Untitled
a Trigun story
by Garnet

Stupid, stupid gunman. Why was it that he wanted to walk the rest of the way to the city when the bus broke down several iles back? They could have waited a few (okay, about six) hours until a mechanic was found to properly fix the vehicle. Thirteen iles to October City! And he did this on a regular basis?

Neither woman could deny the city girl at heart that surfaced as they trudged after the Humanoid Typhoon walking up ahead, totally unfazed by the distance or the heat. In fact, he was mostly (blissfully) silent, except for when they asked something of him or bitched at him. In those cases, he would revert to his boyish whining and goofiness. Either that or politely comply.

Meryl was the first to sigh and pipe up this time. "How much further, Vash?"

Glancing back over one broad shoulder at herself and Millie, the red-coated man grinned. "Only seven iles! Don't tell me you're getting tired already, girls!" He chirped, then faced forward again. A simple gesture which struck Meryl as somewhat... off. In fact, his general behavior since yesterday had been a little... off. He wasn't twittering with the same loony banter and flirting that he normally was, and instead showed his calmer, more serious side. A side usually only exposed when he was deep in thought or greatly saddened. Although he still seemed to be friendly enough, so
Meryl pushed this to the back of her mind irritably, and made it a point to concentrate on the job. No...the mission, as she had taken to calling it to amuse herself. It made her feel important.

Up ahead, Vash suddenly interrupted her train of thought as his shoulders hunched forward and his tall, lean frame gave a violent shiver.

"Hckt'ssshh!"

Well! If nothing had been off before, that certainly surprised Meryl. Who knew that the Humanoid Typhoon was capable of something so base and normal as sneezing? Scoldingly, she reminded herself that Vash actually was quite base and normal at times, but still...

"God bless you, Mr. Vash!" Millie chimed in, oblivious and kind as ever.

"Um...yeah," Meryl added, if only out of guilt at not having said it earlier. It was the polite thing to do, after all. She was abruptly caught off guard as Vash glanced at them over one shoulder and smiled gently.

"Thank you, ladies."

And that was that.

"Kssht!" The sound came through the thin wall again from the next room over, where Vash had chosen to keep himself. Meryl frowned. Naturally, as it was their business to follow this man to every city he went, they always boarded relatively close to the Humanoid Typhoon. In this case, it happened to be in the same residence. Blissfully cheaper than some of the other ones. Meryl had a feeling that he'd chosen this one on purpose. It was a bit shabby, and you could hear a pin drop from three rooms over, but...cost was the main factor. She and Millie had been running a tad low on money, lately, and she felt foolish writing to Bernadelli for more just to follow Vash around. God knew that Vash certainly didn't have to board anyplace cheap or mediocre if he didn't damn well feel like it. Although his tastes were not expensive, she suspected that the man had enough money to keep himself going for a long time.

So he'd chosen this place for their benefit, really. Some legendary, wicked gunman with a 60 billion double-dollar reward on his head. She knew the truth behind this rumor, of course, as it came through in his behavior around the birdbrained antics, but still...

Meryl sighed, her train of thought wandering off its tracks as she glanced over at the clock. 8:30 pm. It was growing dark out. She hadn't retired to bed yet, and was instead typing up a catalogue of the days events to soothe herself. Millie was still on the town somewhere. Buying groceries, Meryl thought she had remembered her saying. Hopefully, her cohort wouldn't fritter their money away on pudding, again. They needed it, and she was far too ashamed to ask Vash unless it was absolutely necessary. It wasn't his job to lend them money, after all, when they were the ones following him.

Meryl shook her head quickly. But that was THEIR job. Twenty-four hour surveillance over the man who caused more need for insurance than any natural disaster, probably. Trouble just seemed to follow him.

"Hkt---sshh!" Again, that fitful, cat-like sneeze could be heard from the room beside theirs, as quiet as it probably was. "H'ksssh!" They were small, and soft, but occasionally grew in desperation or force, when the need to expel the irritation from his nose worsened.

