Author's Notes: Plot Bunnies struck and struck hard. Meryl, I am so sorry for what I did to you.

Borrowed Knives

By Sailor Lilith-chan

When Vash walked into that nameless town, brother slung over one arm, even Meryl could see something was wrong. The thick careless bandages Knives wore were grimy and caked with dried blood and pus. Millie noticed her partner's nervousness and smiled cheerfully, "Look Ma'am, look how happy he is…"

And he was. A big ear to ear smile. Smiling like he hadn't shot his own flesh and blood six times. Smiling like this was nothing new.

Smiling like the devil himself.

"Yeah," she forced herself to say, "I've never seen him happier."

Vash limped over to meet them, his brother bouncing with every step. "Oh," he said, trying to hug them and failing. He placed his brother down in a puddle from the water geyser. Meryl tried not to wince when she saw Knives' already infected wounds soaking in the muddy water. He flipped his wet bangs out of the way in an almost triumphant gesture. "Oh, Insurance Girls, I am so happy to see you."

He hugged them both a little too tight, a little too snug. "Oh, Mister Vash," Milly said happily, I'm so glad you're alright."

Vash kissed each of their cheeks. "Oh, it's great to be back."

For some reason, the shoulder against her felt damp. She pushed him aside. Her blouse was damp with blood.

His.

"Hey, what was that for?" Vash asked, slowly.

"You're bleeding, idiot," she told him pointing to her blouse.

Vash blinked.

"Oh," he said slowly, "So I am."

He passed out.

ooo

He was getting along with Knives wonderfully now. They spent hours talking on the front porch of Meryl's home in December. They had a lot of catching up to do. Over a hundred years.

Neither of them really minded or cared. What is time to an Immortal?

He laid on the porch swing, long legs hanging off comically. Knives stroked his hair slowly and told him how much he loved him.

There was no agreement in this situation. Both knew that neither would agree with the other. "I'm not okay with your choices," Knives whispered in his ear.

Vash closed his eyes and sat up. The last thing he wanted was this. If they couldn't resolve their differences, the battle could for millennia. It could quite possibly last to the end of time.

"Knives…"

"You're my brother," Knives said soothingly, " I always have loved you. That's what siblings do. Care for each other."

"Thank you, Knives," he said, spotting Meryl as she walked up the front steps.

"Vash," she waved a hand, the other was clutching a small paper bag. Instantly Vash caught a hint of cinnamon and sugar.

"Meryl, what did you get us?" Vash leapt over the handrail and picked her up. Ignoring her squeaks of protest, he carried her over to the nearest table. "Tell me."

"Sentimental idiot," Knives mumbled, although the way he said it was soft and mild.

"Maybe I shouldn't let you have these," Meryl said, clutching the bag.

Vash squealed like a small girl, if that were possible. "Come on… don't be cruel."

"Fine." Meryl opened a bag to let him peer inside.

Vash cooed at the sight of rows of cinnamon twists. "Oh wow, it's been decades since I had one."

"Where is my coffee?" Knives asked.

He looked up to see Knives frown. "Is everything alright?" Meryl asked.

She always ignored Knives. He told her that she just had to give his brother a chance. "You forgot Knives' cup of coffee."

Meryl frowned. "So I did."

ooo

Hooked up to an IV slowly feeding him a mixture of saline and painkillers, Vash slowly healed from his bullet wounds in the town's health clinic. Millie out of the kindness of her heart and a determination seen only in a Thompson stayed. Only a Thompson would stay up all day and all night making sure no one tried to kill the famed Humanoid Typhoon.

She, on the other hand, had HIM to deal with. Him being that scum of the earth, Millions Knives. Who named their child Knives anyway?

Granted, he was handsome with hair so blonde it was white, but he was sharp as… well… knives.

And at the moment he wasn't doing so good. Beneath the make-shift bandages, his wounds were puffy and inflamed, gobs of pus floating in pools of blood. Wincing slightly and chocking back bile, she tried to ignore the flies already tasting the ragged flesh around the bullet holes.

