hear that? He said he's not hungry?! How can that be?! This is not Goku! Hakkai, Sanzo, what should we do?!"
However, he didn't get his expected reactions from the other guys too. Hakkai was busy stirring his cup of tea with his head bent down. In fact, he had been doing that since half an hour ago. While Sanzo grumpily read the morning paper, even more dead-silent than he usually was.
Sanzo was actually the most observant of the gang. He had been watching the peculiar tension shared between Hakkai and Goku, looking for some signs that would tell him of the situation. Something wrong had definitely happened between the two, but what exactly he didn't know. He didn't even know if the thing involved both of them. It was possible that one of them found out something about the other one, something really bad that probably resulted in their ignorance to each other.
He wanted to know what happened but never thought of reducing himself to inquiring about other people's business. He who think highly of personal privacy wouldn't be found poking at other people's junk.
Yet…
It bothered him so.
From behind the newspaper, he watched the noisy Gojyo stating his disbelief, if not disappointment, as loudly as if he tried to tell the whole tavern patrons about it. Hakkai looked forlorn, while Goku looked…… How Goku looked perplexed him. The boy was not sulking, not also angry. He looked almost like in fright.
Sanzo decided he should observe some more, at least for the sake of his peace of mind.
Five days passed with a strange, rigid silence shared between the four of them. Like the silence before the storm, it was the kind of silence that was unnerving. Even the usually oblivious Gojyo sensed something was going wrong. But unlike the taciturn Sanzo, he expressed his confusion in a rather loud frustration.
His frustration was understandable, though. In the last five days, Goku had turned into someone who was not Goku at all. The commonly riotous, over-lively monkey boy seemed as if he had dropped his vivacity somewhere in the inn and couldn't find it back. He hadn't returned Gojyo's deliberate teasings, no matter how much the man poked at him. He hadn't even seemed to know that Gojyo was teasing him.
But what was even scarier, he had stopped eating much.
This frightened Gojyo and worried even Sanzo.
Hakkai was also not of himself lately. The already usually quiet man had been more reserved lately. He barely talked to anyone else these days. He would answer people's questions, after a whole long minute of being distracted. But he didn't say other things much.
He would always say he was all right when he was asked, of course.
As his wound constantly healed, Sanzo gradually regained his strength. He didn't need to wear thick wrappings of bandage anymore. But the group decided to wait for another fortnight before they would leave for their journey, just to be safe.
And what was defined as "the group", was actually Gojyo and Sanzo. Goku just shrugged his agreement, while Hakkai nodded his quietly.
This, in turn, frustrated Gojyo more and more. He lost both his sparring partner in quarreling and his best friend in the same time. He tried to reason the whole strange situation, yet he continuously bumped into dead-ends. He hated this, much to his surprise. He would rather have the old Goku, who would fight him back over something as trifling as breakfast's menu, or the over-tolerating Hakkai, his old friend, over this. He knew something happened, something awful, but he couldn't understand why. Hakkai, being even more reserved and shut himself from other people, hurt him the most. He felt abandoned, distrusted. He felt useless as a friend and ignored.
Gojyo asked about their new situation to Sanzo once, only to receive a grumpy grunt as the answer. He figured, Sanzo was as lost as he was about this matter. The monk told him to wait for the matter to surface by itself, but he didn't think he couldn't do that.
Still…
Still, everytime he tried to shake the answer out of Hakkai, his best friend would only smiled meekly and said that everything was fine.
Everything was fine my ass, scowled Gojyo.
Fine. If Hakkai was playing the all secretive, than he'd probably better stop concerning about him. Gojyo found an escape out of the frustration by drowning himself in liquor and women.
They didn't help much, though.
Still, they were better companions than his friends right now. He would be gone for days to the local bars and brothels without returning to the inn. No one seemed to care about it and thus he was hurt more.
The fifth night after the incident, Goku found himself standing by the window of the inn's hallway, looking out to the midnight sky. Moonlight showered upon his figure in silvery rain of rays. Basking in the glitter, his face looked as serene as the moon above.
He laid his hands across the window's threshold in a listless pose. He dropped his eyes onto his hands, lost in his thoughts.
