TRIGUN: GunGrave
By ShadowHawk & Turles
Disclaimer: We do not own the copyrights to Trigun, or any other copyrighted information. All Copyrights belong to their respective owners.
Trigun: Gun Graves
Chapter 3: The Last Gung-Ho Gun
20 years ago.
In the remote deserts of Gunsmoke was the city called "Little Denver", it dwelled in the shadow of the remains of a ship. Or at least a great fragment that stuck out from the ground like an enormous shark's fin. Written upon it was one word that no one knew what it means, "Seeds". The city was as big as Mei (or May) City, it wasn't short of anything, shops, schools, churches, restaurants and so on that dwelled under the enormous metallic shark fin. It was here in the city of "Little Denver" that lived the family named Strife.
The Strife's were a loving family, only having the husband, wife and their three children.
There was Brandon, the eldest who was 16 who like all the other Strife's had dark eyes and hair. The next one down was Rem Striffe, who was 9 years old and had long black hair that came down to her shoulders. Last of all there was Meryl Strife who had hair as short as a boys but she kept it just the same without letting anyone get to her. Yet, even in this picture perfect family, there was trouble.
Most of the trouble came from Brandon, who like many first-born children was the hardest to deal with. As a young boy he caused a lot of damage around the house, such as when he was 13 he stayed out a little too late one night. His mother usually locked all the doors and windows leaving Brandon with no key to get in. So, he got in through one of the small windows using his fist as a key. The trouble the next morning was mind- boggling. The mother and father were trying to figure out why this had happen. Rem was the one who was bandaging up Brandon's right hand and Meryl she was like her parents trying to figure out why Brandon was doing all these things.
Then there was that time that he wanted to use the family car but didn't know how it worked. He had the gears in reverse and then stepping on the gas pedal he then found out that the car was in reverse. That was after he felt something hit him from behind and he looked and hit the garage door.
Needless to say, Brandon was a problem child. This truth was growing as Brandon got older. There were a few times when he was arrested. During that time his family was still there, Rem still was the peacemaker, but Meryl got to be a little bossier. She always tried to keep Brandon under control, which proved to be quite useless in the end. Since because of the strictness of his mother, father and Meryl, Brandon had to get away from all that. So, writing a good-bye note Brandon Strife ran from home.
He thought that life would be a little better away from all the boundaries of home. How wrong little Brandon was, for from city to city his troubles only grew. He did become an avid street fighter and gunslinger. He had actually stolen a gun from a man he fought.
Using this stolen pistol he continued to make trouble.
That was until one day he decided to mug the wrong person, one that particular day the person turned out to be a professional gunslinger and bank robber. Brandon had realized in the instant that the bullet hit his throat how bad of a mistake he made.
Brandon's funeral was short and simple, especially with the facts of his criminal life. There weren't very many people there to mourn for him, until the news reached his family back in Little Denver. Then all of his family mourned for him. All of them wishing that he had stayed home. His mother and father crying over his grave with their tears like rain upon the sandy soil. Their little girl Rem was devastated when she cried in the arms of her sister. Meryl Strife had to be the strong one for her sister since their beloved brother was gone.
Yet, there was something in that graveyard that caught Meryl's eye. It was over on one corner of the cemetery, there was a small shack. IN the creeping shadow of it there stood a figure. She couldn't see it very well because of the darkness, but she did notice the long white coat of whoever was standing in there. She also noticed what looked like spikes extending from one of the shoulders like rays of the sun and it also looked like the figure had his or her arms crossed like someone waiting for a haircut.
Meryl was brought back to the matters of her family. Even though Meryl was only six years old she had to keep her sister together. She left the cemetery that was called Jerusalem's Lot leaving behind a piece of the past that she will forget. She will forget this past even inside the Bernardelli Insurance Society but the drive to fix things up would still exist and so would her bossy attitude.
Back in Jerusalem's Lot the figure moved out of the shadows. He wore a long white coat that brushed the headstones that he walked past. His black hair touched the tops of his ears and covered his left eye. While his right eye beamed out into the cemetery with a vampire yellow hue to his iris. On his left shoulder were spikes like spokes on a bicycle wheel. On his right arm was a human skull wrapped onto his arm with a chord piercing through the bridge between the eyes like a nose ring.
He walked up to Brandon's grave never stepping upon the area where the casket was laid. He widened his eye at the grave as if in surprise but actually had a strange determination about it. He stared down as the ground shook and up from it the dirt and sand plowed away as the casket was brought back to the surface. It rose to the surface like some kind of great rock being thrown from the soil by a great earthquake.
The coffin was settling itself upon the freshly shifted dirt. It was a simply wooden box in the typical coffin shape with six sides and a cross set upon it. The man in the white coat looked at it and as if being pulled up by magic hands the coffin nails began to rise out from the box at the same time like rising trees. At last they weren't holding the top board down onto the box as it shifted off to the side revealing the poor soul who had died in it.
He looked down at Brandon Strife as his eyes narrowed back to normal and for a brief moment this vampire like man was looking at him oddly. For this look was like that of human pity.
Far off into the desert did the man in the white coat carry the body of Brandon Strife. He brought him to a great chasm that looked like any other chasm on this planet. Yet hidden within this chasm was a ship that had crashed upon this dust ball of a planet long ago.
