Chapter Text
They called it the ‘domestication program’.
‘They’ being Vash’s infernal friends, that is. Vash himself knew better than to say such a thing in his brother’s presence, especially because such a title was incorrect.
Knives was not being domesticated, he was not some lazy lap dog that just needed a muzzle and leash. He very nearly tore out the throat of that tiny, irritating human who snarked such insubordination. The only thing that held him at bay was Vash putting the barrel of his revolver to his temple.
He knew perfectly well Vash would not kill him. He had his chance to kill him, laying defeated, and for some inexplicable reason, he refused. But the threat was there all the same, that a bullet would enter his body if he continued on.
So Knives snarled his grievances and slapped the gun away to stalk off. That was the one thing that those humans would never understand about Vash. That he chose to roll over and bare his belly for them to impale and rip apart—for some reason that he would never, ever comprehend. If his brother was weak, it was because he decided to be. They would never understand that he could be just as volatile, just as violent, that he could put that gun to his own brother’s head and get angry.
Vash came back to apologize some hours later. Knives nearly tore his other arm off in a fury at the audacity. They wound up fighting again all the same, and by nightfall they were sitting a yarz apart from one another, nursing their bloody wounds and glowering out into the surrounding desert.
“Nai,” Vash started, and he hated how it made his hackles rise, to hear a name spoken by no other in a hundred and fifty years. “Let me prove it to you.”
“Prove what?” He snapped, glaring over his shoulder.
“That you don’t have to be scared of them.” Vash said, blood spilling from his lip.
“Scared?” Knives whirled around, an ugly laugh in his chest, even as his ribs cried out and shifted. “Have they turned you stupid as well? After all this, you think I am scared of such lowly, trivial creatures?” He bared his teeth, fangs flashing his own twin’s blood, tasting the same as his own despite it all.
“I know you are.” Vash said, as simple as ever, so infuriatingly simple. “I was scared of them, too.”
“Scared,” Knives snarled, a fire under his lungs and he felt it, the way his body shifted to accommodate the sharp edges and feathers. “I am not scared. They are moronic, greedy, selfish animals who could only best angels such as ourselves by tearing apart a child.” He spat, spit flying and eyes wild. “They got lucky once and thought themselves gods. I intend only to ensure they know their place.”
And Vash looked at him so sad. It made him roar wordlessly into the night, and he moved to lunge at him. His broken leg crumpled underneath him, hitting the sand in a shower of too many limbs and writhing flesh. He felt wild, untamed, as he was meant to be. Claws digging into the sand and ripping apart the air and rocks as he moved to Vash, who just sat and watched.
“They bite everything, including themselves for indescribable differences.” Knives let out in an inhuman screech. “They will try to kill us and they will fail. Humans are petty, worthless beasts. They hurt you only because you let them!” He barked. “You let them and you say I am scared? No, they have never touched me and I have made sure of that!”
Vash just turned sadder. He simply stared as Knives shoved himself up, their foreheads pressed together as he bared an uncountable number of teeth, as his wings arched in a display that threatened to blacken the few remaining blond strands of hair he had left. He did not care. Vash was blackened to the roots. They were both destined for death, it was pointless. All of it. And yet Vash continued to prolong their suffering, as he had done for over a century.
“Look at what they’ve done to you,” Knives whispered, pupils contracted, “when you try to show them mercy.”
Vash just looked at him. Turned his head so their heads slotted together, a perfect symmetry, as it always had been and always would be. No, that wasn’t right. They hadn’t been in symmetry for a long, long time. And certainly not even in body anymore. Knives made sure of that.
The coil in his chest was an ugly thing. Vash grabbed his wrist, and he realized only then he had been raking a claw across his own chest to tear out that which poisoned him from the inside out.
“Some humans,” Vash began, quietly, “will never be good.”
“And yet,” Knives hissed.
“And yet, maybe one day they will be.” Vash said. “Maybe they won’t. I don’t think…” He looked away. Then back. “I have the right to decide that.”
“Hypocrite,” Knives curled his lips. He knew what had happened to Bluesummers.
“I know,” Vash looked down, then up. “I guess I have to change too, huh?” He sighed out, then lowered Knives' monstrous hand to his lap. “Most humans, they want to learn to live with us. They want to be kind.”
“I’ve yet to see that.” Knives growled.
“Liar,” Vash smiled a little, “the first human—”
“Murdered our sister.” Knives spat, wings arching out threateningly, protectively.
“And she spent the rest of her life trying to make up for it.” Vash implored. “I don’t think…” He held both his hands around Knives' own, “that it matters if it does make up for it. I think it matters that they try to be better today than they were yesterday, even if they’re never forgiven for it.”
“Please,” Knives scoffed, recoiling his head away, “they wouldn’t put in such effort if they reaped no reward.”
“It’s rewarding enough to be better.” Vash said simply. “Because they want to be kind.” His eyes went up to the stars, voice hoarse. “They want to be loved, and they don’t want to be scared anymore.”
Knives followed his gaze, as if there was anything up there for him to comprehend. There wasn’t, of course. Just an endless array of stars, like the view outside the SEEDS ships. The moons high above, the one with a crater straight through its surface. His wings twitched, laying in the sands and he hated, he hated the grains in-between his feathers, the screaming pain in his blood, Vash still holding him—
“Let me prove it to you,” Vash murmured, so quiet, Knives' gaze still on the stars. “You can’t blame crabs for how they act in a bucket.”
“I am not so lowly.” Knives hissed.
“We’re in the bucket too, Nai.” Vash looked at him.
Knives wordlessly snarled, yanking his hand away. Vash let him. There was blood matting a patch of his hair. His coattails were riddled with so many bullet holes. Before him, he could sense and feel every inch of Vash’s skin, a gaping hole where his arm should’ve been. If he just hadn’t been so, so—
“I’m tired, Nai.” Vash said, so softly and so…weary. “I’m really tired. Aren’t you?”
Knives closed his eyes, turning his head away. Opened them, glowering at the vast emptiness. “I will not lay down and die.”
“Good,” He didn’t check to see if Vash was smiling like his tone suggested, “I still want to show you what humanity can do when they’re not scared. They have a lot of beautiful things to offer.”
“I don’t care.” He growled, eyes shut.
“Okay,” Vash said, easy as ever. “We’ll take it one day at a time.”
Knives glared. Vash was smiling, the deeply sad kind that didn’t reach his much too-heavy-eyes. Like this, he could feel all those decades upon his bones. A hundred and fifty years, and Vash still thought it could all be wiped in the face of what? A little blind hope?
“You may not have long left.” Is what he said. “Not even the torturous scientists from SEEDS knew how long a blackened Plant would last. They kept driving Tesla to the brink and killed her before she could die naturally.”
“I know,” Vash seemed…far too at ease for that, it was making Knives bristle. “So could I just…” He looked down, then up. “Have you with me, in my metaphorical hospice?”
“Who is to say I will not kill humanity after you are gone?” Knives bared his teeth.
“Nai,” Vash clicked his tongue, so very sad, “we both know you won’t stay long enough for that.”
