AND LATITUDE

Today could have gone better.

Really, it could have. It hadn’t started so badly, in Vash’s opinion. For once, they had found themselves in a town where nothing seemed to be going catastrophically wrong. Nai didn’t seem to have his hands in the pot there, and while the people were a bit gruff – attitudes that Wolfwood matched without missing a beat, something Vash pretended he wasn’t incredibly fond of – it was, overall, fine.

They’d even had a half-decent lunch! There was nothing to complain about.

Except for the fact that, once they’d finished that half-decent lunch and stepped out of the tavern, some guys had thought to start trouble. Harassing the tavern owner and trying to steal his money for the day and, well, obviously Vash wasn’t about to let that happen. Wolfwood hadn’t even protested about their needing to get a move-on, he’d just followed along.

That hadn’t been the most relaxing start to their afternoon, sure, but once the would-be thieves were dealt with, things should have looked up.

Instead, as they crossed town, passing the Plant facility, Wolfwood had stopped, looking at Vash with an unsure, almost concerned looking frown, his fingers tightening on one of the straps on the Punisher.

Vash had opened his mouth to ask if Wolfwood heard something, his own ears straining, hand going under his coat, fingertips brushing the grip of his gun.

And then, suddenly, Wolfwood was gone.

Or...

That wasn’t exactly right, actually.

Wolfwood wasn’t gone. Not entirely, because in his place, or, rather, in the place where he’d been standing, next to where the Punisher was now precariously balanced on its end, was...

“Wolfwood?”

The man on the ground groaned, pushing his sunglasses up with one hand to rub at his eyes.

“Dammit, did the Plant take me literally?”

He looked like Wolfwood. Sort of. Same black suit, same dark hair, same tanned skin. Sunglasses, of course, which was probably good considering he was laying on his back, facing the suns, having some private crisis of suddenly being here rather than wherever he may have been before.

But he was...

Bigger. Fuller. Knew the virtues of a well-fitted button-down.

Vash took a breath, looking from his chest back to his face as this Wolfwood sat up, sunglasses dropping back into place.

“You... are definitely not my Spikey.”

Well, at least he wasn’t so messed up from whatever had just happened that he couldn’t see. That, at least, was something Vash could be grateful for, even while he tried to keep down the vague panic that was brewing in his gut.

“And you’re not my-- ”

Halfway through his sentence, Vash lunged forward, grabbing the Punisher before it could tip itself over and bonk Wolfwood on the head. He’d barely managed it, righting the thing and dragging it a few feet away, the end leaving a wide trail in the sand as he did.

“Not my Wolfwood,” he finished, sighing as he righted the Punisher next to himself.

“That my Punisher?”

“Errr...”

Vash paused, wrapping his arm around the thing, one shoulder leaning against the cross-beam as he looked between the wrapped-up gun and this version of Wolfwood sitting in the sand. One of his eyebrows was raised, clearly waiting for an answer.

His Wolfwood would have interjected vocally by now.

“Technically, I guess so, but he’s a bit territorial about the Punisher, and I know you’re Wolfwood, but you’re... not...”

On the ground, Wolfwood laughed, a quiet, easy thing that Vash hadn’t expected, before he stood up, brushing himself off. He was a bit taller than Vash’s Wolfwood, too, now that he was upright, his hair a bit shaggier.

“I can’t blame you for protecting the thing, needle-noggin.”

Vash blinked.

Only Wolfwood called him that. This was Wolfwood, sure, in a way, but did that mean that, wherever this one had come from, there was a Vash that, like him, got that funny, warm feeling whenever he heard that nickname?

“I just hope my idiot is doing the same back where I came from. Think mine’s probably heavier than that, though, with how you’re handling it, so maybe your Wolfwood won’t even be able to lift it, huh?”

At that, Vash made a face, something that Wolfwood seemed to catch immediately, both hands going up in a clear movement of defense.

“Hey, don’t give me that face! Shit, you really are a version of him, aren’t you?”

There was something about the way that Wolfwood looked him over that made Vash pause, wondering what was so different about him compared to whoever he’d been with before. That wasn’t something he had time to ask, though, because, right at that moment, there was a bigger priority.

“Did you mention something about the Plant?”

It turned out that Wolfwood had, in fact, mentioned the Plant, because there was a very, very good chance that the Plant that powered the town where this Wolfwood and his Vash had been staying had been responsible for the fact that, right now, Vash was sharing the table in his and Wolfwood’s room at the inn with a version of Wolfwood that had eyed the two beds and asked, “you guys actually use both of them? Oh.”

Whatever that meant.

Vash had a faint idea, but he wasn’t about to get into it with someone who wasn’t his Wolfwood and was, probably, already dealing with more than he needed to. What with being in another dimension, and all.

“I don’t think I understand.”

Across the table, Wolfwood frowned.

“Do you... not know the things about Plants that my version of you does, or...?”

Vash balked, pushing away from the table and standing up to pace over to the window. It was open a crack, the breeze ruffling the gauzy, yellowed curtain as Vash peered out through the smudged glass. The Plant facility loomed on the horizon, sticking out like a sore thumb among the rest of this town, all the other buildings squat and dusty looking. “I know enough, I just didn’t think they might... Well, I suppose if they were bored, maybe it was considered helpful.”

Looking back at Wolfwood, Vash tried for a smile. It got easier when he saw what Wolfwood was doing, fingers cupped around his hand while the familiar flick of a lighter sounded.

The entire reason the window had been cracked in this room to begin with.

Turning back to it, Vash curled his fingers under the frame and pushed it up a little higher. A quiet way to make it clear he wasn’t about to admonish Wolfwood for smoking. Did the other version of him do that?

Probably not. If the other him was anything like him, he’d let Wolfwood get away with a lot.

Maybe too much, sometimes.

“You’re worrying.”

Vash shrugged, turning away from the window and pacing past the table, towards the end of the bed that Wolfwood had claimed. As always, he’d tossed the sheets back into a somewhat orderly state this morning before they’d gone out. A remnant of growing up at the orphanage, the habits instilled in him there hadn’t really worn off. Vash’s bed, on the other hand, wasn’t messy, but the sheet was just sort of tossed back how he’d left it when he’d gotten up.

“How can I not?”

“Not judgin’ ya, kid.”

Vash frowned, halfway through pacing back towards the table. From his seat, smoke curling up from the cigarette in his fingers, Wolfwood grinned.

“I don’t know about you calling me ‘kid’,” Vash pointed out. If this Wolfwood knew the things about Plants that he did, enough to suspect what had happened, then he knew enough about Vash that what Vash was about to say wasn’t going to blow any cover the other version of him had. For some reason, knowing there was another him out there made Vash feel like he needed to have some kind of loyalty to the guy in not sharing his secrets. “I’m still older than you. Probably.”

Likely. There was no way this Wolfwood was older than 150.

Wolfwood smirked.

“Probably,” he agreed. “But if you saw my Vash? You’d call yourself ‘kid’, too. You’re a damn cute little thing.”

That...

Vash could feel his neck getting warm, his cheeks colouring. This wasn’t his Wolfwood, but it was a version of Wolfwood, and a version of Wolfwood looking at him and calling him ‘damn cute’? Well, it wasn’t like Vash was a starving man in the desert – most of the time – but that was almost too much.

And, clearly, this Wolfwood could tell.

“Wow,” he drawled, a whole lot of context hidden behind that one syllable. It almost made Vash mad, and that was saying a lot, because it usually took more than one word to do that.

Today had been stressful, actually. Vash decided today was stressful.

“Anyway, back to what I was sayin’, though,” Wolfwood continued. He hooked the ashtray on the table with his free fingers, pulling it closer before tapping ash from the end of his cigarette. “You’re worrying, and I’m not judgin’, but if you’re worried about him, think about it. If I’m with you...”

The trail off on that sentence was obvious.

If this Wolfwood was with him, than Vash’s Wolfwood was with this Wolfwood’s Vash. Which meant...

Well, Vash didn’t really know.

“He’s fine. He’s with you.”

Vash crossed his arms, flesh fingers tapping on the side of his prosthetic. Wolfwood sounded so sure that there was nothing to worry about, because Wolfwood was with a version of him that understood whatever dimension he was in. If that Vash was anything like him – and he had to be, wasn’t that how other selves worked? – he would make sure that Wolfwood survived whatever this was without so much as a scratch.

“Well. Maybe I’d worry a little.”

Abruptly, whatever peace Vash had coaxed himself into cracked, his eyes snapping back to watch Wolfwood as he stubbed out his cigarette.

“My version of you is a bit of an idiot. I think at last count, I’ve gotten him out of more sticky jams than he’s gotten me out of by at least one.”

“Oh.”

Somehow, hearing that made Vash feel better. Enough so that he made his way back to the table, pulling out his chair to drop down into it.

“I get told pretty often that I’m an idiot,” he pointed out, smiling across the table at Wolfwood. He really was just like Vash’s Wolfwood had been stretched out, had his posture corrected, bought a better fitting suit and did it up just enough.

Vash was staring at his chest again.

Playing it off with a shrug, Vash looked back at Wolfwood’s eyes. He’d taken off his sunglasses, at least, so that was much easier than it usually was. Maybe Vash needed to start requesting that of his Wolfwood.

But, then, he’d have to do that himself, and sometimes the sunglasses felt like they were helping him keep at least some of his thoughts and feelings hidden.

“So, really, how bad could it be?”

Wolfwood hadn’t had an answer for that, at least, not one that he had cared to share out loud. Part of Vash suspected that was probably for the best, the less he pushed for answers, the less he’d be worrying that Wolfwood was in some weird dimension, without his Punisher, and without him, and sure, he could handle himself, but...

It wasn’t a road Vash needed to be travelling down, mentally.

What Wolfwood did have was a suggestion that they get dinner, because he was starving. Vash supposed that being thrown from one universe to another could be a good way to work up an appetite. He wouldn’t know. He never had.

It was during dinner – some greasy affair in the loud little place adjoining the inn – that Wolfwood shared more of his thoughts on what had happened. It was almost comical, that the two of them were sitting there, at a table, in the middle of a rowdy pub, discussing...

“Plants are capable of interdimensional travel. They have to be. Only explanation.”

Yeah, that.

Honestly, it wouldn’t be the most off-the-wall thing Vash had overheard in a pub.

“Well...” Thinking back, Vash had to agree that made sense. The things that Nai had shown him, entirely against his will, but, still, had shown him, proved it was possible. Under the right conditions, really, even he could do it. Problem being that the right conditions weren’t generally in the best of circumstances, at least thus far, but Wolfwood didn’t need to hear all that.

Vash hadn’t shared much of that with his Wolfwood. It was too personal. Better to not start laying out all the dirty laundry if this Wolfwood would never have to know so much as a scrap of it.

“I guess that makes sense.”

“Might not work for you, though.”

Wolfwood hadn’t missed a beat on that, and Vash raised an eyebrow, dragging a ragged piece of bread through the mysterious but flavourful sauce on his plate. “Why not?”

“It might’ve only worked because my Vash isn’t like you.”

Popping the sodden bread in his mouth, Vash packed it into his cheek, speaking around it, “what does that mean?”

Wolfwood sat back, crossing his arms and looking Vash over. It was an appraising look that Vash wasn’t entirely sure he disliked, even though he was in the middle of putting more saucy bread in his mouth.

“You’re sweet. Not that he isn’t, but he was being a handful today. I wasn’t thinking about where we were, and what I was sayin’ until I’d said it. I think, just, with how he is, the Plant thought maybe I could get a break for a little bit. Had a quick interdimensional chat with the Plant here, and,” Wolfwood whistled lightly, passing his two index fingers in front of himself. “We got swapped.”

“What’d you say?”

Vash’s mouth was full of bread, but Wolfwood didn’t seem to need a translation.

“Somethin’ like ‘I wish I could find a version of you that was less of a pain in my ass’, because he was being a pain in my ass. Not in the usual way, either.”

Vash blinked.

Wolfwood watched him, and then shrugged, “all right, we can discuss where you two are at in that whole journey later, because I have a feeling you’re right in the middle of going through it and, that said, my condolences. But, I think that’s it. Plant overheard, thought I was being serious, and,” he gestured, taking in the two of them and their table in the motion. “Here we are.”

As much as Vash wanted to pretend that he hadn’t caught on to what Wolfwood was getting at with his first words, he knew entirely and, very suddenly, he realized that if he was with a Wolfwood that didn’t have problems casually mentioning differing ways that his Vash could be a ‘pain in his ass’, than his Wolfwood was with that exact Vash.

Which had him feeling some complicated feelings, to be frank.

“That doesn’t really explain why you think it only happened because your Vash is your Vash,” he pointed out, instead, deciding to ignore everything else going on in his head. That had worked fairly well with his Wolfwood so far.

The whole complicated mess of emotions that Vash was sorting through in the back of his mind on any given day aside.

“Well, no offense, needle-noggin...”

It still felt really weird to hear that coming out of the mouth of a Wolfwood that wasn’t his Wolfwood but was still Wolfwood and still clearly knew him enough to know how he’d feel about being called that.

Namely, pretty okay.

“...But I’m getting a feeling that you might not have the same kind of... relationship with the Plants here. Like they might not know your Wolfwood the way the Plants where I come from know me, because they don’t have that kind of exposure to everything that you’ve got going on.”

It was surprisingly on the nose.

“Because you and your Wolfwood haven’t gotten your heads out of your asses and just told each other how you feel.”

It was annoyingly, jarringly on the nose.

“What – that doesn’t – Wolfwood knows I care about him!”

Across the table, one single dark eyebrow raised.

Vash knew Wolfwood. He knew the fact that he wasn’t exactly an open book, and he played things close to his chest, unless it was anger or annoyance - but they had gotten closer. A lot closer. Wolfwood did sweet things for him and then expected Vash not to mention it, at all, and looking at this Wolfwood, at the question in his eyes, even though his expression was doubting Vash’s own take on what he’d said, he could see the mirror.

The difference was that this Wolfwood had crossed whatever threshold it was that Vash and his Wolfwood kept conveniently not seeing, walking past, and skipping around instead of just passing over it.

Which, Vash could admit, wasn’t just Wolfwood’s fault.

“So, what, you think because you and your Vash are... have... talked – ”

Probably way more than talked, and Vash knew that, but he wasn’t going to say the word. It made him feel complicated about where his Wolfwood had flitted off to, again.

“- then the Plants where you’re from know more about your situation, because of your Vash – ”

Wolfwood leaned forward.

He was smiling, now, and he really was terribly handsome when he smiled. It shut Vash right up, which should have been annoying.

“You’re connected to some kind of... Plant hivemind sometimes, right? You know things about how they’re feeling?”

Instead of speaking, Vash just nodded.

Wolfwood’s smile got wider.

“You think that goes both ways?”

Quite suddenly, Vash understood the concept of a two-way street. He got impressions from the Plants of their thoughts and feelings, their concerns and their joys. Vash had never stopped to think that it might go both ways, and that the Plants might get those same impressions from him when he was nearby.

All kinds of impressions.

“But, then, why would one of your Plants swap you with my Wolfwood? Wouldn’t they know that you two are... You know, together. And not want to interfere with that?”

“Can’t say for sure, but Vash always says that the Plants like to be helpful. Maybe this was supposed to be helpful.”

Vash very much wanted to pretend that the look he was getting across the table was not pointed. So he did.

“If that’s all, then why don’t we give it a shot tonight?” he asked instead, glossing over everything else, and balling up his napkin onto the plate in front of him. Voice lowered, he leaned in. Wolfwood hadn’t leaned back, and it brought them quite a bit closer.

Vash didn’t mind.

“We can ask the Plant here to help us out.”

It had seemed like a straightforward enough thing to do. Vash had been inside plenty of Plant factories, and they were all built fairly similar. Big doors, winding stairs, the Plant tanks in places of honour high above everything, connected to whatever lines necessary to keep their assigned town going.

This one was no different. Once the town had gone to sleep – and, unlike some, this one had gotten quiet once the hour got late enough – Vash and Wolfwood had made their way over to the facility. Sneaking in was easy, because, as Vash had expected, there wasn’t a round the clock guard here, and the door opened without much convincing from his lock-pick.

“Now, the ones where I come from,” Wolfwood started, his voice a quiet drawl echoing back off the walls as they climbed the stairs, “aren’t like this at all. They’re big outside tanks.”

One hand on the railing as he led the way up, Vash glanced back, “outside? Don’t they worry about the Plant being taken?”

They crested the top of the stairs, and as they did, Wolfwood let out another one of those low whistles, looking at the tall, glowing blue tank in front of them.

“Sort of, but it’s less of a concern when the tank is the size of a building,” he said, moving closer. As he did, he tucked his hands in his pockets before coming to a stop a few feet in front of the Plant tank. Vash watched him, studying his face as he leaned forward, his eyes catching in the blue light put off by the Plant as he took it in. “Think the Plants where I’m from are a bit bigger, too, but I guess I could’ve figured that one out without seeing this.”

As he spoke, his eyes shifted from watching the Plant to meeting Vash’s gaze.

He smiled.

Vash smiled back, reaching up to push a hand into his hair.

