Respice Finem by Elvaron

Index

Chapter 1: Prologue: Crimson Tide
Chapter 2: Chapter 1: Ebony Tide
Chapter 3: Chapter 2: Silver Inches
Chapter 4: Chapter 3: Emerald Horizon
Chapter 5: Chapter 4: White Lilies
Chapter 6: Epilogue: Gray Dawn

Chapter 1: Prologue: Crimson Tide

Respice Finem -- Look to the End.
by sf

Begun : September 13, 2002
Rating : PG-13
Warning : Angst, Swearing.
Dedicated to Lux -- For support and inspiration in dire times.

Notes : A Hakkai and Gojyo centric piece, written from character PoVs. Obscure references to obscure events. Know your canon before you read this. Attempting to do a Hakkai-Gojyo medium length fic (est - 5-6 chapters?) while remaining as in character and as close to canon as possible. Which means *glances at PG rating* -- don't get your hopes up. Written on a not-rainy angsty night. Depending on my mood, it may degenerate into a death fic. *pauses*. Yes, I'm morbid these days. Set along the journey, in a random inn in a random town, so Sanzo and Goku might make an appearance -- it's hard to write a fic without all of them.

Summary : A rainy night and too much sake sends Hakkai into a depression, with disastrous consequences.

It is raining again.

The clatter of the rain drops as they splatter across the rooftop and against the windowpane is not music to my ears. It is nothing as innocent as that. It has never been and will never be. Not since the day she died and nothing was left, not love, not life, not even the sound of the rain.

And the darkness closes in, like that night and the nights after that, dark and deep and soundless as a tomb, a tomb in which I was caught, and yet was still alive.

And the rain was falling again the night I met him... or was it the same night? One fails to remember; the line between dream and reality is too blurred for memory to distinguish. All I beheld was red, a crimson tide, blood misting over my vision to match the blood sweeping over my hands.

She said she loved my hands. A quaint thing to say; she will not love them now, blood-stained as they are.

As she would not love me now. Gonou at least was honest, but I live a lie like the smile I wear. A life that is a lie and a life that should not have been, save that he intervened and petitioned for clemency. For my sake. That was folly... folly to believe that I deserved a life after death, for such a life is exists only on borrowed time. The debt must be repaid one day.

Perhaps that time is running out. The shifting of droplets drums into my ears like the shifting of sands in the hourglass of the soul, that which counts heart beats, not seconds. And it wears thin, running out with each passing breath. Wearing thin, running out, closing the circle; the specters of the past returning to haunt the starless night.

It is impossible to escape from the past.

In the morning all things will be normal. The sun will shine down on a new day, washed clean by the rains of the night. By the morning, all will have passed, and the world and I will rest easy.

But there is something about this night that says that there will be no morning. A sunless day will dawn upon a dying world.

Something whispers in my heart that this night will be the last.

And as I toss and turn, seeking the blissful nothingness of sleep, the rain hammers upon the doorway of my soul, the executioner demanding entry. Not now, not yet. It is not time.

Not now, but soon.

Unlike him, I cannot escape my ghosts by drowning them in a bottle. I have tried, but while he has been long asleep, sleep continues to elude me. And the rain continues to fall.

Perhaps I will stand in the rain for a while, to hear its unmuted roar and to feel its chill caress upon my face. Then I will know that it is just rain, just water, insensitive to our pasts and ghosts and fears. Perhaps I will face this darkness instead of running from it; face it and conquer it forever, until nothing is left but the rainbow after the storm.

Perhaps.

***

The door creaks open.

No, not my door, but the one across the corridor. The room that he's sleeping in tonight, except that he obviously isn't sleeping. He's been edgy all day, and so has the monk... the cloudy sky and the smell of approaching rain must have something to do with it. It's going to be a real storm tonight.

The storm of the drops splatting against the rooftop mask the quiet tread of his footsteps. He's always quiet, so polite and so considerate, minding his own affairs and tiptoeing around the place so as not to tread on your personal space.

That's the reason why he's the only one who can room with the monk. Sanzo has a real problem with personal space.

But we have our own rooms tonight, which means that I don't have to put up with the monkey's snoring all night. Which is great. But I can't sleep. It's not the rain, not the lightning and the thunder that's starting to crash overhead, not even the sound of insomniac companions prowling the corridors at night.

There's just something fundamentally wrong with this night and this place. There's a dry, acrid sense of danger in the air that tickles the back of throat and annoys the crap out of you. Like smoke that's almost too faint to smell. But it's there, anyway, and it seeps into your nose and your clothes and stinks. It sure as hell isn't because someone's holding a barbeque outside my window tonight. And it isn't, damn you, because of the cigarettes. Cigarettes smell fine. Tonight just smells.. okay, feels bad.

