TRIGUN: MOON CHILD ¤ The Oklahoma Years Chapter 5: Int w Wolfwood ¤ P1 ¤ Pistol Sermons, a trigun fanfic

TRIGUN: MOON CHILD
THE OKLAHOMA YEARS
Based on "Distant Lives" (FFN #3519328/9) from Trigun: Moon Child Chapter Five
Interview With Wolfwood

Part 1

Pistol Sermons
By R. A. Stott

The man groaned from under the weight of the large cloth-wrapped cross laying across his back. His buddy was kicking and screaming in pain from underneath him.

The cross was lifted off them and planted with a clank into the soft soil. A flick of a snap and the straps holding the cloth flung free, exposing the gun-box nicknamed The Cross Punisher. It was lifted up by the central trigger switch, deploying the massive machine gun that ran along its long arm.

"HALLELUJAH!" he shouted as he let loose with a salvo of bullets. "REPENT SINNERS!"

"Hey! Hey! Hey!"

Wolfwood looked at his feet. There were at least four chibi Vash the Stampedes circling him in a silly mad dance all chorusing "Don't kill them! Don't kill them! Thou shall not kill! Thou shall not kill! What sort of Preacher are you, huh? Huh? Huh?"

"DON'T GIVE ME THAT CRAAAP!" he shouted as he resumed firing at some unseen enemy. Ricochets rattled off the buildings nearby as a cloud of dust billowed through the street.

"But Mr. Preacher," a voice from a silhouette in the falling soot said, "smoking is bad for the children!"

The dust parted and Millie fell to the street with a thud.

"HONEY!" he shouted. He wanted to run to her, but found his feet glued to the ground. He looked at the Vashes and found them all pointing their silver revolvers at him.

"YOU KILLED THEM! YOU KILLED THEM ALL!" they shouted as their arms shredded away at their sleeves and their guns became Angel Arm cannons. He had little time to react as they tore loose their rings of energy on him.

"DAMN!" he yelled as he yanked his head off his desk in the rectory. Sunday's draft sermon was plastered to his cheek. He peeled it off and leaned back in his chair and looked at the dark walls sweating. Blast he could use a cigarette just now.

"That looked nasty," he heard from his doorway. He looked over and saw a dark backlit form of a demon as she slowly folded her wings back and forth. "Bad dream?"

"Who is that? Xuru?" he asked as he rubbed his forehead with his hand. "What can I do for you?" he grumbled. He seemed more miffed at her question than the nightmare he just had.

"I show concern, and the best you can ask is 'what can I do for you'?" she mocked him. "Such gratitude!"

"You're a demon – I'm a man of the cloth… I think I have my reasons…"

"Oh," she said with a coy wink. "I'm a bad girl and you're a goody-goody? I don't believe that for a moment, Reverend. And I think you know that as well…"

Wolfwood grunted. "What do you want?" he now snarled.

"Your life… your history… your memories, silly," she replied as she leaned against the door jam. "School projects are such a pain…"

"I seem to remember you saying that you fought for the honor of this assignment," a cattish voice said from the dark sofa across the room from them. "Isn't that the truth?" N'ya asked with a toothy grin.

Xuru huffed. "Oh, it's you," she snorted. She looked back at Wolfwood and bowed to him. He sat upright not expecting such a greeting from a demon.

"Please sir, may I interview you?" she asked.

"Me? By yourself?" He craned his neck to see if the Goddess-in-Training was with her, but only saw the back wall of the hallway behind her.

"Why not?" she grinned as she looked up from her bow. "Puruu is off getting a verdict on her last interview session, seeing she did it by herself and all…"

"She did?" N'ya asked while washing a paw. "Why would she do that without you being present? And why would she need a verdict?"

"Well…" Xuru coughed and cleared her throat. "The interview was actually a confession… she needs clearance to use any of it in the project."

Nicholas leaned against his desk. "Confession? Whose?" he asked the demon.

Xuru shook her finger at the Reverend. "Now-now sir, you know as well as I do that a confession is a private affair. And even though I'd love to tell you, I'm under orders to keep it mum." She then came over and sat on the desk and winked at Wolfwood. "Wanna know?"

N'ya gave a loud coughing noise that sounded like a small car backfiring. "Unless you want the wrath of your elders, young lady, I would stifle that thought right now."

She stuck her tongue at him. "I could have told him it was yours!"

"Ha!" the Kuroneko chortled. "I'd never have to confess! I have nothing to hide!"

She crossed her arm and stared at the cat. "And who was it who scratched up the back corner of his pulpit?"

N'ya looked at his shiny white claws. "I'm a cat. I have to sharpen them somewhere!"

"You do know that when you're scratching the pulpit, you're scratching me as well?" Wolfwood said through gritted teeth.

N'ya curled away. "Yeep! You're tied to this building just like Rem was connected to her tree?"

Wolfwood nodded his head. "You know, you don't seem anywhere as wise as you were before you decided to stick around here."

"Aheh… yes…" the black cat coughed. "I need to take a trip… Bye!" With that he jumped down, ran out the door and through the wall as he vanished into sub-space.

"I keep forgetting he can do that," Wolfwood said. "You know he was helping me with my sermon."

"Oh yes, he was doing a splendid job, wasn't he?" Xuru laughed as she pointed at the desk where she had found him sound asleep. "You need the help of your daughter Meryl again, don't you?"

Wolfwood sat back. "You really have been taking in everything, haven't you?"

"Meryl would edit your sermons… so would Millie…" Xuru spun off the desk and sat in a chair the best she could with her wings and tail. She looked at the Reverend and saw him gesturing across the room.

"Wouldn't you feel more comfortable in that?" he noted.

She looked over. She saw the black jacket Wolfwood normally would wear resting on a chair-back that seemed familiar. The Reverend walked over to it and removed the coat.

"M-my chair… Kinza's chair…" she whispered as she saw the narrow backed chair meant for her wings and tail.

"I guess someone knew you'd be coming here," he said as he returned to his desk.

She grunted. "Damn it!" She stood up, moved the seat closer, inserted her tail through the special hole at the base of the chair-back and sat with a huff. "Does this mean you'll allow me to interview you?"

"Like I have a choice?" he laughed. "Well then, where would you like to start?"

Xuru conjured up her notepad and pencil. "Well now… You were an adventurous man… and so far, all Oklahoma has given me is the soft stuff – the action is what I'm looking for."

"But I was a married man with a growing family then," he replied. "What sort of adventure were you looking for?"

She flipped her notes back, surprising herself at just how much she actually wrote down. "Well now… you admitted before that even during your time in Oklahoma that you had times that you had to take the bull by the horns, so to say?" she noted as she tweaked her own small pair protruding from her head. "And after all, you are Nicholas D. Wolfwood…"

"How the hell did you hear that?" he asked.

Xuru snapped her fingers. Instantly they were seated in the blazing sunlight of the twin Gunsmoke suns. She was seated on one side of a chunk of wall, while he was still seated on the other. But he was also seated ON the lopsided wall, though this Wolfwood had wings.

"DAMN!" the reverend yelped as he scrambled to his feet. He then noticed that his other self was not reacting to them. "What the hell is going on?"

"There are some cases where actually observing what went on first hand is better than any question I could ask," Xuru smirked. "Of course, I could get much more than I expected, and the teachers frown on the use of this technique, but we are allowed to use it as a means to prepare for the interview."

Wolfwood looked at himself, wondering just when this was – he had sat on this slab numerous times – then he noticed… he was not smoking a cigarette.

