Short Story

Hey gang!

I'm gonna post a short story.  It's actually... *checks* 17 pages in a word processor, and almost 10,000 words, which I think is on the long end of a short story.  *checks that, too*  Wikipedia says a short story can be up to 20,000 words, so I'm good.  Not that it really matters.  I just wanted to warn you that you might set this aside for when you can read it in one sitting.

And, I should warn that it's a Trigun fanfiction, and that it's set AFTER the end of the anime, so there are SPOILERS.  Like totally.  We're spoilering it up in here.  So if you don't want spoilers, or you don't watch Trigun, I'm sorry.  :(  I'll have something not-Trigun next time.  (And this isn't, by the way, the fanfiction I mentioned before.  That one's long, and still not finished.)

I started this quite a while back and didn't finish it.  But with Halloween coming up, I was reminded of it, since it's a ghost story, and completed it.  Although, it's not scary.  In fact, it's meant to be kind of humorous, because silly Trigun is the best Trigun.  But, basically, the whole thing was more or less made up as I went along, for my own enjoyment, so I can't guarantee the quality.  But if it gets a chuckle out of you at any time, I'll consider it a success. 

This doesn't have a title, because I'm bad at titles.  I would probably name it something like, "Attack of the Ghost Who Was Actually Quite a Nice Ghost and Didn't Mean to Scare Meryl, So He's Very Sorry, But Not Sorry for Being a Pain in the Butt to Knives, Because Knives Deserves It."  Yep.  Award-winning title right there.

Okay, anyway, here's my gibberish.





Vash was late for breakfast. Meryl found this troubling.

Usually, Vash was such an early riser that he was the one who cooked breakfast for the rest of them. But this morning, Meryl had come into the kitchen to find Knives grumpily digging through the cabinets demanding to know where his brother was hiding the coffee. Normally, Meryl wouldn’t be concerned. After all, everyone slept in once in a while. Perhaps Vash didn’t feel well that morning. But it was the latest in a long list of uncharacteristic behavior from him.

It had been some time since Vash and Knives had faced each other and, in the days following, things had been rough. There had been a lot of yelling. At one point Knives was treating Vash so harshly that Vash had had to ask the girls to go out for the day and left Meryl wondering if the tiny house they were renting just outside of town would be there when she got back or if she would only find a crater. At another point, Meryl had punched Knives in the face.

Then things calmed down and the stress was replaced by an unhappy quiet. Knives became sullen and spent all his time holed up in the boys' bedroom. Vash became ill. The girls didn’t fare too well, either. It was as if they all felt like the worst was finally over and, as a result, it all seemed to catch up to them and they crashed, physically and emotionally.

But things were starting to look up now. Vash was showing signs of his old self, the kind of person he was before Knives forced him to sober up, and the girls were starting to feel comfortable again, even with Knives around. Knives spoke a little more politely (meaning he was able to talk to everyone without spewing venom and death threats), but mostly spoke when spoken to, and even joined them at the table for meals.

And then Vash started to... go a little strange. Stranger than usual, that is. He had gained the habit of suddenly stopping in the middle of what he was doing and looking away as if he were listening to something. When asked about it, he would always say, “Did you just hear something?” or “Did something just move over there?” No one else ever saw or heard anything. And then he started staying up at night. He would go to bed with the rest of them and then, after a short time, creep back out of his room again. They all heard him doing it at night, but no one knew what he was doing. He seemed to just go to the living room and sit there for varying amounts of time before slinking back to bed again. Once, Meryl had caught him alone in his room talking aloud as though there were someone there he was holding a conversation with. She hadn’t listened to what he was saying, but walked in expecting to find Milly or Knives there, but he was alone. When she asked why he was talking to himself, he laughed, and lied, and said he hadn’t been talking at all and that she must have been hearing things.

And now he was sleeping in. She shouldn’t have been so surprised. After all, who knew how late he had stayed up last night, doing whatever it was he did when he stayed up.

“You’re burning the sausages.” Knives said.

“Oh!” Meryl had stared at the hallway toward Vash’s room and gotten lost in thought. The sausages were, indeed, getting rather black. “Oh goodness! I’m so sorry!” She picked the skillet up off the stove and made a face as she wondered what to do with them. “Oooooh! I’ll make new ones! Shoot!” She scooped the sausages off the pan and into the trash and returned to skillet to the stove so she could fetch new sausage links.

Milly came into the room, dressed but with hair still ruffled, and yawned hugely as she sat down at the table.

“Good morning!” she sang.

“Morning, Milly.” Meryl answered. Knives ignored her.

“Is something burning?” Milly asked. “I think I smell smoke.”

“That was me,” Meryl gave her an exasperated look. “I burned the sausage. I’m making new ones.”

Milly cocked her head to one side. “Oh? Why didn’t Mr. Vash make breakfast? Is he still in bed?”

“I think so. I guess he’s not feeling well.”

“That’s too bad! Do you think I should go check on him?”

Knives had been sitting beside her sipping his coffee and butted in. “He woke up when I got up. I don’t know what he’s doing in there.”

Meryl was a little relieved. At least he wasn't sick. She pushed Vash from her mind and finished with breakfast. Then she set the table, included a place for Vash, and the three of them started on breakfast.

It wasn’t long before they heard a door open down the hall and the sound of Vash’s footsteps. He came to the table looking like he always did, spiked hair and all, and then stood behind his chair and said solemnly, “I have an announcement to make.”

The other three looked up at him, surprised and curious.

“I am being haunted.” Vash informed them.

The three didn’t react. They just kept staring at him. There was a long pause. Finally, Milly asked, “You mean like... by a ghost?”

“Yes.” Vash answered firmly.

They exchanged looks. Meryl and Milly looked concerned and Knives looked confused.

Still solemn, Vash added, “You may ask me questions if you like.”

“Um... what?!” Meryl asked.

Vash’s attitude faltered. “You’re... going to have to expound on that question if you want me to answer it.” he said.

Meryl gave him a look and grumbled, “It was rhetorical.”

