nomans_land | Tragic Ends VS Bad Ends, Trigun Flavor

Tragic Ends VS Bad Ends, Trigun Flavor

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.

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Yeah, I got 'im. He makes a peep, I'll let you guys know.

[That was why he was in the back and not sitting between them on the center console, after all.

The silence that settled over the car after they sped off was definitely not comfortable, and it wasn't long before he began to grow listless. Not long after that, the faint memory of cigarette smoke began to fill the car, after he manifested another imaginary smoke, to give his hands something to do and to try and help settle his own nerves. Every so often, he glanced back at the unconscious form beside him, his chin leaning on an arm where it was propped up on the empty space on the seat near Vash's head.

Wait...shit...did his smoking count as second-hand exposure? Did unborn Plants get defects if their parent was exposed to that before they were born? That was something that could happen in human babies, right? Shit.

He shook the memory of a cigarette away not terribly long after he'd "lit" it, waving his hand in the air to try and disappate what wasn't actually there.]

Sorry, Spikey, my bad. [The guy wasn' even conscious, but he mumbled it anyway, just in case.]

[ You can't really keep a Vash down for long unless you're going for skull-breaking volumes of force, so it doesn't take many iles for the mess of a man in the back to stir slightly, moving his hand a bit and then to curl up more. Nothing more than that at first, too dizzy to really focus, but he did twitch.

He can feel the roll of the tires, hear the sound of the engine, and things start to come back - and when those blues open, they're icy and hollow, not broken and dead. Brains like to protect themselves from trauma, be it physical or mental, so what better way to save the mind from shattering further by just resetting what had been shaken loose? ]

Edited 2023-07-12 21:33 (UTC)

[ There's really nothing crueler you can do to a smoker than smoke around them when they're out. Wolfwood's barely caught a whiff before the ghost in the back is mumbling apologies and the scent dissipates, but a whiff is all he needed. ]

Stop fucking doing that! [ The words are a hiss, out of consideration for the unconscious man on the back seat. ] If you can't share 'em then I don't want to smell 'em, you got that!?

[ The ghost likely is already speaking up, but because Vash is reaching out mentally, he recognizes immediately that the other him is awake, the sense of Nai strong about him once again, so his head whips towards the back seat, lips pressed tight at the sight that greets him, the sight that confirms what he was sensing.

He doesn't speak out loud, not yet, but he does reach out mentally towards the other Vash, tired, but very determined. ]

Don't even think about hurting him again. I know that you don't care, and that Nai probably would like you to do it, but Nai isn't here, and there is a way to keep you and the little ones safe and taken care of until we can figure out how to reach him.

[ Because he knows that if the other Vash were able to reach out to him, well. Nai would be close. A part of him wonders how horrifying that absence, that silence, must be. He suspects he can probably use it, too.

He doesn't want to have to. So he's trying to keep the situation under control in more reasonable ways. ]

You won't be among humans.

[ He is also carefully, neutrally, not thinking of how indubitably awful things will go if they do manage to reach Nai. He certainly is planning on showing some of his more unpleasant side. With what he's seen... he is not feeling guilty about it in advance. ]

[He registered the twitch of that hand first, glancing up to see the unconscious man's eyes open, and the look that he saw would have made his blood run cold if he still had any. "Shit. Shit." He turned to warn the Vash up front and found himself face to face with him having already noticed and looked back, and the look on his face was...similar. But so decidedly different, he wasn't sure what to make of the weird sort of way it made him want to laugh and get out of the way at the exact same time.

There was also, obviously, something going on behind those eyes that made him shunt that thought to the back of his head and also keep very quiet for a moment before he phased through - and somewhat around, as much as he could to avoid phasing through his living counterpart - the front seat so he could whisper to the Wolfwood up front.]

He's conscious. Keep driving, be quiet. I think your Blondie is doin' something. If he tries anything, I'll do what I can to stop him so he doesn't get to you. [And then he was dropping back into the floorboard of the back seat, no longer lounging but crouching on his knees and staring at the reclining man, thankful for once that he wasn't corporeal and didn't have to worry about things like squeezing his limbs into tight spaces when he could just phase through the seats altogether.]