Within the belly of that metallic giant was the equipment that the man in the white coat needed to use Brandon Strife to his own doing. Down into the chasm they went, the man with the white coat kept looking down the stone stairs while the object on his left side grew. It was like a skyscraper that had lost its foundation and had set up its new home in this subterranean world. Along its sides were steel cables that held it in place within this narrow drop.
The body of Brandon Strife was stiff from his death, he was bent at his waist on the man's shoulder in a 45-degree angle with his arms dangling like a lifeless doll. His eyes never open as the man in the white coat had approached the door of the underground skyscraper.
Standing near the edge of the doors was 11 other people. The most diverse crowd to ever been seen by human eyes. One man was enormous and muscular, there was a woman who had a metallic eye patch, a boy with a red scarf, and a man who was carrying a very odd looking saxophone.
"Legato Bluesummers." He said, "You're back."
"I am, Midvalley." Legato said, "And I've found a new recruit for the Gung- Ho Guns." Midvalley crossed the bridge between the rock wall that held the stone staircase and the underground skyscraper. He looked at the body that was slung over Legato's shoulder.
Like all the other Gung-Ho Guns, Midvalley the Hornfreak could definitely tell when someone was dead. He looked back at his master and bowed.
"Forgive me for being observant." He asked, "But this person you brought with us is dead. How can he be a Gung-Ho Gun?"
"Simple." Legato answered, "We'll use the help of our master to revive him. He has only been dead for under a day. It won't be a problem for the master to deal with."
Legato walked to the doors of the underground skyscraper. Its exterior was filthy, covered in dirt, sand and rust. Yet somewhere in the heights of it all there was a single word that was starting to fade from its metallic shell. The word was "Seeds". It seemed ironic to Legato that a ship with the word "seeds" could give rise to such creatures as he and the other Gung- Ho Guns. The great doors of the underground skyscraper opened in slow great motion sending down its dust and debris. Within Legato saw the gleaming white lights of the skyscrapers interior, it all looked brand new as if this place was just built yesterday. He walked forward through the blinding lights of the hallway to a great chamber.
The chamber held what looked like glass caskets or at least that's what they looked like at first glance. A closer look shows that they are actually capsules for people to sleep in or rather to hibernate. Legato came to a small bridge that extended outward into the chamber but then stopped like the edge of a cliff. Down below his feet the chamber opened up into a greater and more spacious place like a canyon. In front of Legato was a capsule like all the others, but inside it was a man, suspended in a light blue fluid.
"Master." Legato called to that capsule, "I have brought another man to become one of us."
Inside the capsule the man inside awakened and breathed through the water like it was air. As he spoke his voice could be heard throughout the chamber like a priest within his own church. Legato never took his eyes away from his as he spoke.
"Very good, Legato." The man inside had said, "place him in one of the capsules, allow the lost technology heal him. Then we can make him one of us."
"I understand, master."
From one of the walls, a capsule came forward, its glass dome that covered its front opened up as if inviting someone to come within it. Legato moved toward it and placed the body of Brandon Strife into it. The glass closed around the capsule, the body slumped down into a crouching position as the capsule was filled with the same light blue fluid. It filled all the way to the top allowing Brandon's body to float within it as the capsule moved back along the great wall of this cavern like chamber.
"Master Knives?" Legato asked, "When we make him one of us, he cannot have his original human name. We must give him one suitable for the Gung-Ho Guns."
"Agreed." The man in capsule named Knives answered, "I'll leave that up to you." "Thank you, master." Legato bowed and left the room.
The twin suns had crossed and rolled through the blue diamond sky. The clouds have come, gone and come back again. Events above ground haven't' changed a bit, peoples lives have gone on, people have died, and Vash the Stampede still wanders.
Days had passed, soon the days had turned into weeks. The weeks slowly went by that gave away to months, and soon it had nearly been a year. Yet, inside the underground skyscraper, Brandon Strife was undergoing a great amount of changes. His heart had started again, life had come back into his body, his heart was beating again and the wound in his throat was healing. Whatever magic or lost technology was in this place it had brought a young man back to life from the death that he once was held.
From the point of view of the Gung-Ho guns it had nearly felt like an eternity. Especially to those who were waiting a long time to put their plans into action, but Legato and Knives were patient. Who could blame them? They could live for hundreds of years or were perhaps immortal and could afford to be patient, the rest of the Gung-Ho Guns were restless in waiting for Brandon to come out of that capsule.
To Brandon on the other hand, everything was like a dream or maybe a nightmare of the things that had happened. He thought back to all those terrible things that he did and thought that if he did things a little differently the death wouldn't have been so horrible. He then thought about the man he tried to mug. He had very black and slicked back hair, which matched very well, with his equally black suit. At the time that Brandon tried to mug him he saw what else the stranger had.
A very pink/purple shirt that was unbuttoned to expose the lapels and his chest, but it was what he had in his hands that was burned into Brandon's memory. The man held a very odd looking saxophone, come to think of it, before he mugged him he heard him playing very beautiful music before he was killed by him. His memories flashed and saw the man take his saxophone he looked as though he was going to play it but it opened and out sprung six barrels and it shot Brandon.