“Is your Vash, uh... Bigger than me?”

That seemed to make sense. This Wolfwood was bigger than his Wolfwood. Maybe everyone in that dimension was.

“Oh yeah,” Wolfwood said, straightening and looking up at the Plant again. “You’re pretty tall, but Vash, he’s...”

Vash smiled, watching Wolfwood’s expression, the little changes in it. Laying his hand against the glass of the tank, he shifted forward, getting a little closer to it before he spoke.

“Do you miss him?”

For the first time, Vash really saw his Wolfwood in the way this one reacted. His face that had, a moment before, been something like an open book, shuttered, brows furrowing, frown finding its way onto his face so fast that Vash actually hadn’t seen the progression. One second it hadn’t been there and the next, it was, fully situated like it had never not been there.

“It’s only been a few hours, did you forget the part where the Plant did this because I said I needed a break from him?”

Holding up both hands like a shield, Vash grinned, taking a step back.

It was almost uncanny how alike the two of them could be. Maybe, if Vash looked a little more past that fact that this was not his Wolfwood, he would see more of that.

“Right, right. Well, um, would you mind...?”

Wolfwood, still frowning, crossed his arms and turned away, taking a few steps towards the control boxes instead so that he really wouldn’t have Vash directly in his eyeline.

“You shy about it, too?”

Vash laughed quietly, looking up at the plant.

“A little,” he replied, softly. “Other me...?”

“He’s not exactly chomping at the bit to show off his Planty ways, if that’s what you’re askin’.”

Instead of really replying, Vash just hummed, before laying both hands on the warm glass. With the colour, it could seem odd to some people that it wasn’t cool to the touch, but Vash knew better. Not only had he had many, many decades of doing this, but he himself ran a little warmer than the average human. Plants were an energy source; it only made sense that the tanks that held them would be warm.

It was better, Vash thought. A little more welcoming, and when he pressed his forehead to the glass, he could felt the hum of that energy right down into his boots.

He didn’t need to speak out loud for the Plants to hear him. He’d never had to, but for the comfort of the humans around him, he often did. In this case, though, with a Wolfwood he didn’t really know, but who knew what he was, how he could communicate, Vash didn’t bother speaking.

Hello. I have a question.

In the tank, the Plant shifted, the light in the room changing. Through the hazy of the water inside, Vash could see Wolfwood shifting on the other side. If he turned around, now, he would see something different, Vash suspected, than what he was used to. As far as Vash could tell, though, he wasn’t turning. Respecting Vash’s wishes for the concept of privacy, keeping his back to them.

Inside the tank, an elegant hand with long, thin fingers pressed to the other side of the thick glass and then, just as gracefully as that movement had happened, the Plant floated down into Vash’s view, meeting his eyes before mimicking his position.

They both closed their eyes.

Hello, red brother. What is your question?

Vash’s smile widened at that. Maybe it had been too long since he’d just stopped and talked to another Plant. One that wasn’t intent on grossly destructive violence, despite Vash’s pleas to the contrary.

My friend is away. Do you know about that?

A flurry of something like excitement or, when Vash really thought about it, maybe it was more like amusement passed from the Plant to himself.

Away. Yes. I know.

Vash shifted his feet, keeping contact with the tank. That sounded promising. Maybe Wolfwood really had been on to something. They had been on the right track by coming in here the first chance that they got.

Can you help me get him back?

No.

The answer was so quick and so short that, before he could stop himself, Vash pulled his head back from the tank, eyes opening to stare at the Plant inside. As though that had been expected, he was being looked right back at. Unless he was mistaken, there was a hint of a smile, there.

What do you mean ‘no’​?

Inside the tank, the Plant leaned forward, not quite touching forehead to glass.

I didn’t do it. I know he is away. I know this one is here. But I can only accept.

Oh.

That was a snag that Vash hadn’t thought of. If the Plants were the source of all this, then the Plants could be the ones that corrected it. Every Plant, though, had its own unique purpose and abilities. Vash hadn’t stopped to think about the fact that not every Plant would be able to slingshot his Wolfwood back, and send this one home in return. If this side was only capable of acceptance, then they needed to wait.

It has to come from there?

Yes. From there.

Vash worried at his lower lip with his teeth, looking away from the Plant to the dark outline of Wolfwood through the tank.

I understand. Thank you.

The Plant looked almost pitying, for a second, before it pulled its hands away from the inside of the glass, closing back in on itself as Vash pulled away, too.

“Um. Wolfwood?”

On the other side of the tank, Wolfwood turned. At some point while Vash had been talking to the Plant, he’d lit another cigarette. That didn’t exactly help to keep their intrusion here as low-key as possible, but Vash wasn’t sure his Wolfwood would have refrained either. Again, more ways they were alike.

More distracting than that though, was the way Wolfwood looked at him, shock registering on his face for a second, reminding Vash that this one had never seen him after he’d spoken with the Plants. The markings would still be stark on Vash’s face, and, if Wolfwood got closer, his eyes.

To his credit, he rallied quickly.

Maybe his Vash had this, too.

“I’m guessing that the fact that I’m still here means there’s a snag in the plan.”

“Something like that,” Vash agreed, moving away from the tank, and closer to Wolfwood. Inside the glass, the Plant had fully closed up again, floating suspended like nothing had changed since they’d made their way up the stairs. “This side can only accept.”

Wolfwood nodded, bringing the cigarette to his lips.

“So, it’s the one on the other side, back with my Vash, that needs to do the heavy lifting.”

Vash sighed. “Seems so.”

Blowing out smoke, Wolfwood regarded him. He still had his sunglasses off, and something about that made Vash feel like the exposed one.

“Don’t worry,” he repeated for what had to be the third time.

It didn’t really matter how many times Wolfwood said that. He had the advantage of knowing what he’d said just before he’d been sent here. His Wolfwood didn’t know any of that, but this Wolfwood had been the one to put everything together. Had the other Vash even heard what this Wolfwood had said before he disappeared? What if they didn’t work it out?

Vash was starting to actually, genuinely worry.

“Hey. Listen, my Vash is an idiot. And I’m sure you know that, you’re him, but he’s... Fully grown.” Whatever that meant. “Spikey will sort it.”

Vash certainly hoped so. By the time they got back to the inn, all he could do was flop into his bed, with its badly made sheets, kick off his boots and shrug off his coat, and try not to worry enough to get a little sleep.

It had been twelve whole hours already.

A Wolfwood was still a Wolfwood, of course. There wasn’t really anything wrong with this one. If anything, he seemed a little less likely to randomly erupt, but maybe that was because he was seeing Vash as little and cute, unlike his own Vash who was apparently big and a pain in the ass.

Vash laid awake for longer than he wanted to, thinking about the fact that his Wolfwood was with a Vash that clearly had something worked out with his own Wolfwood. There were things that Vash got away with when it came to Wolfwood that he knew he shouldn’t, a line that he toed, watching Wolfwood toe it on the other side, neither of them acknowledging things. There was an elephant in the room that they didn’t talk about, they just got into their separate beds, day after day, town after town, and kept their thoughts and hands to themselves.

It was stupid, but Vash sort of wished he’d just crossed the line already.

That might’ve been his last thought before he fell asleep. When he woke up, the room was bright, the sun beginning to peek over the buildings, and Wolfwood was...

“I thought we agreed you weren’t going to touch that!”

When they had gotten back to the inn, Vash had carefully propped the Punisher up in the corner where Wolfwood had left it the night before. Wrapped up and safety tucked away, Vash had, at least, not needed to worry about the massive gun on top of everything else while they’d been sorting this out.

Now, he was sitting straight up in bed, staring at this other Wolfwood as he stood, his suit jacket tossed over one of the chairs, shirt tails untucked, with the Punisher half unwrapped.

At least he had the decency to look caught.

“It’s way different than mine,” he said, like that explained it. “I just wanted a look. It doesn’t open up?”

Throwing off the sheet, Vash got out of bed, walking closer. The Punisher’s gunmetal was gleaming dully in the morning light, the scant sunbeams catching on the teal that ran down its body, disappearing into the wraps that Wolfwood hadn’t completely removed yet.

“I don’t think so. It does when he needs to reload ammunition, but it has two modes. This side,” Vash pointed to the long end, “fires like a regular gun. The other side,” this time, Vash tapped the top of the Punisher with his finger, “fires a laser cannon.”

Wolfwood stared at him.

“It what?”

That was almost monotone. Vash grinned.

“Fires a laser cannon. What?” Taking a step forward, Vash put his hand on the cross-beam of the Punisher, giving Wolfwood a shrewd look. “Does yours not fire a laser cannon, Mr Wolfwood?”

Looking between Vash and the gun, Wolfwood shook his head. “Nope. It certainly does not. Does open up a mini armoury though, so I guess I can’t complain too much. Lasers though...”

Vash smiled, reaching down to gather some of the wrappings from where they had loosened. “Come on. Help me wrap this back up, because I don’t know how he does it, and he’s gonna be real mad at me if he comes back and thinks I let you use it.”

Taking the wrapping from Vash’s hand, Wolfwood smirked.

“If I promise to make it look good as new, will you let me use it?”

Rolling his eyes ceiling-ward, Vash tapped his chin, pretending to think about it with a little ‘hmm’ before he met Wolfwood’s eyes again and answered, “no,” with a grin. “Come on, let’s hurry up and do that, I need breakfast before I can think about what we’re supposed to do next.”

Because sometime during the night, Vash had decided they were going to keep trying to work this out. To, somehow, get a message through the universe to their other selves so that they might work out that the Plant there was the key to turning this all around. Between the thought that had been rotating in his mind when he’d drifted off, and the way Wolfwood’s face had changed when he’d been thinking about his Vash, he’d decided this was really the only course of action.

“Breakfast breakfast, or donuts breakfast?”

Vash, halfway back to his bed to get his coat and boots, stopped, looking back at Wolfwood.

“Could we? Have donuts for breakfast?”

Wolfwood, standing there with his dress shirt pulled from his waistline and his sleeves rolled up, grinned.

“Sure, needle-noggin. Donuts for breakfast. Why not?”

Donuts for breakfast turned out to be a good excuse for Vash and Wolfwood to return to the room at the inn with freshly brewed coffee and a box that was, admittedly, far too large for what Vash thought even he could eat. The bakery had been busy that morning, people weaving between each other, and Wolfwood had rightly suggested that, instead of sitting in the hot suns risking being overheard while they talked about interdimensional switches, they go back to the room.

So, now, Vash was seated at the table with a half-eaten selection of about four different donuts, listening while Wolfwood spoke.

“I’ve already said, at least forty times, that he’s an idiot.”

Picking up one of the donuts that had a pale pink frosting on it, Vash nodded, “you did. My Wolfwood calls me one, too.”

“Well, he should be calling himself one. Take it from someone who is him. I’m seeing a lot of evidence that he’s not not an idiot,” Wolfwood continued. He took a sip from his coffee and then pulled out his cigarettes. He had to be running low, but Vash wasn’t sure if they would sell his preferred brand in this dimension. He didn’t recognize the carton, not that it meant anything. Just that it wasn’t the same as his Wolfwood’s Skulls.

“Back to my Vash though,” he said, once he’d lit the cigarette. “He pretends not to be as smart as he is, which is why I call him an idiot. He’s kind of a genius, thinks I don’t know it.” If Wolfwood tried to catch Vash’s eye, meaningful, Vash pretended he didn’t notice.

Which could be playing right into what Wolfwood was saying.

“Guilt ridden. He takes on more than he should. He’s better than anyone on that damn planet deserves, especially me, even if he frustrates the hell out of me with his ideals.” There was that look in his eyes again, the one Vash had seen yesterday. “But he sticks to them, and I have to admire that. He doesn’t bend or break.”

It was sort of heartbreaking to listen to this. Not because Vash didn’t think it of himself, but because, selfishly, he wondered if, somewhere, his Wolfwood was thinking the same things about him. He didn’t like to talk about his feelings very often. He needed to be pushed to an edge to do it, and Vash never wanted to be the one to do that. It tended to result in eruptions.

For this Wolfwood, though, it had to be different. He’d moved beyond being tied up by the possibility of his feelings being dismissed. Vash knew that much, without it being explicitly spelled out. Whatever he felt about his Vash, it was returned, and they both knew it.

“Does have a weird thing about feet though. Glad you haven’t gone after ‘em yet.”

Vash’s mouth hung open for a minute before he asked, a little too loudly, “what?! What kind of thing about feet?”

Wolfwood took a drag of his cigarette.

“Don’t worry about it.”

Vash wanted to point out that he very, very much was worrying about it, because what the hell did Wolfwood mean ‘a weird thing about feet’, and was it something he needed to be watching out for in himself? Was this some trait that was going to manifest itself later on and freak Wolfwood out? Before he could ask any of those questions, though, Wolfwood carried on.

“All right, your turn. Tell me about your Wolfwood. What’s he like? Aside from an idiot.”

No matter how much Vash wanted to circle back around to the foot thing, he was the one who had started this whole conversation. When they’d sat down with the donuts, Vash had asked if the other him liked donuts too, thought that he must because of the way that Wolfwood had immediately suggested it in that knowing tone. One thing had led to another, and now, Vash was on the spot.

He’d been, mentally, berating Wolfwood just a minute or two ago for not talking about his feelings until he was pushed to an edge. Now, Vash set down the half of donut he’d been holding, picking it apart into smaller sections.

“He’s... yeah, he’s an idiot,” Vash agreed. “I guess we all are, right? He’s prickly, a little bit afraid of his feelings. Tells me I’m too soft, but freaks out when he realizes he’s being the same way.”

On the other side of the table, Wolfwood snorted.

“I understand him.”

“I’m sure you do,” Vash agreed, picking up one of the larger pieces of donut he’d torn up and popping it in his mouth to chew. “He pretends he isn’t, but he’s kind, and he’s sweet. Last time I had donuts was because he surprised me with them.”

Wolfwood rested his chin on his hand, fingers of his other hand flicking his cigarette over the ashtray. “Uh huh. Go on.”

“He pretends he isn’t good. He always talks about himself like he’s a bad person, but he’s not. He’s...”

Vash smiled, shrugging before picking up another piece of donut.

“When it comes to good people, he’s one of the best I’ve met.”

“You’re in love with him, aren’t you?”

Half-way to his mouth, the donut fell from Vash’s fingers, and he didn’t make a move to stop it. The pastry slipped between the edge of the table and his chest, hitting his leg and bouncing before it landed somewhere on the floor, completely ignored as Vash stared across the table at Wolfwood.

He was still sitting with his chin on his hand, watching Vash expectantly, but with an air that he already knew, already understood. He didn’t need the answer.

“I... He’s my friend, and I...”

“It’s okay,” Wolfwood said, reaching over to crush the butt of his cigarette into the ashtray. The butts in there were mixed, now, this Wolfwood’s and Vash’s Wolfwood’s, and Vash wasn’t sure who had contributed more. “We’ve got all that going on, too. I remember this stage. I wanted to pull my hair out, like, every day, because he wasn’t getting it. Or I thought he wasn’t getting it. Problem was, he was thinking the same thing. You know, it’s a lot easier if you just go for it.”

Vash frowned, pushing back from the table to look and see where the donut had gone, instead of looking at Wolfwood when he spoke.

“That’s you. Your Vash is...”

Lucky. He has his Wolfwood. They understand each other, they care about each other, and they know that. The other Vash didn’t go to bed every night listening to every breath from this Wolfwood and wishing he was close enough to feel the rise and fall of them. This Wolfwood wouldn’t jump like he’d been burned if that Vash stood close and touched him when it was just the two of them. That Vash could kiss this Wolfwood and he didn’t have to worry – anymore, Vash supposed – that Wolfwood would turn tail and run as far away as he could get.

Vash was jealous of him.

Not only had he crossed that line with his Wolfwood but, right now, he had Vash’s Wolfwood with him and right this moment Vash really wished his Wolfwood was here so he could finally, bluntly, tell him how he felt. Just lay it all on the line.

“My Vash isn’t that different from you.”

Instead of continuing to look for the fallen donut piece, Vash looked up. Wolfwood was moving, pulling his chair around the table, moving closer to Vash and, suddenly, Vash felt very put on the spot. Warmer than usual. Wolfwood had put his jacket back on when they’d gone out, but he’d undone the buttons when they’d sat down to eat, and it was falling open over his hips, now, as he leaned towards Vash.

It was easier to stop thinking about the differences between all of them, and about how the other Vash might be luckier than him, and had his Wolfwood right now. It was easier to just lean in, and close his eyes.

When Wolfwood kissed him, the first thing Vash tasted was the smoke from his last cigarette. Then, the sip of coffee he’d had, and the hint of cinnamon sugar on his lower lip from the donuts.

Then Vash stopped thinking about it and gave in, pressing into Wolfwood, pushing out of his own chair and into his, all but climbing into his lap. Wolfwood didn’t stop him; he just let him do it, hands on Vash’s hips holding him steady, guiding him in.

This was what Vash had been wanting for so long, and he was finally, finally getting it, hands curling in the white lapels of Wolfwood’s dress shirt and--

White.

White.