Knives turned slightly in his sleep. There was a metallic glint off a bullet lodged in his shoulder. Meryl finally gathered her strength and dug her fingers into wound.

Knives' eyes flew up and his back arched back, lips peeled back. He screamed and clawed at the sheets, tiny knife-like protrusions slicing into the foam and feather blend of the mattress.

"They're killing me!" he screamed, blood smearing the sheets with every twist of his body, "Brothers, sisters… they're killing me!"

Meryl, tiny fingers still wrapped around the deformed slug, felt as if her arm would be wrenched off. She made her choice rapidly as she could. Balling her other hand into a fist, she punched him in the cheek.

Oh, it was like punching solid steel, but as she watched, he blinked slowly before his eyes narrowed and he glared at her with hatred. "You piece of shit," he snarled, lips pulled back expose his very sharp teeth, "Who gave you the right to reach around in me as you please?"

"I did," she said and removed her hand, the bullet gleaming crimson in the suns. "Your wounds are already infected…"

She trailed off. If looks could kill, she would be dead thrice. "You aren't going to help me," he stated.

His eyes were a pale blue, as cold as ice and hard as diamonds. Meryl shuddered slightly and straightened. "Of course I will help you."

"Liar."

ooo

Sometimes they walked in the town. They talked about nothing really. Sometime Vash brought up Love and Peace, sometimes he didn't. And then Knives spoke of the wonders of their kind. It's funny. He never knew how strong his siblings are. Knives also spoke of a Utopia for all Plants to enjoy.

He didn't bring up humans and Vash didn't push the subject. He knew it bothered him.

Besides, when Knives spoke calmly like that, he made perfect sense.

ooo

"Mister Vash!"

The Plant tucked a bookmark into his book and looked up. His bright green eyes sparkled even though it was the middle of the night. Millie even noticed that they seemed to glow. Did all Plants behave like that? Millie hoped so. "Look at my project."

He looked. "What is that?"

It was pink and had a head, legs, and arms. "Why it's a plushie."

"For who?"

"You."

"Me?" Vash pointed to himself, puzzled.

"Yes, you," Millie chirped pointing to him.

He leaned over as carefully as his injuries would allow. "What is it of?"

"Not telling."

"Rats."

ooo

"When you and I were born we were angels," Knives said out of the blue as they sat on the steep pitched roof of Meryl's apartment building. "But now," he clenched his fist slightly, smiling all the while, "Now, we are gods becoming."

Vash checked his balance on the roof and walked over the duct where Knives was sitting. He could hear the sounds of passerbys gasping as they watched him cross with the grace of a cat.

Or an angel.

Or a god becoming.

Knives was smiling. It was small and close to invisible, but a smile all the same. "That's a good thing. Right?" Vash asked, "It's a good thing… isn't it, Knives."

His twin chuckled. "It's the best thing in the world."

Vash looked. The moons sparkled in the sky. There they were. Vash smiled and counted them.

One.

Two.

Three.

Four.

Five. Hole in sky.

Six?

"There's a sixth moon," Vash squeaked, pointing to the pale pink moon between the third and fourth moons.

"Of course there is," Knives scowled, "Trust humans not to know how to count."

"Knives," Vash said in warning, clucking his tongue in disapproval.

Knives said no more.

ooo

"My wounds feel like they're crawling," was the first thing Knives greeted Meryl with as she walked in the door.

Meryl scowled and then put on her most perky facial expression. "If it crawls, it means it's healing."

Knives rolled his eyes. He didn't seem a bit convinced. "If it heals," he mimicked her voice to a T. He snorted in disgust and resumed speaking normally. "You haven't changed my bandages. All you do is wrap fresh ones around the old ones. You're just as bad as my bro-"

"Fine," she snapped, interrupting him, "I'll change your bandages."

She began to unwind them, slowly but surely. Knives was right. She had been just putting bandages on top of bandages. "Why do you hate me?" she finally asked.

Knives made an O with his mouth. "Didn't Vash tell you?"

"Tell me what?"

