DISCLAIMER: Saiyuki isn't mine, it belongs to Minekura Kazuya. So do Sanzo, and Goku...also Hakkai...and Gojyo...and KOUMYOU... *longing sigh*
Gojyo: *sweatdrop*
Isn't there any way you can restrain your fangirl, Hakkai?!
Hakkai: But Gojyo, she's yours now too, you know...
Sanzo: Goku, go steal her Requiem Visual Complete, her Gensoumaden
Saiyuki fanbook and her Saiyuki manga, before she's further inspired...*disgusting
visions of M.Y. and Koumyou Sanzo gushing about how CUTE Kouryuu is dancing in
head*
Goku: Okay.
(Warui, you could say this is one of those 'filler chapters' but it sets the stage for stuff to come. Promise! Oh, and by the way, if you want to see Gojyo fight You Jouji in the upcoming chapters, let me know, whether by e-mail or review! Sankyuu!)
IMASHIME
Caution
"Aniki, I really need your help on something. Listen, what is it that girls like as gifts?"
"Ohoooooo! So, my little bro has a kanojo! You devil, you!"
"Shut UP! I do NOT have a girlfriend!"
"Ch', FINE, BE that way. Heh heh heh...well, I dunno. Cards...chocolates...flowers...kisses..."
"...I don't have enough money for chocolates, and I don't think kaasan would appreciate cards..."
"K-kaasan? What? You want to give her a gift?"
"Un-n. Is that so wrong?"
"No, no, but why suddenly...?"
"Just cause...I mean, I want to thank her for the piano lessons. I love her...and...and...and I'd like it if she loved me too..."
"...Oi, gaki (brat), don't give me that puppy-dog face. She DOES love you. She just has a funny way of showing her love, all right?"
"Sou da kedo...even so, I wish she'd change,"
"Aa. So do I."
_Naa...even if kaasan leaves you alone, I never, EVER will._
"So?"
"So, what?"
"What should I give her, aniki?"
"Hmmm. Flowers would be good. I'll go with you on Sunday, and we'll buy some for her. How's that?"
"Sounds perfect..."
"Good. Now go to sleep, you, and get outta my bed."
++++++++++
The stars shone down from the heavens as the two men walked down the empty road back to Feiyan. "You've known Seiko for a long time, it seems," Gojyo remarked, breaking the silence. He casually lit a cigarette and took a long pull on it.
"Since childhood," came Ying's reply. He smiled, but it went unnoticed by his companion. "I owed her my life once, long ago. My heart was young and more open then--it didn't know about the barriers that politics and prejudice could cause." He cursed softly under his breath and sighed. "...If only I could have known about this sooner, then I could have helped her get away from him."
"Ii jan--seems all right to me. She has accepted her fate." The cigarette tasted a little bitter somehow.
"Gojyo-han, can you really say that after seeing how he treats his people today?"
Gojyo didn't answer and changed the subject very quickly. "Well. Any idea why You Jouji hates youkai so?"
"He was brought up that way--hating demons and anything impure or 'abnormal' to his surroundings--but there will always be one who takes his fight further than is necessary." Ying snorted, his eyes narrowing. "Lemme tell you something, Gojyo-han; I saw a man branded with the Mark a long time ago when I was just a chibi (little one). They use a white-hot branding iron, and I heard it's often administered with a number of lashes on the side. It's a punishment that's hard to survive, and those who do are marked for life like ruddy cattle. To survive, conform. To speak out is as good as forfeiting your freedom, your reputation and your life. I cannot accept that and never will -- no one can change the human values you were taught, only yourself. Trust none except your own."
Gojyo 'tch'ed amusedly. "Spare me, man. You're beginning to sound like a namagusa bouzu I know. All on his lonesome self, cutting his own past and trusting no one..."
"I trust no man, nor youkai. I am in between them, and therefore have nowhere to turn to." Ying sounded serious. "But yet...I sense no put-on airs, no sympathy or prejudice from you or your friends. You put on no act that I can detect. I feel like I can actually trust you all, Gojyo-han."
"Yo~sh', well," Gojyo shrugged lazily, "that's a start."
No more was said until they reached Feiyan, but the mood was decidedly lighter.
++++++++++
When they reached home, Zhen Ji was squatting by the door frame playing with something. he beamed up at Zhen Ji happily.
"Oniisan, look! Aren't these pretty?" He chirped as he stood up and jumped happily around his elder brother, waving the bunch of pinkish flowers in his grasp around frantically. "I got them from..."
"Ah, ah, I don't want to hear any more. Show me tomorrow, chibi, 'cause you should be in bed!"
"A~h, come on, oniisan, lemme stay up late just this once!"
"No!" said Ying hurriedly, and frog-marched his vehemently protesting brother off to bed. Sanzo watched him nonchalantly from his seat in a battered old armchair as he read the day's papers and smoked. The ashtray was already full to the brim.
