TWENTY-TWO: still strangers

Milly sighed down at her glass of water, wishing for something a little stronger. "I think we should go after him," she announced.

They'd gone after Vash once before, only to have themselves hog-tied, tortured and nearly murdered before his very eyes, courtesy of Legato Bluesummers. It had been the first time she had known Vash to take a life with his own hand, probably the first time he'd ever pulled the trigger with an intent to kill.

No, she knew it wasn't just probably. Legato had become Vash's first victim, his first kill. His first intentional kill. She had dreaded watching the pain in him as he recovered from the injuries of that day, both physical and emotional.

Those emotional wounds had been the worst of it by far.

She glanced up to Stryker. The two were alone, sitting at the table in the kitchen. It was well into the early morning hours, and Vash had still not returned. Meryl had gone off to take a walk. None of them had been able to find sleep.

"I know how much she cares for him," Milly said, a sigh in her voice. "You can see it on her face. He hurts her so much without meaning to. Like…well, oh…" Her thought fizzled out when she couldn't find the words to express it. Tears began to well up in her eyes, but she wiped them away before they could fall.

Stryker leaned toward her, resting a hand on her shoulder. "Hey, are you all right?"

She didn't answer, and she probably wouldn't. He didn't press the matter. He let her lean against his shoulder to rest. It felt pretty good, he had to admit, offering his shoulder to a lovely young woman, though he didn't truly know her. Not yet. She was nice, she was funny, but she was still a stranger. They were all still strangers.

What the hell was he doing here?

But the memory of what he had seen in the geo-plant, the knowledge Vash had shared with him, swept all those questions to the backdrop of his thoughts.

Milly sighed quietly and let her eyes drift closed. He brushed her hair from her eyes, watching her in silence, glad to have her at his side. Glad that she trusted him enough, though they were still strangers.

----------

Meryl continued walking away until she stood out in the open desert. Her thoughts were of Vash, of course. They had been of Vash since his departure, though she was no longer angry with him for having left. He was only thinking of her well-being, of everyone's well-being. What right did she have to be angry at all?

She scanned the horizon, but he wasn't there. She didn't expect to see him. Not quiet yet. Nonetheless, she couldn't help but feel sad that he wasn't there, by her side, right where she most desperately needed him.

Her troubles didn't fade. She had a nagging worry tearing away at her soul, a terrible feeling that grew and grew and made her even more worried. So instead of standing around in that cold ship and letting her troubles eat at her, she had decided to go for a walk.

She was watching the horizon, wishing for his safe return, when a single headlight appeared on the horizon. A motorcycle, she realized, coming directly for her from the northeast. She frowned, wondering who would be traveling out here at this time of night. To be safe, she rushed out of sight and hid behind a large dune, derringer in hand.

Very soon, the motorcycle rolled to a stop right where she had stood. She watched the silhouette of a man rise from the bike to look around.

The man was Vash. He was shaking his head, grinning, reminded of those video images of deer Rem used to show him. When a deer was cast in the glow of headlights, often they would stare up at the oncoming in surprise right before they would bound away to hide. His coat flowing in the breeze, Vash glanced to the dune where she had run.

"Meryl? Come on out. It's just me."

Meryl didn't show herself. Not immediately. "You're back earlier then I thought you would be," she whispered.

"I know."

"We had visitors while you were gone," she said, her voice drifting to him from the shadows. "Your friend from Black Rock. They took some parts from the hull and left. We found some cameras too; Stryker destroyed them."

Vash nodded. "I knew he would take care of you."

"Something was bothering me after you left," she replied, huddled against the dune where he couldn't see her. She sighed and finally rose to her feet, meeting his gaze. When she saw the red coat, questions instantly arose that she had not expected. Her eyes were wide as she inspected him, seeing him as she had seen him so many times before, seeing him as she had seen him before she had truly understood who he was. "Vash, what happened out there?"

He stared at her for the longest time, uncertain of how to tell her what he'd learned. Uncertain of how to tell her that she too was marked for death, not just Vash the Stampede. They were all marked for death now. At least she would like the fact that she would get to stay with him now. That much was certain. If he let her out of his sight, he would be unable to protect her, and she was as good as dead.

He wet his lips and approached her, slowly, fighting to get a better look at her in the darkness of night. The Fifth Moon hovered high overhead, an ominous reminder of the capabilities of his right arm. His heart leapt to his throat as he decided there would be no sense holding it off. "Knives is dead," he whispered. "They found him and butchered him while he was defenseless." He closed his eyes, fighting back a tear. "I imprisoned him and left him defenseless, Meryl. He died because of me."

