YunCyn: Well, it's the holidays again.

Imaginator: (grumbles) Well I for one don't see anything holiday-y about it. I've got, I don't know...A TON OF HOMEWORK???

YunCyn: Serves you right. WHO told you to go into science stream?

Imaginator: (glares accusingly at muses)

Muse #1: What? We did NOT so tell you to go to science stream!! Really!!

Muse #2: Yeah! For once, we wash our hands clean of this matter!

Muse #1: Don't we always?

Muse #2: Indeed. (both muses nod sagely)

YunCyn: Shut up with the mutual admiration society already...the point is we've produced yet another stupid, pointless scene!

Muse #2: Full of error and mistakes, as usual...

YunCyn: (ignoring Muse #2)Thanks to taxing pressures from various teachers cough cough and much debate, we have produced something significantly tied to our studies.

Muse #1: In other words, obsolete. As usual.

Imaginator: Yunnie ol' pal...it's been some time hasn't it?

YunCyn: Yeah...exchanges knowing glance with Imaginator I still have our Mallets of Doom right here collecting dust in a corner.

Imaginator: Good. Because I think it's high time we practice our stress-relieving technique known as...

Yuncyn and Imaginator: (in unison) Muse discipline.

(The Hammers of Doom simultaneously appear in both Yuncyn and Imaginator's hands)

Muse #1 and #2: (exchange glances)

Muse #2: Do you think they'll give us a head start?

YunCyn and Imaginator: DIEEEEEEEEE!!!!!....

(Plot bunnies wiggle their noses as their respective owners chase certain muses around )

Disclaimer: Authors currently busy. You make your own assumptions.

A/N: Just a small rant so please indulge us here. There WERE supposed to be double spacing so as to make the story much more interesting. HOWEVER, the site seems to have gone cranky again and won't let us put in the double spaces. (humphs) Anyway, there's nothing to be done so... please bear with it until we find an alternative. Thanks, guys!

Prose and Couplets

By: YunCynImaginator

'Behind every rock, there lies trouble.'

Who was the wise philosopher who said that? Or perhaps it was from a Chinese Fortune Cookie. Or perhaps it was the famous last words of the captain of the doomed Flying Dutchman.

Oh, wait. That was "Scurvy me hearty, lads! She's going under!!"

At any rate, what a true saying it was.

For, as the Sanzo-ikkou wended their way into the next town, they were unaware of the large rock looming over their heads on the cliff overhanging their journey into the village.

No, the rock did not drop on their heads, squashing them flatter than pancakes. What WERE you thinking??? (And we thought we were sick.)

It was what that was behind the rock that really would bring them trouble. As it lay there, in the sun, innocently resting prostrate on the rock, a sickly green mist began to seep out of it in puffs, convalescing together as it sunk to cover the unsuspecting Jeep as it rode into town.

Little did the Sanzo and his crew knew what calamity had just befallen them...

Sanzo woke up at the crack of dawn the next morning. Part of the reason he was up at that hour was because he wanted a moment of solitude to himself. Partly was because the idiots in the rooms next to his were making such a huge racket it was a wonder no one had complained.

Crouching by the window, he watched as the sun began to rise, all the while pointedly ignoring the noise. As the moment ended, he closed his eyes and prepared to fall back into Wink-a Bye-Bye Land...

Until a crash jolted him back up, causing him to whack his head on the windowsill. Rubbing his throbbing head, he glared at the wall as if he could somehow burn a hole through it to kill the two assholes who were, undoubtedly the cause behind all this.

Somehow, the wall managed to remain intact.

Growling, he stalked his way out, still dressed in his black undergarments...

We now take a moment to drool like fangirls. DROOOOOOOL....

...still dressed in his black undergarments as made he made his way next door. Dammit, he needed his sleep. Upon reaching the rest house the night before, he had made a beeline for the inviting futon and dozed off.

If that red-headed kappa and the equally stupid monkey think they could interrupt his rest and get away with it, he would have to remind them of a thing or two.

Kicking down the door, he found (not to his surprise), Gojyo and Goku yelling at the top of their voices, arms waving, jumping up and down. Typical Goku-Gojyo behavior. He raised his hand to deliver his infamous Sanzo 'Shut-the-frigging-Hell-Up' Whack...