I'm not going to fall asleep anytime soon.

Maybe I should talk to him. Play a round of poker... or a few. A few beers and a few smokes. A few jokes to pass the time. And then this bitch of a storm will end and the static or whatever that's making all of us so edgy will die down, and we can all go back to sleep. Yeah, right.

Ah shit, I should go after him, anyway. Better than sitting Sleepless in Some-place-whose-name-I-can't-remember and staring at the rain. Spooked by the weather. How inane.

Shit, my door creaks too. Just what you need for a B-grade horror movie - creepy storms, rickety inns, and fucking creaky doors. Even the floorboards creak. Perrrr-fect.

He's not in the common room, but the door's slightly ajar and the rain's sleeting in. He can't have gone out, can he? Standing in the rain's going to give you pneumonia, you nut.

Yeah, like the time I stood in the rain after she died. Stood in the rain and waited for it to wash everything away -- the rain, the scars, the pain. It didn't work, of course. Nothing but time can get rid of those, and sometimes, time's just plain sucky as a Stain-Remover-for-Bad-Memories. I figure it's the same for that green eyed dude. He's never taken kindly to rain.

Damn, he really is standing in the rain. Not on the porch, where there's at least a roof, but in the rain. Yo, Hakkai, something's wrong? You wanna talk about it? Or at least drown it behind a few good bottles of sake?

Oh wait, he's already tried that, hasn't he? The kid and I came back this evening to find several crates worth of empty bottles on the table, and the monk on the verge of passing out. But Hakkai doesn't get drunk.

Instead, Hakkai goes and stands in the rain. Freaking brilliant, smart guy.

Oh great. Now he's walking off. Let's see... footing's too slippery for me to run after him, rain's too loud for me to yell at him. So what do I do?

Follow, of course.

Bah.

***

Perhaps... perhaps I should not have come out.

Here there is no barrier between the darkness and I, no shield from the lashing rain, no protection from it's unfettered fury. It is not just water after all; it is a powerful force, an angry one, and the wind howls in tandom to the roar of the thunder.

But... what matter? Here I am in my element, a beast in the dark. I do not fear the rain. I do not fear the darkness. I do not fear the threat that lurks ahead. I walk, patient, towards the dark line of trees beyond.

Ahead, I can sense them, lurking in the shadows and waiting to pounce. The rain cannot mask their presence, the darkness cannot mask the sharp tinge of youki that permeates towards me. Unmistakable.

They shift, uneasy, fearing the one that approaches. Undecided in their course. For theirs is the way of the coward; to strike while the lights are out and when they are least expected. A direct confrontation is not what they seek.

But they will not run. To run is to admit defeat, and they will not back down. Rather, they will charge, each towards his death, believing that they can defeat me.

I halt my footsteps. I will not advance into their territory, but stand just within it, a clear challenge. It is I who chooses the battlefield, and I choose this place, this borderline between the darkness and the rain.

***

There are youkai in the woods. Damn you, Hakkai, don't you sense them? You're walking straight towards them!

"STOP!"

He can't hear me, of course. Not with the wind screeching past our ears, with the damn rain hammering and pouring, and with the distance between us.

But he stops anyway. Pausing. Waiting. Oh shit. He knows they're there. And he's just waiting for them to attack him. Hakkai, Hakkai, just what do you think you're doing?!

There's something terribly wrong with him.

Perhaps Hakkai does get drunk.

I quicken my paces, trying to bridge the distance between us.

***
TBC
***

Back to index

Chapter 2: Chapter 1: Ebony Tide

After consideration, I've decided to switch back to the usual third person PoV, interspersed as necessary by first person PoVs.
Warnings : Angst, violence, swearing

Dedicated to Lux -- Whom, by requesting it, catalyzed the inspiration for the whole fic.

RESPICE FINEM
Chapter 1 - Ebony Sky

They came at once; having made up their minds, there was no reason to pause. Pausing would have meant fear, and to these youkai, crazed by bloodlust and the Minus Wave, there was no such thing as fear.

Hakkai stood his ground as they appeared, dark shapes materializing from the trees. The thunder rang through his ears, obscuring sound. Just like the night, that night that he'd reached the castle. The night when one life had ended. And the other had not yet begun.

She'd died that night, in the same cold rain as this night. Died and left nothing for him. Not killed, that was the irony; no, she had died by her own hand, by the blade he'd borne.