"Sonna ni kuyashii no ka?" grinned Gojyo, looking at the still-smoking cigarette butts. "Are you really that put off you have to go back tomorrow?"
"Are you really that eager to see what the other world looks like?" growled the monk. There was a respectful silence as Sanzo puffed on the last dregs of his Marlboro and put it out. "Motto mo kuyashii no wa ano Ying darou ga--it may be Ying who's more put off than I. There is something somebody's not telling me here," Sanzo said, looking up, "and I don't like being kept in the dark, Gojyo. What is between Yaku Seiko and Hong Lang Ying?"
"Nothing whatsoever." _Except maybe You Jouji._ He lit one of his own cigarettes.
"You expect me to believe there is NOTHING between them?"
"Nothing at ALL." Gojyo resisted the urge to grin.
"Quit BSing me, you cockroach bastard," snapped Sanzo, "Hong Wu told us everything after you tromped off after him. Lang Ying's bearing a torch for Yaku Seiko."
Gojyo hid his surprise well. Guess even wily hanyou couldn't escape the 'all-seeing eye' of their parents. "Ah, guess the secret's out. So what you gonna do to me for lying, O Holy Sanzo-sama?"
"I am hardly in the mood for any jokes, Gojyo. I go tomorrow, perform my duty and we leave. Simple enough for even a hentai like you to fathom."
Gojyo's expression turned serious. "Oii...you seriously going to marry a nice girl like HER to a snot-nosed, shitty-assed, cold..."
"...'bastard like him', resident potty-mouth?" Sanzo flipped to the sports page. "Yes. I have my obligations, and I will say what I am meant to say, as well as what I truly mean to say."
"Meaning?"
"What's the damn use of killing off Gyuumaou again if they're all going to keep bickering like spoilt children over blood issues?"
"Hooo...So, Sanzo-sama does have a heart after all. Not like you, bouzu. Wasn't it you who said that we were no 'defenders of justice', hmmm?"
"This has nothing to do with justice, love or any other useless crap like that." Sanzo closed the paper and folded it up noisily. "Anyone who gets in our way to the West must expect to pay a high price. And since I don't want to waste my spare bullets on HIM..." The high priest got up, dropping the Tougenkyou Herald neatly onto the chair. "I shall see you tomorrow. Don't sleep in or I'll make sure you have all the time to do that in hell." With that unorthodox farewell, the monk was off to bed.
"Yeah, Goodnight to you too, namagusa bouzu!" yelled Gojyo, but the door had already closed. He sighed and chucked the cigarette ashes into the dustbin before leaving to find Ying.
He was sitting quietly by his little brother's side, stroking the soft, fine scarlet locks gently. The young one was sleeping the untrammeled sleep of the innocent, still clutching those pretty pink blossoms. Gojyo tiptoed in and tapped Ying on the shoulder, and was acknowledged with a soft grunt.
"How old's the gaki, anyway?"
"Eight. He runs around like a freaking beigoma (spinning top) every day, and he stilll won't go to sleep at night. Dumb gaki...scared of the dark. But still...I can't refuse him, can I? I want him to shut up and go to sleep, so he'll leave me alone."
"I suppose that's what he used to do..."
Jien-aniki won't you stay just for a li'l while?
"Eh? Did you say something?"
"Ah ha, no, of course not, nothing at all..."
"...Gojyo-han, may I ask you a favour?"
"I suppose, yeah. What?"
"Hakkai-san tells me you know how to play the piano."
_AAAARGH! HAKKAI!!!_ "What if I do?"
"I'd ask you to play 'A Time For Us'." Gojyo stiffened. "My father used to play the piano, and he played this song at the village bar to try and court my mother," Ying explained. "He taught me a little too. I miss the sound of the song, but unfortunately, he hasn't played since his leg became crippled..."
"How'd THAT happen?"
"...I prefer not to say, Gojyo-han, not now, I'm afraid. Do you know how to play?"
"Yes I do." Gojou relented and let himself be taken towards the back of the house, where a small room was unlocked. Inside lay an upright piano, clean though old. Gojyo seated himself and stared at the keyboard. It looked vaguely familiar.
"Where did you get this piano?"
"It's not originally ours, of course...can't afford such luxuries. My father used to be in the construction business, and he salvaged this from one of the houses due to be destroyed in Minghu. He told me it hadn't been sold for four years since the previous owners left it suddenly, and this is the only thing that survived the demolition. That plot of land is just a spare lot now." He patted the instrument's sleek sides lovingly. "It's just too bad that the previous owners left their piano behind. Grand ol' thing, ain't it?"
"Aa. That it is."