That was wrong, because his Wolfwood didn’t have a white dress shirt. Just those too loose grey ones, the ones that teased Vash with hints of what was underneath, the promise of what he would find if Wolfwood let him closer, let him touch. Not white.

Vash pulled back, retreating to his own chair, pressing two fingers to his lips.

Wolfwood’s shirt was disheveled, pulled up and tight in the front from Vash’s insistence, but he didn’t make a move to fix it. He was just watching Vash.

Not with annoyance, or disappointment.

Almost with pity.

“You poor thing,” he murmured, shaking his head. “You’ve got it so bad. He needs to move on this before you explode. I just hope he can handle you.”

And then he was gone.

Vash blinked.

One second, Wolfwood had been sitting there, talking about how he hoped the other version of him could handle Vash – God, Vash hoped he could, that he would, too – and then the next, there was nothing but an empty chair.

The missing donut piece was on the floor between the legs of it.

And Wolfwood was gone.

Wolfwood was gone.

Vash stood up so fast the chair he’d been sitting in clattered backwards onto the floor, ending up on its side, but he’d already raced out the door before it settled.

The town was awake and bustling. It was the weekend, everyone off of work and out of school and making their way to this shop and that, to visit friends and relatives, and that was all well and good, but Vash was having to dodge and weave his way through the crowds, getting out half-apologies as he raced towards the building that loomed over the town.

The Plant facility.

If his Wolfwood hadn’t come back to him exactly where the other had been, that had to be where he was. Vash was sure of it, scrambling to keep his footing as he swung around the bend of the building and sprinted for the door, flinging it open and dashing through.

He’d expected that he would need to climb the stairs. Wolfwood might be in a bit of a daze, up there, the same as the other one had been when Vash had met him.

Instead, there, nearly to the bottom of the stairs, was his Wolfwood, pulling himself into a lurched stop when Vash came in, boots squealing on the shiny floor.

He looked like Vash remembered. Ill-fitting suit that was more of a tease than anything, hid things from Vash that he wanted to see. Messy black hair, those ever present sunglasses over eyes that were watching Vash, sweeping over him.

Vash felt that look in his belly.

Oh.

The other Wolfwood had been right. He was so right, and they had been so stupid for so long, and Vash was done with it, he was done--

“Plants can do a lot more crazy shit than you’ve told me, needle-noggin.”

That was what they’d needed. Something to break the tension, to let them both know it was time to move, again. The heavy main door had swung shut behind Vash, leaving them in just the cool, dim lighting of the facility, but Vash could see every bit of the smile on Wolfwood’s face as he came down the last few steps, as Vash himself moved forward to meet him.

“I’ve told you,” he started, his voice a little more teasing than he’d meant it to be, but, somehow, he didn’t think Wolfwood was going to mind. There was something going on behind those sunglasses, a kind of hunger that Vash had only glimpsed once or twice before, something Wolfwood always hid from him quickly. “I don’t know everything they can do.”

He was learning more, though. Perhaps Plants could do some pretty impressive things in the interest of meddling. Of pushing things forward. Thinking back to the wave of amusement Vash had gotten off the one upstairs yesterday, he had to wonder. Had there been more to it than giving the other Wolfwood the break he’d been bemoaning?

That thought reminded him of something that Wolfwood had said, about things being a two way street and Vash glanced away from Wolfwood’s eyes for a second, trying to keep that thought under control.

But, what did it matter? He’d hesitated on things long enough, and he felt keyed up and ready to break, and if he had to live another day pretending that he didn’t want to crawl into Wolfwood’s skin, he might actually lose it.

“Hey, Wolfwood,” he started, meeting his eyes again. “Can we talk?”

Instead of using his words, Wolfwood reached out, both hands cupping Vash’s face, and Vash’s heart felt like it doubled in speed, tripping over itself when Wolfwood leaned in and, for the second time in less than ten minutes, Vash was kissed.

He didn’t hesitate now, either, hands grabbing Wolfwood’s blazer to keep him from getting away, because he wasn’t going to. Not now, not when Vash could kiss him, finally, teeth catching on his lip when Wolfwood moved away just to come back, lips parted, the kiss just as needy and desperate as Vash felt.

And, suddenly, he was done feeling that way.

Using the grip he had on Wolfwood’s blazer, Vash broke the kiss to glance over his shoulder, tugging Wolfwood with him. There was a door, there, marked UTILITY CLOSET, and maybe it wasn’t perfect, but it was going to do for now. Vash had felt like he was going insane, he needed Wolfwood. Now.

Wolfwood didn’t argue. He didn’t try to pull away. His hands had found their way under Vash’s coat and were settled on his side, gripped in his turtleneck as he was dragged towards the closet, laughing.

“The inn’s just down the road!”

Vash looked back at him, smirking. There was no point in pretending, anymore, that he didn’t want what he wanted. Wolfwood wasn’t running from it. He was, in fact, leaning into it, like he was afraid Vash might get away if he didn’t stick close.

“You’ve made me wait long enough.”

Reaching back, Vash found the door handle with his prosthetic hand, twisting it. He felt more than heard the dull pop of the lock going, and then the door swung open.

“We can go to the inn later.”

Instead of Vash pulling Wolfwood inside, he found himself pushed in, the door swinging shut behind them and leaving the two of them in a kind of gloom that was almost too total until Vash heard a click and a dull light came on overhead.

Wolfwood’s fingers moved away from the switch, removing his sunglasses and setting them on a nearby shelf. The last thing Vash saw before Wolfwood moved back in and kissed him was a wide, genuine smile and his own fingers twisting in the grey fabric of Wolfwood’s dress shirt, pulling him close, letting him crush his body up against the back wall.

“Wolfwood...”

It turned out, when he put his mind to it, this Wolfwood did a fine, fine job of handling Vash.

Multiple times in one day.

The ship was quiet, tonight.

That was an odd thing to notice, but Wolfwood had been acutely aware of it while he’d been walking through the corridors, rounding the corner that separated the hallway where his and Livio’s rooms were, and the one where Vash’s was. When they’d settled in, there had been apologies made about splitting all of them up, but, secretly, Wolfwood sort of liked it.

He knew Vash did.

Neither of them had really gotten to have the clandestine, forbidden midnight visits that people tended to have when they were younger. Wolfwood had been too caught up in helping at the orphanage, and then being turned into a living weapon, and Vash...

Things were weird for Plants, especially Independents. Wolfwood got the impression that Vash hadn’t really had the space to even think about that sort of thing.

Now, though, it was almost embarrassing how much they were thinking about it. Moving onto the ships in the fleet had been a big change. Instead of everything Wolfwood had known for his entire life, now there was space, and different clothes, ones provided to him, and different roles. Actual jobs, ways that he was helping on their voyage. It meant that he stayed busy, and so did Livio. Meryl and Milly were not just encouraged, but almost required to continue their documentation of all the travels and adventures they were experiencing. And Vash, on board ships with so many Plants to tend to and help, flourished.

It was different.

It was nice.

But, even with all that change, the things that he and Vash had fallen into, in the last weeks of their time on Noman’s Land hadn’t slipped away.

If anything, they’d gotten worse.

Wolfwood would see Vash in passing, the two of them crossing paths in a corridor, Vash on his way from one Plant bay to another, Wolfwood on his way to help out with ferrying some of the children from one lesson (Drama, with Leonof) to another (Music, with Midvalley). It would be quick, and brief, and anyone who saw could infer whatever they wanted, but Wolfwood was almost helpless to resist the way Vash would reach out, their fingers catching in a two second embrace.

Sometimes, it was more than that.

Sometimes, it was Vash catching his wrist and pulling him in, and in those moments Wolfwood would find himself breaking away from Vash’s lips a minute later, promising, ‘later, later, I’ll see you later, the kids are gonna wonder where I am’ while Vash smiled, letting him go, looking entirely too smug about it. Or, he’d find himself being left in the corridor while Vash dashed away, waving and promising to see him in a few hours.

He understood the smugness. He felt it, deeply, in those moments, watching Vash hurry away to do whatever he’d promised to.

That smugness would carry him through the rest of the day. Sit with him during meals, when they were all together, and the girls were going on about the things they’d learned, or Livio talking about how good his day was, which was a damn beautiful thing to hear. It would be there, at that shared table, when Wolfwood’s foot knocked against Vash’s under the table, or Vash’s hand lingered a little longer on his arm than it needed to.

If the others hadn’t figured it out, Wolfwood didn’t intend to waste the time telling them. He was too busy. All of his spare time was taken up, thinking about the next time the two of them could be alone together.

He was absolutely going through some kind of giggly honeymoon phase, but Wolfwood didn’t care.

Reaching Vash’s door, he rapped his knuckles against it, glancing down the corridor as though he expected someone to jump out and declare them caught. Meryl, likely, though Wolfwood wouldn’t put it past Livio to get curious about hearing him leaving his room. No one jumped out, though, and a few seconds later, Vash opened the door.

He was smiling.

God, he smiled so much, these days. Didn’t he know it made Wolfwood weak?

Without a word, he stepped into Vash’s room, closing the door behind himself. He heard the automatic lock engage, the same soft whirr that the one in his room made, but it was quiet, lost under the sound of his own pulse tripping with the way Vash boxed him in against the door.

“Missed you.”

Wolfwood grinned.

“You saw me an hour ago,” he pointed out, one hand curling around the side of Vash’s neck, fingers brushing in the soft black hair at his nape. Wolfwood hadn’t liked that hair, at first. Hadn’t liked what it symbolized. Now, though, more than a year later, he’d grown to like it just as much as the blonde. Especially for the way it made Vash’s blue eyes stand out like they were now, searching Wolfwood’s face.

Like he needed to look for permission before he leaned in.

“I still missed you.”

This shouldn’t have still felt novel, shouldn’t have still made his heart do weird, complicated things, but every time Vash kissed him, it was a rush that couldn’t be matched even by the feeling of his accelerated healing kicking in. That hadn’t gone away and when Vash kissed him like this, pressing him into the closed door, the thrill was intoxicating.

Of anyone that Vash could have wanted, anyone this otherworldly, powerful creature could have wanted, it was him.

Wolfwood didn’t think he made a secret of how much he liked that. Not with the way he kissed back, the hand against Vash’s neck keeping him close, other hand sliding around Vash’s side. He wasn’t wearing all the things he’d had on at dinner. Just a thin white shirt, the loose fabric bunching under Wolfwood’s fingers as he guided Vash’s body into his own.

There were things the ships had provided to them that he was supremely appreciative of. One of those was the loose, comfortable sweatpants he’d worn to come here tonight. They were enough to keep him decent, but only just. They left nothing to the imagination when his body pressed into Vash’s.

Both of them gasped, and then Vash was laughing, soft, pressing their foreheads together.

“I was thinking about a shower, tonight.”

That was still a new concept for all of them. Constant, clean, hot running water, pouring down from a head in the wall. They had one in every room. It was a wonder. A treat.

And Wolfwood had found out they weren’t a terrible space to share with Vash.

“Thinking about sharing one?”

This close, Vash’s smile showing in his eyes was pretty much all Wolfwood could see. It was more than enough to show the hint of teasing that became all too apparent when Vash opened his mouth.

“You’re too easy.”

Pulling back, Wolfwood frowned. It wasn’t real, and he knew Vash would know it, even as he wormed out of his grasp, slipping away from between Vash and the door. Vash’s room was, maybe, a little bigger than his or Livio’s, but that was to be expected. Also meant that Wolfwood had enough space to stay out of Vash’s reach while he shrugged his shoulders, and tugged at the hem of his own shirt.

“Kind of rude, coming from the guy who said he missed me after an hour.”

Pulling the shirt off over his head, Wolfwood tossed it on the floor, meeting Vash’s eyes again.

He hadn’t moved much. Maybe a step or two forward when he’d been trying to catch Wolfwood, but now he was standing there, a safe distance away.

Looking Wolfwood over in ways Wolfwood would have dreamed of, just a year ago.

“Oh, you did really miss me,” he drawled, backing up a few steps towards the open doorway that led into Vash’s adjoined bathroom. That got Vash’s attention, his eyes flicking back up to Wolfwood’s face, the hunger toning down for just a second.

God, seeing it made Wolfwood weak in the knees, though.

Vash was, essentially, the closest thing to a damn angel as he was ever going to get, and Vash looked at him like he’d devour him and show him the true meaning of ‘heaven’ all at once? Wolfwood had not been a good enough person to deserve it, but he knew a thing or two about looking a gift horse in the mouth.

“It’s been a few days,” Vash reasoned, coming towards him. Wolfwood stepped backwards over the threshold of the bathroom. The movement caused the motion sensitive lighting to come on, a little brighter than Wolfwood might have liked, the white light reflecting off white surfaces. That could be adjusted, though, he wasn’t taking the time to do it now. His hands were too busy, undoing the tie on his sweatpants. “Not that it wasn’t nice to wake up next to you, the other morning.”

Two nights ago. When Vash had snuck into Wolfwood’s room, and, like the dumb, lovestruck idiots they were, they’d curled up in Wolfwood’s bed, trading kisses before they’d both fallen asleep.

Low stakes life.

Wolfwood could get used to it.

“If we’d woken up a little sooner...” Wolfwood started, letting Vash get close to him, now. He stopped right outside the bathroom, pulling that white shirt off. His expanse of marked up, scarred and healed skin stretched as he pulled it off over his head.

Some might be run off by that. Maybe Wolfwood, who couldn’t scar even if he wanted to, should have been. It was chilling, to see the things that his life had done to Vash, the souvenirs it had left him with, but Wolfwood had gotten used to them. Gotten used to the way they felt under his hands, against his chest, even the metal grating over the place where Vash’s heart should be.

Vash didn’t try to hide it or apologize for it anymore. It was good.

“You were saying something about waking up a little sooner?”

Vash stepped into the bathroom, and Wolfwood backed up, properly, giving him space. While Vash reached back behind himself to guide the sliding door shut, Wolfwood’s fingers reached out, hooking in his waistband to pull him closer, moving to the already loose knot in the strings. Clearly, Vash had barely made sure he was dressed enough. This had been his plan all along.

“If we’d woken up a little sooner the other morning, maybe we could’ve...” Wolfwood looked away from Vash’s waistband, meeting his eyes. His mouth quirked in a smile. “You might’ve been late for your check-ins, though.”

He could tell Vash was thinking about it, if not by the look in his eyes, then by the slow spread of pink in his cheeks.

“Would they know?”

Wolfwood knew Vash understood what he was asking. Would the Plants know? Would they understand why Vash had been late to visit them, if he’d stayed in bed with Wolfwood, and had a slow, sweet start to the day?

Instead of answering, Vash reached out, tugging Wolfwood’s sweats, that were already sitting low on his hips, down. It was the slightest tug, but they crumpled immediately, gathering up at his ankles while Vash stepped back, sliding off his own.

They were both bare underneath.

It was kind of ridiculous, how they’d both known where this was going to end up.

“Turn on the water, would you?” Vash asked, turning to the panel on the wall. Above them, the lights set into the ceiling changed tone from bright white to a lower, warmer orange. It definitely hurt Wolfwood’s eyes less as the shower started up, hot water hitting the floor, steam starting to fog up the room immediately.

Without waiting for an invite, Wolfwood stepped past the wide glass doors that walled the shower off from the rest of the bathroom, and under the spray. He’d set the temperature just right, in his opinion. The ships weren’t exactly cold, but they didn’t run hot, either, and this was nice.

Nicer was the press of Vash’s body behind him, two hands, one prosthetic, still cool against his skin, and one flesh, coming around his sides. Vash’s chin pressed into his shoulder, his chest against Wolfwood’s back, and Wolfwood sighed.

He didn’t deserve this.

He wouldn’t ever give it up without a hell of a fight.

“You wanted a shower, right?” he asked, after a second, one hand reaching back. The spray of water wasn’t hitting their heads, certainly wasn’t reaching all of Vash, and his hair was mostly dry, though Wolfwood could feel where he was getting hit with droplets, and his own hand was wet, sliding through the strands.

Behind him, Vash made a non-committal noise. “This is nice.”

Still, Wolfwood felt a kiss press to the back of his shoulder before Vash let him go, his right hand tapping at Wolfwood’s hip in a universal signal for ‘move’.

Obligingly, Wolfwood did, stepping back and letting Vash get under the water.

It wasn’t like he didn’t get something out of this, either.

They’d both learned, early on, that if something actually needed done, like a shower, then they needed to give each other space to do that, even if they were crammed into the stall together, and there was less than a foot of space between them, and while Wolfwood was standing there, he couldn’t do anything but look at Vash and want.

But, everything took longer if he didn’t keep his hands to himself, so he did, balling them into fists and crossing his arms, leaning on the cool, slick wall of the shower while he watched Vash scrub shampoo into his hair, the muscles moving under his skin, soapy water sluicing down his body, away, down the drain. Waiting until Vash stepped out from under the spray and gestured with his prosthetic hand for Wolfwood to take his place.

That arm was a wonder. Wolfwood didn’t have the first idea about how Brad had made the thing, and, if he had any kind of inclination to understand, maybe some day he’d sit Brad down and ask how he’d done it.