Knives snarled, shoving Vash to the ground, putting distance between them. Didn’t look him in the eyes. Just wordlessly dug his claws into the ground and buried his head in his arms, wings arching over his spine and into the endless night.
He hated his brother. The stupidest angel that had ever graced existence, cursed with an eternal knowledge upon Knives' very being. Knives knew everything about Vash, too. He thought he did. That was the part that made his eyes hurt with an unfamiliar motion. He thought he did, and now he was looking at a stranger that knew him.
“I can’t bear to look at you.” Knives broke.
“That’s okay.” Vash murmured softly, “I can’t look at me, either.”
Knives wished his brother had just killed him. Wished he had just killed himself, like he wanted, before humanity could get to him first. It would have been a much kinder fate than this.
Learning to live as Vash demanded was a torturous endeavor. Knives wondered, many times, why he bothered putting up with it. More than once he had simply left. And each time, Vash had found him.
“You can be unsupervised,” Vash would say with a faux chipperness, “when I know you aren’t going to make another cult.”
“I did not even make that cult!” Knives snapped. “I did my work and they decided to create themselves around us and the Plants. I simply decided to start making them useful after they grew more than a ramshackle herd in the sticks.” He paused. “And in any case, I am fairly certain they have not even disbanded.”
“Aren’t most of them dead?” Vash squinted.
“I had only employed a select few from that cult. Most of them were fanatics who threw themselves into death without making a real dent.” Knives rolled his eyes. “As far as I am aware, they are still active. I am sure another leader as been appointed among them.”
“Huh,” Vash’s hand twitched near his revolver, “okay then. Come with me.”
“What?” Knives blinked, Vash grabbing him by the shoulder and yanking him. He pulled back and hit him. “To where, you manhandling cretin?”
“To disband the Eye of Michael.” Vash said, like it was easy.
“Oh who cares?” Knives groaned. “They are useless without all that I could give them.”
“Then—” Vash suddenly lit up with an idea. “Actually, you know what? You can have your AGL Arm back.”
“What?” Knives echoed. Vash had taken his hand-made revolver after his first defeat, despite how pointless it really was.
“You can be unsupervised for as long as you like,” Vash said, smiling with sharp teeth, “once you stamp out the Eye of Michael.” He raised a finger in Knives face. “Without killing any of them.”
“Do you have any idea how impossible that is?” Knives growled, moving like he was going to bite his finger before he moved away.
“I thought there was nothing humans could best you at.” Vash sniffed, and Knives very nearly killed him on the spot.
The last dregs of the Eye of Michael would be removed within the following forty years. He could’ve done it in half the time if Vash wasn’t so stubborn about his ruleset. When that day would come, Vash would look unfairly proud, and Knives would almost forget he could go wherever he wished with no complaint anymore. Which was ridiculous.
His ‘friends’ also insisted on making an appearance. The short one he had to routinely remind himself not to murder despite how easy it would be. The tall one had a blinding optimism that rivaled Vash himself, which is why he made sure he was never alone in a room with her. He couldn’t bear what kind of conversation she would try to have with him.
Then there was Double Fang.
“Livio,” Vash chastised.
“Whatever it’s damn name is.” Knives rolled his eyes, “I don’t care.”
“You will. Call him Livio.” Vash reiterated. Paused. “Or Razlo, honestly, you’re more likely to meet Razlo.”
“And why is that?” Knives sighed.
“Well, Livio doesn’t like you.” Vash winced. “And when Livio doesn’t like something, Razlo tries to take care of it.”
“That one would enjoy being called Tri-Punisher.” Knives snorted, amused by it.
“Well, don’t.”
Knives hardly ever saw Double Fang and the Tri-Punisher. This was fine by him, because he didn’t care. The few times he had been face-to-face with him, he knew two things immediately: Double Fang didn’t want him around, and Tri-Punisher wanted to kill him. The feeling was mutual.
“I do not know why you insist upon any of this.” Knives had growled. “When it is clear the humans would like you far more were I not around.”
“Livio knows why you’re still here.” Vash told him. “He’s actually the only one who didn’t ask why you aren’t dead.”
Even the tall human had asked why his life was spared? Intriguing. Knives raised a brow, arms crossed. “And why is that?”
“You’re my brother.” Vash said, smiling. As if that were enough.
There were also these habits. These infernal, irritating habits Vash had apparently picked up from humanity. The desire to eat food despite hardly needing it, which was revolting. The need for rudimentary transportation, which was degrading. The alcohol consumption, good lord, it was appalling. Knives had recoiled into his very skin when he’d dared venture out of the shack Vash had put them in this time, when he didn’t return when he said he would, and found him stumbling out of a saloon.
“Oh, hic, hey,” Vash slurred, draped over a railing and reeking of depravity.
“You are disgusting.” Knives curled a lip.
“I knoooow,” Vash giggled, slumping slowly until he tumbled over the ground, “I feel gross.”
“What is wrong with you?” Knives snapped, stepping back. He didn’t even bother trying to pick him up. He could hear the laughter of people inside the saloon and it was making his skin crawl.
“I don’t know,” Vash hiccuped, curled into a sad little ball on the ground. “I thought I’d, I’d,” He pushed his face into his arm, “feel better.”
“Poisoning yourself is meant to help?” Knives scoffed. “Get on your feet at once.”
“Sometimes,” Vash mumbled, turning his face to the side, covered in dirt and sand, “s’used to feel better with…with company.”
“I said get up.”
Vash groaned, slowly pushing up. He swayed, nearly tumbling back over again. Splayed out his legs like a newborn animal and held out his arms. Looked over at Knives, who was watching him with disgust. His eyes were hazy.
“Do you ever…” Vash swallowed, then almost swayed into Knives before he stepped back. “Do y’ever…” He stopped. Knees wobbling, staring at the ground, mental state visibly fading away.
Knives sighed, long and heavy. He grabbed Vash by the sleeve and hauled him along, not stopping to let him get his bearings as he dragged him back to the shack for his humans to deal with, since they seemed to consider themselves experts.
“Nai,” Vash whined, tripping over his own feet, “Nai, did…did you know?”
“Know what?” Knives sighed.
Vash didn’t respond. He finally looked back and found Vash just staring at him. He was paused, briefly, by how devastated he looked, at something unseen.
And then he stumbled and fell, half-conscious with alcohol. Knives left him there to go fetch his stupid humans to deal with him.
He also leaked a lot. He was covered in all those human-like emotions that she had implemented in them. Unlike Vash, Knives had learned to overcome such hurdles in his nurture. Vash, meanwhile, would routinely stop and stare at nothing. More than once he had found him hastily wiping at his eyes as if that would hide how wet his face was.
There were a number of humans Knives killed in his ‘rehabilitation’, as the short human called it. Vash cried at those, too, but it was with anger. Knives would not be surprised if Vash had considered the possibility of giving up. Perhaps he had pushed just for that reason.
“You’re all I have left.” Vash croaked to him.
“And you think I do not feel the same?” Knives hissed back.
