Tragic Ends VS Bad Ends, Trigun Flavor

[procreation]

CW: mildly Plantcesty bc of canon end events but mostly toxicity, mindfuck, extreme codependency and.... co-parenting?

Somewhere in the sands is a tall person traveling on bare feet, a cloak of galaxies and roots covering their face from the sun. Vash moves slowly, not because he's tired or struggling, but because he's not really in a hurry. He doesn't get tired anymore, or hungry. Just weak, sometimes, but he's always been weak, hasn't he? That's why his brother has to protect him.

So this place couldn't be bad, because Knives would never leave him somewhere bad.

He stops briefly to collect a bleached skull left in the sand, picking it up with the roots and wisps of shadow and then holding it with the curiosity of a detached scholar rather than a compassionate man. Human, by the looks of it. Not killed by one of their brood, just unlucky in the desert.

Shrugging, Vash lets it drop into the sand again like an unwanted piece of trash and lets all those roots and glimmering energy unfold around him. He makes a little seat for himself, black flowers with shiny blue specks acting as cushions as the rest of his cloak peels away for a canopy. The dark undersuit is an echo of his brother, including the sturdiness of four perfectly fine limbs.

No memories were left, physical or otherwise. Sometimes you just have to remake your little brother to make him understand your point of view, and Vash... doesn't really know any better, anymore. It's fine, all he needs to focus on is making new Independents.

The roots continue to stretch over the sand, slithering over the area to see if they can pick up anything other than old bones of a doomed race.

Comments

[el_llorono]

[There was a few moments of worrying silence, the haunted look on Vash's face as he very visibly let things roll through his head making the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. And then he was talking, already sounding hysterical, and then screaming, and Wolfwood sat up like a bolt, shocked and horrified and, unfortunately, not at all surprised.]

Blondie, hey, Blondie! Come on, you're ok, breathe! Fuck!

[He knows, he knows. He's heard Vash going out of his mind before, he's seen it so many times from both sides of reality, and it's never been like this, and he should have known it was coming. That didn't make it any easier to watch.

He had to do something, he couldn't just leave him like this, alone and broken and out of his God-damned mind! He wanted to help, but how-...how could he possibly...?

Fuck. This...this was going to be unpleasant and possibly really fucking bad for one or both of them. But he didn't see much choice.]

Vash, Vash, Listen to me! I'm gonna try and get you to people who can help, but you're gonna have to trust me! This is gonna be weird, but I promise, it won't be forever, I can't keep it up for very long, and I'm not gonna make you do nothin' you wouldn't want, I promise! Please don't fight me, please!

[He reached down, his hands touching the sides of his head as he curled over him, focusing everything that was Nicholas into a single point of consciousness on the edge of his awareness. Focusing himself, until he could feel the sensation of sand under his bare feet, the heat of the suns on his skin, and the sound of screaming stopped coming from below him and began rattling around inside of his own head. Distorted by flesh and bone, different to his ears than it had ever sounded before.]

Come on, Vash, come on, relax, it's fine, lemme take over, just this once, just lemme help, please!

[It hurt, his whole body like fire, keeping him detached from being able to take full control as he projected his voice into that consciousness that hovered just next to his own, filling the same space, hysterical and deranged and hurting, hurting so much. It hadn't felt like this before, but then he had never tried to possess a Plant before, and for a moment, he became acutely afraid that maybe he'd made a terrible mistake, and he was about to find out what happened if something really, truly harmed what was left of his being.]

[procreation]

[ Vash screams and screams, horribly and drawn-out until it sounds like his vocal chords are tearing apart. He grasps at his head, tearing at blonde hair as his mind strains to hold on to any form of sanity.

The ghost - Wolfwood, god, Wolfwood, the look on his face when he killed him, he killed him, he killed him and he laughed about it, enjoyed it. He's a monster, he's a monster!

Then the panic is suddenly slowed, like his mind is muddled and covered in mud. Vash kind of wants a cigarette for some reason? It's enough to shock him into taking a breath, tasting iron in his mouth and then kind of... letting go. He doesn't fight, he has no mental strength left to do anything, and if he doesn't have to think, if he doesn't have to exist in his head for a little while, it's mercy.

Vash is wide open for Wolfwood to take, even if it might be painful for him to possess a plant - and he's filled with so much energy, not only his own. Vash's last conscious thought for now is all about that, all about them. ]

...the children... they're not ready. They're innocent, they didn't ask to be made. I don't care what you do to me, just don't hurt them inside me.

[el_llorono]

[Everything was screaming and pain and horror until suddenly he felt the body around him gasp and go still, and while the pain didn't fully cease, there was an ebbing to it that made him gasp, the action strange, distorted, and he realized that he had done it immediately after Vash had, and there was no more room in those lungs to fill. He forced himself to remember how breathing worked, and then how to let the body take over and control that for itself, and he rolled over, pushing himself to hands and knees, taking it slowly so that he could remember what it felt like to have physical form.

It was while he was reorienting himself that he heard that final, plaintive plea, and he wasn't sure if it was emotional bleedover from Vash or from his own bleeding heart, but even with the horror of what he was talking about, just the thought of it hurt.]

Vash, buddy-...[Oh, that sounded so weird - his vocal cadence coming out of Vash's vocal cords.] I don't wanna hurt your kids. I don't care what that fucker did to you, they're just kids. I just wanna help, I promise. Whatever...whatever form that takes.

[He waited a few more minutes to really settle into the limbs and get used to the weight before dragging himself to Vash's feet, grimacing at the feeling of what could only be described as electricity rippling unpleasantly through the entire body.

And then he was off, shuffling through the desert and back in the direction of Rem's home, only...not quite. More southerly. He knew the best chance of finding one of the Vashes within a walkable distance would be there, but he absolutely did not want to show this one where to find Mom.]