Then again, given the things that hand had done to him, he wasn’t sure he wanted to be talking to anyone but Vash about it.

Despite the fact that he had been perfectly respectful of the fact that Vash needed a minute to get himself something approaching clean, Wolfwood was fairly sure it was only forty or so seconds before he could feel Vash moving into his space. Head tipped back to rinse, he wiped a hand over one eye and then cracked it open to check.

As expected, Vash was watching him, standing close. There was a sheen on his skin that Wolfwood immediately understood had come from the bar of soap in his right hand, something he would need to rinse off.

“Can’t wait a minute?”

“Nope,” Vash answered, brightly. As though Wolfwood speaking had been permission, he moved in the rest of the way, right arm going around Wolfwood.

It should have been embarrassing, the way Wolfwood obediently tipped his face back down to meet Vash’s mouth, water running down his temples and cheeks from his wet hair. He’d barely finished what he needed to do, but Vash was close, touching him, and kissing him, and he couldn’t say no to that.

What he could do, though, was move them out of the spray, just enough. Both hands on Vash’s chest, finger catching on the metal on his chest, he got him back about two steps before he decided that was enough.

Letting his hand drift downwards, Wolfwood played his fingertips over Vash’s hip. It was unnecessary teasing, and he could tell that Vash thought the same from the way he kissed back, distracted for a second.

But, there was something so satisfying about the clunk of the soap bar hitting the floor when Wolfwood slid his hand between them, and ran up palm down the length of Vash’s cock. Maybe Vash had forgotten he was holding it, maybe he’d intended to put it back, but it didn’t really matter now.

What mattered was the way Vash’s hands came up, cupping his neck and keeping him close. Wolfwood pulled back as much as he’d let him, looking Vash’s face over.

Eyes closed, long lashes over his cheeks, flushed from this and from the warmth of the shower. Dark, dark hair framing his face, one strand stuck curled next to the mole under his eye. Teeth pressing into his lower lip, living a rosy little dent there.

Pressing harder when Wolfwood moved, stroking in slow touches.

Vash’s lips parted, eyebrows knitting together.

There were endless tomes of Plant research available on this ship, but Wolfwood did all of his learning right here. He discovered the most, in moments like this, like the way Vash’s body reacted to his touch, getting hard in just a few touches, leaking enough that Wolfwood’s palm felt slick when he moved in, letting Vash pull him into a hungry, open kiss, licking into his mouth like he needed to taste him to live.

Wolfwood wasn’t complaining. Wouldn’t dream of it. Not with how good it felt to have Vash this close, pushing into his hand. It wouldn’t be a secret to Vash, either; maybe Wolfwood didn’t react quite as fast, but there was no hiding how he was feeling, especially when his hand bumped his own cock, making him pause to breathe.

That had been the opening that Vash had been waiting for. The break where he could get things back under his own control.

“Turn around.”

Vash’s lips were warm and wet against his, between the way he’d been kissing him and the water and steam around them. Wolfwood didn’t hesitate following that request, couldn’t have if he’d tried to do it just to rile Vash up. He was riled enough already, his hands on Wolfwood’s sides guiding him to turn, to face the wall, before he was crowding in against his body.

Wolfwood could feel his cock bumping between his legs, the water-slick slide of it against his skin the perfect tease. One hand splayed against the damp shower wall, he let it slide, pressing his forehead against his forearm. Vash’s flesh fingers pressed into his hip, and his other hand...

“Fuck, Vash—”

This was why Wolfwood didn’t think he would ever be able to ask anyone but Vash himself a damn thing about that arm. Not without turning red, and thinking about the way those fingers pressed inside him. It shouldn’t have been allowed, and Wolfwood knew it was something about Vash, about the way he was moving his fingers, but it destroyed him, every time.

Made him the mess he was, right now, already, rocking back against Vash’s hand without thinking, chasing after that sweet feeling.

“Slow down, Nick.”

Vash’s lips, against his ear, his voice low and quiet, but there was a strain there that Wolfwood couldn’t miss. This was just as torturous for Vash, and of course it was. Wolfwood could feel him, hard against his thigh, could tell from the grip on his hip that he was barely keeping it together.

“You don’t need to do all that,” Wolfwood huffed, turning his head against his own arm to look at Vash over his shoulder. He looked gorgeous in this light, the dimness of it only lighting him up enough for Wolfwood to see the flash of his eyes, the edge of his smile. There was a faint glow to his skin, now, that had little to do with soap or anything else.

Wolfwood swallowed.

In reply, Vash pressed a kiss to his cheek, and then another, before his fingers pressed deep, curling up inside Wolfwood, and if he hadn’t had the wall to lean on, he might have collapsed.

It was bad enough as it was, the sound he made echoing off the smooth white walls, easy to hear over the running water. They didn’t need to add the sound of him collapsing on the floor.

“But I like to do all this,” Vash murmured, his voice still so close, fingers moving slower, now. “You like it so much...”

“Vash, you’re gonna fuckin’ kill me.”

There had been a time, very, very early on, when Wolfwood had uttered that sentence, and Vash had backed off immediately, believing he’d done something wrong. Now, he made the problem somewhere in the neighbourhood of thirty times worse, laughing softly.

He did let up, though, fingers sliding out and leaving Wolfwood feeling equal parts empty, needy, and eager.

Not for long, though.

Wolfwood’s other hand, the one that wasn’t bracing his forehead against the wall, curled, his breath coming out slow and shaky. Vash’s hand slid from his hip to his stomach, bracing him, his warm palm pressing against the muscles there while his other hand, the one that he’d been using to take Wolfwood apart just a minute before, moved to grip his other hip.

There was no explaining how good it felt when Vash pushed inside him. He couldn’t have expected it, hadn’t known how much he’d love it until the first time. Then, he’d been on his knees in his own bed, Vash curled over him while he whined into a pillow, asking if it was okay, if it hurt.

No, it never did, and maybe that was some kind of fucked up, weird Plant thing, or maybe Vash was just really good at prepping him, but either way, Wolfwood didn’t care. Hadn’t then, didn’t now.

He hadn’t stopped needing it, since that time, and he knew Vash knew it. He could feel it in the way Vash pressed up against him, cock pushing deep inside before he pulled his hips back, rocking forward slow, careful, like he might break Wolfwood.

Maybe he could. Wolfwood might welcome it.

“Drivin’ me crazy, spikey...”

The hand against his stomach moved, drifting up, against his chest.

“I know.”

Like Wolfwood speaking was all he’d needed to know he wasn’t about to pass away then and there, though, Vash moved faster, the hand on Wolfwood’s hip guiding him back to meet him on every push in. Forehead against his shoulder, Vash groaned.

“So good – ah, Ni- Nick—”

It hadn’t been a secret that Wolfwood had needed to guess at, when he’d gotten there tonight, but it was always nice to hear and feel exactly how much Vash had wanted him, and just how much he was enjoying it.

“Losing it already?” he asked, not sounding put together himself with the way his voice shook.

And the way he closed his eyes and whined a second later when Vash pulled his hips back and ground into him. God, it wasn’t fair how good that felt, and how Vash knew it would shut him up immediately, make him dumb for a few long seconds, eyes closed, breath coming in shaky pants against the wall. At least Vash took pity on him, picking up his rhythm again, one foot knocking against Wolfwood’s.

Getting him to spread his legs wider.

Change the angle.

Make it so Wolfwood couldn’t string together two words of sass again when Vash pressed into him. This was better, for both of them, and Wolfwood knew it, but he wasn’t thinking straight anymore. Not with Vash leaning over him, the wet slap of their skin hardly enough to drown out the praise he was heaping on Wolfwood.

“Need you, need this—”

Vash’s cock was hitting that spot inside him, the one that made it hard for Wolfwood to keep up.

“So good for me, Nick, ah—”

Between the rough, whispered tone of Vash’s voice and the way he was fucking him, no one could have blamed Wolfwood for the sounds he was making. Needy, growly little whimpers, forehead pressing hard into his own arm, eyes staring, unfocused, at the wall.

He could come like this. Just from this alone, and he had before. Vash had made him lose it with nothing but his cock and his sweet words, making Wolfwood muffle himself into his own hand, caught up in nothing but good feelings.

Wolfwood could come from this, but he still reached down with his free hand, wrapping it around his own cock, moving quick and trying to match the way Vash was pushing into him.

Against his chest, Vash’s hand pressed harder.

The fingers on his hip squeezed.

“That’s it...”

Vash’s mouth was against the back of his neck, hot breath making goosebumps pop up when it shouldn’t have been possible. Not in here, where the hot water from the shower had made the room thick with steam, and Wolfwood was so warm all over anyway from what they were doing.

“Don’t—”

Vash’s teeth pressed against his shoulder, and Wolfwood groaned, his own voice echoing back at him, the tension in his body ratcheting.

Even if he hadn’t gotten the second word out, Vash understood.

He didn’t stop, pushing Wolfwood closer to the wall, closer to the edge. Vash had him exactly where he wanted him, and they both knew it. Wolfwood barely had space to keep his hand on himself, he’d turned his cheek against his arm, panting into his elbow, and Vash was right there. Crowding him in, fucking him hard and fast.

His forehead pressed against Wolfwood’s hair, so close Wolfwood could hear the whimper on his every exhale, could see the telltale blue glow on his skin, geometric little patterns brightening the closer Vash got.

There, trapped between the wall and Vash’s body, Wolfwood felt everything sweeten, cresting to a perfect, bright point of bliss that had him gasping for breath, his own hand moving furiously, Vash whispering in his ear.

The sound he made when he came was too loud. It would have been bad outside the shower, but it was worse in here. Not that Wolfwood cared much, or noticed, desperately stroking himself through it, painting a mess on the shower wall, knees feeling properly weak, now.

If it wasn’t for the way Vash was holding him, arm viced around him while he shamelessly chased his own high, Wolfwood knew he’d be sliding to the floor. He’d happily lay there getting drowned by the shower, glad to have gone out the way he did.

That didn’t happen, though, because Vash wouldn’t let him go. Not until he’d had his fill.

Taking his arm off the wall, Wolfwood let his cheek rest against it, reaching back, threading his fingers into Vash’s wet hair.

“Come on, sweetheart...”

Vash’s face pressed into his neck, his hips moving erratically. The markings on his skin were so bright, shining in the dim orange light. He was so close.

“...Let go...”

Vash let out a strangled noise, his hands holding hard enough to bruise, pulling Wolfwood back to meet him. It was a lot, too much, but Wolfwood loved it, fingers tightening in Vash’s hair.

“That’s it, that’s—”

Vash’s teeth bit down on his shoulder again, harder, this time, and Wolfwood slammed his other hand against the wall, bracing himself as Vash whined, holding him tight when he came.

It was pathetic, how good that felt, the way Wolfwood idly wondered every time if he could get off again just from feeling Vash come inside him, from hearing the way he gasped against his skin, breathy whispers of ‘fuck... fuck, Nick’ music to his damn ears.

“Need you to cuss a bit more, it’s fucking hot.”

Vash let out a laugh that was more of a whimper, face pressed against Wolfwood’s shoulder, muffling whatever he said in reply.

“What was that?”

Vash lifted his head, leaning in again. He hadn’t slipped out, yet, and he was so close that the movement pressed Wolfwood into the wall. Pressed him in, making Wolfwood hiss at how oversensitive he was.

Chin against Wolfwood’s shoulder, Vash repeated, “you’re too coherent.”

Wolfwood laughed.

This was stupid. He was being pressed up against a shower wall, fucked out, happy as hell to be standing there. Not all that long ago he’d been considered some kind of ruthless killing machine.

“If it bothers you, I could stay the night.”

Vash hummed, his hands drifting down Wolfwood’s sides to hold him still as he pulled out. It wasn’t an unpleasant feeling, but Wolfwood shivered, making a face when he felt something slip down his inner thigh.

It didn’t matter how many times Wolfwood had argued that this wasn’t a good use of the slim resources they had left to get them through until Livio got back, or the crew from Ship 3 arrived. He had been argued down, not only by Vash, but by Melanie and, for some reason, the kids. It was one thing to try and argue with an infuriatingly patient blondie and Melanie, who had never once pulled her punches on being firm with him, but when you added in a trio of whiny kids saying they’d actually be less worried about him if he just did what they were saying he should, arguing became futile.

“What, do I stink or something?”

“If we say yes, will that make you do it quicker?”

“Because yes, Mr Nico, you stink!”

That had been, maybe, hopefully, a lie, but Wolfwood hadn’t been able to keep up the fight. Ignoring the triumphant smirk on Melanie’s face, and the way Vash was trying and failing to hide his own smile behind his prosthetic hand, Wolfwood had given a big shrug and turned, marching himself off towards the big, semi-private bathing room at the other end of the orphanage.

Semi-private because the damn door didn’t lock. That hadn’t really been that much of an issue, when he’d been a kid here, because everyone was running around, coming and going, and it had never been a concern to want the door locked. It was better, Wolfwood reasoned. It allowed Melanie and the other older kids like himself the ability to get into the room if something was suspected to be going wrong.

Now, though, as a grown man, he wasn’t sure he wanted to run the risk of someone barging in to see if he’d died in the tub. There was no getting around it, though. If he jammed the single chair in the room up against the handle, he knew there was at least one person who would be strong enough to still break the thing down and come in to make sure he hadn’t nearly left this plane of existence. Again.

It was that chair that Wolfwood sat in now while he watched the tub fill with hot water. Again, he thought this was a waste of resources, and it wasn’t like he exactly had wounds that needed regular tending. Hell, he wasn’t even using the crutch anymore. The hole Livio’s – Razlo’s – Punisher had blasted through his lower leg had filled in, muscles knitting back together, skin regrowing over it. There wasn’t even a single damn scar to show what his body had gone through.

Just the dull ache that hadn’t quite gone yet.

Standing and turning off the faucet, Wolfwood unwrapped the towel from around his waist, glancing at the door again. The other side of it was silent, everyone going about their usual day as though they weren’t trying to stay afloat long enough for the cavalry to arrive. He didn’t have anything to worry about, no reason to think he might not have this time to himself.

Dropping the towel onto the worn seat of the wooden chair, he stepped into the bath, letting out a slow breath as he eased himself down into the hot water.

That ache had been what had led him to this position now.

It had started innocently enough.

Picking up the clean cloth draped over the side of the tub, Wolfwood lowered it into the water, and then rubbed the soap bar into it vigorously.

He’d woken up this morning not needing the crutch, and walking without it while he’d done his circuit of the orphanage. The kids had all still been asleep then, quiet in their beds, lined up the same way they’d been when he’d grown up here. Melanie had been awake, her bed made, and Wolfwood knew she would be somewhere in the building, preparing for breakfast.

As for Vash...

Seeing him in the place that Wolfwood considered home was weird. He shouldn’t have fit in here, he didn’t belong here, and yet, he did. Every time Wolfwood saw him on the grounds, or with the kids, he just fit. He was a stranger, he wasn’t like the rest of them, that much had been something the kids and Melanie had seen for themselves, but he belonged here just the same as Wolfwood did.

He belonged in the kitchen, next to Melanie, finishing spooning out the breakfast foods into their big, communal dishes. Talking to her in low, hushed tones, even as the bell rang for the children to wake, smiling at something she said.

Rubbing the cloth over his chest, Wolfwood remembered that smile, and the way it had changed when he’d seen Wolfwood standing in the doorway.

The sounds of small feet moving around upstairs had made the ceiling above them rumble, but Wolfwood hadn’t thought to even notice that.

Vash’s smile could light up a damn room. Any room.

Hell, it could light up the end of the world. That was something he’d learned fairly recently, and it was sticking with him. Hard to forget. Harder still when Vash wouldn’t stop turning the thing on him, even with that edge of concern it had as he’d come towards him.

“You’re up without the crutch. How’re you doing?”

This was where he’d gotten himself in trouble.

“Fine. Body hurts a bit, but nothing I can’t handle.”

It had been nothing but an offhand statement. Something to make Vash stop looking at him like that, like he had barely made it off Death’s doorstep, when the reality was that he’d gotten off the doorstep, down the walk, and out of the front yard. Vash hadn’t seen it that way, though, and neither had Melanie. Big wooden spoon in her hand, bits of clumpy breakfast meal clinging to it, she’d pointed at him.

“You should take a hot bath. Don’t open your mouth to argue with me, Nicholas. Your body needs it.”

Problem was, he couldn’t tell her that his body probably didn’t need it, because it was probably in his head. Between the vials he carried, and Livio’s blood, there was no reason his body should need anything else, much less a hot bath. It was the truth, plain and simple, but there were some things about the ways he’d changed that Wolfwood just didn’t want to shove in Melanie’s face.

Not yet.

She’d seen him fighting Razlo. She’d found out enough for now.

It might have been an easy thing to wave off, pushing himself through to help with getting the food out for breakfast, supervising while the kids came through with their bowls and general lack of coordination, if Vash hadn’t stood there nodding.

“Melanie’s right. You went through a lot, Wolfwood. It will be nice! Relaxing!”