She turned away then, listening to him and pausing a long moment before nodding. "I felt something was wrong," she whispered. "I guess we should start preparing for the worst."

"Yeah," he sighed.

"Vash, you can't blame yourself for Knives. Rem would understand. Even you couldn't have protected him from something like this. Don't you think Knives would understand that, too?" Before he had a chance to respond she threw herself into him, wrapping her arms around him. She wanted to let him know she was there for him, and there was no better way than this. He could cry right here and now and she would never see him as anything less than the man she knew him to be. "No right shall fail you, Vash. No wrong will prevail. I know this in my heart."

"I know the man who hunts me, Meryl." She turned her eyes to him, confused. "He's more dangerous than any man I have ever faced. He's dangerous because he commands an army of plant-spawn, recycled from the arm I lost during the July incident."

She frowned, gazing up to him.

"There's no doubt now what he intends to do. He's going to punish me for believing it was over. He's going to come at me and fight until I am dead, until all those around me are dead. It means that our time here may be ended sooner than either of us anticipated."

"Vash?"

"Meryl, I don't know if I can beat him," he whispered. He let his words sink in. Her eyes turned away from him. He wanted to gauge her reaction as she clung to his every word, and he could tell by the look in her eyes that she was crushed to hear this news. Before, he had said she couldn't go. Would she expect the same of him now?

"Vash… I can't leave you again. I won't leave you."

He took her in his arms and crushed her to his chest. "What I'm about to tell you hurts me in every facet of my life, but it also means that you and I have come full circle. His name is Morgante the Warhead, and if we are going to stop him, we have to go right away."

Meryl turned her eyes up to his. "We?"

He nodded.

She clenched her eyes tightly as the world seemed to fall away from her. There would be no happy ending. No happily ever after. The sound of his voice seemed to confirm it. What was happening now was only the beginning of a very tragic end. She'd known it was coming since before she proclaimed herself, though she was surprised at just how much it stung to hear it though Vash's very own words.

She pulled back from him, breaking whatever it was and started back for the shuttle. "Let's go get Stryker and Milly, then."

There would only be that one tender moment which Meryl would take with her. It was not as grand as what Milly and Wolfwood had shared, but Meryl knew it would be enough. Until she had breathed her last, anything Vash could have offered, one kiss or a million, it would be enough.

He took a deep breath and followed after her. His eyes sparkled in the moonlight as he watched her guide him back toward the shuttle. His heart broke to thing that he would never have the time to take her in his arms and share more than a passionate kiss.

But a moment like that would likely never come. Not with the shadow lingering overhead. He peered at the fifth moon and shuddered. He wished for one moment that he was no more than a mortal man, and that he and Meryl had met in another lifetime, and that they had spent their lives together beneath a single sun in a vast, green world.

He thought of Earth, the world Rem had left behind so long ago, and of Alex, the man his hairstyle represented, who had shared a brief but joyful time with her. It pained him to no end how Rem's love life so closely resembled his own: tragically brief.

"We'll get Milly to make you some soup or something. You must be starving."

He closed his eyes when she tempted him with an offer of food. A smile crept onto his sad face. "That sounds nice," he said gently.

She led him into the shuttle, glancing to him from the corner of her eye. It was tearing at her to see him like this, so grim. She only seldom saw him quite like this, and it frightened her even more than the thought of her untimely end. We'll make it through this, Vash. You have to believe that. But she couldn't find the strength to say it aloud.

She couldn't let it end like this, on such a sad note with a false smile that would stay in her eyes until the skies themselves faded and the world blackened around her. She wished to take a happy thought with her to the shallow grave which waited for her in the not so distant future. She couldn't let it end like this.

Suddenly, she paused in the corridor and took his hand. Grabbing him by the collar of his coat, she pulled him down to her, demanding his attention one last time before they went off to face what was to be the final page this very short chapter of their lives. She placed her lips to his. She closed her eyes as tears poured down her cheeks.

She gave him everything she had then and there, all in that simple moment.

He parted from her suddenly, gazing to her with eyes that were full of tears. She still clung to the collar of his red coat, refusing to let go. He didn't try to pry free of her. He just wanted to look at her, take her in while the moment was still new. He was so grateful for her company, for her friendship. For her love.

She had his, unconditional and unparalleled. His eyes trailed from hers, down the length of her perfect nose to her plush lips. He wrapped his arms carefully around her, feeling so terribly sorry for all of his failures as a companion.

Would the others be able to follow him as he knew she would?

No doubt Milly would follow the both of them into the pits of hell if it were required, and he thought that maybe Stryker would understand his part in the twisted tale that was their history, a history that seemed to grow more corrupted by the day.

