thenearshore | I held my nose, I closed my eyes... [CLOSED]

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I held my nose, I closed my eyes... [CLOSED]

Who: Sanzo and Gojyo
What: Fighting ayakashi! ...Sort of.
When: Forward-dated to the 4th of April, game time
Where: An industrial park on the waterfront, Near Shore
Warnings: Will update

He had to learn how to use his new godly powers. There wasn't any way around it -- not only was it his job as a god to use his powers to fight ayakashi (and if he wanted to stay in heaven he was pretty sure he needed to start doing his damn job), but until he learned how to control his abilities he was a danger to everyone around him.

He didn't dare use his powers on another god again, and using it against a shinki (even against his own creepy Banri-shaped hole in the world) didn't feel right. That left mortals or ayakashi, which wasn't any kind of a decision at all.

Which was why Gojyo was on the waterfront that afternoon, trolling the mostly-empty spaces for any signs of glowy red-purple eyeball creatures. He found some, too -- a whole nest of little salamander-looking things, chilling in the shady interior of a rusted out shipping crate.

He summoned his staff (stupid looking thing, he mentally grumbled, side-eying the ridiculous pine cone at the tip), and held it at the ready, aimed at the oblivious ayakashi. Maybe if he blasted them from further away they'd turn on each other, instead of on him? It was worth a try.

With a deep breath, Gojyo triggered that feeling in the back of his mind that made his power work. The pine cone glowed a soft pink (...wait, pink?!), and the ayakashi began to move.

Apparently gods could get blighted when they touched ayakashi, just like shinki could. Apparently gods could also not do a goddamn thing to hurt those ayakashi, other than running like big dumb cowards. His arms and hands were already covered in blight by the time he realized this and took off running, but the little bastards wanted more. Much more. Why they wanted to rub on him like cats instead of biting him he didn't know, and didn't much care. It still fucking hurt when they touched him, and so, out of options, he ran.

Now what was he supposed to do?

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Of all things that he might have expected out here on the Near Shore, crossing paths with a fleeing cockroach god wasn't one of them.

"Line." The word was spoken in a sharp, commanding tone. The demand that brought into being a bright shimmering wall to cut off Gojyo's pursuers. Several of the strange ayakashi crashed into it and were repelled in the short time it took for Sanzo to take stock of the situation. The barrier would buy a moment to take stock.

Not much time, though, that much was obvious. Strangely single-minded, they were skittering to get around his boundary. His skin was crawling, has been since before the idiot bolted right in his path.

He had been out here for his own reasons, but those are both suddenly on the back burner and looking like a serious miscalculation. There were a number of questions running through his head, but one came right on out, "What the hell did you stir up, you idiot?"

He never thought he'd be so happy to see Sanzo in his entire goddamn life.

"Ayakashi," he gasped out (as though Sanzo couldn't see them), taking full advantage of the moment's reprieve with his hands on his knees and head down, gulping down deep lungfuls of air. "Tried t'blast 'em. Didn't work."

The ayakashi were pouring around Sanzo's barrier, scrabbling their little glowing legs against the asphalt in their rush to get to Gojyo -- and to Sanzo, too, it seemed, now that he'd shown himself to the horde. Gojyo's visible skin was a patchwork of blight -- one little fucker had even rubbed against the side of his face where his blackened eye was almost healed, purpling the skin there anew. "I can't hurt 'em." He straightened up, already moving again. "We've got to run."

Sanzo bit down the urge to point out that the god could just teleport out of there. Hell, it'd solve a lot to get out. Words hissed from one of the ayakashi that he's half sure was something about 'want' and 'taste' as he dodged a lunge.

"Damn drunk-" He's not getting left behind. If they fled successfully, it would leave a roiling, writhing mass of ayakashi looking for victims. "You can't kill them without a shinki."

He probably shouldn't cast aspersions. He'd come out here to figure out the magic available to shinki, and he'd done it without his god. Why that led him here was just bad luck.

If he could just teleport out of there without the potential for ending up inside another tree he fucking would have, okay? But that wasn't an option. The ayakashi were riled and it was his fault so he had to come up with a solution, preferably without getting blighted any further.

"I know that now!" Gojyo retorted, kicking hard at a pair of ayakashi that were trying to attach themselves to his leg. One went flying but the other clung tightly -- he could feel the blight burning even through his pants as the little creature bounced up and down.

Wait, what.

He wasn't seeing what he thought he was seeing. He couldn't be.

"You're a shinki, right?" He shook his leg again, but the critter held fast. "Get 'em off me!"

