Disclaimer: The usual. Saiyuki is not mine.

My chapters are always so ridiculously short. I am completely incapable of writing anything of length, so if I write lots and lots of little short chapters I fool myself into thinking that the fic is longer than it is.

Thanks to 'iceblitz' for giving me ideas for Goku's escapade. :P Sorry I wasn't able to use them all...

Sound of the Night

Chapter 6: Eternity Ends

The delicate little triangle might have been preserved for months, maybe, if it had not been for Goku.

Goku, despite his reputation, was not a stupid monkey. He could see that something was up but he didn't have a flying clue what it was. He'd dropped off a few questions about what the hell was going on but he'd immediately gotten his head bitten off by three people simultaneously. He was right annoyed and showing it, but nobody else seemed to care.

After another rather stilted meal with Gojyo (Sanzo and Hakkai were eating their meals alone) Goku sat in an inn kitchen, munching on scraps, trying to figure out a plan.

Goku figured that if he got all three of them really pissed off at him, then their shared rage would bring them together, somewhat. And Goku was very skilled at getting people pissed off at him.

He sifted through a few ideas that ranged from hiding all the cigarettes to throwing a beehive into the jeep, but none of them seemed to have the right ring. He needed to find something that would annoy Hakkai as well, and it was damned near impossible to piss that guy off.

He stayed up quite a bit later than usual, thinking of all the possibilities.

He finally settled on the brash and blunt approach. He went outside and rummaged through a nearby garden shed to find a couple of buckets (he looked for a third but there wasn't one), and he filled them using a tap out by the garden. The carried them into the inn and up the stairs as quietly as he could and sloshing as little as possible.

He decided to get the worst over with and started with Sanzo's room. Without pausing to take a breath he burst into the room and yelled "FIRE!" at the top of his lungs.

Sanzo shot up with a gun in hand within seconds, just as Goku had expected. Goku was readying to give Sanzo the splashing of his life when he saw a second form stirring.

In the bed.

With Sanzo.

It was like something in slow motion. Fingers slowly lost their grip on buckets, the buckets falling to the floor with an echoing clatter, rolling in arcs towards the sides of the room, spilling trails of water that spread without hesitation across the room, puddling around Goku's feet and chilling his bare feet.

Goku whipped around and headed for the door, slipping as he went, soaking his knees before clambering once again to his feet and continuing towards the door.

He fairly tumbled down the stairs. Running as fast as he could and unsure of his destination, he found himself once more in the garden shed, tucked between a rake and a bucket of fish fertilizer. He wrapped his arms around his knees and stared at a spade hanging from a hook across from him.

His mind kept coming up with absurd explinations for what he had seen. There was some kind of mental block between him and what had happened five minutes ago. If he went back into the inn, he knew that he's see Sanzo, standing soaking wet in the inn, waiting for him with the fan. Hakkai and Gojyo would each come out from their rooms to see what the commotion was. It would be fine.

He didn't know how long he'd been sitting there when he heard Gojyo open the shed door and sit down beside him, sliding aside the bucket of fish fertilizer with a wrinkled nose. Gojyo just sat there for a while, saying nothing. Maybe he was trying to think of something to say.

"Y'know," Gojyo began, "Sex doesn't equal love."

Goku sniffed.

"Not by a long shot," Gojyo continued. "I mean, if it did, then I'd know, right? And most people don't even know if they're in love or not. It's easy to fuck someone, but a lot harder to love them. You know what I mean?"

Gojyo was answered with another sniff and a choked sob.

Gojyo really wasn't sure what he was supposed to do at a time like this. Jien had always just given him a whack on the back and said something along the lines of, "Buck up. Don't cry." Somehow Gojyo didn't think that was very appropriate for this situation.

So Gojyo just sat there with Goku, saying nothing. He hoped his company would do some sort of good.