Imbri: It's short. It's pathetic. It rises out of the Mush Pile file on my computer by popular demand-it is HAKKAI VS. KOONOTORI! Meh. I don't have anything better to do.

Hakkai was brooding deeply by the time he got into bed. He found it ironic and a little sad that Sanzo was oblivious to the effect he had on others-especially others named Goku and Gojyo. Both monkey and kappa were deliriously worried, and to see them both in such a state wore on Hakkai. The enormity of their situation definitely bred a heavy sickness in his stomach-the echoes of Kanan and her kidnapping were undeniable. For him, this threw her ghostly shadow over his soul once again, stripping Hakkai down to his sad and cynical core.

He wasn't quite sure what he would do if they couldn't find Sanzo. It would crush Goku utterly, he knew, and probably Gojyo too-it would ruin them both. Their care for Sanzo was deep-seated and quiet; they probably hadn't realized themselves how much the surly priest meant until his very disappearance. If they couldn't find Sanzo, their journey West was most definitely over.

Ordinarily, Hakkai would not have worried. Sanzo was Sanzo; he was tougher than leather and knew how to take care of himself. He was surly and angry, and funneled all that into fighting his enemies. Ordinarily, he would have fought he way out by now, and they'd all be playing Mahjong and laughing about the misadventure.

But Sanzo wasn't back, and they weren't playing Mahjong. Goku was making his way through some fearsome nightmares, tossing and turning, and Gojyo was staring at the ceiling, sulkily brooding.

Without Sanzo, Hakkai realized, everything fell apart. Each member of the Sanzo Ikkou was instrumental to the group's wellbeing: Goku kept their spirits high, Gojyo counteracted Sanzo's crabbiness, Hakkai watched over them all, and Sanzo kept them all together, and in their place.

He left a rather big hole in his wake. Even more so, now that he was pregnant.

Hakkai sighed, snuggling up to a sleepy Hakuryu. The little dragon was exhausted from driving around all day, and Hakkai mentally thanked him for it. He was about to fall into a light and troubled sleep when a voice roused him-a warm, amused, female voice, whispering near his left ear.

"Whatchya doin'?" the voice asked, and Hakkai blinked, unable to make out the fuzzy glow coalescing by his bedside. He fumbled for his monocle, and, finding it, peered at that mysterious light.

It was, in fact, a girl. A slightly luminescent, white-skinned youkai girl with equally white wings, but a girl nonetheless.

"Hallo," said Hakkai.

"Hallo!" said the girl.

"And you are...?" Hakkai prompted, a little put-off by this mysterious light-girl/bird-youkai who had approached without him sensing her chi. Either she was ridiculously powerful, or Hakkai had been too wrapped up in his brooding to notice her sneaking in. He placed his bet on the latter, squinting again at her.

She looked slightly familiar, although the last youkai he had met fitting her general appearance had been that memory-stealing siren youkai, and this girl seemed a bit more...cheerful. Possibly exuberant, even. And she didn't wear clothes, which was a far jump from the siren youkai's frilly robes.

"Don't you remember me?" the youkai asked with a pout. She was frightfully good at pouting, which, oddly, made her only cuter still.

"Ano," Hakkai hedged, trying to remember. Her cute was troubling him, and he really couldn't remember other than that siren chick and that girl from the Creepy Crane who-

Wait.

"Koonotori-san?" Hakkai guessed-and guessed right, if her exuberant smile was any kind of indicator. "Koonotori-san, who took your clothes?"

"Urumi," Koonotori replied with a shrug. "But I don't really like clothes anyways, so I just didn't get redressed. So, Mr. Cho, how're ya doing?"

"Well, Sanzo's missing-" Hakkai started to say, sitting up. He gently replaced Hakuryu onto his pillow, where the little dragon could sleep without being disturbed.

"I know," she said.

"And Gojyo and Goku are not well-"he tried, looking over to where the two respective lumps were fighting their way through Sanzo-less nightmares.