Brandon awoke violently to find himself in a tube surrounded by blue water. His instincts told him that if he was in water he could drown. He struggled and banged against the glass trying to break free and breath. Yet as he struggled he found that he wasn't loosing air at all, as a matter of fact he was breathing in this water. Where am I? He thought, is this heaven? He looked at himself and found that he was wearing a fine suit yet he had this scratchy feeling in his throat. He reached up and felt a scar or a crater in his throat. It wasn't a dream. He ripped open his shirt and found bullet holes in his chest. Five of them in a diagonal order, two of them were in a downward angle to his left from his chest. While the other three were in the same angle but only a few inches away from the first two bullet holes. So, he had died from six gun shot wounds, but why was he feeling alive?
"Let me out!" He shouted, but he felt very odd because he could feel his lips moving but he couldn't feel anything in his throat. Normally in water anyone could feel a vibration from their throat when they speak but Brandon wasn't feeling anything except his lips moving as if he was speaking.
In his original panicked state he didn't see out into the rest of the chamber he only wanted to get out to breathe once again. Now that he's had time to calm down and assess where he was or at least be calm enough to breathe in this odd water. He looked through the distorted view of the glass and beyond. He found that he was standing up he could feel it from the gravity like knowing that the gravity was pulling down from his feet instead of on his back like lying in bed. He looked and found the chamber to be enormous, it was like the inside of the plants at some of the towns. There was an enormous light bulb object to his left but in front of it was a bridge or at least half of one that extended out to it. Below it was just more space like a cavern. He wanted to know where he was and why he was still alive.
As the question was asked so too was the entire capsule moved. To Brandon it was now like being inside a carriage being moved along and set down. He felt the pull of gravity move from his feet to the whole of his back. He knew he was lying down he also knew that from all the air bubbles that traveled to the front of the capsule. At the same time he saw the water drain away and then a feeling of a sucking action all around him.
The blue water drained away and he then felt relief that he would breathe normal air again. Then a thought popped in his head, if he could breath water what's to say that he wouldn't be able to breathe air again? Would he have to spend the rest of his life in a tube filled with blue water?
As the rest of the water drained away he tried to move (in the limited space he had) to breath in what was left of the water. He began to feel the water running off of his skin and the dry feeling coming back.
The fear was growing when the last of the water was gone and Brandon was holding onto his breath. He held it in like a pot smoker holding in the smoke. Then he felt a tickle in his throat, like he was about to cough. He couldn't hold back the feeling anymore he coughed. Against the dry skin and from within his throat he felt water. He was coughing up water, he didn't notice at first but he then felt air coming back into his lungs. He could breathe air again.
"Thank you, God." He thought
Then the glass door of the capsule opened. He leaned up and looked around to see his surroundings more clearly and in living color. It truly was a strange place, but the strange went to the bizarre when he heard music. It was the music of the saxophone. Brandon looked as a man dressed in a white coat came over to him across the bridge.
"Good morning, Brandon Strife." His voice was a calm tone almost apathetic from Brandon's point of view.
"Hello." Brandon said but he heard no words coming from his mouth. Brandon grasped for his throat and felt that bullet hole again. It was true now, he had no voice anymore. How would he speak? How will he live life if he couldn't speak anymore?
"Don't' be afraid that you lost your voice." The man in the white coat spoke out loud.
"Who are you!" Brandon tried to shout but only his lips moved as he screamed so loud in his mind.
"My name is Legato.. Legato Bluesummers." Legato introduced himself, "And I am also the 12th Gung-Ho Gun."
"What's happened to me!" Brandon cried, but the only thing that came from him was his tears as he sat in the lying down capsule. "How are you hearing me?!"
"You've died." Legato explained, "But with the technology of our master we've brought you back to life. And I am hearing you through your thoughts. When you died, you were brought here and you were changed. You've been made more powerful than before. You've become telepathic with the aid of our powers. The powers of the Gung-Ho Guns and you my young friend are now a Gung-Ho Gun."
"I don't want this!" Brandon screamed as he covered his ears hoping to block out the voice of Legato. As he tried to block out the voices he cried silent tears but through it all he heard music. He looked over Legato's shoulder and saw a man standing in the entrance. A man that was playing a saxophone, Brandon knew who it was, it was the man that killed him.
Brandon got up from his capsule and dashed over to the man who was playing the saxophone. In his pity and his rage, Brandon grabbed the man by the lapels of his suit and shouted at him, silently.
"Why did you kill me?!" Brandon demanded with the fires in his eyes at the saxophone player, "Who are you!?"
The sax player shrugged, "Sorry, kid I can't hear you."
Brandon raised his fist and slugged the sax player and the sax player fell to his side with his saxophone. But then Brandon felt a strange feeling in him; all his muscles froze as if he had lost control of himself. He then felt himself move down onto his knees and his arms moved by themselves. His hands were placed behind his head against his will. He was facing the 12th Gung-Ho Gun, Legato Bluesummers.
"I see you still have a lot of work to be done." Legato stated, "you've struck one of your fellow team members. This arrogance must be punished."
Brandon felt his left arm move by itself again, he watched as his left hand formed a claw. He tried to fight against whatever force was at work against him. But he couldn't stop what was about to happen.