His fingers idly traced her spine as he gazed to her, and slowly he tilted his head back toward hers, returning his lips to their rightful place. He hoped he hadn't broken the moment before.

He tasted her, clinging to her as tears continued to spill down his cheeks. He knew they were falling onto her face, knew that his sorrows were melding with her love, and that only bound him tighter to her, in a way he hadn't expected. His spirits rose as he breathed her into him, letting the power of her spirit pour into his body and soul, lifting him from the pits of despair.

His past didn't matter. His future could wait.

Right now, all that mattered was a simple kiss.

Meryl tasted the tears she more than she felt them. They were mixed with hers and fell to the metal floor of the long-deserted shuttle, momentarily warming the cold metal floor, giving wake to the future that awaited them. It was not a warm bed they could possibly share, but a cold and hollow grave somewhere out in the barren desert, where no one ever deserved to be buried, covered not by the satin sheets they deserved, but by a blanket of blood.

There were no happy endings.

All that awaited them was the bitter knowledge that the end had come in more ways then they knew. Meryl could feel time pulling not only away from her, but away from the one she held her so eagerly and meaningfully in his arms. She broke away, gazing to him with soft, wounded eyes that could no longer hide all that was inside.

"I couldn't just let it end like that," she whispered. She closed her eyes and placed soft kisses to his cheeks and lips, gritting her teeth against the pain that washed over her. "'Live each day as your last,'" she murmured, quoting the famous line. "How do you live when you know that your last day is here?"

He smiled, gently caressing her face. "I will protect you, Meryl. I will not let it end so easily. Morgante may know me inside out, but if that's true he knows I'll never give up without a fight."

He stared into her eyes, lost in love.

Love.

His eyes widened in realization. Love.

He closed his eyes, his heart racing. Deep inside, he felt the joy of life swelling through his soul and crushing the demons that had engulfed it. The answer was there, standing before him, an answer that he did not need to hear from Rem or from his departed brother or from his own painful experiences. His memories didn't matter.

It was the presence of love that made him understand. The presence of the woman before him who had so easily stolen his heart. Again she had given him the answer. Both times, she had only been stepping in harms way, determined to save him. Before it had been the men in a little town where he had left them a year ago, when she had stood before them with her arms outstretched and lectured them in the style of Rem Saverem. Nobody ever has the right to take the life of another.

"God-damnit Meryl, why didn't you just say it?" He grinned, an unforced, enlightened smile that filled the room with light. She blinked suddenly but barely had time to react before he scooped her up into his arms and spun her around. "You've given me the answer!"

She clung to him, not sure of what had changed, but glad it had. She felt more at home then in their previous encounter in the way he was speaking to her now, just enough to give her a measure of hope.

"I…I don't understand."

He crushed her into his embrace and found her lips again. It was a brief, loving kiss. The tears were gone. Now his eyes shimmered with love and understanding. "If we hold true to our love, there is nothing that can stop us." He cupped her cheeks gently with both hands. "So long as we believe in love, he can't tear us apart."

She raised her hands and locked them around his wrist and simply stared at him. "I won't let you go and do anything alone anymore, Vash. Wherever you go, I'll be right here at your side, no matter how much you protest."

He smiled. "I really don't have a choice in the matter, do I?"

"No, you don't."

"Well then, here you will stay," he said gently. He kissed her again. "I'll be with you until my parting breath. We're in this together." He blinked at the irony of his next words: "Until death do us part."

Meryl shivered slightly and nodded.

"The man who set this trap…I told you his name is Morgante the Warhead."

She nodded again. "I remember."

"Well, he's the last of the Gung-Ho Guns that once followed my brother." He wet his lips, engulfing her tiny hands in his own. She blinked, unsure as to why he had stopped, but something made the wheels turn faster and her breath to be sucked in. He stared at her with doubt. "His real name is Richard Stryfe."

Meryl's spine went rigid. Richard Stryfe.

"I don't know the name myself," he said quietly. "I thought originally it was a coincidence. You look nothing like the man, but the name always drew me back to you. I just couldn't know for sure. But then, I went to find Knives yesterday, and I was drawn into a battle with another clone."

He choked on the word, closing his eyes.

"When I gunned down my impostor, he was wearing this coat, and he had my angel arm magnum." He tapped the silver handgun at his side. "I don't know when they got it, but they would have had to have taken it from the place where I fought Knives last year. It means they must also have Wolfwood's Cross Punisher. If I know the Gung-Ho Guns, they'll try to use it against us."