"God, this was just after returning to Gunsmoke," he whispered to himself. "After Oklahoma…"

The man on the wall section pondered the world around himself, especially the young men, women and other creatures meddling around in the Observer Trainee's post there in Angel Wings. "Will I ascend for my life with her, or will I fall because of my first life?" he muttered to himself. "God, only you can tell me. I've been blessed with two lives… this one counts as my third… or half… whichever."

Wolfwood stood and watched as the Plant-Angel mulled over his previous life. He was shocked to find that he could repeat word for word what his former self was saying.

"The truth is," they said, "even in my life with her, there were some things I wasn't proud of. I guess that's just what it means to be human. But I tried to be the best husband I could for her, right?"

"I slept there that night," he said. "I thought I had lost Millie again. I thought that this would be the end. When the fighting was done, all that would be left would have been the trial, then oblivion. That was all that had been promised me by the Plants."

"Then maybe we should go further back in time?" Xuru suggested.

Wolfwood looked about. "This isn't the chapel. I'm not allowed to leave the chapel for more than forty minutes or so…"

Xuru reached over and knocked on something solid, even though she was tapping on thin air. "We haven't left your office," she noted. "This is merely an illusion. Why aren't you allowed to leave the chapel?"

Wolfwood rubbed his neck as the past faded back to the office they had been in. "Well, not just the chapel – The Source… I can't leave The Source for more than forty minutes, or this reality would vanish, and I'm told that the entire Plantoid race would have a headache that they'd never forgive me for."

"It also involves the safety of your family, Reverend," N'ya said as he stuck his head back through the wall. "You need to be here so that they could survive here. Even with Millie's reworking of your basic central work, this chapel, she would not be able to survive here without you being here. Truth is, even as with your predecessor, Rem, you are the central Source of life in this universe. Without you, it all crumbles."

"Gee, don't put too much on my back!" Wolfwood grunted. He noticed Xuru looking down at the Kuroneko.

"What are you doing back here, fuzzball?" she was snarling at the cat.

"What do you mean?" he snapped back. "I've been away for the last three weeks touring the outer rim having the adventure of my life!" He looked cross-eyed at them for a moment. "Aw nuts, did I come back just after I left?"

"Truth be told, yes," Xuru said as she crossed her arms and smirked at him.

N'ya rubbed his nose with his paw and sneezed. "Hairballs… I must be getting senile… I can't even sniff my way through the timelines anymore without dropping out of the streams… I miss the tree…" He shuffled off down the hallway muttering to himself.

Xuru pulled out what looked like the remote from a television or VCR. "Nothing worse than a truth kitty with sinus problems!" she said as she twirled the device. "Now, let's see what's on…"

"What?" Wolfwood chirped as the room vanished and a field of wheat sprouted around them. Off in the distance he could see the cabin.

"Where are we?" he barked as he stood up and took his bearings. With the cabin still there, it meant that this was early on, but not too early. This was wheat they were in – he had tried his hand at it only once while the cabin stood. This had to be spring of 1895!

"This is a sorry looking crop," Xuru said as she started walking towards the cabin. "Coming?"

"What the hell are we doing here?" Wolfwood barked, now showing signs of anger towards the demon.

"I told you, we're looking in on your more adventurous life, not your dull Reverend Saverem bit!" Xuru winked and continued on.

"I thought you said that we'd stay in my office!" he yelped as he started after her.

She laughed. "We are still in your office, silly!" she said with a giggle. "But to anyone looking in on us, they'd think we were out of our minds!"

N'ya ears drooped as he watched the pair blindly walking about the office, knocking over stray objects as they did.

"What foolishness!" he griped. He turned and found a spray of wheat swatting his nose.

"PHAA!" he griped. "How did I just get swallowed up in this?"

"Just lucky kitty," Xuru grinned as she continued towards the cabin.

The sound of a crying child wafted through the early summer air. The open cabin door allowed them to see a figure inside rocking back and forth while nursing the infant.

"1895… 1895…" Wolfwood was muttering to himself as he stepped through the field. "What happened in 1895?" He looked in and saw Millie and Baby Meryl peacefully together and smiled. The reason for their visit escaped him as the memory of this blissful time washed over him.

"Damn! Crap! OWWW!"

He looked back over the porch at Xuru, who was nearly in tears with laughter. She was pointing around the corner of the cabin towards the back where the chicken coop was.

"Oh god, the eggs…" he said, the memory of the moment returning to him. He was doing the coop that day, and some of the chickens had decided that he was a tasty morsel. To add insult to injury, the hutch lid had slapped down on his back, and half a dozen of the eggs had just splattered across his pants.

"This is not going to be a good day," he said as he saw himself stagger away from the coop with a basket of eggs that he now had to clean.

"You're telling me," N'ya said as he jumped up onto a rail-post to the corral that kept the horses penned up. Wolfwood noticed that and placed his hand on one of the cabin's beams. He looked at his younger self as he started in on the muck that was across his front.

"He can't see us can he?" he asked the junior demon.

Xuru stepped up to the egg-splattered man and waved her hand across his face with no reaction. "See?" she said as she grinned back at them. "You have to remember, we're not really here."

"Are you sure?"

N'ya looked beside himself at Diamond Mane, who had sauntered to the edge of the corral and was watching the mess his owner was getting into. "He might not see you three, but I do," he said.

Wolfwood just stood and pointed at the horse, his mouth agape. Xuru stepped up to him and closed it with a finger to his chin.

"You might let something in that way," she kidded him.

"HE SPOKE!" Wolfwood finally barked. "I KNEW IT!"

"Idiot!" the horse rebuked.

"EXACT-ly… hey…"

"Lay off Diamond Mane," the egg-splattered Reverend griped as he started in on cleaning what he could off the contents in his basket. The other Wolfwood stormed over to the horse and planted his hands on the rails of the fence.

"You mean to tell me that you could always talk!?"

Diamond Mane looked him in the eyes and snorted. "As an Observer, I am stationed here. The welfare of your family is my duty," he said quietly.

"So why can he see us and not him?" Wolfwood asked as he pointed at the horse and his egg-covered self who was now waddling around the front of the cabin with his bucket of cleaned pullets.

"He's a Cheverian," N'ya said with a rub against the large neck that was beside him. "He is named Nightwatch. Cheverians specialize in guiding and teaching those they deem special."

"You make it sound like there are many of us," the horse snorted.

N'ya bowed while on top of the post as his tail flipped over and flopped across his head. "Pardon me, oh most unique of creatures!" he sarcastically noted. "Truth be told, you're not unique to this universe."

"We are rare," Nightwatch retorted.

Wolfwood shook his head. "Yes, I'd say a talking horse is rare…"

"Aheh…" N'ya grinned. "Not exactly just talking," he added.

Wolfwood was about to ask what he meant when a gust of wing blasted him and most of the corral vanished behind a pair of huge black shimmering wings which had sprouted out of nowhere off of Nightwatch's shoulders. The size shocked him, and also reminded him of the pair he once had.

"Cheverian, roughly translated, means Aero Horse," Nightwatch noted as he folded the appendages again as they vanished into his shoulders. "As for why I can see you I am uncertain… You three are obviously not here, yet I can see and hear you."

Xuru sat on the rail next to them. "Not to break up this mutual admiration society, but we are here to interview you," she told Wolfwood.

Nightwatch moved over and nuzzled up to the demon. "I know you from somewhere," he said while peering at her with his left eye. He snorted and backed up a step. "Ah, Xuru… How is your mother these days? When last I saw, Gabrella was having her hands full doing her council duties while handling an armful of a certain baby demon."

"Oh, you know my mother, ea?" she coyly replied. "I never knew that she knew a Cheverian, let alone one so hansom?"