Legato watched as he used his powers against Brandon Strife. The boy looked so pitiful on his knees, then again to Legato humans are so easily controlled. All he had to do was concentrate just a tad and they were like puppets. Brandon shoved his fingers into his right eye, from the wounds that he had made the blood ran down his fingers to his hands and down his arm. It also ran down his face where it went into his silently screaming mouth. Legato then commanded Brandon to pull out his hand and Brandon did so against his will. He pulled out what remained of his eye. The pain was indescribable it was at the point where he wished that he was back home with his family. He realized the errors of his way but it was all too much for him to take as he spewed onto the clean floor where his blood lay.
Released from Legato's power, Brandon had fainted with the agonizing pain still there in his face. Legato went over and picked up Brandon in his arms and went across the bridge over to the enormous light bulb where Knives was watching the whole time.
"Why did you do that, Legato?" Knives asked
"Forgive me master." Legato bowed with the unconscious boy in his arms, "the boy needed to be taught a lesson. I feel that he is still too attached to his human past. I think he needs to have his childhood memories erased so that we may train him to be a killer like us all."
"Very well." Knives agreed, "put him back in the capsule. Have some special weapons made for him, a new set of clothes and an eye to replace the one that you forced him to rip out."
Legato bowed again, "I understand master." He went back to the capsule and placed Brandon back into it. The glass door covered it as it filled with the blue water again but this time the blood from his missing eye had mixed with the blood too.
Weeks had passed, weeks gave way to months and moths to years. Brandon had change even more while inside the capsule. Occasionally he would be taken out, but he would be kept under sedation. During that time his eye had been replaced with a bionic one. His muscles also began to bulge all over, pretty soon he became so muscular that he had ripped his funeral clothes. So, his old funeral clothes were taken away, while a new set was being made for him.
There was even one day when Legato and Knives looked at Brandon together. They felt that he needed a new name, a name that was worthy of the Gung-Ho Guns.
"I christened him," Legato stated, "Gun Grave the Undead, the 14th Gung-Ho Gun."
With the lost technology at the disposal that the Gung-Ho Guns had, they erased Brandon's (or rather Gun Grave's old past). They soon replaced it with new memories, memories of him being within the company of the Gung-Ho guns ever since he was a kid. From his point of view everything was dark. Then he began to loose thoughts and memories. The voices of people he used to know were there but then they were gone. Once there clear as could be but then they were gone like a snowflake in a fire's grip.
Then Brandon woke up he was sitting on a table and his clothes were changed, he was wearing a jacket that had broad shoulders that made him look bulky and even more muscular. He was even wearing gun holsters. Then something strange occurred to him, what was his name?
"Who am I?" He thought to himself, "Where am I?"
"Good morning, Gun Grave." A voice spoke and he looked and there was Legato Bluesummers.
"Hello." He said noticing that he had no voice or even any recollection of what has happened. Then he thought about what he did know and then he had a set of things coming back into his mind. He remembered training with several people, people that he knew as the only family he had. It was as if something had knocked all that away from him and it was now coming back. His family, the Gung-Ho Guns, Monev the Gail who taught him to sharp shoot and to physically train. Dominique the Cyclops who taught him how to use a technique called Bullet Time. Chapel the Evergreen who taught him how to use his guns the Cerberus as well as the coffin that Chapel had designed. Even the dark Legato, who taught him to use his psychic abilities, the life he had was clear now. "Master Bluesummers." Gun Grave said with his mind, "What happened?"
"You were careless while training with Chapel." Legato explained, "You fell quite far and even though you are a Gung-Ho Gun, it is a miracle that you survived at all."
"I promise it will never happen again." Gun Grave pleaded even though he had no recollection of such an accident except training with Chapel the Evergreen and then taking a stumble. He never knew how serious that stumble was until now.
"I've come to tell you this." Legato said, "You're training is nearly complete. Now you have to travel above ground through the cities. You are to go west and keep going west until you are instructed otherwise. We of the Gung-Ho Guns are in search of a man named Vash the Stampede."
"The brother of Master Knives." Gun Grave stated
"Yes." Legato answered as he pulled back the sleeve of his left and looked at it with a glare in his eyes that was like ecstasy. "We don't know where he is, so all we can do now is simply search for him. All of us are searching, that's why you are to go, but remember Vash is spineless he'll think twice about killing. Which will give you the advantage."
Gun Grave looked and found his coffin with its connecting chains lying on the floor. He went over to it and slung the coffin over his shoulder. He looked and found his broad brimmed had and looked at his master with his normal eye and bionic eye that he had for as long as he could remember.
"I'm ready master." He said
"Go, then." Legato said, "Remember to supply yourself with fresh fluids from humans. That will be the only way that you can sustain yourself."
Gun Grave remembered the egg he was given that would help him to be supplied with bodily fluids. He patted his coffin knowing that the egg was in it. He left the underground skyscraper and found the surface to be full of blistering heat instead of the cool underground. He looked to where the suns were setting and knowing that was the west. He headed in that direction feeling a small itch from within his coat. He reached in and found a pocket there and pulled out a picture. A badly worn picture with two children in it, a boy and a girl. He couldn't tell who they were or why the picture was in his pocket. Yet as he headed off into the west he had put aside the picture and placed it back in his pocket. Even if he did put it aside he still couldn't help it, it was like a reoccurring itch that had to be scratched sooner or later. Who were those children in that picture?