He smirked. That stuck-up, no-good Plant smirked at her. "I'm an equal opportunity hater," he said, "I hate all of your kind."

The bandages finally slipped off. Strangely, the wounds in his shoulders, thighs, and torso seemed to writhe in the dim light of the room. Curiously, she flipped on a light and then wished she hadn't. Meryl immediately staggered to the washroom and threw up.

Maggots.

The words rang in her head as she flushed the toilet and shakily wiped the bile from her mouth.

There were maggots in his wounds. Fat pulsing maggots chewing away at his rotten and blackening flesh. Meryl shakily walked to the bed, dragging a wastebasket behind her. Knives looked up, the very persona of contempt and superiority. "Don't touch me," he snarled as she scooped out the maggots by the handful, "Don't touch those!"

"If I don't get them cleaned out-"

Knives tried to slap her, hand already twisting into twitching withering blades. As she worked deftly and filled the basket with the disgusting squirming things, the blades traveled up his arm, across his shoulder, and twisted out of his cheek. "Stop it, stop it, stop it, stop it, stop it!"

Meryl slipped the last maggot into the wastebasket. Knives' white hair was plastered to his head with sweat and streaked black. "What are you doing?" he gasped, sweat beading on his brow. "You stupid, stupid fool… you're trying to kill me."

He shifted slightly and Meryl was aware of the blade pressed against one of her breasts. The slight movement caused it to sink in. Blood oozed around it, slowly and steadily. She winced and pulled back. "I'm trying to help you."

"Then die," he said.

ooo

Millie smiled fondly whenever Vash said Knives wanted a cup of coffee. And being the good loyal girl she was, she ran and got it. She would even ask how his relationship with Knives was going. "Fine," he said.

"Of course it is," Knives added, rolling his eyes slightly. Millie ignored him. Knives smirked slightly and sipped his coffee. "Tell her, more sugar next time."

Vash rolled his eyes. "What did Mister Knives say?" Millie said, aware of the fact that Knives refused to talk to anyone other than Vash.

Vash looked Knives briefly, hiding a quick smile at the sight of his brother's glare. "He said that there's not enough sugar in his coffee."

"Well, if I put in any more it will be sludge."

"Knives doesn't mind."

ooo

Meryl pressed her back against the hallway in the health clinic. She was risking her job for this. Getting antibiotics for a man who cursed her very name as well as the species she was part of.

This was ridiculous. She shouldn't be doing. Logic told her that this way was very stupid. But she's had the antibiotics in her cape and it was their fault for charging so much. If they had been in one of the cities, she wouldn't have to do that.

The light was on in Vash's room and she peered in. Vash's breath was even and calm and the gash on his face had faded into nothing. Millie suddenly looked up from the doll she was making. It had blue button eyes, fuzzy yellow hair, and a beauty mark under the right eye. Knives.

"Sssh… Ma'am, he's asleep," Millie whispered, putting her hand to her mouth in a hush gesture of silence. "How's Knives?"

Meryl's breast stung when her partner mentioned his name. She closed her eyes and lied.

"He's just fine. Just fine."

ooo

"Is being superior such a bad thing?"

"I… I really don't know, Knives."

"Immortality. We are ageless beings. Embrace that."

"I'll think about it."

ooo

"Applesauce," Knives sneered, lips pulled back, "Do you take me for a baby, woman?"

Meryl gritted her teeth. She had spent time twisting opening the capsules and dumping them into the treat. "If you don't eat, you will die…"

"Bah," Knives snapped, his wounds bleeding red and clean into the gauze, "You'd see me dead. And you'd see him dead. You are all alike."

"In that case," she said, shoving the bowl of applesauce into his lap, "It's for your brother…. EAT!"

Slowly and painfully, Knives scooped the applesauce out and swallowed it. His hands, twisted into claws by pain and injury, were too stiff to use a spoon. He licked the bowl empty and spent several minutes smacking his lips. "Done?" she asked.

"Very," he replied and closed his eyes, "I don't see this as an ending. I see this as a beginning."

"Really?"

She waited for the medicine to kick in.

