Chapter Text
Vash can’t stop staring at his hands. One flesh, one metal, trembling and unsteady. They’re pristine; there’s no blood and grave dirt creased into his palms. Underneath his feet, there’s only grass, though some part of him expects the churned up dirt of the killing field. He fears that if he looks up, he’ll find the shell of a half-blown out building. But there are only trees.
He lifts his right hand to his face, covering his mouth. When he breathes in, all he smells is the leather of his gloves, not iron and gunpowder. Beneath that is the air of the garden, redolent with the scent of blooming flowers. It’s an alien sensation for this once barren world. In some ways, it defies the laws of nature. Much like a man coming back from the dead.
He glances at his twitching fingers again, the ones that man nearly broke in his grip. It felt just the same as it did on that day, so long ago now, when he spotted someone passed out in the desert.
Strong and calloused. Real and warm and alive.
His hair is longer and his clothes are more casual, but there’s no mistaking those liquid dark eyes. Vash remembers how easily he used to get lost in them, drowning in their depths whether the other man was angry or exasperated or amused. Until the day they were nothing more than flat gray discs staring up at a disappearing shuttle.
But just now, they’d gazed at him like no time had passed and no insurmountable barriers had been crossed.
It wasn’t a hallucination or a drunken fantasy. He wasn’t a ghost or a dream or a doppelganger or a strange coincidence.
Wolfwood. That was Wolfwood.
There’s no doubt about that. Vash knows Wolfwood down to his atoms, past blood and bone and sinew to his very core.
He knows that voice, that deep, whiskey-smooth rumble. He’d called out to the children, and it was like he was yelling Vash’s name again, annoyed that he was about to do something stupid. And Vash knows that body too, how it moves, the unerring confidence with which he holds himself and tries to intimidate Vash. He even reaches for his cigarettes with the same offhanded gesture and keeps them in the same place, too.
If he had any doubts before, they disappeared when Wolfwood invaded his space, drawing close enough that Vash could hear the steady beat of his heart. It was a sound he’d grown used to over the long months of their journey and during his solitary confinement on the Ark. No matter where he was, no matter how far away or how dark the night, Vash had always been able to pick out that heartbeat. It thrummed in his ears as Wolfwood questioned him.
Vash had heard that heart stop, the breath flee from his lungs, the complex movements of his body going suddenly, starkly limp. He’d dug a hole in the ground and buried that body six feet deep. But here was Wolfwood, like it was just a bad dream and Vash had finally woken up. Except, as it always was in Vash’s life, reality was far worse than a nightmare. Despite the way Vash knew Wolfwood inside out, Wolfwood looked at him like he was a stranger.
Wolfwood’s eyes had moved over him, sharp and glinting, in exactly the same way he did when he was assessing a potential threat. And when Vash told him his name, it meant nothing to him.
He doesn’t remember me, he thinks and drags his hand down his face. He doesn’t even remember his name.
Vash tries to take a breath and the air rattles in his lungs, refusing to go down. The trembling spreads from his hands to invade the rest of his body, and he can’t stop shaking.
What is this? What’s happening? How is any of this possible? Vash has so many questions, but the answers don’t matter. However Wolfwood is alive, however he found himself in Haven with no memory of himself, it pales in comparison to the other thing Vash saw.
Wolfwood has a life here.
Garth speaks to him like an old friend, and apparently, Wolfwood even had a hand in the planting of the garden. And the children—the children know him and love him. They aren’t scared of him and they come when he calls. He’s someone important to them, someone they trust.
Though it haunts him every day of his life how little Vash knows about his friend, it was obvious from the moment they met how much he cares about kids. And on the day he died, Vash learned how much he was willing to give up for them too, even when he thought they could no longer love him.
Whatever questions or wants he has, as much as his body screams to chase after Wolfwood and never let him out of his sight again, Vash won’t. He can’t risk destroying this perfect thing Wolfwood has created. He won’t drag Wolfwood back into his orbit and ruin his life by association again.
After everything, Wolfwood deserves to live the life of an ordinary man. Not an assassin, an experiment, or a companion of an outlaw. He’s Nico, just Nico, and Vash will do everything in his power to make sure he remains that way.
Finally, his body gives out and the trembling disbelief he was holding back crumples him to his knees. He fists his hands in the grass and tries to appreciate the miracle of this place, the smoothness of each individual blade, the springy dirt between his fingers, sensations from a long forgotten childhood. He closes his eyes and listens to his sister’s never ending song and the musical rustling of the leaves and tries to forget that he ever met Nicholas D. Wolfwood.
But he can’t. The blackness behind his eyelids conjures images of Nico smiling at the children, of his back retreating from Vash’s sight. Of Wolfwood, bloodied and beaten, his heart slowing, content and ready to leave it all behind.
It’ll happen again if Vash doesn’t get out of here. He ruins everything he touches, kills anyone who gets close to him. If he’s not careful, it’ll happen to Meryl and Milly too. It’ll happen to Haven, just like it happened to July. Vash could wipe out this whole damn town, this beautiful, wonderful place that’s trying so hard to build something good from the ashes of itself. What a fool he’s been to think anyone could be safe with him.
His sister’s worried trill breaks through his spiral, and Vash gasps. The world comes rushing back in. His hands are clenched so tight, the gears in his metal hand have started to whir, and there’s a rush of tears sliding down his cheeks. The geoplant worries at his mind, nudging him with comfort and concern that makes Vash’s gut roil with guilt.
He lurches to his feet, sending a half-convincing hum of reassurance to his sister, and stumbles out of the dream of the garden and into the solid present of the town.
Vash isn’t sure where he’s going, and it doesn’t matter anyway. The more distance he can put between himself and Wolfwood’s haunting presence, the better. Some part of him hopes that the space will make him seem less real, just another hallucination. He’s been losing his mind for years, what’s a little more insanity to add to the mess in his head? But even surrounded by the mundanity of a town that is just like any other on No Man’s Land, Vash can’t let go.
He sees Nico around every corner, in any tall man that crosses his path, and he jumps at the smell of cigarette smoke. In all his years of longing, he hasn’t wanted to see someone again as badly, if only to remind himself that Nico is real. But he can’t touch him, though he aches to envelop him in his arms and never let go. Vash doesn’t deserve that when he couldn’t save Wolfwood when it mattered most. Not when any association between them would blow up the soft, peaceful life Nico has here.
In all his years of wandering, Vash’s feet have never led him astray. Now that he’s shaking and breathless and afraid he’ll start screaming with the grief and guilt pumping through his veins, he’s not surprised when he stops in front of the one place that could offer him respite.
The saloon.
Booze always steadies him. It smoothes out the jagged edges his mind catches on, calms the screaming, gibbering thing that tries to claw out of Vash’s chest. On his worst days, it’s all he has to keep the dark thoughts away and get him to sleep without the blood-drenched nightmares that lurk in the recesses of his unconscious.
Just stepping into the smoky shadows of the bar calms the relentless scraping in his head. When the bartender, a slight woman with curly golden brown hair, pours him a shot, his shoulders drop and he sighs in anticipation. The whiskey burns when it goes down and drowns out everything else. For a moment, he forgets what sent him running here, until he opens his eyes and sees the bartender holding a bottle of Bride.
Vash asks for another shot. And another.
His alcohol tolerance isn’t what it used to be. After a particularly bad night almost a year and a half ago, Meryl and Milly made him promise to lay off the booze. And he really had. Today, he needs it, but at least he has the shame to nurse his fourth shot and not ask for the whole bottle. Like the drunk he is, deep down, he craves it. But he won’t. Vash still has some lines left.
