FanFiction.Net - unleash your imagination
| FanFiction.Net - unleash your imagination |
|
| Home Just In Communities Forums Beta Readers Dictionary Search | Login Register Extras |
Ok guys, this is the end. It's going to close with the same point of view that it opened with, so that Kyomitsu gets to have the last word. I tried to have them all be in character and to wrap up any loose ends that I hadn’t up until now. Hopefully this meets your expectations. Thank you for reading this and for giving me such nice reviews! Maybe something will come after this, like another story...
The scared little maid had found Kyomitsu and the former general as they creped through the halls, searching for the monk. She sobbed as she admitted to Kyomitsu that she had let slip that she’d seen them in the hallways to another maid in the presence of Lee Taing. He had been the one to send the guards after them.
Following her rather tearful directions lead them back to the hallway that the separation had occurred in. A little snooping on Sha Gojyo’s part had unearthed a single locked doorway covered in quite a few dents. Voices came from beyond it. Whatever guards had been trying to brake down the door with brute force had given up in favor of finding a spare key. Sha Gojyo scoffed a their stupidity as he picked the lock.
Kyomitsu almost wished he left the door closed. The last thing he had ever wanted to do was find Lee Taing twitching and moaning on the floor in agony as Sanzo and Kanzeon Bosatsu looked down on him as if he were a worm. The shock of the whole thing was only seconded by the revelation that Lee Taing had been poisoning Crown Prince Nataku with the same poison he had tried to kill Son Goku with.
He had always known that Lee Taing was a power hungry fool, but he had never thought the man was suicidal. Everyone knew that Kanzeon Bosatsu had taken a personal interest in Crown Prince Nataku, and everyone knew that pissing that particular goddess off was a death sentence.
It seemed her nephew took a similar stand on dealing with the unfortunate souls that touched what was his.
From where he stood now the general could clearly see the monk and the Great Sage. The boy looked terrible, pail, weak and shaky, but oddly happy as he staired up at Genjo Sanzo. Utter adoration shone in his eyes even as they began to close. A small smile tugged at his lips.
“Sanzo. Sanzo, I never told you, I have a present for you,” the boy said dreamily. His voice was so raw from screaming and soft from exhaustion that even the god’s superior hearing nearly missed the comment.
“You idiot, why the hell are you telling me that now?” Genjo Sanzo asked in exasperation. But in affection as well.
The boy continued to smile as he went limp and fell forward into the arms of his frustrated defender. Knocked off balance by the dead weight, Genjo Sanzo fell unceremoniously onto his back side. For a moment no one moved. Genjo Sanzo stared down at the tousled head of Son Goku, his eyes screaming the relief that his voice would not. The monk’s shoulders seemed to slacken, the tension that had been in them from the moment he and Kyomitsu met finally running away. And then Sha Gojyo bursting out into uproarious laughter destroyed any atmosphere there might have been.
Kyomitsu didn’t see anything that was particularly funny.
The former general clapped him on the shoulder, shaking his head at the apparent insanity of the world, and then went to join his companions. Cho Hakkai, who for some reason was limping slightly, met him half way and they knelt beside the monk and the boy as one. Their little dragon left the safety of a small bush it had undoubtedly taken refuge in and landed on Cho Hakkai’s shoulder. The man leaned his face into the creature’s caress even as he brushed the hair away from Son Goku’s forehead.
Somehow, Kyomitsu felt as if he were intruding upon sacred ground just by standing near. No one had said as much, in fact Sha Gojyo had even alluded to the fact that he might not hate his replacement (even if he didn’t seem to remember he had been replaced) as much as he thought he would. There was just such a… a chemistry surrounding the four of them that he felt as if the mere thought of taking any of them to Heaven and leaving one behind was criminal.
Sizo came to stand before his superior, giving a sharp bow of respect. “Sir, we encountered hostility, lead by Ginji. They were… put down by Son Goku,” he said respectfully.
Kyomitsu raised an eyebrow at the sergeant’s choice of wording. He would have to have Sizo make a full report when they returned to Heaven. Somehow, he didn’t think now was the time or the place.
“Were there any casualties on our side?” he asked instead. There didn’t seem to be, but it was always better to ask then it was to assume.
Sano shook his head. “Negative, Sir. Son Goku took the bulk of the fight upon himself and he seems fine,” the tall god added, raising an eye brow speculatively back at the boy and his friends.
Kyomitsu shook his head and sighed. “Yes, he does, doesn’t he?”
He watched as the demon prince and the two women that were with him joined the group already inspecting Son Goku. The smallest of the three, the girl called Lirin who had been refreshingly disrespectful in regards to the Jade Emperor, practically threw herself on Genjo Sanzo and ruffled his hair as if he were a small child.
“You did it, baldy!” she chirped.
Genjo Sanzo looked torn between hitting her and ignoring the fact that she existed.
“Thank you.”
Kyomitsu turned away from the scene before him to find himself face to face with the tall demon that guarded the prince. He tried not to look as incredulous as he felt when he asked, “What?”
The demon grinned, reveling pointed teeth and a pleasant smile. “Thank you. For saving the kid. None of them would have admitted it, but even Kou would have been sad if he died.”
Kyomitsu fought the urge to shrug the whole thing away. He hadn’t done much to fix things, especially when one considered the fact that he was the reason Lee Taing even thought Son Goku would be competition. “I did nothing. I’m sure, had the situation been reversed, you all would have done the same.”
The tall demon nodded. His eyes narrowed ever so slightly before he asked, “ Is it true? Are you the one that imprisoned Kou’s mother?”