_Naaah. It couldn't be._
Without further ado, Gojyo touched his hands to the keyboard and began to play, letting the notes flow from his heart as they had so long ago. His head began to nod in time with the music as he progressed, fingers sweeping across the keyboard as if across a long-lost beloved's skin. One foot worked the pedal to accentuate the correct notes, and...
Mi do' ti la so do' ti la so...scrunch.
"What--...'scrunch'?" Ying blinked and Gojyo's head bowed down violently in exasperation. The player stood up and looked into the piano, wondering what was causing the sound. The strings seemed all right, but there was something stuffed inside, sticking to the hammer. Gojyo mentioned this, and reached inside to pull it out. He retrieved the offending object and stared at it blankly.
_How'd that get in there, you familiar damned piece of wood?_
"Gojyo-han, what was it inside?"
"Piece of cobweb must've worked itself loose," came a hastily muttered reply as Gojyo shoved his hand into his pocket. He pleaded extreme fatigue and excused himself to bed.
A faded, crimson petal lay unnoticed on the floor, dried in the darkness of the upright piano's innards for fourteen long years.
++++++++++
"Gojyo-han, Gojyo-han WAKE UP!"
"Ah Ying! Where's Zhen Ji!?" Gojyo distantly heard Sheng Wei's voice.
The half-demon started awake into a Sunday morning. Weak but still dazzling sunlight blinded him momentarily, and he blinked blearily at Ying's fuzzy form. Behind him, he could see a rather worried-looking Goku.
"Whassamatter?" he mumbled gruffly, springing up out of bed. "Where're Hakkai and Sanzo?"
"Both of them have gone to Weishan already, but that's beside the point!" Ying exclaimed. "Zhen Ji's gone missing and Goku found this lying on the table when we woke up for breakfast!" Gojyo snatched the piece of paper Ying was waving at him and read it quickly. It was written in a child's scrawl with a few spelling mistakes.
Oniisan I've gon to get you some of the pretty pink flowers I was showing you yestreday. Nobody semes to want them althuogh they are very pretty. I will be back soon okay?
Zhen Ji
"Ying, what's happened? Where's your little brother?" Hong Wu asked, his voice shaking slightly.
"Anata...look..." Sheng Wei whispered fearfully, retrieving from the dusty wooden floor a fragile, delicate pink blossom. Hong Wu drew his breath sharply, and Ying flinched.
"That idiot...he's gone to Weishan!" cursed Lang Ying, pacing tensely around the room. "I have to get him back here, now!"
"Ying-san, calm down just a little, will ya? He can't necessarily have gone to Weishan! He could just be somewhere in the village!" Goku tried to get him to calm down.
"He IS in Weishan," Ying said steadily, striding over to a small chest and drawing out two gleaming, red-tasselled sais, "because those pink blooms of demonsbane only grow in and around the walls of Weishan's citadel. Ten years ago, I tried to pick them myself, and just you look what happened."
Hong Lang Ying raised his head, looked towards Goku and Gojyo and pushed the left side of his fringe away from his face.
"Holy--" breathed Goku.
"Oh saints--" spluttered Gojyo.
"Now you see the truth that I must hide," Ying whispered hoarsely, his scar now revealed in the daylight. All of it.
++++++++++
And now, review thanks --
ayie@Hairi -- *looks uncomfy* Uhm, yes, in a way, sort of, uh-huh...Of course he'd interfere! I certainly don't think Seiko n Jouji belong together! XD I'm glad you're still reading! :) And oh...Gojyo sent me this message for you.
Dear ayie-chan,
I can survive fine without my aniki, or anyone else, and if
you continue to try and kill me I will come into your room SUPER LATE at night
and [THIS PART HAS BEEN CENSORED BY FF.NET TO KEEP THE RATING PG-13]
Lots of love,
Gojyo ||^_^||
Ashura Akuma -- Wah, Melbourne?! Coolness. Yep, Seiko and Ying all along ^_^v. Don't worry about Goku, he's a little sensitive when it comes to all these racial issues. You's pretty misguided, after all, and you'll find in the next chapter exactly HOW misguided.
real-circus -- Yeah, go get 'im Gojyo! ^o^
L.L. Artemisan -- Thanks for catching my spelling errors!
Lady Ravenshadow -- Thank you, thank you and thank you for reviewing. I'm so glad you like ATFU so far! You looked really deep into the story, didn't ya? I think that deep down, erogappa has a kind and gentle heart, evident in the manga and anime, and it needs more airtime. ;) If you can see him bonding with another half-breed, well, perhaps you'll like the fic I have planned after this one (more Gojyo-fluffiness). I hope you'll enjoy the rest of my work, and PLEASE do update 'Beneath The Skin' and 'Inbetween Days' soon. They're good reads. ~_^
To all regular reviewers (3 or more reviews)-- As a thank-you for your support I have sent you a pic-preview of the next chapter. Hope you like it, and please--no spreading my poor pic all over the Net! ^_~