Chapter Three

And the Voice Vanished

"Hey, Hakkai. Is it just me, or is Sanzo completely out of it?"

"Really Gojyo, what can you mean?"

Gojyo, who had been staring with not-so-rapt attention at the cream-colored ceiling of their room, tilted his head to look at Hakkai who, at this moment, was sitting at a small table, nursing a cup of hot tea… with a little shot of whiskey in it.

The wine had been a lie.

"Well, whoever did send her was laughing at us. And he knew about Goku's history. From the Oasis."

"The pigtails."

"Morbid touch, don't you think?"

"…"

Gojyo sat up and crossed his legs on the mattress. He ruffled his hair, thinking hard. "I don't wanna say Kougaiji because, seriously, the man respects us more than that. But whoever did… and Sanzo not even picking up on it… Damn, someone's having a good laugh."

Hakkai had not said a word. He had, however, turned his seat a little to face Gojyo, who now looked straight at him. Finally, he quietly said, "Sanzo wasn't with us at the Oasis."

"Still," Gojyo growled, "How out-of-it did he have to be to not be able to tell she was an assassin?"

Hakkai sipped his tea. Gojyo leaned back against the wall that his bed was pushed up against. "He should know that no one on our little road trip ever knows who we actually are until we get there. I mean, that's what the whole 'we expect a divine monk and royal ass-kissing disciples' spiel is about in every town we get to. No squirt would know all that about us. And…" he smirked, "that gag about me was just lame."

"If you're really all that troubled by it, why didn't you say anything at the restaurant?" And thus the Green Eyed Sage graced the Lowly Child of Sin with his wisdom. Amen.

For a moment, the only sound in the room was the dysfunctional rotating of the fan in the corner. Gojyo raised a red eyebrow. "Dude. I know Goku's a dummy, but honestly, he can take care of himself. And even if he can't, he's got Sanzo. And if the Mighty Monk himself can't tell a fangirl from an assassin… It ain't my problem."

Hakkai smirked as he stood up to get some more tea.

Whiskey.

"In all honesty, I think he was just a bit put off by the fact that Goku could even attract a girl, which the sender of the assassin was probably counting on. After all, Goku is growing up pretty fast, isn't he?"

"Yeah, whatever," Gojyo looked back up at the ceiling. So, they had played into yet another evil idiot's hands. So, what? Happened every day. But the idea of his fate-chosen kid-brother growing somehow didn't sit well with Gojyo.

"You won't tell Sanzo?"

"Let the idiot figure it out for himself."

"Then why have you been harping on it?"

"What else am I supposed to do until you get up the sense to offer to refill my glass? I ain't getting up."

"Ah."

"And don't dilute it with that crap either."

"Just tea then?"

"…"

...

It was after dinner than Sanzo heard Goku's footsteps coming down the hall. He was sitting with Hakkai in his and Gojyo's room, discussing the best route through the labyrinth of mountains that were just some miles beyond this town. Ever since that had gotten into the western portion of Shangri-La it seemed as if nature itself seemed to be working against them, damnit.

From the staircase, Gojyo and Hakkai's room was closer than Sanzo and Goku's. So, when Sanzo called out for Goku to 'get his ass in here,' Goku stepped into the door frame, still holding a package in his hands, much as he tried to conceal the bulky thing behind him.

"So, how did it go?"

Sanzo, his mouth open, and his own question still lodged in his throat, turned to look at Hakkai, who had spoken.

"Yeah," Gojyo, who had plopped his feet up on the table – much to Hakkai's annoyance when his boots got dirt on the map – suddenly sat up and righted his feet back onto the floor. "No broken bones, monkey?" Sanzo would have thought the man was joking… would have…

Goku blinked at them. "What the hell are you talking about, cockroach? We went out to dinner."

Sanzo watched Hakkai and Gojyo exchange meaningful glances before he felt himself asking what he thought was the obvious question. "Where did you get the change?"

He was now at the receiving end of Goku's idiotic blinking. "Eh, odd jobs? You guys don't really think I just sit around all day and night, do you? There's only so much time we spend in restaurants. And besides, with the card not working in most town, I thought it would be a good idea to start saving up." He ambled into the room, package still clamped awkwardly at his side, and in one fluid motion swiped Gojyo's – refilled – cup of 'tea.'

