CHAPTER 4: START OF A JOURNEY
The sun was blood red, its mighty rays blinding everyone within the vicinity. Dry land, together with tall mountains and valleys, stretched everywhere. Grass and other plants were scarce, but not as scarce as the supply of water. There was no wind present, causing the temperature in the air to be hotter than hot.
On the track covered road, a lone trailer was moving at an unnatural speed, defying the laws of nature and everything else. The vehicle looked like it was ready to fall apart because of the speed. Its windows were about to break and if one looked closer enough at the wheels, one could've sworn there was fire burning underneath.
The passengers weren't faring any better, either.
A tall man by the name of Sha Gojyo buried his head in his hands, his grip on the passenger seat tightening as the driver's foot pressed the gas pedal harder. "Ugh! Hakkai, you're driving next time. Anyone who disagrees, I'll cut his head off with an axe," he somehow managed to say. His normally tanned face was turning a sick shade of green.
Beside him, a bespectacled gentleman laughed. "Alright, I will. If our dear doctor here doesn't mind," he said, referring to the handsome blonde currently in charge of the wheel who only replied with an annoyed "Tch."
"I feel like I'm riding a roller coaster!" A young boy with golden eyes said, his usual cheeriness disappearing once their companion started driving. He had his hands on his head, and tiny stars were appearing above it.
"Yeah, a roller coaster that had ceased to function properly," Gojyo agreed. His red hair had transformed into a nest. He glared at Sanzo. "Couldn't you slow down a bit?"
"Shut up!" Sanzo barked, which caused in another stomach-lurching turn on the road. It was quite understandable that everyone riding the car was looking at him either pleadingly or angrily. He drove like a mad man. He probably wasn't aware that he wasn't in any kind of race. Hell, they were the only ones on the street anyway. Hakkai mildly wondered how the hell he even got his driver's license. He had a suspicious thought that his aunt, Kanzeon, had bribed the authorities in order to do so.
"Whose idea was it to start a trip as crazy as this anyway!" Gojyo grumbled, as he suddenly felt the urge to throw up his lunch.
Hakkai smiled. "I believe it all started because of…"
Flashback
"GOKUUUUUUUU!"
"Eek!" Said person ran along the corridors at lightning speed as fast as his legs could carry. His eyes were wide and he had the slightest idea of what would become of him if he let Sanzo touch a single hair of his.
"Come back here, you stupid monkey! When I get a hold of you, you'll wish you've never been born!" Sanzo screeched, looking ten times more menacing, one hand clutching the important documents his nurse Wilma gave him yesterday. Or what was left of his documents.
"I'm sorry, Sanzo! I didn't mean to! It was an accident!" Goku managed to say while running for his life. "I thought they were scratch papers!"
A dark cloud formed above Sanzo's head and for a moment, he stopped. Then… "ACCIDENT MY ASS! I'M SUPPOSED TO HAND THESE OVER TODAY BUT NOW BECAUSE OF YOUR STUPID BRAIN, I'LL HAVE GO OVER THIS AGAIN!"
"Gaaaaaahhhh!"
The angry doctor chased Goku, shooting bullets along the way. He didn't particularly care that it was his house he was damaging. Nothing mattered to him at the moment, except catching the source of his anger for the past few weeks. Ever since Goku came into his life, his orderly lifestyle became a complete mess. If this was his aunt's means of getting rid of his boredom, well, screw her! The brat was noisy, messy, troublesome and always hungry. In just a short span of time, various people had been hunting him now because of all sorts of things the monkey had done. Now he couldn't as much as get some decent sleep.
"My, my. Did we come in wrong timing?"
His right eye twitched and Sanzo knew right then and there that his headache was about to get worse. "Shut up, Gojyo, unless you want to suffer the same fate as the monkey," he snarled as he slowed down his pace.
Gojyo, who was leaning on the white-painted walls in Sanzo's living room, smirked but wisely shut his mouth.
"Whatever did he do now?" That was Hakkai speaking. Ever since he had healed from his injuries, he had been staying over at Gojyo's temporary house, until Gojyo deemed it fit to leave. But the redhead hadn't voiced over plans of doing so, saying things about how the city well suited his tastes, which Sanzo highly doubted. Hakkai, on the other hand, had been sought after by the police after the incident in the streets where he was almost killed, but luckily everything went fine in the end. The authorities somehow believed that Hakkai had just protected himself, but he knew very well they only let him go because Sanzo was on his side, and fame and popularity won the police over. And now, he had been working as Sanzo's medical assistant, seeing as he had a fairly amount of knowledge regarding medicine.
"Goku suddenly found it interesting to cut my important documents to shreds." Sanzo replied icily, not bothering to hide the tremendous irritation and anger in his voice.