In a way he'd killed her, killed her as surely as the youkai who'd taken her from him. Killed her as surely as that cold steel that had wrenched life with a single, sharp thrust. He'd been unforgivably careless; he had not been there when the youkai had come. He had not protected her. And in rescuing her, he had failed again, come too late to stop the atriocities that had happened. He had failed utterly.

The rain knew; it whispered past his ears, murmuring again those dark secrets of the yesteryear that he'd locked away in his heart. It told him again of the past and its sorrows, of the grief that could not be quenched, of the wounds that could not be healed, and most of all, of the guilt that could not be forgotten.

Fighting was a reflex action, a habit, something as mechanical and thoughtless as breathing. The first youkai fell to punch to the jaw, a punch fueled by hidden youkai strength and perhaps something more. The second fell to a blade, pillaged from the corpse of his first companion. The third and fourth and fifth succumbed to balls of ki, those concentrated blasts of energy that rended a body into its component atoms.

Fighting was a reflex action, a habit, as his mind rode through other tracks and retraced the paths of memory. It was as if he was back there, returning back across three years in the blink of an eye and in the embrace of a cold thunderstorm. They said that a thousand had died by his hand that time; he could not recall. He remembered only the blood, splashing across his vision as one youkai after another fell, victim to the unfeeling steel of his blade.

And another, and another.

They had cursed him, screamed at him, but he could not hear their cries. He had been deafened, listening to the voice in his heart, blinded, seeing only the darkness and her face before him.

And another.

He felt nothing now. They had taken from him that which was the most precious, and there was nothing left. If the carnage was unjustified, he cared not. It did not matter. There was blood on his hands already. A little more was of no consequence.

But it seemed that there was a great multitude of enemies, appearing from the trees and leaping down to attack him. So many that all he saw was a blur of motion. Light glowed between his finger tips again another wave went down, but there were too many of them. They were forcing him back.

One of them slipped past his defences, and he thought, through the numbness that had engulfed him, that there might have been a tingle of pain where the claws ripped through flesh. Then there was nothing but another youkai corpse flying backwards.

Thought was going. He could no longer recall what he had been thinking about. All he saw was the blackness, the blackness of his heart and soul and the blackness that was the void, sucked dry by anguish and sorrow until all there was left was a vortex, spinning towards infinity.

He whirled, and another youkai fell. And another.

***

Hakkai was fighting like he was demented. There had to be a least a dozen youkai attacking him at any one time, and he warded them off singlehandedly. Gojyo paused for breath, hands clenched around the shaft of his shaku jou as the bloody scene unfolded in front of him.

Hakkai was a fool to think that he could handle all of them alone though. No matter how fast he was, no matter how powerful he was, there was always the chance--

--Gojyo winced as a youkai attacked from behind, claws tearing a bloody streak across Hakkai's back. Then there was a flash of light and the youkai's head dissolved into a bloody mess.

"Idiot," he whispered.

There was something so wrong with Hakkai that he could not place it. Hakkai would never, normally, have wandered out to fend off the enemy himself. He was not, for the wont of a better word, that crazy. He would have summoned assistance, even at the expense of waking the Grand High and Mighty Sanzo-sama from his sleep.

Yet he was there, attempting to eliminate a full-scale youkai assault on his own.

And it was terrifying. All of them fought, and fought well. But when Hakkai fought seriously, he rivalled even Goku in his power. He was a full youkai, after all, and the legacy of that race ran through his veins -- the strength, the speed, the power. As a human, he'd massacred a thousand youkai and half a village, alone. As a youkai, his powers enhanced, he was nothing short of horrifying in battle.

Yet, even so...

The Minus Wave lent a madness to their enemies, but with that madness came strength, where all caution was thrown to the winds and all that existed was the hunt and all that mattered was the kill. These youkai were vagabonds, accustomed to years of survival in a hostile world, strengthened by experience and now by magic. Even if he got to Hakkai's side in time, there was no saying that they would be able to hold all of them off. With the monk and the monkey, perhaps...

His steps faltered, as he glanced back towards the compound of the inn, tempted to summon Sanzo and Goku. But there was no time left. When he had roused them and returned, Hakkai would be dead. There was no choice; they would have to face this threat alone. Perhaps Sanzo or Goku would sense the enemy and come running; one could always hope for miracles.

Gojyo grimaced. When this was over, he would have a long talk with Hakkai about Saving the World Alone.

As he glanced back towards the fight, preparing to sprint the last fifty meters or so, he saw Hakkai jerk back as another youkai's claws found their mark. His breath caught, his heart stopped, as Hakkai faltered and staggered unsteadily.

Then it happened, so fast that all he saw was a flick of a wrist and a sudden glint of silver.