"I know," she said.

"And-"

"I know, I know, I know," Koonotori said, waving him off with one hand. "What I don't know, Mr. Cho, is how you're feeling about all this. The pregnant Genjo Sanzo is missing, and, try as you might, you can't seem to find him."

"However did you know that Sanzo is-"

Koonotori's eyes danced with amusement. "I know," she said simply. "I know more than you can understand right now. Now then, how are you doing? You look stressed."

Hakkai paused, truly giving the question thought. It was difficult to pare away the layers of his emotion-for some reason, Sanzo's face in his mind kept being replaced by Kanan's, and it was all he could do to keep himself from waking the others and haring off to find the monk again. The baby's safety was a weight on his mind, more for Gojyo's sake than his own, and he knew that Sanzo was in trouble, seeing as he had not returned yet of his own accord. Hakkai sighed.

"I suppose I am stressed, Koonotori-san. I fear for my friends," Hakkai said softly, wringing his hands. "Sanzo is ill-equipped to protect himself and the baby as it is; we have his banishing gun and Sutra with us. In the-the condition he is in now, hand-to-hand combat is a joking proposition for him. He's kidnapped...and he needs us to find him."

"So you're worried about the baby, too?" Koonotori asked, sounding surprised.

"Yes," Hakkai said, looking downcast. He gently stroked Hakuryu's head, his face pensive. "I am very worried for his child. Though he acts gruff, Sanzo loves his baby more than anything. He cares very little for himself, but trying to escape would put his baby in danger, he would not risk its safety."

"Very noble of him," Koonotori commented, smiling a bit.

"He tries not to be, but Sanzo is quite noble," Hakkai agreed. "And he is my friend. If we could, any of us would take his place in order to help him."

Koonotori's eyebrows shot up in surprise. Her grin widened.

"Really?" she drawled, seeming very intrigued by the thought. "Would you temporarily take his baby, so that he could escape?"

"Take his-"Hakkai stammered, his eyes widening. "-take his baby...you mean...physically carry the child myself?"

"You said you would do anything," the youkai pointed out with a nod, her violet eyes twinkling merrily. "And what I described can be arranged. Let me level with you, Mr. Cho-you know I'm considered a criminal among my people. That's because I, ah, bend the rules a bit. You see, I'm a Stork."

"The kind that brings babies?" Hakkai guessed, putting two and two together.

"Precisely," Koonotori agreed with a nod. "But I'm-oh, how'd they put it-a deviant. I prefer males as my test subjects. Knowing this, The Merciful Goddess asked me to conduct Mr. Genjo's little test. She also gave me the option to undo it if things got out of hand-and that's not something I'd like to do. But if we were to, say, transfer the baby to either you, Goku, or Gojyo...it's a win-win sit, right?"

Hakkai did not say anything for a very long time.

Finally, he said, "Yes, you are right. I would do it. To help Sanzo, I will do it."

"Lay down, Mr. Cho, and relax," Koonotori instructed. He did as she said, slowly stretching out in his bed and taking a deep, calming breath. The thought of taking this baby was both mind-boggling and terrifying; he could barely comprehend the enormity of the decision he had just made. He swallowed hard.

"Will it hurt, Koonotori-san?" he asked, a little timidly. "I am no stranger to pain, myself, but I can only imagine that since my body is, um, not accustomed to such a change..."

"I'll take it slowly," the youkai assured him, touching his flat stomach with both hands. She was uncommonly warm, and her touch was gentle and light. "It should just feel a little uncomfortable. Although-although, I would loosen your sash a bit, Mr. Cho, because it's gonna be a bit snug."

Hakkai took off his sash, un-tucked his shirt, and unbuttoned his pants while he was at it. No sense in losing buttons to this, too.

(Imbri: See, Hakkai didn't fight it, so he didn't have the same 'problems' as Gojyo

Koonotori: No, Author-san, you're being nice to Hakkai cuz you just like to torture Gojyo. You're mean.

