Chapter 3: Hundred Lies
Author's note: Gintama belongs to Sorachi H. This story is unbetaed and might NOT BE THE FULL VERSION due to site restrictions. My tumblr / wordpress / livejournal / AO3 has the full chapters but there will be delays in uploading there. Reviews are greatly encouraged and appreciated. Holy shit, I think I have forgotten where I was headed with this story. My fault for not creating an outline. Sheesh. So yeah, I'm kinda making this up as I go along.
Gintoki stands approximately twenty feet from where Sacchan, Catherine and Otose are discussing something heatedly. He cannot hear anything but he can very well tell that they are arguing.
Sometimes, they sneak glances at him. Sacchan especially shoots him suspicious glares from time to time. So what? He regroups his thoughts instead and focuses on her outward appearance. Just hours ago they were almost making love before they were rudely interrupted by a knife.
Her hands are on her hips as she talks spiritedly and Gintoki watches her jut out her generous chest. Her miniscule waist emphasized the curves of her body. He takes a deep breath as his thoughts delve into naughty territory.
His eyes follow as she flips a few strands of hair from her face. Pretty isn't what he would describe her to be. She was appealing though and his first impression of her was slowing dissolving.
"I am simply doing her a favor," he mutters to himself.
"What does Gintoki know?" He hears his name from their side.
"Gintoki knows nothing," he says to them, drawing their attention.
Sacchan speaks up, "He might prove to be useful. I'll keep him around."
"HE needs to be clued-up by you girls."
"We just need to destroy it and be rid of it!" Sacchan is livid. "I demand that you hand over that container, Otose!"
"I'm afraid I cannot do that." The old lady puffs her cigarette. Her face is even more saggier than before.
"Pray tell why?"
Otose levels her with a stare. "Because I have lost it. Years ago."
Sacchan swipes out her blade faster than the blink of an eye and it is positioned across the old lady's throat. "You must really have a death wish."
"I am not afraid of death. I am old." She does not even flinch. "Whatever I am supposed to live for is no more."
"If you lost it, then it has already been destroyed." Sacchan has drawn blood. "Your recklessness has cost me. There is no other way, then."
"STOP!" Gintoki yells and pulls Sacchan back. She is strong, almost successfully resisting him. "Don't kill the old lady."
"She'll kill herself if she knows what her life is worth now."
"Look, Sacchan, there must be some other way we can destroy that holy – I mean, powerful object." He turns her away from Otose to face him and discreetly signals Catherine to leave with the old lady. They are gone within seconds. Sacchan does not seem to notice… at first.
"What are you doing?" Her eyes narrow and she turns around to find them gone. "Whose side are you on anyway?"
He sighs. "Look, I'm here to help but you must tell me something. I can't help if I'm just following you around like a headless chicken."
"The less you know-"
"I think we've established that I need to be updated." He moves closer until he sees the exact color of her eyes again. "You have permission to kill me if I screw it up."
Her pupils enlarge as she studies him wordlessly. Gintoki has more than half a mind to kiss her again but she steps away before his brain signals his body.
"We'll talk tomorrow. There's someone I have to contact first."
Gintoki hates that "tomorrow" could mean anything between the next twenty-four hours. "Tomorrow" means hours of torture. He couldn't really sleep much. She keeps dominating his thoughts – and dreams.
Truth be told, he tries to care about that damn object but he only finds himself naturally drawn to her. After their latest steamy encounter, his thoughts swirled with her hips and juggled with her breasts. He blames her supposed mysterious persona. She is keeping him on edge.
Once they get it out of the way – when she tells him everything today – she will no longer harbor in his thoughts. He just wants to return to his odd jobs and bumming days.
He drifts into slumber and is awoken by her naked form after midnight. She bears nothing except a stringed coin around her throat. It shines painfully in the darkness almost blinding him. Gintoki's body fails him as she slides over, presenting her breasts to his face.
"Look." Her hands graze his shoulders.
"I am," he whispers huskily and bows his head to nip at her breast.
She stops him, "Not that. The object, watch it and know."
His eyes focus on the reflective piece at her throat. Immediately, he feels a rush in his veins, heat projects from his center and vibrates his nerves. His limbs are suddenly larger and he can hear his brain thinking of millions of ideas, recalling every single memory, knowing every piece of concept ever imagined. He is bigger than everything that surrounds him right now and the woman in front of him, he can make her do anything he ever wanted her to do.
