CHAPTER 3

The sound of running water caught Sanzo's attention. Scanning the area, still wary of an attack, he made his way towards it.

The stream wasn't very far away, and as he reached it, the first glint of sunlight was reflected off the dark waters. Looking up, he could make out the faintest of pink glows in the distant east. Dawn was breaking.

The water was a welcomed relief after the fight and a night of trekking. The light was good. All he needed to do was to find the road--

--after he got a rest, he decided. Carefully, he tested the injured arm. It still ached dully.

Gods, but he was tired. He wanted a bed. He wanted to flop down and not move. He wanted a roof over his head, an arm that didn't hurt, and a few blissful hours of oblivion.

He settled for a tree against his back and a cigarette instead. Ahead, the sun crept up into the sky.

*

Morning found Gojyo and Goku holding a snoring competition by the stream. Gojyo wasn't doing too badly -- his snores battered the leaves of the trees around them and echoed through all parts of the forest. Several trees shook and threatened to fall. But he couldn't beat Goku, whose snores rocked Hell and woke the dead.

One set of snores became muted as Gojyo turned over onto his side. He muttered something in his sleep that would have made any listeners blush, and flung out an arm.

His hand smacked into Goku's face.

"Ehhhhh... breakfast..." Goku muttered. His snoring didn't miss a beat; his eyes stayed firmly shut.

It was Gojyo who came groggily awake. "Why do I always wake up at the good parts?" he complained, rubbing his eyes. The stream gurgled happily onwards, and didn't answer him.

It was light enough to make out the silhouettes of the trees. Light enough to make a move. Standing, he stretched, yawned, and kicked Goku to wake him up. "Oy, Goku!"

"Itai..." Goku rubbed his head and sat up slowly. "Is it time to get up already?"

"Come on, saru. The faster we find Hakkai, the faster we get breakfast."

*

Hakkai, in the meantime, was eating breakfast and having his ankle bond up.

"Does it hurt?"

"No, no, it doesn't. Thank you, Houli-san," Hakkai said, sipping tea. He flexed the ankle experimentally. "As good as new."

"Try not to put your weight on it. Don't you go running anywhere," Houli, the man's wife, cautioned.

"Hai." He glanced out of the window. "It's starting to get brighter."

"Yes it is," his host, Hanto, said. "You're going in search of your friends?"

"Yes I am. Where's Hakuryuu?"

"I'll go with you. I know this part of the forest better than you do, and you'll need an extra set of hands and eyes if those youkai attack."

"But--"

"No arguing. Besides, I need to find out if those youkai have left the forest. I'd have gone, with or without you. And you aren't fighting anything with an ankle like that."

Hakkai, being Hakkai, didn't tell him that he'd just taken out about a dozen youkai earlier with a sprained ankle, in the dark and single-handedly. "I still think--"

"I said, no arguing," Hanto steam-rollered his unvoiced objection.

"Let's make a move, then," Hakkai said with a wry smile of defeat.

They followed the stream. It became evident after a while that it was useful to have a guide who knew the lay of the land. Especially a guide who could lead him back to the road..

But it wasn't easy, walking with a sprained ankle. Hakkai's smile disappeared, turned into a frown, and eventually became winces. He was just about to propose a stop when there was a click and the cold metal of a gun barrel met his head.

"San..Sanzo..? It's me. Hakkai."

"Chi." The gun moved away, and Sanzo stepped into his field of vision. "One can hear you coming from a mile away."

"It's the ankle," Hakkai replied, by way of apology.

"Who is this?" Sanzo asked, indicating his companion.

Hakkai opened his mouth--

--when the sudden surge of youki slammed into him.

He glanced over in alarm, and instead of the short, friendly man who'd been standing there, a youkai towered over him and Sanzo. Black haired and clawed and ruby-red eyes glistening in anticipation. The bushes exploded into movement, and as more of them surged into the area.

Unexpectedly, the youkai that had been Hanto turned to Hakkai. "Thanks for the directions, Hakkai-san," he said, grinning.

Sanzo's gun was in his hands and his glare darted around the clearing... and came back to fix on Hakkai.