Melanie had just about spoken over him, her tone so familiar that it had coaxed Wolfwood’s teenage instinct to push back and sass her to the surface. “And when’s the last time you took a bath?”

Right on cue, then, had been when the kids had started to show up. Wolfwood knew when he was outnumbered and, maybe in an actual fight, the Punisher humming in his hands, he would refuse to give in, but this? Over a bath?

And maybe Vash had a point.

Squeezing out the cloth, his skin rubbed pink with soap, Wolfwood draped it over the edge again, sliding down further into the water.

He didn’t deserve to relax.

Right now, he shouldn’t relax.

There was too much to worry about, with Knives planning whatever he was, and the immigrant fleet not far off from arriving. He should be out there, helping to make sure that they were ready, when Livio returned. They’d need to get the kids to safety before anything else could happen, and he had to do his part to help with that, rather than laying in here, worrying about body aches, and other things that were only in his head.

Unfortunately, there was a lot in his head, these last few days.

The least of which was that damn smile.

Laying on the ground, in a pool of his own blood, vision going hazy, breath harder to take, heart pounding to try and keep him going, Wolfwood hadn’t expected to remember that smile. The way Vash would look at him, those blue eyes so sweet behind his glasses. The way that smile had been constant, present, pulling Wolfwood along behind Vash until he’d changed in ways he wouldn’t have thought himself capable of.

Until he could think of himself as maybe, possibly, beginning to approach being worthy of getting that smile turned on him the way he did. Day to day, moment to moment.

Nicholas D. Wolfwood wasn’t necessarily a good man, but Vash hadn’t seen it that way, and, really, it was because of him that Wolfwood was here, now.

Proud of where he was standing.

Yeah, there was a lot in his head, and it was harder to ignore than he’d thought it would be. Before, Wolfwood had been able to push those things aside and focus on something else.

It was bad, now.

It didn’t help that Vash hadn’t let up for a damn minute since they’d taken Wolfwood off the ground outside the orphanage and brought him inside. He’d been there, semi-constantly, when he wasn’t keeping watch outside for Livio, or any signs of anything else. Every morning at breakfast. Every night in the quiet dark.

Wolfwood sighed, tipping his head back against the edge of the tub.

Vash had been with him last night. He’d been spending so much time watching the horizon, but when Wolfwood had called it a day, Vash had followed him in. He’d settled himself next to Wolfwood’s bed and leaned in, talking to him softly. Asking how he was healing.

Running his flesh fingers through Wolfwood’s stark, silvery-white hair and smiling, because to Vash that was a sign that things hadn’t been as bad as they could have.

Always that stupid damn smile.

So close, and so pretty, and Wolfwood was a sucker for it. He knew that, now. He was fully aware of it, feeling the way his heart had sped up, not out of a desperation to keep him alive, but from the mere brush of Vash’s fingers against his scalp.

This was why the door in this room should lock, Wolfwood thought idly. The water was cooling, not nearly as hot as it had been when he’d gotten in, but it was still warm, and he wasn’t done. Embarrassingly, he wasn’t finished.

Thinking about Vash had pushed him to that.

And he should feel guilty, because he was supposed to be out there, helping. He hadn’t even needed this bath.

But Vash’s smile this morning, the way he’d brought a hand up to cover his mouth, to try and hide it, even while he met Wolfwood’s eyes, even while he knew Wolfwood could see it, that wouldn’t leave his mind. Wouldn’t let Wolfwood be.

Maybe this wasn’t the time, but it had been so long...

Opening his eyes, Wolfwood glanced at the door, listening, straining his ears to hear anything but the silence in the hallway beyond, and the sounds of the orphanage in motion distant, too distant to be a concern. He reached for the soap bar, running his palm over it while he watched the knob, as though somehow, now, it was going to turn and someone was going to walk in on him.

But it didn’t, and the space outside it stayed quiet, not a single distraction to stop Wolfwood as he slipped even lower in the tub and lowered his hand, fingers wrapping around his cock.

It had been a while. The last time Wolfwood had done this had been months ago, and he’d been holed up in a room on the Ark. One with a door that locked, getting off quick into his own hand and trying not to think about why he’d needed it, because that would have meant confronting some things about himself, and about why he’d ended up there after watching Vash argue with his brother on the security feed.

That wasn’t this.

Wolfwood knew, as his hand moved slow, warm water lapping against his chest, exactly why he was doing this.

Because of Vash.

Everything because of him.

He couldn’t even be mad about it. Even if he wanted to. Midvalley had called it out, months ago, and Wolfwood had known it then, even joked about it to Vash. Razlo had seen it, mocked it. Wolfwood himself had accepted it, in the moments he’d thought might be his last.

Vash had changed him. Wormed his way past the walls he put up, under his skin, right into his heart. He’d made it possible for Wolfwood to know who he really was, who he could be, outside of the Eye of Michael, apart from the Punisher.

All with those damn smiles, those pretty eyes looking at him and saying he was good.

Wolfwood’s free hand lifted out of the water, gripping the side of the tub.

He didn’t need to rush this, like he had last time, chasing the high until he was choking back the sounds his mouth desperately wanted to make. This time, Wolfwood could take it slow, eyes closed, hips pushing up to meet his own hand in a careful, torturous pace.

If things were different...

When things were different...

Maybe Vash would let this happen. They could fall into bed somewhere, anywhere. Hell, it wouldn’t need to be a bed. Wolfwood would take anything, anywhere, just to have Vash close to him. To get him out of that huge coat, and all his clothes. To feel Vash’s body against his, Vash’s breath on his neck, Wolfwood’s needy hands on his skin, pulling him closer.

His thumb squeaked against the side of the tub, his grip tightening.

Vash on top of him. Vash, smiling like that at him while they fucked. Vash smiling while he was feeling so good, and it being because of him, because of Wolfwood.

“Fuck,” Wolfwood whispered, brows knitting. He was close, Vash’s smile playing on the inside of his eyelids. The way it would go a little slack, his eyes closing, head tipping back--

“Wolfwood?”

That hadn’t been in his head and Wolfwood knew it. It had come with a soft little rap of knuckles against the door. Polite, and careful, but Wolfwood had frozen, head lifting, eyes snapping open, to stare at the door like it was about to open.

Like he might be about to be caught.

“What, blondie?”

That didn’t sound quite right, his voice a little thicker than he would have wanted, and Wolfwood cleared his throat.

“Sorry – what is it? Everything okay?”

On the other side of the door, Vash spoke, his voice soft and a little apologetic. “Oh, yeah, everything’s fine! I just wanted to check on you.”

Had he been in here for a long time? He couldn’t have been.

“I’m almost finished. I’ll be out soon.”

There was silence on the other side of the door and, for a second, Wolfwood thought Vash had left. He could imagine it. A little nod, satisfied with Wolfwood’s answer, before he trotted off. Heading back outside to perch himself on the ledge and watch for any signs of help.

It stretched for long enough that Wolfwood started to believe that was it. His body hadn’t reacted to the sudden panic, and he could still feel the need, the demand to finish what he’d started, prodding at him. Cautiously, Wolfwood settled back against the tub, again, eyes still on the door.

Almost as though he knew Wolfwood had relaxed, Vash spoke again. His voice was still soft, but the note of apology was gone, replaced with something else.

Something knowing.

“You should finish. Take your time.”

Wolfwood swallowed. Something in his stomach flipped, the hand on his cock sliding up, squeezing at the head. He’d felt the interest there.

Did Vash know what he was doing in here?

How could he? Wolfwood hadn’t given anything away.

He didn’t think he’d given anything away.

“Whole point of this was for you to feel good.”

Wolfwood let out his breath in a huff. Not better. No, Vash hadn’t used the word ‘better’. He was standing there, on the other side of the door, feet away from where Wolfwood had been laying, thinking about making Vash feel good, and Vash was saying the whole point of this was for Wolfwood to feel good.

He should have felt guilty about the way he shifted in the water, his hand moving again, stroking over his length faster, now. Wolfwood needed this, he couldn’t ignore it. The guilt could come later.

If it came at all.

Vash’s voice was quiet through the door. “Does it feel good?”

He knew. He had to know. He couldn’t have been that unaware. Wolfwood felt like the sound of the water lapping back and forth around him was loud as hell, giving it away.

If it wasn’t, his own voice when he answered without stopping it would have. Rough, a little shaky.

“Feels great.”

It wasn’t a lie. This was better. If Vash didn’t know, maybe, it could have been wrong. It might have been perverse of Wolfwood, but he didn’t think Vash was ignorant. He was there, right there, on the other side of the door. Close enough that he could come in here. The door didn’t lock.

Vash could come in. He could close the door behind him. Wolfwood would let him have anything he wanted, do anything he wanted.

“I’m so glad you’re enjoying it...”

Wolfwood’s hand, the one that had been gripping the edge of the tub, came up, knuckles pressing against his mouth.

“Wolfwood...”

Vash didn’t sound like he didn’t know what was happening. The bastard was standing out there, this close, knowing Wolfwood was in here, hand on his own cock, desperately chasing that good, good feeling that was teasing just at the edge of his reach. Did he know he was the reason why, that, right now, as Wolfwood pushed into his own hand, movements getting reckless, cooled water sloshing up against the sides of the tub, his face was the only thing Wolfwood could picture?

A sigh.

“Wolfwood...”

This was torture. This was delicious, perfect fucking torture, and Wolfwood hadn’t known this was what he needed. Head tipped to the side, eyes struggling to focus on the door, his cheek pressed to the edge of the tub, uncomfortable but unnoticed because this was what he’d been needing. This could fix him, if only for a little while.

The door knob didn’t rattle, it didn’t even move, but there was a soft sound from it, like Vash’s hand had wrapped around the other side.

“Nicholas.”

There was no way Wolfwood managed to strangle the noise that came out of him. Not entirely, not in time. It was needy, mindless, slipping through his lips before he forced himself to bite down on his fist, sliding lower into the water. It was at his shoulders, and if he wasn’t careful he’d slide too far down and cause himself real trouble, but that wasn’t registering.

The only thing that was, was the bright, beautiful sting of pleasure singing through his body, making his bones buzz, the only thing in his head the same as it had been this entire time.

Vash’s smile.

The one he was probably wearing on the other side of the door, now, so close but too damn far away, listening while Wolfwood fought for breath, his orgasm rolling through his body until he could finally push himself back up in the water, blinking at the mess he’d made.

All because of Vash.

At least no one would know. It would swirl away down the drain with the bathwater.

Well. No one except...

Wolfwood turned his head, looking at the closed door again.

Like Vash knew he’d looked, there was a soft tap against the door, and then, just as soft and careful as he’d been this whole time, Vash spoke.

Wolfwood could hear the smile, now.

It didn’t seem like something a Plant should be able to do but, then again, Nicholas D Wolfwood hadn’t spent his time at the orphanage reading up on How Plants Worked, because he had not had one single aspiration to be some kind of Plant engineer or whatever.

Funny how things worked out.

Still, even if he didn’t know much, Wolfwood knew enough to know that, in general, Plants did not just up and spin someone off to another dimension, or whatever the hell had happened to him. They made water, and generated electricity, and helped with food production. All that good, somewhat normal stuff that humanity needed to survive from day to day, week to week.

Not interdimensional travel. Right?

Vash probably would’ve told him if that was just a thing that some Plants could do, wouldn’t he? They’d had conversations about it. It was interesting, in a way. Wolfwood didn’t know much, Vash could’ve told him anything. Maybe, if he had told Wolfwood that, Wolfwood would have laughed it off as a very bad, unconvincing joke, and moved on.

But he would have remembered that. He was sure he would have remembered that.

Not that it mattered, right now, because unless Vash had told him explicitly how that all was supposed to work, Wolfwood was shit outta luck to figure his way out of this one without help.

And help was...

“You’re so fluffy.”

Fingers raked through his hair, wrapping some of it into a spiral and dropping it back down. Wolfwood’s shoulders tensed, and instead of backing off, the hand came back, repeating that little movement.

“What the hell are you talking about?”

Jerking away from the touch, Wolfwood turned, glaring at the owner of the overly-touchy hand.

One Vash the Stampede, but not his Vash.

This one, somehow, seemed taller, though maybe that was just the fact that he was carrying himself without what seemed to be a care in the world. Red coat, but this one was a duster, buttons up the front, high neck, straps. Orange sunglasses, but, noticeably smaller, more manageable, minus the design of the frames. Prosthetic arm, that much Wolfwood could tell, but where his Vash had a very obvious jade beauty made of old tech, unless you knew this Vash had that arm, you might not guess right away, under the straps and leather.

And, yeah, there were a lot of straps and leather.

Like, a lot.

Like, Wolfwood kind of wondered exactly how long it took him to get in and out of all of it if he needed to.

For no reason at all. Really, for no reason.

“Your hair. I don’t know, it’s so different. You’re fluffy, like a Tomas chick. My Wolfwood isn’t so fluffy. It’s cute. It’s like you’re not a fully formed—”

“—You’re an idiot.”

Vash beamed, pointing at him.

“That is like my Wolfwood, though. Words of love. I understand how you talk.”

Wolfwood could feel himself bristling.

This Vash was something he was having a hard time getting a handle on, and he didn’t like that. On top of the whole ‘getting sent to another dimension by a Plant’ thing, trying to work out how to wrangle a new Humanoid Typhoon that was still enough like his to be uncanny, was not a party.

Sometimes Wolfwood thought that the things he went through meant he really was sort of owed some kind of party, but the powers above had not seen fit to provide just yet.

They certainly hadn’t when they had seen fit to allow a Plant to pluck Wolfwood from the dusty, backwater town he and Vash had been staying in, just to plonk him down in a different dusty, backwater town.

That had been yesterday. One minute, normal, bickering with Vash about the way to go about dealing with some thugs that were causing trouble in town. The next, very not normal, very much knocked ass over tea kettle in the sand, rolled up against the massive supports of this new town’s Plant tank, without his Vash, without the Punisher, and without any real idea of what had happened.

And this guy hadn’t been much help.

He’d been there, of course. First thing Wolfwood saw when he got himself upright. Staring at him like he was some kind of strange worm, eyes huge behind those sunglasses, hands clasped in front of his chest while he looked Wolfwood over before saying, extremely unhelpfully, “all right then.”

It was decidedly not ‘all right then’. From that moment on, Wolfwood had been dealing with a Vash who knew exactly who he was, and had a maddeningly simple but likely accurate idea of what had happened (“I think the Plant swapped you with my Wolfwood”), but who couldn’t seem to keep his hands to himself, and wouldn’t stop staring at him. Wolfwood had almost been afraid to go to sleep, before he’d discovered that if he shoved a chair under the handle of his door at the inn, it couldn’t be opened.

That had been a relief for all of a few hours, before he’d woken up and found Vash sitting at the table in the room, the curtains waving softly in the night breeze, staring at him. And all Vash had done was smile and say “I just wanted to make sure you were having sweet dreams.”

That had, really, been the end of any sweet dreams Wolfwood had been having. They had reached some kind of messed up silent agreement where Vash stayed where he was, and Wolfwood rolled over in bed and tried to pretend he couldn’t feel himself being stared at.

By the time morning had come, just a few hours ago, Wolfwood was more than ready to really try to figure this out. The concept of the whole thing reversing itself on its own was clearly not going to happen. Wolfwood was going to have to tackle getting back to his Vash himself.

Or, as it turned out, with this Vash following along with him as he made his way to stand at the end of the dusty road leading up to the Plant tank, yammering away the whole time. Wolfwood hadn’t really been listening; maybe if he had been, he would have understood what had led up to being called fluffy.

He didn’t really want to, though.

“If you’re going to stand there petting me, can you at least try to think and help me out?”

Vash grinned, moving closer. His fingers flexed, the subtle movement of it threatening as hell.

“You’re going to let me pet you if I do?”

Wolfwood gritted his teeth. What was this guy’s problem?

“I didn’t say that!”

Quickly enough that Wolfwood didn’t really have time to register it, Vash moved in close to him, both hands coming up to cup his face. He used that hold to press their foreheads together, a dramatic sigh coming out of him before he said, “you didn’t need to, my love, I know what you want from me.”

Wolfwood’s hands pressed up between them, shoving Vash back a few steps. He could feel heat spreading up from under his own collar, something he tried very hard to ignore. For his part, Vash was smirking, or, more, he was trying to pretend he wasn’t, trying to look innocent as he batted his eyelashes at Wolfwood.

“I changed my mind, hands to yourself!”

Vash shrugged, an annoyingly placid smile on his face.

“Suit yourself, Nico.”

Now, that was something he didn’t need to hear coming out of that mouth when, a second ago, Vash had absolutely been coming on to him. He was so much more forward than Wolfwood’s Vash. No hesitancy there, he wasn’t waiting for some kind of build-up that would break the dam and let everything loose. There was no dam, here.

“Just try and think of a way to fix this, all right?”

Shaking his head, annoyance coursing through his veins and attempting to neutralize the other feelings he’d been fighting a minute ago, Wolfwood moved away from Vash to sit himself down at a table outside one of the nearby saloons. It was damn hot in the sun, and he was having a hard enough time thinking already; he didn’t need to add that to it.

