#wukong: gets a damaged eyebrow in canon

[skellebonez]

Prompt 63; Sun Wukong and Sandy, becayse Sandy deserves to be pissed at Sun Wukong for leaving as much as Pigsy.

So this prompt was sent in well before S2E8... and now I have the chance to use that as a very fun basis for my own head canons! (Even though 1 is very debatable.)

I believed you! I stood up for you! Defended you! And you lied!

It was only a matter of time before Wukong was confronted by Sandy. The moment he saw the aquatic demon after the defeat of the Spider Queen at the Lunar New Year festival he knew that he was on borrowed time. Now, on the air ship... drone... thingy, there was no time left and he knew that Sandy would eventually want to talk. Alone.

"You lied to us, left us, and we couldn't find you."

"... I thought you wouldn't come looking for me," Wukong said, looking down over the edge of the ship. It was dark, well into the very early hours of the morning, and he couldn't sleep. Apparently he hadn't been the only one, Sandy sneaking up behind him. He must have been more off his game than he realized.

"You're a dumbass," Sandy retorted back at him, tone more tired and sad than anything else this time. He was more blunt than Sandy had ever heard him around MK or the others. "Of course we would have looked for you. We're brothers."

"I know that now," Wukong admitted. "I just... I guess I wasn't thinking clearly. That's not a good- no, there isn't an excuse for just leaving like that."

"Look, I get it," Sandy continued on, moving to stand right beside his once-brother. "In a way, now at least. You'd just fought someone you used to consider a sworn-brother for the second time. Had to do to him what was done to you to keep him from hurting people. But you lied to us."

"I know."

"You told us before you left that you'd come back and you didn't!"

"I know!"

"I believed you! I stood up for you! Defended you when people said you were never going to come back! And you lied!"

"I know!" Wukong snapped, louder than Sandy had raised his own voice, teeth barred and growling under his words. "I know, Wujing, I lied to you! But I can't take that back!"

Sandy pinched the bridge of his nose, taking in a deep calming breath before continuing. "... I know too. What's past is past, we can't change it now. We just have to work with what we have."

"... that sounds like something master would say."

"It was something he said." Sandy sighed. "He probably misses you a lot, you know. I hadn't been up there in years... couldn't bring myself to step foot there when Red Son took us there to get the ingredients for the anti-venom."

"I can't believe no one has gone after you all for that... maybe master had a hand in that."

"Or they're still scared of The Handsome Monkey King who once wrecked Havoc in Heaven," Sandy said with a ghost of a smile. Wukong couldn't help but chuckle at that, soft and almost as much of a ghost. "But I think he did. They probably know... at least a bit. Definitely that you're back and about MK. Everything else, I don't know."

"If they did I think we wouldn't be in this mess right now." Wukong bit his lip, scowling. "I should have swallowed my pride and asked for help. Gone to master or Guanyin or even the Jade Emperor."

"But what's past is past," Sandy repeated. "We work with what we have."

Wukong laughed again, this time cold and bitter and hollow.

"What we have is a shapeshifted super strong celestial who doesn't like to fight, a really kick ass dragon girl, just some guy who knows way more than he should, two monkies who don't even have half their powers anymore, and..." He trailed off, looking back at the entrance to the inside of the ship. "And..."

"Pigsy."

"Bajie," Wukong countered. "But... not Bajie anymore."

It had been a shock when he had seen the four of them at the Lunar New Year festival. It was like the past had returned with a new coat of paint and slapped him in the face.

Mei had the same aura as her ancestor, Bai Long Ma, radiating off her in droves. She even looked similar to one of the dragon's multiple human forms. And she and MK looked inseparable.

Tang looked... a lot like Tripitaka. Even shared his name, to an extent. He didn't have same aura as his master but there was something about him that made him wonder if maybe he could be a distant relation.

Sandy was Wujing. That was much was clear to him. He looked different but his voice was the same as always and Wukong could see his power shining through him so clearly.

And then there had been Pigsy. He looked so much like Bajie and yet so different and Wukong thought he must have just been a fluke. But no... no, he chanced a quick glance at them all with his True Sight and could see them for who they were.