"Oy! Monkey! That's–"

Gojyo never got the sentence out, for at that moment Goku was felled down by a paper fan. Gojyo just barely rescued the cup in time.

"What the hell was that for?" Forgetting himself for a moment, Goku threw the package into full view as he used it as a shield against Sanzo.

"What's in the package?" a chorus of voices asked at once. Sanzo closed his eyes momentarily. Great. Now he was thinking in sync with Hakkai and Gojyo. His brain really had melted during the course of this journey.

Something very odd happened then. Goku was always a ball of energy, at least up until the last few days. Up until Tenjin. Hell, when they had first started out on this pain-in-the-ass mission, one of the things that Sanzo had dreaded most had been being in a confined space with Goku for extended periods of time. He had avoided that by throwing Gojyo under the bus instead or, as it turned out, in the back of the jeep.

Even in his sleep Goku would twitch and murmur and snore. The idiot just could not stay quiet. Which was why, when he froze in the middle of Hakkai and Gojyo's room, Sanzo knew something was very, very wrong. Or rather, given that Goku had been unreasonably quiet of late, he knew that this outright silence meant that something was even more wrong.

"Kid, you can try to look cool later, when it doesn't come off so lame." Gojyo emptied his reclaimed cup in one swig. He obviously had not noticed Goku's stillness. Drunken idiot.He had, however, become uncharacteristically serious. "But you aren't really trying to tell us that chick wasn't an assassin, are you?"

Right. Now Sanzo was downright confused. Sanzo hated being confused, and this was the second time since dinner that he had been confused. Someone was going to die.

"Now," Gojyo set his glass on the table. "Let's cut the crap. What'd she give you?"

"I…" Goku clutched onto the package more tightly. "I don't know what you mean. She wasn't an assassin and–"

"Fork over the package you idiot!"

"No! It's none of your business! Just lay off, Gojyo! You just didn't like her because she said the obvious – that you're a middle-aged lady sort of guy!"

"SAY WHAT?! NOW LISTEN HERE YOU–"

"What's in the package." Sanzo finally pinpointed the spot on which to vent, and if looks could kill the parcel in Goku's hands would have died a hundred death's right then.

"…it's none of your business either…"

"…What?" Sanzo felt a muscle under his eye twitch.

"I said," Goku took a deep breath, "It's none of your business any more than it is the prevy cockroach's!"

"…Give it to me or I will kill your sorry ass."

"Now there's one I haven't heard before! If you really want to know about that girl so much, then just ask!" He wasn't letting go of it, damn him.

"Who the hell wants to know about your little girlfrie–?!"

"Yes Goku, please tell us about her," Hakkai's voice washed over them like a pail of cold water. Sanzo had almost forgotten he was there.

After a whole afternoon of getting hit over the head about how much Goku had grown up, Sanzo was suddenly struck by how…small he looked, standing in the middle of the room with three men staring him down.

And he hated that look on Goku's face. It was the look with which Goku usually came to Sanzo when the monks had been picking on him, or when he had a moral dilemma about something that had happened on their journey. It had been the look on his face when Sanzo had found him outside, in the quiet moments before Ukoku attacked, and almost killed him. Before Goku had almost bled out in his arms. Now, however, it seemed that Sanzo was the culprit to Goku's expression.

He felt himself about to say 'Tish, whatever, I don't care.' Or 'You're making a bid deal out of nothing,' or something like that. He did that when the drama wasn't worth the problem it was happening over.

But Goku opened his mouth and said, "She knows a bit about my past."

The blood chilled in Sanzo's veins.

"I mean, she doesn't know my past, but she knows about it. She knows how I can sort of… open up and let it come back. And apparently there's a book or something that actually has everything written on it. It was written by some Dragon King… guy, and…"

"So, that's how it is?"

Goku, who hadn't met anyone's eye, now looked at Sanzo, "What?"

"We're in the middle of this pain in the ass life-threatening mission and you decide that now you want to go on a side trip down amnesia lane?" Goku swallowed, and something akin to guilt – but certainly not guilt – pinched at Sanzo.

"I just…"

"Is that what you've been sulking about for days?!" Before he knew it, he was on his feet and positively hissing at the stupid monkey child across the room from him. Day after day of that stupid quiet in the back seat, who knew how many weeks of that sheepish look on the monkey's face, and for what? Not because of any shit that had happened. Not because of anything here and now and real. No, the little bastard had been having some sort of teen-journey-of-self-discovery issues, and Sanzo had it up to here with this crap. He had never signed up to take any of this junk. He had never signed up to be the role-model father figure. And he had certainly never signed up for the nerve wracking experience that was Goku.