Vash lightened. “Oh! That’s good, because I didn’t know how to answer it!”

“Vash, you can’t be serious,” Knives said, sitting back and folding his arms. “There’s no such things as ghosts.”

“I think there are.” Vash said simply.

“Vash,” Meryl, still looking concerned, looked up at him. “You... I mean... You’ve had a lot of stress to deal with recently. Are you sure you’re feeling okay? I mean, you’ve been acting a little... funny...”

“Have I?” he asked, looking surprised. “What have I done that’s funny?”

“You stay up at night,” Knives said. “You think you’re sneaky, but your not.”

“Oh, yes, that. I’ve been staying up just a little bit to see if the ghost will do anything. I thought maybe without other people around I might notice things better.”

“What things?” Meryl asked.

“Well, sometimes I think maybe I can hear someone talking.” Vash looked thoughtful. “And sometimes I’ll catch someone walking past out of the corner of my eye, but when I look no one is there. And sometimes when I leave my room and come back, things have been moved a little, like someone picked things up to look at them and set them down again, or rummaged through my things.”

The girls both looked to Knives, who shrugged. “Don’t look at me. Vash’s stuff is all worthless to me.”

“But,” Meryl started and then cut herself off. She had started to say that surely Knives had rummaged through the house looking for the angel arm guns that Vash had hidden. She knew that was the only reason Knives was still with them even though he had healed. But she felt it wouldn't be a good idea to actually say it.

When Meryl didn’t say anything else, Milly asked, “Mr. Vash, aren’t you scared?”

“No,” he said. “I’ve thought about it, and I’m sure the ghost isn’t malicious at all. It’s been here for a while and it hasn’t done anything threatening.” Vash shrugged. “I’ve had plenty of good friends in the past who have died. Maybe one of them just wants to hang around a bit. Or maybe we’re renting a house that someone’s already living in. They seem to be polite enough, though, not to try to throw us out.”

“But,” Meryl said again, only this time she didn’t know how to finish it. “I... Vash! You can’t be serious! I mean, a ghost?!”

Vash gave an embarrassed laugh. “Hey, look, everything’s okay! I decided this morning that that must be what’s going on. I wanted to tell everyone so that if anyone notices anything strange going on, they’ll know not to worry.”

There was a pause in which Vash tried to give a reassuring smile. The other three looked back at him, Meryl looking exasperated, Milly still looking uncomfortable, and Knives giving a look that seemed to say, “You’ve outdone yourself in your stupidity this time.”

Vash slowly began cringing under their looks until it was hard to tell whether he was smiling or whether he was going to be sick. “I’m just... going to... get some breakfast now... okay?”




A few days passed without incident. Vash didn’t mention the ghost again, and didn’t stay up late at night. But Meryl found herself uncomfortably paranoid. She remembered what Vash had said about the ghost moving things and began second guessing where she had left things and if anyone had moved them. The worst was when the stack of dishes in the kitchen sink shifted with a small clanking noise and made Meryl jump. She thought instantly that the ghost was messing with things in the kitchen before catching herself and realizing how stupid she was to think such a thing.

One day, though, as the girls were settling down in their room to sleep for the night, Milly sat up in bed for a moment, frowning.

“What’s wrong?” Meryl asked.

“I think maybe there really is a ghost.”

“What? Not you, too!”

Milly frowned thoughtfully. “Well, you see, I didn’t really notice until Vash had said something, but now that I think about it... I’ve been having this feeling lately like there’s someone else in the room. You know how sometimes you just feel someone else there when they walk in and you don’t have to look to know they’re there? It’s that feeling, only when I look there isn’t anyone around. Just yesterday I was doing the crossword in the newspaper, and I was sure someone came into the room and sat down nearby. Since I didn’t hear them say anything, I thought, ‘Oh, someone just wanted some company, so they came to sit by me.’ But then I looked up to ask them for help with the crossword and no one was there.”

She said all of it very calmly and then looked to Meryl to see her reaction. Meryl stared at her a moment and then groaned.

“Milly, you’re just letting what Vash said get to you. He’s put ideas in your head.”

“No, I don’t think so. I’m sure I had that feeling before Vash said anything. I just didn’t pay any attention to it before.”

“I... You... Milly...” Meryl rubbed her face and groaned again. “There’s no such things as ghosts, Milly.”

“But there are souls, aren’t there?”

“What?” Meryl said looking up.

“I mean like our souls. We have souls and when we die, our souls will go to heaven, right? Well, so, maybe some people decide to stay here instead of going to heaven. Or maybe it’s like Vash said, and one of his friends went to heaven and then came back to visit.”

Meryl looked at her a little helplessly. She didn’t really know how to argue with her on that one.

Seeing her expression, Milly added, “Don’t worry, Meryl, it’s nothing to worry about. Like Mr. Vash said, I’m sure the ghost is friendly. It hasn’t done anything mean to anyone and it’s had plenty of chances to. It’s just there. It’s not hurting anything.”

“Uh... yeah... right...” Meryl decided to take the opportunity to end the discussion there. “Okay, whatever. Goodnight Milly.”

“Goodnight, Meryl.”

Milly didn’t mention it again, either.




Another few days passed, and Meryl began to calm down and forget about the ghost. It didn’t last long. One day when Meryl got home from work, she found Milly making dinner and Vash and Knives gone. Milly said the two had gone out not long ago.

“This is the first time those two have gone out just the two of them, isn’t it?” Meryl asked.

“That’s right.”

Meryl sat down at the table and leaned on an elbow. She laughed a little and said jokingly, “Those two out together. I don’t know whether to be glad or to be worried.”

Milly smiled. “They’ll be fine. Mr. Vash said he wanted to go into town and that he wanted Mr. Knives to go with him. Mr. Knives didn’t want to, but he agreed to. I think that’s a good sign.”

“Hm.” She was quiet and thoughtful a moment. Then she said, “I know Knives has been on pretty good behavior lately, but... I don't know... I just can't help wondering sometimes if he's trying to lure us into a false sense of security or something.”

