YWMTBM Chapter 11
CHAPTER ELEVEN Broken Triangle
Branches cracked and leaves crunched off to their left. Gojyo's voice arrived just ahead of him.
"Dammit, Sanzo, where the hell are you? Hakkai says we're ready to go!"
Gojyo thrashed through the last of the undergrowth in his way just as Sanzo and Layla broke apart. All three stared at each other. Gojyo's shock gave way to cold resentment. Layla felt her heart constrict painfully at the sight of the anger and hurt in those crimson eyes.
"So," Gojyo said. "This is how it is."
Layla pulled free of Sanzo's embrace, wiping at the chocolate smeared around her lips. "Gojyo, please. I just--"
"Tell me one thing, Layla. What is it that keeps making you turn away from me?"
Before the naked pain in Gojyo's eyes and voice, Layla could think of nothing to say that wouldn't make it all so much worse.
"Leave her alone." Sanzo wiped the chocolate off his lips and licked at his fingers. That display wasn't lost on Gojyo.
"How can you possibly want him?" Gojyo jabbed one long forefinger at Sanzo. "He isn't supposed to want you, and he sure as hell isn't supposed to do anything about it!"
"Gojyo, please!" Layla made a helpless gesture with both hands, then buried her face in them and started to cry.
"Nice work, kappa," Sanzo said. "You made her cry again."
"Shut up, you pathetic excuse for a monk!" Gojyo snarled. "You're lucky I don't nail your hypocritical ass to that tree!"
"Will wonders never cease? The kappa knows a word like 'hypocritical.' But can he spell it?"
"Stop it!" Layla cried. "Stop it, both of you!"
Gojyo ran both hands back through the heavy weight of his long crimson hair. "Layla, just tell me. What is it about me that you cannot bring yourself to like?"
"Gojyo...." Layla held out one hand to him, trying to come up with the words that would answer him without causing him even more pain. "It's-it's the whole problem with the youkai. Everyone is so terrified now. Any hint of youkai is enough to scare us all half to death."
"Sorry." Gojyo shook his head. "Not getting the point."
"Try not to be any more dense than you already are, cockroach." Sanzo pushed away from the tree and put his arm around Layla. "Anybody with half a brain can take one look at you and know what you are. That's what she's talking about. You're a halfbreed. You're cursed."
Gojyo stood there, hands hanging at his sides. Those crimson eyes were wells of pain so deep Layla shuddered, afraid of falling into their depths and never coming up again.
"Layla?" That deep, strong, merry voice was broken now. "Is it true? Is that what's wrong?"
Fresh tears flooded Layla's eyes. "Forgive me, Gojyo. Please. Please. I was raised by people who had never met a man as good and sweet and kind and heroic as you are. If we had time, this would go away."
"But we don't." Gojyo's expression hardened. "So you found another shoulder to cry on, a human shoulder." He turned that scalding crimson glare on Sanzo. "Just your luck, hey priest? She needed somebody to save her from the big bad horny kappa. First you let her sleep in your room. Then you insisted on having her sleep in your tent." Those big hands tightened into fists. "Have you fucked her yet, Sanzo?
"Shut up!" Sanzo stepped forward, pushing Layla behind him. "Shut your filthy mouth, you youkai bastard!"
"You haven't, have you?" Gojyo sneered. "Figures. When it comes to using anything but your precious pistol, you really are nothing but a scared virgin."
"You stupid fucking cockroach. The one woman in all of our travels who wants me instead of you and you can't stand it, can you?"
"Y'know, the more I think about it, the more I'm guessing you can't be a virgin, not with that pretty face." Gojyo lit up a cigarette and blew two long, thin streams of smoke out his nostrils. "All those horny monks in that temple probably passed you around like the last cigarette in the pack."
With a bellow of pure rage Sanzo yanked his pistol out of his sleeve and leveled it at Gojyo. Layla screamed. She grabbed his arm and jerked it sideways, making his shot go wild.
"Stop it!" she shrieked. "Stop it stop it stop it stop it!"
"Shut up!" Sanzo snarled. He jerked free of her grip and shoved her out of reach, then turned to take aim at Gojyo again. "Kiss your insolent ass goodbye, you worthless fucking half-breed!"
Hakkai and Goku came running, arriving just in time to see Layla launch herself at Sanzo and tackle him around the waist, spoiling another shot as his gun hand jerked upward and the pistol fired into the treetops. Sanzo tore free of Layla's grasp. In the same motion he whirled around to strike Layla across the face with the back of his fist. The blow sent her staggering backward with enough force to slam her into the closest tree. Her eyes rolled up and she crumpled into a heap among the fallen leaves.
"Sanzo!" Hakkai shot him one disgusted glare before rushing to Layla's side.