And Hakkai's youryoku limiters, nestling on his ear, fell away and hit the ground.

***

Pain washed across him as another youkai scored home. He was too slow, too weak. Limited. Unable to exercise his full potential. But that could be resolved. For he could not afford to die, could not afford to fail, could not afford to lose.

His hand flew to the limiters.

***

The sudden surge in youki roused him from sleep.

Sanzo was out of bed in an instant, the revolver in his hand and the click of the safety catch flicking off echoing through the room.

When no attack materialized, he realized that the emanation came from without. Somewhere, in the rain and the darkness, the enemy was attacking again. Swearing softly at yet another interrupted night, he shrugged his robes on and stalked towards the door.

He was not truly drunk -- he had not consumed enough sake to inebriate. Getting sloshed was certain death, here in the heart of youkai territory, where the only thing that stood between them and madness was a single wooden fence. Vigilance was their only friend.

He had left most of the drinking to Hakkai. Hakkai, quieter than usual and bereft of that annoyingly fake smile that he always wore, had sat in silence and consumed glass after glass of alcohol. But Hakkai's alcohol tolerance was phenomenal, so he had merely nursed his own drink and made no comment.

It was this place, this miserable village that was the last outpost, the last sanctuary before a massive stretch of youkai territory. Here they lived in the shadow of death and the talons of fear, constantly glancing over their shoulders and wondering if the next day would be the last. Their fear seeped into the walls and soaked through the ground, becoming almost palpable. It grated on his nerves, it attacked his subconscious, making him irritable and jumpy and paranoid.

And then there was the rain, which was always a trigger for bad memories and no friend of theirs. Youkai attacked under the cover of nightfall, and rain, rain that extinguished the fires of the watch beacons and the light of stars, only lent them a cloak in which to hide themselves.

He had felt it creeping up on him. Hakkai had felt it too, Hakkai--

--was not in his room.

Sanzo stared at the empty bed, brows knitted in a moment of confusion. Spinning, he glanced across the corridor--

--Gojyo's door was ajar as well.

They were gone. Perhaps they had sensed the attack and gone to confront... no, they would not have. They would have sounded the alert. It would not do to face down a mad pack of youkai with your companions blissfully asleep and unaware of the danger. There was no evidence of a struggle, so they had left of their own accord. Their reasons were beyond him and fell into the realm of postulation, and there was no time for guesswork. He could simply have to deal with the threat on his own.

Goku had better be in his room.

TBC 

Back to index

Chapter 3: Chapter 2: Silver Inches

A/N : No, this is not going to become a shounen ai fic -- I never write romance and I don't intend to start. I write about hope and the lack thereof, I write about life and relationships, relationships that have nothing to do with love, but more with friendship. Because love is short-lived, but friendships may last forever.

And having stood on both sides of the divide, I appreciate that some fans do not enjoy yaoi in any form, even a platonic relationship, and therefore strive for a middle ground, much as Saiyuki itself does. I present the facts as they stand in the canon; the rest, gentle-reader, I leave to you.

Warnings : Violence, Angst, Swearing

Dedicated to Lux, for countless insights into Saiyuki and many interesting comments.

RESPICE FINEM

Chapter 2 - Silver Inches
Who can tell me if we have Heaven,
Who can say the way it should be.

"Huh? No, I don't know where they went..." Goku sat up, rubbing sleep out of his eyes. "But I ..." Abruptly, he sat up, traces of alarm fleeting across his face. "Youki. Outside."

Sanzo glanced towards the window. The rain practically obscured all visibility. If there were youkai outside--

--a high pitched whistle cut through his thoughts. Gliding in on silent wings, Hakkai's little dragon, Hakuryuu, appeared in the doorway.

Goku sprang to his feet and raced towards the dragon. "Where's Hakkai?" The little dragon went nowhere without its master. That Hakuryuu was here and Hakkai was not... could mean nothing but trouble.

Hakuryuu glanced significantly towards the doorway of the inn, and chirped urgently.

Sanzo shot him a hard look. "Hakkai's outside?"

"Kyuu!"

Hakkai was outside. There had been a sudden peak in youki. Gojyo was gone. Hakuryuu was worried. The nagging suspicion that had been at the back of his mind solidified into icy worry. Swearing venomously under his breath, Sanzo stalked towards the door.

***

Light illuminated the night sky. It reflected off raindrops, refracted, split by those tiny prisms into a kaleidoscope of color. Death could be beautiful in its own way.

Gojyo plunged through the shimmering rain to reach his companion's side, fending off youkai that were fleeing in terror from this new apparition in their midst, fending off youkai that stood their ground and fought, fending off stray ki blasts that scorched past him, hot enough to ionize the very air.