The buzz pads his head enough to muffle the voice screaming abuse at himself and soothe the raw wound in his chest where Wolfwood always lives. It doesn’t hurt so much now to consider Nico as he is.
He’s healthier, that’s for sure, filled out enough that he’s not all muscle stretched taut with nerves. He lets his cigarette dangle from his lips and doesn't grind down the filter within an inch of its life. Shockingly, Nico smells the same too. Vash was overwhelmed by the scent of him when Nico got in his face. He’s still cigarettes and gunsmoke, with just the slightest hint of whiskey.
Vash hadn’t expected the gunsmoke, hadn’t noticed the faint outline of a handgun under his jacket until he was close enough that Vash could’ve reached out and brushed Nico’s overgrown bangs from his eyes. Nico barely brushes his hair, and neither did Wolfwood, but Wolfwood never would’ve let it grow that long. It would get in the way too much during a firefight.
Most of all, he looked happy. Though perhaps that’s too weak a word for it. Vash turns the glass in his palms, watching the amber liquid slosh around, and thinks that he’s never seen Wolfwood look so unburdened.
Nico’s broad shoulders weren’t bowed beneath expectations that would’ve crushed another man alive. So often, he’d accused Vash of faking smiles when Wolfwood rarely smiled at all. And here’s Nico, a beautiful easy grin on his face while the sun shines down on him and makes his dark eyes glitter with hidden depths and a gaggle of excited children surround him. It was the kind of toothy grin that Vash took great pride in pulling out of him with a dumb joke or half-serious whining session. In their most relaxed moments together, though they were few and far between, Vash did what he could to get Wolfwood to light up with the goodness hiding in his soul. He cherished those times more than anything, knowing they were just for him.
Selfish thing that he is, he spent every moment of their short, strange conversation hoping Nico would do that for him, too. One kind thing to last Vash the rest of his interminably long life. But Nico didn’t so much as quirk his lips in Vash’s direction, and Vash’s hopes came crashing back down to this harsh dusty planet he lived on.
This man doesn’t know Vash or his exaggerated humor. He can't laugh with him or at him. He isn’t Wolfwood, he’s Nico, and Nico’s never known Vash the Stampede as anything but a fiend and an outlaw. Even if he does smile the same way.
Vash sniffs into his drink and takes a sip to burn away the tears gathering behind his eyes. More than anyone else Vash has met, Wolfwood—Nico—deserves to smile like that more often. It was good to see it again, if only for a moment. Even if it wasn’t meant for Vash. Haven is lucky to have him.
An older man settles on the bar stool beside Vash with the relieved huff of someone who’s delighted to be sitting down after a long day of work. He takes off his battered hat and uses it to wave over the bartender before fanning himself with it. The bartender immediately drops what she’s doing to get him a drink, not even asking what he wants.
He’s stout and strong, with shocks of gray in his unruly brown beard and his equally unruly hair. His clothes are the worn yet comfortable fare of just about every average citizen of No Man’s Land. Even the gun at his hip is unremarkable, a well-used yet serviceable revolver. In many ways, it’s like Vash’s, like anyone who has spent their fair share of time surviving on this planet. Marked and used and battered, but still here, still somehow alive and taken care of by someone who treasures it for some unfathomable reason.
Judging by the way the bartender casually pours him a drink, he’s just another local. The man accepts it with only the thanks a raised glass can offer. It’s not anything Vash should be troubled by, least of all right now.
Vash intends to continue staring into the depths of his glass, and is contemplating the best way to drown himself in it, when the clicking of a lighter draws his attention. The man growls in frustration, a cigarette clenched in his teeth, and mumbles, “Damned thing.”
He flicks the lighter’s wheel again to no avail.
The gesture has become automatic to Vash. He reaches into his pocket and holds out the silver lighter he keeps there for emergencies.
“Here.” With an easy twitch of his finger, he lights the flame.
“Much obliged,” the man says, leaning forward until the tip catches. He sits back with a satisfied sigh, and Vash inhales the comforting scent of cigarette smoke. His duty done, Vash snaps the lid shut with a flourish and puts the lighter away until the next time a stranger needs a light. It must shift the tails of his coat because his neighbor’s eyebrows go up.
“Nice piece you got there,” he says. The man’s voice is gruff, but with the kindly undertones of someone’s uncle or grandfather. It still startles Vash, who has grown accustomed to getting a far more aggressive reception in bars when someone notices his gun. But when Vash glances at him, he finds nothing except curiosity in his gray eyes.
“Yours isn’t so bad either,” Vash replies. Even though he’d rather be pickling his liver in silence, he’s just buzzed enough that a conversation seems like a good idea. Truth be told, it’s not often he gets asked about his gun without the other person wanting to use theirs against him.
“I’d certainly say yours is a mite fancier. Is it custom?”
“Sure is!”
Vash forgets about his drink and spends the next ten minutes comparing specs and talking shop with the old timer. He knows his way around a six-shot revolver and asks interesting enough questions that Vash takes the risk of unholstering his and showing it off. He doesn’t usually get the chance to do that unless he’s threatening to shoot somebody and trying to get off on the intimidation factor alone. Before he knows it, they both have their guns out, weighing the pros and cons of Vash’s Long Colt to the man’s standard Smith & Wesson, and then suddenly Vash is waxing poetic about the advantages of having a heavier gun in a firefight.
(Less recoil and it makes a great bludgeoning tool if you run out of bullets).
The other man’s knowing smile brings Vash to an embarrassed halt.
“A gunslinger, eh?” he says.
Vash shrugs sheepishly, holstering his gun again. “More of a bodyguard these days.” He hides his reddening cheeks behind his glass, taking a fortifying sip. “Though you seem to know your way around a gun pretty well, too.”
“Oh, I’ve been around,” the man says with a chuckle. “Learned some things in my time. Name’s Neil Rosen, by the way.”
“Vash Saverem.”
“Fitting,” Neil says, raising his glass in acknowledgement. They both drink this time, and though the whiskey still burns, Vash finds it goes down much smoother when his throat isn’t closed tight. “Not sure what kind of work there is for you here though. Unless you and Nico wanna duke it out to see who’s the best shot.”
At the mention of his name, Vash jolts like he’s been shot. The pain in his heart that he’d buried beneath the alcohol and conversation returns with a vengeance.
“Was it somethin’ I said?” Neil jokes with all the good humor Vash is currently missing.
Quickly, Vash schools his face and puts on a tight-lipped smile. “It’s nothing!”
Neil examines him closely over the top of his glass, gray eyes winking shrewdly. Then a big grin spreads over his face and he guffaws, startling Vash so that he nearly jumps again.
“Had a run in with Nico, did ya? Lemme guess. You were talkin’ with some of the orphanage kids?”
“Wow, got it in one,” Vash says weakly. He’s not sure if he can take this. Another person who knows Wolfwood. Another piece of proof that he belongs to this place now.
“That boy sure knows how to scare the piss out of people.” Neil shakes his head with fond amusement. “Don’t worry ‘bout it though. If he hasn’t run you out of town, it means you’ve passed muster. He’s got a bit o’ bite to him, but he’ll grow on ya after awhile.”
Don’t I know it, Vash thinks miserably. Neil hasn’t said anything about Wolfwood that Vash doesn’t already know, and it still hurts to hear. Since he’s apparently a masochist, he decides to find out just how much Neil knows about Nico and the man he’s grown into these last two years.
