My next chapter. Again, I shall announce I do not own Trigun characters...I shall sob now...

Chibi Knives: Humans and their emotions...tsk tsk...

Me: Aww, c'mon, my li'l buddy ol' pal! You're so cute!

Chibi Knives: I know...

READ AND REVIEW! I will give you treats!

Death to the masses
Who do not read my tale
I swear I won't get you in trouble
Or get you thrown in jail!

If you read this story,
I promise I'll give you bread
And cookies and icecream too
Don't shoot me in the head...

Cough...arighty, then, folks! Here 'tis!
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A few hours later, as she sat in the cramped and dirty space of her room, seeming to feel each little bump the steamer hit, she counted up her remaining money, and found she had $$9 double dollars with her. Enough to buy a meal in April City, and then she'd get to business searching for her gang.

She left the room and went up onto the deck of the steamer, gazing out at the desert and cliffs surrounding them, at the suns in the great blue sky. Her plan was pretty simple and clear: she'd get a gang, of course as a boy, and work up her status at that. Soon she'd be good enough by herself, and she'd ditch the gang and become her own outlaw. Alex knew she had to pick a name; all the great outlaws had outlaw-ish names. Her hero amongst the outlaws was one she had heard in the rumors and gossips of the town, of a man named Vash the Stampede, the Humanoid Typhoon, the first natural human disaster. He had put a crater in the moon, and destroyed entire cities, like July. He was her hero, and she hoped to be able to rival him someday.

Alex was a pretty good shot with a gun; nearly five years ago, Chris had stolen a pistol in the chaos of a small riot in Warren, and had given it to Alex. She had found bullets cheap in the markets, and after hearing from one of the gunslingers in a tavern about how to work a gun, she had started working on her shot. At first she was completely awful at it, but after hard, determined practice, she soon became better, and better, and better, until she could hit a glass cup on a post from thirty-five yards away.

That pistol was in her bag; she had tried as hard as she could to find a way to carry it, but it felt so clumsy and awkward whenever she kept it in her holster, she had just stopped and flung it resignedly into the bag. She'd take it out when she needed it; so far, nothing had come to that yet.

"Whatcha thinkin' about, lad?" a voice said next to her ear, making her jump. She whipped her head around to look at the man leaning against the rail next to her, and had a hard time speaking. He was extremely attractive, to say the least. His hair was spiky and dark brown, his eyes a deep, bright emerald. He wore a white mesh shirt and thick brown pants underneath a thin brown coat that was so long it touched the floor by his black knee-high boots. He had the body of a runner, tall, slim, agile, lithe, and muscular, with a masculinely pretty face, ovaline yet with high cheekbones, a square jaw covered in brown stubble, and a strong-boned nose that looked like it had been broken a few times. "What, cat got your tongue, eh?" he asked with a laugh.

"Uh, no," Alex answered quickly. She sounded enough like young boy she didn't need to change her voice, so she was able to talk normally, unlike Kara, who had tried dressing and acting like a boy once but couldn't get her high, feminine voice of a fourteen-year-old low enough to even be close to convincing. "Just thinking 'bout my friends in my hometown."

"Where y'headin'?" he asked, looking out across the landscape.

"To April City," she said, and was just about to add, To find me a gang, when she realized it might not be safe enough to say things like that. Instead she lied, "To get a job."

"Ain't you a bit young to be seekin' a job?" he asked, sounding amused. "How old're you, boy, ten? Eleven, tops?" He laughed, then looked suddenly serious, though his eyes twinkled with a daredevil's constant humor. "Hey, I got a job for you. You don't much care for the law, do you?"

"Nope, not at all," she answered, starting to get excited. Just those few words sounded like the beginning of a successful offer.

"Well, I need your help," he said, reaching into a coat-pocket and pulling out a crumpled piece of paper. "I'm searchin' for this man."

She took the paper, and as she read it felt her heart sink. The picture was a drawning of an older-looking man, probably fourty or so, with a large black hat and dark black eyes, and a sneer of a smile. Above it the sign said "Wanted" and below said, "Left-Shot Lucius: $$2,000 double dollars. Wanted for the murders of many, as well as kidnapping, theft, and vandalism."

"So, what, you a bounty hunter or somethin'?" she asked.

"Naw, I'm just lookin' for him. Been searchin' for him for a while." The man didn't say more, other than, "Have y'seen him?" At the shake of her head he finished, "Well, y'could help me look for 'im."

"Sure, I'll help," she said, handing him back the paper. "I got nothin' better t'do anyways. I'm Alex, by the way."

"Cheers, Alex," the man greeted, offering her his hand. She took it, enjoying the feel of his cool, whispery-slick flesh on hers. "I'm Eamon Daurez. I'm headin' to April City to meet a few friends of mine that I've not seen in ages. On the steamer you c'n be me li'l pal, a'right?"