"You prick!" Gojyo charged Sanzo, moving with such furious speed he knocked Sanzo's gun hand aside before Sanzo could take aim again. Gojyo seized Sanzo by the front of his robes and jerked him up into the air, leaving his feet dangling. "You absolute bastard! Look what you've done to Layla!"
"Put me down."
"I'll put you down, you fucking waste of breath. I'll put you down so hard you'll bounce!"
Something hit Gojyo across the back of the head with enough force to stun him. His grip on Sanzo loosened, letting Sanzo land on his feet. With one hand to the lump rising on his skull, Gojyo turned a wobbly circle to see Goku standing there, his nyoi-bo in hand.
"Back off, kappa!" Goku snapped. "You touch Sanzo again and I'll thrash your stupid halfbreed ass!"
"Wrong thing to say, monkey boy."
Gojyo buried one fist in the cloth of Goku's shirt, then snatched him up and sent him flying. He heard a familiar click beside his ear just before Sanzo jammed the muzzle of his pistol into his neck.
"You're dead, kappa. This time I mean it. This time I really am going to blow your fucking head off."
A scream tore through the air, going on and on, making all four men wince and duck. The pain in it, the anguish and the rage and the helplessness, made Gojyo curse and drop to his knees with his hands clapped over his ears.
"Sanzo!" Hakkai yelled. "Sanzo! Layla's having some kind of fit!"
Layla was on her knees, head hanging down, her long hair streaming loose and tangled with bits of leaves and twigs. The face she raised to Gojyo turned his blood to ice. Her eyes were still rolled back in her head, showing only the whites. Her mouth hung open. Out of it came that unearthly screeching. Sanzo stuffed his gun back into his sleeve and ran over to take her by the shoulders.
"Layla? Layla! Stop this! Get a grip on yourself!"
She went on howling, beating her fists in the dirt. Sanzo looked at Hakkai.
"Can't you do anything?"
Hakkai shook his head. "I'm afraid to knock her out without knowing more about why this is happening."
Gojyo pushed past Sanzo to kneel behind Layla and put his arms around her. He held her, rocking her, petting her wild hair.
"Help!" she screamed. "Help me! Daddy! Mama! Make it stop! Make it stop!"
"Hush now, baby," Gojyo crooned. "Don't you worry. We're here, we're warm and dry, everything's all right."
"No more...." Layla's eyelids flickered down. The howling subsided into broken wails of grief. Gojyo kept petting Layla and talking to her. At last Layla sagged back against Gojyo.
"Please," she said. "No more. Sell me if you like. I don't care! Just stop hurting each other!"
Gojyo looked at Hakkai, who shrugged.
"Layla," Gojyo said. "We don't want to sell you."
"I told you! My family will pay you a fortune! Just take me to them and don't-" Her voice broke. "--Don't hurt me. Please. Not like that!"
"Flashback," Sanzo said. "She thinks she's still with the bandits." He took a step toward her, one hand reaching out.
"Fuck off, Sanzo," Goyjo snarled. "You and your fucking dojo-trained reflexes! You hit her hard enough to knock her mind back into last week!"
"Then that makes me the one who's responsible for repairing the damage." Sanzo glanced back at Hakkai. "Get a blanket."
Hakkai fetched one from the gear piled next to Jeep. Sanzo shook it out and spread it on the ground beside Layla.
"Put her down, kappa."
"What are you going to do?"
"Just shut up and do as you're told! The longer she stays like this, the harder it will be to bring her back!"
Keeping his venomous glare on Sanzo, Gojyo gently herded Layla onto the blanket and pressed down on her shoulders until she laid back. Her fists were clenched and she was shaking all over. Sanzo stretched out beside Layla and lifted up one end of the sutra where it hung down over his shoulder, laying it across Layla's forehead. Sanzo lay back, closed his eyes, pressed his hands together, and began to chant.
Tiny dust devils whirled into being around them all, making the twigs and leaves jump and dance. Gojyo felt a tugging inside his mind, a shuffling as bad memories surfaced. His stepmother with the ax. Bad nights on the streets when he was so hungry he'd done things he never wanted to think about again. The night he got too drunk and picked the wrong girl to go home with, walking into an ambush that almost cost him his eyes. Gojyo looked over at Hakkai, who had already turned his back, his hands over his ears. Goku had backed away, sitting down with his knees drawn up against his chest and his arms locked around his knees, those big golden eyes clenched shut. Gojyo jumped up and backed away, out of the reach of the sutra's magic. The uproar in his mind settled down.
The tension drained out of Layla's body. Her breathing settled into a regular rhythm. Gojyo thought she might have been asleep, until she reached up to touch the sutra where it lay across her forehead, covering her eyes.
"It's all right, Sanzo-sama. I'm all right now."