“Mr. Vash trusts him,” Milly offered. “And maybe, he really is becoming good. Maybe living with us is showing him that we're not so bad after all.”

“Maybe.” She smiled. “It's not surprising that Vash trusts him, though.” She laughed a little. “Sometimes, Vash is a little ridiculous. In a good way, I mean.”

The front door burst open and Knives came storming in shouting, “Vash is absolutely ridiculous!”

The girls looked to him in surprise. Knives strode up to Meryl and slammed his hands down on the table as he bent down to face her.

“What’s happened to me?!” he demanded.

“Um... what?”

“I had such high hopes! Such grand plans for the future!” Knives cried. “And now look at what’s become of me! I’m living with that fine specimen of an idiot!” He pointed back toward the door, although Vash was yet to make his appearance. “And I’ve somehow ended up agreeing to participate in that... that... thing!”

“What thing?” Milly asked.

Rather than answering, Knives sank into a chair and laid his head down on the table with a thud.

“Attention everyone!” Vash’s voice called, and the girls looked to the door. Vash was framed in the doorway and was holding a flat box over his head as if it were a trophy. “I have a plan!” he announced grandly.

Knives groaned.

“A board game?” Milly asked, looking thrilled. “I love board games!”

“Not just any board game!” Vash proclaimed. “A Ouija board!”

“A... what?” Meryl asked, staring at the box.

Vash strode to the table and lay the box on it reverently, as if he were placing crown jewels on a cushion. Then he lay a hand on it and, with head solemnly bowed, he said, “With this board, we will communicate with the ghost in this house... and become friends with it.”

Milly leaned over, looking at the box, delighted. Meryl looked at Vash as if he had just suggested they all wear their underwear on their heads.

“What?” she asked again.

“That’s right!” Vash looked to her, smiling from ear to ear. “You’ll play, too, right? I want you to be friends with the ghost, too! It’ll be great!”

“I... I...”

Vash continued beaming at her.

“Knives?” Meryl whimpered.

“Yes?”

“I think I sort of know how you feel.”

Knives lifted his head. “We could start a club.” he grumbled. “The My Life Became Something Humiliating Because of my Connections to Vash the Stampede Club.”

Vash burst out laughing. “What are you guys talking about?”

“Open it, Mr. Vash!” Milly urged him, and Vash lifted the lid off the box and pulled out it’s contents. There was a board that had printed on it the alphabet along with the numbers 0 through 9, plus the words: “yes,” “no,” “hello,” and “goodbye,” There was also a heart shaped pointer with a lens near the point.

There was a moment’s silence while everyone studied the board. Then Meryl said, “Um... Vash... this board is decorated with a skull with horns and bat wings.”

“Hm.” Vash looked at the board thoughtfully. “Oh well! We can fix that!” He retrieved a marker and began drawing feathers over the bat wings. When he was finished, Milly asked, “What about the horns?” Vash drew hair over the horns. Then, for good measure, he put a halo on as well. There was a pause while the three looked over his work.

Milly commented, “The skull has your hair. It looks like you on the board now.”

“Yeah, except you’re dead.” Meryl said.

“If only we were so lucky,” Knives murmured, his head still down on the table.

“That’s too bad,” Milly said. “I like you better when you’re alive.”

“Yeah, me, too.” Vash agreed.

“Well, I need to finish making supper. It’ll be ready soon, so don’t run off!”

Milly returned to the kitchen, while Meryl took a seat beside Knives. The two viewed Vash unhappily as he continued drawing on the Ouija board.

“Meryl,” Knives said, leaning toward her slightly. “How long has Vash been like this?”

“What, you mean with the ghosts and the Ouija boards? This is all new. He’s never done this before.”

“No, I mean, how long has Vash been like that.” Knives said, pointing at him.

Meryl looked Vash over. He was drawing hearts and peace signs on the board while singing to himself, “Love and peace, love and peace, la la la la love and peace...” As he bent over the board, he wiggled his butt back and forth to the tune of his song.

“Oh.” Meryl said. “That. He’s been like that for as long as I’ve known him.”

“Ah. OK.” He was quiet a moment and then added, “I was just wondering if maybe he’d lost his mind a little bit because of what I had done to him.”

“No, he was definitely like this before you showed up.” Meryl said firmly. “Although, it might have been Lost July. Do you think?”

Knives gave her a thoughtful frown. “I don’t know. Maybe.” He turned the frown to Vash. “Hmm!”

“Hmm!” Meryl echoed.

“I don’t know.”

“I don’t know either.”

Knives laid his head down again.




That evening, Vash lay the Ouija board in the middle of the floor and called, “Okay, everybody! Come here!”

The gang assembled, Milly instantly plopping down beside the board, while Meryl and Knives grudgingly joined them at a much slower pace. Meryl noted that across the bottom of the board, Vash had written, “This board is made of love and peace.”

In his efforts to dawdle, Knives noticed a box sitting beside Vash, and made his way toward it.

“You bought donuts?” he asked, and took one from the box.

“Hey! Don’t eat that!” Vash cried, putting his hands onto the box to stop Knives or anyone else from taking another one.

“Too late,” Knives said with his mouth full.

“You spit that out this instant! These aren’t for you! They’re an offering to the ghost!”

“Offering to the ghost?! I thought you bought them for us to eat while we play your stupid game!”

“No! They aren’t for you!” Vash repeated. “Now put it back!”

“Put it back? I already bit off of it!”

“Well then cut off the part that you bit off of and then put it back!”

Knives narrowed his eyes at Vash. Then, without taking his eyes from him, he very slowly licked the rest of the donut all over.

Vash gave a start and watched with horror. Then he too narrowed his eyes at his brother and said, “Yooouuu! You licked someone else’s donut! I knew you were bad, but I never believed you’d sink so low!”

“Um, Vash?” Meryl said, interrupting them. “How is a ghost supposed to eat donuts? They don’t have a body.”

“Ah, see, actually they can,” Vash said. “They just don’t like to do it in front of people.”

She gave him a skeptical look. “Oh really?”