He reached out with his real hand and placed it against her cheek. "The man I fought, the other Vash, resembled me in every facet but one. He didn't have heart. It made him arrogant. It saved my life. Richard Stryfe is a man who would do anything to hurt me, even if it meant taking out his own family." He stared quietly at her for a moment. "That was when I knew I couldn't part from you again. Ever."

The color drained from Meryl's face. If it was not for the soft breaths that escaped her lungs every so often, one might have thought her dead. How could it be? It couldn't be true, yet she knew in her heart that Vash wouldn't make light of this. If he said anything to her, he meant it.

Richard Stryfe…doesn't look anything like you…wouldn't hesitate… She shook her head against the soft skin of Vash's palm. She had read in her last few letters from her broken home that he had disappeared, had wandered off into the desert. They didn't know anything.

Now I know, she thought, gazing to Vash.

What a burden that was being placed on her. "Oh God," she whispered, leaning into him. Somehow she managed to push away and turned to look down the corridor which suddenly reminded her of the cool length of a gun barrel.

She blinked again at the two tall figures that appeared from the shadows—Milly and Stryker. They stared at Vash and Meryl with concern. "Did I just hear right?" Vash's duplicate asked. He was shirtless, revealing the smooth, perfect skin against the body of a young athlete, so unlike the tarnished flesh of the Humanoid Typhoon. He ran his fingers through his long hair, which fell loosely around his shoulders. He held Milly's canteen. Next to him, Milly wore a simple, white blouse and a long, blue skirt.

His green eyes accepted the truth in Vash's quiet gaze. "I'll go get my guns," he said finally, and turned from them, retreating back down the hall.

He looked to Meryl and sighed. The secret was out and by the look on Milly's face, she was filled with concern. The journey would be underway, and this time, Vash wouldn't be making the trip alone.

There were also deeper things, animalistic needs that seemed odd for him. After all, Vash the Stampede was a plant-spawn, not human, but the desire filled him nonetheless. His eyes went to Meryl, trailing the length of her body, and finally returned to her face, peering into her gorgeous, violet eyes.

He didn't say anything. The look in his eyes was powerful enough.

They spoke a simple promise, a promise that spoke volumes for his character. I will protect you Meryl. I promise.

He would protect Milly too, with all his heart. Milly. Looking to her, Vash grinned and reached out to wrap an arm around Meryl's shoulder, pulling her to him. He smiled brilliantly despite the terrible truth of the situation, awaiting her reaction.

If hearts were dynamite, Milly's would have exploded in her chest then and there. She dashed over to her friends and crushed the both of them into her powerful embrace. Tears streamed down her face as she cradled them near hear heart, right were they belonged. "Oh! I love you two!" she cried.

Meryl laughed. "We love you, too, Milly."

"You'd better, or I wouldn't know what to do," she replied, heartfelt love pouring through her simple response. The world was certainly at its finest when Milly was happy. She held them a little tighter. "I'd walk to the edge of the world and back, so long as the journey was with you."

Vash had to smile. "Us too, Milly."

With all our hearts.

----------

The trip was begun. Vash and Meryl rode on the bike he had taken from his impostor back at the alien fortress, and Milly and Stryker followed only a few bike lengths behind. Meryl clung to him, eyes drifting to his troubled face as they sped to the north. She wondered what he had been doing in there, in the geo-plant, before they had departed for the north, a land void of settlers.

I'll be back shortly. There's just something I have to do. Wait right here.

She had been hesitant to let him go, but when she realized where he was headed, she hadn't protested. He wasn't going far enough to lose her, anyway. So she had let him go. As he had promised, after only five minutes, he had returned to them.

"Vash," she murmured, staring up at him, so trusting, so loving. "The name, Richard Stryfe. I know it."

He nodded. "Thought as much."

She squeezed her arms tighter around his waist, resting her head on his shoulder, as if needing all the strength he had to offer. She needed to say this before anyone else could steal something more from them. This was something she could not speak of easily. The dark truth of the matter burned into her, making her blood run cold. "He is my father."

She closed her eyes and clung to him, as if she might wake up from a sudden nightmare, but it was all still there. Those words, ringing in her soul: Richard Stryfe is a man who would do anything to hurt me, even if it meant taking out his own family.

"Somehow, I already knew that. I figured it could've been your uncle or maybe a distant relation, but that would've been too easy, right?" He had to smile a little, resting his flesh and blood hand on hers as she clung to his waist.

They were in this together. They would be through to the ultimate end.

He would protect her. If she had to die, he would make sure she did not meet that end alone. She would not die before him. It was a silent vow he made to himself, though he refused to speak it aloud.