To be continued.
By ShadowHawk & Turles
Disclaimer: We do not own the copyrights to Trigun, or any other copyrighted information. All Copyrights belong to their respective owners.
Trigun: Gun Graves
Chapter 3: The Last Gung-Ho Gun
20 years ago.
In the remote deserts of Gunsmoke was the city called "Little Denver", it dwelled in the shadow of the remains of a ship. Or at least a great fragment that stuck out from the ground like an enormous shark's fin. Written upon it was one word that no one knew what it means, "Seeds". The city was as big as Mei (or May) City, it wasn't short of anything, shops, schools, churches, restaurants and so on that dwelled under the enormous metallic shark fin. It was here in the city of "Little Denver" that lived the family named Strife.
The Strife's were a loving family, only having the husband, wife and their three children.
There was Brandon, the eldest who was 16 who like all the other Strife's had dark eyes and hair. The next one down was Rem Striffe, who was 9 years old and had long black hair that came down to her shoulders. Last of all there was Meryl Strife who had hair as short as a boys but she kept it just the same without letting anyone get to her. Yet, even in this picture perfect family, there was trouble.
Most of the trouble came from Brandon, who like many first-born children was the hardest to deal with. As a young boy he caused a lot of damage around the house, such as when he was 13 he stayed out a little too late one night. His mother usually locked all the doors and windows leaving Brandon with no key to get in. So, he got in through one of the small windows using his fist as a key. The trouble the next morning was mind- boggling. The mother and father were trying to figure out why this had happen. Rem was the one who was bandaging up Brandon's right hand and Meryl she was like her parents trying to figure out why Brandon was doing all these things.
Then there was that time that he wanted to use the family car but didn't know how it worked. He had the gears in reverse and then stepping on the gas pedal he then found out that the car was in reverse. That was after he felt something hit him from behind and he looked and hit the garage door.
Needless to say, Brandon was a problem child. This truth was growing as Brandon got older. There were a few times when he was arrested. During that time his family was still there, Rem still was the peacemaker, but Meryl got to be a little bossier. She always tried to keep Brandon under control, which proved to be quite useless in the end. Since because of the strictness of his mother, father and Meryl, Brandon had to get away from all that. So, writing a good-bye note Brandon Strife ran from home.
He thought that life would be a little better away from all the boundaries of home. How wrong little Brandon was, for from city to city his troubles only grew. He did become an avid street fighter and gunslinger. He had actually stolen a gun from a man he fought.
Using this stolen pistol he continued to make trouble.
That was until one day he decided to mug the wrong person, one that particular day the person turned out to be a professional gunslinger and bank robber. Brandon had realized in the instant that the bullet hit his throat how bad of a mistake he made.
Brandon's funeral was short and simple, especially with the facts of his criminal life. There weren't very many people there to mourn for him, until the news reached his family back in Little Denver. Then all of his family mourned for him. All of them wishing that he had stayed home. His mother and father crying over his grave with their tears like rain upon the sandy soil. Their little girl Rem was devastated when she cried in the arms of her sister. Meryl Strife had to be the strong one for her sister since their beloved brother was gone.
Yet, there was something in that graveyard that caught Meryl's eye. It was over on one corner of the cemetery, there was a small shack. IN the creeping shadow of it there stood a figure. She couldn't see it very well because of the darkness, but she did notice the long white coat of whoever was standing in there. She also noticed what looked like spikes extending from one of the shoulders like rays of the sun and it also looked like the figure had his or her arms crossed like someone waiting for a haircut.
Meryl was brought back to the matters of her family. Even though Meryl was only six years old she had to keep her sister together. She left the cemetery that was called Jerusalem's Lot leaving behind a piece of the past that she will forget. She will forget this past even inside the Bernardelli Insurance Society but the drive to fix things up would still exist and so would her bossy attitude.
Back in Jerusalem's Lot the figure moved out of the shadows. He wore a long white coat that brushed the headstones that he walked past. His black hair touched the tops of his ears and covered his left eye. While his right eye beamed out into the cemetery with a vampire yellow hue to his iris. On his left shoulder were spikes like spokes on a bicycle wheel. On his right arm was a human skull wrapped onto his arm with a chord piercing through the bridge between the eyes like a nose ring.
He walked up to Brandon's grave never stepping upon the area where the casket was laid. He widened his eye at the grave as if in surprise but actually had a strange determination about it. He stared down as the ground shook and up from it the dirt and sand plowed away as the casket was brought back to the surface. It rose to the surface like some kind of great rock being thrown from the soil by a great earthquake.
The coffin was settling itself upon the freshly shifted dirt. It was a simply wooden box in the typical coffin shape with six sides and a cross set upon it. The man in the white coat looked at it and as if being pulled up by magic hands the coffin nails began to rise out from the box at the same time like rising trees. At last they weren't holding the top board down onto the box as it shifted off to the side revealing the poor soul who had died in it.
He looked down at Brandon Strife as his eyes narrowed back to normal and for a brief moment this vampire like man was looking at him oddly. For this look was like that of human pity.
Far off into the desert did the man in the white coat carry the body of Brandon Strife. He brought him to a great chasm that looked like any other chasm on this planet. Yet hidden within this chasm was a ship that had crashed upon this dust ball of a planet long ago.