Kyomitsu almost winced. He knew the demon prince had looked familiar. He had met Prince Kougaiji on his first real mission, acting as support and guard for Crown Prince Nataku. The demoness had not been an intended target. The whole thing could have been handled better and it still made Kyomitsu slightly guilty in retrospect.
“Yes, and for what it’s worth, I am sorry for that.”
The large demon considered him for a long minuet. What ever he was searching for he seemed to have found because he gave a small nod. “Can she be revived?” he asked carefully.
Kyomitsu was silent for a long moment. Sizo glanced between them uncertainly before the general nodded. It would be treason to say anything other then that, even confirming that the imprisonment wasn’t permanent was almost crossing the line. The demon understood, apparently, because he grinned again and turned to look over his charge and the others.
Kyomitsu rather liked him.
“They never would have survived in Heaven,” someone said simply, right in Kyomitsu’s ear.
General, Sargent and demon all jumped in surprise. A sound suspiciously like a snicker escaped Kanzeon Bosatsu’s lips as she took a step away from Kyomitsu. Her attendant stood behind her, looking thoroughly harassed and altogether uncomfortable with his mistress being on earth. The Merciful Goddess smirked at the grip the demon had on his sword. She winked at him, which resulted in the demon looking slightly confused.
“Merciful Goddess,” Sizo said immediately, dropping to one knee in equal parts respect and fear. The other solders followed suit. Kyomitsu began to kneel was well before the goddess waved her hand dismissively.
“No need to stand on formality here, gentlemen. I ashore you that I wont,” she said easily. She then ignored the solders altogether in favor of watching her nephew and those gathered around him and his charge.
“They never would have survived in Heaven,” she repeated. “You realize that now too, don’t you, General.”
Somehow it wasn’t really a question. She said it like fact, and Kyomitsu had to accept it as fact as well. All the same his nod was hesitant.
“All that boy ever wanted, from the very beginning, was his sun. All Konzen ever wanted was that boy. Kenren and Tenpu were the same. They were never pulled into the monotony of Heaven. And they just felt too much,” the goddess said almost sadly.
“What does that mean?” the demon asked somewhat defensively. Something Kanzeon Bosatsu said had not sat right with him.
Slowly the goddess turned to lock eyes on the demon. Though she was a good foot shorter, Kanzeon Bosatsu still seemed to tower over him and while her eyes were not cold they were not warm either. There was an air of complete seriousness about her now.
“Have you ever heard of a god loving? We are immortal. We don’t need to feel things the way you mortals do. You grow utterly attached so quickly. It’s part of your beauty and your frailty, you feel so completely because you have such a fleeting time to experience the things around you. But with immortals it’s different. We have all the time we could ever want. If we felt that strongly all of our existence we would go mad. Heaven is eternity; nothing is fleeting except our interests.”
She turned to look back at Genjo Sanzo, indicating the whole group with a wave of her arm. “It’s better that they be mortal, here and now, where they can feel with their whole hearts. They tried that once long ago, in Heaven, and it got them nowhere.”
The demon looked slightly startled by this explanation. He took a small step away from the goddess, who smirked, all seriousness forgotten in the face of her amusement. She waved her attendant away when he tried to whisper to her and sauntered away to join her nephew.
“Relax,” she called to the poor man. “What’s the worst that could happen?”
Her attendant gave a long suffering moan. “The list is endless when you’re involved,” he muttered.
Kyomitsu smirked. He agreed with the man completely, and in the interest of peace for all concerned he was willing to be the one that dragged the goddess away. In as polite and respectful a way as he could.
“So, I thought you would like to know that Lee Taing is going to wish he had never heard of you by the end of the night,” she said pleasantly when she drew level with her nephew.
Genjo Sanzo was still sitting on the ground, with Goku in his lap. He somehow managed to turn a normally intimate jester into something only marginally bearable.
“Good, because if I ever see that guy again I really will kill him,” the monk said simply, but with utter confidence.
“Why are there so many gods showing up? Is this a party of something?” Lirin whispered loudly. Her brother shrugged helplessly.
Dokugokuji gave Kyomitsu a wink before he clapped a hand down on the demon prince’s shoulder. A flicker of red eyes was all it took for the two to exchange some silent conversation. The prince nodded in a distracted manner before turning back to the others. Kyomitsu watched as a smile graced the demon’s lips for the first time. It was directed at Son Goku, but somehow everyone else seemed included in the look.
“Keep an eye on him, Sanzo. I expect a decent fight the next time we see you,” Kougaiji informed him easily.
Genjo Sanzo rolled his eyes and gave a snort. But his grip on Son Goku grew slightly more secure. Kyomitsu noted the action and tried not to find the whole thing rather anticlimactic. After all, everyone present seemed to have expected this outcome all along. Was he the only one that feared for the boy’s life and didn’t think it would make a difference?
Mortals really did have an amazing capability for faith.
The demons in their midst all gave polite goodbyes before following their prince as he turned and walked away. Lirin hung back for just a moment to shout, “Next time, I’m taking the sutra, Baldy!” before rushing to catch up with her brother.
Kanzeon Bosatsu actually laughed at the look of raw annoyance on her nephew’s face. “You four have a mission to be getting back to, don’t you?” the goddess asked pleasantly.
Sha Gojyo grinned wolfishly. “Yeah, maybe.”
Cho Hakkai nodded with equal pleasantness. “That does seem to be the theme.”
Genjo Sanzo rolled his eyes. “When this stupid monkey wakes up we’re going west.”
Son Goku snored contentedly in the monk’s arms.