He had come to this revelation: how they were, one of them would have to give. One would have to submit to the other. And he realized, in that final face-off, that it would not be Vash. It was impressive. After all that had happened, all he went through, the agony in his eyes, he knew it would never be Vash. Oh, he had given up alright, but not in the way Knives had wanted him to. Never in that way.
He had tried to break Vash into seeing his side. Instead, he had realized he’d gone too far. He’d broken a Vash who saw no point. He’d given him a lack of anything to care about except his one final creed, and for that alone Vash should’ve been allowed to kill himself on the spot.
It was almost humbling. It shattered him from the inside out, that despair that erupted in a grieving shriek. Vash would never be the one to give in. He could kill every human in the universe and Vash would never let him win. What a spoiled fucking brat.
When it came to that which Vash loved, Knives had realized there was no acceptable victory. Humanity would not win, either. Vash would not give up on the humans, and he would not kill Knives. That left two options for Knives: fight for the rest of eternity, or die.
At least until Vash held him to the cot when he tried to stab his own generated blades through his throat, snarling and crying in his face. One year, Vash demanded of him, give me one year. And when that year was up, he asked for one more. And then another. And another. And another.
Knives suspected it had been a request Vash was making to himself, too. Just one more year.
In that first year, there was a day Vash vanished from him in the early morning. They were in the city of December. He was watched by the insurance humans again. He’d demanded all the same to know where the hell Vash had gone now.
“Just to visit someone.” Said the tall human, eugh, Thompson, and that was all he could get out of her.
Knives got free eventually, of course he did. He had heard people who were hunting his brother again, despite the bounty being lessened. Had heard of the Earth Federation, knew they thought himself dead and he had no intention of telling them otherwise. So he went to find Vash. In case he got into trouble.
And he found him, overlooking some building he did not know or care about, sitting before a grave. It must be. Except the ‘cross’ shoved into the ground was no doubt one of those Punisher weapons that the Eye loved so much.
Vash stood as Knives approached, turning back around. He didn’t seem surprised Knives was there. Likely heard him approach.
“Seriously?” Knives sneered. “A gravesite? What, must you pay a visit to every single miserable life you passed—”
“Nai.” Vash spoke curt, hollow, and that made him stop. “I’m not doing this right now.”
And Knives just stared as Vash hobbled to his feet, digging into his coat as he passed. He glanced back once at the grave, raising his brow, then turned to watch Vash as he departed again. Finally followed him as he took a seat over a cliffside overlooking the city, from that jut of rock the building and gravesite looked over.
He curled his lip when he saw Vash had withdrawn his cigarettes. Another horrible, nasty habit he seemed to have picked up: smoking. He had a rusted golden zippo lighter with him and would, for some reason, use it to poison his lungs. He didn’t even seem to enjoy it.
“Do not smoke when I am here, I refuse to give myself a disease.” Knives warned, but Vash lit the cigarette anyway, staring out blankly. He looked back at the grave. To Vash. “Do not tell me that is for the Punisher.”
Vash paused. Looked up at him. “You recognize…?”
“The Eye of Michael was very particular about that rank. I recognize the weapon.” Knives growled. “I know it is not one of the kinds given to the Tri-Punisher, he is still alive.”
“Oh,” Vash looked back out, holding the cigarette between his fingers as he exhaled slowly, “yeah, it’s for him.”
“What, do you mourn Bluesummers, too?” Knives sneered. Watched Vash flinch with it.
“No,” Vash’s voice was cold. “He wasn’t my friend.”
“Friend?” He scoffed instead of something much crueler he’d like to say, about Bluesummers. He had been the only human he could actually stand in this world, but there he went. “You know very well why you had the Punisher with you.”
“I do.” Vash looked up at him finally, searching. “Was his job really to keep me safe?”
Surprising. Vash didn’t like to talk about such matters. Nevertheless, “Yes.” He said, standing at his side and crossing his arms. “The Punisher was intended to merely ensure you lived through all that was sent your way. It would have been pointless for you to suffer and then die.” He saw no reason to be anything other than blunt.
“Huh,” Vash took a slow drag, “well, you couldn’t have chosen anyone better. He was good at his job.” His eyes turned downcast.
“That one,” Knives jerked his head far, far back to where they’d come from, “was not the original one intended. I foolishly thought he’d proven his worth. He shot his old master, you know.”
Vash paused. Tilted his head, looking out. “Oh, yeah. Well, he deserved it. You still picked right with him.” He exhaled, quiet. “He took care of me.”
“He ensured you lived.” Knives rolled his eyes. “And then died in a matter I found horrendously pointless. That is not taking care of you, and certainly not a friend.”
Vash was very, very quiet. Knives glanced down, wary. Vash’s eyes were hidden behind the low light of the suns on his sunglasses, dusk upon them, glinting in the reflections.
“He was my friend.” Vash said in a quiet, shaky resolution.
“Whatever,” Knives dismissed, but there was something tense under his skin. He felt, inexplicably, like he was facing down a Plant threatening to overload, a Last Run intended to take out all that remained around her. “He served his purpose. Chapel had high expectations for him, though I hear he failed to reach them.”
“He was kind,” Vash spoke softly, “he was too kind to be what you would’ve wanted.”
“That, I know to be untrue.” Knives scoffed. “You would not be alive if he were kind.”
“Then you don’t know either of us.” Vash snapped, tense and coiled, a fang flashing before his lip lowered. “I…” He swallowed thickly, then dropped his face to his palm, scrubbing over it. “I couldn’t have done this without Wolfwood.”
“Oh,” Knives hummed dismissively, looking off to the city, “that was his name, wasn’t it?”
He saw the burst of feathers out of the corner of his eye only a second before his face erupted in a split of blood and agony.
“Fucker!” He yelled, falling back and clutching at his face. Generated tendrils of blades sprung free, snarling with blood dripping down his nose, up at Vash, his bloody fist and—
Oh, that was a cold fury he had not seen in some time. It held him still, staring at the piercing eyes and elongated fangs, the feathers and wings and how his throat cracked and splintered apart on echoing distortion. He didn’t move fast enough to react to Vash leaping onto him, holding him to the ground, hands around his throat and wings blotting out the sky.
“His name was Wolfwood!” Vash snarled, glowing lines of a monstrous, ugly beast. “You couldn’t—” He choked, shaking and heaving for breaths that weren’t coming. “You didn’t even know his name?” It came out as a sob, tearing at his chest.
“What does it matter?” Knives strangled out, clawing at those hands holding him down. “I barely remember any of their names! Who cares?”
“I care!” Vash howled, Knives head forced back with the force of his grip, all but trying to bury him into the sands. “His name was Wolfwood!” He repeated, a desperate cry, and—
This was a new anger. This was despair, this was helplessness. Vash had been angry with every dismissive word Knives said. Every life he deemed unworthy. He had fought him about it more than once. Knives had seen his disappointment, his tear-filled anger.
This was nothing like all the other times. This was animalistic, more feral than even the worms could be. This was choking Vash even as he restricted Knives' air supply, feathers ripping free from his skin and leaving blood in their wake.