And Goku actually blurted back. "Hell, I want to know, Sanzo!" He actually shouted back, the little son of a–

"Goku, have you ever considered how weighty those memories might–"

"Hakkai, look, I…You killed a thousand demons, and they changed your name." Goku, slight wiry Goku, was clutching that package so hard it looked as if he was going to tear it in two.

"Hey now," Gojyo tried to cut in. Goku was treading on glass now, but the idiot just plowed on.

"You got a new name! And that was for annihilating a village and a fortress full of youkai! And…and for that they changed your name…" He was wheezing a little now. He had eyes for Hakkai only. It was a little unnerving, to see the way they two were looking at each other. It seemed that, of everyone, he had decided to make Hakkai understand– that pissed Sanzo off more than he would ever admit. At the same time, it looked as if Hakkai would kill him if Goku didn't finish his explanation, having begun it the way he had. The 'this had better be worth it' look Hakkai was giving Goku made Sanzo a little jittery not to get caught in the crossfire.

"What did…" Goku swallowed hard, "What did I have to do to get locked away, without even remembering my past, for five hundred godforsaken years?"

No one said anything. That last statement threw things more into perspective than Sanzo cared to admit. It was true that as the punishments of the gods went, Hakkai had only to get a good word from Sanzo and a changed name, and that was for slaughtering one thousand demons. Two entire youkai clans. What had Goku done to be locked away on a desolate mountain for five hundred years, without even the memory of his past? It also threw into perspective that Goku had actually been thinking about this for a while. Since long before his conversation with Tenjin. How long? How many months now, while they had been traveling West and living in the here and now, had Goku's mind been elsewhere altogether? Even subconsciously?

"You guys…Sanzo…" He was pulled from his thoughts by that same voice which had called out to him six years ago. "Please… will you help me with this?" Those golden eyes fixed on him. He had once heard Homura say that golden eyes were the mark of a heretic. Sanzo didn't know anything about that. "I… I need this…" Small, shaking, clinging to him. Suddenly Sanzo was filled with the overwhelmingly selfish desire for Goku to always stay that way. Perhaps all parents felt like that, but unlike most parents he could actually hold on to some extent. After all, if Goku got his memories back, what then? What new faces would he turn to in his mind's eye? He, Sanzo, would no longer be his only ray of light. Suddenly it struck him how pathetically he had come to rely on that…

"Go to your room." It had to be one of the lamest things Sanzo had ever said, but right now he just needed to get the upper hand on the monkey who was still three quarters of a head shorter than him.

The flinch that rippled over those narrow shoulders cut more deeply than he would have liked to admit.

Goku then made a facial expression he had never made before. He smirked bitterly. When had he learned to do that? From whom? "Jeez," he rasped, "Thanks. Funny how that was exactly where I was heading before I got sidetracked by all your bullshit quest–ions." He rushed the last few words and still his voice cracked on the last syllable. Package still in hand, he turned out of the room, and slammed the door behind him. The woodwork cracked.

Sanzo looked back to the map expectantly. He had to endure a few moments of feeling Hakkai's expectant stare into the top of his head before the debate of which rout to take was reopened. Just then Sanzo would have liked to lose himself in all those little blue and purple lines that made up the topography of the land to which they had already been traveling for two years.

...

Goku woke himself up in the middle of the night. He would have just waited for Sanzo to fall asleep, but the thing about Sanzo was that he always seemed to wait until Goku was asleep before he fell asleep himself. It was a habit that had probably developed when he had first pulled Goku out of the cave.

Back then Goku would sometimes crawl into bed with Sanzo when he was scared. He had often talked Goku to sleep. Never, at any of those times, could Goku remember being alone with a sleeping person. Whenever he had whispered Sanzo's name, the monk had responded – albeit, often with no more than a grunt or a quiet insult. But still, he had always let Goku know that he was there, watching over him.

Great. He was going sentimental. Goku really did not need to go remembering junk like that. Not right now. Sanzo had basically said he wouldn't help him… and Goku couldn't just keep on living with the dreams. That had been why it was so easy to wake up again tonight– the knowledge that, in a while, the dreams he could never remember when he woke up would become… memories.