“Yes, really,” Vash said with a firm nod. “See, there are some religions (but I don't remember what they are now) in which people will try to win over spirits with food offerings. So I decided that’s what I’m going to do. This is my offering to the ghost! It's a good idea, right?” He looked proud and thrilled that he had come up with it.

Everyone was sitting now, Knives tossing the last of the donut into his mouth. Meryl ventured to ask, “Are we going to turn out the lights and light candles or something?”

“Naw,” Vash waved it off. “The ghost doesn’t care if the lights are on or not!”

“Oh. Yeah, I guess.”

“Alright!” Vash sat up and asked, “Is everyone ready? I will now ask the spirit to join us!” Vash clapped his hands together and then bowed low. When he rose again he kept his hands together and spoke loudly and solemnly and with his eyes closed. “Spirit... we come in peace! We have become aware of your presence, and we wish to become your friends. We have brought you a food offering to show our good intentions, and ask that you please ignore Knives, who so rudely licked your donut. We have brought a Ouija board so that we may communicate with you. We would like to know who you are, and if you have any specific intentions in being here, and if there is anything that you would like to say to us. Please feel free to participate whenever you are ready.” Vash looked to the board and said eagerly, “Okay, let’s do it!” He reached out and laid a pair of fingers on the pointer. “Everyone touch the pointer thing!” he called happily.

They all reached forward and put a finger or two onto the pointer.

“Spirit,” Vash called, “We await a sign from you that you are here and willing to participate.”

They sat there.

Nothing happened.

And then nothing continued to happen.

And then, much to Vash’s annoyance, nothing happened some more.

Finally, Milly asked, “Did I leave the stove on?”

“No,” Meryl answered, sounding bored. “I would have noticed when I did the dishes.”

“Oh, good.”

“Maybe,” Knives said, leaning one elbow on his knee, “your ghost isn’t real.”

“Maybe he’s just not home right now,” Milly offered.

“Maybe he’s mad because you ate his donut!” Vash snapped.

Meryl sighed. “Look... Vash... there’s no such things as- oh! Whoa! Hey! Who’s moving the pointer!?”

The pointer was indeed moving, ever so slowly inching it’s way across the board.

“It’s not me!”

“Not me!”

“Not me.”

“Well it has to be somebody!”

“That’s right!” Vash said. “It’s the ghost!” He was watching the pointer with hunched shoulders and a grin that made him look like a kid on Christmas morning.

“No, seriously!” Meryl snapped. “Vash, stop moving it! You’re being stupid!”

“It’s not me, though!”

“Oh, it’s not is it?!”

“No! It’s not!” Vash lifted his fingers off the pointer and held both hands up for Meryl to see. The pointer continued moving.

“Then it’s you, isn’t it?!” Meryl looked to Knives. “You’re moving it just to mess with Vash, aren’t you?”

Knives, looking annoyed, also lifted his hands to prove it wasn’t him. The pointer kept moving.

“Milly?!” Meryl looked incredulously to her.

Milly ignored her, watching the pointer. “Oh! It stopped!” Everyone looked to the board. “It landed on ‘Hello.’”

“Of course it did!” Meryl cried, throwing her hands up. “What else would it say on it’s first move!”

“Hello, Spirit!” Vash called happily. “It’s nice to meet you!”

Knives frowned slightly and looked between the pointer and Milly and said nothing.

“Now, look. Just.... just listen a minute.” Meryl said, holding her head as though it hurt. “There’s a reasonable explanation for this.” They all looked to her. She looked round at them and faltered slightly. “Uh... look... look, it’s like this! See, Milly really wanted there to be a ghost. And “hello” is the reasonable thing for the pointer to land on while on it’s first move. So, subconsciously, Milly wanted the pointer to move to that word and began moving it herself without realizing what she was doing!”

“Oh? Was that what happened?” Milly held up the finger that had been on the pointer and looked at it questioningly. “I didn’t mean to make it move.”

There was a pause while everyone considered the idea. Finally, Knives said, “Well there’s an easy way to test your theory. We’ll try it again and leave Milly out this time.”

They all reached out to the pointer again, while Milly sat back and watched. Then Vash said, “Alright, Spirit. Are you still there? Do you still want to talk with us?”

There was only a brief pause, and then the pointer began slowly moving again.

“Okay, seriously!” Meryl cried. “Who’s moving it?!”

Once again Vash pulled his hand back, and the pointer continued without him. Meryl looked to Knives again, who also let go of the pointer. Then, to Meryl’s horror, she found herself watching the pointer as it went slowly on it’s course with only her finger touching it.

“Oh, look!” Milly said. “You’re the one who’s moving it without meaning to!”

“No! No, it’s not me!” Meryl jerked her hand away as if the pointer were red-hot.

The pointer continued moving without a single person touching it. Vash and Knives both sat up, shocked. Meryl gave a cry and threw herself at Milly and clung to her, while Milly reflexively held her and said brightly, “Oh, look! I knew there was a ghost!”

“Make it stop!” Meryl cried, still clutching Milly and trying to scoot away from the board at the same time. “Make it stop moving! Stop it! STOP!”

The pointer stopped.

Everyone stared at it. It wasn’t on any letter or word. Meryl had told it to stop and it had stopped.

There was a silence.

“What just happened?” Knives asked.

No one answered. The silence stretched on a moment longer.

Slowly, Knives started reaching for the pointer.

“No! Don’t!” Meryl was still hugging Milly and looking at the pointer in horror. “Don’t touch it! It’s... it’s possessed or something! Vash, get rid of it! Get it out of here!”

“Uh... but...” Vash was looking very uncomfortable, and kept looking between the pointer and Meryl. “Meryl,” he said gently, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to do anything that would scare you.”

“Just... just get rid of it!” she demanded.

“Um... Spirit...” Vash said cautiously, “Do you have any ill intentions toward anyone here?”

There was a pause, and then the pointer moved again of it’s own accord. It slid quickly and smoothly across the board until it landed on the word “No.”

“Do you have any hard feelings against anyone here?” Vash asked.

The pointer slid off the word, then looped around and landed on it again.