Nightwatch shook his mane. "Down kitten… you have many years ahead of you before you should be acting like that," he noted.

"Let alone species," Wolfwood added.

She giggled. "Species means nothing to a full demon," she grinned. "Haven't you ever heard of a demon horse?"

Wolfwood shook his head. "I've had my fill of demon thomases and horses… not to mention cars and motorcycles…" He looked about, remembering the day that he had the eggs all over himself. "This is not a good day."

"Ohhh?" Xuru asked. "And just how?"

Wolfwood gestured to his earlier self as he stumbled out of the cabin to clean the mess off himself. "I'm about to trip and add to that mess," he mumbled.

He stumbled slightly and continued past them, much to Wolfwood's surprise. But he was even more shocked when he watched him snap back and fall to the ground dead. He felt dizzy and staggered a bit as he saw the bullet hole that was oozing blood from his younger self's forehead.

The shock of the moment caught Xuru by surprise as well as she juggled the remote she was holding and quickly pressed the pause switch. She jumped down from the fence and walked over to the corpse. "Uhh… this didn't happen to you, did it?" she asked as she moved the body slightly.

Wolfwood was having a hard time breathing. He grabbed his chest and held onto the fence post he was next to. "Of course not!" he managed to bark.

"This is not good!" they heard N'ya yelp. He had jumped off the fence when the shot had been fired and was near the edge of the porch. They looked at what he was staring at and saw Millie and their child held in time as they were coming out to see what had happened.

"I… I know what's happening!" Wolfwood grunted through the pain. "I fell down… the fence post shattered, and I had to tell Millie to get inside…" Sweat was pouring off his face and his vision was getting blurry.

"Jeeze, you don't look good," Xuru said. She looked at the remote and pressed reverse. The small cloud of dust the falling body had made backed up and then launched the man up to his feet. The wound vanished and Wolfwood could breathe again. He then watched as his former self froze again. Looking over he saw that Xuru had again pressed pause.

"I thought you said we were still in my office!" he barked at her.

Xuru reached over and tapped the wall again. She scratched her head and looked at the remote. "I don't understand it… We're still in your office, but we're also here in Oklahoma… Got any ideas Night… oh…" She looked at the Cheverian, but he was frozen as well. "Umph… this is going to play tricks with his mind!"

"So what happened?" N'ya asked as he looked at the fence. "You said that this rail shattered?"

Wolfwood nodded and looked at the post. "Yea… yea, this one took a bullet meant for me… but I had fallen down… why didn't I fall down?"

Xuru held her hands up and snorted. "Wait a minute… exactly what was happening here? You said this was going to be a bad day."

Wolfwood looked at her with the realization that they did not know what was going on. "Ah… yes… this was the day I got bushwhacked," he said as he examined the area again. "And I know by just who!" He bolted for the grassy hill that would later have the cemetery in it.

"WAIT!" Xuru shouted but a bit too late as Wolfwood slammed into the rear wall of his office.

"What… happened?" he groaned.

"You have to keep us within a certain range, or you'll run out of room in your office," she explained while hiding behind the remote.

"Uhhh… we should have done this in the rectory's gym…" he moaned. "Come on…"

They walked through the grass to a still figure who was holding a rifle out. Wolfwood snorted and nearly kicked the frozen man.

"Frank Dartmouth… a notorious bandit from these parts…" he grumbled. "He's known for killing settlers and stripping their homesteads."

"So what happened?" Xuru pondered. "You said that you tripped and the post splintered behind you, yet you obviously took a bullet to the forehead instead…"

N'ya sneezed as a blade of grass tickled his nose. "Truth be told, I think it's because we were suppose to be here," he sniveled as he rubbed where the leaf had brushed him.

Wolfwood looked back at the paddock area at his still form. "You mean to tell me that I have to go and TRIP myself?"

"Guess so," Xuru said as she scratched one of her horns. She then noticed that N'ya was climbing over the form of Frank Dartmouth, rubbing up against his cheek. "What are you buddying up to him for, furball?"

"Hardly," he said as he peered down the length of the rifle's barrel. "Just as I thought… we have another problem." He raised his head up and looked over the field at where the gun was aimed. "If he maintains this angle, he won't hit the post. He'll hit Nightwatch."

They all looked back at the homestead. "Are you sure that he won't just attempt to follow me down as I fall?" Wolfwood asked.

"Can we take that risk?" N'ya asked.

Collectively they sighed and began walking back to the corral.

"What would happen if we just got out of this little glimpse of the past?" Wolfwood asked. Xuru pondered that for a moment and snapped her fingers.

Oklahoma blinked for a moment, but it was not the office they found when it left, it was a vast yellow haze with high winds and no church.

The grass returned to brushing against their legs. They sighed again.

"I wouldn't do that again until you settle this," they heard.

"Yea, someone might get hurt!" another voice said.

"Needle noggin'?" Wolfwood asked.

"Who are you?" Xuru asked the other man.

Vash the Stampede was standing beside a bald man in a Federation uniform who looked as if he was having a headache.

"Blast it! Why did you insist on doing this in such a small room?" he griped.

"Burnside!" Nicholas said with a surprise. "What are you doing here with our favorite broomhead?"

Burnside rubbed his head. "Getting down to why there's a temporal anomaly in your rectory's office, that's what!" he grumbled. "Damn I hate checking these things out. You can never get out of them without getting beat up."

"So what brings you here, Mr. Vash?" N'ya asked as he rubbed up against the ex-gunman's legs.

"Hey, I'm just the lift here," Vash said with his hands in the air. "Burnsy let us know that there was something going on up here, so I brought him up."

Wolfwood plopped his hand on the officer's shoulder. "Aren't you getting a bit old for this?" he asked with a smirk. "What are you doing on Gunsmoke anyway?"

Burnside snorted as he continued to rub his nose where he had smacked it into something unseen. "I live on Deneb One!" he griped. "I retired from active duty on the Observer Corps… I'm on reserve duty now… I only do local things like this."

Xuru clutched the remote with both hands as she nibbled nervously on its end. "A temporal anomaly? How bad? I mean, do you think…"

She stopped when she saw the glare from Burnside. "They saw this clear to the border of the Gamilon and Romulan Empires… we have ship diverting two thousand light years to avoid the turbulence simply because it stretches from Deneb back to Earth! So yes, I would say that they see this all the way back to your school!"

Xuru dropped to her knees. "Eeep!" she squeaked.

"Now now," Vash said as he tapped Burnside on the shoulder. "You don't need to be so harsh… Tell her the good news!"

"Good news? Where is there any GOOD NEWS in all this?" the Federation Officer barked.

Vash shrugged. "Well it'll be good news for her at least…" he suggested. Burnside thought about it a moment and nodded.

"I guess so," he said. "Well, it seems that this was supposed to happen, so you're not to blame… totally…"

"Totally?" she whimpered.

"Well you did open this time view," Vash said while scratching his cheek.

Xuru looked about. "But what went wrong?" she asked. "I've done these in class before, and I've never become interactive with the scenery… unless…"

"Unless…" Burnside urged as if he knew but wanted her to figure it out.

"It would take an increase in energy to do so," she said. "But I haven't increased my energy…"

Vash waved a finger. "Uh uh – you need to take the environment you're in as well…"

Xuru looked about. "Here?"

"You're in The Source, m'am," Burnside noted. "And you brought along a conduit."

"I did?" she asked in a confused teenager way. She looked at Wolfwood, who gave her a little twiddle-y wave with his hand.

"Hi there, I'm a Plant!" he said. The realization swept over her as she stepped back and slapped her forehead.

