A/N: Thanks for pointing out the spelling and grammar mistakes, guys. :D I've re-uploaded the chapter to correct them and made sure I didn't make the 'blonde' mistake again. Now, onward! Hope you enjoy!
Chapter 2: First Grooming
It had been a week now since Sanzo had reluctantly drug the loud and obnoxious Goku down from his mountain prison and to Chang 'An, and the monk was spitting nails. Literally. Having chain-smoked his way through his last carton of cigarettes in record time, Sanzo had resorted to chewing carpet nails in an effort to release his tension while he waited for the anonymous monk he'd sent to town to return with his smokes. It wasn't helping. In a mere seven days the monkey had turned the entire temple upside down; not to mention broken three statues, muddied the floors everyday, eaten every drop of food (and few things that weren't suppose to BE edible), painted on six different walls in an effort to 'brighten the place up', drawn happy faces on four monks' bald heads while they slept, eaten every peach from the Merciful Goddess' offering tree (though Sanzo wasn't TOO upset by that), accidentally set two monks' robes on fire, and on three separate occasions gotten incense sticks stuck up his nose. Needless to say Sanzo had seen better weeks.
It had gotten to the point where the blond monk could tell the difference in an apprentice knocking to ask a question and an apprentice knocking to rat the boy out. At the moment, the resounding knock of 'that filthy child has done something wrong again' was echoing through his room. Sanzo groaned to himself. He really needed a smoke right now.
"Come in, damn it, and tell me what the brat did now."
A sheepish monk (one of the four lucky recipients of the 'happy face') slowly entered the room and bowed low before Sanzo.
"Lord Sanzo." He started curtly. "The other monks and I were wondering if perhaps you would allow us to…um…"
The blond narrowed his eyes. "Allow you to what?"
He could see the sweat rolling down baldie's happy head and the monk didn't really seem like he was asking for something he wanted to do.
"If you would allow us to…groom the…child you brought back."
Sanzo was stunned silent for a few minutes. No wonder happy boy didn't seem like he wanted to ask. Who would want to try to tame that monkey long enough to groom him?
"What exactly did you have in mind?"
Happy Baldie Boy paused. "Er, the child could most definitely use a hair-cut, Lord Sanzo. Not to mention his toenails and fingernails trimmed. Perhaps a lobotomy…."
The happy-face monk trailed off this last comment and, though Sanzo did hear it, he decided to let it go this time. Hell, at this point he was ready to agree with him but Sanzo doubted any amount of brain surgery would help Goku.
"Ch. Fine. Do whatever you want."
Happy Boy bowed low, giving his –reluctant- thanks to the high priest before leaving the room. Sanzo stared at the door for a moment.
"Hope you don't think I'm going to chant at your funeral."
After finally receiving his cigarettes (as it turns out, from Happy Baldie Monk #2) and gaining nearly two hours of peace and quiet, Sanzo couldn't help but be curious as to how the 'grooming squad' was doing with Goku. More than likely the monks had spent the last two hours simply trying to find the boy and it would be several more before they would actually get done with their self-appointed task.
Fate, (played by Vanna White) spun the wheel of destiny at this moment and unfortunately landed on 'holy shit'.
This was the very curse mumbled by Sanzo seconds before an airborne mass of monkey meat slammed into him and toppled them both from the chair and onto the floor. The monk was already reaching for his trusty fan when Goku grabbed his shirt, eyes full of tears, and began wailing at the top of his lungs.
"SAVEMESANZOTHEMONKSARETRYINGTOKILLMETHEYWANNACUTOFFMYFINGERSANDMYHEADANDIDONTWANNADIEEEEEEEE!"
Sanzo put his hands over his ears in a vain attempt to save his throbbing eardrums before proceeding to whack the frightened Goku half to death.
"YOU IDIOT! TALK LIKE A NORMAL DAMN PERSON OR SHUT THE HELL UP!"
Goku drew in several deep breaths and tried again. "The monks want to cut off my fingers and my head! I don't want to die Sanzo, please, please, please don't let them do ittttttttt!"
THWACK
"Moron. Get off me."
Instead of waiting for the boy to do as told, Sanzo pushed the child off and stood up. He lit another cigarette hoping to fight off the migraine now starting up behind his eyes. Looking down, he found Goku still sitting where he'd landed, rubbing his red eyes and sniffling quietly.