'Bai Long Mas dragon aura. Tang a normal human. Sha Wujing's powerful water demon visage he couldn't forget.

And Zhu Bajie's too.

"Does he... remember anything?" Wukong asked, watching a flock of birds keep pace with the ship. Or bats, possibly, given the lack of sunlight. He couldn't tell, much like how he couldn't tell how far away they were. Not anymore... Not yet.

"No," Sandy answered.

"Good." Wukong breathed out a shaky breath, remembering how it felt when the chef had berated him. It felt so... similar he almost thought... "Good... it's better for everyone if he doesn't. Especially MK, he wouldn't... he wouldn't take knowing one of his actual parental figures had been lying to him. It's bad enough you and I do."

The two fell into a silence, watching as the sun began to rise above horizon. It was almost nice. For a moment.

"How did he die?"

Sandy tensed. "Is this really the conversation you want to have at sun rise?"

"Yes," Wukong answered immediately, no hesitation in his voice whatsoever. "I've put it off too long. I'll learn eventually, it's pretty clear we're not going to be able to run from our past for much longer, so why put it off anymore?"

The silence returned once again as the two watched the mountains they slowly flew over gain an orange-gold hue of early morning. Wukong used to love watching the sunrise, either up early enough that it was just him and Tripitaka or centuries later on his mountain home with his monkey court. No matter what happened? If he was able to watch it he felt like things would be alright.

Now the sight left a bittersweet taste in his mouth that he wasn't sure would ever leave.

"Battle," Sandy eventually said. "After you left... a lot of demons were angry, far angrier than before, and there was no order with DBK locked under that mountain. It wasn't nearly as bad as before but it was more widespread and chaotic. Bajie and I left our new stations in the Celestial Court and returned to the mortal realm to protect the humans and he..." He sighed, leaning forward on the railing to look down, away from the sunlight. "We underestimated an opponent. Bajie took a hit meant for me and... I-I don't remember much after that."

"I can imagine why," Wukong said softly. He'd seen how into battle Wujing get when truly angered, losing himself in rage until his opponent was no more. It only ever happened when one of them had been hurt.

"When I realized that I had... When I went to check on him he was already gone," Sandy continued, wringing his fingers together. "If I had just worked on my anger sooner, long before then, maybe I would have left with him and he wouldn-"

"No," Wukong interrupted firmly, standing straight to glare at Sandy. It wasn't an angry glare, but a sad one. "No, Wujing, you have no way of knowing how bad he was... it may not have... never mind, let's not think about that."

"Go on, say it," Sandy insisted, gripping the railing. "I think I've needed someone to say it for a long time because I can't say it to myself. Please."

"... he... he may have already been gone before you blacked out," Wukong said softly, watching as Sandy tensed and wincing as the railing warped and groaned under his grip.

But eventually he calmed, relaxed and loosed that grip and sighed.

"He probably was," he admitted, standing straight and watching the clouds above them. "... I'm still pissed at you."

"You should be," Wukong said as he pushed away from the railing with a pained groan. His wounds still hurt, treatment and time or not. "You deserve to be. I made a lot of mistakes."

"You can make up for most of them." Sandy stretched, offering a half smile. "You've been trying already. I can tell how much you're trying to watch MK when he thinks you aren't around now. And how you've been bugging Pigsy."

"Even if he doesn't remember I guess I... wanna make up for lost time," Wukong said with a chance of a smile of his own.

The two of them turned to head inside, Sandy moving slower than usual to accommodate for the king's slower gait with his limp. His injured knee would take a long time to heal without his usual powers now.

"I'm going to tell them," Sandy suddenly said as he reached to open the door. "About me being Wujing. We can't afford to keep running from our pasts, brother. Not anymore."

The way Sandy said his name, as soft and welcoming as he ever had on their journey made Wukong pause. He almost surprised himself when he felt something running down his left cheek, realizing that his now injured eye made it harder to hide how he felt when the damaged tear ducts and added sensitivity let the tears run free.

"Not anymore," he agreed.

And Sandy opened the door and they headed inside.