Imbri: ...and you're so not one to talk.)

For a moment, nothing happened. Hakkai was briefly left to wonder if Koonotori was simply pulling his leg, and would burst into nasty giggles any second, but then he felt it-a loosening sensation, as if he had lost control of his stomach muscles. Curious as to how this was all going to play out, he lifted his Chinese-style shirt a bit, poking at his stomach. He didn't feel anything, really, aside from the strange warmth he attributed to Koonotori's touch, and perhaps that was her branch of magic.

And then Hakkai realized that his flat stomach was no longer very flat. The long, deep scar that ran from just under his ribcage to his left hip was starting to pucker-his eyesight was not the best, but even he could tell that his belly was slowly becoming less concave and more convex. In fact...

"Oh my," Hakkai murmured, blinking hard. He had hoped his poor eyesight was betraying him, but such was not the case-just beneath his navel, his belly had started to slightly bulge outward, gaining momentum and size as the moments passed. Quite effectively freaked out-which was saying something, since Hakkai was not one prone to freaking out-Hakkai decided it best not to watch as his bellybutton started to poke out, the slight bulge evolving into a decided roundness, and then start to really swell outward in earnest.

But, it seemed Hakkai was going to watch, like it or not. His quickly tugged-down shirt was smoothing out, the wrinkles disappearing as the slack fabric was quickly being eaten up by his expanding waistline. And then, the movement started-in a way, it made this strange process a little less surreal; it was definite that there was something inside him, then, and Koonotori was just not spitefully increasing his weight. Which, Hakkai would have pointed out, would have been a vastly unfair joke. At least with the pregnancy, there was a reward at the end of it all. Hakkai winced. This 'reward' seemed bent on liquefying his liver.

"You're at five months," Koonotori cheerfully informed him. She gave his swollen belly a pat, giggling as she was given a slight kick in return. "And doing well!"

"So-two-two-more months, then?" Hakkai asked, short of breath. The heat of the fairy's magic seemed only to be intensifying; he sat up, dabbing perspiration off his face with his sleeve. She had been right; it didn't hurt, precisely, but it was definitely becoming increasingly unpleasant. He was acutely aware that his stomach was feeling uncomfortably tight, and that even the first stage of 'loosening' had done nothing to remedy this point. So tight, in fact, that he had run out of slack in his shirt-it was strained so tautly across his growing middle, he couldn't have gotten it off if he had tried. His shirt was not fitted to contain a Hakkai who looked like he had swallowed a large melon whole.

Hakkai gritted his teeth, knowing that the only alternative was for him to grow out of it-which Sanzo's baby seemed absolutely fixed on. The youkai hunter sent a mental apology to his poor shirt, which had accompanied him faithfully during the whole of his adventures with the Sanzo Ikkou. He assured it that its demise was for the furthering of a worthy cause-that cause being the development and health of Genjo Sanzo's unborn child. And develop it did, cruising right along through what felt like twenty added pounds-which, to Hakkai's embarrassment, caused the springs in his bed to creak in offense-and so that Hakkai's poor belly was really starting to ache. He really wasn't meant to be stretched out this way.

He groaned softly, which his shirt probably done as well, had it a voice. It may have started crying, too, as a large rip appeared, and his shirt was rent clear across.

"Well, that's unfortunate," Hakkai mumbled, tugging at his ripped shirt as Koonotori lapsed into infectious giggles. Hakkai wriggled out of what was left of his poor shirt, sighing at his own heavy, round belly, swollen far over the waistband of his pants. He was exceedingly pregnant by this point, and knew it quite well. In fact, he felt bigger than Sanzo had looked before being kidnapped, which could have been his own perspective, or-

"Koonotori-san?" Hakkai asked shakily, timidly running his hands over his now-bulging stomach. "How far along is it now? I would think that it has almost been the allotted time, hasn't it?"