"Bastard... You led them onto me..."

"I..." Shock obscured rational thought for a moment. He hadn't known.. but he should have. He could detect youkai, even in human form. But it took effort. He hadn't checked. He'd trusted implicitly..

He should have known that little old men didn't live alone in a houses in the middle of a forest...

Youkai surged past, obviously ignoring him in favor of the priest.

Five shots rang out, and the five youkai directly opposite them fell. Then Sanzo was gone, breaking out of the circle that was rapidly closing in on all sides.

"SANZO!" Hakkai yelled. He tried to give chase, but a stab of pain through his right foot stopped him. Too slow. The whole party had overtaken him and was disappearing into the forest ahead. He fired, taking out a few stragglers, and lost the rest as they vanished in pursuit of Sanzo.

"Hakuryuu, follow them!" he said desperately.

"Kyuu..." Hakuryuu voiced his relunctant assent and winged off.

*

Fuck.. he didn't raise a finger.. Sanzo swore as he reloaded. Snapped off a few shots over his shoulder and was rewarded by screams. This is the fourth attack in three days. Someone is definitely after us.

The whole pack of them had swarmed past Hakkai, totally ignoring him. Right in the lead was the one who'd been accompanying him.

Memory clicked. Hakkai's ki blast filling his vision with a yellow-white glow...

He winced and dumped more emptied shells on the ground.

Hakkai.

Youkai.

When...? Why...?

His feet pounded against the forest as he ran. He was still outpacing the pursuers, but he was running out of air. Still drained. Still hurting from Hakkai's attack.

Outnumbered, outgunned and betrayed. He clenched his teeth in sudden anger. He'd learnt to trust. Made that grave mistake somewhere along the line and couldn't even remember when he'd done so. Damn damn and damn.

A wave of sudden cold slammed into him.

Slammed into him and seeped.. no, raced through his entire body. Every muscle abruptly locked up. The next moment, he was falling, slamming hard into the ground. The gun left his fingers and skittered off. He couldn't get up. Nothing responded.

There were footsteps as his pursuers caught up. Then darkness closed in around his vision and cut him off from the world.

***

"I hear something!" Goku perked up.

Gojyo glanced around. "Where? And what's 'something'?"

"Footsteps. Someone running..." Goku's eyes went wide. "Youkai!"

By now, Gojyo could fill it. The tingling sense of youki that indicated youkai presence. It was faint, distant. He still couldn't hear the footsteps that Goku had mentioned.

"This way!" Goku indicated, setting off at a run.

"Oy, are you just going to chase them like that? Oy! Bakazaru! OY!"

They crashed through the undergrowth. Goku leapt over bushes and ducked to avoid branches as Gojyo hacked his way through with the scythe.

He espied movement out of the corner of his right eye. "Goku!" he yelled, diverting. Crashing through the trees, he raised the scythe to strike--

--and screeched to a halt as he came face to face with Hakkai.

"HAKKAI?!"

"GOJYO?!"

And together : "What are you doing here?"

Goku came running up. "They're going in the other-- Hakkai!"

"We're following youkai," Gojyo said curtly.

"They're after Sanzo," Hakkai said flatly. "I sprained my ankle. I couldn't keep up."

"I'll follow!" Goku volunteered, and raced off.

"What happened to you?" Gojyo demanded.

"Go. I'll catch up. Get them first. We can talk later."

There was something wrong with Hakkai, Gojyo knew. Something more wrong than the ankle. But it was true. They didn't have time to waste.

"Damnit, can't the monk look after himself?" Gojyo grumbled, and dashed off after Goku.

"OOF--!"

Gojyo sped round a bend and slammed into Goku. Both of them went down in a tangle.

"OY! Why did you stop, bakazaru!" Gojyo asked, furiously pushing Goku off and leaping to his feet.

Wordlessly, Goku held up something.

Silver glinted in the sunlight along the barrel of a Smith and Wesson revolver. Gojyo swore. "Sanzo's."

"He never drops his gun," Goku said quietly. "They.. they must have gotten him."

"Well, then we follow them, baka! No use standing around!"