"Ch. Idiot. They're not trying to kill you."
Goku looked up at his sun, still rubbing one eye and sniffling pathetically. "They…they're not?"
Sanzo rolled his eyes, picked Goku and his chair up, and sat the distraught monkey in it.
"They want to cut your hair and your fingernails, Goku."
"Oh." The boy said after a moment. "Why?"
Sanzo looked down at the wild mane of brown hair spilling past Goku's shoulders and the jagged claws he had for nails.
"I can't begin to imagine."
Goku was a bit puzzled at this statement and was about to further question his keeper when two monks (Hey it's Happy Baldies #1 and 2!) scurried into the room looking sweaty and out of breathe.
"We're so sorry, Lord Sanzo." They said in unison, bowing low and revealing their happy face heads.
Despite his reassurances, Sanzo could see the boy quivering at the sight of the monks from the corner of his eye. He sighed.
"Never send a monk to do a Sanzo's job." He mumbled.
"Pardon?" Baldie #1 spoke.
"Ch. Go back to your studies and chants. I'll take care of the brat."
Both monks looked incredibly relieved, as if Sanzo had just granted them eternal life, and bowed profusely before leaving the room. The blond sighed again and turned to Goku, who was happily spinning the in chair now that the threat was gone.
"Go take a bath."
"But Sanzo…"
"NO BUTS! Go take a bath and then come straight back here. And do not come back until every speck of dirt and filth has been washed from your body and your hair and you're DRY, got it?"
Seeing the obvious murderous intent flashing in those violet eyes, Goku quickly scurried off to obey. By the time the boy had returned, Sanzo had neatly laid out every tool he could possibly imagine he'd need. He felt his eye twitching as his gaze fell upon the boy. Goku was washed and squeaky clean and dry, just as Sanzo had commanded. But unfortunately the little monkey was also butt naked. The blond monk pinched the bridge of his nose and felt the migraine swimming back full force.
THWACK. THWACK. THWACK.
"PUT ON SOME CLOTHES YOU DAMN WILD IDIOT MONKEY!"
Once the boy returned, dressed in his pajamas this time, Sanzo motioned for him to sit on the stool he'd brought out. Goku obeyed, though he nervously glanced at the spread of unusual items laid out across Sanzo's desktop. The monk grabbed the nail clippers and pulled his chair around to rest in front of the curious boy. He sat down and picked up Goku's hand, fully intent on ridding the fingers of the offending claws. Goku, however, still remembering the monks' threatening words, immediately pulled his hand back and widened his golden eyes at Sanzo.
Sanzo sighed. "I'm not going to cut your fingers off, stupid. I'm just going to clip your fingernails."
Still not convinced, Goku crossed his arms and hid both his hands under his armpits. Deciding that showing would be easier than trying to explain, Sanzo held up his hand for the boy to see and proceeded to clip one nail off. Alarmed, Goku moved to stop the monk but watched in fascination as the nail flew off and landed on the floor. He immediately grabbed Sanzo's hand and began searching for an injury.
Amused, Sanzo let the boy inspect his hand for a moment before pulling it away.
"See? Doesn't hurt at all. Now give me your hand."
Goku hesitantly obeyed, but was soon awed by the sight of each of his nails flying across the floor and the lack of pain or blood involved. Once the claws on his hands had been reduced to their proper length Sanzo scooted back, gently picked up one of Goku's feet, and placed it in his lap. The monk examined the toenails for a moment before he sighed.
"What's wrong, Sanzo?"
"I think I'm going to need bolt cutters for these."
Goku's eyes widened. He wasn't sure what 'bolt cutters' were, but it didn't sound like a good thing. Realizing the puny nail clippers would have no effect on Goku's grotesquely overgrown and thick toenails, Sanzo stood up and retrieved a large pair of scissors from the desk. He returned and picked up the boy's foot again; Sanzo placed the blades between one big toe nail and clipped with all his strength.
SNAP
Sanzo stared down in awe at the broken scissors in his hand.
"Holy shit. I think I really am going to need bolt cutters."
It took nearly an hour of shuffling through the temple before Sanzo was able to find a pair of diamond cutter scissors. Fortunately, those did work, though no one could quite explain how they came to be so dull afterwards. Sanzo breathed out in relief as the first task was finally done. To think he, Genjo Sanzo, had been reduced to grooming some wild dirty monkey…
But, on to the haircut.