"Ragnorok! I forgot he was a Plant!" she grimaced. "So what's going on now? Are we stuck here?"

"Until we settle any other interaction that we find," Burnsides said as he looked at a data PADD. "There are a few showing up at numerous locations on the time-line."

"Wait a minute," Wolfwood interrupted. "What would have happened if we had never come here?"

Burnside shook his head. "That wouldn't have happened… This is what we call a fated intersection. It was bound to happen, so hoping or wondering if it would is moot."

"It is?" the perturbed Reverend asked.

Burnside shrugged. "Believe me if we thought about it too much, we'd just get headaches."

Wolfwood pinched his eyes. "Don't worry, I've already got one."

Vash clapped his hands together and rubbed them. "Okay, so what should we do first?" he asked in a sprite tone that got him a rather terse look from Wolfwood.

Burnside stepped over to Xuru's side and examined her remote. "That thing have slow-advance?" he asked.

"Great," Vash exclaimed as he turned on his heel. "I'll see what can be done over…"

He fell backwards holding his nose.

"That felt like a wall," he complained.

"Because it was a wall," Wolfwood said as he lifted him off the prairie grass. He then looked confused to Xuru. "Where did that come from? Didn't we just see that it wasn't there anymore?"

"To us it's gone," she explained as she added a jog-shuttle dial to the remote. "To them it's still quite there."

"Great," he grumbled. He then reached out and felt the edge of a bookcase. "Looks like its back for us as well…"

Xuru did the same and plunked her hand down on something soft. She looked under her hand and found it full of golden blond hair, and the face of Puruu looking back at her.

"What is going on here Xuru?" she asked.

The junior-demon gave a slight grin and shrugged. "Oh, hi there Puruu," she grimaced. "What are you doing here?"

"Looking for you," the Goddess-in-Training remarked as the rest of her appeared in the still grass. "The council needs to talk to you about our last interview."

"But I wasn't there for it," Xuru complained.

"At the very end you were," Puruu corrected her. "They want to know if you overheard anything that should be stricken from our report!"

"Ohhhhrrgh!" Xuru grunted as she grabbed her horns and spun about. "They are going to make me see saints!"

N'ya jumped up on a rock and looked about. "Truth be told, this office isn't this big folks… There are way too many feet for my liking in here!"

"The fuzzball has a point," Wolfwood said. "If we're back in the office, we'd better not have anyone else join us here…"

He then turned and got a face full of Millie.

"Join you where honey?" she asked as she blinked at the sudden sunlight she was in.

Wolfwood stared at her in disbelief. "Chickie, where are the kids?" he finally asked her.

"Umm… they're in the school," she said as she looked around at the vista that she now had view of. She noticed Vash and waved.

"Hellooo!" he said.

"Hellooo!" she replied. Wolfwood slapped his forehead.

"This is getting to be some party!" Xuru said with a grin. Puruu shook her head.

"It would probably be best if we all got out of your office," N'ya noted as he darted between legs. "Follow me and I'll get us to the side door." He then promptly stubbed his nose against the hallway wall.

"You didn't do that before," Wolfwood kidded the Kuroneko. N'ya snorted and slid along the invisible wall.

"Honey, what's going on?" Millie asked as she clung to his arm.

"Ask the students," he grumbled as he guided her out the narrow unseen doorway into the hall. He looked back at the form of Frank Dartmouth back in the tall grass. "Isn't this a bit wrong? I mean, won't we simply wind up back in there?"

"We've been doing laps in your office to walk a straight line here in this reality," N'ya said as he bounded into the field beyond the doorway. "Now that we're all out here, unless we walk into the buildings, we should have more freedom of movement." With that he flattened against something, and a chicken appeared out of nowhere.

"Found the chicken coop," Xuru said as she looked at the remote in her hand. Puruu examined it as well.

"Aren't these history scans centered around the location of an object, such as the remote you're using?" she asked. Xuru blinked and then grinned.

She reared back and let the unit fly much to the shock of everyone around her, save Burnside.

"Not a bad idea," he said. "Hopefully there isn't anything in the way between us and that remote."

"A good idea? How so?" Wolfwood asked still puzzled by the toss. He watched as Xuru carefully followed the remote's trajectory.

"Puruu is right," she said as she started to walk to where the remote landed. "This projection we're in is centered on a singular spot, which I chose to be that remote control. So by tossing it there, we change the center of the projection. Hopefully, if I remember correctly, that should be around the field south of the church, so let's get going…"

Puruu looked behind them. "It is also a good thing we didn't get slapped in the back by something large and heavy when you made that toss!"

Wolfwood reached back and found a solid surface there. "That feels like the back wall of the barn!" he grimaced when he saw just how close it was.

As they started for the control, they noticed that they were actually not moving, or at least the ground they were walking on was not. But the remote was getting closer.

"This is weird," Wolfwood mumbled. He was about to ask why this was happening but was interrupted by a squawk from behind the group. They looked back to see that the chicken who had joined them was being dragged by some unseen force. Millie walked back and gathered up the bird and rejoined her husband as they resumed walking towards the remote.

"This is very strange," Millie noted. "Is this some sort of game?"

With that, Wolfwood slammed into something solid and low. He keeled over and squeaked. Vash stepped over to him and placed his hand on whatever it was he hit. It had a strange top, and what felt like a handle to one side. He grabbed the unseen device and brought it up and down.

"Found the water pump," Vash said.

"Yay," Wolfwood gasped. He then suddenly had a face full of water splash him that seemed to come from nowhere.

"Must be beat up on the Reverend Day," N'ya remarked. He jumped back as he got a swipe from the wet preacher's hand for it.

Xuru scratched her head. "Odd… the water entered here, but the chicken coop and this water pump didn't… why is that?"

"Because they aren't organic," Puruu noted.

Xuru looked at the small pool of water. "Ew… you mean there's something organic in that?"

"Most likely," Puruu sighed.

"Wait a minute," Burnside grunted. "The chicken, Millie, myself, I can see that coming here with the assistance of those here, right? And the birds were here in The Source to start with…"

Wolfwood nodded from his seated position. "Yea, the chickens were brought in by the Vash Express…"

"And transferring chickens to The Source is no easy task!" Vash said with exasperation in his voice. "Can they squawk!"

Burnside shook his head – too much information there – "But the water… that's created by The Source here isn't it?"

They all looked at the water, then at Millie.

"What?" she asked.

"Umm," Vash started, "come over here and see if you can touch the water pump, would you Millie?"

Millie saw where Vash's hand rested and nervously reached out with a single finger to see if she could tap on the invisible pump. As she did, the metal unit appeared as did a long pipe that seemed to vanish into the ground, which now did not seem as opaque as it did before.

"I was afraid of that," Puruu said as they examined the wellhead. She then looked at the ground behind them and saw that where Millie had been walking the ground seemed darker. "Since she is the creator of the world we visit in The Source, Millie is bringing little bits of it here with her. We must take care not to have her touch anything else until Xuru picks up the remote."

The Junior Demon smirked. "That should be a cinch then," she smiled. If I remember right, that should be an open field out there, right?"

"There's a few large stones," Millie recalled from memory, "and of course the cows…"

They all blinked at her. "Cows?"

Millie smiled her patented smile. "Oh yes, I let them out into the lower field this morning."

Xuru flung her wings wide and floated over the ground. "Where!?" she shrieked.

Millie scratched her cheek. "I'm not sure. They could be anywhere… where are we?"

"I don't know!" Xuru yelped as she scanned the ground between them and the remote. "But I'm the only one in bare feet here, and I don't want to step in processed organics!"

Puruu floated up beside her. "Oh, you think sandals are any better?" she noted.