"Hakkai!"

The youkai that was Hakkai did not hear him -- it seemed that, with nothing to restrain his full youkai form, Hakkai had passed beyond his reach into madness.

Indeed, there was nothing but madness in those emerald eyes now, half shadowed by his damp hair. There was madness in that feral look, there was a madness in the very way he struck -- not just to kill but to rend and maim, tearing youkai from limb to limb in showers of blood.

The silver rain had been stained red.

He could only watch in a combination of shock and awe as Hakkai dispatched the last youkai with merciless efficiency, tearing out the jugular in one sweep. He did not even require his ki attacks. The deadly claws that tipped his fingers, each three inches in length, proved more than sufficient for the task at hand. The incredible strength that lay in muscles of steel overcame obstacles such as a bone and cartilage with terrifying ease.

He was not smiling, Gojyo noted with a sick sense of irony. The usual, placid smile that graced Hakkai's face had not been corrupted into a dreadful parody in his bloodlust, and Gojyo was privately glad for that. Hakkai as a youkai was as wild as Goku, but his was a chilly dementia, a cold, calculating one. Hakkai had more control than Goku, and Gojyo could only hope that that control would prove sufficient.

He found the limiters, lying in a pool of blood, their silver surface scarred with red streaks.

And as Hakkai turned, he fought down the sense of dread and terror that welled up in his throat, and held out the limiters.

Cloud shifted, and for a moment, moonlight struck them, bathing them in a gentle white glow.

And Hakkai delicately extended clawed fingers to pluck them from Gojyo's hand.

Then the clouds moved again, chased by the wind, and the moonlight was severed.

Hope died in a flicker of sudden foreboding.

Hakkai spasmed, a wave of agony and indecision washing across his face. He cried out, an inhuman howl that tore through the air and drove chills into Gojyo's very bones. Then he struck, a blow that raised fountains of blood and sent Gojyo flying backwards in a spray of crimson.

The limiters fell from his hand in midflight, tumbled into the darkness... and were lost.

It burned. The pain burned like flames torching through the bloody gashes across his chest. It consumed, a raging inferno, unstoppable and uncontrollable--

--With an effort, Gojyo terminated that train of thought. He heard the dull thump of Hakkai's footsteps across the watery ground, and cursed himself for being a fool. He had thought, nay, he had hoped that Hakkai would listen to reason, that he would have taken the easy course...

...and he almost had. Almost. There was a flicker of pain at the sheer closeness of it all, a pain that had nothing physical to it, but cut as deeply as his wounds.

So close.

So far.

Hakkai stood over him, his face enshadowed. Any expression he might have worn was hidden from Gojyo.

There was no way he could overpower Hakkai. There was no way he would win in a fight between them both. So he resorted to the last course of action at his disposal.

"Killing me won't solve anything."

Claws, raised to strike, paused.

Gojyo struggled into a sitting position, one hand clasped over his injuries. He could feel the blood seeping through his fingers, trailing down his jacket, lost in the rain that trickled through his hair and down his face. "I'm on your side, remember?"

Hakkai's hand dropped to his side and he cocked his head, evidently considering the words. Then, in a voice as deep and dark as the night that surrounded them, he spoke. "She is dead. There are no sides. There is no hope. There is no life."

Gojyo swore silently. He had hoped that it would not come to this -- Hakkai had lost himself in memories of the past, had torn open emotional wounds that they had all thought had healed, had returned to another rainy night and another life.

"There is life," he retorted, desperately searching for words. "There's plenty of life. We found peace, of a sort, remember? You and me and Sanzo and Goku, journeying west together. If you want death, there's plenty of that. We don't need any more."

"She is dead." Anger and grief whispered through those words, words of a man who had lost himself in his guilt.

"She's been dead for three years," Gojyo told him gently. "But we learn to put the past behind and move on. Grief passes; new joys can be found." He cursed the clumsiness, for he lacked the eloquence that Sanzo had. Lacked the knowledge of how to deal with circumstances like this, with a grief-stricken and guilt-crazed youkai standing over him. He was simply, completely, at a loss at how to handle the situation.

"Hakkai..."

Something in that name sparked a reaction. Perhaps it was recognition, perhaps it was denial, perhaps both. But far from inspiring a return to sanity, it achieved the opposite effect.

Hakkai shuddered, obviously fighting some inner battle... and losing. There was a tortured whisper of air, a word that could have been 'No', rapidly drowned by a snarl of sheer rage.