[ Blue on blue clash in the back seat, serious meeting cold as they two blondes look at each other but say nothing. 'Thorns' is tense but keeps down, no roots or galaxy coat in sight. Just a man in a bloodied under-suit, hair still matted from where the cut had healed. ]

No, you're right. I don't really care about killing him again, that's terribly boring. [ No matter how disgusting it feels to be at the mercy of some human and a still sick version of himself. ] Why would I trust a single thing you say?

[ It is... weird, to not have Nai here. It's been so long now, since he had to make choices or fight for anything. He was a happy follower, busy working on Eden while Nai took care of the rest. It feels like he's missing a piece of himself. ]

No humans, you say. Like this world isn't dripping with the filth already.

[ The last is said out loud, that uncanny twitch of his head making it cock just enough to peer into the front view mirror. ]

[ He doesn't notice when Blondie turns in his seat -- well, he does, but he doesn't take any note of it other than to assume that he's checking on the status of their guest. No, the first hint Wolfwood has that anything's gone wrong is when, with no warning, the ghost comes up and whispers it right in his ear -- he's conscious.

Wolfwood's entire world narrows then, every sense hyper-focused on the man in the back seat. His breathing, the creak of the seat beneath his weight, the way the air moves around his body. If he tries hard enough, he can almost hear the man's heartbeat. He's well out of his league here -- all he can do it keep driving.

Somehow he missed the first part of the conversation -- because of the ghost? Or were they talking that plant talk Spikey used to do with the plants in the bulbs? -- but the little asshole's snide comment is enough to get a reply. Wolfwood's never known when to keep his mouth shut, and today's sure not the day he's going to start. ]

Yeah? And whose fault is that?

[ In other circumstances, Vash would have been tempted to pout at that first response from the other him. But he does know better right now. Instead, there is a half smile that is... well, not cold. It's hard, though, in ways that he rarely shows. The immovable object he can be, when he digs his heels in. ]

That was uncalled for. Have I lied to you? [ And, also... ] How much do you remember?

[ It's important. ]

Okay, let's track back a little. This place is not where you were. It's bringing people from different times and places. A lot of us, I mean, a lot of Vashes. Some Nais. Some Wolfwoods. And some plants that we've never known before. A whole town of independents, for example. A lot of them keep to themselves, but they are there. It won't be near Nai, but you won't be alone, at least.

[ Whatever state this Vash is in, being alone is not likely to be good for him.

And he's not bringing up Rem. Nor Tessla, not unless the other Vash indicates that he might remember who she is. ]

[Oh, they're being scary again, which he knew Spikey could do, but it was actually a surprise, coming from Blondie. But there was no denying that yes, that heavy, oppressive feeling that had at one point been his entire impression of Vash the Stampede was rolling through the car in waves between them, and it was making his skin zing with energy that he didn't like.

But he was quiet, looking back and forth between the two and hovering close to the one in the backseat, waiting for him to make a show of attacking so that he could stop him again if he needed to. It had been exhausting the first time, but that didn't matter. He would do it again if he had to. Anything to keep the other two safe and to keep him from rampaging across the countryside.

The fact that death seemed to be something that was beyond them now didn't matter. He didn't want to take any chances. He was just regretting a little, the fact that that also meant there might not be anything they could do to put this one out of everyone's misery, if he proved unable to be contained for any real length of time.

Of course, up in the driver's seat, the other him just had to pop off, and he rolled his eyes hard enough that his head dropped back with a groan that wasn't audible to the rest of the vehicle. Not that he was surprised. They never did have any common sense, did they?]

[ Those blue eyes look amused as Vash peers into the front mirror and the thing there giving little quips again. Poor little vermin, he had a point. ] Mmm... he was only a year old, you know. Terribly sorry everyone didn't die in the crash, but cockroaches are always so very hard to kill.

[ He glances back at the sickening mirror of himself, raising a brow. ] Not yet, but truth is relative in a place like this, isn't it? [ Vash smirks, moving his arm (carefully, slowly) to a more comfortable position. ] I remember you and it. I remember walking away and finding another... thing. We fought. Then I woke up here.