Koonotori didn't say anything. She just sat in her chair and grinned.

Hakkai could feel the baby continue to grow, and himself stretch to accommodate it-and a hint of fear started to set in on him. Surely, it should have slowed down by now...Sanzo was only seven months along, for goodness' sakes, and the real growth of the baby occurred in the following two months. But it didn't seem to be letting up in the least; if nothing else, the changes seemed to only be increasing in tempo, and the ache was rising into a true, sharp pain.

"Koonotori-san!" Hakkai demanded sharply, steadying himself with one hand as the 'last two months' seemed to hit him almost all at once: his breathing became short and choppy as the pressure on his internal organs increased, his melon-sized belly seemed bent on only enlarging itself further, despite the pain it was bringing him, and a harsh, numbing pain suddenly ripped all the way around his stomach.

"Oh, don't get bent out of shape, Mr. Cho," Koonotori said lightly, her tone patronizing. "I thought that since you were being such a good sport about all this, I'd save the whole Ikkou the trouble and just have you birth the baby yourself. How's that for an idea?"

Hakkai's sweat ran unexpectedly cold. If she was speaking the truth, that pain he had just felt was more than likely...

...a contraction.

"Bad idea!" Hakkai howled, his arms hugging his swollen belly. "That's a very, very, very bad idea, Koonotori-san, and I'd like to stop right here! This is all a very silly predicament to begin with, and my birthing Sanzo's baby won't help in the-augh!" He doubled over as the contraction really took hold of him, sending a painful shock throughout his body. His lungs started to burn.

"Hmm," said Koonotori thoughtfully. "I guess it is about that time. Well, I have people to corrupt and morals to twist, so I'll be seeing you, Mr. Cho."

She mistily started to dissipate-obviously well on her merry, moral-corrupting way-and Hakkai became completely irrational.

"Don't you dare leave me like this!" he snapped, throwing a hasty chi barrier over the youkai in hopes of messing up her transportation spell.

He gave Koonotori his very best Angry Eyes, and she quailed a bit, pausing.

"I will gladly carry Sanzo's baby for a bit, but birthing it myself is right out. I think you'll agree that this is Sanzo's test, and it is utterly up to him to make such decisions! I will not do this; give it to Gojyo, dammit!" Hakkai sighed as the first contraction passed, but knew that others would follow if Koonotori did not repeal the spell. "It's probably all his fault, anyway."

"How right you are," Koonotori said, corporeal again. She tapped her finger on her lower lip in thought, smiling. "Well, I suppose you've passed, then."

"What?" said Hakkai, justly confused.

"You've passed, sweetheart," the youkai said again, stepping closer to him. She ran one hand over his nine-month belly, and the heat slowly started to melt away. Hakkai half-closed his eyes, suddenly immeasurably weary. "I was just testing you, to see if you'd really do this for dear Genjo Sanzo. You're a very good friend, yanno. I wish I had more friends like you!"

"And since I passed," Hakkai queried tiredly, feeling spent. "What now?"

"I'm giving you lot a bit of leeway. Find Mr. Genjo, and you won't have this-"she stroked his stomach with a grin. "-to deal with. It'll be completely Sanzo's again."

"Good," Hakkai said, closing his eyes. "...in the morning, we will find him."

"Good," Koonotori repeated, misting away again. "I'm glad we see eye-to-eye like this. I'll be seeing you, Mr. Cho."

"I certainly hope not," Hakkai murmured before falling into a deep and smothering sleep. He only awoke because he heard Gojyo stirring, and the day beginning again.

A/N: The next chapter is coming, I swear. Blades of Ice, being as cool as she is (cool...ice...ha! It's a pun!) has agreed to help me with writing the next chapter, since I have realized I have 19 credits this term and several other projects to finish. Bah, humbug.

So if you want the next chapter, stop bothering me, and go bother Blades of Ice. pokes Blades Bother, bother, bother.