Son Goku ☀ (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
rockthemonkey) wrote2018-04-12 11:13 am
rockthemonkey) wrote2018-04-12 11:13 am
Entry tags:
IC Inbox - ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
thefarshore
Hey, is it- ... yeah! Hi! I'm Son Goku and, uh, I guess I missed you calling or something? We can still talk, don't worry!
no subject
[He's frying eggs with mushrooms and greens; he looks up from the skillet to see Goku with the hat tugged down over his ears, and his own smile meets Goku's grin.
It does suit him, actually.]
Ah, that looks good on you!
no subject
[Oh, man, and that smells good. Goku darts into the kitchen and ducks around Hakkai to get a look at the eggs eagerly. Yes, coming back was definitely a good idea.]
Thanks! Did you get it? I didn't know you were at that place yesterday! [He was distracted. He's still distracted. There's food now, it's distracting.]
no subject
-- Yes, I stopped by. The rides aren't really my thing, but I picked up a few gifts for all of you.
[He adds, mildly curious:] You were there too?
no subject
[Anything to speed up how long it takes for the food to reach his mouth. Goku spins around and rushes off to the cupboard to gets plates.]
Mm, yeah, I was there for a little while! I had to find Ayu. [Calling her "-chan" seems a little weird and cutesy after a while. He's not a kid, after all. And now they're actually friends too.] I didn't do any of the rides or anythin' though.
no subject
[Hakkai looks up from the eggs in surprise, his chopsticks stilling above the skillet.]
Why were you looking for her?
[Not that she and Goku don't seem to get along reasonably well, but.
Of all the people he could have been looking for at the theme park, why her?]
no subject
[Goku has his back to Hakkai, rummaging through the cabinet and trying to decide how many plates they need. Chikusa, Ken and Gojyo too, right? Unless they ate already.]
And when I found her she was bein' hassled by some of those gross guys. [Ayakashi, he means Ayakashi. Goku pauses, holding a pile of plates a little tensely for a second.] ... So I gave her a name and everything.
no subject
She's a diligent and hard-working shinki.
[His gaze seeks the back of Goku's neck, looking for telltale splashes of blight.]
... And I'm sorry.
[There's no one else in the room; Gojyo's still asleep, and Ken had gone out with Chikusa before Goku arrived. Still, Hakkai lowers his voice. He'd rather not hint at this where any shinki can hear.]
She was my shinki when she first arrived. [He knows exactly, to every last brutal detail, what Goku must have experienced naming her.] Are you all right?
no subject
Yeah, he can't hear Gojyo or Ken running around and he feels like he would if they were here. He'll just get two plates out. Goku's neck is mostly hidden by his scarf, but there's a hint of blight creeping out from under it anyway.]
Don't worry, I'm okay. [He might have nightmares for a while, but he's seen fucked up shit before. That was especially brutal, of course, but he has to deal and so he will. He probably should have expected it, really.
Goku turns around to put the plates out and hesitates, biting his lip briefly.]
... It felt real. Like- like I was remembering something that actually happened.
[He hadn't expected that.]
no subject
Goku's claim to be okay doesn't sound entirely sincere. Still... he probably will be okay, in time. It's not the first terrible thing that he's seen, and it won't be the last. It is, though, a particularly terrible thing: the brutality of her fate, and the loneliness of it, her life ebbing away in the rain.
Luckily, he had already hated the rain, himself.
He turns back to the eggs, chopsticks prodding briefly at them -- yes, they're done, and will be overcooked if he leaves them any longer. He picks up the skillet, turning towards the table to serve out their portions as Goku sets the plates down.]
It's that way whenever you name a shinki. Sometimes, it might have been something that did really happen, but even the memories that aren't real feel as if they are.
no subject
Goku will be okay, even with the lonely image of Ayumu dying in the rain burnt into his brain for the rest of his life. Really, he will. Even if he's not right now, as shown by the fact that Hakkai doesn't even have to smack his hands away while he serves the food.]
... How do you tell? Which stuff is real and which isn't?
no subject
He does serve Goku a solid three-quarters of the egg mixture, though, on the grounds that food almost always makes things better -- at least, when it's things that can't be helped otherwise. It's hard to be sad and chew simultaneously.]
I'm afraid that unless you know already, you can't tell. With Gojyo, I know it didn't happen that way. Ayumu....
[He trails off. He'd spoken to Hijikata about her, and from the other man's responses, he suspects that all the brutality of the death he (and now Goku) saw is true.]
I don't know. Perhaps it's best, though, to act as if it is real, unless you know it's not.
no subject
[For Ayumu's sake, anyway. Neither of them can talk to her about it, so it really doesn't make a difference what they saw.
The food looks really good. Goku can't wait to eat it, but he still doesn't rush off with the plate once it's been served.]