It showed clearly on Sanzo's face when it registered just what was happening there. This was the worst possible situation, clearly.

His uncanny aim carried over to his ability to implement borderlines, and the creature is peeled off with a flash of light. Yet it can't kill, and he makes an entirely undignified curse that was not a yelp (it absolutely was) as he narrowly dodged a larger one with an alarmingly lolling tongue.

"Wash your hands." He doesn't bother explaining himself, chucking a bottle of water stashed somewhere in his robes at him. Another dodge, another boundary line, and he has to hope Gojyo's on the ball. (They were both dead. Dead by pervert ayakashi because of a pervert god. How was this his fate?) The idea that came to mind wasn't a good one, and like hell he was getting blighted when he made him go through with it. "We're going to fight."

Sanzo did something that zapped this little fucker (literally) off Gojyo's leg, but there wasn't time to be relieved. There were a dozen more of them coming -- more than a dozen, twice that maybe, and coming, Gojyo was horrified to realize, was absolutely the issue here.

"Wash my...?" He caught the bottle on instinct, shooting Sanzo a confused, are-you-fucking-with-me look. But they didn't have time for games; he wrenched the cap off the bottle and dumped the whole thing over his hands, dropping the empty when the water was all gone and rubbing his hands together frantically. Why Sanzo was carrying a bottle of holy water Gojyo neither knew nor cared. His blight was gone -- from his hands at least -- and that's all that mattered.

"Okay, they're clean!" Could he punch the ayakashi with his holy-wet hands? Surely the water's protection wouldn't last long enough to take them all out, though. What was Sanzo planning?

This was going to be humiliating, and right now he can't afford to care. It might not be the most reasonable thing, but he pulled his revolver and it's not because he was planning on trying to shoot the ayakashi.

"Give me a name and take these bastards down." Somehow, aiming at Gojyo made it slightly easier to get those words out. He has control here. It's not some sort of submission if he's forcing the issue. In moments, they'd be hopelessly swarmed by those disgusting creatures as his borderlines bought them less and less time.

For a brief moment, the corner of his mouth quirks up before falling flat again. It's a little too easy to feel at home in absurd life or death situations. "Now!"

Sanzo was pointing the damn gun at him. Sanzo was pointing the gun at him and shouting things about names and absolutely nothing made sense when there were glowing salamanders fucking acid into your shins.

"Genjyo!" he shouted, twisting away from the ayakashi trying to wriggle its way up the back of his shirt. "Genjyo Sanzo, your fucking name is Gen..." And then, in a flash, he remembered. Name your shinki, name them something-ki, and then they'd fight for you.

He held out his hand toward Sanzo. "I name you Gen-ki!"

In a flash, everything went very strange. It's disorienting to be there and not, almost disembodied as the spirit of a weapon. Or something like one, anyway. In hand, Gojyo now had an oversized white fan. Edged in green, black Sanskrit scrawled along it, it wasn't nearly as imposing as, say, a gun.

If this was how he really died, Sanzo decided, he didn't even care anymore. Fuck it.

"That's the name you pick?" He'll go out bitching, at least.

In a flash, everything went very strange. Sanzo vanished, only he was still there, as the fan in Gojyo's hand, his presence unmistakable.

Worse were the visions. Scattered, blurry, half-focused like in a dream, but still clear enough for somebody who knew all the players. Engokuki, Kougaiji's fiery summon creature, and then pain. Pain, and flashes of faces. Goku's. Hakkai's. His own.

But that wasn't possible.

He could worry about that later, though, because the ayakashi weren't waiting for shit to make sense. Sanzo was a solid weight in his palm (which wasn't ever a thought he thought he'd ever think!), and he knew what he had to do.

"Don't argue with your god, Genki!" he proclaimed, pulling his arm back to strike. "Makai..." And he swung, as hard as he could. "Tenjou!"

It came so naturally, for all that he despised having his fate literally in someone else's hands. Being at Gojyo's command was galling-- but he wasn't, not entirely. If he'd lost all sense of self-preservation, he knows he could fight this.

He also knows innately that he can smack the hell out of these ayakashi.

"Like hell you're my god!" It's an extension of his will, he's sure, not Gojyo's that lashes out. With a sound like rustling parchment, he stretches out. A multitude of scrolls burst forth, seeking the alarmingly intent ayakashi. One of the scroll-like tendrils just so happened to whip around and smack a certain loudmouth in the head on its way to grab up a salamander trying to leap on him. Each one snatched up was crushed, the writhing creatures shattering into points of light.