That seemed to satisfy Vash, and he looked to Meryl. She stared at the pointer. At the ghosts answers, her fear was slowly dying down, but certainly not gone altogether.

“S... Spirit?... Um...” Meryl swallowed hard. “Promise me... Promise me that you aren’t going to hurt anyone... And don’t lie! I want your word! You have to promise me!... Do you promise?”

There was no hesitation this time. The pointer instantly moved to the word “Yes.”

“That was a sure answer,” Knives murmured.

There was a pause. No one seemed very sure what to do or say after that. Vash's enthusiasm had been deflated, and the ghost seemed to be waiting to be prompted before moving the pointer again. The silence was broken when Meryl said quietly, “I don't want to do this anymore.”

“Meryl, I'm sorry. Really.” Vash said. “We'll quit. Spirit, thank you very much for talking to us. We're going to quit now. Good bye.”

There was no response from the ghost.

Another pause followed and Vash, looking increasingly uncomfortable, finally murmured something about being thirsty and got up and left.

As soon as Vash had disappeared into the kitchen, Knives pounced on the Ouija board, snatching it up and running his hands over it.

“What are you doing?” Meryl hissed, horrified.

“Magnets, maybe,” Knives said by way of answer. “They might be inside the board, and in the pointer... but... would he have to make the magnets move inside the board?” Knives held the board at arms length, frowning at it.

Meryl slowly detached herself from Milly. “Do you think that's it?” she asked, hopeful.

“I don't feel anything, though.” Knives seemed to be talking aloud to himself rather than to her. “Maybe telekinesis. Maybe.”

“What's that?” Milly asked.

“The psychic ability to make objects move with your mind,” Knives answered. “It's the same ability Legato used to control other's bodies.”

Meryl cringed at that, while Milly said, “Mr. Knives, I don't think Vash is the kind of person who would try to trick someone like that, especially if it scared anyone. If Vash was just playing a trick and it scared Meryl, I'm sure he'd stop right away and tell her it was a trick. He wouldn't want her to be scared.”

The hope that Knives had been kindling in Meryl was snuffed. Milly was right.

Knives considered the idea, and then threw the board down in aggravation. “Oh, forget it!” He stood and headed down the hall grumbling, “Stupid Vash and his stupid ghost! It's all ridiculous! I'm going to bed!”




---




A few nights later, Knives lay in bed, pretending to be sleeping. When he was sure Vash was sound asleep, he very quietly stood and crept toward Vash's bag, which was propped against one wall. As he reached for it, it tipped and fell onto the floor.

Knives froze, his heart skipping a beat. Vash shifted and made a small noise, but that was all. It was still a long moment before Knives dared move again.

He bent to lift the bag as quietly as he could, but as his hand neared the top end of the bag, it suddenly slid about a foot along the base of the wall and out of his reach. For a second, Knives didn't move an inch, but stayed bent over with his hand hovering where the bag had been. Then, slowly, he straitened and stared for a very long moment at the bag. Had he really seen it move? It was the middle of the night, and quite dark. It might have been his eyes playing tricks on him. But no, there had been the sound of it sliding. Had Vash done something to move it? Knives turned to look, but Vash was lying with his back to him. Giving Vash a gentle, cautious telepathic prod, Knives found that Vash's telepathic aura was dim and blurred, which meant he was definitely sleeping. Knives looked back to the bag again. He looked at it for a very long time.

Finally, he stooped and reached for it again. It slid again, just out of his reach. This time, Knives instantly straightened and pulled his hand away, as if the bag were a snake.

He spent another very long moment staring at the bag.

The word “ghost” floated into his mind.

That's ridiculous! Knives thought. There's no such things as ghosts!

But... The bag just moved! On it's own! Do you have any better ideas?

Fine! Maybe there was a ghost! If there was, Knives viewed such a being with derision. What could someone who was dead possibly do to him? They were dead! In Knives' mind, there were only two kinds of people in the world, those who were a nuisance, and those who were deceased (aka: no longer a nuisance). The fact that the ghost was both dead and a nuisance only meant it was a particularly stubborn specimen.

But, in the end, humans were only a step above cockroaches in the grand hierarchy of the universe, and that was only because they were lucky enough to have opposable thumbs. The ghost of a cockroach was no more threatening than a live one, if not less so.

When he viewed the bag again, it was not with the utter confusion of seeing an inanimate object move, but with the inner fire of a predator examining its prey. The bag was his. No ghost would keep him from it.

The predator pounced, snatching up the drawstrings before the bag could slip away from him. He held them firmly, bracing himself for the bag to pull against him, which it did. But it was unsuccessful, and Knives lifted it into his arms. He darted from the room as quickly and silently as he could. On his way to the front door, he snatched up a bag of clothes he had hidden behind the couch and his shoes. Then he was gone.

Ten minutes later, he was making a late nigh trip to the sheriff’s office.

“I know where Vash the Stampede is.”




---

Meryl sat up with a small cry, her heart pounding hard. She was certain that the noise that had just woken her was a gunshot. It was very close.

The bedroom was lit with pre-dawn light, and she looked to Milly, who was also sitting up, looking shocked. A second and then a third gunshot was fired. In near perfect unison, the two scrambled out of bed shouting.

“Vaaash!”

“Mr. Vash!”

They found him in his room, looking out his window which faced the front of the house.

“Aaawww maaaaan!” he whined. “Why? Why does misfortune follow me everywhere I go? It's like Bad Luck is an insurance agent or something.”

“Hey!” Meryl snapped.

Milly tried to peer out his window from where she stood in the doorway. “What's out there, Mr. Vash?”

Vash slumped. “A posse, it looks like. They're firing shots to get our attention.”

“What? How did they find you?” Meryl demanded.

Rather than answering, Vash asked his own question. “Hey, where's Knives?”

“I don't know. Bathroom? Who cares!” Meryl cried. “We've got to get out of here!”

“Well...” Vash looked apologetic, and a little afraid to say what was next. “I just saw them send some guys around to the back to watch our back door.”

“Great!” Meryl cried, throwing up her hands. But her voice was drowned out by another from outside, speaking through a megaphone.