[ He took damage, he can tell. The blue eyes narrow as he looks up at Vash, anger and fear rising. ] If you bastards hurt them in any way...

[ If he could make sure his children were okay, the town of independents sounded like a good place to go - because what did he care about extra Vashes and Wolfwoods? Some Nais, though... he needs that. He needs him. ]

[ Okay, there's definitely a conversation going on that he's not a part of. No way the asshole in the back seat is threatening humans in one breath and warning against hurting them in the next.

Wolfwood's pulse is screaming through his veins, every instinct demanding that he turn and fight. He tightens his grip on the steering wheel until it creaks, his attention darting between Blondie at his side and the bastard behind him. Any second now this is going to get ugly, and he needs to be ready when it explodes. If Thorns is smart he'll go for Vash first, and Wolfwood's got no intention of letting that happen. ]

You don't get to make demands, asshole.

[ For some reason, Vash's eyes warm a little at Wolfwood's snarling. It's ... familiar. And right. It means he's all right, or at least as he can be in the situation. Now to keep him that way. ]

We haven't. But that's because other than your attack on me, we did not really fight. If you force that issue, I can't guarantee anyone will be safe. Including them. So... let's not, all right?

[ His voice also softens, just a little. ]

And one of the Nais is one year old. He hasn't even done that, yet. Be careful with those you meet.

There are things that were taken away from you, not by us. When you remember them, you hurt, but some of them are important. I think not having to deal with those who feel wrong to you will be better. For you and the little ones. Will you stay there, if they will take you?

[ He can force him. Or at least deliver him unconscious. But it will be better if he makes the choice himself. ]

[He grimaced at the Wolfwood in front snarling out threats as if he had some sense, as if he wasn't aware of what had been done to this man to put him in the place he was in, now. Not that he was surprised, either, not if what they'd said had happened had been true. He had a very good reason to be so on edge.

Still, he wanted to avoid fighting and tension if he could, and with the worry about the babies being hurt coming back up, his voice rippled out into the back seat, not very far from Spikey.]

I promised I'd make sure your kids weren't hurt, and I meant it. We don't want to fight you, we don't want to hurt your babies. We're tryin' to get you someplace where they'll be safe.

I can tell that I'm still healing from injuries, so we obviously fought. Lying already, are you? [ Vash says to his double, and then gives Wolfwood another look, too-sharp teeth bared in a half-grin that's all predatory. ] Strange, you'd think I could make all the demands, seeing you're all trapped in a moving vehicle with me.

[ It's not like they're the ones that has him trapped, after all. Everyone's still alive only because he has babies to keep safe and another him to match in his 'delicate' situation.

Then the other Vash says one of the Nais is only a year old. Now that has his attention, frowning as he watches his double. That's the same age as the second generation was right now, the first children born from his gate rather than stressing the sisters into red.

So little. He needs to meet this baby brother.

The rest of what Vash says is a little easier to stomach, and makes the tension in the air lessen just a bit. ]

I have no real interest in anything but keeping the children safe. If there's a place with only Independents, then that works for both of us. If you keep your dogs muzzled.

[ He eyes where he heard he ghost wolf from, and then gestures a bit to his blood-matted hair. ] How diligent of you, to keep me so safe. [ Vash says bitterly. ] Without Nai here, I can't even check on them.

[ He shoots a sharp glance at Blondie when little Nai is mentioned, but bites his tongue against any verbal reply. This asshole doesn't need to know that Nai's here! He doesn't get to go anywhere near that kid! But he's not going to say anything and keep Thorns's attention on the idea that there's any version of his fucked up brother here. ]

What the fuck do you mean, you can't even check on 'em? [ There's a lot more he could say to the messed up bastard in the back seat, but that little tidbit snagged his attention and won't let go. It's not really a question he wants to ask with Blondie right there, but he needs to know. If he's going to have to kill this guy and all his unborn kids, he needs to know everything he can about how that whole situation works. ] You keeping 'em in a box somewhere, shithead?