“And—” Vash choked, tears falling from his eyes in a final show, a swan song, a splintered glass finally shattering with one last hit. “And he—” He trembled, and finally Knives could breathe as Vash’s grip failed him. He crumpled into Knives' chest, shaking as his body was wrecked with choked-back cries. His wings trembled, tattered and ruined, because he never took care of them.
Knives sat up. Vash didn’t move, just slid down, gripping at his clothes and quivering like a leaf in the wind. Was this a mental break? Knives grabbed around Vash’s shoulders, instinctively taking a cursory look around, just in case anyone saw, anyone may come to hurt them.
“I—” Vash cracked, clutching into Knives chest, and through a broken voice, “I miss him.”
Knives stopped. Looked down at Vash, shaking apart with glowing, geometric lines and wild feathers. He sounded like he was suffocating, yet refused to move his mouth away from his chest to get any better air.
He was only human, he thought to snap, one among millions. Even less than that now, after all he had done to the planet.
But his nose was still bleeding, dripping onto Vash’s hair, so he kept his mouth shut. Surely Vash knew that, he was old. He has lost humans that tricked him into being their friend plenty of times. The Punisher was nothing more than a human Knives sent to keep Vash alive, and then he went and died when he wasn’t needed anymore. Nothing more, nothing less.
“Surely you’re not this stupid?” Knives growled all the same. “You know why he was there. He didn’t care.”
“He did,” Vash whispered, though even to Knives' own ears it sounded like he was trying to convince himself, “if he didn’t he wouldn’t have…”
“Wouldn’t have what?” Knives eyes narrowed.
Vash shook his head, and he just clung tighter.
Humans had ruined Vash. He knew this for a very long time. They had ruined him irreparably and there was nothing he could do to fix it. It was for this reason Knives wished he could kill them all, for taking his twin away from him. But if he did that, he knew he’d never see him again, and that alone was barely enough to still his hand. At least for now.
How pathetic, he couldn’t help thinking, letting his nose sting as Vash sobbed in his arms, that he sought care from nothing more than a rat.
He was glad that Punisher was dead. Maybe now Vash could get a damn grip.
It was ten years after humanity nearly fell.
Every year, like clockwork, Vash went to visit that damn Punisher’s grave. It was always the same day. He always reeked of smoke, booze, or both when he returned. Truly, this was obscene, but the one time he had complained to Thompson (who was, unfortunately, tolerable to speak to. She did not fight him. He would not call her insightful. But she was…he could talk to her, if he was bored) she had been rather upset with him.
“There was nothing special about him.” Knives growled. “Bluesummers, now, he was something special. Crimsonnail too, I suppose. But anything that made him worthy of remembrance was done onto him.”
“You’re lucky I don’t like hitting people, mister.” Thompson said firmly, and he sneered at her mere audacity. “People don’t make friends because of what they can give.”
“Vash makes friends with half of humanity.” Knives said. “What makes one Punisher, my Punisher, so damn different?”
“Well, I don’t know.” Thompson shrugged. “Sometimes you just meet someone who gets you better than anyone.”
“‘Get?’” He scoffed again. “He was a tool at best.”
“Mister,” Thompson frowned.
“Oh, come off it.” Knives rolled his eyes, but he stepped away. He could dismantle her easily, but Vash may very well remove a limb as a long-overdue comeuppance. He liked these few humans quite a bit, for whatever reason. “There is nothing a human could understand about Plants.”
“I don’t think it had anything to do with being a Plant.” Thompson said. “You’re much more than that, you know.”
“I am an angel.” Knives' pupils slitted. “A being far above even that which your words could comprehend. As is Vash.”
“And I bet that was why Mister Vash liked him.” Thompson smiled quite brightly. “Mister Wolfwood didn’t think he was anything like that.”
How dare. He came from the Eye of Michael! They were raised upon worshipping their two angels! Perhaps he should have looked more into just who had decided to shoot up Chapel. Of course, by that point he’d already made the call to send him out. By that point, the Punisher had ripped Vash free from the Ark and bolted into the sands. Perhaps that was why Vash was so hung-up on him, a single action that was clearly nothing more than a rebellious streak.
Everything he learned about this Wolfwood was against his will. Livio considered him his brother, for some stupid reason. There was an orphanage that Vash regularly visited, apparently he’d come from there or something. Knives vaguely remembered Chapel promising to punish his runaway stray for ruining his plans, and Knives had sent him off towards that place. On the day he learned the lighter Vash carried had been from Wolfwood, he went and tore apart a river of dunes in frustration.
He allowed himself to sit on his frustration, since he had no other way to deal with it. Vash and Thompson said it was good for him, or whatever such nonsense. He decided he was frustrated because Vash was torturing himself. It was one thing to grieve a human who did not deserve it, this was excessive. Yes, maybe in the grand scheme the changes to his lifestyle were small, but it was still change. Over a human.
Thompson and her, well, whatever that short Stryfe was to her, were busy with some new radio show or whatever it was they did. So he was with Vash again, wandering in the blistering heat and hating his entire fucking life as he once again demanded they just make some place with trees to stay in, ask their sisters for aid.
“I’m not isolating us from humanity.” Vash sniffed. “That won’t help you.”
“That is rich coming from you,” Knives huffed, “you’re always with those petulant animals and yet you’re hated by them. That is being alone all the same, is it not?”
“I have some friends.” Vash pouted. “That’s better than you.”
“I am not making friends with those things.”
“But you’re getting there!” Vash insisted. “Just the other day you had a whole conversation with someone and didn’t insult them to their face!”
“That was because you were glaring at me the whole time.” Knives crossed his arms. “And I did insult them, they were just too stupid to pick up on my insinuations. Flew right over their miserable head.”
Vash rolled his eyes, but he was smiling. Ridiculous.
There came a town, some place Knives didn’t care about, that Vash apparently had not visited in some time. He appeared to not have realized he hadn’t traveled here for a while, until a young man spotted him.
“Vash?” The man stared.
“Uh,” Vash tensed, and Knives reached for the AGL Arm strapped around his waist, “hello?”
“It is you!” The man grinned. Then shook himself off. “Gosh, sorry, I must look different. Uh, Neil?” He looked nervous. “If you remember, I was…” He moved his hand to show someone shorter. “You helped my mom and I out when Dad was…”
“Oh!” Vash perked up, then smiled bright. “Neil! My goodness, you got big!”
They ended up chattering away like old cronies, Knives sighing and dropping his hand. They talked about the man’s mother, his father, walking through the town because the man was on some errand or whatever. Knives tried to portray with his eyes he wanted to be literally anywhere but here, because he still hated being within ten yarz of most humans, and Vash staunchly ignored him. At least this Neil took one look and knew better to say much about Knives presence.
“And what about you?” Neil asked. “How’re you and that preacher doing these days?”
Vash faltered in his step. Twitched his brow, then smiled hollow. “Oh, we’re good. Not much to report.”
“What preacher?” Knives turned on him, eyes narrowed. Vash ignored him.