Five days. Five days had gone after the frightening incident, he thought. The pain in his body had faded, even though the pain in his heart stayed still. It was not the forceful act of it that hurt him more. Instead, it was the matter of who had done it to him. He still couldn't believe that Hakkai, his friend Hakkai, would ever do such a thing to him. Five days had passed and he still couldn't believe it. He didn't want to believe it. Yet, the pain inside and the humiliation he suffered proved him that it was true. Not a nightmare. True.
He didn't believe that Hakkai was such a man. Ever. The kind of man blinded by desire and roughness. Gojyo, he wouldn't be surprised. But not Hakkai. Definitely not Hakkai.
He hated the man now. He never thought he could feel that way to Hakkai but he did now. The recollection of the pain and roughness from the incident had scorched a wound in his heart deeper than the one in his body.
And he had to suffer it by himself. He couldn't tell Sanzo. He was too humiliated to tell Sanzo. He didn't want Sanzo to think of him as weak and used and thus would abandon him. He shivered in terror at the very thought. He couldn't tell Gojyo either, for Gojyo was Hakkai's best friend and God knows what he would say about the matter. It was possible that the man would stand up for his friend, and after all the time they had spent in fighting and swearing to each other, Goku was sure he was not one of Gojyo's favorite friends.
He didn't know what to do. All of his hatred, fear and frustration had welled up inside him, aching for relieve without anywhere to relieve it to. For the first time in his hundreds of year time of life, Goku felt as depressed as he felt right now. Not even during his long imprisonment in his rocky jail in the mountain did he feel this way.
"Does it work?"
Startled, Goku jerked out of his thoughts. He suddenly found Sanzo standing right next to him by the window. He eyed the monk with reflect-evoked fear at the first ten seconds, before he blinked and returned to his new gloomy self.
"I don't like that," said the monk in a short snap, angry.
Goku blinked. "What?"
"The fear in your eyes. I don't like it. Since when do you see me with such fear in your eyes?"
Goku looked away. "It's not fear."
"I don't like liars too."
Goku didn't answer for Sanzo was true. He was obviously lying. He didn't like it, his instinct made him do it.
"What does your first question mean?" he asked, trying to divert the conversation.
"You look like you have something tremendous you hold inside. You're standing here as if you want to tell it to the moon. So, does standing here bathing under the moonlight work?"
Silence. "Not really."
Sanzo glanced sideways to the boy. He decided to gamble and forced himself to do it.
"Try me."
Goku's eyes widened with surprise. It was very much unlike Sanzo to say those words. Such simple words. Yet it filled his heart with swelling warmth that felt too good it actually hurt. Was Sanzo worrying over him? Him? The good for nothing monkey who had brought so many miseries into the monk's life?
For once he was offered the opportunity he had long desired and for that one time he couldn't fulfil it himself.
"I.. can't…."
"Why?"
"I just can't."
"Since when are you hiding things from me?"
Goku swallowed hard. He wanted to say "Since never", but couldn't bring himself to do it. The lump in his throat hurt so much when he wanted to speak, thus he chose silence. Moreover, he was afraid he couldn't help but ask for self-pity from the man he had considered his master.
Sanzo gritted his teeth, discreetly. He felt like a commander betrayed by his soldier. The words "disloyal" and "dishonest" were rioting in his head. The group had been breaking up in the last few days. As the head of the gang, he felt responsible to keep it from being torn up by this stupid problem, whatever it was.
As the master of Goku, he felt he deserved the explanation.
He looked down sideways at the spiky brown head next to his arm. He raised his head again when his eyes caught a movement from the other end of the hallway. He saw Hakkai going out of his room. The man froze when he saw Sanzo and Goku standing by the window, only a few feet away from him. His initial reaction was to open the door to his room again and disappear inside. Yet he stopped in mid-motion. Sanzo saw the revolution of resolution that he went through. The battle of will was won by the rational Hakkai.
Hakkai turned around and started to walk towards them.
Goku sensed that Sanzo was looking somewhere else. He followed the monk's glance and found the coming Hakkai.
Sanzo could feel the lithe body next to him sprung into a rigid, if not tensed, mass of nerve. As if the boy sensed a youkai nearby, which Sanzo checked right away and found none. It was truly Hakkai who made Goku tensed up. He wondered if something might happen and he would actually find out what the hell was going on between the two.