And Gojyo flung out his shaku jou in a desperate attempt to forestall the blow.

Hakkai side-stepped the flat blade and dodged the mobile one, and leapt back, preparing to charge in for the kill.

Gojyo muttered obscenities. Leaning heavily on his staff, he forced himself to his feet, reeling from the pain. He hadn't expected to perish here, in this god-forsaken place, between the sun-scorched deserts and the dank forests that never saw the light. He had not expected to die at the hands of the man he called his best friend... this cheerful, smiling man, the one who held the strongest purchase on logic and sensibility.

He did not know why Hakkai had removed his limiters. As he could not understand this sudden transformation, this sudden regression. He knew that the rain was to blame, but they had survived rainy nights before. He could not comprehend why this night would be different...

...And why this night would have to be their last. This not so special night, drenched by rain and blood.

For, with the limiters lost, one of them would have to perish in this encounter.

Sha Gojyo did not fear death. It was a reality that all of them faced each day. It was a reality he had faced as a child, faced and embraced and accepted, that fateful day that his mother had tried to kill him. He had wished for death then, if his own death could only bring joy to the one he loved the most.

But it had not been him who had been appointed to die that day.

And it was only irony, only cruel fate, that he should die at the hands of another he cared for, of the one he had saved, 3 years ago, on a night as cold and deep as this. Destiny was unforgiving, it seemed.

It was with regret that he stared into the eyes of his companion, those green orbs that had once harbored smiles. They were barely visible now, and they were black with the pain that clouded them.

Regret that this was the end.

Regret that it had to end this way.

Gojyo hefted his staff. I'm sorry, old friend. Sorry that it had to come to this.

Then Hakkai charged.

And stopped short as the night was punctuated by a bullet streaking past both of them. Stopped short as a streak of brown leapt into the space that lay between them, a golden limiter glinting and a red staff held at the ready. Stopped short as Goku, taking a defensive stance, glared him down and yelled, "What the hell do you think you're doing, baka?"

A mixture of surprise and relief swept through Gojyo. Perhaps, just perhaps, there was some hope after all...

There was a quiet footstep as Sanzo materialized behind him, the Smith and Wesson held his left hand, a bullet missing from the magazine. The monk wasted no time with preamble. "Where are the limiters?"

Gojyo shook his head slowly and glanced towards the darkness that lay under the trees.

Sanzo growled under his breath. "Fools. Both of you."

***
TBC
***

Back to index

Chapter 4: Chapter 3: Emerald Horizon

RESPICE FINEM
Chapter 3 - Emerald Horizon

There was the darkness.

There was always the darkness, and he had been a fool not to realize that it had been there all along. It had followed him, through brighter years, careful to hide, careful to stay out of sight. He had only fooled himself into believing that it was gone when it was really out of sight for the moment. Lurking in the little crevices of his heart, as much a part of him as the smile he wore.

He killed all that he touched, he tainted all that he touched, he took life and gave none back.

Half a village. One thousand youkai. Kanan.

He could not afford to touch any more life, he could not afford to drag them down into the darkness with him. He would remedy that, he would remove his taint from the world once and for all, and the ghosts of the past would finally be laid to rest.

He had prolonged this life for far too long.

No one saw it coming; no one saw it coming or they would have tried to stop it. No one saw anything but the splash of blood across the shifting silver screen of rain, no one heard anything but the strangled curse, no one felt anything but the breath of air and the sudden chill that struck their bones.

The Smith and Wesson barked once, and fell to the ground.

"SANZO!"

Goku leapt to his companion's side, a mere meter and a hundred eternities too far to save the one who mattered the most to him. He caught the priest as he collapsed to the floor, his back a bloodied mess and blood leaking from where the claws had run straight through internal organs to emerge on the other side.

Sheer panic seized him, fear of a kind far too familiar to him these day. That fear paralyzed him, froze time to a moment, as he watched the blood fall in a bloody drizzle to splash across the cracked ground. The earth thirsted, it soaked up blood and water in equal abandon. The earth did not discrimate between the two, not in this dusty, barren, lifeless region, bordered by the mountains and the desert. This was a place of desperation and struggle, fears and shadows, madness and death. Life had thrived here, once, and moved on long since.

He missed Gojyo screaming his name, he missed the attack from behind, he missed everything that happened next, until the world exploded in pain, and he was flying, flying, flying....

The ground rushed up to meet him, and his vision supernovaed into a brilliant, blinding kaleidoscope of pain and color and overwhelming brightness. Then darkness embraced him, more gently and more welcomed, drawing him away from the light.