"Ow!" Gojyo complained, but he was too thrilled at the effect to be truly upset at Sanzo's little slap. It worked. The scroll -- the fan -- whatever it (he) was, it reached out, zapping all the horny little lizard things just like the sutra had done back when they were alive.

Gojyo could get used to power like this.

A flicker of purple-red movement caught at the corner of his eye and he turned -- "To the left!" -- flicking fan-Sanzo in a downward slash at the remaining creatures. Well, most of the remaining creatures. There were still a few that had been at the back of the pack, charging at them, gibbering excitedly. "Oi, Sanzo, you got another one in you?"

"Keep going until they're dead." He wasn't about to brook argument. Just how many times he could pull this off might be in question, but it'll be enough to kill these bastards at least. His revulsion lent itself well to a certain single-minded focus to see to that.

And there's something distinctly satisfying about the way the perverted spirits shatter under the pressure that he can exert. He'd wrought serious damage and it's almost (almost, but not exactly) enjoyable.

Keep going until they're dead was something Gojyo could get behind! He swung fan-Sanzo again, pointing him right at the oncoming lizard things, when something occured to him.

"Hey, how are you talking?" He didn't have a mouth... or a throat... or lungs. "How are you breathing?" He was dead and all, but still.

Edited (tiiiiiime teeeeeense) 2016-07-04 03:55 (UTC)

"What kind of stupid question- gah!" He learned quickly that he shouldn't let his attention wander while fighting, making a sound of disgust as one of the creepy little bastards wriggled against his odd scripture-self in rhythmic fashion. It hissed sibilant nonsense about something smelling good, and that was more than enough to have to deal with. Being resistant to blight didn't make up for how utterly disconcerting that is, or that odd under-layer of panic that welled up briefly before he could crush the ayakashi.

"Focus, idiot cockroach! Don't distract me!"

But then he's lashed out like some particularly wrathful deity, and focus isn't nearly as important as overwhelming force.

Oh whoops. "Okay okay, sorry!" he laughed, unable to help it. The nasty little things burned everywhere they touched him, but Sanzo didn't seem to be accumulating any blight. Which meant that the lizard humping his folds was just funny.

Shifting his stance wider and sturdier, Gojyo gripped fan-Sanzo with both hands and held him steady, targeting one hump-lizard after another in quick, steady succession. Five more to go. Four more. Three. Two.

Finally.

He didn't drop his ready stance, though, just in case. "I think that's all of them," he said, scanning the surrounding buildings. "You see any more?"

Freaky hump-lizards were very serious business to Sanzo, no matter whether he could be blighted or not. It wasn't long before they were eliminated, and Sanzo stayed quiet a moment.

"No," he answered finally, no sense of any particularly malignant ayakashi noticeable to him. Even if that's a relief, it didn't seem to improve his mood any. "Now get me out of this form. I don't want your filthy hands on me longer than necessary."

"Yeah, yeah." Even without him memories and shaped like a fan Sanzo was still a grumbly asshole. But Gojyo supposed that was one of those universal constant things. Water was wet, girls were distracting, and Sanzo was a pain in everyone's ass.

With a bit of a dramatic flourish (because seriously, when was he ever going to get to wave Sanzo around like this?) Gojyo held Sanzo up and out to the side. And waited.

And waited.

Well crap.

"So how do I do that?"

Of all the gods to have to deal with, this one was clearly one of the worst. Sanzo might not be able to grind his teeth in annoyance at present, but the thought is there. Between the flailing about with him and the general incompetence, his aggravation was quite probably palpable.

"Didn't you pick up on any of this? Use my name." As if it were completely obvious. Well, it wasn't, probably, but that's not the point. Someone thrown into the role of a god should have damn well caught onto the mechanics. "My real one, moron."

Hey, it's not like being a god came with a manual or anything! (Sure, okay, there was that introductory lecture that he really should have paid better attention to, but he was a little busy with the you're a god now part. Oh and also the all your friends are dead part. That part was a little distracting.)

"Fine, geez." He cleared his throat. "Toua Genjo Sanzo, thirty-first of China, come forth!" There. Would that do it?

Somehow, it was nearly as disorienting to have his natural form back, standing beside the so-called god suddenly. Then again, no, it's not that. It's not that in the least. He was dimly aware that his expression had taken on an uncharacteristically bewildered cast, and he almost stumbled as he backed off a step.

Toua Genjo Sanzo, thirty-first of China.