“Vash the Stampede!”

Vash cringed at the sound of his name.

“We know you're in there. Come out with her hands up!”

Meryl and Vash exchanged worried looks.

“Um... Mr. Vash?” Milly had slipped out of the doorway and just come back again. She looked just as worried as her friends, if not more so. “Mr. Knives isn't in the bathroom. Actually, I can't find him anywhere.”

“What!?” Vash nearly tripped trying to scramble out of the bedroom. “Kniiiives! Knives, where are you!”

Meryl and Milly hovered in Vash's bedroom feeling increasingly anxious.

Vash returned. “His shoes are gone.” Then his sight darted around the room. “So is my bag. He's gone. He ditched us.”

“Vash the Stampede!” The voice boomed once again from outside. “You have ten seconds to come out, or we'll open fire on the house!”

The three looked between each other, frantic. Then Vash gave a fake smile and an even faker laugh. “Hey! It's okay! I've escaped posses lots of times!”

“Yeah, but what about us!” Meryl cried. “I don't want to get arrested as your accomplice!”

“Well... uh... We'll tell them you two were my hostages!” Vash offered brightly. “You know, some rumors say I'm quite a womanizer!” He burst out laughing... until Meryl kicked him in the shin.




---

Knives wanted to stop and dig through Vash's bag, but resisted. He continued walking, eager to get as much distance between himself and town as he could, just in case Vash realized he was gone before the sheriff could get a posse to the house and distract him.

The further he walked, the higher his spirits lifted. He was free from Vash and his obnoxious human pets. And he had the angel arm guns. He was sure of it. There had been a day when he had seen Vash digging through the bag and had caught sight of a safe box. Surely the guns had been locked inside. Knives had looked everywhere else, taking every available opportunity to turn the house upside down.

But there was nothing. The safe box was the only place they could be. He doubted he could open the box on his own, so he would need to hurry to the closest town and have someone open it. Once he had an angel arm gun in his hand again... He smiled, thinking through his plan. 1) Find Vash again. 2) Shoot him while he isn't paying attention. 3) Blow up everyone. 4) Live happily ever after.

He hummed to himself as he walked.

“Where are you off to?”

That stopped Knives in his tracks. It was a little difficult to tell what direction the voice had come from. Besides, there was no one around.

No, there was really no one around. Knives turned a very slow full circle, looking even for rock outcroppings that someone might hide behind. There was nothing. And then he returned to facing forward again and gave a slight start.

There was a man standing there. He wore a black suit and had black hair. There was something just a little off about the look of him. He was a little too soft, or a little too pale, or something of the sort. It was as if he had been cut out of one photograph and pasted into another. He just didn't quite look right against the hard desert behind him.

He was standing with his hands in his pockets and smiling. “Hey, Knives!”

“Who are you?” Knives demanded.

“Does the name Nicholas D. Wolfwood ring any bells?”

It did. That was Chapel's boy, the one that had been sent to hang around Vash. Knives took him in a moment. “You're the ghost.”

Wolfwood beamed. “Yep!”

“That was you, then, fooling around in the house, trying to keep the bag from me, playing with that stupid the Ouija board.”

“Yeah. When Vash bought that board, I thought, 'You gotta be kidding me!' But then you guys just sat there and sat there until I finally started feeling sorry for you! Hey, by the way, when you see Meryl again, tell her I'm really sorry, okay? I never would have done it if I had known it would have freaked her out like that.”

“If I ever see her again, it will be to kill her,” Knives grumbled.

Wolfwood shrugged. “Sorry, but I've got other plans for you.”

“Oh? Do tell.”

“You're going to turn around and go help Vash out of the situation you just put him in.”

“Ha! Oh, you're very funny! Now if you'll excuse me, I need to go exterminate the human race. I'm only sorry there isn't a way to kill you a second time!”

“The guns aren't in that bag,” Wolfwood said casually.

“What!?” Knives glared at him, trying to determine whether or not he was lying.

“Nope! Vash gave them to me for safe keeping,” he said, looking proud.

How was that possible? Surely Vash hadn't spoken to Wolfwood after he had died. Otherwise Vash would have reacted differently to the ghost in their house.

“He buried them in your grave!” Knives cried.

“Hey, that's a really good guess! In fact, that's kind of a cool idea! But it's wrong!”

What? Then where were they!?

Wolfwood, seeing Knives frowning, grinned and said, “You'll never find them! Vash was pretty clever about it!”

Knives' frown was turned to Wolfwood. Finally, he said, “You'll tell me where they are.”

“Ha! What're ya gonna do if I don't? Kill me?”

Knives rose to his full height, his eyes flashing. “You have people you care about. I will track them down. I will kill them one by one, until you tell me.”

Wolfwood's smile faded. Then, slowly, his expression became one of anger and contempt.

A wind sprang up, and it took Knives a moment to realize that it was moving in a circular motion, like a whirlwind, with Wolfwood in the center of it. It grew in intensity until Knives had to shield his face, and pebbles were sent skittering across the dirt. When he lifted his eyes to Wolfwood again, the man looked even more out of place, to the point that he seemed almost as if he were glowing slightly. He took a few slow steps forward until he and Knives were very close. The whirlwind moved with him so that the two men stood in the eye of the storm, the wind blowing up a wall of dirt around them, as if to cage them in.

“Let me explain something to you,” Wolfwood said in a low, threatening voice. “You can't hurt me. But I can hurt you. If you make a single move to hurt anyone I care about, I will haunt you until the very last day of your very long life. When you try to sleep, I will make such a racket that you will beg me for five minutes of rest. When I let you rest, I'll fill your dreams with nightmares until you're afraid to close your eyes. Do you know what happens when someone goes too long without sleep? They start dreaming while they're still awake. They start hallucinating.

None of your belongings will be safe, either. Every time you turn your back, I will take the things you need the most: money, food, water, weapons, and I will hide them from you. Any new followers you gain, I'll give them the same treatment, until everyone knows you're haunted, and the world avoids you like a plague.

