A/N: Just wanted to give a quick thank you to Sugar Pill for the extensive brainstorming and beta-ing for this chapter! Also, thanks everybody who reviewed the last chapter! On to the story...
If they didn't hustle, she was going to be late. Still, she didn't particularly want to hurry.
As they walked together, Meryl couldn't help but glance at Vash every once in a while. He had his hands in his pockets and a faraway look in his eyes. That was, until he saw her staring at him. Then he would turn to her and smile self-consciously, his eyes questioning. She would just smile back. She felt incredible and she wasn't really used to feeling this way. As he looked at her, she wondered if she had ever felt this way.
They arrived at the bus station with about five minutes to spare. Meryl exhaled loudly as she double-checked the schedule one last time, just to be sure. Meryl sat down on a bench and looked around the station. Not much had changed since she last saw this place. Last time she took a bus from this station, it had been her sophomore year of college.
Meryl looked over to Vash, who was looking at a small patch of plump succulents growing near the foundation of the platform. They didn't get too much growing out there, since the closest geoplant was still a few iles away. But even at that distance, some vegetation found a way to grow.
Living so close to a geoplant made the land in this area very valuable, but very dangerous as well. Bandits had been known to come through and try to take over homesteads. Meryl was a little worried about squatters coming and claiming her home now that her mother wasn't there, but there wasn't much she could do about it at the moment. She couldn't stay there, since Vash needed to go back to the ship and take care of his brother. She could, however, take solace in the fact that many of the residents in the neighborhood were members of the Socialist Libertarian Party. Their main ethos: "Do for others as long as it brings no harm upon you or yours." This was in opposition to the majority National Objectivist League, which advocated cut-throat self-preservation at all costs.
Sometimes Meryl wondered why people even bothered to form political parties, though. The government was under a near-constant state of martial law. That meant most important officials were appointed anyway. It was probably just an attempt at normalcy in a climate of constant uncertainty.
"I could come with," Vash cut into her thoughts, his voice apprehensive. He sat down beside her.
Meryl groaned. "It was your idea to hang back at the house!"
"I know, I just...worry."
Sighing, Meryl attempted to reassure him. "We both know it would be a rookie mistake for you to accompany me. The Central Office is practically run by the Feds. The place will be crawling with operatives. I'm just going to go in, hand the Chief my letter of resignation, then come back. It'll be simple."
"So much could go wrong." Vash said without looking at her. He could see the bus approaching off in the distance.
"But it won't," Meryl assured him. He cocked an eyebrow and looked at her seriously. "Trust me! I'm very self-sufficient! This will probably be the safest, most trouble-free thing I've done in a long time."
They sat in silence until the bus arrived. Meryl was about to get up, but Vash gently grasped her fingertips. She looked back at him and saw worry in his eyes. She squeezed his hand. "I promise I'll be careful," she tried to reassure him. She wondered if he had always worried about her this much or if it was brought on by what had recently happened between them.
He held on for a few more seconds, then released her hand. Meryl smiled at him and stood looking at his face for a moment, then turned and boarded the bus. She was carrying only an envelope with her resignation letter inside. She wore her standard uniform, all fifty derringers locked and loaded, but he still found himself worrying for her safety. After a few moments, she located a window seat and waved to him. He smiled and waved back to her. She settled in as the bus began to move. He watched until he couldn't see the bus through all the dirt it had kicked up.
Vash sat for several minutes more, looking in the direction the bus had gone, but finally decided it would be best if he returned to the house. He got up and stuck his hands back in his pockets, his posture going to hell. He was mostly in his own little world, debating whether or not he should allow himself to have any hopes of this going anywhere. It had only been a few hours, but so much had changed from yesterday to today. He knew they couldn't go back to the way they were, but could they really go forward?
From around the corner, a vehicle spun on a dime and raced towards Vash. It was all he could do to dodge out of the way. He leaped onto someone's porch and skidded to a stop, trying to assess the situation. There were four people in the jeep, no weapons he could see. He was at a poor vantage point, though, and the vehicle was traveling fast. The vehicle didn't even slow down as it passed by him. It continued down the street until it turned the corner at the end of the block, disappearing from view.
Vash tried to relax a little bit. They didn't appear to be after him, just crappy drivers. He caught his breath, looking over his shoulder at where the jeep had turned and exhaled a relieved breath.
When Vash got back to the house, he fished the spare key Meryl had given him out of his pocket and unlocked the door. He came inside and closed the door, leaning against it. This was the first time he had been alone in the house. It was so strange being so close to where Meryl grew up. He really didn't know anything about her childhood. He didn't even know what the deal was with her mom being gone. Meryl hadn't told him and he hadn't asked. He knew she was tight-lipped about her family on a good day and if she didn't want to talk about it, she wouldn't.