“He around?” Neil asked. “Mom would love to see him. She still brings him up when Dad can’t cook any good meals.” He snickered.
“Oh, no, he’s not…” Vash’s hands twitched. “Sorry, he’s some cities away.”
“Aw,” Neil clicked his tongue, “well, tell him to visit! Y’know Mom would love to cook for you two again. Especially, you know, after—”
“Thank you,” Vash interrupted, curt. “I’ll…tell him.”
They chatted together a moment more before the man went to grab his produce. To Knives' surprise, Vash didn’t wait outside. He immediately turned and hurried at a brisk pace.
“Oh, what, not going to stay and chitchat some more?” Knives sneered, coming into stride beside him.
“Shut up,” Vash hissed, “we can’t stay anyway.”
“You were always a runner.” Knives jeered, and Vash’s glower remained outwards, in the direction they were heading. “What preacher? You don’t know a preacher.”
“You—” Vash stopped. Gave him a hard look. “It was…” He looked away, then kept walking. “Wolfwood said he was one.”
“A preacher?” Knives couldn’t help barking out a laugh. “He must have stolen that from Chapel, though at least his was accurate. He was a priest, even if only for the Eye.” He hummed. “Speaking of which, I’ll have you know I took apart a hideout the other week. You are welcome.”
“Thank you, Nai.” Vash sighed, but he did try to smile. “Meryl told me about it, she heard it on the news.”
“Ugh,” Knives wrinkled his nose, turning away. Let them walk a few moments longer, then turned back. “You told that man the Punisher was alive.”
“I did no such thing.” Vash stiffened.
“Well, you didn’t tell him he’s dead.” Knives scoffed. “What are you playing?”
“I am not playing anything.” Vash’s shoulders remained stiff, and he walked a little faster, moving around a crowd of people, back to the path out of town. “Okay? I just didn’t want to drop that on him. He was a kid when we last saw him.”
“So you think it kinder to let him and his mother go on believing a man is alive,” Knives drawled, “patiently waiting for a day he will come by for dinner, which will never happen.”
Vash stopped short. His hands clenched at his sides, eyes shut as he took in a breath. Released it, and unclenched his hands.
“They’ll forget.” He spoke quietly, sharp. “Their lives move on.”
“That man said his mother routinely still brings up the Punisher.” Knives couldn’t help poking it, driving the blade into the puss-filled wound, just to see what would happen. “And you just left them like that? Won’t that hurt?” He sneered, condescending.
“Stop it.” Vash turned to him, a hard set to his jaw.
“How cruel,” He couldn’t help taunting. “I didn’t think you had such a thing in you.”
“Maybe,” Vash hissed, getting in his face and making Knives grin with all his sharp teeth, “I didn’t want to cause a scene. Maybe, and here’s a thought, I want them to remember him kindly.”
“What does being dead have to do with being kind or not?” Knives demanded. “It doesn’t change their lives. Remembering differently won’t make him any less dead.”
Vash fisted the front of his shirt. He let go immediately after and stepped away, but Knives saw that desire. It was thrumming in his veins, the urge to keep pushing. Vash did not get so violent so quickly over any other human Knives defaced the name of. It was pissing him off.
“There’s—” Vash shut his eyes, opened them. “Maybe there’s a certain kind of life in a memory.” He muttered, then turned and resumed the brisk pace.
“You are a bleeding heart.” Knives rolled his eyes, then followed.
“Shut up,” Vash muttered, and he took them far away from that town.
Knives really did wonder why Vash bothered so much, when it was so easy to upset him.
It was thirty years after humanity nearly fell.
Thompson and Stryfe were showing their age, wrinkles and a few gray hairs. Vash pretended he didn’t notice. Livio was working full-time at the orphanage, apparently the original head died and he couldn’t bear to let someone else take over. Not that Knives cared.
The Earth Federation had steadily given up trying to lure in Vash. They had intended to put a neural block chip in him, (of which Knives nearly left his hiding to rip them apart. Over his dead body.) but Vash kept dodging their advances. It seemed they finally realized it was worthless. In any case, his hair was blackened. They didn’t know how long he had left, but it surely couldn’t be that long.
The Eye of Michael was nearly finally smushed under Knives heel. He had, regrettably, found he was receiving help he had not intended. Apparently some ex-cult members had turned into bounty hunters and were tracking them down, too. He learned this because he ran into one of them.
“Huh,” The human had said, “well, hey, could always use someone on the same side.”
“I am not on your side.” Knives snarled, and then he left. The humans kept showing up, and they kept greeting him. Annoying. At least they had not recognized him, likely simply low-life members he never dared show his face to, couldn’t be bothered.
Wolfwood’s grave was weathered with time. The cross had sunk significantly into the ground, but it was given a proper headstone. Flowers had been planted, green life coming to the planet under the Earth Federations help and a significant boost in Plants.
Knives had snarled his issues until Vash insisted it was being used kindly. Ship Three had been engineering a way to dampen the load upon the Plants, and it was finally put into effect. And indeed, every town and every city Knives spoke to his sisters (well, he checked in on them. Most of them didn’t speak to him anymore, and it did not make his very frame feel smaller than a child’s), they were at perfect functioning capacity.
He still did not like it. He still snarled and spat when he found a Plant who had been sent to her brink, one who’d been poisoned, tainted by greed and desperation. These were the few times Knives still bothered to upset Vash with his killing. And Vash would be saddened each time.
“Oh, like you have a right.” Knives snapped, hands bloodied with the dead human at his feet. “You cannot be so against death when it has stained you.”
“That doesn’t mean I liked it.” Vash said, quiet.
“Nevertheless,” Knives sneered, “you have found an excuse for it.”
“...I have.” Vash looked away. “I thought I understood it before then. Guess humans did taint me, huh?” He teased, dry.
And that twisted Knives in all manner of wrong. “You only refused because of humans in the first place.”
“And I killed for them.” Vash spoke blankly. “So what’s the difference?”
Vash seemed to be doing worse some days. It was always after he saw those girls or Livio, when his eyes would linger on their signs of age. Knives had rolled his eyes, waiting for him to drag his feet back. At least he could be relieved this would end eventually. Maybe Vash would finally come to his senses when there were no reminders left for him to speak to.
Unfortunately, Knives thus found him at far too many bars. He’d finally mustered the bravery to step inside one and hated it immediately. It was so loud. The lights were so bright. He backed out instantly and had to claw at his own skin as he paced for some time, coiled up on the inside.
He stood out there, watching people coming and going and waiting for Vash to finally step out already. He recalled leaning on the banister and cringing when some young woman slumped over nearby, sighing and rubbing at her eyes.
She glanced at him. He openly shuffled away.
“Too much in there, huh?” She said conversationally.
“Hooligans,” He huffed, and then bristled at once, because he knew what that meant—
“Yup,” She smiled, because now he’d just opened up a conversation. “I never like it in places like this, dunno why my friends insist on it. You get dragged out, too?”
