Chapter Four

Five or Five Hundred Years Before

Goku stood alone in a long hallway. The last thing he could remember was… light. And just when he thought he had caught it… he blinked, only to find himself here. Weird. It was a very ornate hallway. It was trimmed with red granite and there were columns. The whole place looked… pristine.

He took one step and a thousand echoes reverberated back to him. This is just too weird. Goku couldn't decide now whether or not he had actually thought anything would happen to him in that broom closet. Step. Echo. Echo. Echo. Step. Echo… It was a brightly lit hallway, and he was happy for that. He wouldn't have been comfortable here if it was dark. Not that he was comfortable anyway, but still. Gojyo would have made fun of his 'scared of the dark' attitude. Hakkai would have mothered him, which was just as bad. And Sanzo…well, he knew about his dislike of dark places all too well.

A window? Sure enough, he had come to a large window with the same red frame as the rest of the hall. Looking out of it he saw a grove of trees. They had pink leaves. That was nice… They looked pretty. Slowly, he pushed the window open. The breeze came in. Good, so wherever he was, at least he knew he wasn't dead. He could still feel. Then came the scent. Goku closed his eyes for a moment, smiling. This was another thing he could never tell the gang. Gojyo would probably have laughed him out of town if he knew just how much Goku liked flowers. Hakkai might actually have been alright with it. And Sanzo…already knew about his liking for flowers. How many times had Goku raided the temple's flowerpots to decorate Sanzo's desk? Stupid kid, Goku thought wistfully as he opened his eyes again, still smiling.

"You there! Get your dirty hands off the window! You'll leave fingerprints!"

If Goku was an old man, like Gojyo, he might just have had a cardiac arrest then. As it was, he leapt fifteen feet back from the window, which landed him in the opposite wall of the hallway.

He turned around to see whom the voice had belonged to and there, some twenty feet away from him, was a man in a robe as sumptuous as the hallway itself, his hair tied back in a bun and…He's got a chakra on his forehead.

"What are you gawking at, you unclean runt?! And here I thought, having not seen you around for so long, that we had seen the back of you!"

Goku swallowed. The way that guy was looking at him was the same way the monks at the temple had looked at him. He had not been back at the temple for two years and had forgotten just how nerve-racking it was to have someone stare down at him with utter disgust. In the last two years whenever he had run into anyone who truly hated him, it had been someone who had hated the entire Sanzo Party.

Goku blinked. Scared to walk down a dark hall by myself. Scared by some old fart of a bully. Since when am still thirteen? So, he did something he had never had the guts to do back when he was fresh out of the cave. He talked back.

"What do you think, Fart Face?" He sneered, alliterating his insult just for good measure.

The monk-like asshole went livid. That felt so good to say. And now he's coming at me.Goku would have backed up from the man now stalking down the hall toward him if there had been anywhere to back up to. Also, he did not really feel remotely threatened by this bastard. So, he settled for leaning nonchalantly on the wall – against which he was backed up.

"You are coming with me! We will see how your guardian deals with your foul mouth!" and with that he grabbed Goku by the elbow and began to steer him down the hall. "Honestly, I have no idea what the Merciful Goddess was thinking, keeping you up here. When I, Egan, brought you to her for a decision, this was not what I intended," he muttered heatedly.

Goku's first reaction was to just kick this guy's butt into next week. However, he rethought that choice rather quickly. He did not know where he was. He did not know how he had gotten here. At least this way things were progressing in some direction or other. If he didn't like how things went, he would just threaten this tight-ass Goddess-guardian into submission and go from there. In fact, that was probably what he was going to have to do, given the way this jerk Egan was describing how he, Goku, would be 'dealt with.'

"Excuse me!"

Goku was knocked from his planning by the monk-ish Egan's hammering on a door and crying out "Excuse me!" in steadily rising volumes. "Tish," he finally said, his voice satisfyingly hoarse, "…must be at the Marshal's. Follow me."