Despite whatever Sanzo and Gojyo always said in his being a 'stupid lumbering monkey' Goku could be quieter than shadows. Still, as he crept over to Sanzo's bed, package under his arm, he felt half certain the monk would wake up. Perhaps he really was that quiet. Or perhaps Sanzo didn't sense his aura as a threat, and trusted him.

Again, Goku supressed that idea. He had already made up his mind. And it wasn't like he was Gojyo with his lighter or Hakuryuu the Jeep. He wasn't a part of Sanzo's daily routine, really. He wouldn't be that missed… He hoped not anyway. He didn't want to cause any more drama. Then again, that kind of bothering him too– the idea that Sanzo wouldn't miss him. God, I'm still such an immature brat, aren't I.

Quietly as he could, his toes feeling out for rickety floorboards, Goku got to the side of Sanzo's bed. Slowly, ever so slowly, he slid open the drawer in his bedside table and pulled out the Maten Scripture. He's always telling me how he didn't want to get landed with me in the first place. Okay, so maybe this is kinda late in the game, and I've already been enough of a pain for him, but better late than never. Out of the room, down the hall, down the stairs, and Goku was standing in the deserted sitting room of the Inn.

He wasn't lying to himself to make this easier. He wasn't.

He needed to find a place to do this. After all, he didn't know what would happen to him and he didn't want the Maten Scripture to be just lying around where the first youkai to come in would just be able to pick it up and take it. He looked around the room. It was lit by the dim light of coals from the fireplace. They were more hindrance than help. It was still too dark for the coals to be any use, and it was too light to just get used to the dark. Goku squinted back at the staircase. A closet just under the stairs. That should work.

It was only in front of the closet, the little expanse of darkness and brooms looming in front of him, that Goku swallowed. He realized suddenly that he was shaking. What am I doing? Package in one hand, Maten Scripture in the other… What the hell am I doing?! He could still go back. He could go back, put the Maten Scripture back in its place, even throw the package over the coals on his way upstairs. And then… and then dream.

Goku took a long unsteady breath. It wasn't a deep moral struggle. Goku didn't go for those sorts of things. It was just… one of those things he had to do. No questions asked, none answered…yet. His feet were getting cold on the wooden floor. I'm doing this already. With that, he stepped into the closet, closed the door behind him, made himself comfortable on a bucket and flicked open a lighter he had swiped ages ago from Gojyo.

His fingers shaking a little, he yanked out the contents of the packet. He'd had some time to look over it before Sanzo had come back into their room after making all the travel arrangements with Hakkai. Goku had been listening for his footsteps and by the time the monk stepped into the room Goku was under the covers, facing the wall, the package stuffed securely under his mattress.

Goku fumbled through the papers. Pages printed off websites about ancient lore. Leaflets copied out of books about theories on how Heaven was commanded. Different myths on the War Prince Nataku, who had defeated the Demon King Gyumaoh, they very monster whose resurrection the Sanzo Party as traveling to stop. Someone had made a lot of effort, putting these things together. And then… there were references to the book written by the Dragon King, Goujun. But where was the book itself? How does it all connect? Every time Goku read through something there would be a moment, a second really, in which he would feel a pull or a spasm of recognition. However, when he tried to reread the sentences over which these moments of deja vu had happened…nothing. He drew a blank.

"Here we are," he whispered hoarsely, yanking out a few papers stapled together while trying to keep the rest from spilling off his lap. His eyes flickered to the lighter, careful to keep it far and away from Sanzo's Scripture. His eyes yanked back to the papers he was holding. He had to drop them on top of the pile in his lap. Damn his shaking fingers.

"Enchantments of the Gods, Done and Undone."

These papers had been ripped out of a book – an old looking book. The pages were yellow, and the ink was faded, making it all the more difficult to read. But that was fine. Goku was a good reader. He had known how to read even when he had been in the cave. He had just walked into the temple with Sanzo and realized that he could read the files on Sanzo's desk. Though Hakkai had taught him how to count, maybe now, he'd be able to learn who taught him how to read…

That would be neat.

The first time Goku had looked over this bunch of papers he had immediately thought of Homura. A lot of the stuff here was about the sort of stuff Homura had talked about. In fact, Goku would not have been surprised if Homura had gotten some of his motivations from this very text.