Within the belly of that metallic giant was the equipment that the man in the white coat needed to use Brandon Strife to his own doing. Down into the chasm they went, the man with the white coat kept looking down the stone stairs while the object on his left side grew. It was like a skyscraper that had lost its foundation and had set up its new home in this subterranean world. Along its sides were steel cables that held it in place within this narrow drop.
The body of Brandon Strife was stiff from his death, he was bent at his waist on the man's shoulder in a 45-degree angle with his arms dangling like a lifeless doll. His eyes never open as the man in the white coat had approached the door of the underground skyscraper.
Standing near the edge of the doors was 11 other people. The most diverse crowd to ever been seen by human eyes. One man was enormous and muscular, there was a woman who had a metallic eye patch, a boy with a red scarf, and a man who was carrying a very odd looking saxophone.
"Legato Bluesummers." He said, "You're back."
"I am, Midvalley." Legato said, "And I've found a new recruit for the Gung- Ho Guns." Midvalley crossed the bridge between the rock wall that held the stone staircase and the underground skyscraper. He looked at the body that was slung over Legato's shoulder.
Like all the other Gung-Ho Guns, Midvalley the Hornfreak could definitely tell when someone was dead. He looked back at his master and bowed.
"Forgive me for being observant." He asked, "But this person you brought with us is dead. How can he be a Gung-Ho Gun?"
"Simple." Legato answered, "We'll use the help of our master to revive him. He has only been dead for under a day. It won't be a problem for the master to deal with."
Legato walked to the doors of the underground skyscraper. Its exterior was filthy, covered in dirt, sand and rust. Yet somewhere in the heights of it all there was a single word that was starting to fade from its metallic shell. The word was "Seeds". It seemed ironic to Legato that a ship with the word "seeds" could give rise to such creatures as he and the other Gung- Ho Guns. The great doors of the underground skyscraper opened in slow great motion sending down its dust and debris. Within Legato saw the gleaming white lights of the skyscrapers interior, it all looked brand new as if this place was just built yesterday. He walked forward through the blinding lights of the hallway to a great chamber.
The chamber held what looked like glass caskets or at least that's what they looked like at first glance. A closer look shows that they are actually capsules for people to sleep in or rather to hibernate. Legato came to a small bridge that extended outward into the chamber but then stopped like the edge of a cliff. Down below his feet the chamber opened up into a greater and more spacious place like a canyon. In front of Legato was a capsule like all the others, but inside it was a man, suspended in a light blue fluid.
"Master." Legato called to that capsule, "I have brought another man to become one of us."
Inside the capsule the man inside awakened and breathed through the water like it was air. As he spoke his voice could be heard throughout the chamber like a priest within his own church. Legato never took his eyes away from his as he spoke.
"Very good, Legato." The man inside had said, "place him in one of the capsules, allow the lost technology heal him. Then we can make him one of us."
"I understand, master."
From one of the walls, a capsule came forward, its glass dome that covered its front opened up as if inviting someone to come within it. Legato moved toward it and placed the body of Brandon Strife into it. The glass closed around the capsule, the body slumped down into a crouching position as the capsule was filled with the same light blue fluid. It filled all the way to the top allowing Brandon's body to float within it as the capsule moved back along the great wall of this cavern like chamber.
"Master Knives?" Legato asked, "When we make him one of us, he cannot have his original human name. We must give him one suitable for the Gung-Ho Guns."
"Agreed." The man in capsule named Knives answered, "I'll leave that up to you." "Thank you, master." Legato bowed and left the room.
The twin suns had crossed and rolled through the blue diamond sky. The clouds have come, gone and come back again. Events above ground haven't' changed a bit, peoples lives have gone on, people have died, and Vash the Stampede still wanders.
Days had passed, soon the days had turned into weeks. The weeks slowly went by that gave away to months, and soon it had nearly been a year. Yet, inside the underground skyscraper, Brandon Strife was undergoing a great amount of changes. His heart had started again, life had come back into his body, his heart was beating again and the wound in his throat was healing. Whatever magic or lost technology was in this place it had brought a young man back to life from the death that he once was held.
From the point of view of the Gung-Ho guns it had nearly felt like an eternity. Especially to those who were waiting a long time to put their plans into action, but Legato and Knives were patient. Who could blame them? They could live for hundreds of years or were perhaps immortal and could afford to be patient, the rest of the Gung-Ho Guns were restless in waiting for Brandon to come out of that capsule.
To Brandon on the other hand, everything was like a dream or maybe a nightmare of the things that had happened. He thought back to all those terrible things that he did and thought that if he did things a little differently the death wouldn't have been so horrible. He then thought about the man he tried to mug. He had very black and slicked back hair, which matched very well, with his equally black suit. At the time that Brandon tried to mug him he saw what else the stranger had.
A very pink/purple shirt that was unbuttoned to expose the lapels and his chest, but it was what he had in his hands that was burned into Brandon's memory. The man held a very odd looking saxophone, come to think of it, before he mugged him he heard him playing very beautiful music before he was killed by him. His memories flashed and saw the man take his saxophone he looked as though he was going to play it but it opened and out sprung six barrels and it shot Brandon.