We did not fight. [ Lightly, almost, but earnestly. ] You were run over by a car.

[ They are stuck in traffic and all that.

But it's truth.

... and no, he will not give any more details about the young one, it is a big world out here. ]

I will ask for permission for you. I do wish you and the little ones safe.

And what will happen if their time of maturing as they are ends and he is not there? Of course, there may be others who can help, where you will hopefully be.

No, the car wasn't part of the plan, trust me...[Not that he was naming names. Again, he understood. There was a reason his younger, living counterpart had done what he'd done, obviously, but Spikey didn't have to know that.

But then, the uncomfortable questions start coming out, and he cringed with every part of his existence, glancing back and forth between the two Vashes awkwardly.

He really didn't want to force Vash to have to sit through this type of questioning. It was invasive at best, and none of his damn business, frankly.

But...damnit. It was also, unfortunately, really fucking important.]

[ Vash gives all of them a raised brow, and then laughs. It's an uncomfortably Vash-like laugh, like the few moments you ever hear him do so genuinely. ]

You hit me with a car? That's a new one.

[ Usually he was strong enough to stop even speeding vehicles with his roots, so it must have been after he lost the fight with... the ghost one. He's not even sure how that ended, and it hurts his head to try to remember so he'll leave it alone for now.

The human's question, though... it's a dangerous one. If they knew the children were in an alternate dimension, what protection did he have? Killing children you won't ever see is a whole easier than killing an obviously pregnant person. Then again, he didn't exactly have an actual womb to put them in, so it was clear he wasn't 'physically' pregnant.

Vash would understand. ]

They're in my gate, of course. [ He says, as if that's obvious - more to annoy Wolfwood than anything else. ] I can't enter my own gate, so he checks on them and delivers them when it is time.

[ If he's not here when it's time? Well. That was a chilling thought. Could another plant enter his gate? ]

[ You know, when the Eye sent him on this damn mission, they really should have given him a crash course on how plants worked.

Even after the discussion with Blondie earlier, the comment about the kids being in his gate makes no kind of sense to Wolfwood -- the gate is the part of a plant where the stuff they make comes from, right? Food or water, or gravity, or whatever? Babies too, apparently? So if his gate is a part of him, then why can't he see it?

If the other Vash weren't here, he'd have so many more questions. But for once, tact takes over, and he keeps his mouth shut. ...On that topic, anyway. ]

Next time I'll use a truck. [ Thorns has been giving him toothy grins in the mirror this whole time, and so it's Wolfwood's turn to return the gesture. ] Don't want you getting bored.

... not me, I'd be more danger to myself than anyone else behind the wheel.

[ ... look.

he is being honest.

Plus, Wolfwood supports that, anyway.

The hint of levity fades down as he winces at the reply to those questions. ]

So you will very much need help. Given that I have been here for months, now, and there is no way to know who will or won't show up. You'll need to tell them about this when you get there. Please? It... probably will be hard for you, to have someone else do it.

[ But it's not difficult to know the price of not allowing it. ]

[Normally, listening to Blondie talk was just different enough from his Needle-Noggin's voice that there was a bit of a disconnect. He was much more soft-spoken, quieter and gentler, and it made the strange reality they were in not quite so unsettling.

That laugh, and the context of it, who it came from, was so familiar and so disturbing because of it that he flinched, actually recoiling a bit as one of his hands reached up to press against an ear as if he wanted to shut it out. He didn't realize the soft, unhappy humming noise that sounded out into the car afterward was himself, was too busy trying to keep his thoughts from recalling his greying old man and hearing that same laugh from his voice, and then mashing the memory of him with the traumatized, murderous person next to him.

He didn't like that, not one bit. Don't do that, thanks. Fuck.

Through the discomfort, the mentions of Spikey's "gate" managed to trigger tiny sparks of recollection, though they were fuzzy still, a familiar word in an almost-familiar context that he'd been able to mostly understand through repetition over the years, though he'd been unable to ask what it really meant, what with being dead and all. At the very least, his understanding of it was about as far from what he imagined Vash "carrying children" to mean, and the "invasive questions" were suddenly just confusing.]

