Thousands of voices
Disclaimer: I don't own Trigun. Lyrics taken from "Distant Early Warning" by Rush.
A/N: Beta'd by Celesma, thanks my dear :)
There's no swimming in the heavy water
No singing in the acid rain
"It is your fault, Knives. The humans didn't fall, they were pushed. You can't crush someone into the dirt and then expect them to embrace it and sing your name in hymns. What did you think?! "
His brother's silence, the silence of the world, is as heavy as the darkness weighing down on him from all sides. He knows that Knives has heard him – they cannot close each other off, not even with thousands of miles between them. "It will take time and sometimes they might relapse – but humans do make progress! You – "
"Progress?" Knives suddenly sneers and his voice seems to come from the very shadows, from everywhere and nowhere. "What you call 'progress' has given them the means to experiment on us! And given them the impertinence to believe it was their right to do that!" He pauses, voice dropping in disgust.
"You are willfully blind, Vash. You tread in darkness and still think you can see the truth. I pity you, 'brother'."
Vash can feel him leaving, back turned in a mocking show of trust. Trust in the belief that Vash is blind and a coward and won't make a move against him, not again.
The silence stretches – and it hurts, it hurts so badly!
He doesn't move.
It's so hard to stay together
Passing through revolving doors
We need someone to talk to
And someone to sweep the floors
"It's funny, you know... Knives and me – we both think we're doing the right thing. We both think we know a truth the other doesn't."
They stride on under the sun. Vash knows that Wolfwood heard him, that he's listening, because the priest is not saying anything. But for that same reason, he also knows that the other man thinks that he, Vash, is not right, that he's not doing the right thing – Wolfwood has his own ideas about what is wrong and right. Vash respects this and yet it sometimes makes him want to tear out his hair in frustration. How should he, how should anyone, ever do the right thing, if apparently no one could agree with anyone else on what that was? There had to be an answer, there had to be an absolute truth.
He knows, to kill is a sin, he knows, he has to forgive – but what will it matter, if no one ever listens?
Maybe that is why, in his head, he knows Wolfwood will leave him.
They are close but the gap between them is unmistakably there – they fight together and yet they don't. Whatever awaits them at the end of this road – they will not walk together much longer.
Wolfwood throws his head back and squints upwards at the sun.
"Well, maybe you both do, Tongari," he suddenly says, and Vash's breath catches.
Left and rights of passage
Black and whites of youth
Knives stares impassively at the gun Vash points at him, sadness and anger building and disappearing in his eyes like storm clouds. Thunder in the distance cuts through their silence.
"I tell you, you wouldn't do it. If you'd seen the future of humanity, you wouldn't do it. There will be progress Vash, oh yeah, there will be – but the killing won't stop, not ever! Some of them may not be mean to you, some of them might try to stop it, but they'll never be able to – eventually, even those humans will become the very thing they tried to fight, don't you get that? It's inevitable. Yes, I pity them, I pity you. They are evil in their core, and they don't even know it."
Knives is not moving, yet the lines of his body seem to shift, crawl.
He smiles.
The silence of deafened voices, thousands of voices, roars in Vash's ears. He trembles with it, shaking.
"Your aim is wrong, Vash. Let me help you out. I understand. I pity you, I do."
He reaches out.
Vash closes his eyes, conflicting thoughts and fears chasing each other in the chaos that is his mind and – keep your hand steady, don't let him corrupt you, do it, do it now, do the right thing – and the silence whispers in his ears again, a thousand voices crying out.
Who can face the knowledge
That the truth is not the truth?