If you hurt anyone I care about, I will reduce you to a pathetic heap before you have the chance to touch anyone else.

Now, I'm going to ask you again: Where are you off to, Knives?”




---




Vash, Meryl, and Milly huddled in the hallway, while gunfire sprayed the front wall of the house. The windows had been shattered, and the door had holes in it.

“Any ideas?” Meryl asked.

“Working on it!” Vash answered.

“Work faster!”

She was loading her derringers, but they seemed like little petty things compared to the damage the posse was doing. Milly had her stun gun, and Vash had retrieved his angel arm gun. Occasionally, one of the three would dart out, take a shot through a window, and then dive back again. With Vash's speed, he could have done significant damage, but the posse was in such a thick crowd, Vash was being extra cautious to avoid any accidental deaths.

Milly's stun gun was doing the most good. After the first shot had taken out a window, frame and all, she was knocking down two or three of them at a time.

There was a lull to the gunfire from the posse. The three exchanged glances, and then waited for some further demand or threat from those outside.

What they heard instead was someone shouting, “Get out of my way, you stupid humans!”

“Knives!?” Vash looked bewildered.

“I don't know anyone else who uses the term 'stupid humans,'” Meryl responded.

“Don't point that gun at me, you imbecile!” Knives continued. “Yes, I know Vash the Stampede is in there! That's why I'm here!... How dare you talk like that to me, you filthy human scum!... Get out of my way! I swear you people get stupider every day!... No, don't shoot at me! Don't shoot at me! DON'T SHOOT AT ME!”

Knives came crashing through the front door, followed by a spray of bullets. He dove for the hallway, and plowed into Vash in the process, the two of them tumbling to the floor. For a moment, the two lay there in a heap. As Knives pushed himself up with his hands, he didn't seem to notice that one hand was firmly on Vash's face, nor did he seem to care that his knee dug into Vash's stomach as he stood.

“Alright! I just want everyone here to know that I HATE you ALL!” Knives announced. “Now give me a gun!”

“What? No way!” Vash cried, wincing as he picked himself up.

“I'm here to rescue you, Vash, now give me a gun! I'll take the one you have there! It's all the same to me.”

“No!” Vash hugged the gun to him. “Wait, rescue me?”

“That's right. Now give me a gun so I can kill the humans for you, Vash.”

Vash looked horrified. “No! Don't kill them!”

Knives threw up his arms in frustration. “Fine! Give me a gun so I can maim them for you!”

“Vash the Stampede!” It was the posse from outside. “If you and your accomplices refuse to surrender, we will have no other choice but to burn the house down!”

“I hate humans!” Knives cried. “So much!” He suddenly rounded on Vash. “Especially your little friend!”

Vash stared at him. “Which one?”

“The dead one!”

“...Which one?”

“The stupid religious one!” Knives cried. “If I die in a house fire, I will find a way to kill him a second time! I swear I will!”

Vash looked confused. “Wait... Wolfwood? Why are you mad at him? What's he got to do with any of this?”

“He's your ghost!” Knives snapped.

Meryl stared at him, wide-eyed. Vash's jaw dropped. Milly cried, “Yay! I knew it!”

“I met him on my way out of town!” Knives continued. “He demanded I come back! He threatened to keep me up all night and take all my money!”

Vash looked thoughtful. “I had a girlfriend like that once,” he mused.

“Oh, shut up!” Knives spat. “Now give me a gun, so I can rescue you!”

“Mr. Knives,” Milly put in, “Underneath my bed is Mr. Wolfwood's cross.”

“Milly! No! No, stop!” Vash cried. He scrambled to reach her, but as he passed Knives, his brother took hold of the back of his shirt collar and jerked him back again.

“Look inside the right arm of the cross,” she continued. “There's a panel that slides over.”

Knives bolted. Vash snatched at him and missed. “No! Wait! Stop! She's lying!” But Knives was gone. Vash looked after him a moment, paling. Then he turned back to Milly and asked, “Why did you do that!?”

“Well, if Mr. Wolfwood sent him back to help, then it must be okay, right?” she seemed unfazed by the fact that she had just armed a megalomaniac.

Vash sighed, and then offered a hand to shake. “Well, Milly, it was nice knowing you. And you, Meryl. You've both been very good friends to me. I want to thank you for everything you've done. I figure Knives will kill you, too, after he's done with me, so at least we won't be separated for very long. I'll see you on the other side!”

“Knives better not kill us!” Meryl cried. “If he tries, I'll... I'll... I'll shove a derringer down his throat!”

Vash looked emotional at that, his lip quivering slightly. “That's the spirit, Meryl!” He sniffled. “Even when the situation is hopeless, you won't go down without a fight! You're so brave!”

They heard a loud, long string of cursing, (Milly gasped and covered her ears.) and then Knives came stomping back to join them. He was holding his black angel arm pistol.

“They were inside the cross the entire time!?”

“Eheh heh, yeah.” Vash said.

“How was I supposed to know there was anything inside the cross!?”

“You couldn't! That's why I hid them there! Pretty clever, huh?” Vash beamed, proud of himself.

“Oh, you are so lucky that I'm not going to kill you... right now... Is the house completely surrounded?”

“There's a few watching the back door. Everyone else is in front.” Vash said.

“Alright. Keep them from burning the house down, while I get on the roof.” Knives said.

“Right!... Wait, the roof? Knives! Knives, you're not going to blast them are you!?”

He had already taken off down the hall, seeking a window on the side of the house. He surely heard Vash, but ignored him.

Vash ran to one of the broken windows at the front of the house and put his head out. He immediately yelped and dived to the side while the posse outside shot at him.

“Wait! Wait! Don't shoot! Don't shoot!”

There was a pause.

Vash cautiously looked out the window again.

“Do you surrender, Vash the Stampede?”

“Uh... well... no... Ack!” Vash darted to the side again as another round was fired at him.

“Vash, what are you doing?” Meryl demanded.

“I'm buying some time!” Vash answered. Once again he carefully peered around the window frame. “Hey... so... uh... Have you heard the one about the dog that went to the flea circus? He totally stole the show! No, wait! Stop shooting at me!”