Again, though, Goku adamantly refused to allow Sanzo to 'chop off his head'. And once again the monk decided to show instead of tell.
Fate (still played by Vanna) spun the wheel again and this time it landed on '!$#'.
Which was again what Sanzo issued forth as he slipped and accidentally lobbed off a rather large chunk of blond hair. Upon hearing this utterance and seeing the pained looked on his keeper's face, Goku became even more adamant about refusing to let the dreaded blades near his head.
Once again the censors step in, due to violence and graphic language, in an attempt to maintain the set T rating.
By the time Sanzo was able to convince Goku to endure the haircut, both were utterly exhausted. However, the blond was not about to let the opportunity slip him by and immediately set about the task of shortening the monkey's hair. Though it retained its ruffled appearance no matter how Sanzo tried, he finally gave up deciding the shorter length, at least, was an improvement.
"Hey, Goku. Get up and go to bed. We're finally done."
Hearing no response from the boy, Sanzo walked around to look at the quiet child. He found Goku sitting up straight (as Sanzo had literally beaten that into him by then) and fast asleep. Sanzo sighed for the millionth time that day and an amused smile danced across his lips. After an entire week of torture, he didn't imagine he'd ever see the day something would wear Goku out. Sanzo lightly picked the sleeping boy up and was again amused when Goku automatically wrapped his small arms around the monk's neck.
"Sanzo…" Goku buried his face into Sanzo's neck trying to embrace the warmth he knew was there.
He tried to squash the fuzzy feeling rising in him at the boy's simple gesture but soon found that, at least for now, it was nearly impossible to do so. Sanzo wearily headed towards his bed and lay down with the sleeping brunet still curled up in his arms. He pulled the blankets over them both and felt his eyelids already drooping with exhaustion.
'Just for tonight, monkey.' His tired mind thought before drifting off to sleep. 'Just for tonight.'
(-end First Grooming-)
A/N: Thanks for the warm welcome back for this story everyone! Just to note that while there might be fluffy moments, none of them are meant to show a relationship or potential relationship between Sanzo/Goku or any of the other characters. While I do like a good 39 fic, I present Sanzo and Goku's relationship here as more of a father/son thing. :D But feel free to see it otherwise. (L) If you see any mistakes, don't be afraid to point them out. I don't have the best grammatical skills in the world, but I do like to improve. If there's a ton of them (which wouldn't surprise me, quite frankly) it might be better to jump in my profile and go to the link there. You can start a thread about Goku's Firsts and point them out. Anyway, please let me know what you think! Til next time, Ja!
Madame Maya: Aw, sankyuu! (hugs) I pretty much got them all back, thanks to some wonderful readers. :D
doublelynn: Well, since they just need to be edited, updates should be faster than when I first put them up. (L) So there should be quite a few, if not all, of them up by October. :D
unheard screams: After we e-mailed, I kept looking and keep coming up with the same kind of things about sneezing. So I dunno there. (L)
Ahja Reyn: A Saiyuki fan too? My kinda gal! heheh.
space-cadet6: It's been so long, I'm surprised a lot of people even remember these things. (L)
Braeca: Aw, thank you. :D It will probably be a long time before the Insomnia Trilogy is put back up. As for Of a Place Long Ago...well, that's going through a MAJOR overhaul. (L)
jarmets: (L) No, not yet. I need to get back into writing for these, but we'll see. ;D
Koryu-Sanzo: Ahhh, fresh fan meat. (LOL) :D
Kimra Dattei: Well, on the first one: It's an anime thing. (L) On the second: That's from a later story in Goku's Firsts, actually. It's from one of the drabbles. :D So you'll get to see it eventually. heheh
midnight silver kitsune: That's all right, but thanks! I'm not about to lose my stuff twice. (L) I've taken extra precautions against that. :D
Zili: Well then, here's another!
muckraker: Ahh, thank you! I've fixed it. :D
Chicken Nuggets: (I love that name, makes me hungry) (L) That ended up being one of my favorite lines, too. hehe :D
Wolfstone: Since I did brunet right, you'd think I'd have seen that, wouldn't you? (L) But then, I had to have brunet as opposed to brunette pointed out to me too. heheh Thank you! I've fixed it and I make sure to fix it in future chapters. :D