Warning: This story contains references male/male relationships and some bad words.
Disclaimer: Saiyuki is (c)Kazuya Minekura, Enix Co., Tv Tokyo, etc. I do not claim to own any of these characters, though the views expressed within my story are my own.
A/N: Well, I changed my mind. I didn't make this into an all out several chapter long fic. Somehow what I wanted to say fit into 2000 words and so I've decided to just leave it as a one shot.
Yes, there is an OC in it, but there had to be because I needed her to make the characters think about something. So she's not really important. And by the way, this isn't an action fic, it's just a general musing on what haunts each character.
By the way, I had wanted to include more details on the All Saints day type of thing in Japan, where they make one animal out of a cucumber so that the spirit can come down, and another out of something else... but I couldn't remember the details and just avoided it... So if you do know it, tell me cuz I'm curious!
He wasn't drunk. That's what he kept telling himself as he stumbled up the stairs, holding on to the wall for support.
Gojyo blinked wearily and looked down the long corridor, trying to remember which door was his. As he peered in to the slight gloom the corridor shifted and spun, making him groan and clutch his head, eyes screwed shut as he continued forward, alone.
He had tried to get a girl, but he'd been too far gone by then. His charm had deserted him, and the red locks of hair meant nothing on their own.
"Aw... fuck it," he muttered to himself, chasing away thoughts of his lonely bed and picturing instead the hot cup of tea that surely awaited him, the cup of tea that never failed to be there after a long night of drinking, the cup of tea poured out moments before he arrived.
He knew Hakkai was too nice to him, and he enjoyed it immensely. Hakkai had always taken care of him, been there for him, done everything his mother had not. He knew he was unfair with Hakkai, but what could he do? It was part of his nature.
There, at last he was at his door. He pushed it open and walked in, eyes flicking around before landing on the girl.
She was lying on the bed. Her hair was mussed up, her skirt hitched up her legs a little, her lips were swollen and red and she gazed over at him, still in a daze of lust. It looked as if someone had begun to ravish her and stopped abruptly, leaving her there for him to find. Just like the usual cup of tea, poured moments before he arrived, letting Hakkai slip back in to his own room quietly.
Man. He had died and gone to heaven. He stumbled over to the girl, pinning her down on to the bed, and leered at her. She stared up at him in utter confusion, nose wrinkling at the smell of alcohol on his breath.
"Excuse me," she said timidly, "but I think--"
"Don't think, just do," he slurred, before pressing his lips against hers. She gasped in shock and he took advantage of the fact, flicking his tongue in to her mouth with expert ease.
Suddenly someone grabbed him from behind and pulled him away. Gojyo felt an icy cold wrap around him and then a fist connected with his face, sending him slamming into the wall.
"No!" The girl sat up franticly, staring at thin air. "Leave him alone, it was a mistake!"
Gojyo looked around but saw nothing, no one in the room other than him and the girl. Another punch aimed at his face made him reel backwards, and he blinked when he heard the soft crunch of cartilage and felt his nose shift slightly.
"Stop it!"
There was a sudden silence, and Gojyo swore, looking down at his bloodstained shirt. He reached up to touch his nose, but jerked away when a spasm of pain racked through him.
"You're in the wrong room," the girl whispered abjectly, staring up at him with wide, frightened eyes.
"Oh." Gojyo felt quite stupid. He opened the door and went back out, looking back one last time at the girl on the bed. Then the door slammed violently in his face, leaving him staring at the red substance on his hands in surprise.
They were silent while traveling, each absorbed in his own thoughts. Two nights ago Gojyo had stumbled into his room, mumbling about girls and ghosts, blood dripping down his face. Hakkai had know this was definitely not like Gojyo, and had spoken to Sanzo.
Yesterday they had confronted the girl Gojyo had stumbled into, seeking to banish the ghost that was probably haunting her.
The ghost hadn't been very pleased. As soon as Gojyo had stopped the girl on the street, he'd been punched in the gut.
Sanzo had taken over after that, somehow being able to sense where the ghost was. He'd fired a shot at the ghost, told it to shut up and behave, and spoken to the girl. Hakkai had to admit that Sanzo did have style at times.
The girl had finally explained the whole story. The ghost was that of her dead boyfriend. They had planned out their whole lives together, but one day a band of demons had attacked their village and her boyfriend had been killed.
She'd been at his side while he died, and he begged her not to mourn for him, not to burn incense, and not to pray for him on the day of the Spirits.
She'd done as he'd ask. Her parents had been disgusted. They hadn't understood, but she knew exactly what she was doing.
On the day of the Spirits she'd gone to the nearest willow tree and waited. And that's when her boyfriend had appeared in front of her. The village hadn't been able to accept their new visitor. She'd left.
Gojyo had been highly suspicious. Why in the world would she want to remain with a violent boyfriend?