She grinned, though didn't particularly like the words "li'l pal". Hey, she wasn't that little! "A'right, man." She heard her stomach grumble, and the familiar feeling of hunger struck her. She licked her lips and urged her stomach to be patient. She didn't have enough money to waste on food on the ship.

"God, m'boy, you sure sound hungry," Eamon exclaimed. "When d'you last eat?"

"Uh, not since yesterday evenin'," Alex answered. It was true; her, Chris, and Kara weren't really able to eat straight meals as most people did.

"Chrissakes, lad, that's too long!" the man said in shock. "Come with me, we'll go get a bite."

Grinning, she followed after him to the dining level of the steamer, thinking, I might like this a lot!

"Y'know how t'shoot that, Alex?" Eamon asked, nodding to the pistol she held in her hands. They sat on the deck of the ship again, under an afternoon sky, her showing him her meager possessions. It had been a day since she had left Warren, and most of that whole time was spent with Eamon. The man had the most amusing sense of exasperated and cynical humor, though he could be as stern and serious as a father at times, and not only that, he was real smart, explaining to her things about the world that she would've never even dreamed of learning in Warren.

"Yeah, of course!" she growled indignantly. "I wouldn't be carryin' it if I didn't!"

"Okay, okay!" he said mildly, holding his hands in surrender. "Lots'a people carry guns and pretend to be able to use'em, when they really don't have a clue in hell. That's called bein' a damn idiot. Carryin' a weapon should mean y'can use it, which means that y'can get shot at an' be able to fire back. Idiots die all the time from stupid shit like that."

"I'm not an idiot, though," she said matter-of-factly, checking the chamber to find two bullets in place. She cocked the gun and aimed at a rock a good distance away on the ground, taking careful aim, she pulled back gently on the trigger, and hit the rock nearly evenly, causing it to split into huge portions and tiny shards.

Eamon whistled appreciatively. "Mighty fine, m'lad, y'got a shot t'rival the Humanoid Typhoon!"

Hearing the title, she looked at him excitedly and said, "Y'mean Vash the Stampede! He's my idol!"

He frowned at her mockingly. "Nice young boy like you shouldn't have a deadly outlaw like that man for an idol. Only get you in trouble."

"So? I love the stories about him! Didja hear what he did t'the city of July? Totally destroyed it, though not a single fatality in the wreckage. He's my hero!" She grinned.

"You're a disturbed child," Eamon said, shaking his head, then took on a smooth, sophisticated tone. "Such a violent, cruel world we live in these days, where children learn to shoot guns from birth and men die each and every day through causeless acts of hatred and anger that could be altogether avoided. We are but mere mortals with mere emotions under the sky of God."

"Now you're talkin' disturbed," Alex laughed. "I mean, sure, it's true, but don't get all philosophical on me, now, man."

She handed him the gun, which he sat down carefully beside himself, as she pulled out her next item. It was a bow and fiddle, not the finest quality but still playable. In the same riot that Chris had stolen her her gun, she had gotten herself a fiddle as well. Just like the pistol, she had played and played at it, working out little tunes and going to celebrations in Warren's centerplace to hear the songs played by orchestrations, and speaking with fiddlers, then figuring it out on her fiddle. After a while, Alex had gotten pretty good at it.

"You c'n play this?" Eamon asked, touching the scroll of the instrument delicately.

"Good 'nough," she answered. She took the fiddle and played a little scale on the strings, G, D, A, and E, then a quick little tune that she remembered was about a dog with three legs and a tail-less cat.

"Hmm, that is pretty good," he agreed. She handed him the fiddle and bow, and reached into her bag for her next items: a knife from Chris, her money in a little pouch, and bandages from Kara. Alex explained quickly that they were from her "girlfriend" in Warren, who was worried about her getting shot. In actuality, Kara had sent them with her so when Alex had the nuisance of breasts, she could bind herself.

"You're too young to have a girlfriend," Eamon said about Kara, then added, "or to get shot, for that matter."

"Hey, mate, you're never too young," Alex answered with a wink.

"I'm gettin' advice like that from a child?" he said dryly, and she grinned.

As well as that, the pair continued to search for the outlaw known as Left-Shot Lucius, but never really getting close to successful. It was the night before they entered April City when luck and fate struck.

Hope y'don't mind the language, folks. It'll be in this story to the end. Anyways, I plan on getting quite a few chapters up until I run out; I just started typing this, and divided it into chapters. So to all my readers, all two of you :) keep reading!

Here's a quote-of-the-chapter:
"It's great being a pessimist. You're never truly shocked, just pleasantly surprised."

-Wolf