Wolfwood sighed as he wiped his face and shook off the pain he had been inflicted with. "Let's just get that remote," he grumbled.

With the Goddess-in-Training and the Junior Demon floating off the ground, the others started to walk towards the remote making sure that Millie was surrounded – they did not want any extra objects to appear in this weird world they were now in. But then they found themselves dragging the two floating ladies as well. Reluctantly, Xuru and Puruu lowered to the ground and continued towards their objective.

"Ew – ew – ew – ew!" Xuru complained, expecting each step to be a messy one. But they managed to finally drag the remote within grabbing range. She reached down and found that something was in the way.

"Must not be anything organic, or it would have joined us," Vash said.

Burnside shook his head. "Not exactly – she's a demon. And since it was her powers that created this projection, she can touch things in the real world without bringing them here."

"Well why didn't you tell me that in the first place!?" Xuru barked.

Burnside scratched his bald head. "Sorry – slipped my mind…" he meekly answered her.

She snorted and let out a breath of air. "Well good, because I think this is a cow."

"Which end?" Wolfwood asked.

Xuru looked back at where her hands were with panic in her eyes. She slowly drew her hand up and over the top of the unseen shape - It stopped on something thin and sticking up.

"What the heck it this thing?" she pondered. "It seems stiff and it's vibrating…"

"Oh, that must be its tail!" Millie exclaimed. She then got an expression of fear on her face. She jumped and grabbed Xuru by her own tail and yanked her back. The chicken in her arms squawked.

"YEAAAAAOWW!" the junior-demon shouted as the shock of her tail being yanked charged through her body like lightning. She bore her nails, her teeth and whirled around with fire in her eyes.

"I'm sorry Xuru," Millie apologized. "But that cow was about to… you know…"

Xuru blinked and looked back at the remote. It seemed to shuffle about slightly as if something was dropping on it.

"Awwww… crap…" she said. She then started to giggle.

"Well, it's not like it's really there," Puruu noted. She then noticed that her friend was now nearly bent over laughing. She looked at the others who were all looking at her with puzzled expressions.

"Is there something to be laughing about?" Wolfwood questioned.

"Oh! Make it stop!" was all Xuru could say. She was now pounding the ground.

Puruu looked at her closely and noticed the demon's tail seemingly being pulled and dropped by some unseen force. Its short stubby fur would move back and forth. Puruu shifted herself slightly to enter the normal reality of The Source and found that the cow was now licking Xuru's appendage.

"Shoo! SHOO!" she yelled from the ether. The cow leapt up and darted for the lower field where the other bovines were. Puruu then looked at the pile it had left behind. She waved her hand and the offensive mound vanished. She then returned to the others. There she found Xuru growling at her feet.

"I'll make HAMBURGER out of that cow!" she snarled as she checked her tail for any damage.

"Interesting," Puruu said as she rubbed her chin. "Why did that cow see your tail like that?"

"I don't know, and I don't CARE!" the demoness huffed as she reached for the remote, then quickly drew back and looked back at her partner.

Puruu continued to contemplate the reason why a cow could see them, or at least Xuru's tail. She nodded to her that it was safe to pick up the device. Xuru quickly snatched it.

"Okay, now that we're back to the remote, what now?" Wolfwood asked looking back at Frank Dartmouth.

"Well first of all, let's slowly roll this little drama," Xuru grinned as she spun the jog-shuttle on the device in her hand.

Dartmouth could now be seen taking a bead with his long-range rifle. Over at the corral, the younger Wolfwood was just appearing from behind the house.

"Honey, what's that man doing in the grass?" Millie asked as he pulled his trigger. Xuru stopped spinning the shuttle and backed it up. The bullet returned to the muzzle of the rifle.

"Move it forwards just a hair," N'ya said as he examined the end of the gun. Xuru crept the dial slightly until a flash of flame stuck out of the barrel making the Kuroneko jump back a bit. She held it just as the bullet started out.

"You're the expert marksman here," Burnside said to Vash. "Think you can redirect his shot?"

Vash was looking a bit confused with what they were doing at first. It was when he noticed the younger Wolfwood over by the buildings that he realized just what was going on. He grabbed the Preacher that was with them aside apologizing to his wife that he needed to talk to him in private.

"Does she know anything about this?" Vash yelped as quietly as he could.

"Of course not!" Wolfwood snapped then returned a grin to Millie. He slowly returned to looking at Vash as he continued, "Do you think I'm out of my mind? This is going to be one of the bloodiest days here in Oklahoma!"

Now Vash was looking over at Millie and grinning. He slipped back down so that Wolfwood hid him from her again. "How bad?" he asked him. Xuru and Puruu leaned in to listen.

Wolfwood sighed. "There's going to be four bodies by the time this day is through… I got three of them… I have no idea how the forth one…"

Vash nearly exploded if Puruu had not placed her hand over his mouth. "Dead!?" he mumbled through her fingers.

Wolfwood glared at his friend. "It was for the defense of this family," he growled. "Look at him! Does he look like he's full of remorse or worry over what he's about to do?"

Vash looked at the rifleman on the ground and his intended target. He glanced at the Goddess-in-Training to release his mouth. He walked over to the prone man and examined the flare from his gun. "What's he suppose to hit with this shot?" he asked.

Wolfwood gestured towards the corral. "Third post from the far end," he said.

Vash leaned down in front of the rifle and eyeballed the line of flight. "Tricky shot," he said. "Downright impossible from this line of site… too high, and he'll get your… thing… horse I think they call it…" He placed his index finger on the front of the barrel and swayed it about slightly. "There… that should hit the post."

"The TOP of the post," Wolfwood reminded him.

Vash said "Ah," and pulled the gun up just a touch. "Let her go!"

"Wait a minute!" Wolfwood said as Xuru started to spin the dial on the shuttle. The bullet continued out then stopped a few yards away. "Aren't we forgetting something?" he grinned.

"Umm…" she replied with a blank look on her face. "What?"

Wolfwood turned beet red and pointed a shaking finger at his younger self. "Aren't I suppose to be on my face by now?" he steamed.

"On your face honey?" Millie asked with a confused look. She looked back at the corral area and jumped slightly making the chicken squawk in her arms again. "Oh no, what day is this?"

Wolfwood grimaced, fearful that his attempt at keeping Millie out of the loop had failed miserably. He now bore the look of a deer stunned in the headlights of an onrushing truck.

"What DAY is this?" she repeated. "Please tell me! Tell me this isn't May 25th, 1895?"

Xuru looked at the remote and at the little digital screen that was flashing that very date across its face. She shrugged and said "Ummm, yes… yes it is…"

"Oh mercy!" Millie gasped. She looked back at the house, which surprised Wolfwood – he expected her to blow up on him for not telling her. But she continued to stare at the structure. She then bolted for it with the chicken now howling in her arms.

"Err, umm, will she be able to reach the house without us moving with her?" Vash asked.

"As long as she doesn't hit anything," Burnside grumbled. "We'd best follow her."

Millie ran past the still form of the egg-covered Wolfwood and made the turn around the face of the cabin. She stepped up to the door and saw herself cradling her youngest daughter with a smile on her face. She was looking at a bucket of eggs that were under water waiting a cleaning.

"Oh god!" she said clutching her hands to her face and making the chicken nearly gag. She heard the footsteps of her husband come up behind her. "It is that day, isn't it?" she asked him.

"I'm sorry Miss Millie, it's my fault," Xuru said from behind Wolfwood. "I'm doing an interview with your husband about this day, and things seemed to have gotten out of hand…"

She looked back at herself and the baby she was cradling. She touched the child's head and sighed. She turned to face them again and found Vash standing to the rear. She looked down and shook a little.

