DISCLAIMER: Trigun and its characters belong to Yasuhiro Nightow.
Colt Winchester was many things – a robber of people, a robber of banks, a robber of sand steamers – ok, so most of the things he was could be simply condensed down to "robber", that seemed fair enough. It must have seemed so to the authorities, too, or he would not have a bounty on him.
Colt Winchester was also a notorious killer of men – well, all right, he actually was only wanted for the one murder. And according to the Bernardelli Insurance Society, which was responsible for the bounty, it was only murder in the eyes of the law because it occurred during a robbery. If not for that, they said, one robber killing another would be poetic justice.
It was his partner's own fault, damn it! They had come in with their guns drawn and Winchester had specifically ordered everyone, "Don't move!" His partner moved, and Winchester shot him. That fool – he should have told Winchester something like, "I'm going to move, partner." It was like that woman on the radio, the one who referred to herself as a Love Doctor, was always saying – you have to communicate with your partner.
He was too fast, that's all there was to it. He simply was born to the gun. Everybody knew this, and that was why he was only wanted for one killing – nobody was willing to try to match the blinding speed of Colt Winchester, outlaw extraordinaire!
While it was true he was a robber and a killer and a wanted man – no doubt idolized by many who had no idea of the true hardships the wanted man must face, such as never being able to be in one place long enough to even let himself be pursued by the many ladies who no doubt longed to say their heart had been broken by him, their eyes betraying their desire for him even as their mouths cursed this wild, untamable man who pulled them into wild nights of romance only ever to be gone in the morning barely ahead of a posse. It was a shame he could never stay and actually experience being fought over by women under the Winchester thrall. – Winchester felt the truest thing about himself was that he was no fool.
This was why he was so irked by this blond outsider who somehow had a knack for making him look like a fool.
But no more. The big blond had gone into the saloon some time ago. Winchester had watched from the shadows outside, pushing his patience to its limits as he waited and scouted, but no one else had gone in and he was positive his quarry had not left.
There would be no more running. No more nonsense. Now, Colt Winchester would end this!
He crossed the street and entered the saloon. Thaddeus was wiping down the bar. The blond man Winchester had come for was sitting at a table in the corner. He had no drink, but his non-gun hand was holding a flat rectangular object at almost chest level. He seemed to take no real notice of Winchester.
Well, that was going to change. "I have you now, you –"
"Hush!" the blond man commanded.
The outlaw was incredulous. "Did you just hush me? How dare you –"
"I said be quiet! There shouldn't be any loud noises or disruptions to my concentration. Maybe you know why."
In the dim light of the saloon, it was hard to tell what his opponent had in his hand, but it resembled something Winchester had himself used once in what had been meant to be a daring theft and instead was the destruction of the entire vault and the money in it because he'd used too much explosive.
His skin began to whiten. "Is that a detonator?"
The blond outsider shrugged. "What do you think?"
Winchester willed his bravado to return. "I think you're bluffing! No one would risk blowing themselves up!"
"You came here to kill me, right? To avenge your wounded honor or prove you're the badder man or whatever idiocy makes one man kill another? A certain type of man might think, if I'm going to die anyway, why not take you with me?"
"There's no way you have this entire place wired!"
His prey countered, "Isn't there? Haven't you been watching from outside for quite a while? Are you so sure I haven't been in here long enough to turn it into a trap for you?"
Winchester eyed the hand holding the detonator. It was steady as a rock. So was the stare holding his.
No man could make such a big bluff so calmly.
But it had to be a bluff!
Yet – the stranger had outfoxed Winchester before, proven himself on par with the trickster, wily old Coyote. And he was right, he had been in here long enough that if he were of a mind, he could have the place set to blow. It was cowardly, but Winchester had no trouble believing a man who would run from a showdown as long as this one had been was a coward.
But Thaddeus – no. No, if this man were cut from killer cloth, Thaddeus would be only so much collateral damage. Perhaps his blond opponent even had Thaddeus trapped behind the bar with a dead-man or tripwire arrangement, so if the bartender had at any point tried to flee for help, the saloon would go up anyway.
"All right," Winchester ground out. "We will dance this dance again some other time. But rest assured, you big blond bastard, Colt Winchester will lead on that occasion!" He slowly moved out of the saloon, seething with every step.
Thaddeus the bartender waited until Winchester was well out of earshot to speak. "That might have been the biggest lie I've ever witnessed."
Vash glanced at him. "What lie? I didn't lie."
"You said you had this place rigged to blow. Thanks for making my heart jump for a second, by the way."
"Sorry about that. But if you'll think back, I never said any such thing. I just was careful with my words and let his imagination fill in the blanks."
"So that's not a detonator? That was why I panicked for that one instant – I knew you hadn't set anything up, you've stayed put right there since you came in, but then you had that thing and fooled even me."
The object in Vash's hand let out an electronic cackle of victory. He snorted and let it fall to the table with a thud. "That's just this stupid toy game I borrowed from the hotel clerk. Harder than hell to beat.
"But never mind that and never mind the goof for right now. I just checked my watch – it's beer-thirty!"