“So, um, who is he? I didn’t really get a chance to ask.”
“A friend of mine, for one thing, so I hope you’ll believe me when I say he’s a good kid. His heart’s in the right place.” Neil takes a thoughtful sip, making the same face Vash imagines he would if someone asked him to describe Wolfwood. “Otherwise, well, he’s a lotta things ‘round here. Best shot, like I said, though Martha can give him a run for his money. Makes a living bartending and handymaning, mostly. Puts in a lot of time at the orphanage, as you’d expect.”
“Is he from here?” The people of No Man’s Land have always been itinerant to an extent. Whether they’re running from something or seeking better fortunes, people go wherever the wind blows them. The last few years have only made it more true, so it’s not a strange question to ask. And Vash can’t help but wonder how a dead man ends up in a town so far from where he was buried, living peaceably among its residents.
“Nah, we picked him up in the desert.” Neil makes this statement as breezily as can be and it has Vash raising an eyebrow. There’s a lot to unpack there.
“That’s…something,” is what Vash settles on.
Neil chuckles. “Yeah, I guess you could say Nico's our local man o’ mystery. Actually, it’s quite a story how we found him.”
If he hadn’t realized it during their earlier conversation, it becomes clear now that Neil is something of a storyteller. He spins a tale of a dangerous trek across an empty desert hauling a precious Plant, a caravan of refugees attempting to rebuild their lives, and a man who appears out of nowhere. They find him miles from anything, half-crazed with thirst and no memory of his past. He tells them he woke up alone in a big, empty building and has been traveling on foot since, long ago losing track of how many days he’s wandered. Committed to their fresh start, they offer him the same thing. They’re grateful for it when, a few days later, he proves himself to be a gunslinger in his own right, saving them and their Plant from raiders. Nico has been a part of Haven ever since, one of its earliest and most devoted residents.
“Not that it was all sunshine and roses in the beginning, mind,” Neil says, taking a pull from his cigarette. “A lotta people thought he was fakin’ the amnesia, especially after his little sharpshootin’ display. Couple fools even thought he was workin’ with the raiders, actin’ as their inside man or some dumb shit like that.”
“But not you?”
“Nah. See, a man like that, he’s seen some things. Who hasn’t the past few years?” Neil taps the ashes off the end of his cigarette, his weather-beaten face turning contemplative. “I think he survived something unsurvivable. People cope with it differently. Some get lost in the bottle and others turn to religion, but if what happened is bad enough, I imagine it’s easier to forget. Someone who can fight like that, he’s better off not rememberin’, better just walkin’ away and livin’ the best life he can.”
Vash remembers standing among the rubble of Jeneora Rock, gazing up at the hole he’d blasted into the Fifth Moon, and wishing for the same thing. To forget. To be forgotten. To be someone else entirely, not this weapon of mass destruction. So he stripped himself of everything that made him Vash the Stampede. He became small, meek Eriks, living a quiet life with Lina and Sheryl, where the hardest thing he had to do was keep Lina out of trouble. And for all the indignities he suffered, he loved it, right up until Wolfwood came calling and Vash was forced to return to reality.
Some days, he still misses it.
He swallows around the lump in his throat and stares down at his reflection in the glass. “Yeah, I think so too.”
The ambient noise of the saloon rushes back in as they each get lost in their own minds, their own pasts, for a minute. Then, Vash watches his reflection narrows its eyes in confusion and swings back around to look at Neil.
“Wait, why did people think he was working with the raiders?”
“It was the damndest thing, actually,” Neil says. “He didn’t kill any of ‘em.”
“What?” Vash rasps.
“Well, I’m certain he maimed some of ‘em, but I’ve never seen anything like it. He was deliberately not takin’ lethal shots. I’m talkin’ takin’ out kneecaps. In the dark. At fifteen paces. Saw him shoot the guns outta their hands too. That’s a whole lotta effort to go to for some raiders.”
Vash’s head is spinning, but it isn’t from the alcohol. Is it happiness that fills him? Relief? Whatever it is, it’s bittersweet like so much of today has been.
Oh, Wolfwood. You finally put down your cross.
“What convinced you to let him stay?”
“For one thing, he risked a lot to save our skins and didn’t ask for nothin’ in return. But we also believe in second chances ‘round here. When we offered him one, he seemed pretty committed to it.”
“That’s a very noble idea.”
“And we take it real serious. It’s even in the town charter!”
Vash laughs. “I like the sound of that.”
Neil nods in agreement and finishes off the dregs in his glass. “I hate to cut ya off but I’ve got some business to attend to. It was a pleasure speakin’ with ya, Vash. I’ll see you around.”
With a firm handshake and a polite tipping of his hat, Neil goes off and meets two people who’ve been patiently waiting by the door. Chatting animatedly, he leads them to the far end of the bar and sets up camp in the corner, surrounded by the newcomers. Vash never did ask what he did. He must be a businessman of some kind, to be meeting with people in a saloon in the evening.
Vash finishes the last of his drink and orders another. The relentless swirling of his thoughts has passed, as has the need to chug alcohol like water. He could leave, find the girls and see what they’re up to, but for right now, he wants the quiet anonymity the bar offers. He can never truly be invisible, but he likes to pretend sometimes, especially on days where he wants to be alone with his thoughts and memories.
It’s not a facade he can keep up for long, but Vash lets himself fade into the background. He lowers his face, curls inwards, and becomes just another man relaxing after a long day. His mind wanders down old paths, remembering things he should probably leave in the past but that he never learned to let go of. The dead, the lost, the forgotten, the many mistakes he’s made. Sometimes, he finds the good too—the people he’s saved, the joys he’s witnessed, the few happy times he had with friends and family.
Habit has him eavesdropping, on the lookout for danger or useful information. He catches snatches of conversation, contextless snippets about people’s lives and jobs and problems. He smiles to hear so much talk about the garden, even here.
He’s long lost track of time when a voice pings his danger radar.
“You been drinkin’ all day, old man?”
Vash turns towards the voice like it’s true north and sees Nico lounging against the bar, talking to Neil. Except he’s behind the bar. The woman is nowhere to be seen. What’s he doing here?
Then, it comes back to him. Bartender. Neil said Nico was a bartender. Much too late, Vash remembers this is the only saloon in town.
The urge to melt under the bar and scuttle out is strong. He resists, purely because it would pull more attention towards him and that’s the last thing he needs. Vash stays still and listens, waiting for the right moment—when they’re distracted and not looking his way—to slip out.
“Multitaskin’! Drinkin’ and takin’ meetings!” Neil responds.
As Nico pours him another glass, he shakes his head. “What’s the point of havin’ an office if you don’t even use it?”
“Hmph! And risk gettin’ jumped by some nosy reporters? No thanks!”
That gives Vash pause. Unless this little place has some very persistent local journalists, the only ones in town are Meryl and Milly. And their only plans today were to speak with the town council. So who exactly is Neil? He doesn’t strike Vash as any sort of government official, and he’s unfortunately quite familiar with that type.
All the while, Vash’s eyes follow Nico. Now that he isn’t caught in helpless panic, he picks up on all the little details he missed earlier.
Nico’s hair is a little longer in the back, brushing against his neck in the beginnings of a mullet. The shaggy look is good on him. Vash in equal parts wants to make fun of him for it and curl the soft strands around his fingers. Though some things never change. He still leaves his shirt indecently unbuttoned. And there’s still that surliness of his, but now more than ever, Vash feels that he’s playing it up. As a defense mechanism or for a laugh, he isn’t sure. Nico’s smiles sneak through, even when he grumps at a customer or moans about Neil’s penchant for taking business meetings in the goddamn saloon.