***

Gojyo's heart missed a beat when Sanzo fell, and wellnigh stopped when Goku, Goku, missed Hakkai's attack. The kid was light enough to go flying, blood tracing an arc across the sky.

The stench of blood was everywhere. A sickening miasma that clawed down the nostrils and caught in the windpipe.

"HAKKAI!" The cry echoed through the trees, a cry of despair and fury and disbelief. Gojyo glared around, trying to spot the youkai, his knuckles white around his staff. "Hakkai! Get out here, you idiot!"

There was a shimmer of movement, and Hakkai was in front of him, the green eyes slitted like a cat, the pupils opening on twin wells of darkness and insanity.

"Damn you! Get your act together!" Gojyo railed, sparing no thought on wondering why Hakkai was not attacking him. "I know you can! You're not an idiot like the ape!"

Rain dripped off the strands of Hakkai's fringe, poured off the shoulder length hair, as the wind sprang up, whipping them into a frenzy. Gojyo shuddered... by all the gods, it was cold tonight.

"You will be dead soon." A whisper from the entity across from him, an emotionless observation.

"Yeah, and so will you." Gojyo's eyes sifted through the gloom to spot the tear in Hakkai's shoulder where Sanzo's bullet had punched through.

There was no reply to that, not that he'd expected one. Just the rising howl of the wind through the trees, driving the rain into their eyes and obscuring their vision.

Ah, damnit, Gojyo thought to himself. He could not win against Hakkai, so he would have to find those limiters, preferably before all of them perished. Keeping a watchful eye on Hakkai, who, damn him, was still standing there, he took a cautious step in the direction of the fallen limiters. They had to be here somewhere, the undergrowth was too sparse to provide ample cover...

One step, and Hakkai remained motionless, the emerald eyes tracking him.

Another step, and there was still no response.

A third, and, as if he'd cut some hidden tripwire, Hakkai stirred and vanished from sight in a splash of water. Gojyo flung up his staff out of sheer, blind reflex, and was rewarded by the clang of claws against metal. Hakkai sprang back, cat-like, falling into a crouch. There was a breathless moment of inaction, then he attacked once more. Again Gojyo countered, and heard a hiss of frustration, then of pain, as he swung the blade around to scour a wound across his opponent's arm.

Abruptly, the strain on injured muscles hit him, along with the growing weakness from a loss of blood that he'd be feeling for the past few minutes. His knees gave out, oh, such a bad, bad time to do so, and Hakkai was there and--

--and jerked backwards as the bullet slammed into his back, a low growl of pain escaping.

Trust the monk to be too tough to die, Gojyo thought crazily, as Hakkai spun, abandoning one target for the newer threat. He took a painful breath, trying to regain his feet and his balance.

"Distract him, damn kappa!" Sanzo's voice cut through the storm to reach his ringing ears.

"I'm trying," Gojyo mumbled, but the world seemed to be caught on a rough sea, going up and down and up and down, and vision was racing through a dark tunnel centered around a single pinprick of light.

I'm trying.

But his body had different ideas, it seemed.

Sanzo muttered an oath under his breath as Gojyo lost the fight against consciousness. He was in worse than bad shape, coughing up blood and choking on it, barely capable of staying on his own two feet without the support of the tree behind. If the kappa had just stayed still and bought him enough time...

But once again, it was up to him to save the world again. Oh joy.

"Come, damn idiot," he snarled at Hakkai, holding the gun unsteadily between shaking hands.

And Hakkai struck, far too fast for his wearied and dulled reflexes to cope with. For a solid, shaking moment, he saw the silvered and bloodied claws raised to strike, knowing with a solid certainty that this was his last breath...

When another shape, moving even faster, blurred into view to superimpose itself cross the fearsome visage of Hakkai's youkai form...

Claws met the solid metal staff of Nyoibou as Goku intervened. "Hakkai! Pull yourself together!" he cried, a desperate plea to Hakkai's roving sanity. A roll of thunder crashed on his words, and the wind whipped them away, to be lost in the night and the rainfall.

Goku glanced backwards to check on his companion, and nearly missed the counterstrike from Hakkai. He flung up an arm to parry, earning three long gashes. Instinct clouded judgement for a moment, and he struck back. The force of the blow, augmented by his weapon, caught Hakkai straight on and sent him crashing back into the darkness. Goku gasped, and rushed forward, dread seeping into his conscience... Oh my god, what if I've killed him... oh my god...

Fears were allayed by a different kind of dread when Hakkai pushed himself to his feet, madness burning so intensely through his eyes that it was almost palpable. It was a look, a blank, crazed look that he had seen before, but always on other youkai, those who had succumbed to the Minus Wave. He had never expected or wished to see it on the face of someone he called a friend.