Perhaps he could use this to his advantage. “I am here to fetch my brother.” He glanced at the doors, scowling. “Yet he is taking an eternity. Was there a man in there who looks like me?”
“Oh, uh, maybe?” She squinted at him. “Sorry, I wasn’t really looking around at people. My friends might, they’re always looking for a guy.” She rolled her eyes.
“Revolting,” He cringed in on himself at once, “tell them to keep their mitts to themselves.”
She snorted, amused at that, somehow. There was something spooling in his chest and he didn’t like it.
Then the doors to the saloon opened, and the man of the hour stumbled out.
“Finally!” Knives barked, storming right past the woman as he grabbed Vash’s arm. “We are supposed to leave in the morning, what the hell is wrong with you?”
“M’sorry,” Vash mumbled, slouching into his side, eyes rolling around lazily in his head.
“Good luck!” The woman called as Knives hauled his idiot brother down the steps. He growled wordlessly over his shoulder, because he did not need it, and certainly not from some human.
“Nai,” Vash muffled into his shoulder, “youuuu should. Should go.”
“And you should purge your liver.” Knives snipped back.
“Nai,” Vash grunted, then tried to push away from him. “I don’t, I can’t,” He closed his eyes, pressing his hands to his head, “I don’t want to…”
“Oh, you are such a child.” Knives rolled his eyes, taking his arm again. “This is what you get for poisoning yourself to such excess.”
“Don’t touch me,” Vash snipped, jerking away.
Knives raised a brow. Well now.
“Is now really the time for a tantrum?” He sighed, the two of them in the middle of the damn street.
“I don’t wanna talk,” Vash stumbled away, hands still to his face. “Please don’t talk to me.”
“Fine,” Knives tapped his foot, “but we are still going to the—”
“Stop talking.”
“Vash.” Knives returned, clipped. “I am not letting you wander the streets. You will get robbed. Assaulted.”
“I don’t care,” Vash slumped against a nearby wall, bowing his head low to his knees, “I don’t care. They should.”
“Oh for Christ’s sake,” Knives groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose. “I am not in the mood for your self-sacrificial tendencies right now.”
He sounded almost too put-together for someone who was drunk. It was a weird state with him, not thinking clearly as he fell to the ground, burying his face in his bent legs, clutching tight at his hair and pulling.
“Leave me alone.” Vash muffled into his legs.
“You are a grown fucking Plant, get up.” Knives commanded, standing over him.
“I don’t want to talk to you.” Vash clenched his hands tighter.
“I will carry you back if necessary.” Knives threatened, hands on his hips. “What did I even do this time? I haven’t killed anyone in ages!”
Vash tightened. He looked up—eyes shiny, wet with tears. Knives balked, staring as Vash’s hard glare met him, feathers lining down his cheeks.
“Oh, great,” Knives sighed, “what’s wrong with you now?”
“Everyone…” Vash looked down. “When I was eighty, everyone I knew was dead.”
“Boohoo,” Knives rolled his eyes.
“They’re getting old,” Vash whispered, shaking.
“They’re human, it happens.” Knives tapped his foot on the ground. “You’ll find a dozen others who tolerate you.”
Vash buried his face in his knees again. Hiccuped a little. Muffled, so quietly; “He was supposed to get old.”
Knives rolled his eyes to the sky. If God did exist, he asked for his patience. Stormed forward and grabbed Vash by the elbow, hauling him up to his feet. He didn’t care what the hell was bothering Vash now and he wouldn’t ever care.
Vash didn’t protest this time. He let Knives drag him all the way back to the old hotel. But Vash refused to go up the steps. He wobbled and swayed, and then took to the fire escape. Knives sighed, and after a moment followed him up to where Vash slumped over the roof, gingerly laying down and curling up.
“You cannot sleep up here.” He said.
“I hate you,” Vash muffled into his arms.
“Riveting,” Knives drawled, unimpressed. “Truly, I’m hurt.”
“M’sorry,” Vash muffled, shifting to sit with his knees pulled up to his chest, face hidden, “I don’t hate you.”
“Vash,” Knives stood over him, glancing once to the sky above, to the worms flying far. He hated seeing the worms. He knew Zazie was watching them. He had the urge to impale them. “Go to bed.”
“I love you,” Vash sniffled.
“I am aware.” Knives kept himself still. “You love and forgive, that is all you do.” He spat, bitter with it.
Vash raised his head, staring out emptily at the town. His cheeks were wet. His voice was hollow, clicking when he spoke. “I don’t forgive you.”
Knives blinked. Slowly raised a brow.
“I’ll never forgive you.” Vash sniffled, shoulders shaking with it.
“Oh, what,” Knives sneered, curling a lip, “am I supposed to cry about it? Give me a break, I don’t need your forgiveness.” He paused. “But you must, surely, because I am still here.”
“I love you,” Vash rested his chin on his knees, “but I don’t forgive you. That’s different.”
“You are ridiculous on your hang-ups.” Knives grumbled, arms crossed.
“I’m sorry,” Vash pressed the back of his hand to his eyes, “I can’t.”
“No?” Knives drawled, thoroughly bored.
“I miss you,” Vash sniffled, and that finally drew his attention, “I miss what…” He lowered his hand, staring emptily at his knees. “I can’t forgive you. And I can’t…love you. How I used to.”
Knives stared. And stared. And stared. There was a sliver of blades coiling around his leg, arching up and up and up.
“I love you,” Vash slowly looked to him, eyes deader than any corpse, “and I can’t recognize it anymore.” He pushed his hand over his face. “But I can’t recognize you, either. I think it…it’s always going to…”
Vash realized it now. That Nai and Millions Knives were two different entities. And Vash had finally come to accept this, as Knives always insisted he should. He has accepted what Knives enforced. Nai is dead. His brother is dead. A corpse remains. That love can never return. It has been dead for over a hundred and fifty years. What was fought for no longer existed, and maybe it never did.
It was as Knives always said it would be.
He left the roof. He did not know if Vash watched him and he did not check, wings spread wide. He landed among canyons stretching miles and miles. He felt himself contort and morph into even more volatile feathers and blades, the things he ripped out of the body of Millions Knives. The body of a stranger to Vash the Stampede.
It is exactly as it was meant to happen. He had set it in motion. He had ensured it with his own two hands. He was right. He had been correct. It was exactly what he said he wanted.
His heart beat far too loudly. How did anyone stand the sound?
Come that morning, people will pass by where canyons used to be. They will balk at the rubble left behind, talk of monsters and massive sandworms, to reduce a whole system of canyons to such destruction. They will find feathers covered in blood and nothing more.
Vash the Stampede will find the would-be God named Millions Knives a week later. He will find him as a monstrous beast, covered in eyes and wings that kept growing back no matter how many times they were torn from the root. He will take him to the conjunction of Plants in a nearby city, and their power will stitch up the cavernous hole in his chest that exposes his beating, impaled heart.
It was the first time they would all speak to him in thirty years. It was the first time he wanted them to shut up. For not the first time, they didn’t listen.
It was forty-two years since humanity nearly fell.