"Honey?" Wolfwood said. She walked around him and sat down on the porch chair.

"I'm fine," she said in a quivering voice. "You do what you must, please. I'll… I'll just wait here…"

"Chickie?" Wolfwood placed his hand on her shoulder.

"JUST DO IT!" she finally exploded. Wolfwood stepped back and snapped an angry look at the Junior-Demon."

"AND DON'T YOU DARE BLAME HER!" Millie added. Wolfwood looked back at her as if she had lost her mind.

"Nicholas D. Wolfwood, just do it!" she snapped before he could complain.

"Okay then," Burnside said to break the tension, "let's go trip Wolfwood." He started dragging everyone back around the cabin. Vash stayed momentarily staring at the ex-Insurance Girl."

"You going to be okay?" he asked her.

Millie wiped her eyes. "Yes," she sprightly said hiding her fears. "Please Mr. Vash, go help them, I'll be fine."

He nodded and did so. She sighed and looked at the roof of the porch.

"Why now?" she asked no one in particular.

"Because, students can be too inquisitive, why else?"

She looked beside herself and found Kinza seated on the wooden planking of the porch whittling a stick.

"Why Mr. Fuzzy?" she asked the spirit. "Why weren't you there?"

"What… on the 25th of May of 1895?" he asked as he leaned back against the building. "I was on assignment on another level that day… though I'm pretty sure that wouldn't have mattered…"

"Wouldn't have mattered?" she whispered. "What do you mean?"

He sighed. "Millie dear, you have to understand, the Observers Corps can not be the police for everything. If we prevented everything that happened to you and your family, suspicions would arise on just how lucky this family had it. Believe me it's just as hard on us as it is on you…"

"Like you and Lexy?" she asked.

Kinza nodded as he continued to slit chips off the stick he was whittling on. "Like me and Lexy, and Thomas… god what I went through with Thomas was enough…" He muttered to himself some strange Tomassamassian swear.

Millie stroked the chicken and pondered its plumage. "But still, this day of all days…"

"This day indeed," he said.

She looked down at him. "You do know what happens today, right?"

"Yup," he replied.

"Everything?"

He looked up at her, nodded and quietly said, "Everything."

Millie's eyes grew wide. "Oh my god," she said with trepidation, "you knew?"

Kinza scowled. "Millie, it was for the safety of the family. I would have done the same."

"Yes, but…" was all she got out when a cheer came up from the gang around the side of the house. She noticed the fence post splintering across the grass and dirt. She was about to get up and see what was going on when her other self stepped out of the cabin to see what had happened.

"Honey! Get back in the house! Bar the door!" she heard the Prairie Wolfwood say to her younger self. The mother spun about and ran with the baby into the cabin and slammed the door on Millie and the spirit of her friend. She slowly opened it again and entered the building.

The mother looked back at the door and slammed it again. She was panting hard, the baby swathed in her long hair as she darted about looking for shelter for her. Millie stood back in the corner as Kinza stepped through the wall and watched. The baby was wrapped in a light towel, placed in a blanket then laid into the washbasin which was then slid into the closet.

"That was a good idea," Kinza said he stood beside Millie. The mother then stopped moving. He looked out the side window and saw that Xuru had once again paused the events with her remote. "Silly girl," he laughed.

In the paddock area, the egg-covered Wolfwood was getting to his feet, his gun drawn, running towards the chicken coop on the back of his house. The moment had been stopped on the account that he was about to be struck down again by one of Frank's rounds. The Reverend was pacing back and forth tapping his head trying to remember what he had done then.

"I'm sure I simply dove for the back side of the coop, because I remember seeing the second man as soon as I did."

Vash looked back towards Dartmouth's position and distinctively saw the shaft of a rifle jutting out of the tall grass just up hill of the first gunman's position.

"Ah yes, I see," he said. "And the third one?"

Wolfwood looked back behind the group. "The third one was from the back side of the shed," he said as he gestured to the structure that made up the back of the corral. "Betsy and Diamond Mane warn me of him."

"And the forth?" Burnside asked.

Wolfwood looked to their right, on the downhill slope next to the house. "The Army boys found him after all this played out… I thought at the time that he was struck by accident by the second guy out there when I shot him."

Vash grimaced at those words. Burnside nudged him and reminded him "This is history son, not much to be done but make sure it happens as it did."

"Even if we're the reason it's happening like this?" Vash retorted. Xuru groaned. Vash settled and held his hands up. "History, that's all it is!" he repeated. "Well then, we'll have to redirect this bullet then." He walked out to where Dartmouth was laying and waved to have the bullet returned to the gun by the junior-demon.

"It is very strange looking at myself like this," Millie said as she stepped around her former self. She examined the horror on her own face and remembered the thought of possibly loosing both people she loved the most in life that day. She watched as the Oklahoma woman slowly backed up slightly in time with the remote's commands.

"When does she…" Kinza asked.

"Soon… very soon," Millie said. She looked out the window on the south side of the house and saw the stray forth gunman. "Soon…"

Vash and N'ya examined the shot coming from Frank Dartmouth. "Where's this one supposed to go?" Vash yelled.

"Back of the coop, right in front of me," Wolfwood directed. "As a matter of fact, it strikes this knot in the planking…"

"Got it!" Vash called. He stood up and looked at the overall layout of the gunfight. "These guys didn't realize just who they were up against, did they?" he asked the cat. "It may have been a perfect ambush, but Nicholas D. Wolfwood would have won this easily, right?"

N'ya sighed. "Not to put down the Reverend's gun-playing abilities, but truth be told, he had not shot a gun in anger at this point for some time."

Vash snorted. Wolfwood rusty? With his family at stake?

He looked downhill and saw the forth gunman.

Possibly. He decided to wait to see what would happen with that one.

"It becomes a real gunfight after this shot," Wolfwood said. "We'd best get out of the way." He shooed everyone up the hill beside the corral in an area that he was pretty sure that the bullets would not hit anyone.

Xuru turned the shuttle on her remote to slow advance and started to spin the jog. Dartmouth shot his arrant bullet which knocked the knot out cleanly.

Inside the shack, the bullet slowly zipped by the Mother by only inches and impaled itself in the ceiling joist over the doorway. Kinza looked at Millie, who had sat down in the rocking chair. She was almost glassy-eyed as she watched herself react to the bullet. Mother Millie dove for under the window covering her head as a small amount of splinters scattered across the room. Outside, Dartmouth and the second gunman were now peppering the area. The past Wolfwood was behind a water barrel which was starting to spray all over from the holes it was taking.

"Is that when you called us?" Burnside asked as he saw that the younger Wolfwood was reaching for his com unit.

"Yea," Wolfwood said as he wiped his forehead. "The cavalry was a few hours down the road, and transmats were unavailable since there weren't any ships in orbit at the time."

Vash studied the slowed gunfight. He saw every bullet, every trajectory, every near miss. He tossed a stone that redirected a bullet he saw that was going to be much too close to the Wolfwood of this time if he was to come out of this without a scratch.

"You are supposed to come out of this without a scratch, right?" he asked the Wolfwood beside him.

The preacher snapped an angry look at him then rethought that expression. "Um, no… I wasn't hit," he said as he scratched his head. He was going to mention something else when the gun play stopped, as did all the movement in front of them. He looked over at Xuru. She was blowing on one of her claws.

"Ow, that smarts!" she complained from the rapid spinning of the jog-shuttle. Vash took that moment to re-examine the results of this first part of the skirmish.