He moved over to a shelf which held a few thin photo albums and several awards. He looked over the trophies and ribbons. Meryl had apparently been a pretty good shot as a child, and not a bad toma rider, either. He took one of the photo albums off the shelf and blew at its dusty coating. They were mostly baby pictures. Meryl had been adorable: shy and serious at the same time. Meryl's parents looked young. Her father beamed in every photograph. Her mother appeared reserved, but there was an intensity in her gaze that he had often seen on Meryl's face.
At the time these pictures were taken, his mug shot was just beginning to circulate on wanted posters. He put the pictures up.
Vash moved over to the couch and sat down, but after a while, he got restless. He walked to the kitchen to see if there was anything to eat. He only found some more ration packs and canned vegetables. He contemplated going to the bar, but it was a little early for that, even for him. He decided to investigate the house. He didn't want to intrude, since he knew Meryl would probably kill him if she found him snooping, but he wanted to know more about her. They said curiosity killed the cat, but he had the good fortune not to be a cat. Starting with the top floor, he began looking around.
The master bedroom was empty. It hadn't been lived in for a while. He could tell by the thick dust that had settled over everything in the room. He lingered a moment at the doorway, but the room made him feel isolated and alone. He turned and went across the hall to the other bedroom. It was obviously Meryl's. He smiled as he saw that nearly everything in the room was either white or purple. He had to give it to her: the girl knew what she liked. On the immaculately organized desk stood stationary, fountain pens, and a miniature toma statue. On the other side of the room stood a small book case filled with books. Vash looked over them and saw every kind of genre imaginable: mystery, textbooks, various children's books, science fiction, adventure, how-to-draw books. He was fairly impressed. Books were hard to come by and these had obviously been well taken care of. There couldn't have been more than 20, but that was a huge collection for a family to have out in the desert, and especially for a child.
Still, he couldn't get over how young she really was. He knew she could take care of herself, but without her actually standing here, he was having trouble remembering her as an adult. She had probably only been on her own for what, five years? He had been on his own since he was two... Did it really matter, though? Wasn't it just one more thing he could use to talk himself out of pursuing this? Would she ever understand the vast gulf that lay between them?
His breath caught in his throat for a moment. It was possible that some day she might... When Doc had been explaining the whole idea of imprinting, he had mentioned elongated life spans for people who were exposed to a fraction of the radiation that Meryl had been. Was it okay for him to hope this would be the case? Doc had also mentioned the correlation between his newly darkened hair and plant decay...
What if she outlived him?
He needed to get out of this room. He practically tripped all the way downstairs. When he got back down to the first floor, he walked around for a few minutes. The rooms hadn't changed: there was a living room, a sitting room, a bathroom, a dining room, and a kitchen. He walked into the kitchen again, checking the pantry one more time. He pulled out one of the ration packs after all.
As he was gnawing on a protein bar, his eyes fell upon a small, forgettable door a few feet away from the pantry. He was surprised he hadn't seen it before. Maybe there was some better food in there...
Expecting to find a cupboard, he was surprised when the little door opened down into a cellar. The really odd thing was that it smelled like canned air and...gun powder. There was a light switch by his shoulder and he flicked it on. He couldn't make much out, so he decided to go down and take a look. When he got to the bottom of the stairs, his eyes nearly fell out of their sockets. He let out an impressed whistle.
The small cellar was covered from wall to wall with guns, weapons, and ammunition.
As he looked around, he saw an old political banner strung across the ceiling: "Don't Tread on Us." He looked around again, still shocked by the sheer amount of guns and ammunition that was being kept in this house... Vash turned, surveying all the different varieties of weapons. There were several racks devoted solely to derringers. Another wall was devoted to handguns. He picked up a Glock and regarded it a moment. He automatically pushed in the magazine catch and caught the empty magazine in the palm of his hand. After a moment, he slid it back into place. It wasn't his first pick when it came to firearms, but he'd known someone who preferred that type of weapon.
There were several varieties of revolvers, some quite beautifully crafted. He touched a few gently, picking up one that had a mother-of-pearl inlay in the silver metal grip. He felt its satisfying weight in his hand and wondered how it handled. He spun the barrel, listening to the sound it made. After a few more moments, Vash carefully returned the gun to its rightful place. They all looked to have been well taken care of. He turned around and surveyed the rest of the room. Beneath the stairs, he found grenade launchers and several different types of grenades and incendiaries. He opened a munitions box to discover a few semi-automatic rifles. A shelf holding boxes upon boxes of ammunition took up the remaining wall.
Yep. Everything you needed to start a small war... What kind of family was this?
He looked back to the banner hanging on the wall. The Socialist Libertarian slogan. Vash wondered who was involved with the party in Meryl's family. Her parents were obviously members. Was Meryl, too?