The text was all about using the founding Scriptures to do or undo the work of the gods. Here was a whole page about the theory of the earth's founding. And here it went on to say that, even without all of the Scriptures a 'new world' – Homura's new world – could still be founded with a powerful enough source of energy like… the Great Sage. Seiten Taisei.

Goku's eyes flickered back to the lighter, checking that his hand had not meandered to anything flammable. Back to the text.

The Great Sage was not only a creature that could be used in correlations with the Scriptures. He was made from the Scriptures for, if the Earth was his Mother then, in a sense, the Scriptures were his grandparents.

So Sanzo has been carrying my grandpa on his shoulders for years. Hell, he'd hate that idea. Goku smiled nervously. "The Scriptures instill a natural order. When the Sage's power is not being used in unison with the Scriptures for the creation of this 'second world,' each separate Scripture has a unique effect on the Sage:

The Muten Scripture, sutra of Death, or 'Nothing,' is the only known entity that can kill the Sage, who derives his power from the Earth and is powered by her immense strength.

The Uten Scripture, sutra of Life, is responsible for the flood of life within the Sage, overflowing into two different personalities, one of whom committed heinous sins in Paradise.

The Koten Scripture, sutra of the Unkown and Infinite, guards over the Sages boundless strength and power, as it does over the power of the Earth itself, which moves and shakes the very core of life as we know it.

The Seiten Scripture, sutra of Sanctity, fuels the Sage's diadem, which acts as a limiter to his awesome strength and was crafted by the gods. In no observations has this Scripture directly influenced the Sage.

The Maten Scripture, sutra of Evil, is not only said to be the core of the Sages being, but is also something of a suppressor. Within the Sage are concealed, by order of the gods, the evil deeds which he committed, unknown to all, including himself, so that he may never think to repeat them."

Goku swallowed. Well, he could see why Homura's heart went out to him. His own heart went out to him too. What shithead had written this? …'overflowing into two different personalities, one of whom committed heinous sins in Paradise.'… 'the evil deeds which he committed, unknown to all, including himself, so that he may never think to repeat them.'…

Anyway, he thought, pulling his eyes away from the highfalutin insults. I have what I need. Awkwardly, crumpling the top page a little, he stuffed the wad of papers back into their envelope. He flicked out the light. Gingerly he slid the package and the lighter as far into a corner of the closet as he could without knocking against a mop. It wasn't very far.

In the dark, as carefully as he was able – he didn't want to tear the paper – he unrolled the Maten Scripture. I suppose some idiot would say it was fate that Sanzo had to carry this Scripture. The one I needed, he thought, bending over and laying out on the floor. The edges curled up against the narrow walls of the closet.

He sat like that on his bucket for a while, leaning over, keeping his balance by holding onto the floor, fingers pressing into the paper of one of the Five Founding Scripture of Heaven and Earth. …Now what?

He was tempted to go back to that packet. Was there a magical spell he needed to mutter? Sanzo always chanted something when he activated the Scripture. Damnit, he should have listened more carefully, shouldn't he. But hell, how was he supposed to know whatever it was Sanzo always muttered under his breath? Half of it was insults and another quarter was old-man complaints. Goku began to get really nervous.

He swallowed hard. Calm down. Just calm down. And still he sat there. What to do, what to do, what to do…Had he thought it would just come to him while he sat on this bucket in some closet of a lonely Inn that wasn't even in India!

That was exactly what it did. His eyes snapped open, and he grinned outright. Of course. How stupid he was. What was the one memory he had from before the cage? What was the one bridge he had into that life? What had been the one thing he had clung to day after day in that cave? For five hundred years. He licked his dry lips and set his palms flat on the Scripture. It crinkled under his grip. He hoped he wouldn't leave sweat marks on it.

"My name," he whispered into the dark, "is Goku."

For a moment, nothing happened –then an explosion of power rushed up Goku's arms and into his slight frame. It was as if a torrent of hurricanes had been injected into his system and were now hurtling about inside him, willing to find a way out. He opened his mouth, his eyes, his ears, his pores. He needed to get them out! They were going to rip him apart!

He felt something slap him on the face. The Maten Scripture had extended into its greater form and was whipping about him and every place that it lashed out upon he felt a burn and to that place the hurricanes rushed and good god he felt like he was a boiling, bubbling concoction of pain.