And paused. Something didn't sound right. In fact...

Goku turned to see Sanzo. "Sanzo!!!"

"Sanzo!!!" Gojyo leaped at the monk and seized his...undergarments.

We pause to drool some more. DROOOOOOOOL...

"Sanzo!!! What the hell is going on??? Is this some kind of scam or con????"

Sanzo growled none-too-softly. "Get your filthy hands off me, or in your throat a bullet be." He shoved the tall half-youkai away...

And stopped.

Had he just rhymed???

It must have been a slip of his tongue. Or pure coincidence. He glared around and hoped no one noticed.

"Sanzo, Sanzo, hear me out!!! Tell me what this is about!!!" Goku grabbed at Sanzo, his hair messy, his eyes wild, "Since this morning broke I find, that I have seemed to lost my mind!!!"

"Every single word I utter, must be rhymed with another," added Gojyo, pacing around the room, his head in his hands, "I want a frigging explanation, for this stupid aggravation!!!"

"Will you two idiots just shut up??? And let go of me, you bloody pup." Sanzo couldn't help cringing at his own words. Pup???

Hakkai appeared in the doorway, also in his undershirt. (Actually, they were all in their undershirts, being too distraught to even think of dressing.)

DROOOOOOOOL...

"Hakkai, thank goodness you're here," Gojyo turned to face his comrade. "Our sanity's about to disappear."

"Do you know the cause of this? And give us all the basic gist?" All eyes turned towards Hakkai, usually calm and rational in all situations. Good ol' Hakkai, he'd know what to do.

But even Hakkai looked unusually grave. "I'm sorry to say I have no clue, about this affliction placed on you, And all of us, I think it be, the path had a trap none could see."

"How shall we, this problem, get to the core?" yelled Gojyo, literally tearing at his hair, "No girl will like me anymore!!!"

"Hakkai, drive us all back to, the place where happened this to-do," said Sanzo in a very, very dangerous tone. If he found out exactly who had placed this unbelievably bizarre curse on him...well, whoever it was better pray really, really hard that Sanzo never find him in this lifetime.

"I will comply with this at once-" Hakkai began to return to his room to put on his clothes...

"Will we be back in time for brunch?" broke in Goku hopefully. He quailed under two disbelieving glares and one very incredulous look. "Never mind. Let's rewind."

"I really cannot quite believe it, "Gojyo sighed in frustration, "I've searched every single bit. But not a single thing I find, to explain this thing, or such its kind."

"And it's so hot under this sun," Goku slumped against Jeep, panting from his exertion. "To think this search's not half-begun."

Sanzo didn't say anything, but grimly scoured the nearby areas. He'd be damned if he had to read the mantras and prayers he was obligated to perform as Sanzo in rhyme. The very thought of it made him search all the harder.

Hakkai sighed. "At the rate that we are going, we'll be here till the next morning." He felt alongside the road, as if he could find something invisible lurking there.

Goku looked up from his weary search. "We've been here for an hour. Can't we go back and take a shower?"

"Not until the very time, I find the cause unto this rhyme, "Gojyo said grimly as he continued to sift through sand and shift stones. "Until then do I swear, to check each stone turned, each tree bare."

The hunt continued in relative silence, saved a few couplets now and then spouted by a disgruntled searcher. Then, Sanzo noticed a ledge leading to a ravine on the opposite side. He frowned; why hadn't he noticed this jutting cliff before? He made as if to approach it...

When three youkais sprung up from behind the huge rock sitting on the rocky cliff, sneering and leering. Sanzo took a step back, his eyes hardening.

"Hah!!! Genjo Sanzo hoshi-sama," one of them said, a glint of malice in his eyes, "Prepare to die!!!"

At that very moment, two thoughts ran through Sanzo's mind:

One: That was the lamest and most clichéd line he'd ever heard.

Two: If these three lowlifes were responsible for his current disability...they would pay very dearly.

BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!

Hakkai, Gojyo and Goku all looked up as they registered the sharp report of Sanzo's gun just around the corner.