Brandon awoke violently to find himself in a tube surrounded by blue water. His instincts told him that if he was in water he could drown. He struggled and banged against the glass trying to break free and breath. Yet as he struggled he found that he wasn't loosing air at all, as a matter of fact he was breathing in this water. Where am I? He thought, is this heaven? He looked at himself and found that he was wearing a fine suit yet he had this scratchy feeling in his throat. He reached up and felt a scar or a crater in his throat. It wasn't a dream. He ripped open his shirt and found bullet holes in his chest. Five of them in a diagonal order, two of them were in a downward angle to his left from his chest. While the other three were in the same angle but only a few inches away from the first two bullet holes. So, he had died from six gun shot wounds, but why was he feeling alive?
"Let me out!" He shouted, but he felt very odd because he could feel his lips moving but he couldn't feel anything in his throat. Normally in water anyone could feel a vibration from their throat when they speak but Brandon wasn't feeling anything except his lips moving as if he was speaking.
In his original panicked state he didn't see out into the rest of the chamber he only wanted to get out to breathe once again. Now that he's had time to calm down and assess where he was or at least be calm enough to breathe in this odd water. He looked through the distorted view of the glass and beyond. He found that he was standing up he could feel it from the gravity like knowing that the gravity was pulling down from his feet instead of on his back like lying in bed. He looked and found the chamber to be enormous, it was like the inside of the plants at some of the towns. There was an enormous light bulb object to his left but in front of it was a bridge or at least half of one that extended out to it. Below it was just more space like a cavern. He wanted to know where he was and why he was still alive.
As the question was asked so too was the entire capsule moved. To Brandon it was now like being inside a carriage being moved along and set down. He felt the pull of gravity move from his feet to the whole of his back. He knew he was lying down he also knew that from all the air bubbles that traveled to the front of the capsule. At the same time he saw the water drain away and then a feeling of a sucking action all around him.
The blue water drained away and he then felt relief that he would breathe normal air again. Then a thought popped in his head, if he could breath water what's to say that he wouldn't be able to breathe air again? Would he have to spend the rest of his life in a tube filled with blue water?
As the rest of the water drained away he tried to move (in the limited space he had) to breath in what was left of the water. He began to feel the water running off of his skin and the dry feeling coming back.
The fear was growing when the last of the water was gone and Brandon was holding onto his breath. He held it in like a pot smoker holding in the smoke. Then he felt a tickle in his throat, like he was about to cough. He couldn't hold back the feeling anymore he coughed. Against the dry skin and from within his throat he felt water. He was coughing up water, he didn't notice at first but he then felt air coming back into his lungs. He could breathe air again.
"Thank you, God." He thought
Then the glass door of the capsule opened. He leaned up and looked around to see his surroundings more clearly and in living color. It truly was a strange place, but the strange went to the bizarre when he heard music. It was the music of the saxophone. Brandon looked as a man dressed in a white coat came over to him across the bridge.
"Good morning, Brandon Strife." His voice was a calm tone almost apathetic from Brandon's point of view.
"Hello." Brandon said but he heard no words coming from his mouth. Brandon grasped for his throat and felt that bullet hole again. It was true now, he had no voice anymore. How would he speak? How will he live life if he couldn't speak anymore?
"Don't' be afraid that you lost your voice." The man in the white coat spoke out loud.
"Who are you!" Brandon tried to shout but only his lips moved as he screamed so loud in his mind.
"My name is Legato.. Legato Bluesummers." Legato introduced himself, "And I am also the 12th Gung-Ho Gun."
"What's happened to me!" Brandon cried, but the only thing that came from him was his tears as he sat in the lying down capsule. "How are you hearing me?!"
"You've died." Legato explained, "But with the technology of our master we've brought you back to life. And I am hearing you through your thoughts. When you died, you were brought here and you were changed. You've been made more powerful than before. You've become telepathic with the aid of our powers. The powers of the Gung-Ho Guns and you my young friend are now a Gung-Ho Gun."
"I don't want this!" Brandon screamed as he covered his ears hoping to block out the voice of Legato. As he tried to block out the voices he cried silent tears but through it all he heard music. He looked over Legato's shoulder and saw a man standing in the entrance. A man that was playing a saxophone, Brandon knew who it was, it was the man that killed him.
Brandon got up from his capsule and dashed over to the man who was playing the saxophone. In his pity and his rage, Brandon grabbed the man by the lapels of his suit and shouted at him, silently.
"Why did you kill me?!" Brandon demanded with the fires in his eyes at the saxophone player, "Who are you!?"
The sax player shrugged, "Sorry, kid I can't hear you."
Brandon raised his fist and slugged the sax player and the sax player fell to his side with his saxophone. But then Brandon felt a strange feeling in him; all his muscles froze as if he had lost control of himself. He then felt himself move down onto his knees and his arms moved by themselves. His hands were placed behind his head against his will. He was facing the 12th Gung-Ho Gun, Legato Bluesummers.
"I see you still have a lot of work to be done." Legato stated, "you've struck one of your fellow team members. This arrogance must be punished."
Brandon felt his left arm move by itself again, he watched as his left hand formed a claw. He tried to fight against whatever force was at work against him. But he couldn't stop what was about to happen.