Livio was dead. His body could no longer keep up with all the enhancements had done to him, but even with that he had lived a truly impressive amount of time. A child he had taken in from the orphanage ran the place now. Vash had gone to the funeral, as had Thompson and Stryfe. Knives knew he was not welcome, so he did not attend.
They spoke of Livio for some time afterwards. Thompson especially, comforting Vash that he was with Wolfwood now, and they had a lot to tell each other. Vash’s smile was wobbly and wet, and Knives kept his mouth shut.
The Eye of Michael was dismantled. Livio had lived to see the last of it destroyed. Knives had grudgingly worked with the ex-members and their information. He kept his blades tucked away and shot with only his gun. They offered him a place among them, and he sneered with a cruel smile and told them that would be their greatest mistake. He will give them the only mercy he has ever granted: he will reject that offer.
He took the symbol of the Eye and held onto it for some time. He could not explain why he did this: he went to Hopeland, without Vash’s permission, and he found Livio standing out the back. Before any guns could be drawn, he tossed the symbol at Livio.
“There.” He snapped, “Now you can quit looking over your shoulder every damn minute.”
He barely spoke to Livio. But the times he did, he saw his twitchy nature. Heard of it from Thompson and Stryfe. It was driving him nuts.
Livio just looked at the symbol in his hands. Thumbed over it quietly. His other eye had been slowly giving out on him, but it wasn’t there just yet. The constant regeneration was failing him. His face was so pale, covered in wrinkles.
“Huh,” Livio spoke, and he finally looked up, “never thought you’d manage to clean up your own mess.”
“Fuck you,” Knives spat, and he saw the tiniest hopeful smile before he turned and left.
Livio was dead two years later, almost down to the very day.
Vash closed himself further. He spent an obscene amount of time around Hopeland, the endless children. Knives hated children. They were so noisy and wanted to touch everything. That, and nobody trusted him around them, which he was perfectly fine with.
More than once Vash was still by that damn grave. The fabric had fully rotted off the Punisher, and the metal beneath was so rusted it finally looked like true stone. He still visited it the same day, every year. He had heard Vash talking to it before he turned and noticed Knives, shutting up before he could hear anything concrete.
Of all the people Vash had met in his life, it was Wolfwood he talked about the least. Knives had realized this after a while. That Punisher sure seemed to haunt him plenty, but Vash spoke more about strange bandits he’d fought than he’d speak of Wolfwood, anything actually about him. It was like prying out teeth, and Knives didn’t even care to hear anything about him in the first place. It was suspicious. Especially after he’d taken up smoking after the man had kicked it.
For once, he tried to quell his temper, especially with Vash so high-strung after Livio’s passing. Though he still wrinkled his nose at the smoke.
Before Livio’s untimely end, he took the opportunity to venture on his own, now that he was trusted to be alone for long periods of time. Left for a full year before he came back, and Vash just smiled upon his return.
“Did you have fun?” Was all Vash asked.
“It was boring.” Knives scoffed. “This planet has nothing to offer.”
“It was boring without you, too.” Vash teased, and Knives just rolled his eyes.
On the day he came back to that old building in December, the one they actually paid for, he stopped at the threshold. Vash was nursing a bottle of wine, one called The Bride. He noticed this only because it was the one wine Vash said he despised and had never once drank from, no matter which bar he went to.
He was also turning that zippo lighter around his fingers, staring out at the empty sunset. He was sitting on the small balcony, bottle dangling from his fingertips. He was drinking it straight from the neck.
“Alright,” Knives sighed, and was surprised to find Vash startling, looking back. Somehow, he hadn’t noticed his arrival, “fine. I give in.”
“...you…do?” Vash raised a questioning brow.
“Sitting here and watching this is just a testament of patience not even I have.” Knives leaned one arm on the chair Vash sat upon, glowering down at him. “Why?”
“...why?” Vash cocked his head.
“This,” Knives gestured to all of him. “All of this. All of this brooding. You are nearly two hundred years old, and you have never been so goddamn melancholic over one damn human.”
Vash blinked, slowly. He could see how he started closing in on himself. “You weren’t there for most of my life.”
“You were observed.” Knives said simply, which got Vash’s eyes boggling a little. “And I was not reported on any particular moping lasting anywhere near this long. What the hell did that Punisher do to you? This is pathetic.”
Vash blinked at him. Then he smiled sheepishly, closing the lighter into his fist. He was without his coat, in that tacky underarmor of his. They were on a high enough floor that no one would see him. He drew his legs up onto the chair, crossing them and looking down at the bottle of wine.
“He didn’t do anything.” Vash mumbled, thumbing over the details on the glass.
“It can’t just be you.” Knives curled a lip. “He did something and it’s pissing me off. You never speak of him, either. Like a bad stain.”
“There are some things…” Vash’s face downturned. “That maybe isn't for you to know.”
“Excuse me?” Knives reared back.
“Maybe,” Vash continued, “I want something for myself.” He lifted the bottle to his lips, then tipped his head back. “And maybe it’s Wolfwood.”
“Oh for—” Knives rolled his eyes. “Fine, don’t tell me. I still don’t get why he of all humans has to matter so much to you. Look at you, you’re disgraceful.”
“You grieve for the people you love,” Vash mumbled into the rim.
“Love,” Knives repeated. He felt spikes shoot out down his spine, lining the joints. “You loved him?”
Vash paused. There was a certain tone to Knives' voice, and he truly hoped he was incorrect, because even Vash knew what that meant. He had this ‘love’ for humanity, this guilty conscience and care. But there was his undying, otherworldly love, and then there was—
“Well,” Vash lowered the bottle with a shy smile, eyes glinting as he glanced Knives' way, “suppose you can’t do anything about it now, can you?”
What the fuck.
“You’re joking.” Knives stared, horrified.
“Not about him.” Vash looked back out to the city of December, twirling the lighter over his fingers again.
“You don’t—” Knives took a step back. “That’s not a feeling we have.”
“Excuse me.” Vash snapped his eyes to him, hardened at once.
“We are Plants.” Knives bared his fangs, feeling wild. “Such—such matters are for animals, the humans who are drawn by lust to—”
“I did not say lust,” Vash kept staring, a poised bomb primed to go off, “I said I’m in love with him.”
“You don’t have that capacity.” Knives insisted.
Vash was on his feet in the blink of an eye. The lighter was discarded on the small table next to him and Knives was backed up against the railing with a hand fisting into his shirt, Vash’s fangs risking catching on his nose. They were much too big for his skull. He dropped the wine bottle as well, where it clattered against the stone balcony.
“Do not tell me what capacity I have.” Vash hissed, low and cold. “If I’m not in love with him, then I don’t know what this is.”
“You are confused.” Knives bared his teeth. “We are not capable of such things, it is beneath us.”
“Wolfwood is not beneath me.” Knives' back was hurting from the angle it was bent over the railing, the long drop below, both hands clutching at the metal clasps of his underarmor.
“He was a Punisher.” Knives snapped back. “He was sent to you under false pretenses, kept you alive to suffer, and then what?” He laughed, vindictive. “He was nice to you a few times?”