Knives chuckled. "You see whatever happens, I still win."

Please, she thought to herself, please work. "Is that so?"

He opened his mouth either to retort or reply, but failed. A gout of blood mixed with vomited-up applesauce poured out of his mouth and nostrils and down his chin. The look in his eyes was of utter horror. If he could speak, she knew what he would say.

You poisoned me. You poisoned me. I knew. I knew.

Black moved across his hair like an ink stain as he twitched, blood smearing the sheets in and the walls.

She had done it.

Unintentionally to be sure, but Knives was dying.

ooo

"She doesn't look at you much anymore."

"Knives, the short girl… Meryl loves me."

"But you love this human?"

"I…"

ooo

Knives gave a shuddering last breath as his hair darkened to a dull black. Meryl sighed in relief. Knives would bother them no more. His evil would be gone.

He was wrong. He had lost.

Meryl closed her eyes and turned away as Knives' body charred, loops of burnt intestine spilling out of his body, eyes shriveling in their sockets, limbs cracking open as core-like rubies imploded.

And Vash…

Meryl opened her eyes, staring at the corpse that had been the cruel Millions Knives. She laughed. She had beaten the beast with her own hands and a selection of antibiotics.

The door to the rented house creaked open. "Ma'am," Millie's voice echoed through the building. "We're home."

"The conquering hero returns," Vash added.

What she had done finally sunk in. Meryl in panic looked at Knives' putrefying corpse and screamed. She had killed Vash's brother. She had killed him without a thought to that fact that he was not one bit human.

He'd never forgive her. Vash would never forgive her. Meryl backed up until her back brushed against the wall. He'd never forgive.

"Ma'am?" Millie's hand brushed against her shoulder, a comforting gesture, "Ma'am… Vash's brother. What have you done?"

Meryl finally allowed herself to cry. "Oh, Millie," she sobbed and buried her face in the taller woman's side, "It was an accident… I didn't mean… I didn't know…"

Her partner swallowed nervously. "I know, Ma'am," she said softly, "But Mr. Vash… what will he say?"

Vash suddenly burst into the room. For someone who could see his brother's corpse in the center of the room, he looked cheerful.

How could he be?

And then Meryl saw the little plushie Millie had made clutched in his hand, already dressed in tight Tomas leather.

"Insurance Girls, Knives was kind enough to pay me a visit. He says he's willing to listen to me, if I listen to him."

Meryl and Millie stared on in horror.

ooo

"I is not an answer, Vashu."

"I don't know."

"Can you be certain in her love for you?"

"Why do you ask?"

"Because I believe she is cheating on you."

"Don't joke around, Knives."

"I'm not."

ooo

Meryl took Vash and "Knives" back to her apartment in December. Millie went back to her family in Concord's Crossings when the pregnancy started to show two months ago. It proved hard to work with Vash, who refused to face the reality of his brother's death.

Maybe it was better this way. Now she didn't have to own up to the fact that she had killed him.

She also found herself drifting apart. Tonight at the Bernardelli Insurance Society's Christmas Party, she could forget about Vash and his "doll". She could be Meryl Stryfe, top agent in the DID. She could…

"Oomph."

Someone stumbled into her and caused her to drop her champagne glass. "Sorry," he apologized.

This was her fourth glass and she was blitzed. And from this angle, he looked like Vash. "Just clumsy," she slurred, twirling her finger on his jacket.

They were out the door, mouths pressed against each other with urgency and strength.

Even as he was renting them a room, she didn't even stop to ask him his name.

ooo

"I don't believe you, Knives."

"Then go to this hotel room. If I am wrong…"

"You are wrong. What if you're right?"

"Will you admit humans are scum?"

ooo

Just as the stranger was opening her blouse, Vash kicked open the door. Suddenly Meryl found herself staring at Vash. He shook like a leaf and clutched the Knives plushie against his chest.

"Vash… I…"

"You," Vash whispered, "Whore. You painted Jezebel. Knives was right. Knives was always right."

"Vash," Meryl squeaked out, "This isn't how it looks."