"Looks like you winged Dartmouth at this point," he commented as he saw the gunman had a bloodied arm. "The guy coming down the hill is about to get his…" He stared at the bullet that was heading for the man. He had an urge to move it away sweeping through him.

"Vash…" Burnside warned. "That's a no – no… remember – History's Daggers."

"You Observers seem to like to quote that line a great deal," he said as he started back towards the group. It was then that he noticed something that made him stop. He made a double take, making sure what he had seen was true - then he continued.

"Everything okay?" Puruu asked. "You looked like you had seen something there."

"Hahaa! Nope! Nothing at all!" Vash cackled. The two students looked at him with puzzled expressions.

"Don't worry ladies," the Kuroneko noted, "he always acts like that…" N'ya scampered towards the cabin.

"…when he's trying to hide something," he mumbled to himself as he entered the side of the structure.

"I wish I could do that," Vash said as he watched.

Kinza and Millie had watched the mother crawl across the room during the height of the gun battle and enter the pantry. Even as bullets punched holes in the slatted walls, she managed to get to the gun closet and remove the rifle it contained.

"I can't believe I did that," Millie sat nearly stupefied.

"Personally, I'd like to know how you knew about the clothes closet," Kinza said.

"Huh?" she asked a bit confused as her younger self froze at the open window.

"You put baby Meryl in the clothing closet," the Tomassamassa noted. "I reinforced that back wall with rock maple behind the cedar wall slats. It's as close to bullet-proof as you can get."

"Really?" she asked looking at the closet. "I put her in the washbasin for that reason…"

Kinza shrugged. "Ah… that too…"

Xuru started the spinning on the shuttle again. The group watched as the second gunman fell forwards, his gun going off as he fell.

"That should have been when that one down the hill got his," Wolfwood said as he watched his former self come out from behind the barrel and fire the last shot at Dartmouth with his freshly reloaded revolver. He started to move to one side to get a clear sight down the hill.

Vash looked to the side of the corral. "Hey, is that your third man?" he said quickly getting Wolfwood's attention.

"Ah, yes… this should be just a second…" he said as he looked back. "There… the horses should be getting my attention…"

The two animals were slowly prancing and their time-dilated nays and whinnies could be heard. The Wolfwood in their world heard the noise and turned quickly and fired.

Vash heard two shots – practically simultaneously fired.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw two bodies fall.

Kinza nodded. "Had to be done." He turned towards Millie. "There wasn't any choice to be made, m'am… did you want to be a widow?"

Millie dropped her head much like her younger self did. They broke into tears.

Vash stepped up to Xuru and placed his hand on her shoulder. He leaned down and quietly told her, "Let it play."

"Huh?" she said, still spinning the shuttle.

"Let it play," he repeated. "Let time flow for about… three minutes, won't you?"

"Why?" Puruu asked making sure her voice was not overheard.

"Trust me," Vash said. "It will be for the best."

Millie raised her head as she heard the normal sounds of herself sobbing. She saw the mother stumble to her feet, the rifle held at arm's length as if it had just tainted her. She did cock it again, ejecting the spent shell which rang as it bounced across the floor. She ran back into the pantry and returned empty-handed. She reached down to pick up the casing, but dropped it again as she found it still quite hot. She looked panicked as she looked about the room for something to handle the bullet.

A hole in the floor where a knot had been near the edge of a board greeted her eyes. She quickly used the side of her shoe to tap the shell to it and drop it down into the cold cellar. She then rushed to the closet and checked on Meryl. The baby had slept through the whole ordeal.

Mother and daughter froze again as N'ya stepped through the pantry door and sat beside them. "Nice pair," he said. "Well done, m'lady!"

Millie stood up and shook. "Is it? Is it really?" she said quivering. "I took a life! Mr. Vash always said that it was wrong to take anyone's life! Mr. Vash…" She broke down sobbing. The chicken dropped to the ground and scampered about.

"Millie, there was no choice," Kinza said as he knelt beside her.

She looked up and attempted to fall over his shoulder, but found herself falling through his ethereal self. She then felt his paw on her head as he concentrated on it being sold enough to be there with her.

"It's so hard, Mr. Fuzzy," she whimpered as she grasped the hand. "I know that I needed to do that, but I can understand Mr. Vash's point of view as well…"

The door slowly opened. Millie and Kinza looked up and saw Vash standing there with Puruu and Xuru behind him. She quickly sat up and fiddled with her fingers nervously.

"Hey, what are you doing here?" Xuru asked the ghost beside her.

"Huh? Who are you talking to?" Vash asked.

Puruu looked at the Tomassamassa. "Kinza… he's right there beside Millie…"

"He can't see me," the furry officer said as he stood up. He then looked as if he was having a headache. He then appeared to Vash, but became translucent to Millie.

"Whoa!" Vash said. "Not bad for a dead guy!"

"Heh, frequency modulation… can't beat it!" Kinza winked. "That's why Knives couldn't see me it seems… Plants and humans do have some things uncommon to each other… the spectral range they can see for one thing… one of the reasons why you can track bullets like you do." He scratched the back of his head and laughed. "Never make a ghost of a person with a scientific background I guess!"

Vash smiled but then became serious when he saw Millie. He got down on his knee and bowed to her.

"Can you ever forgive me?" he told her. Millie was not expecting that. She was expecting him to tell her that it was okay, that she had done what had to be done.

"Ea?" Kinza asked.

"Nyaa?" the Kuroneko mused.

"I didn't mean it, really," Vash started to cry. "I redirected one of the gunmen's shots and mistakenly hit the guy down the hill…"

Millie sat back, suddenly not knowing what was going on. She nearly placed her hand on his back to sooth him but did not know if she should.

"But Mr. Vash… it's okay, you didn't do it! I did!" she told him. "I did it!"

Vash shook his head. "No… no you didn't… Your shot hit the ground at his feet… It stopped him momentarily… if he hadn't stopped, he wouldn't have been hit! Oh Miss Millie, I took another life!"

Millie looked at him, not knowing if to hug him or break down crying herself. She fell over his back and joined him.

N'ya sat down with a thud and looked confused. "Umm, but… truth be told…"

Kinza shook his head and placed his finger to his mouth. He winked and gestured the cat to follow him. They joined the goddess and demon on the porch. There he saw Wolfwood and Burnside standing over by the corral post. Wolfwood looked a bit shocked and was shaking his head.

Vash stepped out wiping his tears. He nodded to Puruu and Xuru to enter as he stepped over towards the two men.

"Did you fix it?" Burnside asked.

Vash nodded. "It is best for her to think I did it rather than she did… after all, I have done it before…"

Wolfwood planted his hand on his friend's shoulder and shook him. "You're too much, you know that?"

Kinza looked back at the shack. "Maybe," he said. "But she's also pretty smart…"

Wolfwood and Burnside looked down on the Tomassamassa. "What's he doing here?" they asked.

"Ah… yes…" he smirked.

Millie dusted herself off as she stood up and wiped her face. She looked at Puruu and Xuru and smiled weakly.

"He didn't have to do that," she said to them as they held their breaths. Puruu covered her mouth at the thought of what she was saying. "I've handled guns all my life. I know when I shoot someone."

Xuru smiled. "Rocking!" she said as she produced her papers and scribbled notes down. Puruu slowly looked at her friend and almost reluctantly had to do the same.

Millie saw how the Goddess-in-Training looked. She placed her hand on her arm and surrounded herself around her. It was then that Xuru realized just how stupid she had just been.

Puruu cried over she shoulder for the person she held in her arms. Her pad and pen clattered to the floor as they held one another.