Now Goku faltered a little. Marshal? A snooty goddess was one thing. A godly Marshal was another. He would have to fight in that case. Could he even summon his weapon in this place? It was not that Goku doubted that he could kick the Marshal's ass under normal circumstances – or as normal as they could get when fighting a god. After all, he had once defeated the War Prince Homura himself. It was just that he wasn't sure if he was stupid enough to walk into trouble that easily.

He mulled over it for about half a second as he was dragged down yet another hallway. Then he grinned. I'll just have to risk it. Yes, he was that stupid after all.

Again, they were in front of a door and again jerk-face Egan was knocking.

"Yes, who is it?" Goku, who had been looking around this latest froufrou hall, snapped to attention. What the…

"Marshal, I apologize for the intrusion, but I have a disciplinary case which I must report to Konzen Douji."

I know that name. I so know that name. Wait…

Egan's next words, however, completely pulled Goku from this latest trail of thought. His ears picked up a sigh and then, "Alright. My dear General, clear out a space will you."

He knew he should have run when he had the chance. A Marshal and a General?! The jerk must have been referring to the general when he had said 'Konzen Douji.' Great. And to top it all, Goku was hungry. He and his brilliant ideas–

"Alright brat, in you go!" With one unconvincing shove Goku allowed himself to be pushed into the room. There was nothing for it. He was just going to have to jump into action from the get-go.

"Nyoi-Bo!" Goku's question as to whether or not he could summon weapons in this place was swiftly answered, as the familiar and comfortable weight of his staff was summoned from another plain and into the palm of his outstretched hand.

He could smell one, two, three people in the room. Having the sharpest senses of the four members of the Sanzo Party had its great perks, so long as he stayed clear of Gojyo's dirty laundry. One person smelled of liquor, another of gunpowder, and both of cigarettes. The Marshal and the General Konzen Douji. The third however – ink, laundry detergent and flowers. A girl. The goddess.

An idea popped into his head that Hakkai would not have approved of. But, then again, Hakkai would probably not have approved of his brilliant strategy of getting pushed into a room with two army-related gods either. This idea was the most cliché idea that Goku himself had ever encountered, given that he had encountered it time and time again in battle. The last time had been just a few weeks ago, in the drawbridge village, with Tamuro and Rei.

The idea was– a hostage. How very, very lame. Still, nothing for it.

With one spin, he was behind the flower-scented goddess. Yup, it's a girl alright. Long blond ponytail, and a dress, and all. He clamped an arm around her and brought the two of them right together. Hakkai would so not approve of this. Then, with his other arm, he brought the Nyoi-Bo up against her throat. It was a good thing she was only about half a head taller than he was.

"Anyone who wants to screw with this 'unclean runt' is going to have to go through girly here first!" Fear me! I am oh so very, very LAME.

There was utter silence in the room. Goku, who had pulled the girl down a little so that she would be his height, now looked over her shoulder at the Marshal and the General. His mouth slowly opened. He had not been imagining the similarities between the voice of the Marshal and the voice of Hakkai. Or if he had, then he was now imagining far more than just that.

Hakkai stood before him. Or rather, it was not Hakkai, but Gonou. That was who the man before Goku looked like. Dressed in a white lab coat, katana drawn, hair long and brushing against his shoulders, he looked to Goku the spitting image of the criminal after whom Sanzo and he had been sent, and to whom they had given a new name, five years before.

Gojyo stood by his side. Or rather, it was not Gojyo, but a Gojyo of the past. That was who the man before Goku looked like. Dressed in a black uniform, two dueling pistols cocked and ready to fire, he looked to Goku the spitting image of the man who had sheered his hair short in mourning upon learning that 'Gonou' was dead, and whom they had met, five years before.

Then maybe…

Slowly, horror rising within him, Goku's eyes slid to the face of the 'girl' just inches from his own. He realized, a little too late, as he looked into all too familiar violet eyes, that his guardian and the goddess were not one and the same. Oh no.