The gate's like...the word for your powers, right? How Plants can do things?

[Vash hadn't been able to use his since not long after Wolfwood's death, but he'd visited enough of his siblings, and even met a few young Independents after they'd been born to No Man's Land, that the concept had come up in conversations he'd had over the years.]

A truck sounds like overcompensating. [ Vash quips back, and then rolls his eyes slightly as his other self tries to break the tension with his comment. Still, the other Vash has a point and he doesn't like the idea of some random person rooting around in his gate. Independent or not. Nobody else had the right to touch his gate, the most inner part of him. The idea felt disgusting, violating.

He needs Nai here. ]

You said there were other versions of him here. I'll just find one and have him do it.

[ His icy blue eyes turn to look in the direction of the ghost's voice, and then he (slowly, telegraphing his movements) sits up better again. ] I'm sure you would love to know details, but I'm not interested in sharing every secret. Ask him. [ Vash gestures to his copy. ] Why don't you tell the dogs how very not human we are?

Like hell you will.

[ Thorns shifting around in the back seat has all the hairs on the back of Wolfwood's neck standing straight up. None of the rest of what the messed-up bastard says lands -- he's got the biggest dick of anyone in this car, bet on it, and calling him a dog is honestly just funny -- except the part about Nai. ]

He's just a kid. You stay the fuck away from him.

[ There might be other versions of that murderous brother-obsession psycho here, but the only one Wolfwood's met - -the only one Blondie here identified -- is the little one, and there is no goddamn way Thorns here is getting anywhere close to that kid. ]

I will have to agree. Interacting with the little Nai, making him go through that when he is not ready, and I can promise you that he is not ready, will hurt him, and you will realize that sooner rather than later. I rather doubt that is what you want. Another may be better suited to assist you.

[ There are two groups of people that the other Vash would not risk harming. Nai, and their children. Himself... he suspects is a distant, distant third.

His smile twists. ]

One of them will not be surprised by anything signifying how not human we are. And I suspect the other one is getting there rather fast.

A Gate is exactly what it says. An opening, to a different dimension. That is how plants produce everything that they do - it is more like taking it from there. Mine is just, [ the fingers of his left hand twitch, then fold in a fist, ] a little more complicated.

[For a minute, his confusion had overridden his wariness, and he'd almost forgotten just who they were talking to, so when he made the little quip about the little guy overcompensating with a truck, he actually snorted, not even offended at the by-proxy insult, because ok, that was pretty fuckin' funny, and sounded a bit more like the absolute sassy asshole his Vash could be when he was in A Mood.

But then he had to go and make it creepy again, and start talking about bringing the kid into this whole debacle, and if that hadn't already gotten his hackles raised - Nai being the kid in question or not - he started sitting up, and Wolfwood immediately moved, shifting through the seat until he was hovering around him, looming and ready to lunge for control if he made the wrong move.

Honestly, compared to everything else, the implication that he wasn't intimately aware of what Vash was capable of was almost amusing. At the very least, when his voice rumbled out in reply, it was darkly smug and cocksure.]

I have watched Vash the Stampede put a hole in the Fifth Moon and grow wings tipped with feathers longer than I am tall that were able to stop bullets. Don't assume my lack of book learnin' when it comes to all the technical terms means I'm an idiot, or I don't know what you are.

[His voice settled, and he wouldn't even care enough to be offended if Spikey thought his cowing down when Vash spoke was just more proof he was like a loyal "dog." He was no Legato, there was a difference between crazed, blind devotion and respect, but he was still more than willing to stop and listen when Vash spoke, especially when it gave him an answer that both surprised him and made things make just a bit more sense, especially when he thought back on those fancy little bullets Needle-Noggin had crafted out of thin air that were able to swallow things up and make them disappear.

Though now it brought up other questions and confusing mental images about how children were involved, and he almost would have asked just how the Hell that all worked, but glancing up at Blondie told him that now was exactly the opposite of the right time, if there ever was one, so he held his tongue.]

Tragic Ends VS Bad Ends, Trigun Flavor

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