Then, like any boiling bubbling concoction, he evaporated. Just like that. He felt cool, and weightless, and all he could see about him was… light. Was that the sun? He reached up a hand to feel for his diadem. It was still there. Good. Good… He smiled. Now… the sun… light as could be, warm and comforting...

His body crumpling on the closet floor.

...

Sanzo jolted awake. "What the–"

A surge of power, a surge that was much too familiar to be good, coursed through him. Yes, much too familiar. Indeed, it was too familiar to even be anyone else's Scripture. "Shit!" He yanked his bedside table drawer open. "Shit!" Panic flooded him.

He fumbled about, disoriented in the dark, and then stopped. There wasn't a sound. That wasn't right. Goku, quiet as he had been in the days, could not control the sniffles and snores he emitted at night. Though Sanzo would never have admitted it, those sounds had been a comfort to him. They had reassured him that Goku was still there and still Goku. And they were gone. He was gone.

"Sanzo?!" Light blinded him and he threw up his arms as best he could against it. "What happened!? Is everything alright?!"

He lowered his arms and blinked at Hakkai and Gojyo's silhouettes. The radar that they as the Sanzo Party shared had activated again.

"Hey, where's the monkey?"

"And the Scripture," Sanzo added darkly, getting up and pushing the drawer back into place. He was overreacting about Goku. He did that much too often. Goku would be fine. He was twenty after all. And besides, Sanzo hadn't heard his voice calling out to him, so he was probably just fine.

"The Scripture?! You're kidding me!"

"Let's go," Sanzo pocketed his gun and took an extra carton of bullets, just in case. "The monkey can take care of himself. Right now, we need to worry about the Scripture. How the hell did anyone get in here without my noticing?!" His head was pounding. It was way too early in the morning for this. Or was it too late?

"Sanzo?" He blinked at Hakkai.

"Tell Hakuryuu to fly over the city. I'm going to activate the Scripture. If it's still in the vicinity, he'll see it." Something else was bothering him. He was the only one who could use the Maten Scripture. Then why had he felt its power just a moment ago?

"Hakuryuu, if you would?" Hakkai asked the little dragon sitting on his shoulder.

The dragon let out a 'cheep' of consent, and Gojyo opened the window for him. Out he flew, letting a cold evening breeze into the room. Again, despite the trauma of the moment, a nettling, annoying voice in the back of his head asked Sanzo, Where's the monkey?

He took a deep steadying breath, and proceeded to chant.

For a moment, there was nothing. Then the floorboards rattled violently.

"How in the–?" Gojyo teetered.

"It's downstairs?"

Sanzo's eyes narrowed. Something was very, very wrong.

Curious eyes looked out at them from open doors as they ran down the hall. "Oy, keep it down, will you?!" echoed from one of the room. Down the stairs, into the common room, and… Sanzo turned around slowly. Everything that had been rushing by much too quickly, stopped.

"Sanzo?" He pushed past Gojyo, staring.

No. "Hakkai, stoke up that fire," he rasped. There was a shuffling, a crackle, and a blaze as the fire roared to life with a new log and a handful of kindling. No. There, under the staircase, the door thrown open by the force of the Scripture, were the two of Sanzo's belongings that had gone missing that night. "No…"

Years ago, Sanzo had walked into his office to find Goku tangled up in the Maten Scripture. Hands, legs, and Creator of the World as we know it, all in one awful mess. After recovering from his near-heart-attack, Sanzo had whacked Goku with his fan to within an inch of the monkey's life. "Bu– but it smells nice! It smells like you!" a teary eyed Goku had sniffled up at him in his defense. The fan had stilled in mid swing. Idiot.

That same idiot was now face down on the floor, having slumped off the bucket he had been sitting on, which had itself keeled over. He wasn't 'tangled up' in the Scripture now. There was not enough of it, or perhaps too much of him, for there to be a tangle. It was wrapped around his neck like a scarf that had billowed in the wind. He did not move when Gojyo sat him upright. He did not say anything when Sanzo carefully pulled the Scripture off him. He was breathing regularly, and for all the world, he looked asleep.

But Goku was not asleep. Sanzo knew he was not. Why didn't he call out to me? I would have come. I always came before. Why? A hollow thought echoed in Sanzo's now utterly vacant mind as he pulled his ward from Gojyo's arms and slowly carried the scrawny limp body up the stairs.

Maybe he didn't want me to come.