"Yes it is," the Vash-like stranger next to her said, trying to grope her breasts. "It's everything-"

"Shut up!" Meryl screamed, punching him in the jaw, "This is all your fault." She turned around, "Vash, please listen to me."

He was already gone.

ooo

She lied. She lied. She lied. She lied!

Knives' hands slipped around his shoulders and gave him a hug as Vash rocked back and forth on Meryl's couch. "You know that if you hadn't discovered that, she would have continued. Perhaps she will…"

"Meryl," Vash moaned before dissolving into tears, "Meryl, Meryl... I loved her, Knives. I loved her!"

"Sssh, sssh," Knives soothed, "You are a loving god, my Vash. The most loving being in this universe."

Vash sniffled once more, "I loved her."

"I know," Knives said, a small smirk crossing his lips. "But sometimes the unfaithful must be punished."

"That's what Wolfwood said," Vash whispered.

"So, will you listen to me?"

Vash smiled cruelly. "You have my all, my dearest brother."

ooo

Meryl fumbled for her keys as she reached her apartment door. That look of betrayal on his face haunted her. The way his eyes widened and jaw trembled. He looked just like Knives did when he had died.

Perhaps Vash in a way had died when he saw her with that man. Vash loved far too much and loved too strong.

No, no, Vash was still alive. He had to be.

Meryl finally opened the door and flipped on the switch. Light flooded the room.

Vash sat in the center, nude and surrounded by bloody implants and his artificial arm. He was smeared with fresh blood and utterly perfect. Untouched. "Vash," she walked over to him, "Vash, I'm so sorry."

Pain rushed through her mind and forced her to her knees. "Bow to your one true god, weakling," Vash commanded, rising to his full height, "Although it is not what you deserve."

Beside him, the tiny plushie seemed to walk on its own. Stiffly and slowly, but it was walking. "Please listen."

"I have," Vash snapped, eyes flashing blue for a split second, "But no more. No more, Meryl." He pulled on a nearby robe and almost preened. "Now, I listen to the brother that loves me."

The little Knives plushie walked over to him and embraced a leg. Meryl struggled to get up and wished for the solid weight of a derringer in her hand. "Knives is dead."

"Oh," Vash said, shaking his head, "Knives explained it all to me." The little doll appeared to be shaking in laughter. "You destroyed his body, but not his spirit."

He forced Meryl down onto floor, her bones cracking in protest. She screamed as several bones ripped through her skin, gleaming with blood, muscle, and marrow. "Vash… love… lo-"

"You would have come home, reeking of sex, and kissed me with a mouth that swallowed his seed," Vash howled in anger, "That isn't love. My brother will return in a new body. That's when he and I will bring Eden to our kind."

"Love…"

"I'm sick of your voice," Vash said, waving his hand carelessly, "I wish you would shut up."

Meryl howled in pain as her tongue was yanked out by an invisible hand. She was beyond speaking as her mouth filled with hot blood and pain.

"Knives gave me his weapons," Vash suddenly whispered and forced Meryl to look up. His fingers on both perfect hands were twisting, sharpening. "He taught me. Millions and millions of knives."

Meryl gurgled out a protest before blackening out.

The last thing she saw was a cloud of blades heading for her.

ooo

He was waiting for his Master to return. He's patient that way. The others told him to give up hope, but Legato knew that Master would praise him for what he's done. He's given up an arm and a good portion of brain tissue now for a man with gold hair and beautiful green eyes.

"That's not your Master," Elendira would tell him with a scowl, but Legato wouldn't listen.

He knew that Master would come back.

Even kicked dogs were loyal.

ooo

Is that Legato? I thought I shot him.

You always did damage your toys. But Legato is stubborn.

Is he?

Yes.

It would better if he had died.

But he is loyal.

They all are.

Then he is the most loyal.

Of course…

ooo

Vash the Stampede, Humanoid Typhoon, Diablo, Destroyer of July and Augusta, Act of God, and Lucifer Incarnate, placed his hands on Legato's shoulders.

"Rise, my most faithful servant," he said, "You have done well."

The End