She'd gotten angry at that. It wasn't his fault he was violent. The anger he felt was a result of her not praying for him properly. The anger he felt allowed him to stay with her. He just vented that anger on demons, the ones responsible for his death.
Sanzo had asked whether she wanted her boyfriend banished. She'd refused. Then all he'd said was, "You can't live in the past forever."
That had really pissed her off, Gojyo had commented idly last night. She'd begun to yell at them angrily.
"How dare you say that to me? Everyone lives in the past! Everyone has their own ghosts. Even you guys, who are trying to act so superior to me, even you guys are haunted by something! I'll bet my life on it. Only idiots don't have ghosts they tow along with them."
She'd stomped off, and they'd all shrugged their shoulders and gotten into Jeep. After a while, Gojyo had laughed. "I guess Goku's the only one here without ghosts then, right?"
Gojyo and Goku had argued and fought, and things had seemed back to normal. But today... they all seemed to be thinking back on what she'd said.
It was true, Hakkai decided. They all had their own ghosts. They were all haunted by their own past. They all carried the weight of tragedy around their shoulders, and nothing could be done to get rid of it.
He let his usual smile slip from his face as he thought about what his companions could be towing behind them. He knew they were all digging into themselves, trying to understand whether there really was something always on their minds.
Except for Sanzo. Sanzo probably already knew what it was that troubled him. Sanzo was probably dwelling on his master's death, on how it had affected him.
All of them had been changed by their past. Their past continued to change them up to this day. What would Sanzo have been like had his master not died?
He wouldn't have been a Sanzo. He would have grown up in the temple without leaving it. Would he have ever heard Goku's voice? Would they have ever met each other?
That was Sanzo's ghost. Hakkai knew Sanzo fought against it as much as he could, but his efforts were useless. Sanzo tried so hard to remain distant, to be cruel and cold and prove to the world he was not worth any sacrifice, especially that of his master's life. But as tainted as he tried to make himself, he could not bring his master back to life.
And he? Did he know what his ghost was? Was the answer really that obvious?
It was. His ghost was in the shape of Kanan. She would always hover in his mind, always remind him of the void he would let no one else fill, not even Gojyo.
He let himself suffer as a way to pay for his sins, as a way to somehow make up for having failed his lover. He submitted to Gojyo's attentions as a way to wash away the stain on her life, to erase her defilement and shame by becoming someone she would have been ashamed to know.
And yet he also could not get rid of his ghost. At least that girl had chosen to keep hers.
And Gojyo?
He glanced back and realized that both Gojyo and Goku had fallen asleep. Perhaps all their investigation into their own past had been too much for them. Perhaps they hadn't even bothered.
Try as he might, he couldn't understand what was haunting Gojyo. Well, he knew what was haunting him, but not how.
"Sanzo?" He glanced over and saw Sanzo had opened his eyes.
"Ghosts," was Sanzo's reply.
So they had been thinking of the same thing.
"Can you banish them?"
"I don't answer stupid questions."
Of course, Sanzo's response meant. You can choose to do anything you like. But you have to want to do it. You have to be ready to give up and live. It was hard.
"I don't see how Gojyo's manifests itself," he said.
"Women," was Sanzo's reply.
Hakkai didn't know why he hadn't seen it earlier. Gojyo was always lusting after women, trying to make them want him even for just one night. How else would he fill up the gap of the one woman who hadn't loved him, the one woman he needed to love him? And when he didn't have a woman to distract him, why else would he turn to beer, or even to Hakkai himself?
He didn't ask Sanzo what his ghosts were. They both knew each other so well that neither of them had doubts on what haunted the other.
And Goku? What about Goku? Was he the only one who didn't have ghosts haunting him on a rainy day?
Did that make him an idiot? No. that made him the smartest of the four.
If Goku had any ghosts only Sanzo would know. It was hard to imagine Goku did, though. He was always so energetic and cheerful... Unless his ghost was that of his demon form? Of having nearly killed them all? Somehow that didn't seem right.
Hakkai shrugged. Perhaps Goku was too young to have ghosts.
"You're wrong," Sanzo spoke up, reading Hakkai's mind as he sometimes did. "He's older than all of us put together."
"But does that count? He can't even remember before that time."
"It's not the before that matters. It's the five hundred years spent alone. Why do you think he's always so hungry?"
Sanzo paused to let him reflect on what he'd just said. Then the monk continued. "He's always trying to fill that emptiness inside caused by five hundred years of loneliness, five centuries of knowing no one cared."
Hakkai sighed. "You always understand, Sanzo."
They drove on in silence. After a short while Hakkai glanced back and realized Goku was awake, and was staring at Sanzo.
Goku met his gaze, and then turned to stare into the distance.
He didn't say he was hungry.