Vash doesn’t realize he’s staring until, from all the way down the bar, Nico’s dark eyes lock onto his. He jerks his gaze back into the depths of his glass, but not before he catches the uncharacteristically flustered expression on Nico’s face. His luck holds out, though, and Nico doesn’t bother him. They’ve got no business this time and Vash’s drink is still basically full.
He tells himself he should leave. Now’s as good a time as any. He’s already caught Nico’s attention by accident; there’s no point in hiding his departure. But it’s too hard to look away from the sight of him, breathing and moving so casually.
And then Nico picks up a bottle of Bride.
As he pours, every clink of glass takes Vash back to the couch they sat on as they watched the suns set. Wolfwood’s strong fingers stained with blood, gripping the neck of the bottle until he couldn’t anymore. The dull thunk of it falling to the earth and the utter silence next to him.
Except Wolfwood is here instead, his hands sure, steady, and unmarked. Vash watches those hands rearrange bottles on the shelves and wipe down glasses, a far gentler occupation than they were used to. It’s mesmerizing. He can’t bring himself to walk away from it, not yet.
He’s so enamored, he doesn’t pick up on the approaching click, click, click of Meryl’s boots until it’s too late.
“There you are!” Meryl says. Vash has just enough time to wheeze in panic before she collapses on the stool next to him and groans, angling a disapproving look at the glass in his hand.
Milly takes the empty seat on Meryl’s other side, leaning around her to smile happily at him. “We’ve been looking all over for you!”
“Ah, well—” Vash starts, but Milly barrels on.
“It’s good you’re here though, ‘cause I’m starving!”
“We skipped lunch to get more interviews,” Meryl pipes up. “There’s a way bigger story here than we originally thought. It’s not just about the garden, the entire founding—or refounding, I guess—of this town is exactly the kind of thing people need to hear about. I mean, listen—”
She’s already chattering a mile a minute, not paying him any mind. Vash hardly hears her. His heart is pounding and his mind is racing, glancing between Wolfwood’s back and Meryl and Milly’s animated faces. As long as neither of them see who’s standing at the other end of the bar, it’ll be fine. He just needs an excuse to get all of them out of there before the girls notice Wolfwood and this turns into more of a disaster than it already is.
“—rebuilt from nothing, all on the strength of a promise and the idea of renewal and second chances. It’s literally in the town charter! If ever there was a story about hope, this is it.”
His blood beating in his ears, Vash hums in response. Apparently, that isn’t good enough for Meryl. She punches him in the shoulder and that finally pulls Vash’s attention to her.
“Are you even listening to me? This is a big deal! A whole town built on the idea of forgiveness and looking to the future rather than the past, all the work they’ve been doing to make that a reality—I thought you’d love this!”
Meryl has that familiar fire in her eyes that says she’s latched on to an idea and isn’t letting go of it for anything. Her passion would be admirable in almost any other circumstance, but he really wishes she hadn’t decided that she needs to get into it with him right here and right now.
“It is, definitely!” Vash stutters. “Just—don’t you think we could have dinner somewhere nicer? We’ve been to so many saloons—”
“What can I get you?”
Oh, Vash is so fucked.
Drawn over by the new arrivals, Nico leans on the bartop right in front of them, looking and sounding very much like his old self. Of course, aside from the slightest flicker in Vash’s direction, he doesn’t acknowledge them or joke with them or complain about how long it took the girls to get here.
How many saloons exactly like this had the four of them passed through together? How many evenings did they spend huddled around a table or staking out their space at the bar, plotting out their next move or hiding from bounty hunters? If Nico wasn’t standing on the other side of the bar, it’d be just like old times.
The girls are stunned into silence at the sight of the very alive and definitely not dead Nicholas D. Wolfwood. Milly clutches onto her stool for dear life and Meryl is as white as a sheet, both of them staring with wide, incredulous eyes. An awkward tension hangs in the air, Nico shifting uncomfortably under all the attention. If he wasn’t so scared of making it worse, Vash would be on the floor howling with hysterical laughter at just how bad his luck is.
It’s ultimately Milly who breaks their incredibly unpleasant standoff, sniffling and bursting into tears. “Oh, Mr. Wolf—mmph!”
Practically leaping over Meryl, Vash claps a hand over Milly’s mouth before she can finish saying his name. “Mr. Wolfy!” Vash bursts out. “It’s okay, Milly, you’ll get to see your beloved pet again soon.” In an undertone to Nico, he continues, “She gets very sentimental about her cat when she’s on the road.”
“Yes, she certainly does,” Meryl says with an incredibly fake chuckle. She glares at Vash hard enough that it feels like she’s trying to set him on fire with her eyes.
“But I don't—” Milly protests around Vash’s hand.
“Isn’t he just the cutest, Meryl?” Vash says over her.
Meryl’s smile is tight-lipped. Vash swears he can hear the sound of her teeth grinding together behind it, but bless her, she plays along anyway. “Absolutely adorable.”
Despite how confused Nico must be, there’s trouble in his raised eyebrow as he leans forward on his elbows to examine them. It’s easy, laconic, the kind of thing he’d do when he was really playing up his annoying bastard routine.
“...And I remind her of him?” Nico asks.
“Yep!” they all say in panicked unison.
Nico’s face splits in a shit-eating grin. “Glad to know we’re all in agreement. I am very adorable.”
The tension breaks like a popped balloon. Milly titters softly behind Vash’s hand while Meryl rolls her eyes to high heaven. And Vash, well, Vash’s heart tugs at his chest and his stomach swoops at having Nico so close to him. Their bodies are inches apart, separated only by the bartop, and he so badly wants to feel the calloused skin of Nico’s palm again, to slide his fingers up his wrist and feel the way his pulse beats beneath the thin skin. He swallows the desire down and pulls his lips up in a smile, finally removing his hand from Milly’s mouth.
Nico’s eyes briefly flicker over Vash, a slight furrow appearing in his brow before it’s smoothed over and he repeats his original question. Somehow, Meryl manages to string together enough words to order food and drinks for them. Nico pours Meryl’s tea and Milly’s soda without any comment, though he can’t seem to stop glancing at Vash every other second. Each one is just as shocking as the first time Vash met Nico’s eyes in the garden and realized who he was.
Nico tops up Vash’s drink without asking and disappears into the kitchen.
The noisy hubbub of the saloon rings in Vash’s ears and fills the heavy silence between him and his companions. A strange sense of unreality settles over him. This can’t really be happening. It’s all too normal. The chair he’s sitting on is a bit sticky with layers of old booze and he can smell the sweat beneath Meryl’s perfume. But then there’s Wolfwood—Nico.
Where are the ill omens or the choirs of angels singing out about this miracle? Things like this don’t just happen. Supposedly dead men don’t just take your order and pour you another shot of whiskey like it’s any other day.
There’s a faraway look in Milly’s eyes as she gazes at the kitchen door, errant tears still sliding down her cheeks. She sniffles and uses her sleeve to wipe her nose. Meryl grips Milly’s other hand tight, her chest rising and falling with breaths that are just a little too quick. Vash doesn’t like the look of that.
“What the fuck?” Meryl snaps. She whips around, and the fire Vash finds in her eyes is far more dangerous than what was there earlier. If that was a warm hearth, this is an inferno that promises to burn everything in its path. “What the hell was that, Vash?”