Legato watched as he used his powers against Brandon Strife. The boy looked so pitiful on his knees, then again to Legato humans are so easily controlled. All he had to do was concentrate just a tad and they were like puppets. Brandon shoved his fingers into his right eye, from the wounds that he had made the blood ran down his fingers to his hands and down his arm. It also ran down his face where it went into his silently screaming mouth. Legato then commanded Brandon to pull out his hand and Brandon did so against his will. He pulled out what remained of his eye. The pain was indescribable it was at the point where he wished that he was back home with his family. He realized the errors of his way but it was all too much for him to take as he spewed onto the clean floor where his blood lay.
Released from Legato's power, Brandon had fainted with the agonizing pain still there in his face. Legato went over and picked up Brandon in his arms and went across the bridge over to the enormous light bulb where Knives was watching the whole time.
"Why did you do that, Legato?" Knives asked
"Forgive me master." Legato bowed with the unconscious boy in his arms, "the boy needed to be taught a lesson. I feel that he is still too attached to his human past. I think he needs to have his childhood memories erased so that we may train him to be a killer like us all."
"Very well." Knives agreed, "put him back in the capsule. Have some special weapons made for him, a new set of clothes and an eye to replace the one that you forced him to rip out."
Legato bowed again, "I understand master." He went back to the capsule and placed Brandon back into it. The glass door covered it as it filled with the blue water again but this time the blood from his missing eye had mixed with the blood too.
Weeks had passed, weeks gave way to months and moths to years. Brandon had change even more while inside the capsule. Occasionally he would be taken out, but he would be kept under sedation. During that time his eye had been replaced with a bionic one. His muscles also began to bulge all over, pretty soon he became so muscular that he had ripped his funeral clothes. So, his old funeral clothes were taken away, while a new set was being made for him.
There was even one day when Legato and Knives looked at Brandon together. They felt that he needed a new name, a name that was worthy of the Gung-Ho Guns.
"I christened him," Legato stated, "Gun Grave the Undead, the 14th Gung-Ho Gun."
With the lost technology at the disposal that the Gung-Ho Guns had, they erased Brandon's (or rather Gun Grave's old past). They soon replaced it with new memories, memories of him being within the company of the Gung-Ho guns ever since he was a kid. From his point of view everything was dark. Then he began to loose thoughts and memories. The voices of people he used to know were there but then they were gone. Once there clear as could be but then they were gone like a snowflake in a fire's grip.
Then Brandon woke up he was sitting on a table and his clothes were changed, he was wearing a jacket that had broad shoulders that made him look bulky and even more muscular. He was even wearing gun holsters. Then something strange occurred to him, what was his name?
"Who am I?" He thought to himself, "Where am I?"
"Good morning, Gun Grave." A voice spoke and he looked and there was Legato Bluesummers.
"Hello." He said noticing that he had no voice or even any recollection of what has happened. Then he thought about what he did know and then he had a set of things coming back into his mind. He remembered training with several people, people that he knew as the only family he had. It was as if something had knocked all that away from him and it was now coming back. His family, the Gung-Ho Guns, Monev the Gail who taught him to sharp shoot and to physically train. Dominique the Cyclops who taught him how to use a technique called Bullet Time. Chapel the Evergreen who taught him how to use his guns the Cerberus as well as the coffin that Chapel had designed. Even the dark Legato, who taught him to use his psychic abilities, the life he had was clear now. "Master Bluesummers." Gun Grave said with his mind, "What happened?"
"You were careless while training with Chapel." Legato explained, "You fell quite far and even though you are a Gung-Ho Gun, it is a miracle that you survived at all."
"I promise it will never happen again." Gun Grave pleaded even though he had no recollection of such an accident except training with Chapel the Evergreen and then taking a stumble. He never knew how serious that stumble was until now.
"I've come to tell you this." Legato said, "You're training is nearly complete. Now you have to travel above ground through the cities. You are to go west and keep going west until you are instructed otherwise. We of the Gung-Ho Guns are in search of a man named Vash the Stampede."
"The brother of Master Knives." Gun Grave stated
"Yes." Legato answered as he pulled back the sleeve of his left and looked at it with a glare in his eyes that was like ecstasy. "We don't know where he is, so all we can do now is simply search for him. All of us are searching, that's why you are to go, but remember Vash is spineless he'll think twice about killing. Which will give you the advantage."
Gun Grave looked and found his coffin with its connecting chains lying on the floor. He went over to it and slung the coffin over his shoulder. He looked and found his broad brimmed had and looked at his master with his normal eye and bionic eye that he had for as long as he could remember.
"I'm ready master." He said
"Go, then." Legato said, "Remember to supply yourself with fresh fluids from humans. That will be the only way that you can sustain yourself."
Gun Grave remembered the egg he was given that would help him to be supplied with bodily fluids. He patted his coffin knowing that the egg was in it. He left the underground skyscraper and found the surface to be full of blistering heat instead of the cool underground. He looked to where the suns were setting and knowing that was the west. He headed in that direction feeling a small itch from within his coat. He reached in and found a pocket there and pulled out a picture. A badly worn picture with two children in it, a boy and a girl. He couldn't tell who they were or why the picture was in his pocket. Yet as he headed off into the west he had put aside the picture and placed it back in his pocket. Even if he did put it aside he still couldn't help it, it was like a reoccurring itch that had to be scratched sooner or later. Who were those children in that picture?
To be continued.