Just when he thought he'd had a pretty good idea of Meryl's life, he found this. After looking at the weapons for a while longer, he climbed back up the stairs. Living on this planet was hard, but he just hadn't expected Meryl's family to be so...prepared. As he got to the first floor and closed the door, he thought about his own gun, now sitting in the desert. He missed that gun. Sometimes he even felt unbalanced without it at his hip. But he was glad he didn't have to arm himself. He had the machine gun in case of emergencies, but his colt - he didn't need it anymore. His brother was "taken care of," he and Meryl were approaching some semblance of a relationship, and things were looking up. Life was pretty good.
A knock on the door drew his attention away from his musings. Before he could answer it, the person on the other side had begun knocking again. He knew it wouldn't be Meryl, no matter how much he wished it would be, but he was completely unprepared for what he found.
Ms. Kenley had her neck bandaged up, but it was still bleeding through. She looked stricken. "Thank god you're here!" she exclaimed. "I have to tell somebody! Somebody has to do something!"
"What happened?" Vash asked, his eyes wide.
Ms. Kenley began to sink to her knees. "I'm sorry...I'm so sorry... I didn't know it would end up like this..." She was sobbing.
Vash looked outside, scanning for enemies. When he saw no one, he collected Ms. Kenley and brought her inside. He sat her down at the kitchen table. The woman was still sobbing as he came to sit next to her. "May I?" he asked, motioning to the cloth around her neck. She nodded her head slightly, a hiccup escaping her mouth. Vash uncoiled some of the gauze from her neck. It was a knife wound and looked pretty bad, but it didn't appear to be life-threatening. He placed the bandage around her wound again.
"This is my fault!" she wailed again. "What have I done?"
"Please, try to calm down and tell me what happened," Vash pleaded.
"They made me..." she started. "They threatened me that if I didn't tell them, they would kill me." She took in a shuddering breath. "I didn't know they were going to set up a trap for Margaret!" Ms. Kenley continued to sob.
"Who is Margaret?"
"Meryl's mother! They were trying to get information about the Stampede from Meryl, and they were going to use Margaret to lure her to them. I don't know if they had a buyer or if they were just hoping to sell that man's head to the highest bidder, but they were after Vash the Stampede!"
Vash was confused. He didn't realize he was involved in Mrs. Stryfe's disappearance. His mind made a logical leap. "You...were a lookout?"
Ms. Kenley took his hands in hers and looked at him intently, her eyes full of guilt. He'd nailed it. He remembered the jeep from earlier and his heart sank. He could almost taste the fear in the back of his throat.
The woman was still explaining herself. Vash was already ahead of her and was walking out the door. Ms. Kenley followed close behind. "I tried to resist. You have to believe me, but someone else tipped them off that Meryl got here yesterday and when they came looking for her this morning and didn't find her, they told me they would kill me if I didn't tell them where she was. I knew they meant to do it, too. These are men you don't mess around with... And she had mentioned she was leaving on the bus this morning."
Vash stopped, realizing he didn't have a vehicle or a weapon. He ran back inside, still being trailed by Ms. Kenley.
"I'm so sorry," she continued to mumble, and sat at the kitchen table, her head in her hands.
Vash ran downstairs, trying very hard not to think about his pounding heart or his mind screaming at him to hurry up. He quickly picked up the silver revolver and some speed loaders. He loaded them quickly and made sure the gun was fully loaded as well. Then he grabbed a holster, belting it across his waist and securing it around his right thigh. He started to go up, but reconsidered. He picked up a few grenades, then bounded back up the stairs.
He laid out his haul on the kitchen table and went to get his bag. Ms. Kenley looked at what he'd brought up with wide eyes. He returned, throwing the articles in the bag. "Ms. Kenley." No response. He shook the woman by the shoulders. "Ms. Kenley. Do you have a vehicle?"
The woman looked rattled, but nodded her head yes.
"I need to borrow it. I saw the men going after Meryl this morning and they've already gotten the jump on me." He tried to remain as calm as possible. "Can I please borrow your car?"
She realized what Vash was saying and suddenly sprang to her feet. "You have to save her! There's no telling what these men are capable of! Come on!" She quickly made her way through the door and down the front steps.
Vash was right behind her.
A/N: And there you have it...just when things look like they're resolving, more problems arise! Why oh why can't it ever be simple?
Because simple is boring!
We've got some major action coming up on the horizon. I'm actually really looking forward to writing the next few chapters. That's a good sign! Please review. :) It makes me feel like people are actually enjoying this! (If you're not enjoying this, you should probably let me know, too... I have been known to change things upon suggestion.) Again, thank you to everyone who has taken the time to review and to Sugar Pill for all the help! :)