And he needed a smoke. That thought was almost background as he brought a cigarette to his lips, lighting it and tucking his lighter back away as the chair across from him dragged out. Vash sat down in it, propping his chin on his hands, elbows on the table top. He was staring again.

“That’s not helping, needle-noggin.”

The second the nickname had passed through his lips, Wolfwood knew a few things.

One, he wasn’t sure how he felt about using that one for this Vash. Yes, this was some kind of version of his Vash – some very peppy, very handsy, very unfortunately intuitive version – but he’d never once used any nickname for Vash on anyone else.

Two, Vash loved it.

There was no way around pretending that wasn’t the case. Not with the big, stupid grin that spread across his stupid face, and the way he reached out, both hands grabbing both of Wolfwood’s, pulling him bodily across the table towards himself. The suddenness of it jostled the fresh cig from Wolfwood’s mouth, bouncing it into the sand, and he wasn’t sure what was more annoying; that, or this.

“You use it, too. That’s one of my favourite petnames.”

Wolfwood tensed, stopping in the middle of trying to pull his hands free – was this one stronger than his Vash, or just less willing to give in? – to stare across the table.

Petnames.

“It’s not a petname, it’s a nickname!”

Vash smiled serenely.

“You’ll catch on eventually. You’re just starting out. You haven’t figured out how in lo-”

“-Let go!”

Wolfwood wasn’t sure if Vash had loosened his grip, or if he had just managed to finally use enough strength to get himself free. All he knew was that one second he was desperately yanking out of Vash’s hands, needing that sentence to not be finished, and the next he was toppling over backwards, both him and the chair rolling off the edge of the wooden boards that made up the front porch of the saloon and landing on the dusty ground.

It was a damn good thing they were outside the saloon, rather than inside it. If they’d been sitting inside, Wolfwood would’ve had to deal with a hell of a lot more eyes on him. As it was, as he rolled from his back onto his front and pushed up, he had to glare at a couple walking past, inspiring them to look away again and mind their own damn business.

“I like your slippers.”

Still on the ground on all fours – probably a very bad position to be putting himself in – Wolfwood glared over his shoulder. Sitting at the table, one leg crossed over the other, Vash was smiling at him, eyes half-lidded. When Wolfwood, instead of vocally asking what the hell he was talking about now, gave him a look that did the same thing, Vash tipped his chin, indicating Wolfwood’s feet.

Oh.

“They’re not slippers.”

Standing up, finally, he righted the chair and slammed it back down onto the wooden boards before sitting in it again. This time, he kept his hands close to himself.

“They’re just shoes. Not ridiculous ones like whatever you have going on with those boots.”

As he said it, Vash lifted the leg that was crossed over, both of them looking at the complicated, nearly knee-high leather footwear he was wearing. Not to mention, more belts. And Wolfwood thought his Vash had clunky boots. He wasn’t going to criticize them again any time soon.

If and when he got back to even see the damn things on him.

“Anyway, can we focus again? How do I get back? And aren’t you missing your Wolfwood?”

That seemed to snap Vash out of whatever train of thought he had been in. For a second, Wolfwood swore he saw something like genuine concern flash over his face.

“Well, sure. But, he can handle himself. He’s always getting me out of sticky jams, I’m sure he’ll be back soon. Knows I can’t get by without him.”

That hadn’t been at all what Wolfwood had been expecting. This guy had been so much for the entire sixteen hours that he’d known him, and Wolfwood had fully expected to be waved off, misdirected or outright ignored when he asked what he had. Instead, Vash’s tone had been almost soft, a little wistful. Maybe there was something serious in there after all, some part that was more like the Vash he’d left in his dimension.

“I hope he gets back soon, though. If he gets back, and you stay? Oh boy, sorry to your Vash but yippee for me. Two Wolfwoods.”

And, there he went. Shoving up from the table, Wolfwood left, shaking his head as he walked away, heading, instead, up the dusty road towards the Plant. Maybe he would think better if he was closer to the thing that he suspected might have the ability to get him out of this mess, especially if it had somehow gotten him into it in the first place.

That, and he needed to walk off the feeling that Vash’s actually insightful words had left him with.

The other him was probably very capable, Wolfwood didn’t doubt it. He’d dealt with this Vash for who knew how long. And now, he was probably with Wolfwood’s own Vash, so at least blondie wouldn’t be without someone to watch his back when he was too busy being a sacrificial lamb to do it himself, but...

A spike of something like jealousy went through Wolfwood. If that Wolfwood was anything like this Vash, the whole game that he’d been wrapped up in, back home, the one where he and Vash danced around the elephant in the room without acknowledging it, slowly going mad, might have gone right out the window.

Wolfwood wasn’t sure he’d blame Vash if he let whoever this Vash’s Wolfwood was sweep him off his feet and--

Shoving that thought aside as he shoved his hands in his pockets, Wolfwood glanced over his shoulder.

As suspected, there was his red-clad shadow.

“What are the Plants like, here?” he asked, hoping to keep them on topic. “Where I’m from, they’re generators, mostly. Electricity, water, heat, food production... Is it the same here?”

Jogging to catch up to him – just a few short strides, really – Vash hummed, clearly thinking.

“I would say so, yep. More or less.” His eyes watched Wolfwood’s face as he slowly said his next few words. “How much do you know about your Vash?”

“I know,” Wolfwood said, flatly. “I know you’re a—”

Vash’s arm swung around his shoulders, tugging Wolfwood into his side, and his leather gloved hand clapped over Wolfwood’s mouth.

“Right, you know enough to be dangerous! I like that in my preacher man.”

Working his face loose from Vash’s hold, Wolfwood snapped, “I’m not a preacher man, I’m an undertaker!”

“Oooh, edgy! Okay, well, I like that in my undertaker. Now, let’s try keeping our voices down and get back on track. So, you know, then, it’s a little more complicated than, say, Plants being generic batteries.”

Oh, yeah.

Wolfwood understood that, loud and clear. That was why he had a very, very strong suspicion that he knew how he’d ended up here. The means, anyway, if not the reason.

“So, if that’s how it is, you really think the Plant could have done this?”

“That… is a very good question,” Vash said, making all the right expressions to show he was thinking about it. He couldn’t have been thinking about it all that hard, though; his arm was still locked around Wolfwood’s shoulders, and no matter how Wolfwood squirmed, somehow he wasn’t getting free “I guess it’s possible. It made the most sense at the time. Even I don’t know every single thing a Plant can do.”

Wolfwood sensed the truth in that. His Vash didn’t either, and even if this one seemed like there was a layer under this facade that had seen a lot of shit and knew a lot because of it, Wolfwood suspected it could still be difficult to fully bridge the gap between dependent and independent.

Their stroll had brought them much closer to the Plant, now, and, after ducking quickly to slip out of Vash’s grasp, Wolfwood craned his neck back, moving even closer. The damn tank was huge, much bigger than the ones he was used to seeing. Did that mean these ones were stronger? Different in some incredibly notable and drastic way?

Glancing over his shoulder at Vash, Wolfwood wondered. 

“So, if the Plant did this…” Wolfwood started, looking up at the thing. It was curled up into a ball, much like the ones he knew. Dormant, maybe. He’d never thought to ask Vash if that was a comfort thing or if they chose that position to sleep in because it was safest. Either way, there were slight differences that he could see right away.

He kept running into those slight differences on this unplanned jaunt to another dimension. 

“How do we reverse it?”

Just behind his shoulder, Vash hummed, shrugged, and then pointed, drawing Wolfwood’s attention to the workers milling about the base of the tank, coming and going. Shift change, maybe. “They’re the experts.”

Wolfwood narrowed his eyes. 

“Aren’t you an expert? Considering you’re—“

Vash’s finger pressed to Wolfwood’s lips, shushing him as he leaned in. When he spoke, his voice was soft, light and easy, despite the clear warning Wolfwood could see in his eyes. 

Slight differences. 

“You’re kind of being a lot right now, Wolfwood. And even if you’re technically right, I can’t think on an empty stomach.”

That sounded like an excuse to Wolfwood, but he couldn’t counter it with any kind of sure feeling. Maybe Vash wasn’t looking to get rid of him right yet, but if the way he’d talked about his Wolfwood was any kind of indication, making excuses to avoid finding a fix for all this seemed to go against sense.

Then again, this Vash wasn’t exactly striking Wolfwood was someone with a lot of sense.

Grabbing Vash by the wrist, he removed the finger from his lips, leaning in himself.

“Kind of hard not to be a lot when I’m the only one of us trying to figure this out. You trying food as a bargaining chip now, since I wouldn’t let you pet me?”

Vash had some kind of barely concealed delight showing on his face. It had been there since Wolfwood had leaned in, but now it was much more obvious, just about making his eyes sparkle. It was ridiculous, how was he even real?

“Will you accept food as a bargaining chip, if I promise I will be the most helpful version of me I can possibly be to sort this out once I’ve had a donut?” he asked. Over his shoulder, Wolfwood could see two of the plant engineers eying them. He would too, if he was watching this from the outside. Didn’t mean that Wolfwood had to like it, though.

“Maybe even a drink? Are you listening to me? This whole bargaining thing doesn’t work that well if you’re not listening to my part.”

“Yeah, sure, fine. We can find something to eat,” Wolfwood agreed, tuning back into the conversation. “But then you are going to help me with this. My blondie isn’t like you.” Letting go of Vash’s wrist, he rolled his shoulder end he turned to head back the way they’d come. He had no idea what this town had to offer, but there had to be something somewhere, right?

As it turned out, that wasn’t the furthest thing from the truth, but this dusty, backwater town was a bit less diversified than the one that he’d been snatched out of. Despite the size of that Plant, what they had amounted to a handful of saloons, a few shops and, thankfully, a bakery that happened to be selling the exact thing Vash had been whining about.

Donuts.

That was another thing the two of them shared, Wolfwood thought, standing back and watching while Vash ordered at the counter. Donuts were fine, but his Vash really did have a fondness for them. One that he, himself, might have used to his own advantage, only three days ago.

Before they’d gotten to that backwater town, and they’d been on the outskirts of November, and Vash had been wistfully looking at a box of pastries a lady had gone by with, lamenting how long it had been since he’d had a good donut. Wolfwood had told him that they had bigger problems and to focus, but he’d come back to their room that night with a box in hand.

A half dozen donuts. He’d played it cool, said he just didn’t want to listen to Vash’s whining about missing out once he found out the ones here were sort of famous. Still, on the inside he’d been quietly celebrating, basking in the look that Vash had given him.

“Wolfwood!”

Snapping out of it, Wolfwood focused on this Vash, again, and just barely didn’t immediately regret it.

“Pay for me?”

Wolfwood gaped.

“Pay for-- I don’t have any money, you idiot!”

Vash pouted, and then dug into one of his own pockets. Behind the counter, the baker was clearly trying not to let every single one of her thoughts show on her face. Wolfwood almost would have apologized, but, technically, he wasn’t responsible for this one.

Something like guilt nudged him at that thought. If he thought the other Wolfwood was taking care of his Vash – meaning, making sure he was staying alive, not anything else – then maybe he should be trying to return the favour.

Taking a step forward, and then another, Wolfwood let himself walk up to the counter, taking the little bag of donuts when it was handed over. It was still warm, and that was kind of nice. Next to him, Vash smiled.

“I’ll carry these. Since you paid.”

The next stop was, apparently, booze. There was a part of Wolfwood that was curious about how that would be, here, and he couldn’t really hide it. Vash clearly had something in mind, though, leading him right to it, not pausing for very long for Wolfwood to browse through the small selection they had.

“You don’t want that.” Wolfwood looked at where Vash was standing, looking at a different shelf than he was, but clearly paying enough attention to have seen Wolfwood looking at some kind of whiskey. “You’ll drink the whole bottle and it won’t do anything,” he continued, matter-of-factly, before turning and looking Wolfwood up and down. “Well... Maybe it would get you. You drink often?”

Wolfwood knew that was probably meant only to be out of curiosity, and nothing else, but he couldn’t stop the look he gave Vash, flat and unimpressed.

“Can you hurry up and get what you’re after?”

“Working on it!” Vash crooned, turning back to the shelf and picking up the bottle that had been right in front of his damn face.

He had to be doing this on purpose. Had to be. There was no other explanation.

Was he trying to make Wolfwood crazy?

Once they had paid up, again, Vash led the way back into the hot afternoon. Wolfwood was still cradling the donut bag, but he had the bottle in hand and now he used that to gesture towards their inn. It was at the corner, nothing special, but Wolfwood was almost relieved to see it. Something familiar in all this.

“If we’re going to brainstorm, we should do it out of this heat, and in there where I know we can sit and you can say all the dangerous things you want without me having to try to smother you.” Vash, boldly, after a statement like that, winked at him, before striding out into the street, and leading the way towards the inn, leaving Wolfwood to jog after him.

Did he have stupidly long legs, or what?

“Wait, you bought booze. And donuts. That’s your idea of something that’s going to get your mind off your empty stomach good enough to help me out?”

“Help us out,” Vash corrected, holding open the inn door for him. Obediently, Wolfwood walked through, and then immediately regretted being so obedient when he felt Vash’s hand on his lower back, guiding him towards the stairs.

Handsy.

“As you’ve helpfully pointed out, my Wolfwood is missing and you’re very cute, and I’m having way too much fun with you, but I am probably going to need him to come back sooner rather than later.” Up the stairs they went, Vash’s hand staying put the whole time.

Right up until they got to the top of the stairs.

Then it slid down and--

“Hey!”

Wolfwood jumped, putting a few feet between them, glaring at Vash with his back now facing the wall. Vash, infuriating asshole that he was, smiled innocently.

“It was just a little pinch. You really are still going through it, aren’t you?” His smile turned almost pitying as he turned down the hallway that led to the rooms they’d occupied the night before. “Poor thing.”

Wolfwood should throw the donuts down the stairs.

It would serve Vash right.

Instead, shoulders hunched in annoyance, he followed down the hallway, showing that he had learned his lesson when Vash unlocked his room door and gestured for him to go in, only to have Wolfwood glare at him.

“Oh, fine! It was only going to be a slap this time, anyway!”

“That doesn’t make me feel better.”

Wolfwood walked into the room, setting the donut bag down on the little table next to the window. The room was the mirror image of his own. The one he’d slept fitfully in until waking up to find Vash sitting there watching him. Same generic bed, same sparse rack for hanging things on, same tiny table with a small ashtray on it. Like the one in his room, there were a few butts in it, though Wolfwood knew those hadn’t been his. The other Wolfwood, probably, which was an interesting thought.

By the time today was over, Wolfwood would probably be adding to the ashes in that dish. He could already feel it. Had been feeling it all day.

The main difference between the two rooms, though, was the wrapped up cross leaned in the corner.

It wasn’t that much different than his own. It had been on the ground nearby when he’d found himself staring at this Vash, last night, but before he had touched the thing, Vash had pulled it away by one of the straps, shaking his head.

“You’re a Wolfwood, but I don’t know if he’d be happy if I let you have his Punisher.”

This Punisher looked thinner, the body narrower in general, compared to his own. Wolfwood’s fingers itched to unwrap it and see what it was like underneath, but Vash hadn’t let that happen.

What was going on with his own Punisher? Was his Vash being as stubborn about not letting the other Wolfwood touch it?

Surprisingly, Wolfwood found that he hoped so. Unless they were in real danger, he didn’t think he liked the idea of some other Wolfwood handling his gun.

Maybe this Vash had a point.

“Have a seat, stop staring at it.”

Vash had produced two glasses from somewhere else in the room and set them on the table now, dropping into one of the chairs, himself.

“I’m not going to let you use it. You don’t need it. Waving a gun at the Plant isn’t going to get it to send you back.”

Maybe he had a point.

Maybe.

“How do you know? We haven’t tried that,” Wolfwood pointed out, pulling out the other chair to make himself comfortable. Across the table, Vash pushed one of the glasses towards him, smirking now. He seemed pleased, and Wolfwood supposed that could be because of the alcohol.

“That sounded like him,” he said, before opening the bottle, and pouring generously into each of their glasses. It was, probably, more than Wolfwood thought he should be drinking, if they were going to actually talk about this whole thing, but he would just keep from finishing the whole glass. This Vash seemed like he might operate okay on booze to a certain point. “He would try that, too. It’s weird, how you two are the same, but also different.”

Setting the bottle aside, Vash lifted his glass and, without having to think about it, Wolfwood did the same, both of them clinking together softly before they each took a sip.

The whiskey was smokey, a hint of spice hitting his tongue immediately, and Wolfwood set the glass down again, giving it an eye.

“I picked a good one, didn’t I?”

Looking across the table, Wolfwood found Vash watching him.

Because of course he was.

“He likes it, doesn’t he?”

Not for the first time, Wolfwood saw that flicker on Vash’s face. The longer all of this went on, the more he was letting the mask slip. He hadn’t seemed all that concerned at the jump, but now that they were having to actually try and think about things, because the Plant wasn’t just doing it on its own, maybe it was setting in that this was real.

He and whoever the Wolfwood from here was, were swapped.

“Do you?”

Wolfwood thought about the question, then nodded. Vash did the same.