“Nai.” Vash warned, pupils slitted and glowing lines flickering.
“We are not human.” He continued anyway. “There are many, many things that differentiate us from them. We are not driven by such disgusting instincts—”
“I will throw you from this balcony.” Vash got even closer in his face, growling in an otherworldly tone. “I have spent years trying not to be in love with Wolfwood—”
“You didn’t know him that long!” Knives was aghast.
“I’m aware!” Vash shook him, claws digging in. “Believe me, he deserves far better than to be remembered by someone like me, but I am in love with him, and that is—” He turned his head away, eyes squeezed shut. “That’s never changing.” He let out, shaky as his eyes opened again. “I’ve tried.”
“You don’t even know what that is, because you can’t feel it.” Knives snapped. “If we were capable of such repugnant impulses, would I have not suffered from it?” He scoffed, haughty. “Clearly, I have not. Because we are above it.”
“You—” Vash flared out, growing just a bit in size with feathers—and then stopped, and he was right back to normal. Stared at Knives for a moment, blinking. Released him. “I think…that’s a you thing.”
“Excuse me.” He repeated back, the same exact tone as Vash had hit him with.
“Well, no, sorry, not just a you thing.” Vash corrected, stepping back and looking him over once. “Happens to humans all the time, too. Huh,” He stared, then tilted his head. “Some things are kinda making sense now.”
“What in the actual hell are you talking about—stop changing the conversation!” Knives swiped at him. Vash just took another step back.
“How much did you figure out about human sexuality?” Vash clasped his palms together. “Because let me tell you, they came up with so many new words in the last two centuries, its nuts—”
“I do not care!” Knives exploded. “You’re not in love with the Punisher!”
“No,” Vash agreed, and his face went sad at the edges again, “I’m in love with Wolfwood.”
“He’s dead.” Knives spat. “Even if that were true, which I seriously doubt, the correct sentence would begin with ‘I was.’”
“Nope,” Vash slowly sat down in the chair again, reaching to pick up the bottle from the floor. “It’s present tense.” He looked over what remained in the bottle after it dropped, sighing. “He’d give me the biggest ‘I told you so’ if he were here.”
“Pardon?” Knives narrowed his eyes, stepping away from the banister and rubbing at his back.
“He always got mad about how I don’t want people to die. Said I was wasting my time.” Vash looked over the bottle, took a sip, then set it down to look for the lighter. “Called me spoiled for it, that I didn’t have the right to dictate what was or wasn’t right. When I could just leave society whenever I wished and let all that chased me die.” He looked over the lighter when he found it, holding it up. “That I hadn’t had anyone I loved enough to feel such personal despair for.”
Knives stared. Slowly moved to stand next to him, ears pricked. He was disgusted, but intrigued nonetheless. This was already more than Vash ever spoke about Wolfwood, even if it didn’t give any real insight to that…nature of theirs.
“I called him a coward for it.” Vash flicked the lighter to life, melancholy. “In a way, I suppose he was, he gave up way too easily. But…” He stared into the little flame. “I get it now. That drive to use a bullet in such a way.” He closed the lighter, looking out to the fading, darkening sky. “It’s kinda funny. I lived for a hundred and fifty years, I thought I’d seen everything humanity had to offer, everything I could ever learn from them.” He smiled, just a little. “And then there came Wolfwood.”
Knives was quiet for some time. He watched the sky, watched as Vash picked up his wine and drank the rest of it down like it was the end of the world. Watched him set it aside. Watched him reach for a pack of cigarettes that weren’t there before pausing.
“...but he did not lay his hands on you, yes?” Knives blurted.
Vash glanced at him with wide, spooked eyes for a moment before abruptly turning them away just as quickly. “I’m not detailing anything to you.”
“Vash.” Knives felt a horrified shot under his skin.
“I said it was for us, and it remains that way!” Vash snipped, meanwhile Knives was trying very hard not to book it to a gravesite and viciously rip apart the corpse in there, just upon the chance he had—”And in any case, I didn’t…” He looked down. “Get to tell him any of that. So who knows,” He shrugged, leaning back in the chair, “probably just me making an idiot of myself again.”
“I do not even know where to begin with this.” Knives just kept staring, mortified, disgusted, and couldn’t decide if he needed to murder a dead man more or purge his own brain.
“You asked.” Vash muttered, sulking.
“I would have rather he infected you with some brain-altering chip.” Knives curled his lip. “He may as well have. That is abhorrent.”
“It’s not for everyone.” Vash chuckled, now just amused. “Will it stop bothering you, now?” He teased.
“This is bothering me significantly worse.” Knives blanched.
“Whoops,” Vash didn’t sound very sorry at all. “But, I mean,” He smiled, just a little cheeky, “he did take care of me. Weren’t those his orders?”
“I’m murdering that fucking mutt.” Knives snarled, claws digging into the back of the chair.
“Too late,” Vash chirped, but his eyes were sharp all the same, an unsaid warning.
Knives let out a wordless abomination of clicks, grating at his throat, before he spun on his heel and stormed out. Vash waved him goodbye with faux cheerfulness, and Knives tried not to rip off his own skin to rid himself of the foul crawling.
Love. With a human? With his Punisher? And now he had reason to believe it wasn’t simply Vash getting such offensive feelings from afar, no, there was…something that transpired that may have encouraged it along. He dreaded even imagining it. Didn’t, for the sake of not going off to murder a few humans and quell his nerves. Paced and raved until he was sure even the worms were laughing at him, of which he impaled straight through the eye and flung their bodies. He hoped Zazie felt that pain, the traitor.
Perhaps it would have been better if he never asked. The whole time Vash was on his way to him, the whole time, he was—?
He could not imagine a more horrendous existence. Torturous in a way not even he could bear to inflict. Yes, he knew of the stupidity humans could commit in such a state, of the bloody acts, of the foolishness and the crimes. ‘Love’, in such a context, turned humans into beasts almost as ugly as greed and fear.
Never mind the lust that, as far as he was concerned, went hand-in-hand. That was something hideous. He avoided it at any given cost. Granted—he was loathsome to admit it, he knew of Legato Bluesummers faults. One of them had been his…eugh. He shuddered to think of it even now. He never entertained such thoughts, and the only reason he kept that man around was because he clearly understood they would never be entertained, and such devotion had served him better than any human ever had. There was benefit to be found in such horrific ideas, when one knew how to control it.
But participating?
He looked off to the grave, far across December. He could not see it from here, but in all his years, he’d gone there enough times to fetch Vash. So he knew where it was, and he scowled with a force that had made men quiver with fear.
“You are lucky, Punisher,” He hissed, “that death has spared you from me.”
And if such a state rendered Vash so…so like that, so caught up on a man dead for over forty years, so horrendously sad—no, he was glad he was above it. That he hadn’t been tainted by humanity in such a despicable way. No human could ever be worth such things. The Punisher had ruined his brother.
Another thing that was his own fault, really.
Knives snarled into the air, and he left Vash far behind to his mourning. Idiot.