"Ahh." Hakkai said with a smile. "I'm sure he didn't mean to." That's Hakkai, calm and reasonable. The people at the hospital often wondered why such a decent man as him was hanging around with a bunch of lunatics.
"He'd been saying that for a while now, but I don't care. That hardly changes what he did," Sanzo said, glaring at Goku at the corner of his eye.
Goku pouted and immediately hid behind Hakkai. "Please don't let him hurt me, Hakkai. He said he'd skin me alive and drop me in a boiling pot and feed me to the sharks," he mumbled, his eyes wide and bright.
Gojyo laughed. "That's quite an imagination, eh?" he said jovially.
"Now, now, Dr. Sanzo. You must be easy on the kids," Hakkai said and he, too, couldn't help but smile.
Sanzo growled. "What are you buffoons doing in my house anyway?" he asked instead.
"Why, is it such a crime to visit a friend?" Gojyo said.
Sanzo scowled. "I don't have friends," he snapped.
Gojyo dramatically placed his hands on his chest and pretended to swoon. "I'm deeply hurt, Sanzo dear," he said, imitating the voice of Sanzo's rooster-faced nurse, Wilma.
"Shut up or I'll kill you!"
Gojyo grinned. "Aren't you even going to offer your guests a drink?" he asked as he carelessly flopped on the red velvet couch and placed his feet on the mahogany table.
Sanzo felt his nerves crack. That table cost a fortune and Gojyo was soiling it with his dirty, mud-stained shoes. "Tch. Tea's all you'll be having," he finally said.
"Oi, monkey boy. You heard Sanzo. Go get me tea," Gojyo said.
Goku stuck out his tongue at him. "Go get it yourself, you red cockroach!" he retorted.
"What did you just call me?" Gojyo said, instantly leaping out of the couch.
"I said, you're a red cockroach! I didn't know you're deaf too!"
"I'm not deaf, you stupid monkey!"
"Then don't call me stupid!"
"What will I call you then…monkey?"
"Why you-"
"Tsk. Tsk. I didn't know your house suddenly became a zoo, Konzen."
All heads immediately turned to the woman in white. It was Kanzeon again. She was standing by the doorway, casually inspecting her nails. No one knew how she got there without anyone noticing, which kind of freaked out everyone except Sanzo, who was so used to his aunt's appearing and disappearing acts. In a flash of lightning, Sanzo withdrew his gun and aimed it at Kanzeon, who coolly dodged it.
"What the hell are you doing here, old hag!" Sanzo bellowed, his mood darkening at the smirk on her aunt's face.
"Glad to know you're still your old usual self, Konzen," Kanzeon said as she walked towards him, swinging her hips in what she assumed was a very sexy manner, but only made Sanzo sicker than usual.
"Hey, someone's here, Sanzo! There's an intruder!" Goku shouted.
"Late reaction, as expected," Gojyo said, grinning as he dodged another blow from Goku.
"Oh, you're also here, Tenpou Gensui, Kenren Taisho and Son Goku," Kanzeon said.
The three mentioned raised their eyebrows and looked confusedly at her. Now here's someone who's weirder than Sanzo. This confirmed Gojyo's suspicions. Craziness sure runs in their family.
"I'm sorry, but my name's Cho Hakkai," Hakkai said, smiling politely at the stranger.
"Sha Gojyo," Gojyo supplied.
"Hey, you got my name right! How'd you know?" Goku said, beaming at Kanzeon.
"She was the one who gave me to you," Sanzo told him. He glared at his aunt. "Don't bother with her. She loves calling people with different names. She's been calling me Konzen all my life for no apparent reason at all," he told Gojyo and Hakkai.
"Oh really?" Gojyo said, gazing at Kanzeon, who was laughing.
"Anyway, I haven't come here to have fun, sadly. There's a serious matter I need to discuss with you four," Suddenly, Kanzeon's voice and facial expression became grave and serious, so unlike her that Sanzo immediately wondered how important this "matter" was to make his usual crazy aunt act like a professional for once.
"Us? Why are we involved here?" Hakkai asked, not liking where this might be going.
Kanzeon took a seat beside Gojyo. "I've just talked to the some of the authorities, Konzen. Do you recall one of the files Wilma gave you? The one regarding the SOI disease?"
Sanzo nodded. "The SOI is a disease that specializes in making people lose their sanity and become crazy enough to do some serious damage, even kill people on their way, whether it be family, relatives or friends. This disease is widely spread on several parts in Asia and mostly affects men. The doctors haven't found any cure for it and had requested not to tell this to the public. So as of now, the people still had no clue on what is happening. Although the doctors do believe that some group had been spreading this disease, but that's not yet confirmed," he explained to the others.