“He does like it. Introduced me to it, actually. I wondered if you would.”

Pulling the bag of donuts towards himself, Vash dug one out, and then leaned back in his chair, regarding Wolfwood across the table.

“You should tell me about your Vash, since you can’t treat me to his favourite things.”

Wolfwood had told himself, when the glass had first been poured for him, that he wouldn’t drink the whole thing. He needed to stay sharp, not just because he was trying to problem-solve, but because just because this was some form of Vash didn’t mean he should trust him entirely. It seemed smart, even essential, to keep his head on straight.

Somehow, though, hours later, not only had he finished that glass, but he was on to his third. The donuts were long gone, shared between the two of them, though Vash had absolutely eaten more, and...

“He should wear more leather. Like me.”

“No, I don’t think so.”

Wolfwood propped his elbow on the table, shaking his head. Across from him, Vash had undone the collar of his coat, and though Wolfwood couldn’t fully tell what was underneath, he suspected it was more leather. Definitely more leather.

“Because it would take you longer to get him out of it?”

Vash raised his eyebrows, smirking. That look had gone from teasing to knowing, and Wolfwood didn’t know how to feel about it. This Vash knew things about him that he hadn’t ever once admitted out loud. He and his Wolfwood had a relationship that had, clearly, stopped giving room to the elephant, acknowledged it, and gone forward from there.

And he clearly found it hilarious that Wolfwood and his Vash hadn’t. Wolfwood hadn’t even admitted it, but he could tell Vash knew. He was telegraphing it, constantly.

“We’re trying to deal with his psycho brother, I’m not thinking about that.”

“And it is so nice to know that in every universe, Knives is described like that. I thought I did something wrong, but you’re telling me yours is just as unreasonable.” Vash shook his head solemnly, raising his glass. “Sad.”

He took a sip, and then added, “you are thinking about it, though.”

“What about your Wolfwood, huh?” Wolfwood cut in, having had enough of the track that comment was leading them down. “Does he really have the crosses on his sleeves?”

Vash nodded. “Mhmm. And he knows how to button his jacket, which I see you haven’t mastered yet.”

A tease, meant as bait, but it was one Wolfwood was hard pressed to stop himself taking. The whiskey was making it more difficult to just let Vash run his mouth and ignore it.

“It’s restricting. I can get more movement like this, my Punisher is bigger than his.”

“Size isn’t everything.”

“Oh, shut up!”

Wolfwood was laughing. He couldn’t tell if the look on Vash’s face was shock, or something else, but he didn’t mind the look of it.

Could be that this Vash was growing on him, too.

Maybe he just had a general weakness for Vash the Stampede.

As soon as that thought occurred to Wolfwood, he reached for his glass, downing another mouthful. The whiskey had started to go down a lot easier after that first glass. He could see why the other Wolfwood liked it so much.

“There’s another thing that’s different between how you dress and how my Wolfwood dresses.”

Looking over the top of his glass, Wolfwood swallowed. “Oh yeah? And what’s that?”

Vash smiled.

Wolfwood didn’t know if he liked that smile.

That smile looked like a threat, and he was the only one in close enough proximity to be victimized.

“My Wolfwood learned to wear lace-up shoes.”

Wolfwood blinked.

“I’m sorry?”

Vash’s smile turned into a wide, toothy grin.

Oh, no, that was definitely a threat.

“I said, my Wolfwood...”

He was an idiot. He shouldn’t have asked Vash to repeat himself.

Vash was pushing his chair out, getting up.

“...learned that he should be wearing...”

Wolfwood should run. He didn’t, and that was the critical error.

“...lace-up shoes.”

Before Wolfwood could scramble out of his seat and at least try to get away, Vash had swooped in, getting one hand around his ankle and yanking. Wolfwood flailed, one hand gripping the table edge, the other holding on to the back of the chair as Vash slipped his shoe off and tossed it somewhere over his shoulder. Wolfwood could hear it clattering somewhere on the boards and, briefly, he considered his options, looking around at the Punisher.

Then he felt Vash’s cheek against his ankle, and the top of his foot, and looked back down in horror to confirm, yes, Vash was nuzzling his bare foot.

“But you don’t know any better!”

Options considered, Wolfwood went for the easiest one, which was to kick Vash in the shoulder with his other – thankfully still shoed-up – foot. Vash must have been expecting it, because Wolfwood barely made contact. He had already been rolling away, laughing like a madman.

“You’re insane,” Wolfwood muttered, getting up and, carefully, walking around Vash to try and find his missing shoe. It had flopped halfway under the bed and Wolfwood bent over to pick it up, before sitting down hard on the edge of the bed to pull it on.

His head was swimming a little. Maybe it was time to slow down on the whiskey.

Vash was doing foot things. It was absolutely time to slow down on the whiskey.

“You said if you didn’t have an empty stomach, you’d be able to think and help me.”

Still on the floor, Vash rolled onto his front, propping his chin on one of his hands to look up at Wolfwood. He looked like he was thinking about whether or not he’d said that, before he sighed.

“All right. You did let me get donuts and booze, plus I got in a pinch and taught you a lesson about your footwear. I guess I’m ready to be serious again.”

Vash saying that while laying, dishevelled and tipsy, on the floor, really was something. Wolfwood wasn’t sure exactly what, but something.

“The Plant.”

Vash nodded. “The Plant.”

“You think it did this. I think it did this. So, first of all, how, and second of all, how do we get it to put it right?”

It wasn’t the first time that Wolfwood had asked, really, but, for the first time, Vash looked up, his face surprisingly sober looking for someone who had drank quite a bit.

“I could just ask.”

Wolfwood was staring again. He felt like he was doing that a lot, with Vash, but there was something about him that was just constantly rendering him kind of speechless. That was a skill, maybe. He wondered if the other Wolfwood felt like this.

“What?”

It had come out a lot flatter than Wolfwood had expected. No bark in it. Maybe that was why Vash had fed him so much whiskey. Make him a little more docile.

“I could just ask,” Vash repeated, shrugging his shoulders before he pulled his impossibly long legs up and moved into a sitting position, still on the floor. “Maybe that’s what made this happen in the first place.”

Wolfwood took a breath.

“It has been... nearly an entire day of us trying to figure out how this happened, and you’re just now deciding to tell me that maybe that’s what made it happen? What the hell did you ask it?”

His voice had been, without his say-so, getting louder with every word and now Vash made shushing noises from the floor, shifting onto his knees to scoot closer.

Wolfwood firmly planted his feet on the floor.

“Technically, I didn’t ask!” Vash explained, still on his knees on the floor. “Wolfwood did. We were passing by the Plant, and, okay, I might have been being a lot yesterday, kind of like you were today—” Wolfwood pointedly did not bring up the fact that he had, today, been dealing with being in a different dimension, and being a lot seemed like something he was allowed to be, all things considered “—and Wolfwood said something like ‘I wish I could find a version of you that was less of a pain in my ass’ and then, bam.”

Vash slapped both hands down on Wolfwood’s knees, looking up at him.

“He was gone, and there you were. So, maybe the Plant was listening, and thought it was being helpful. They do that sometimes.”

Wolfwood took a breath.

That was so incredibly stupid that, really, it couldn’t be anything but the answer. He knew that the Plants tended to work by their own rules when it suited them. So, of course, when the other him had said that, and the Plant had been within earshot, and, presumably, bored...

It would add up.

They were related to Vash, after all. In a manner of speaking. That kind of thinking seemed like just the kind of thing he could expect. It was stupid, but it was simple, and Wolfwood really resented that it had taken an entire day and most of a bottle of whiskey to get them to this point.

“So, if we go back there...”

Vash nodded. Listening.

“...and you ask the Plant, you know, Plant to Plant—”

“—You can stop talking about me being a Plant—”

“—It might just decide to undo this little swap and put me and your Wolfwood back where we belong?”

His hands still on Wolfwood’s knees, Vash nodded again.

Wolfwood waited, the silence stretching between them for a few very, very long seconds.

“Okay, so when are we doing that, needle-noggin?!”

“Ohhh!”

Using the hands on Wolfwood’s knees, Vash boosted himself up into a standing position. Or, what would have been a standing position, if we wasn’t still bent at the waist, hands still on Wolfwood’s knees as he leaned in, grinning broadly.

To his credit, Wolfwood didn’t lean back, letting Vash get as close as he wanted.

“That’s why you were staring at me! Well,” Vash’s fingers squeezed his knees just once and then Vash did stand up, stretching his arms over his head and glancing out the window. The sun was going down, the sky outside lit up in bands of red, orange and yellow. “We should wait until nightfall. I don’t think it would be a good idea for us to just walk up to the Plant and start giving it requests while the engineers are going home for the day.”

Vash, unfortunately, had a good point. It didn’t matter how eager Wolfwood was to see if that was the solution to the problem; if the two of them wandered up and started chatting at the Plant, people were bound to ask questions. Leave alone the fact that it wasn’t the most normal thing to do, Vash, in his bright red coat, would draw attention. Add the two together, and that was a recipe for disaster.

Which meant that Vash proposed that they finish the bottle. It was good booze, and they shouldn’t let it go to waste. Wolfwood should have argued against it, because he needed to be clear-headed and as level as it was possible for him to be if this didn’t go the way he needed it to, but, somehow, by the time they left the room, the bottle was empty, sitting on the table with their equally empty glasses, and there was a pleasant hum in Wolfwood’s head.

Again, maybe this was Vash’s way of keeping him docile.

He was finding, more and more, that he didn’t mind.

Like this, it did feel a little more likely that everything would work out. Yeah, he’d been pretty sure already that the Plant was just granting requests, a distant relative feeling bad for the other Wolfwood having to deal with their weird cousin, or brother, or whatever Vash was to them, and giving him a break.

Thing was, as they walked through the darkened road, up towards the Plant, Wolfwood could admit to himself that there was no arguing this Vash had grown on him. He was an idiot, and he did foot things, and he could be infuriating, but he was still Vash. There was a core to him that was so much like the one that he’d left behind that it was hard not to feel something towards this one.

Like Vash had been reading his mind, he turned, giving Wolfwood a big smile.

There, again. Slight differences. Really damn slight.

“You excited to get back?”

Wolfwood raised an eyebrow. “You excited to have your Wolfwood back here?”

Without missing a beat, Vash answered, “yep. Think I might miss you, though. Think your Vash might miss my Wolfwood?”

The spike of annoyance Wolfwood felt at that must have been something Vash had been looking for. He whistled, low, shaking his head as he turned back around. The Plant was looming on the horizon, the clear outline of the tank obvious over the rooftops.

“You’ve got it bad, don’t you? Think your Vash might be itching to get you back, in that case.”

“What would you know about that?” Wolfwood snapped, doubling his strides to try and pass Vash. Instead of being let do it, Vash swooped in against his side, looping his arm through Wolfwood’s and keeping pace.

“I’d know a lot. I’m pretty itchy myself, but I’ve also been roundabouts where you two are now, and I know how to read a Wolfwood, fluffy variant or otherwise.”

It was the blatant way Vash said it that Wolfwood struggled with. He just knew, and for him, everything had worked out. He and his Wolfwood had something, whatever the hell it was, but he didn’t really know what their situation was, back where Wolfwood came from. There wasn’t time to be catering to the ache in his chest or the vaguely sick feeling in his stomach, the ones the vials could never touch.

They made the rest of the short trek up to the Plant in silence. Wolfwood wanted to know what Vash was thinking, but, instead of asking, it just seemed easier to walk. To walk and, this time, just let Vash have his way. He seemed absolutely thrilled that Wolfwood hadn’t pulled his arm away, and he didn’t drop it until they were standing in the deep shadows under the Plant tank, looking up at the thing.

It still looked like it was sleeping, but Wolfwood knew that didn’t mean anything. They were always listening.

That was what had gotten them into this whole mess in the first place.

“Wait here.”

Vash’s hand came up, squeezing at his shoulder, briefly, before Vash stepped away, moving until Wolfwood could barely see him. That was both different and the same as his Vash. His Vash hadn’t seemed very keen on showing exactly what he was or how he could communicate with the Plants, at first. When they’d caught him at it, unexpectedly, he had seemed shocked to see them seeing him. He’d bounced back quickly, though. Accepted that they knew and let it go. Mostly. He wasn’t flaunting his abilities all the time, and this one didn’t seem to, either.

He also seemed more like he was moving away out of some kind of courtesy to Wolfwood.

Was the other Wolfwood afraid of what Vash was? Examining that would take more time and focus than Wolfwood thought he had right now, but he supposed he could understand it. Deep down, even he was a little unsettled at what his Vash was capable of, of how old he was and how much he’d seen and would see. Maybe it was hard not to be a little off-put by that, but it didn’t make Wolfwood love him less.

The thought had flit through his mind, easy, rolling on the wave of the alcohol he’d had, and it took a second before Wolfwood realized it, with a little physical jolt. Maybe it was that movement that got Vash’s attention, or maybe not, but a few deep breaths later, Wolfwood realized Vash was walking back his way, smiling smugly.

So, their hypothesis must have been correct.

“Got you a ride.”

Pushing aside the mild panic he’d sent himself into, Wolfwood cleared his throat and looked up at the Plant. It looked like it had shifted, unfurled a little, and the light seemed different.

“Guess we don’t have long, then,” Wolfwood murmured, looking back at Vash. He’d moved closer. A lot closer. He really seemed to have issues with personal space. “Uh. Thanks for... the help.”

Vash waved a hand. “Aw, shucks. You don’t have to thank me. I’ll do anything for you, Wolfwood.”

He said it in such a light, easy tone, it would have been easy to write the whole thing off as part of whatever running joke this Vash had his life written with. But, because he was Vash, even if he wasn’t his Vash, Wolfwood heard the note of sincerity in there.

The damn booze had opened him up to a lot of damage he hadn’t known he was going to be taking, given by a Vash he never would have met if the other him hadn’t been making glib jabs.

He wondered if the other Wolfwood knew that, though. That this Vash would do anything for him.

Something in his gut was telling Wolfwood it worked the same way for his back home.

“Let the other me know his Punisher is puny, yeah?” Wolfwood said, rallying against letting the thoughts shouting in his head come out of his mouth. He just needed to get back.

“I won’t do that,” Vash laughed. Before Wolfwood could move, he stepped forward, closing the scant distance between them, both hands coming up. He’d done this so many times today, Wolfwood should have been ready for it, but instead of even taking a half-step back, he stayed put, letting Vash cup his face. Judging by the look on Vash’s face, he was pleasantly surprised.

But, maybe, not as surprised as Wolfwood would have expected.

“When you get back to your Vash,” he started, glancing up. The light around them was definitely changing. They really didn’t have long. “Just lay one of these on him. If he’s anything like me, and I think we’ve figured out we’re all more alike than you thought, he’s going insane waiting for you to hurry up and do it.”

Wolfwood had known what was coming, and he didn’t bother stepping back, or pulling out of Vash’s hands. He just closed his eyes, and let Vash lean in and kiss him.

It wasn’t anything intense. There wasn’t a push there. Vash was careful with him, sweet, his thumbs brushing over Wolfwood’s jaw before he let go, stepping back.

His smile looked different. More real, less of something meant to be a mask.

Right up until he put his hand on Wolfwood’s chest, extending his arm and stepping back, himself. His other hand flew to his forehead, and he looked away, theatrics dripping from him.

“Don’t chase me! You’ve got a Stampede of your own waiting for you at home!”

“I wasn’t gonna!” Wolfwood shot back, wanting to sound annoyed, but ending up in a smile.

Vash returned it.

“Safe travels, Wolfwood.”

Vash couldn’t have timed that line more perfectly. One second, Wolfwood was seeing him standing there, smiling and clearly waiting for the swap, the next he was stumbling backwards, tripping over his own feet and only barely keeping from falling over by grabbing on to the railing surrounding the platform he’d found himself on.

Above him, encased in its neat cylinder, a Plant seemed to be dimming, the glow filling the room going from a bright blue-white to something softer. Settling again after being in contact with its inter-dimensional other self. It looked right, looked like the kind of Plant he knew, and, straightening, Wolfwood understood what that meant.

The Plant facility in this backwater town wasn’t far from the inn where he and Vash had set up, the night before he’d been swapped. Heading for the stairs, Wolfwood took them almost too fast, slowing himself down only with the reminder that if he tripped, fell and broke his neck, the vials in his pocket weren’t going to do him much good.

He’d nearly made it to the ground floor when the main door flung open, and Vash ran in.

His Vash. Oversized red coat, jade beauty of an arm, big orange glasses, and those clunky boots. They skidded to a stop on the shiny floor just feet from the bottom of the stairs, Vash staring up at him with those big, pretty blue eyes while Wolfwood stared back down.

He was screwed. Oh, he really was so, so screwed. It was no wonder the other Vash had known it on sight, how the hell was he supposed to hide the feelings that were trying to claw their way out of his chest the moment Vash was standing in front of him?

Why did he even bother to try?

“Plants can do a lot more crazy shit than you’ve told me, needle-noggin.”

One of them had needed to break the staring contest, and Wolfwood was happy to be the one to do it. Just a few words, and he was able to move his legs again, walking the rest of the way down the last few stairs.