As Hakkai approached closer, Goku became warier and warier. He didn't want the man to come near him at all, unless he wanted to remember the incident that night. He didn't, by Buddha, he didn't want it replayed in his head once again.
But Hakkai stopped a few steps away. The man stared at Goku with a strange expression on his face, that resembled worry to Goku's surprise. Then he bowed low.
Goku stared.
"I'm sorry," blurted Hakkai, rather emotionally.
Goku just stared.
"I don't deserve your apology so I won't ask for it. I just want to tell you that I'm sorry. I didn't mean to do it, let alone to hurt you, but I know I did. I'm really, really sorry."
Goku frowned. "You think everything will be all right after you say you're sorry?"
"No, I.."
"You think can forget what you've done to me, the pain and the humiliation, just by saying you're sorry?"
"No…"
"Then you're wasting both of our time."
In rage, Goku turned away. He aimed for the door to his room, before he felt a hand held him by the shoulder.
"Wait, Goku, please wait. Please listen to me first. I know what I've done is unforgivable, but still, I want to do everything you want me to do to make it up for it."
Instinct ordered Goku to force his way out of the hand that gripped his shoulder. Fear came first. He jerked and leaped away from the hand, as if running away from a poisonous snake. Then anger replaced the fear, urging him to attack his assaulter. Because Hakkai didn't make any further physical contact, he balled his fists beside his body instead.
"Don't touch me!" he barked.
Pain shot through Hakkai's chest like an iron bolt hammered into his flesh. A bloodless wound that hurt much more than the bloody one. It was irrational, Hakkai realized it himself. He should have predicted this kind of attitude coming from Goku towards him. After all he had done, he even wondered why the boy hadn't tried to take a revenge of him. That would probably make him feel better.
Still, utter rejection from Goku hurt like hell.
For a fraction of a second, Goku saw the hurt look radiated from Hakkai's eyes. Only for a fraction of a second, before Goku killed the sympathy that had begun to born in his heart.
Hakkai didn't deserve his apology for what he had done. No one did. Son Goku was not someone weak one could use for his or her advantages. Nor to humiliate. Nor to hurt.
He felt as if he was boiling with fury. With angry steps, he stomped away from Hakkai, and Sanzo, and headed for the stairs. He crashed into Gojyo, who stepping up the stairs, and push the man off his way by his shoulder. The innocent Gojyo was thrown back to the wall, more confused than upset.
"Hey!" shouted Gojyo, staring at Goku's back then at the other two who stood in the hallway.
"What's going on?" he asked, approaching his friends.
Sanzo was staring sharply at Hakkai. "Ask that to Hakkai, Gojyo. He seems to be the cause of this whole thing."
Hakkai bent his head down, still in shock from Goku's harsh rejection. He covered his face with one of his hands. He blew a trembled sigh, thick with guilt and frustration. He was afraid to tell the others about the truth, afraid of what they would do to him after it. Or what they would think of Goku as the victim.
Gojyo stopped only a couple of step away from him, eyes intensely watching. What would Gojyo think of him if he tell him about this? Would he hate him too? A shiver ran across Hakkai's spine as he felt he was too terrified to lose Gojyo too, now that he had lost Goku.
***TBC***
yoong's A/N: Uh...oh It's going darker and angstier, ne? laughing nervously ^^;; The main pairing in my mind is HakkaiXGoku, but there's still a hint of warm relationship between Sanzo-Goku and Gojyo-Hakkai. Hope you like it. Sorry for Sanzo being OOC (maybe Hakkai, too?). The more the story goes, the more OOCness he'll behave. Well, tell you all again. My parts in making this fic is only thinking the plot and uploading each part in FF.net. All sentences you've read are Sakura's effort. All credits this fic might receive are going to be hers.
Sumeragi Sakura's Little Note: Ahh.. the morning after. The after-effect. Everything's cooling down, only to lead into another twist. Poor, poor Goku. Poor, poor Hakkai. Blame Yoong, please, for putting these men in a such difficult condition. ^__^;; Hehehe... kidding. Though I honestly don't have the heart to do this to Hakkai, 'cause he's such a gentle soul. *gets kicked by Goku's fans* The more I write about him, the more I grow my symphathy for him. Sympathy for the angel-faced devil. No, he's not really a devil, I think. He's just a man. Unlike a saint, he has flaws as a man. Then again, who doesn't?