Vash folds his arms on the bartop and gently smacks his face down. So much for keeping this on the down low. “What’s it look like?”
“That looked a whole lot like Wolfwood ,” she hisses. “Except, you know…”
“Alive,” Milly finishes for her, voice soft and amazed.
“Well, there you go,” Vash sighs. The insanity of the day has finally caught up to him and left him shell-shocked. The only thing keeping him from collapsing into a crying fit is the soothing river of whiskey flooding his veins. “Not much else to it.”
“You’re strangely calm about this.”
“Calm isn’t really the word I’d use to describe it.”
“You don’t have any questions? Like, oh, I don’t know, how? Why, maybe? What the hell he’s doing here? Is this even real, for that matter, or are we all experiencing some collective delusion?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“Bullshit, it doesn’t matter!” Meryl pauses her tirade to stare at him. Even with his face stuck to the synth wood, Vash feels the burning heat of her gaze. The longer she goes without needling him, the more ominous the silence becomes. When she speaks again, it’s with quiet certainty. “You know something about this, don’t you?”
“Trust me, I don’t know any more than you do.”
“But you weren’t surprised to see him. If anything you were…” she trails off. Suddenly, Vash is yanked up by the collar of his coat and caught in Meryl’s steel-hard stare. “You’d already bumped into him, hadn’t you?”
And this is why Meryl makes such a good journalist. She can read people like it’s nobody’s business. Once upon a time, he’d been able to brush her off, keep her from wiggling past all of his carefully put up blockades and distractions. It’d driven her insane back in the day. But spending two years living cheek-by-jowl with each other had destroyed any defenses Vash could’ve possibly put up against her.
At Vash’s confirming wince, she exclaims, “And you weren’t even gonna mention it!”
With an aggrieved sigh, she puts her face in her hands, mumbling something under her breath about insane, emotionally-constipated men. Vash tries to put up at least a marginal protest, but it falls flat at Meryl’s glower. She’s gearing up to tear him a new asshole when Milly suddenly speaks.
“Why didn’t he say anything?” She watches the door Nico disappeared through with morose eyes, a puzzled furrow to her brow. “He has to know who we are, so why…” She sniffles again and a few more tears squeeze past her eyes.
It sends a pang through Vash’s overloaded heart to hear her caught between hurt and confusion. Wolfwood could be a dick, but he’d never give them the cold shoulder or pretend he didn’t know them. Especially not to Milly. Only the devil himself could be cruel to Milly Thompson without a hint of remorse.
Meryl isn’t quite so emotionally affected by this question. The gears are turning in her head, and whatever conclusion she comes to has her irritation flaring ever more strongly in Vash’s general direction. She’s long let go of his collar, but the way her jaw is clenched says she’s just itching for a reason to get ahold of it again and shake him like a ragdoll until he spits out some answers.
But the thing is, as much as Meryl has learned to read Vash like a book, he’s also figured out the secret language of Meryl Stryfe. Vash knows she’s holding on to Milly with an iron grip to hide the way her hands are shaking—so no one can see how unsettled she truly is by this. She’s overplaying her indignation just so she doesn’t have to face her own grief and subsequent bewilderment about Wolfwood being alive.
That doesn’t stop her from leveling Vash with the kind of look that would send lesser men cowering. “Explain. Now. ”
“Really, I—I don’t—” Vash stammers. Meryl’s disbelieving glare only intensifies. Vash may have faced down some of the most truly heinous people in the world, but little else terrifies him like Meryl Stryfe on a crusade for the truth. Almost against his will, Vash squeaks out, “Well, I mean—I don’t think he remembers anything?”
The warning note in her, “Vash” holds a world of annoyance, but she never gets any further than that.
Mercy of all mercies, the kitchen door swings open and who should come through it but Nico himself. He makes his way toward them, balancing three plates of hot food, so he’s too distracted to notice Vash kicking Meryl under the bar to shut her up.
“Just go with it, okay?” Vash hisses, ignoring her dark glower as she rubs her shin.
“This better be good,” she grumbles, before she turns into the very picture of prim professionalism.
When Nico sets their food down, she thanks him like she’s never seen him before in her life. Neither Milly nor Vash can manage that kind of subterfuge so they mumble their thank yous and hope Nico isn’t too weirded out by the staring. It’s kind of hard to turn off.
Vash is really banking on the fact that there’s plenty of people here to keep Nico working and distracted, so he doesn’t spend any more time around them. He’s not sure how long any of them can reasonably keep up this charade while Nico is two feet away and giving them a calculating once-over. This is way more attention than a bartender should be giving to three totally regular customers.
Vash shovels food in his mouth, barely tasting what he’s eating, just hoping to get this over with as quickly as he can. They need to get out of this town, yesterday. But first that requires leaving this bar and the trap of Nico’s gaze.
It’s not as threatening as it was earlier in the garden, which is a small relief. That’s not to say it doesn’t spell trouble for them. Who’s to say what will happen if he looks at them too long or too closely? Vash truly doesn’t know what power brought Wolfwood back or took his memories but he’s not willing to risk anything suddenly bringing it all back.
Nico’s chewing on his cheek the way he does when he wants a cigarette but can’t have one. Surely, someone else must need his attention by now, but still, he hovers by them. Finally, he tilts his head in the girls’ direction and makes direct eye contact with Meryl. She freezes with her fork halfway raised to her mouth, grains of rice slowly slipping off it and back down to the plate.
“You know, you sound real familiar…” Nico says. It takes all of Vash’s self-control not to choke on his food. Milly isn’t doing any better. Her cheeks are puffed out with the huge bite she’d just taken, her expression trembling between hope and fear. Nico snaps his fingers as he thinks, the anticipation bearing down on them with terrible force.
When he finally looks up, a slightly self-satisfied smirk on his face, a horrible dread rises in Vash’s chest. He looks so much like Wolfwood—maybe it is him, memories and all, and he’s been playing him this whole time. It’d serve Vash right after the way he failed him.
But Nico only looks at the girls when he says, “Hey, you wouldn’t happen to be those Vash the Stampede reporters?”
After a beat of silence, Meryl remembers how to string words together and form a sentence. “O-oh, um, yeah. H-how’d you know that?”
“I’ve listened to all your broadcasts. You start recognizing certain voices after a while.” Nonchalantly, like he has no intention of leaving any time soon, he rests his hip against the bar. Meryl’s nostrils flare at the proximity, but otherwise, she gives nothing away. “So, what are two bigshots like you doing all the way out here?”
“We’re here for a story,” Milly stammers.
“Oh yeah? About what?”
Being addressed directly must be too much for Milly. Her lip begins to wobble again, her eyes going hazy with tears. Meryl smartly jumps in and starts talking, drawing Nico’s attention back to her. She goes on about the garden and Haven’s founding, much like she had been when she was talking at Vash earlier. He only catches marginally more of it than he did last time; he’s still trying to deal with the out of body experience he’s having just seeing Nico’s side profile.
The proud jut of his nose, the thick, dark fan of his eyelashes, the day-old stubble on his chin. All the same as it was on the day Vash brushed a damp cloth across Wolfwood’s face to wipe away the blood. When he listens closely, he can hear the faint thudding of Nico’s heart, reassure himself with the rise and fall of his chest. He’s real, he’s alive, he’s here.
And he’s just standing there, talking to Meryl. Am I going crazy? Vash wonders, not for the first time in his life and not even for the first time today. All evidence, however, points to the contrary.