"Correct as always, Konzen," Kanzeon said with a nod of her head.
Gojyo snorted. "You sound like a talking dictionary, Sanzo," he said.
"So what has this got to do with us?" Goku voiced what was on the others' heads.
"The government appointed you four to journey towards Asia and find the source of this disease and stop it once and for all," Kanzeon said as casually as possible.
Silence reigned. An icy wind blew. Outside, some crickets chirped.
"WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT!"
Kanzeon winced at their loud voices.
"I'm going to kill you!"
"How can they make such a decision without even informing us!"
"That's…quite a shock…"
"Uhh..I don't understand what's going on, guys…"
That last comment came from Goku, who was scratching his head, not knowing whether to be happy or angry. His golden eyes looked confused. He looked like a lost puppy.
Kanzeon smiled. "Is that a yes?"
"NO!"
"Oh, well…that's too bad then. I guess you wouldn't get to find and know some things...Like who killed the late Koumyou Sanzo, where Gojyo's mother's burial place is, and where Miss Kanan's parents live. Since you wouldn't accept…" Kanzeon shrugged, knowing very well this would do the trick.
"COME AGAIN!" Sanzo bellowed, shocked at what his aunt just said.
"What did you just say?" Hakkai blinked, not entirely sure he heard correct.
Gojyo looked at Kanzeon. "What do you mean, you know where my mother's buried?"
"That's right. The government searched it for you. You honestly didn't think you'd go there without consolation, did you?" Kanzeon said. "After all, Asia is a large place. And oh, Goku dear, you might also get to recover your lost memories there, so I suggest you go."
Goku's eyes widened. "My…my memories?" he whispered.
Once again, there was awkward silence.
"So…changed your mind?" Kanzeon asked, fully knowing the answer.
"YES."
End of Flashback
Gojyo groaned. "Who the hell said YES anyway?" he said as he raked his hair with his hands.
Hakkai turned to him. "I believe it was Goku," he said.
"What! It wasn't me!" Goku protested in between bites of his apple pie.
"Yes, it was you! And hey! Don't go on eating that pie! That's supposed to be our breakfast for tomorrow!" Gojyo shouted as he made a grab of the pie.
"I can't help it! I'm hungry!" Goku exclaimed, placing the pie out of Gojyo's prying hands. "Besides, you ate my share of food this morning, so that's only fair!"
"If I didn't, you would've eaten everyone's share, you stupid monkey," Gojyo reasoned out and finally grabbed the pie and took a bite.
"Gojyo! That's mine!"
"Nuh-uh. You'll have to force it out of my stomach first."
"Ok, then."
Choke. Sputter. "OI! Don't punch me, ape!"
"Give me my food back!"
"I just ate it! What can't you understand about that!"
"Well, you shouldn't have!"
"You can't do anything about it now, can you?"
"You perverted water sprite! You're so mean! Sanzooooooooo!"
"SHUT THE HELL UP!"
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Sanzo stepped out of his seat in order to silence Goku and Gojyo. It seemed as if his patience didn't last long enough, judging from the dark look he's sending the two. It also didn't help that he was suffering from a lot of stress, seeing as he'd been driving for hours now, surviving through the complaints of the group.
Thwack!
"Ahhhhh! I didn't do anything, Sanzo!"
"Stop it, you crazy doctor!"
"Now, now, there's no need to get violent…" Hakkai said, raising his hands as he tried to calm Sanzo down.
More banging….
"Can't somebody have some peace and quiet without you two babbling like ducks!"
"But Sanzo…I'm not…a duck!"
"That's right, because you're a monkey."
"Whaaat! I am not!"
"Oh yes you are!"
"No!"
"Well, would you rather be a duck, then?"
"Better than a slimy cockroach like you!"
"Are you saying something you piece of shit!"
"Sanzo, Gojyo's saying bad words!"
Bang! Thwack! Smack!
"I said SHUT UP! What part of that can you not understand!"
"Ahhhh! Please stop it! I'm sorry, alright!"
"I swear, you should be the one placed in a hospital, not your patients!"
"Oh, boy. Here we go again," Hakkai said, smiling as he gave up his job as peacemaker and opted to watch them safely on the sidelines instead.
The bus suddenly jolted, sending Goku toppling on top of Gojyo, who in turn managed to sit on top of a very, very, irritated blonde doctor.
Gojyo paused from the fight and looked fearfully at the others. When he spoke, his voice appeared kind of panicked. "Uhh….guys? Who's driving?"
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
Sorry for the really late update…I was so busy with lots of other things that I almost abandoned this fic…Well, almost anyway…Haha…Please review if ya have the time…Sank yuu! Oh, and next chapter, Kougaiji and the gang make their appearances…