"They're gone. They're too far away. We'll never catch them in time." Goku sounded angry.

"What choice do we have?" another voice called out. Hakkai appeared behind, limping as fast as his injury would allow. "We can't afford to stop. We'll track them down to where ever they're going.. when they stop, we'll catch up."

Goku nodded, but didn't move.

"What's the problem?" Gojyo demanded. "And stop giving me that 'I'm-so-depressed-that-I'm-going-to-jump-off-the-nearest-cliff-look'."

Goku shook his head furiously. "I failed him. I failed him again.."

Gojyo growled in frustration and clapped an arm around Goku's shoulders. "Baka. Wait till Sanzo's dead. Then you can say that all you want."

"I--"

"In the meantime, shut up about it."

"Lead the way, Goku," Hakkai said wearily.

*

They hit the road just minutes later. Hakkai knelt and scanned the ground. "They headed back east."

"Che! Couldn't they have done us a favor and gone in the direction that we were travelling in?" Gojyo muttered.

"Something's wrong," Goku, who'd been silent thus far, said suddenly. Hakkai glanced at him and gestured for him to continue. "No blood," Goku cocked his head. "I'm sure that Sanzo wouldn't have gone down without a fight."

Hakkai frowned slightly. "No blood? Are you certain?"

"Eh, that's true. Not a spot of blood on the ground where we found the gun," Gojyo added. "Course, that could always mean that they brained him good and proper with a blunt object."

"There were youkai corpses back the way we came.."

"But none where we found the gun," Goku pointed out.

"Kyuu..." a soft but familiar chirp interrupted them. Hakuryuu appeared, flying down the road to meet them.

"Hakuryuu! What happened?" Hakkai asked.

"Kyuuu..."

"He's hurt," Gojyo noted. Blood was seeping across one haunch, and the dragon meeped pitifully again.

"Hold on.." Hakkai laid him on the ground. Goku and Gojyo stood back a little give him space.

Gathering his ki, Hakkai channeled it with practiced ease into a gentle, healing stream. The green glow enveloped the wound, a long gash almost two inches across.

Flesh knitted. Slowly but surely, the ragged edges melded together and merged, leaving a healthy pink scar. Slowly, the glow faded, and Hakuryuu opened his ruby red eyes.

"Better now?" Hakkai asked.

"Kyuu!"

"You know, Hakkai," Gojyo said in a nonchalant kind of way. "I know that Hakuryuu's hurt and all that, but you've seen to him and he should be fine... now, it would be a lot faster if we could--"

"Pursue them on wheels instead of on foot?" Hakkai interrupted, raising an eyebrow.

"Exactly."

"Hakuryuu, are you up to it?"

By way of reply, Hakuryuu took to the air again, and glided to the middle of the road.

In a flash of colors, he grew, turning into a glowing white ball of light. The light took form and came gently to earth. Then it faded. A jeep stood where dragon had been.

"Well, let's go!" Goku leapt into the backseat, as Gojyo and Hakkai climbed in the front.

"Hold on," Hakkai warned. "We're going to break speed limits." He slammed his foot down on the accelerator, and they raced down the road in a cloud of dust.

***

"Look! Horse tracks!" Goku called out, pointing at the ground.

"Hoof marks," Gojyo corrected him.

Hakkai peered through the windscreen. "So it would appear. Seems that a group of horses milled around here for a while before moving off."

"Oy, don't slow down!" Gojyo cautioned him. "There's nothing much to see!"

"Mm hm," Hakkai replied.

"Think it's them? The youkai?" Goku asked.

"Quite certain," Hakkai told him. "This road isn't commonly used. In fact.."

He looked at the rough ground. "I think it hasn't been used."

"What do you mean?" Gojyo asked.

"Remember when we hit that split in the road?"

"Yeah. We took the older road, didn't we? The right fork."

"I'm hungry~!" Goku interjected from the backseat, leaning forward to place his elbows on the headrests. "We haven't had breakfast!"

"Shut up, Goku! We're trying to figure out something here!"

"Actually, Goku's right. Since you're free, you might as well have breakfast," Hakkai said.