Gintoki move his hands, full of cosmic energy, cupping her bottom and pulling her closer to him. He can make them one.
"Have you seen it?" She whispers and her voice is feeble to him. She is an object he will control and possess.
He knows what she needs.
The mirrored coin disappears. Gintoki blinks and all that is left is Sacchan, bare and less vulnerable in his arms. She is watching him through heavy-lidded eyes. But instead of breaking the moment, as they should have, they kiss both with understanding and wonder, and Gintoki lets his palms graze gently over her bottom.
Sacchan moans and surrenders as he spreads her thighs open to settle her over his hardness.
"What just happened?" He asks her in between their starved kisses.
"I'm distracting you." She moves largely over his hips and he barely contains himself. "Is it working?"
He turns her over but doesn't stop grinding against her softness. They make eye contact. "That object. I've witnessed its power."
"It's dangerous. We have to destroy it."
"I agree. But you have to tell me more."
Sacchan nods. "But not like this."
He releases a frustrated groan. "You're the one who started it. I'm merely finishing your task." She definitely has her ways. The way she operates somehow worked on him. He previously thought himself better than this but he can never help himself around her. And she isn't even his type.
Sacchan releases her hips from him, closing herself off but still leans in for another kiss. They go on for a few minutes until she is prompted away by his fingers tweaking her nipples.
"What?" He hates being interrupted when things are getting good. When are they ever going to go all the way?
"I'm sorry. Zenzou… He…"
Zenzou. That hemorrhoid bastard. Are they-? "Are you lovers?" He is never this straightforward.
"No! Of course not!" She snaps and leans back but he holds her to him, aware of her breasts pressed against his own chest. He is still very much aroused and he wants her to feel him on her thighs. He needs her to distract him some more.
"Then what?"
"When he spoke of you and how you could help me… I asked him so many questions and yet…"
"And what?"
"I never thought you'd be like this."
"Like what?"
"Never mind." She slithers away and disappears for a while to get dressed.
Gintoki is severely disappointed but soon she is next to him and they have locked lips again. "Not that I'm not enjoying this… but you might have to tell me what our plans are soon." He is officially sexually frustrated because of this woman who has suddenly crashed into his life.
"There is a way to destroy it other than using the container." She does not stray from his arms.
"How?"
"In the far mountains, there is a temple where legend says a hidden lake is."
"Legend?"
"Listen first," she hissed., still in his embrace. "I must take it to that lake and submerge it, rendering it useless as its energy will be diffused into the earth."
"Why you? A body of water can destroy that much energy?" He has witnessed it just by gazing into the reflection.
Her palms smooth his cheeks with such sweet tenderness. "Because I am the vessel that holds this object. Only I can control it now and it is up to me to destroy it before it is put in the wrong hands."
"You… You hold that much power?"
"It has no effect on me. I cannot utilize its power, only keep it."
"How did it come into your possession in the first place?"
She rubs his chest enticingly, "I'll tell you next time." They kiss again and again and spend the rest of the night together, just at the ridiculous brink of letting go.
Zenzou finds him a few days later on a park bench. Gintoki is busy but the annoying ninja is determined to grab his attention.
"Fuck you, Zenzou, come back later." He concentrates on the view of a small window where a young woman is removing her underwear.
"What are you doing that is making you so busy?"
"Shut up. I don't have to tell you." The woman steps out of view but soon reappears in full naked glory. The rest of the world disappears for Gintoki. He is hooked to her voluptuous body parading within his visual area.
He is not aware that Zenzou had been speaking until he is smacked across the head with JUMP. "You could go to jail for that."
Gintoki regretfully tears his eyes away. "WHAT could be more important that watching a young and beautiful woman in her natural state?" Zenzou is giving him a bad headache.
Without moving a muscle, Zenzou mutters, "Sarutobi is missing."
"WHAT?"
"Six days and we haven't heard from her. This isn't like her. Unless… Have you heard from her?"
"No." Gintoki refuses to think of that woman. After whatever went on between them that night and several times before, she disappears on him, leaving him out of the equation again. Leaving him suffering with frustration and burning desire. "She probably took care of her business on her own."
"That is probably not what happened."
"Oh yeah?"
"She needs you."
"I feel used." He is starting to feel grumpy.
"Her enemies are dangerous. There is reason to suspect that she is in danger."
Gintoki pauses, forgetting all about the woman at the window. "Is she?"
"Do you want to find out?"
"Just tell me how to find her."
Author's end note: Annoyed mode.