Vash comes floating back down to earth as Meryl starts grumbling about some problem they’d hit in their interview process. She’s in her element now, complaining without a hint of self-consciousness or nervousness about how no matter what they did, they just couldn’t get a hold of one of the council members, and his perspective would be so important for this piece. Milly nods along emphatically, no longer on the verge of tears.
At some point during Meryl’s spiel, Nico had picked up some glasses and started wiping them down. He continues even after Meryl peters off, a thoughtful look on his face.
“I mean, it’s nice that you wanna write about our town, but I don’t see why it’s important enough for a news article. We’re just living our lives out here, the same way anyone else does.”
Let it not be said that Vash never pays attention to what Meryl has to say. He believes in her work and wants to do what he can to support her (though when the work involves him directly, a little less so). So he gets it, what Meryl sees in this place. Vash hadn’t known exactly what was behind this little oasis of optimism before Meryl’s rundown, but he’d felt how deeply that sentiment was embedded in the entire community when he was in the garden. He can’t believe Nico doesn’t recognize how abnormal it is to the way things usually work on No Man’s Land.
“It’s good for people like you, to know they have that kind of hope,” Vash says, wistfully, in what turns out to be another mistake in the long line he’s made tonight.
Nico’s eyes suddenly go sharp. “People like me?”
Fumbling for any way to salvage this and not make himself look like a total creep, Vash stumbles over his own words while Nico stares him down much like he did in the garden.
“Uh, y’know, people who…don’t remember where they came from?” Vash winces at the way his voice squeaks up at the end.
“Who told you that?” There’s a new menace to Nico’s tone, and he’s stopped even pretending to do work, his hands clenched over the rag.
Vash throws his hands up in defense and laughs awkwardly under the scrutiny. One hundred and fifty years and he somehow still hasn’t learned how to control his mouth when he’s nervous. And even with two years and a whole lot of missing memories between them, one suspicious look from Wolfwood is all it takes for Vash to spill the beans.
“A friend of yours! Neil! We got to talking earlier, and, well…” Vash trails off at the face Nico makes.
The fear and suspicion make way for sheer exasperation. He drags a hand through his hair, mussing it wonderfully, and tilts his head to the ceiling like he’s asking God for patience. Then, he turns to shout down the bar, “You tellin’ lies about me again, old man?”
Without missing a beat, Neil chuckles and raises his glass. “Only the good ones!”
“Goddamn gossip,” Nico mutters under his breath. And a few other choice words that aren’t quite so kind. Then, all of a sudden, his eyes light up and his lips turn up in a positively evil grin that immediately sets off every alarm bell Vash possesses.
That was the face Wolfwood made when he had a plan, a very bad, very bothersome plan to get back at somebody. One time, it had ended with hot sauce in a hitman’s wounds.
Continuing to wipe down a glass that’s practically shining, Nico oh-so-casually says, “That council member you couldn’t get ahold of, was it maybe Neil Rosen?”
Meryl’s head whips around like she’s just scented blood. All the discomfort she’s been harboring is gone, and she’s practically vibrating with excitement at this potential break in her story. “Yeah, it was.”
Nico hums. “He can definitely be a tough guy to catch. He’s a very involved council member. Likes to mingle with the people, y’know? Lucky for you, he’s been doin’ business here tonight.”
“Really?” Meryl says. Her hands are already hovering over where she keeps her notepad.
“Yep. He’s right over there.” Nico points him out, in the process catching Neil’s attention again. With an absolutely shit-eating grin, Nico calls out, “Oi, Neil! I’ve got some reporters here to see you.”
Neil startles, trying to duck down so he’s not visible in the crowd, but it’s too late. As he’ll soon find out, once she’s got her sights on him, there’s no running away from Meryl Stryfe.
“Aw, hell,” Neil grumbles.
“That’s what you get for airing out my private business all over the place,” Nico says.
Meanwhile, Meryl has lost any and all interest in Nico, much more focused on mentally running through her list of questions and how to best go about getting answers from Neil. With barely a glance in Vash’s direction, she snags Milly by the wrist and goes, “C’mon, we’ve got work to do,” and scurries off. Milly gives him a cheerful wave in parting, already fiddling with her tape recorder, and suddenly, Vash is left alone with Nico.
He smiles awkwardly and, to avoid any more pointless blathering on his part, shoves a forkful of food straight in his mouth. Vash can do this. He can be totally normal around Nico, not that half-manic weirdo he was in the garden. When he’s done, he can go back to his hotel room, forget any of this ever happened, and stay the hell out of Nico’s life.
It would’ve been a great plan, if he hadn’t underestimated just how much of an asshole Nico could be. He’s gone back to polishing glasses, though at least now he’s actually cleaning the ones that could use it.
He whistles lowly as he works, a satisfied little smirk punctuating it. “Vash the Stampede, pimping himself out as a bodyguard. How the mighty have fallen.”
Choking on his food, Vash considers how lucky Nico is that he’s otherwise occupied. If he wasn’t trying to recover his lung’s faculties, he’d be tempted to climb over the bar and wipe that smug look off Nico’s face. Instead, all he can do is sputter incoherently like a total fool.
“Shhh, keep your voice down!” Vash hisses.
“Buddy, you’re walkin’ around in a duster and yellow glasses. Hair dye and a new coat ain’t gonna save you. I don’t get how no else’s figured it out yet.”
Vash takes off his glasses to rub a hand over his eyes, a wry chuckle escaping him. Maybe it’s the alcohol or the complete ridiculousness of the last few minutes, but this is taking on a bit of a hilarious tinge.
The thing is, the “hair dye” has saved him, more than once. People generally aren’t known for being the most observant. Change one major feature and it’s like they’ve never seen you before. Vash can’t begin to count the amount of Terran forces he’s evaded just by flattening his hair and ditching his glasses. Even with word going around about his altered appearance, it’s all too easy to pass himself off as just another run-of-the-mill gunslinger. But then, Wolfwood has always been too perceptive for his own good.
Maybe, just maybe, a traitorous part of Vash hopes this means he remembers him. Perhaps some errant memory remains that would let Nico recognize him despite how much Vash has changed these last few years. Even though it would make this infinitely harder.
But really, the deja vu is uncanny. They’d had a conversation almost exactly like this, what feels like lifetimes ago, sitting next to each other on a bus bound for Jeneora Rock. They were both different people then. Vash hadn’t blown a hole in the Fifth Moon yet. Wolfwood hadn’t been tasked with bringing Vash to his doom.
As much as Vash had been wary of him at the time, some part of him had liked this strange priest. He was sharp and witty, more perceptive than he let on, and was putting on a goofy, tough guy front to hide the kindness of his heart. Vash felt like he could play off him for days without getting bored or feeling the urge to run. That was rare for him. By the time he showed up again, there were years more of lies and baggage between them, but Vash would rather it was him than anyone else. Try as he might, Wolfwood wasn’t a good liar and that honesty meant more to Vash than Wolfwood would ever know.
“You got me there,” Vash says. “You looking to cash in that bounty?”
He means it as a joke, but Nico recoils like Vash just insulted his mother.
“What? No way!”
Vash must be drunker than he thought. There’s something far too flustered about the way Nico reacts to him, a shyness that just makes him want to poke and poke and see how embarrassed Vash can make him.
“Bold words for a guy who was threatening me only a few hours ago,” Vash teases. He smiles around the rim of his glass as he takes a sip. A flush spreads across Nico’s cheeks, and he starts aggressively scrubbing the glass in his hand.
