DISCLAIMER: Trigun and its characters belong to Yasuhiro Nightow.
Lyrics to "Walkin' After Midnight" by Patsy Cline
Lyrics to "Children of Jack" by Guy Forsyth
The farther they walked, the less lamplight there was and the more the desert nightlife began to make itself known.
"What's that song you're humming?"
"Hmm?" Vash looked at Meryl, blinked, then started to sing.
"I go out walkin', after midnight
Out in the starlight, just hoping you may be
Somewhere a-walkin' after midnight
Searchin' for me…"
"The outlaw can sing," she noted. "That's a nice song, too. Where'd you learn it?"
Shrug. "You hang around, you pick up things."
"Is it really after midnight?"
"Probably. This is summer, so sunset wasn't until late. And we've been out a while, wandering around."
"We should get back."
"Not yet," he said. "You haven't gotten your question answered. You might get it now."
"Why now?"
"Stop. Look. Listen."
She looked around. "We've gone straight out of town."
"Uh-huh. Here, sit down with me and watch the show." He gently tugged her down with him as he knelt and sat in the sand.
The night sky was in full pale light, casting a silvery halo over the dark desert. It took Meryl a few seconds, but she saw soon enough what he was talking about as she realized the twinkling of the stars was being replicated in the desert. Hundreds, for all she knew thousands, of little pale twinkles were floating throughout the desert air, winking on and off.
"Amazing," she breathed. "I haven't watched twinkle bugs since I was a kid."
"It's really something, isn't it?"
"Yeah." Meryl looked away from the sight and up at him. "This is their mating ritual, right?"
"Yep. I've heard that on the SEEDS ships, there were different species taken from Earth for terraforming. One of them was something called a firefly. Some people think at least some of the fireflies survived the Fall, and twinkle bugs are their descendants, genetically adapted to Gunsmoke."
"Twinkle bugs, SEEDS, singing...you're full of surprises. Where do you get all this stuff from?" she wondered out loud.
"You'll find the more you listen to people, the more things you pick up." That sounded suitably vague enough, just enough truth to not really be a lie but not the real answer.
Meryl turned back to watching the little bugs light on and off. They sat in silence, just enjoying the scene before them in the cool air.
Eventually, Vash spoke. "Part of why I run is there's no walls out here, insurance girl. No worries about how much money you have. No getting so caught up in life you forget to live. Just being where you are, and then the next day you're someplace else with something new."
She frowned. "I like where we are right now, but I don't think I understand you."
Her frown was answered with a smile. "Sure you do, you just don't know it. It's the reason you like being in the field – you feel alive. I like moving, seeing what comes next." It wasn't the full truth, but how could anyone understand the truth about him and Knives?
She was still frowning.
"Don't think about it too much," he told her. "Just take it for what it is."
Meryl shrugged, then gasped as Vash stood up, taking her with him. He pulled her close, grasping the hand that was cuffed to his, and began to move her around.
"What are you doing?" she managed to squeak. He was far too close; she remembered the way she had felt with his arm around her, watching the sunset. That was not the way a professional should feel about her job – yet she found she did not want to pull away.
"Taking it for what it is," Vash replied. "Feel the music in the air."
"What music?"
She was so close she felt his chest vibrate as he gave her music.
"Do you believe in love at first sight?
As a matter of fact, I do
Every time that I open my eyes
That saying comes true…"
Vash's eyes were burning with intensity again as he looked into Meryl's. She forgot how ridiculous it was that she was dancing in the middle of the night with a wanted outlaw, with no music except the words he sang. A melody created itself in her head, and the combined twinkles of the stars in the sky and the bugs around them made her dare to imagine they were dancing on nothing but air.
"…And I'll play you the songs that I've written
And the ones that I can't seem to write
Maybe you'd know what you're missing
Maybe you'd stay past the night…"
If this was the kind of thing he felt wandering from place to place, then Meryl could begin to understand why Vash would want to run free.
The reality she lived in was obliterated when he leaned down and kissed her, making flashes of light explode across the blank space of her closed eyes.