"YAY!" Goku attempted to glomp Hakkai through the seat.

Jiipu swerved madly.

"Goku.. please don't cover my eyes..." Hakkai said worriedly.

"BAKAZARU!" Gojyo yelled, leaning over to push Goku backwards. He hit the gear instead.

"Waaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!"

Jiipu careened backwards before Hakkai slammed on the brakes. They went into a spin instead of stopping, Gojyo and Goku's yells harmonizing nicely with the screeching of tires.

"WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!!!"

In a cloud of dust, they screamed to a halt by the roadside. Hakkai sank over the steering wheel and breathed a quiet sigh of relief.

Then the storm broke.

"Bakazaru! It's all your fault! Don't distract the driver!" Gojyo yelled.

"Oh yeah?! It's your fault! If you hadn't leaned back, we wouldn't have gone into reverse!"

"If you hadn't grabbed Hakkai, I wouldn't have to--"

"If you hadn't--"

"Maa, maa," Hakkai flapped his hands. "Please get back into your seats.."

Since he didn't have the Sanzo Fan of Doom, neither side was inclined to listen to him. Gojyo was practically standing on the back of his seat, waving fists at Goku, who had one foot on the back of Hakkai's seat, and was yelling threats of his own.

"Hakuryuu, should I just step on the accelerator and send them flying?" Hakkai asked the one creature who was still listening to him.

"KYUU!" Hakuryuu squeaked a heated affirmation.

"Well..." Hakkai smiled in a worried sort of way and put his foot down again.

Jiipu leapt forward. Gojyo and Goku went flying backwards.

"Waaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!"

Goku landed hard on his rear on the backseat. Gojyo flopped forward and tumbled into the back with him.

"Itai yo!" both combatants protested.

"HAKKAI!" Gojyo roared. "I'm gonna get--"

He was cut off as Hakkai shoved a bento box into the backseat. "Breakfast, gentlemen?"

Goku leapt up. "MINE!"

Gojyo snatched it from Hakkai. "I get first dibs on it."

"Hakkai gave it to me!"

"Well, I have it!"

"Not for long!"

And so the fight went on.

Alone in front, Hakkai stopped smiling.

He was thankful for Goku's timely interruption. The more he thought about it, the more puzzled he was about the situation, and somehow, he didn't want to discuss it with Gojyo just yet.

The roads... that had been strange. The right road had definitely been older. But the track that they were driving on right now was brand new, as if it'd just been carved out a few days or a few weeks ago. The hook marks showed up clearly, which they wouldn't have, on an older road.

He frowned, his mind flying back to the fork in the road. He'd advocated the right fork, while..

..while Sanzo had advocated the left.

And they'd taken the right, straight into a youkai ambush.

Hakkai's grip on the steering wheel tightened.

Something was definitely going wrong here. Something was wrong with them.. something was wrong with him, that all his actions, all his choices, were going horribly amiss.

They'd gotten so used to youkai attacks that they didn't think about where the youkai came from. They'd simply assumed that this pack that was following them were either operating indepedently or under Kougaiji's command.

They're too numerous to be Kougaiji's, Hakkai thought. Which means they're probably a clan of their own. In which case, why would they be after Sanzo? Why would they..

It didn't make sense. It really didn't. This bunch of youkai were too well-equipped to be a simple bunch wandering around on their own. They were too big and too persistent to have been sent by Kougaiji, who, nowadays, either came himself or not at all. Their target was, evidently, Sanzo himself, but they were taking pains to .. to..

He was clutching the steering wheel so hard that his knuckles were turning white. "Oh no," he whispered. "Oh no..."

Someone was specifically targeting him. Someone was deliberately trying to shatter the trust between him and Sanzo. And whoever that someone was, he was succeeding brilliantly.

***

sf : Just for the record, Sanzo is not going to get hurt -_-. SERIOUS. Don't get your hopes up!
Muse : ...
Sf : Hm. The heat seems to have killed my Muse. *prod**prod*. River of reviews seems to be drying up as well. Eek. We're all doomedddddd. -_-.

***