Saiyuki Fan Fiction / Gensomaden Saiyuki Fan Fiction / Saiyuki Reload Fan Fiction ❯ What's Left ❯ One-Shot

“What’s Left”
By Viridian5
6/5/08

RATING: PG-13, for language.
SPOILERS: major ones for Saiyuki Reload volumes 7 and 8.
SUMMARY: Picking up and going on.
ARCHIVAL/DISTRIBUTION: Anywhere, as long as you ask me first.
FEEDBACK: can be sent to Viridian5@aol.com.
DISCLAIMERS: All things Saiyuki belong to Kazuya Minekura. No infringement intended.
NOTES: Pre-reading by Bardsley and Syvia.

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“What’s Left”
By Viridian5
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Riding in the jeep shouldn’t be this quiet; the silence gave him too much time to think. Being put to work at the village had been annoying, but at least it had kept him busy.

Gojyo figured that Goku was still thinking about it and the girl, which made him quiet. The monkey hadn’t even complained about being hungry lately. If they hadn’t stopped at the village Gojyo never would have seen that Goku had a type, and what a type it was: haughty, commandeering, aggravating....

If Sanzo had stayed with them, they never would have collapsed in the desert and gotten carried to the village. If Sanzo hadn’t left like a damned--

But having too much time to think made it harder to keep his uncomplicated mad-on at Sanzo going too. Looking back on it, that night had been too weird. He knew the unholy priest didn’t actually have a heart of stone because Sanzo had freaked out so completely over Goku getting so horribly injured. Watching Hakkai bitchslap Sanzo out of his shocked paralysis would have been the greatest thing ever if Goku hadn’t been lying there bleeding out into the ground during it. So why had Sanzo taken off... and with Hazel of all people? Sanzo might not get the “filthy youkai” routine from that weirdo but he’d been creeped out by Hazel flirting with him. No way he’d want to hit the road with him.

Thinking about it, Gojyo wondered how differently things might have worked out if Hakkai or Goku had been conscious to talk things out that night. Gojyo and Sanzo didn’t communicate that well together, never had. If the world ever depended on them talking to each other like civilized people, the world better be prepared to kiss its ass goodbye.

None of this thinking would stop Gojyo from kicking Sanzo’s ass the next time they met, but now he wanted to know why things had gone down this way.

They would meet again. Despite jokes about arriving in the west before Sanzo, they needed their sutra man to make sure this drive didn’t turn out to be the most useless, bloody, ass-sucking road trip in the history of ever.

If Sanzo had stayed with them, they never would have ended up in the village or learned about the youkai thing about calming down into being “born again” and eating people. Gojyo was damned glad nobody there had known about taboo children. Would him being half-human make him edible to them?

If they weren’t really sure about who was youkai, how could they be so blasé about eating people?

Hakkai would consider their stay a learning experience and something Meant to Be. At least he’d say that. Gojyo couldn’t be so easygoing about it, in truth or in mouth service.

They really needed to start talking and stop thinking.

“How could she-- how could they eat people?” Goku asked suddenly.

The atmosphere had to be lightened. “You took a few chomps out of me now and then,” Gojyo answered.

“That wasn’t totally me-- and I’m lucky I didn’t get some kind of disease!”

“Who was the guy who said, ‘Sanzos must taste awesome’?”

“I only thought about that because everybody kept eating ’em!”

Goku had been kind of nearly adult lately, so getting him like this made Gojyo feel better. “Yeah, yeah. So it’s ‘everybody’s’ fault and not yours.”

“...I hope Sanzo’s okay.”

So much of Gojyo’s need to kick Sanzo’s ass came from how sad him abandoning them made the monkey. Gojyo hoped Hazel molested the jerk daily and Sanzo knew what a sweet deal he’d pissed away.

“I’m sure he is,” Hakkai said, reliable. “You know he’s tough.”

“Knowing Hazel, Sanzo’s probably eating better than we are,” Gojyo said.

“I don’t know how well he’s coping with all that rich food.”

“Hazel probably doesn’t let him eat anything stale, bland, or covered in mayonnaise. Has to be torture.”

“Then he’ll definitely be happy to see us,” Goku said.

That asshole better be. Gojyo would see to it. “You know it.”

  ***********************THE END**********************   More Viridian5 stories can be found in The Green Room version 3.0 at http://viridian.shriftweb.org/ No-frames but no-frills access available at http://viridian.shriftweb.org/index2.htm