"If you want to get him, you go through me."
Vash felt his heart stop. No, no, no, she couldn't do this. She wasn't old enough to understand what she was doing, this wasn't where the ticket to her life's journey should be punched!
"Move Lily-Rose!" he yelled.
She was nineteen now. But he still saw the little girl, the defiant eleven year old who had been so lost, and had decided he could be her light. And then he saw the nineteen year old, white-streaked red pigtails thrown over her shoulder, and wondered abruptly when she'd gotten so tall. So strong. Surely it hadn't been him…
Lavender eyes glared in defiant furious terror up at Monev the Gale as Lily-Rose put herself between him and the entrance to the cells where Vash, Milly and Meryl were. The tall, muscular man in the purple suit looked down at her, and laughed contemptuously.
His hand moved fast, and as good as she was, Lily-Rose was not as fast as a man who had done nothing but train his whole life; the backhand knocked her across the room into, and half-through, the wall.
"Lily-Rose!"
He heard the faintest hint of a groan through the transceiver in his earring, and Vash felt his heart start beating again. She was still alive.
At least for now.
Lily-Rose's head rang like a church bell, and she was too dazed to stop what followed, listening as Monev stepped into the cell to confront Vash, as he slapped Meryl down the same way he'd slapped her, and how Milly took offense to that. She managed to get back inside enough to see Vash run by, grabbing his gun on the way.
She watched as Milly and Meryl limped out into the sheriff's office. From somewhere she found the strength to use the broken wall to pull herself upright. Something was damaged, somehow. Her vision was blurred, and her head still rang.
Didn't stop her from getting up, at least, though one of her arms didn't want to work properly. She pulled out her gloves from her pocket anyways, and put them on. There was no denying that Monev wanted to kill Vash. As long as she lived, she would be damned to hell if she let it happen.
She ignored Milly's approach as she worked the gloves on, then flexed her hand. The gloves still worked, and the sharp little knives popped out of the end like the claws of a cat. She saw Milly freeze, and Meryl's eyes go wide.
"L…Lily-Rose…?"
Lily-Rose ignored them both, and fell into training that was ten years past, tuning out the pain. She would pay for it later, if she survived.
She was pretty sure she wouldn't.
Her legs worked, mostly. Something hurt, but she ignored the feeling. She followed the trail of people knocked down or scared inside, chasing, always chasing.
Monev didn't see her coming. He'd stopped, prepared to annihilate a good city block when she jumped him, the hunting cry of a desert cat surprising both Vash–who'd stop in horror, realizing what Monev was about to do–and Monev himself, who hadn't expected someone to try and jump him.
"Lily-Rose, no!"
It didn't stop the large man, though. He unleashed hell on the street; aiming to kill Vash, the girl, and any other people. Collateral damage mattered less than his freedom.
The street exploded, dust, blood, and screams of pain that were abruptly cut short as people's lives were snuffed out. Lily-Rose went flying again, taking hits that she knew she wasn't going to survive.
She landed in the street, not two feet from Vash; he heard her breath bubbling in her throat. How could he not? She hadn't turned off her mic, and no doubt hadn't turned off her own transceiver. She had done this in defense of him.
Her head moved weakly; lavender eyes looking for him in the dust. There was ice in his blue-green eyes, a fury like she had never before seen, and even dying as she was, she knew it was not directed at her. No, this fury was in reaction to what had happened to the people, aimed at Monev.
Her consciousness was fading, but she clung desperately to life. There was still so much to see. Damnit, she hadn't even managed to get him to understand how she felt yet, she couldn't die here!
Darkness took her, and only allowed her one brief swim to the surface at dawn was rising. Vash knelt by her side, grief in his eyes, on his face.
"Why'd you do that?" he whispered, one hand cupping her cheek softly. "Lily-Rose, why?"
She realized after a minute that she was cold, but it didn't seem to matter. She managed a weak, bloody smile instead.
"Dummy…" she breathed, knowing the transceiver would pick it up. "Don't ask… stupid questions…. when you sh-should know… the answer."
Tears were running down his face; dimly she felt them hit her cheek. She wasn't going to have much more time….he was going blurry in her sight, and she had to say it now. She was not going to get another chance.
"Always…. wanted my first kiss… to be you…"
"Lily-Rose…"
He wanted to tell her she shouldn't talk like that. She was going to be fine! But she wasn't going to be fine. Whatever grace that had allowed her to hold on this long, for them to have this last conversation, it was fading, and fast. No amount of medical skill was going to save her…
Eight years. Well, nine, if you counted the year she spent half-stalking him from a cat's curiosity. How had he not noticed how much she'd grown until now?
Vash closed his eyes, still weeping freely, then leaned in before she could pass completely, and gave her that one kiss.
Lily-Rose smiled, and breathed five words before she slipped into the darkness.
And again, Vash the Stampede lost a loved one.