“Well, I didn’t know —” He cuts himself off, shaking his head as if he’s trying to reset all his mental faculties. “Actually, I—I wanted to apologize for how I acted earlier. I didn’t mean to be so aggressive, it’s just…” He flounders to continue the sentence before he sets down the glass and rag and, with an irritated grunt, moans into his hands. Vash just barely catches the mumbled, “Real smooth.”
There’s a warmth in Vash’s cheeks that has little to do with the heat of the saloon and a lot more to do with the man in front of him. There’s a lightness to Nico, a lack of self-consciousness that suits him so well and somehow makes him all the more endearing.
“It’s alright, really,” Vash says as kindly as he can, as Nico most certainly deserves. “You were just trying to protect them. I get that.”
Peeking out from between his fingers, Nico seems to decide that Vash’s sincerity is real and uncovers his face. He goes back to doing his work, though a little more stiffly than before, barely pretending that he’s occupied.
“Thanks,” he says, gruffly. The silence that follows isn’t awkward, but the way Nico keeps chewing on his cheek says there’s something on his mind. After a few moments pass, he haltingly speaks again, never looking away from the glass in his hands. “Okay, I think we got off on the wrong foot. Can we try again?”
“Sure!” Vash wiggles his fingers in a wave. “I’m Vash, I’m a gunslinger and wanted outlaw, but these days I’m mostly a bodyguard and glorified pack mule.”
Nico waves back awkwardly. “Nico. I’m just a bartender.”
Vash considers how much he leaves out, all his other accomplishments. Wolfwood never was one to brag or really see anything good about himself. The work he does fixing things and helping out at the orphanage barely registers as something important to share about himself.
Vash tips his head, squinting at Nico. Even after figuring out who he is, Nico isn’t intimidated in the slightest. Despite all the stammering and general weirdness, he’s strangely calm about the famous outlaw sitting at his bar and playing with the orphanage kids.
“Not that I’m ungrateful or anything, but you’re being a lot more normal about me being here than most people would be,” Vash says.
Nico chokes on a laugh. “Normal? My heart’s beatin’ out of my chest. This is the coolest thing that’s ever happened to me.”
Vash turns the word over in his head and considers all the things Wolfwood has called him. Spikey, blondie, idiot, bastard, son of a bitch, sunshine, lead-for-brains, and, when he felt like being particularly aggravating, needle noggin. And those were just the nicknames. He’d also called him insane, told him he had a martyr complex and no sense of self-preservation, and implied he was a stupid and naive coward. A few times, in quiet, private moments, he admitted that Vash could be too much of an optimist and was hopeful to a fault, but at least he knew when it was time to stop talking and start taking out people’s kneecaps, which was as close to a compliment as Vash ever dreamed of getting from Wolfwood. Never, not once, had he called him cool, though.
There’s far too much shock and raw honesty in Vash’s voice when he says, “You—you think I’m cool?”
“I mean, yeah? You’re Vash the Stampede! You’re a pretty big deal.”
“I’m a dangerous, wanted outlaw.”
Nico rolls his eyes. “Don’t play into their bullshit. We both know it ain’t true. You might be a hot mess, but you helped save the world.”
“Oh.” Vash slumps back in his stool, momentarily stunned. He knows the story Meryl and Milly are trying to tell, even if he’s never listened back to his interview episodes. He didn’t think anyone actually believed it.
“It ain’t as unpopular an opinion as you think. Your ‘business women’ are doing a good job showin’ people that, I think.”
The conviction with which he says it rivals Meryl’s most passionate moments. There’s that threat in his eyes that Vash saw back in the garden, that he was used to seeing when they were cornered and their guns were drawn. He believed in that idea enough to fight over it, and that—that just wasn’t something Vash could handle, drunk or not.
They both glance over to where Meryl and Milly are sitting and getting all up in Neil’s business. They’re engrossed in their talk, not noticing the contemplative looks being thrown their way. The girls are serious and focused, all their attention bent to the task before them, a state that Vash has become intimately acquainted with. Even when it isn’t aimed at him, it makes him nervous. It reminds him of every time they’ve dragged him into an interview, the slow-running tick of the tape recorder, Meryl’s steady gaze, and Vash’s own voice shaking under the weight of his sins.
Last time they’d spoken, it had been about the Age of Chaos, those final days before Vash fully fell from grace. And the—the thing that happened before that, that he avoided like the plague no matter how they asked or how they nudged him closer to it.
Vash swallows down the lump forming in his throat and turns back to Nico. He’d rather not remember those bloody, empty days, not right now when his old friend’s heart is beating so clear and steady.
“They sure do try,” Vash says with a tight, careful smile and artfully changes the subject. “Okay, but I have to ask. Seriously? Neil?”
Nico snorts. “A town council member? Oh yeah. He hates ninety percent of the politics and no one can force him to use his office, but he’s one of the bigwigs.”
“You’re kidding.”
“Nope. Setting this place up was basically his idea. He was pretty much a shoe in for it. Only reason he ain’t mayor is because he said he had more important things to do.”
“Like what?”
“Sittin’ around and yappin’ mostly!” Nico yells loud enough that Neil hears him.
“Quit complain’!” Neil shoots back. “Ain’t like you’re doing much else. Now get over here and actually do your job.”
With a long suffering sigh and a commiserating eye roll, Nico disappears to pour a frankly concerning amount of whiskey for Neil, Meryl, and Milly. Neil convinces Nico to leave the bottle, which has the girls exchanging worried yet determined looks. Vash is really thankful for that separate hotel room right about now.
Vash thinks Nico might stay away after that, but he’s wrong. He drifts right back over and it’s like the conversation never stopped.
Nico glances back towards the little huddle he’d just left as they clink their glasses before downing their shots. “So, those are your ‘business women,’ huh?”
Vash shrugs. “Most people aren’t big fans of reporters around here. Better to keep it on the downlow.”
“They don’t try very hard.”
“That’s because they’re nuts.”
“And you’re not?”
“Only on Tuesdays.”
“And then what happens?”
“I’m allowed one day of unbridled murder and mayhem.” Vash rests his head on his fist with an exaggerated sigh. “Then I gotta go back to doing my job.”
“Really?”
“Yep. It’s all in my contract.”
Then, finally, it happens. What Vash had wished and hoped for in the garden. Nico snorts, his neutral expression breaking. He tries to hide it, but Vash knows what to look for in the shy way he ducks his head. A little half-smile spreads across his face and erases all the grumpiness and devil-may-care attitude he’s been projecting. Quite against his own better judgment, Vash’s heart flips in his chest.
“Ha ha, very funny,” Nico says, shaking his head. But still, that smile doesn’t leave him. “You sure are somethin.’”
“So I’m told.”
Down the bar, someone shouts Nico’s name, and he’s once again pulled away to do his job. Vash watches how he moves, light and brisk, just as fast as was on the battlefield. The bottle and glasses dance through his hands with the same grace that let him wield the Punisher like it weighed nothing. He uses that confidence to spin bottles and do tricks and draw wondrous expressions out of his customers. All while still being the world’s biggest grump.
It strikes Vash then that he’d rarely seen Wolfwood truly engage with the world around him. People were either enemies, marks, or not important. He didn’t waste time trying to fit in or get to know anyone, focused only on doing his job and moving on before the blood congealed and the law was on his heels.
When he returns to stand before Vash, it’s all Vash can do to keep his fond staring to a minimum. There’s no reason to make this night weirder than he already has.
“You fit right in here,” Vash says. Some of his emotion must creep through because Wolfwood stammers for a full thirty seconds before huffing and setting himself to rearrange the glasses.
