Seven hours later Karl and Martin were cutting through the last layer of the
fifty-seventh floor. They had to carefully cut between wires and pipes and all
of the other junk that was stuffed between each level of the ship. Each pipe had a
shut-off valve and each wire had a fuse somewhere that had to be turned off. It
was slow going but they hadn't been electrocuted, scalded or burned in the
process yet.
In the plant room Meryl was awakened by a tapping sound. She got up and looked
at the plant. Vash was smiling and looking at her from the inside of the bulb,
tapping on the glass next to the hatch. Meryl jumped up, climbed up on the
cart and unfastened the hatch. Vash pushed the hatch open, and slid gently to
the floor landing on his feet. Meryl closed the hatch and Vash lifted her off
the cart with both hands and hugged her to himself.
"She wanted to heal me, Meryl. Suzume's wonderful."
"Your scars are gone, Vash," said Meryl, her head over his shoulder. She was happy, very
happy. But now she had to tell him about his brother.
"Yes! I even have a new arm," he said gleefully as he set Meryl down and held
out his new arm for her to inspect.
She looked at his arm briefly.
"Vash, here, take my blanket."
She picked up her blanket off the floor and averted her eyes as she handed it to
him. He wrapped it around his midsection. She turned back to him but savored the look of contentment on his face for only a moment.
"Michael got to Knives," said Meryl in a rapid burst of speech. Vash's face fell into
a icy glare.
"They drugged Milly and used her to get to into his room. They beat him very
badly. We can't get up to the floor. Knives wants to die now. He got to a
control panel and blocked our access to the floor when we went for help. He's
locked in his room. James is stuck up there but he can't do anything. We can't
get into the room. Martin and Karl are cutting through the floor. I can see how
far along they are."
Meryl took the pen out of her pocket. Vash grabbed it out of her hand.
"Doc? Doc?" Vash said as calmly as he could into the transmitter.
"Vash! Are you okay? Do you need me down there?" said Doc from the main control
room.
"No. I'm fine. I heard about Knives."
"They've cut through the last layer of the floor. They're near
the observation windows on the fifty-sixth floor. We need your help up there."
Vash handed the pen back to Meryl and then jumped from the top of the plant
platform down to the lower level. He ran out of the room at his top speed. Meryl
ran down the steps after him. Vash reached the fifty-sixth floor before Meryl
got to the plant floor elevator.
"Vash, we just broke through when Doc got your message," said Martin who was
looking up in the hole in the hallway ceiling. Vash saw James' feet emerge from
the hole. Martin steadied the man as he dropped down to the floor.
"Vash!" James said as he got up from the floor. "I've got Michael, Dean, Thomas,
and Mark tied up in the room next to Knives. I haven't heard anything from
Knives for the past eight hours."
Vash leaped up and grabbed the edge of the hole, crawling through to the top
floor. He looked down at the men from the upper floor.
"Don't let anyone up here until I tell you it's safe. They may have damaged a
dampener."
"Right, Vash, nobody, " said Karl.
Vash ran down the hallway and slammed his hand down on the control panel outside
Knives' room. It didn't open.
"Knives," he shouted "open the damn door."
There was no response. Vash picked up Meryl's cloak, took out several derringers
and shot at the seam where the two doors met. He fired until he made holes just
big enough to fit his fingers. The two doors creaked and groaned as Vash pulled
them apart. He walked in the room and stared in disbelief. He saw his brother's
form underneath his blood-soaked blanket in a corner of the room. Vash
hesitated, flexing his fingers for a second before he pulled back a corner of
the blanket. Bruises covered Knives' blood-stained face and part of his ear had
been torn off. Vash put his hand on his brother's forehead. He felt nothing.
Vash started to cry.
"You weren't going to kill anyone anymore," he screamed as he slammed his fists
on the bloody ground.
Anger spread through every muscle in his body, inciting every nerve to build up
their deadly power. Rem was gone. Wolfwood was gone. Knives was gone. He
screamed again as the energy in his arms began to grow, surging up both his arms
from his finger tips.
Meryl reached the fifty-sixth floor.
"Where's Vash?" she asked as she ran towards the men surrounding the hole.
"Vash said we let no one up there until he says its safe. You're not going up."
"What? I have to go up there, Vash could be in trouble."
James held Meryl back yelling at her.
"Vash is fine, Knives isn't going to hurt anybody right now."
"Then you'll let me up. I saw what Knives looked like. Vash needs somebody up
there with him," she yelled back.
Then they heard the scream.
"If its not safe for him, its not safe for you lady," said James.
"James, look at this," said Karl pointing to the hole. James and Meryl looked up
the hole. A pink glowing light filled hallway and radiated down through the
floor. It was accompanied by a loud high pitched warbling.
"You have to let me up there now. This is what it was like at Augusta," Meryl
screamed.
"Shit," said Karl.
He grabbed Meryl and hoisted her up to the hole. Meryl climbed through the
jagged metal and twisted wires to the upper floor.
Vash didn't care any more. Failure. Nothing else. Always failure. The angel arm
effect spread out from his fingers. Without this gun to focus the energy, the
effect spread all over his body. Enormous wings spread out from his arms and
back and scraped against the blood stained floor.
"Vash, stop this. Stop it now!" Meryl shrieked as she entered the room.
He turned and looked at her. She was going to die now. He couldn't stop it. He
lay on the floor and waited for the blasts to emerge as his huge wings soaked up
more of his brother's blood. Meryl stepped over his wings, and opened
the cabinet door with her key. Her whole body was shaking as she took out the dampener. The energy in the room broke against her like waves and the whining noise grew louder and louder.
Vash wanted his failure to be to be the last thing he saw on this damn planet. He looked back at his brother. Meryl moved toward him slowly and knelt next to his iridescent
cracked skin. She thrust the spike of the dampener into his arm and was blown
back against the wall as a thick octarine cylinder of purple energy arced to the
dampener from both of his arms. Flowing through the coils, the energy circled
his arm in the copper band and traveled down the spike into his arm. Vash arched
his back and opened his mouth. He was in too much pain to scream as the energy
coursed through his organs and into his brain. Vash blacked out as his mind
received the massive jolt of energy. The pink glow faded from the room as the
angel arm effect faded from his skin. His wings folded against his arms and back
covering his body. Meryl picked herself up off the floor and stood against the far wall as Vash slowly regained consciousness. He picked the dampener out of his arm and threw
it against the wall. Meryl hadn't been able to force the dampener far enough into his arm to allow it to fuse to the bone. Vash was still angry but now he was stunned. Vash's eyes were still glowing as he looked up at Meryl.
"Kill me," he said. "Kill me before I kill any one else."
Vash crawled towards her, his wings, which had not faded away with rest of the
angel arm effect, folded out from his back. He whispered the same words to her
again. Vash bumped against a jagged piece of metal as he crawled towards her. It
had been part of the contrivance Vash had made to hold down Knives. Vash picked
it up. Meryl kicked it out of his hand. He lashed out at Meryl with one of his
wings and knocked her against the large concrete slab. Her head hit one of the
corners and she fell to the floor. A trickle of blood ran down from her hair
across her face. Vash picked up the piece of metal and brought it to his throat.
"Needle noggin, put that damn thing down."