They were all fucked. He refused to let his mind wander, and it's a great feat of will to pull that off. He'd been blind, seeing the more obvious connection between this man and Hakkai. He didn't want to know. The past was dead, and to seek it out would only manage to bring death into the present.

"Dammit..."

Ha! It worked! So that's how summoning and returning shinki was done. That was good to know. Now he would be able to take Banri's ghost out hunting... assuming he could ever bring himself to touch Banri's ghost the way he'd been touching Sanzo.

...Sanzo, who was looking pale and shaky. Shit. Did he do something wrong? "Sanzo?" Gojyo took a step forward, concern written all over his face. "Sanzo. Are you okay?"

Now, Elsa's distress was starting to make sense. It was such bullshit, how she'd gone about it, but what other options had there been? It took the repetition of his name before he tore his thoughts very firmly back into the present. He looked up, meeting Gojyo's red eyes and it's jarring to see honest concern.

"Fine," he forced the lie out there without a twinge of remorse, trying to reach for his usual hostility and falling short. "What are you asking for? You're the one that got your dumb ass blighted."

Something was definitely wrong, but maybe it was just that turning into a fan had been as weird for Sanzo as it had been for Gojyo. So long as that was all, he could go along with Sanzo's pretense. Besides, it's not like he could see if the man was blighted under all those robes -- not without risking bullet holes in some of his favorite parts.

"Yeah, well... looks like I owe you one." Words he would never have said to the real Sanzo, but Gojyo was already starting to realize that he liked this Sanzo a lot more than the real Sanzo. Death was a funny thing. "Don't supposed you've got any more bottles of Blight Be Gone on you, huh?"

Sanzo managed, with some effort, to pull himself mostly together. 'I owe you one' wasn't a sentiment that sat right with him for some reason, but he's not going to fight it. The less he engaged while he was off balance, the better. He pulled back some, breaking eye contact as he crossed his arms and tucked his hands in his sleeves. It was easier to breathe and center himself with distance, and the closed body language helps.

"Tch. You're not that lucky." Half-turning away, he glanced out of the corner of his eye at him once again, assessing. "You'll have to get to a shrine."

He definitely had to get to a shrine, and soon. The blight hurt, the throb going deeper into his muscles and bone with every passing minute. It was a strange pain, and not one that he was accustomed to. It was hard to judge just how badly he was hurt when there wasn't blood or broken bones or burns or anything like that. It just looked like a nasty bruise, but it felt weirdly wrong. Wrong like... like...

...Oh hell, wrong like that seed of Chin Yisou's, and the tendrils it had sent feeling around inside his veins. Magically, invasively wrong. Gojyo couldn't quite hold back the shudder as the realization dawned; he needed to get to a shrine immediately and get this shit off him. "Yeah. Yeah, I think I need to do that."

He glanced up at Sanzo again, though, unwilling to just leave the man after... well, everything. It was stupid, but he'd turned Sanzo into a tool. The other man couldn't be feeling good about that. "You're okay though, right?"

It felt like shit to be a tool to be used, but that wasn't something Sanzo ever planned on discussing. It shouldn't even be a topic to consider, given there were more serious priorities. He hasn't been blighted yet himself, but the sense he gets from it is just bad.

Why the hell was he asking stupid questions when he ought to be more focused with getting that taint off of him?

He's been struggling to keep his emotions in some semblance of check since Elsa had called him out on his 'discomfort' with her, not comfortable with the idea that his feelings were some open book to be read, but this pushes past his already limited tolerance. He turns on Gojyo, frustration and the more problematic attendant underlying alarm no doubt strong enough to be clear to the god.

"If you turn into one of those damn lizards because you're too stupid to get that shit off you--" he started irritably before cutting himself off. "Just move your ass already!"

He felt frustrated, certainly. Frustrated and alarmed. He just had no reason to suspect those weren't his feelings. His only experience so far with a shinki was with a soulless ghost who felt nothing -- being around him left Gojyo cold and empty inside, which was totally normal when faced with the hollow shell of a former friend-slash-enemy. Sharing feelings with one's shinki? Experiencing their negative emotions? That was all new ground for Gojyo.

But it didn't seem like Sanzo needed him here, and the blight was really starting to be a problem. "I'm going, I'm going!" he protested, turning his back on Sanzo without another word and jogging off in the direction of his Near Shore shrine. If he was going to continue fighting ayakashi, he thought as he ran, he was going to need a bigger fountain. Maybe he could put a bucket under it... or find an old bathtub somewhere. If he didn't turn into a lizard before then.

Gojyo ran faster.

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I held my nose, I closed my eyes... [CLOSED]

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