Colored Heat

Hakuryuu was tired and so they walked.

How many other people in the world, Sanzo fumed silently, had to deal with a vehicle they could use only so long as it didn’t get sleepy? 

They were walking west, directly into the afternoon sun.  He was hot, sun glare had given him a headache, his feet hurt and he was thirsty as hell.  Worst of all, he was also almost out of cigarettes.  He didn’t think he would run into any general stores out here in Bright Canyon.  They didn’t even know where they would spend the night, yet.  He doubted he would find any place to buy the nicotine his body was beginning to crave.  He was sucking on the sad little cold butt of a cigarette he had lit over an hour ago.  He reached inside his robe and shook the box of cigarettes, then took his hand back out.  He had to make them last.

“I’m hungry,” Goku whined.  Sanzo had to clench his fists to keep from smacking the kid upside the head.  He hated to lose his temper, but around Goku, Sanzo lost it at least five times a day.  I used to be such a calm person, Sanzo lamented.  Then came the day he had set Goku free from that strange cave prison and his blood pressure had been steadily on the rise ever since.  Every time Goku opened up his mouth, Sanzo braced himself for the heart attack he knew was coming.  Damn kid.

“You’re always hungry.  Shut your mouth.”

“I’m hungry and thirsty, too,” Goku complained, ignoring Gojyo.  “Hungry, hungry, thirsty, thirsty.”

“Then keep your mouth shut,” Gojyo snapped.  He had pulled his hair back a while ago to combat the heat, but he was waving at the back of his neck, now, and Sanzo could see a sheen of sweat over his skin.  Sanzo was grimly glad that he wasn’t the only one that was affected by the dry heat.

“It’s true, Goku,” Hakkai said.  “Every time you open your mouth in this heat, you lose moisture.  If you don’t want to feel worse, you should keep your mouth closed.  Otherwise,” he added with his usual sly smile, “you could talk yourself to death.”

“Hmph,” Goku snorted, but he did shut up.  Gojyo, with his antagonistic relationship with Goku, could tell the kid that if he shut his mouth it would rain sweet wine and hail fried dumplings, and Goku would keep whining just to spite him.  In fact, Hakkai with his easy demeanor and calm air was the only one of them that could control Goku without violence.

That pissed Sanzo off, too.  Admittedly, he was pissed at just about everything at that moment, going into nicotine withdrawal and sweating buckets under his robe, but Hakkai really got his hackles up. 

It was just that he was so calm, so goddamn frustratingly calm.  Nothing ever fazed him; it was like he didn’t even live in the same world as the rest of them.  Most of the time Sanzo was grateful for Hakkai’s unruffled composure, but sometimes it got to him.  Those cool, jade-green eyes were knowing, and the half smile on his lips was shaped with almost condescending amusement; at least, that’s how Sanzo saw it.  Goddammit, Hakkai wasn’t even sweating.

“Shit,” Sanzo muttered under his breath, and fished out a cigarette and his lighter.  It would do nothing to make him cooler or less thirsty, but it might turn his thoughts to a less murderous vein.  Goku’s whining, Gojyo’s sharp tongue and Hakkai’s peaceful presence had Sanzo’s nerves wound so tight he was about to snap.  Sanzo knew he was quick to anger and let his rage get away with him all too often, but he still hated to lose his temper.

And dammit, why had he been saddled with this sorry lot, anyway?  Yeah, he was supposed to serve the gods of the Celestial Heavens with unquestioning loyalty and unending patience, blah blah, but honestly, how was a man supposed to maintain any kind of priestly balance around those three?  Couldn’t the Holy Floating Heads have chosen anyone else to accompany Sanzo on this journey?  Someone like, oh, maybe, three mutes?  Or three nice, obedient monks who would bow and be agreeable and speak only when spoken to…

But then, monks always seemed to have an odd sort of problem with Sanzo’s habits.  For some reason, smoking, drinking, and gambling caused unease in the monks at the temple where Sanzo made his home.  A great feeling of dissatisfaction filled and burned Sanzo’s throat like bile.  His forehead itched, right where the red sutra sat like a dot of blood on his flesh, declaring his purity and the depth of his service to the lord Buddha.  A little crimson mark of hypocrisy.  What did Buddha think of His chosen priest’s smoking and drinking beer while cheating at Mahjongg?  Not that cheating helped him win, Hakkai was almost unbeatable at the game—his face was unreadable; blank, white parchment pierced by the knowing green eyes.

Sanzo wondered just how much those jade eyes saw and understood.  Did they see, for example, beneath the façade that Sanzo erected to shield the storm within?  The hot discomfort of his yearning for Hakkai, the stiff ache and its painful penetration into his guts.  Looking at Hakkai just then, Sanzo could feel it, the pain and the nausea, and the dizziness.  Really, it was like being sick, Sanzo would be glad to be rid of it…except there was the wanting, too.  A weakness in his arms and an empty feeling in his chest, and a warm pressure behind his eyes that he hadn’t felt since he had been the weeping little Koryuu, the River Rat.

Sanzo felt uneasy and realized Gojyo’s eyes were locked on Sanzo.  Sanzo blushed and ripped his gaze from Hakkai’s face, taking a vicious drag on his cigarette.

“Sanzo, can I have a cigarette?” Goku asked then, looking up at him with those gigantic eyes.

“What, are you kidding me?” Sanzo said, taking out his fan and shaking it threateningly at the little monkey.  “What the hell would you do with a cigarette?  You can’t eat it, you know.”

Goku shrugged and said nothing, and Sanzo opened the fan and waved it in front of his face.  Stupid little monkey.  What the hell would make him want a cigarette?

Gojyo still watched Sanzo with his hot gaze.  If Hakkai was oblivious to Sanzo’s uncomfortable and embarrassing state in regard to the calm, green-eyed beauty, Gojyo was most surely not.  Sanzo knew that Hakkai and Gojyo were fucking.  It was pretty obvious, though he was pretty certain Goku didn’t know and hoped that the kid remained unaware.  It would probably scar the kid or something.  Sanzo felt some disgusting emotion like protectiveness toward Goku whenever he saw Hakkai and Gojyo moving together in the blackness of the dead hours after midnight when the rest of the world slept.  All but Sanzo, who lay in the burning darkness, trying not to breathe, trying not to die.

They walked in the desert, Gojyo watching Sanzo and Sanzo watching Hakkai and Hakkai watching the wavering horizon.  Sanzo finished his cigarette and flicked it at a rock.  Merciful Goddess, the heat was unbearable.