He wondered, briefly, how he was going to tell her that he had already made another vow, to Knives and to Rem, back at the alien fortress.

He would kill Stryfe if necessary.

"Hey, it's okay," Meryl whispered. "We'll get through this. Everything's gonna be alright, okay?"

He had to grin. "That's supposed to be my line."

"I know." After some time she offered her violet eyes up to Vash and gave him a gentle squeeze. "The world goes on by, and yet we are standing still. We watch the past through the eyes of yesterday, and yet there are words that lift us up and push us forward. The past never truly leaves us. It is carried around in the form of a song or the sigh of a breath held too long." She turned her gaze out to the vast wasteland, a slight breeze coming up to wrap around her and the others.

He sighed softly and touched her arm again, giving it a gentle squeeze. Slowly, he lifted up a little black object that he'd been fingering for some time.

"What's that?" Meryl asked.

----------

One last time, Vash approached the plant, tears streaming down his face. The knowledge of the duty awaiting him rained down in torrential agony. He despised Morgante all the more for what he was about to do.

He stood before the being, gazing to the hundreds of plant spawn within the hazy glass. "I'm sorry," he whispered, and fell to his knees before her.

Begging forgiveness.

Sometimes it's important to turn from the past and simply move into the future that often doesn't seem so clear. We keep on moving because that is our duty. That is the hand fate has dealt us. We continue to search for that bit of tomorrow we can cling to, desperate to snatch it up before it falls away, disappearing forever.

----------

Meryl blinked at the devise and continued to embrace him. She could feel the pain that consumed him but spoke nothing of it. Her heart raced as she started to realize just what she was looking at.

There are people who may come and go in your life, but you are forever connected to those people in ways you cannot truly begin to understand. People you have known for years may move away, while others you have known only briefly come and go as the world turns, but in the end they are still a part of you, just as the sun is a part of the world.

She clung to him. The three of them, including Meryl, had always been close, would always be, but now there was a forth member of their party, a new friend to complete the circle. Not to replace the memories of the priest who had fallen for their cause over a year ago, but to strengthen the bond they all shared. Together they would defeat the evil that plagued their hearts and minds.

After a time, Vash idly twirled the object in his fingers as he gazed to the horizon. She heard him softly whisper, "Damn you, Knives. Even in death you torture me. At least this time, you're right."

He pressed down on the button on the end of the object.

Behind them, a brilliant flash of light filled the night sky. The world shook with tremendous thunder as the explosion tore through the desert, leaving the cave where the SEEDS shuttle had been hidden in the form of a giant crater.

He brought the bike to a stop and closed his eyes. She could see the tears trickling down his cheek. "Vash? What was–"

"If you want to save the butterflies," he whispered, bring his hand up to cradle his wounded heart, "you have to kill off all the spiders."

Soon, Stryker and Meryl came up alongside them. Milly was still gawking at the flames in the distant, stretching up into the night sky. "Meryl…" she whimpered, shaking furiously.

Meryl understood what had happened. She leaned into him, tears in her eyes. "Sometimes we must do the very thing we hate in order to save the things that we love," she whispered. She knew why Vash had left them alone back at the shuttle, just before they had left to go off to begin their search for Morgante. He had gone to make peace with the creature, to beg forgiveness from the very plant he had his mind set to destroy.

He had set the creature free, in her own mind, along with the hundreds of lives that it had contained. Her heart ached for him, though she knew that he had done exactly what needed to be done.

Vash stared to the horizon, the next step of his journey, and for the first time, he felt he had done a just thing. He had freed the geo-plant of slavery, saved the world from countless more plant spawn, and broken one source of Morgante the Warhead's power.

Tears of sorrow still clung to his lids. One occasionally slipped to the sand from his cheeks as he waited there, gazing to the Fifth Moon. He bid the path behind him a silent goodbye. He had suddenly become the executioner as well as the man who had given peace and freedom to the plant that Morgante, Meryl's father, had enslaved.

Death had crept into his soul, but this time it was a comforting thing, knowing that this geo-planet would no longer suffer.

Vash watched the northern horizon. They were out there somewhere, thousands of Vash clones, awaiting him, preparing to wreak havoc on the people of this world. Morgante had guided them toward that end, and as far as Vash could tell, it had all begun with the death of his brother.

He closed his eyes and gave Meryl's arm a squeeze. "I think," he said quietly, and returned his gaze to the horizon, to a land he had never seen before, "I'm ready to go on."

He started the bike up again and began the trek north, away from the destroyed SEEDS shuttle, away from civilization. They traveled together toward his destiny.