"That, I fear, was Sanzo's gun," said Hakkai, getting to his feet, "Let's us get there at a run, without attempting any pun."

"I knew Sanzo would get in trouble," grumbled Gojyo as he followed Hakkai, "That frigging monk was never subtle."

Upon reaching the site where Sanzo was shooting the crap out of the three youkais, they witnessed what would go down as one of the most embarrassing moments in Sanzo's life.

Now, Sanzo planned to keep at least one of those bloody culprits alive. After all, he needed to pressure him to release his bloody curse, didn't he?

So he thought he'd just use the sutra and make things a lot easier. Breathing in, he yelled, "MAKAI TENJO!!!!..."

Now, Sanzo, as we know, is not an avid talker. Rather he allowed his gun to talk on his behalf most of the time.

Perhaps this would explain the...lack of words he could conjure up to rhyme. And at this critical moment, Sanzo felt the irresistible pull of the curse to form a couplet with the words 'Makai Tenjo'. Frantically trying to recall a word, any word that rhymed with '-jo', he mindlessly hit upon the syllable 'ho'.

And so, what came out of Sanzo's mouth was:

"MAKAI TENJO HOHOHOHO!!!!!"

Goku dropped his Nyoibou, Gojyo stumbled, and Hakkai's ki ball zoomed through the place Gojyo's head had been. As one, they stared at the golden-haired monk.

'Hohohoho'?????

Sanzo regretted his choice of words the minute they came out. Forgetting his earlier plan of torturing a cure out of the youkais, he shot all three of them in the head, irritated by his slip up. As the sutra retreated back to its original form, he turned to go back...

Oh shit. They had seen it all.

Gojyo was pounding the ground, laughing hysterically, Goku doing the same on his left. Even Hakkai was trying his best to stifle his smile as he said, "That was rather a sight to see, as you dealt with those youkais three."

"'A sight to see' you say, to put it lightly," bawled Gojyo into the earth, tears of laughter running down the sides of his face, "Don't mind me if I find it rather funny!!!!"

"That was the funniest thing I've ever seen," wheezed Goku, rolling around on his stomach, "So see such again I'm rather keen!!"

BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG

Gojyo and Goku froze in place as smoking bullet holes outlined their body against the ground.

"If you two still want to blunder, I will shove you six feet under," said Sanzo in a dangerously low voice. Two little squeaks assured them they were mum as Sanzo stalked off to the cliff he had wanted to investigate earlier. Hakkai ran to catch up with him, followed by two still sniggering companions.

Then, it happened. As Sanzo neared the rock on the cliff, felt something lifting off him and swiveled on his heel, on his guard. Beside him and a few paces back, Hakkai, Goku and Gojyo were doing the same thing, looking bewildered and suspicious.

"What was that?" Goku was the first to ask.

"Goku! You're not rhyming!" Hakkai felt a smile crack across his face. "Minna, I think the curse has been lifted off us."

"Yes!!!!" Gojyo punched his fist in the air. "Sexy ladies, here I come again!!!"

Sanzo felt his own lips being tugged into a rare smile. Turning quickly as to not allow anyone to catch a glimpse of this miracle, his eyes glimpsed an object sitting on a hollow shelf in the rock. Walking towards it, he recognized it as a book. As he picked it up, the others gathered around him, and they stared at the book in silence.

Goku was the first to say something. "Ano, what is 'Shakespeare's Complete Works And Poetry'?"

The End.

YunCyn: Hope you enjoyed that! GAH! (takes a swing at Muse #1) We'll (swipe) try our darnest (slash) best to update again ASAP!

Imaginator: Yeah!! (whap!) And by the way, check out or homepage, which is actually our (swing) blog! I know we don't ARGGHHH!! update often but then again, that's because (WHAP!) nobody ever reads it... YUNNIE!!!! I'VE GOT HIM!!!!!

YunCyn: THAT'S ME, YOU IMBECILIC BABOON!!!! GEROFF!!!

Imaginator: Oops..hehehe....out of touch?

YunCyn: Never mind....just get 'em!!

Muses #1 and #2: REVIEWWWWWWWW.....................

A/N II: Happy Belated Merdeka to all Malaysians!!