Vash laughed, moving again himself. There was a bit of colour in his cheeks, Wolfwood noticed, watching while Vash rolled his eyes. Was that from running here – he’d run here, he’d known to look for Wolfwood here – or was it something else?

“I’ve told you. I don’t know everything they can do.”

Wolfwood’s shoes landed on the floor, putting him right in front of Vash, and both of them stopped moving.

It had only been a day, and Wolfwood had been with a version of him, but his Vash... his Vash. He’d missed him. Missed the stupid smile Vash was giving him, now, and the way he wasn’t quite meeting his eyes, like he was shy, or something. Same thing that Wolfwood did, whenever they both became aware that the elephant had made itself known in the room and would like to be acknowledged.

When you get back to your Vash...

“Hey, Wolfwood,” Vash started, “can we talk?”

It was long past time to acknowledge the damn elephant. Wolfwood was tired of dancing around the damn thing, it was keeping him from something he wanted.

Bringing both hands up, Wolfwood cupped Vash’s face, not worrying that he was going to pull away, or that this was the wrong thing. He’d figured out a thing or two in the last day.

Vash’s hands found the front of his blazer, fingers twisting in the fabric, a second before Wolfwood leaned in, eyes closed, heart hammering.

He didn’t know why they’d been letting anything keep them from this. He kissed Vash, and Vash kissed him back, those hands on his blazer not letting him get away for a second, and everything settled.

Wolfwood didn’t push, and neither did Vash, but the way Wolfwood kissed him wasn’t anything that couldn’t be described as intense. After this long, it couldn’t be anything but, even if, still, he was careful. That didn’t seem to matter. Vash gave back as good as he got.

The ache in Wolfwood’s chest exploded, but that was all right. It felt kind of good.

Almost as good as Vash using the grip on his blazer to yank him backwards, breaking the kiss to glance over his shoulder at a door marked UTILITY CLOSET.

Wolfwood laughed, letting himself be pulled along, moving with Vash, not letting them get drawn apart. Not again.

“The inn’s just down the road!”

Looking back at him, Vash smirked.

Oh, that just poured gasoline on the fire. Wolfwood didn’t know he’d been needing Vash to look at him like that, but, oh boy, had he ever.

“You’ve made me wait long enough.”

...he’s going insane waiting for you to hurry up and do it...

There was something incredibly hot about the way Vash reached back, twisting the door handle and yanking it open with his prosthetic hand. If that door had been locked, it wasn’t now.

“We can go to the inn later.”

Turned out, the other Vash might have been dead on about a few things.

Wolfwood certainly had had a Stampede of his own waiting for him at home.

“This is kind of pathetic, don’t you think?”

Wolfwood knew he didn’t have a right to be the one saying that, considering, like the others, he was also crowded in the hallway outside Vash’s door, hovering, none of them wanting to be the one to break the fragile peace they assumed had settled on the other side.

Still, one of them had to say it, and he knew damn well it wasn’t going to be Milly or Livio, and Meryl was too wound up, waiting for the okay from Luida, to sass any of them.

“We’re worried,” she said. “Don’t pretend you aren’t.”

Even though she was telling him off, instead of glaring at him, or shoving away, Meryl leaned back into Wolfwood’s side, just for a moment. It was a silent show of understanding, letting him off the hook for answering her. She knew he didn’t need to, and both of them could do without the back and forth, right now. The silent understanding would be enough for both of them.

Despite what Brad had said, when they’d found their way to Vash’s room, Luida had asked them to stay outside and stay quiet. Yes, he was awake, and he was speaking, but he wasn’t in the best of shape. It had been all she needed to say to explain what was going on in that room. Whatever had happened to Vash after the Julai incident, Wolfwood suspected Luida had glimpsed it, even from her safe distance, the one that she had kept everyone else at by saying she didn’t know if he’d survived and where he might be. Right now, very likely, they were walking a careful tightrope.

One move too far could push Vash over the edge into that borderline catatonic state Jessica had talked about. Right now, only hours from what had happened, he was fragile.

They couldn’t jeopardize that.

Especially because, for them, the things that were likely weighing on Vash the heaviest would be the most cause for relief. Knives was gone. Very likely, he was gone, he’d made an impossible and frankly unexpected sacrifice, and that was a spectre that wouldn’t be hanging over all of them any longer. There was a hope for the future there.

It was complicated as hell, and the longer Wolfwood thought about it, the more his fingers itched to light up.

Once this night was over, he was going to chainsmoke an entire pack outside the ship. Right outside the damn door. Sleep be damned.

The sound of the door opening broke into that revelry, and, along with the others, Wolfwood straightened, paying attention as Luida stepped out of the room and let it shut behind her. That didn’t seem like the best sign, but when she looked at each of them, she smiled.

“He wants to see you.”

Somehow, those five words sounded like victory over something Wolfwood hadn’t expected they would need to overcome. It couldn’t be perfect, and he knew Vash enough to know that whoever they found on the other side of that door wasn’t going to be happy, cheery, peppy and up for anything. He was going to be fighting through the instinct to sink into his grief.

Maybe this would help.

“Just... Well, I don’t think I need to tell all of you what to keep in mind.”

Stepping aside, Luida let Meryl pull open the door.

As expected, Vash was sitting up in his bed. He, at least, had been changed out of the clothing they had found him in, dressed instead in clothes that had obviously come from the supplies here on the ship. Whites, creams and greys, soft fabrics in colours that made the stark change of his hair that much more prominent.

Pitch-dark, such a hard turn from the blonde his hair had been – mostly – just a handful of hours before. It was where Wolfwood’s eyes lingered, mentally turning over everything Conrad had told him back on the Ark while the girls moved closer to Vash’s bedside.

When he smiled, that changed things somewhat.

It was such a sad thing. It wasn’t reaching his eyes, and he looked tired, but he did it all the same. A smile, and a hand reaching out to Meryl as she reached for his.

“You all made it.”

There was a hoarse edge to his voice, but it was still soft, still painfully sincere as Meryl and Milly each sat on one side of his bed. The tears that had been threatening to make themselves known from Meryl for the last few hours spilled over. She couldn’t be blamed for the way she leaned in, wrapping her arms around his neck and hugging him tightly.

“You made it, Vash. We thought we lost you.”

“Again.”

Wolfwood hadn’t bothered to keep his mouth shut. Sure, Vash was fragile, but treating him like anything other than who he was wouldn’t help anything. Smothering the instinct to point out that this wasn’t the first time they’d stood on the edge of something and feared that Vash was gone forever would only make things worse.

It wasn’t who he was, and Vash knew it just as well.

From behind Meryl’s shoulder, Vash met Wolfwood’s eyes. Whatever he was thinking, Wolfwood couldn’t tell for sure, but he was distracted from it a second later by Milly leaning in to wrap her arms around both Vash and Meryl. Standing at the foot of the bed, Wolfwood watched Vash close his eyes and lean his temple against the top of her head.

Something in Wolfwood’s chest twisted, watching it, but he wasn’t given a second to linger on it. Not when Livio was moving away from his side, shuffling up next to Milly and adding himself to the hug.

This, right here, was the proof of Vash’s effect on people. It didn’t matter how long they’d known him for, the person he was came through and inspired this in people. Sure, he’d brought Midvalley and Emilio around, and that was a feat in itself, but for Milly and Livio, who hadn’t known him all that long, to be tucking themselves into a hug like this, as awkward and uncomfortable and, honestly, dumb, as it looked, spoke volumes.

Might as well look a little dumb.

It was that thought that had Wolfwood moving around the end of the bed, stepping up next to Meryl. She was still tucked up against Vash, her short legs bent to keep her on the bed, his arm around her side potentially doing a lot of the work in that regard. She didn’t look up when Wolfwood got close, but Vash did.

There was a lot of hurt in his eyes, still. Wolfwood suspected that was going to take a long, long time to go away. There was something else there, too, though, and it was whatever that was that had Wolfwood reaching down, pressing his hand between Meryl’s side and Vash’s prosthetic hand, giving it a light squeeze.

Holding his gaze, Vash squeezed back. His eyes were damp, red-rimmed. Getting worse by the second.

Wolfwood rubbed his thumb over the back of Vash’s hand, and nodded. Why, he wasn’t entirely sure, but something in him felt that was what Vash needed to see. In the middle of all of this, being hugged by the other three, somehow Wolfwood knew a nod would be enough.

Or, maybe too much, given the shake in Vash’s lower lip before he squeezed his eyes shut and tipped his face down. The hand holding Wolfwood’s tightened, not enough to hurt, but enough to communicate the simple truth.

Vash was hurting.

“I know you all just barely got in here to see Vash...”

Luida’s voice, as always, was soft and gentle. It was such a contrast to Miss Melanie’s voice. Wolfwood had never doubted the love and care the woman had for him and the children he’d been raised with, the ones now under her protection. She wasn’t the type to be soft-spoken about it, though. She was blunt, said what she meant, and let the tone carry it however it would.

In some ways, when Wolfwood put Melanie and Luida, mentally, side by side, he could understand Vash more. Luida showed her love and care in her words and tone just the same as Melanie, but it came out gentler. A calm touch from a hand on the head, rather than a jovial nudge from an elbow in the side. She cared deeply about Vash.

Just the same as the rest of them, and maybe that was why, at her tone, everyone let off a bit. Livio straightened and backed up to the end of the bed, giving Milly room to come around, herself. Hand slipping from Vash’s, Wolfwood moved to give Milly the space to be at Meryl’s side as she extricated herself from Vash’s embrace – or rather, extricated Vash from her embrace.

“I think everyone needs some rest,” Luida continued. “There’s no need to worry, I think you should all at least try.”

What there was no need to worry about, Wolfwood thought, was something they all understood. Vash going somewhere, mentally, that they couldn’t bring him back from. Worse, Vash disappearing when they all laid down for a few hours to rest, leaving him unsupervised. Luida’s words calmed that fear. No need to worry, because Vash wouldn’t be left alone, even if he was being left to rest.

“That includes you, Vash.”

Wolfwood had to smile at that. Luida’s tone, there, had sounded a bit more like Melanie. Firm, no arguments. It had the effect of all of them nodding, like instead of fully grown adults they were a bunch of kids being told what they were expected to do.

“We’ll see you in the morning, all right, Vash?” Meryl said.

Milly added, “well, later in the morning. I think we’re already in it, now!”

Vash’s smile, that one that wasn’t quite real, spread across his face again, and he nodded.

“In the morning.”

That was as good of a point as any for them to leave. Wolfwood glanced at Livio, jerking his head towards the door. Silent, universal gesture for ‘let’s get out of here’, and it probably would have gone that way, too. All of them would have piled into the hallway, a little listless, and then found their way to the bunks they had been given months ago when they’d all first reunited.

Instead, Vash’s voice piping up from the bed stopped Wolfwood in the doorway.

“Wolfwood, can you stay for a minute? I’m sure you’re tired...”

It was, maybe, a little embarrassing how easily those words had him turning to look over his shoulder. Sitting up in the bed, still, Vash looked even more pathetic, his eyes gone almost pleading in the ten seconds since Wolfwood had turned his back to go.

Maybe he thought Wolfwood would leave.

“Uh...”

Wolfwood let his eyes move to Luida, who was looking between the two of them. In the hallway, outside the open door, Wolfwood could feel three sets of eyes on the back of his head. Being put on the spot hadn’t been something he was expecting.

“You’re supposed to be resting, needle-noggin.”

“Just a few minutes?”

The pleading in Vash’s eyes ramped up, approaching something like desperation.

How was he supposed to say no to that?

“You’re not going to let me go through that doorway without having a tantrum, are you?” he asked, turning around completely and taking a few steps back into the room. Luida wasn’t saying anything, didn’t seem to be wanting to shut this down. Maybe he could get away with it.

“Luida, do you mind giving us a minute?”

That was unexpected. The second Vash had Wolfwood coming back into the room, pulled on the leash of those pleading eyes, he was asking Luida to leave.

The three sets of eyes watching him seemed to get louder, which was an impossible sort of thing for Wolfwood to be thinking, but it was how he felt. He didn’t bother turning around to face it head on. The way Vash was pointedly not looking at anyone but him was keeping him fairly stuck in place.

Luida took a breath, and, for a second, Wolfwood was sure she was going to insist to Vash that he needed to be resting, so, no, she was going to make him say whatever needed said, right here, right now, in front of them all, and then he was going to sleep.

Instead, what Luida said was, “I can give you five minutes.”

Firm, but more relenting than Wolfwood had expected. Luida’s silhouette moved from the corner of his eye, and then the door hissed shut, leaving just the two of them there, alone in the quiet room.

That felt oppressive, so Wolfwood cut through the silence, clearing his throat and putting his hands in his pockets.

“What’s on your mind, blondie?”

That didn’t fit. He was going to have to come up with a new nickname.

From the bed, Vash seemed to be thinking the same thing, a wry smile finding its way onto his face as he glanced up towards his own hairline. Raising a hand, he beckoned Wolfwood closer.

Once again, he moved without thinking about it, not just moving closer, but finding his way over to sit at the foot of the bed.

“Well? Luida’s only giving us five—”

Wolfwood broke off, not because he intended to, but because without warning Vash lurched forward on the bed, wrapping both arms around him. It wasn’t the first time Wolfwood had felt the inherently inhuman level of strength that Vash often kept under wraps, but it felt different being hauled into his arms, rather than feeling it in the middle of a fight. He couldn’t do anything to avoid it.

He also wasn’t sure he wanted to.

It had been a long, long fucking day, and it felt undeniably good to free his own arms and wrap them around Vash in turn. The other’s face was tucked into his neck, and Wolfwood could feel damp there that wasn’t from lake water in his hair.

“We can’t talk about it in five minutes.”

Suddenly, Wolfwood understood what it was.

The two of them, pinned across from each other. An invisible hand around his throat, squeezing. The air leaving his lungs, his body fighting, convulsing, struggling to live. Vash across from him, with all of his ideals and his moral code, being pushed to the brink, gun in hand.

His life being crushed out of him, and Vash the only one who could stop that from happening if he would pull the trigger and kill a human.

For Nicholas D. Wolfwood.

He must have stiffened up in Vash’s embrace, because the arms around him squeezed tighter and, with a wheeze, Wolfwood got out, “I know what you’re talking about, you don’t need to give me a physical reminder.”

Vash’s grip loosened and he leaned out, his expression so stricken it was almost comical.

It might have been, if they hadn’t been talking – and not talking – about what it was they were.

“Sorry. I’m sorry.”

Not just for the squeeze now, either. That was obvious from the way Vash was searching his face. His eyes glanced down, checking his throat, like maybe there would be a mark left there, something damning for him to see. There wasn’t. There never would be. It had disappeared, like any other mark Wolfwood had ever collected.

“We need more than five minutes, yeah,” Wolfwood agreed, reaching up to knock his knuckle against the underside of Vash’s chin. It got him to look up again, and that was important. “You did it. You pulled the trigger.”

The breath Vash took was shaky. On top of everything else today, even if Legato hadn’t died at the end of his gun, Vash had lost that, too. He’d shot to kill. He’d intended to do it. It had taken him several heartbeats to do it, but he had.

“I did... It took me so long, and you were...”

Suffocating. Foaming at the mouth. Bleeding from more places than he wanted to think about, but had been forced to when Zazie had handed him a scrap of cloth and said, ‘you’ve got something... kind of everywhere.’

Dying. For the second time in a week, he’d been dying.

Vash’s hands finding his brought Wolfwood back from that memory, turned the lights back on after he’d been remembering the awful way everything had been going dark before that gunshot had cracked through the ringing in his ears.

“I could have lost you, too.”

The words came out as barely more than a whisper, scraping out of Vash’s throat, raw with grief and guilt and shame. It was written all over his face, plain in his eyes as they searched Wolfwood’s, looking for an answer to the question he was about to ask.

“Have I?”

They needed to talk about this. They needed more than five minutes, and, at minimum, five hours of sleep, to talk about this.

For now, though, Wolfwood used Vash’s hands in his to pull him in, wrapping his arms around him in the hug he hadn’t given Vash when everyone else had. He could feel the way Vash sagged against him, relief making him lean into his chest.

“Not even close,” Wolfwood said, quietly. Behind him, he heard the door open, heard Luida’s quiet footsteps on the floor. She wouldn’t interrupt them outright, but their five minutes were up.

Turning his head, Wolfwood took a breath, his head filling up with the scent of Vash. He was still here. They were both still here. Against all odds, they’d made it out to the other side.

There would be time to talk, later. They could work through this. They would work through a lot of things.

Wolfwood would like that.

“Think that’s our five minutes.”

They were close enough that Wolfwood could just about feel the small smile on Vash’s face at that.

“Think so.”

He sat up, bringing his right hand up to rub the heel over his eyes, blinking at the ceiling before he looked back at Wolfwood. There was still a complicated mix of emotions, there, things he hadn’t said, things that he couldn’t say for Wolfwood, but at least the desperation seemed gone.

Reaching out, Wolfwood swiped at a stray tear that was hovering by the corner of his mouth, and then stood.