... Hey, Hakkai, have you ever seen somethin' like that before? Not when you're naming a shinki, I mean, just like... You're doin' something and suddenly you see something and it's like it's something that happened a while ago?
[It's hard to put something into words when you barely understand what you're talking about.]
no subject
Hakkai doesn't elaborate on that subject, though; Goku's question distracts him from it, and he looks up from picking out two pair of chopsticks from the drawer. His gaze is probing.]
Like something you see feels familiar?
["That's just deja vu," he could say. "Everyone has it."
And yet... everyone does have it, from time to time, and Goku's standing there holding his plate without making the slightest move to eat. Whatever had been familiar to him, it's left a mark. And...
And Goku isn't a shinki, but he has lost memories, too.]
no subject
[The feeling had started as soon as he'd seen Nataku. It'd continued when he'd learned his name and when they'd seen him again. The vision he'd gotten then hadn't been anything like what he saw from Ayumu, but something about it felt similar all the same. He can't stop thinking about it.]
And then- and then when you're lookin' at them you see something that looks like it was from a long time ago. You know?
[This is a universal experience, right?]
no subject
When did this happen, Goku?
[Is this something that could be related to all of the memory magic here, or something... else?]
no subject
... When we were fightin' Nataku. But I got that familiar feeling the first time I saw him.
[He has a bite of his eggs, more for the sake of something to do with himself than out of any of his usual eagerness. Nataku is distracting.]
no subject
And yet...
Hakkai can't stop thinking of those three supposed gods he'd known for a short time. Lookalikes of himself, and of Gojyo, and of Sanzo, although Konzen had been taller, Kenren dark-haired and purple-eyed. Lookalikes who knew Goku, and who were willing to put their lives on the line to protect him in a heartbeat, even from himself.
Whatever the connection between those three and the three of them now, Goku had lived in the Heavens once. There can't have been only three gods who knew him.]
Sometimes, I've had that familiar feeling when I met someone for the first time, but I've never remembered anything specific to go with it.
[He's silent for a second.]
When you saw something from a long time ago, did it feel real? Like the things you saw when you named Ayumu?
no subject
[Goku trails off and makes a frustrated sound in the back of his throat. It's hard to talk about. Why is it hard to talk about? He starts shoveling eggs into his mouth as a distraction.]
... I dunno. It wasn't the same, but it felt a little similar too. [Helpful.] A bit more like a dream, I guess. It was just for a second.
no subject
It might be that you were really remembering something.
no subject
... Nataku didn't remember me. [Which hurts. It's weird that hurts when Goku doesn't remember Nataku either.] He didn't look at me like I was anything.
no subject
It's still hard not to be remembered by someone important, and Hakkai's wince at that is absolutely sincere.]
I don't know if he remembers very much.
[He hasn't had the chance to meet Nataku face to face, not yet, but he'd heard the descriptions. It had sounded as though the young war god behaved like some kind of automaton.
And it's hard to guess what might have happened to him, in the centuries in between the last time Goku was in heaven, and the War God's descent to Tougenkyo. Hakkai doesn't want to promise that he might remember, not when he doesn't know if that's even possible.]
I'm sorry.
no subject
[Not that Goku knows what's normal for Nataku. He doesn't even know if they were close, how important Nataku was to him, or on what terms they parted. He has a feeling, all the same.]
... I know there's nothin' I can do about it from here. I can't make myself remember, or talk to him, or figure out what's going on with him. But I- [Goku flexes his hand and looks at his palm, staring at if it'll help him see something that isn't there anymore.] ... That time, he was crying. I wanted to do something.
[He still wants to. It's frustrating, knowing there's nothing he can do right now.]
no subject
If not, you'd have noticed me missing, wouldn't you?
[His chopsticks tap the edge of his plate, quietly.]
When we get back, we will have the chance to do something.
[Nataku may be Goku's friend, or Goku's acquaintance, at least: if it's enough to partially overcome his amnesia, though, Hakkai thinks it may be friend. There's no doubt that he'll be involved in what they do, if they're continuing west. There will be the opportunity.]
no subject
... Yeah. [Goku thinks about it a little more, before shaking off his melancholy mood and smiling.] Yeah! You're right! Once we get back, we'll probably see him again! An' I can talk to him then!
[Surely once he gets the chance to just talk to Nataku, they can work things out. Even if they don't remember each other, they can still be friends. All the shinki here prove that. Just the thought cheers Goku up.]
Thanks, Hakkai!
no subject
[It probably won't be as easy as just talking to him... but then, if Goku knows him, despite his lost memories, perhaps Nataku, too, will be reminded with time.
If not, they'll have to work together. If it's impossible, at least, they'll try, and there's no point in worrying that it might be impossible in advance. He smiles, and nods to Goku's plate.]
Don't let your eggs get cold.
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)