“Well, despite what Neil told you, I don’t make a habit of wanderin’ around the desert.” If only Nico knew the half of it. But his deflection is half-hearted at best and made of pure bluster. Did Vash really used to fall for this? He doesn’t know how he ever could have.
“Speaking as someone who does, I think you’ve got a nice little place here.”
“I might be biased, but Haven’s the best place I remember living in.”
Nico waggles his eyebrows at the frankly terrible joke and Vash finds himself laughing, easily and genuinely. It’s all so ridiculous, the gesture, the stupid understatement, that Vash can’t handle it. It’s so very much Wolfwood that he wants to cry. In the end, it’s always easier to laugh, so that’s what he does.
Then, they just talk, like two old friends catching up after a long time apart. It’s so easy to fall into their banter again, the push and pull of verbal sparring. Nico flusters more every time Vash says anything slightly complimentary about him, but if anything that’s a welcome change from Wolfwood’s posturing. As the whiskey flows, Vash’s inhibitions fall to the wayside as do any thoughts of leaving. How can he, when Nico is in front of him and there’s a warmth in his chest he hasn’t felt in such a long time?
Unlike the rest of his friends, Vash is a hypocrite and a liar. He clings to this moment with drunken desperation and ignores the promises he’s been making himself all night. He sinks into Nico’s comforting presence and, for a time, forgets there’s anything else.
The cold night air is a refreshing slap in the face after the heat of the saloon. It brings clarity back to Vash’s much-scrambled faculties as he wobbles his way down the road.
After hours of drinking and carousing, they’d finally called it quits. It had been a strange night, and it had seemed to go on forever.
No matter how many times Nico left to do his job, he’d eventually drift back to Vash. Sometimes, it was just to stand beside him and sneak awed looks his way and other times it was to keep up their conversation. He poured Vash drink after drink after drink, until Vash lost track of how much he’d had, just happy to still be in Nico’s presence. And he was far too sloshed to be anything but grateful when Nico refused the majority of his double dollars and claimed it was “on the house.”
Man, when had Nico gotten so nice? It looked really good on him, though. Of that, Vash was sure.
Meryl and Milly aren’t that much better off than Vash. At some point, their interview with Neil had turned into a drinking match. It was hard to tell if that was an accident or a way for Neil to get his revenge on the nosy reporters he’d been avoiding all day. It was amazing either of them were still able to walk on their own after all that. They stumble along beside Vash, giggling and sneaking kisses when they think Vash isn’t looking.
In the dark, it’s hard to see their faces, but he’s sure the girls are happy and distracted. All in all, a satisfying end to a crazy day.
“Vash, what was that?” Meryl asks.
Ah, it seems he’d spoken too soon. There’s an edge to her tone that he doesn’t like the sound of. Maybe if he plays dumb, she’ll stop asking questions?
“What was what?” he says.
“Oh, I dunno, the Wolfwood doppelganger at the saloon?”
“Does he have a twin brother we don’t know about?” Milly speculates between hiccups.
Meryl petulantly kicks a rock in her path and sends it sailing down the road. Positively dripping with sarcasm, she says, “Is he evil too?”
Or not. Perhaps Vash should be offended at that last comment, but he’s way too drunk to give Meryl the scathing look she deserves for it. He’s afraid if he turns too quickly, he’ll make himself dizzy and fall on his face.
“No, it’s him,” Vash admits.
“Are you sure?”
“You know anyone else who holds their cigarettes between their fourth and middle fingers?”
For a moment, Meryl goes quiet. She must’ve seen it. The girls had been watching Nico just as closely as Vash had. At one point, he’d lit up behind the bar and spent the next few minutes quietly smoking and surveying the whole saloon for threats. It was a pose they were all familiar with, right down to the strange way he held his cigarette.
“But he doesn’t remember who he is?” Milly says softly.
Vash shoves his hands in his pockets and stares down the road to the distant vanishing point on the horizon. “That’s what Neil told me. They found him wandering in the desert, and he doesn’t remember anything about who he is or where he came from.”
“Well, we should tell him!” Meryl bursts out, in that way drunk people do when they think they have the world’s most genius idea.
“No!” Vash snaps.
Milly nearly falls on Vash trying to get in his face. He catches her by the arm as she argues, “Why not? He deserves to know!”
When he’s sure she’s steady, Vash lets her go and starts walking faster, eyes fixed on his target.
“We can’t take the risk. What if—what if he’s maintaining a cover and we blow it? Or the pressure of it gives him an aneurysm and he starts bleeding out of his ears!” He finally reaches his goal, and, with a practiced stumble, nearly brains himself on a lamp post. Just in time, he spins around it to face the girls. The rush makes his cheeks go red. Good. He must look like a wreck. He clutches the cold metal like it’s his only support in the world and gives them his most hangdog look. “It’s too dangerous. Better to leave him as he is.”
With a tired sigh, Meryl relents and pats Vash on the back. “C’mon, let’s get to bed. We can deal with this in the morning.”
The rest of their walk to the hotel passes in silence.
Despite his little act earlier, Vash really is quite drunk. His hands are more unsteady than he’d like, and he fumbles the key to his room an embarrassing amount of times before he gets it in the lock. Damn, he really is out of practice.
He sways inside just as the pad of soft but sure footsteps approaches. Vash turns and finds Meryl behind him, barefoot and dwarfed by a gigantic button-up that must have originally been Milly’s.
Vash leans against the doorway and smiles lopsidedly at her. “Hey, what’s up?”
For a moment, she doesn’t answer. Her lips are set in a serious line, and she seems to be staring straight into him. His smile fades, and he swallows back the uneasy feeling rising in his chest.
“I know what you’re doing,” she says eventually. “You can’t run away from this, not forever.”
“Meryl—”
She raises a finger, cutting him off cleanly. “I hope you realize this isn’t easy for any of us. But I understand why it’s harder for you.”
Vash chews on his lip, staring off to the side. He can’t think of anything to tell her to make her feel better, to make her leave him alone.
She takes a deep breath and tips her head back against the wall for a moment. When Meryl looks back at him, the soft pity in her eyes makes Vash’s stomach squirm. “Milly was right, he deserves to know who he is. You can’t keep that from him. It’s not right.” She straightens until she’s standing to her full five feet and fixes him with a forceful look. “But it should come from you. You were closer to him than me or Milly. But if you haven’t told him by the time we leave, then I will.”
Vash considers arguing, begging Meryl to leave Nico alone and let him live his life. He knows what it's like to suddenly be faced with all the memories you’ve shoved away, the things you're too scared to look at. The pain of recalling July ten years after the fact had nearly killed him. What would the weight of Wolfwood’s entire lifetime do to Nico? Vash doesn’t want to find out.
But Meryl means it. She’ll do it if she has to, and there’s no one in the world that could stop her. In the face of her determined stance, Vash wilts against the doorway.
Deep down, he knows she’s not wrong. He can only imagine the disappointment on Wolfwood’s face if Meryl or Milly were the ones to reveal the truth to him and not Vash. But he doesn’t know if he can do it. Putting all that pain on Nico might just be the thing that tears Vash apart.
“Okay,” he says, mouth dry and eyes prickling.
“Okay,” Meryl says softly, before she slips away down the hallway, back to her room and her girlfriend.
Vash closes the door on his empty room and stands frozen in the darkness, an ageless turmoil awakening in his chest. Eventually, he strips mechanically and curls up on the bed.
He cries himself to sleep, feeling as cold and alone as if he were in the desert.