"Shhh… shhh… Puruu, it is okay," Millie said. "As my daddy always told me, there's no such thing as a perfect human. 'Course, the last time he told me that was when he was disowning me for having a child out of wedlock…"

Puruu nodded and pulled back slightly. "I know… I know… but other than Rem, you were… you were…"

Millie placed her finger on her mouth to hush her. "Even Rem isn't perfect. Remember that. I think even she would tell you that."

"Heh, she has," Xuru said as she rolled her eyes. "The suicide attempt, the soup made of boiled sox, painting her mother's car when she was six years old…"

Millie squirreled up her nose. "A soup made up of boiled sox?"

"Dirty old sox! That nasty Ricky Lester next door never bothered her again!" Xuru grinned.

Millie started to giggle. Puruu could not help but join her.

Wolfwood looked at Xuru with his fists hard to his hips as the ladies finally stepped out of the cabin. "Can we go now?" he asked the demon.

Xuru grinned and snapped her fingers. They left the past for whatever they were to find in The Source, leaving those behind to go on with their lives.

Tolefson and his men rounded the bend at a full run. "Ike, secure that body! Drake, take your men and circle up the west side of the property! NICK!?"

"Tolly!" Wolfwood called as he saw the uniformed men of the U.S. Army squad running about. "Great to see you!"

Tolefson patted him on the shoulder. "You'd best get in there and see if Millie's okay," he told him. "We'll clean up out here."

Wolfwood grinned and ran back up to the house.

Ike trotted up to his commander and saluted. "Looks like he got them all," he reported. "That one there is odd though."

"Why is that?" Tolefson asked as they stepped over to the body.

"He's been hit twice," Ike noted. "The wound to his leg is a rifle shot, and the one that killed him in his chest is a standard pistol wound… wasn't Wolfwood only armed with a pistol?"

"Where'd the rifle shot come from?" Tolefson pondered. His communicator beeped and he popped it open. "Yes sir?"

"Tolly, there is only one wound on that body, understand?" the voice of North said. "Directive 10."

Tolefson nodded. "Understood sir, directive 10. Which shot is it?"

North sighed and looked down the hill. "Mine," he said. He holstered his gun and headed for the duck blind he had been in.

The group materialized back in The Source. There they found not the Oklahoma that Millie had constructed from her memories, but a lone tree.

It was wilting, and little of the leaves were left on it. Underneath sat a gray haired woman who looked up at them with deep brown sad eyes.

"Rem?" Vash asked. "Rem, is that you?"

The sadness left her eyes. Now anger swelled – hate – maddening hatred as her hair of silver began to swirl about her. "YOU!" she shouted. "HOW DARE YOU DESECRATE THIS HOLY FIELD OF HONOR!?"

Oddly, it was not Vash she seemed to be yelling at. It was Burnside she was vehemently spitting at.

N'ya looked at her with a puzzled expression. "I'd say this was a catnip hallucination, but no… truth be told, you are Rem, and that is her tree there…"

"But time isn't supposed to matter here, even if it changes," Burnside said as he stepped back from the now standing old woman. "What have I done to get this lumped on me?"

"You… you OBSERVER!" she shrieked. "YOU RUINED EVERYTHING! YOU KILLED MY VASH! YOU KILLED MY KNIVES! YOU KILLED EVERYONE!"

Burnside held up his PADD as he tried to re-associate himself to his readings. "The time stream is still flowing between Deneb One and Earth, so I would say there are still some things for us to do in your past Wolfwood."

"This is becoming some interview," Xuru said as she tapped the remote. "What's different this time?"

Burnside stared at the readings and swallowed. "Its… its Deneb One…"

"GUNSMOKE!" Rem shouted. "CALL IT BY ITS REAL NAME!"

"Rem! Rem! Stop it! It's me, Vash!" he said as he held the woman back.

"You're not Vash!" she grumbled. "He died when Gunsmoke died. That Observer's ship, you know… that BIG one… it blew up when the Second Moon was destroyed."

"Forrestal?" Burnside asked. "She wasn't anywhere near the beam that Janus sent up to blow up the Second Moon! Only the Nelson was destroyed."

Rem shook her head. "No, she was crippled, and when she fell into the atmosphere, she blew up. What was she powered with, huh? What WAS IT!? It ripped the surface of the planet clean! It tore the air out into space! It destroyed everything!"

"Great… we have to go back and fix something else now?" Wolfwood snarled. "When and where?"

"Umm, I don't know," Xuru squirmed as the Reverend glared at her. "The next time I was going to ask you about was… oh Hades…"

Puruu looked at the remote and gasped. "Xuru, you weren't!"

The Junior-demon snapped a look at her partner. "Well, you sure weren't going to ask them!"

"Out of respect I wasn't!" Puruu shot back.

"And what was it the teacher said!?" Xuru countered. "Some questions might be difficult to ask, but they must be asked!? What am I suppose to do, ignore it!?"

Millie clung to her husband's shoulder. "What day is it?" she asked, a cold tone in her voice quieting the bickering between the two girls.

"June 10th, 1916," Burnside said. Xuru and Puruu stared at him slack-jawed. "That's where the next anomaly goes to."

Vash saw an expression roll over his friend's faces he never thought he'd ever see. Millie cringed behind Wolfwood, and utter hatred rolled over his.

"This interview is over," he said. "You two just flunked."

"Nick, what is it?" Vash asked cautiously not wanting to blow this volcano that was gurgling before him.

"Jerry," was all he said as he and Millie walked past the Goddess-in-Training and the Junior-Demon. "That was the day our son Jerry was killed. We aren't going."

"I'm afraid that isn't possible," they heard. "You see, if you don't go, I'll make you go."

Wolfwood turned and saw North standing behind them all. "You'll what?" he asked his friend.

"Sorry, but the time line is important here," North said. "Unless you all move on with your journey, this timeline will stay, those of you who weren't supposed to be here will vanish, and the universe will belong to D'two."

"D'TWO!?" Vash yelled. "He was killed! And it was Knives who was controlling him!"

North shook his head. "Knives was killed by the blast, releasing D'two from his control. He thus managed to escape the holocaust by launching off the planet in his sphere. Those on the Fifth Moon were also lost when the debris of the Second Moon smashed their ships. Without anyone to stop him, D'two has become the dominant force out there, destroying humanity where he can. He should be within the solar system of Earth in about a month."

"How are you here then?" Wolfwood asked. "Didn't you die with the planet?"

Kinza stepped over to his commander. "No, he's not really here, just like me. We're both spirits."

"As are these," North said ad he swept his hand back and many more bodies appeared, including Millie and Meryl in the forefront. "The timelines are about to collide Nicholas. Do you really want them to end like this?"

"Crap," the Reverend said. He looked back at Xuru and huffed. "You sure you can handle it right this time?"

"Other than bringing along a Plant the last time, I didn't do anything wrong THAT time," she shot back.

Vash patted him on the shoulder. "Looks like this is all your fault, buddy!"

Wolfwood steamed. "Let's make this a mutual everyone's at fault situation, okay!?" he snapped. "Come on, let's do it! Is there any idea what we're supposed to do?"

North nodded. "In this timeline we are in, Jerry lives."

Wolfwood stared at him. "He what?"

Xuru pressed the play button and they vanished.

oOo

Next Episode

I am a father

In the past I saw my second son die in my wife's arms

Why must I relive this?

Dear god, a father should never bury his own son

Let alone, have to choose

Son

Future

Or Family…

Next Episode of TRIGUN: MOON CHILD – THE OKLAHOMA YEARS

Chapter Six - Interview with Wolfwood – Part 2 – Jerry

Please god, not again…

Edited 1807.18

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