"Keep him there, Goku!" a familiar voice rasped from behind, the words torn by coughing and wheezing.

"Sanz--"

"Pay attention, you fool!"

The warning came just in time for Goku to evade another attack by Hakkai. As the youkai passed him, overextending himself in the strike, Goku whirled and aimed a sound blow across the back of his head, a blow that missed completely as he slipped on the treacherously slick ground.

There was a burning sensation as claws connecting with the back of his neck, poised to drive themselves through the base of the skull into the brain--

--when the world came alive with a flash of light and the vision of weaving lengths of sutra. The shimmering coils swept past him, latching onto Hakkai. Goku rolled out of the way and glanced back.

Sanzo stood some distance away, leaning heavily against a tree, his eyes shadowed by his hair, plastered flat by the rain.

"Restore his limiter, Sanzo," Gojyo's voice sounded from somewhere off to the side.

"Don't... know... if it'll work." The reply was hesistant and strained. Sanzo glanced up, lips moving silently in a chant. Vaguely, Goku was aware of Gojyo moving forward, one hand clasped over the wound that Hakkai had rent. He struggled to his feet, conscious of the flaring pain along his arm and his back, as Sanzo limped forward to press his palm against Hakkai's forehead.

A silver glow seeped through his fingers, a glow that grew to form a solid band that coalesced around Hakkai's forehead. Hakkai jerked back in shock as the new limiter slipped into place, a circlet of silver to match Goku's golden one. The sutras relinquished their hold, returning to their places on Sanzo's shoulders.

And the light faded. For a long moment, there was silence and stillness. The rain had thinned to a drizzle, and the wind was gone.

Then the pointed ears shrank, returning to their normal, human semblance. The fangs shimmered and shortened back to bluntness, as the matted hair returned to its usual length. Hakkai gasped and fell abruptly to his knees, even as Gojyo rushed to his side.

Goku was the first to break the silence. "It worked, Sanzo!"

The priest did not reply, his eyes narrowed in contemplation.

"Ah, this doesn't suit you, Hakkai. We'll have to find those old limiters, won't we?" Gojyo said, placing a companionable arm around Hakkai's shoulder. "At least you don't fall asleep like the bakazaru does. Comeon, let's get you back to civilization."

Hakkai glanced up. His eyes had returned to their usual shade of green, the pupils widened to roundness. The monocle had been lost too, presumably during the fight. But the look in those eyes caught Gojyo by surprise. It was not the calm and intelligent gaze that he was accustomed to; it was far from the sparkling, smiling look that Hakkai usually wore, it was a look he'd never seen, throughout their three years of friendship.

It was the look of someone completely, and utterly lost.

"Hakkai... Hakkai, what's wrong?"

Hesistantly, the Hakkai raised a hand to the newly installed limiter, fingers tracing its length in exploration, leaving bloody streaks across the freshly formed surface.

"It's a limiter," Sanzo said flatly.

Hakkai's gaze turned slowly to meet his, and there was another long, tense silence, broken only by the splash of drops from the leaves to the ground. Even the light drizzle had let up, and now there was only the damp and the chilling cold that sank straight to the bones.

"It's okay," Goku injected. "We'll all survive. It's not that bad."

Hakkai's eyes never left Sanzo.

"Don't tear yourself up in guilt over it," Gojyo added, disturbed by this uncharacteristic behavior of his best friend. "Come on, we're all losing blood here."

"Why..." the word tumbled out, as lost as its speaker.

"Why what?" Goku asked. "We--" the rest of the sentence was cut off as Sanzo waved him to silence.

"Why... did you do this?" Hakkai asked, his fingers resting on the limiter. "Why?" His voice was gaining strength.

"What the hell do you mean 'why'?" Sanzo growled, blood seeping out of the corner of his mouth. He swiped it away with one finger. "This is why."

Hakkai shoved Gojyo's arm away and staggered to his feet. "Why did you have to come after me?" his voice echoed into the night, sharp and accusing and furious. "Why did you stop me?" Each word streaked through the air like a bullet, hard and deadly. Hakkai's companions were silent in the face of this ultimatum, the expressions on their faces ranging from shock to disbelief to unreadable.

Hakkai surged forward, to catch Sanzo by the collar of his robe. Sanzo shoved his hand away and staggered backwards, and Goku tensed. "Because we had to, you bastard," the priest snarled, suppressing a coughing fit by sheer willpower.

Hakkai glanced down at his bloodstained hands and flexed his fingers, staring in horror at the blood and gore caught under the nails.

"Why didn't you just let me die?!"