Meryl slapped a hand to her face.

The posse outside seemed suddenly distracted. The trio could hear them talking amongst themselves, and, at the same time, they heard the sound of footsteps moving along the roof of the house. Vash, Meryl, and Milly, reflexively looked upward, following Knives' progress until he was front and center.

“Please don't blow anyone up,” Vash murmured. “Please don't blow anyone up. Please don't blow anyone up.”

“Hey, humans!” Knives called. “Look what I can do!”

Meryl and Milly exchanged looks and then ran to join Vash at the window. They couldn't see Knives, but they could at least see the posse's reaction. The whole gang was staring upward at him, uncertain what to do. Those at the back door had heard and seen Knives, and were coming around to the front.

The air was suddenly full of an electric crackling noise. What was that? Meryl leaned out of the broken window and tried to peer upward, but couldn't see anything.

“Vash, what is he- Vash?”

When she looked to him, Vash was crouching down beside her, eyes shut tight and fingers in his ears as if he were expecting an explosion. He opened one eye to look up at her, and then said, “Angel arm.”

“Wait, what!?”

Then it fired. The beam lit up the place like a lightening strike, but Knives had aimed high and it streaked over the heads of the posse. It hit a large rock formation in the distance. Perhaps Knives fired before the angel arm was fully formed, or perhaps he knew how to control it's power, but the explosion was only a small fraction of what had taken out July City. Nevertheless, it was certainly enough to completely obliterate the rock formation.

There was a long silence that followed, in which the posse stared at where the rock formation had been. Meryl and Milly stared, too, and Vash, still squatting, poked his head over the window sill.

Finally, the silence was broken when one of the men shouted, “HOLY !#@$%... RUN!” Everyone else seemed to think that this was an excellent idea, and the whole posse bolted.

Knives dropped down from the roof, and watched them go a moment with a look of wicked satisfaction. Then he came in through the wrecked front door, Vash standing to meet him.

“Well, that was easy,” he said. He gave the gun back to Vash by shoving it into his chest so hard that Vash grunted. “If you weren't afraid of your own powers, you could have done that yourself,” Knives grumbled. Then he lifted his arm, made bare from the angel arm ripping the sleeve off. “And you owe me a new shirt!”




---




The group packed up and prepared to leave the next day. It was doubtful anyone would return to bother them, but they still felt better moving on. Meryl wondered if Knives would be wanted now, an accomplice to Vash the Stampede with similar destructive power. She secretly hoped he would, just for the satisfaction of knowing Knives might be given trouble by it.

Knives was sullen. The angel arm guns were hidden elsewhere among their luggage, just in case, but it seemed like he didn't want to kill Vash or the girls half as much as he wanted to kill “the ghost.” Since that wasn't possible, he had taken up the hobby of brooding.

Vash's bag was sitting out in front of the porch, and Meryl was about to add her own suitcase to it. As she went out on the porch, she heard Vash call for her from inside the house.

“What?” she called back. She turned around to hear better, but continued walking backward.

But whatever Vash answered, she didn't hear, because as he spoke, her foot stepped off into thin air. There was a split second of heart-stopping free fall. Then she felt a hand against her back, and she was pushed back onto the porch again.

She stood a second, recovering. Then she gave a nervous laugh. “Wow, thanks! I almost-” She turned around and no one was there.

For a moment, she wasn't sure what had just happened. She looked around for whoever had caught her and then run off so quickly, but there was truly no one there.

Wolfwood?

“Oh... um...” Meryl remembered how afraid she had been before, but now the idea somehow felt reassuring. “Thank you,” she said.

She pictured for a moment what his response might be, and she could remember the way he looked when he smiled and the way his voice sounded, as she imagined him saying, “Hey, no problem! Just be careful, okay?”

“Meryl?” Vash appeared in the doorway, distracting her. “Hey, did you hear me?”

“What? Oh! No, I'm sorry. I, uh, got distracted.”

“Oh. I asked if you were all ready to go.”

“Yeah, I'm ready.”

Vash smiled. “Okay, cool!” He turned back inside again, and she could hear him calling, “Hey, Milly? You ready?”

Knives came out then, with a bag slung over his shoulder and announced, “I'm leaving!”

“Wait. We don't know if Milly's ready yet.”

Knives looked at her like he couldn't believe how dumb she was. “No. I mean, I'm leaving. Tell Vash I hope I never see him again as long as I live.”

“Wait, what!?” Meryl cried.

“What's going on?” Milly was coming through the door with her suitcase.

“I'm leaving, stupid human!” Knives cried. “I'll have to repeat myself a hundred times, won't I!”

As he turned away again, Meryl leaned toward Milly and whispered, “Does he have the guns?”

She shook her head and whispered back, “No. I don't know how he could.”

Then Vash was back. “Okay, guys! Everybody ready to go?”

Knives groaned as he turned back around. “Vash! I'm leaving! Goodbye and good riddance!”

“What!?” Vash looked to the girls and mouthed, “Does he have a gun?” He made a small shooting motion with one hand.

“Vash!” Knives cried. “I'm looking right at you! I know what you just said!”

“Eheh heh... Oops.”

“No! I don't have either of the guns!” Knives turned around again. “I'll...I'll build another one. I'll build a better one. Just shut up and leave me alone!”

“Knives!” the serious tone of Vash's voice made him stop. “If I hear any bad news about you... I'll track you down!”

“I know!” As Knives continued on his way, he grumbled, “You and the ghost can torment me together.”

The trio let him go, watching as he walked out toward the road.

After a moment, Milly said thoughtfully, “If Mr. Knives is going one way, and we're going another way... I wonder which way Mr. Wolfwood will go.”

There was a collective thoughtful silence. Then Vash proclaimed, “Both!”

“Can he do that?” Meryl asked.

“I don't know,” Vash admitted. “But... I'm sure if we ever need him again... he'll be there... Well, come on. Let's head out.”

They did. And as they went, Meryl thought that maybe she felt someone following them. But it might have just been her imagination.