Making the excuse for herself that it was too distracting to work, Meryl stood from the typewriter and huffed, slipping out of her room and to the door of Vash's. After all! She did have to keep track of his actions and his behavior reacting to certain things. She paused, a fist posed to knock, and frowned at that thought. He wasn't a science experiment, she reminded herself. He was a potentially dangerous gunman that probably didn't care a lick about them, if they weren't following him around everywhere.

Meryl neglected knocking after all (as she had taken to doing to him recently, especially with that incident when he was fresh out of the shower). Instead, she tested the handle and, finding it to be unlocked, opened the door a little to peep inside.

"Vash? Are you okay?"

A shadowed figure sitting on the bed raised its head quickly towards her as Meryl poked her head in the door and quickly withdrew with a slight gasp at the sudden angry, violent flash of his eyes as they caught the light. The moment passed quickly and his body instead was bathed in some of the fading light from outside as he drew the blind up a bit, for her benefit.

"Mm-hm. Fine," he agreed, almost unnaturally calm and composed as Meryl opened the door a little wider. Nevertheless, he had a small smile on his face that comforted the momentary fit of panic that had seized Meryl, only a few seconds before. That really had been a vicious, legendary gunman. But now it was just Vash again, and she wondered at this for a moment. At last, she shook her senses and squared her shoulders with a touch more of her typical confidence. "I heard you sneezing. A lot."

Vash flopped back onto the bed and sighed. "I think I'm coming down with something," he mumbled in the slightly more whiney-idiot voice that she was used to. Less of an untouchable-inhuman-dangerous-legend seriousness. It was comforting, and she took courage in the moment and strode toward his bed, hot personality again flaring with hands placed on her hips.

"Well! So that's why you've been so 'off' since yesterday. Jeez, it can weird a girl out. Especially when it's our job to make sure you don't make too much off a mess of the towns you go through or of yourself and..." She trailed off at his glittering aqua eyes laughing at her silently. "What?"

Tilting his jaw down, Vash lifted an eyebrow with playful suggestiveness he didn't usually use with her or Millie. Just every other female creature that moved. "So you were worried about me."

"UGH!" He was impossible! Why was she ever worried about him in the first place? As Vash really did laugh this time, Meryl scowled and folded her arms.

"So...there's no telling how dangerous a human typhoon is when he's sick. Should I go find some medicine?"

Vash shook his head and sniffled a little. Adorable. "Please don't go to the trouble."

"Vash..."

His eyes met hers again firmly. "Don't," he assured her again, wrinkling his angled nose a little and rubbing a forefinger beneath it delicately, as Meryl struggled to keep herself together for the duration of this discreet yet irresistible display.

"Heh'ishu!" The blonde gunman cried out suddenly, shuddering thoroughly with the quick force of the sneeze. Meryl bit her lip, charmed although she'd never have admitted it. Vash the Stampede had a delicate sneeze, and it amused her.

"Bless you. Are you sure you d–,"

"Heh'ieshu!" Vash exclaimed again, slightly ashamed for having interrupted her. "Sorry," he mumbled, rubbing at his nose like a little boy with allergies. "Go ahead."

"Vash," Meryl began again, trying to remember what she was going to say as she unconsciously reached out for the man's shoulder and withdrew only in slight surprise to discover that he wasn't wearing a shirt. Why hadn't she noticed that earlier? Briefly, she studied again the vast network of old injuries she'd witnessed only once, before. Deep gashes, some sealed over with age and some still relatively fresh, cross-hatched themselves across what available flesh there was. Some of the wounds, she noted, were unable to hold together by themselves, and in desperation someone had stitched them roughly together with metal gratings and whatnot; it was the price he paid for never taking a life with his own bullets.

Fortunately, Vash didn't seem to notice her involuntary recoil from his horrible scars and that mechanical arm. Or perhaps he had, and chose not to call attention to it.

"I was saying...if you're sure you don't want me to find some... oh! Nevermind," she huffed at last, folding her arms.

"You can just take care of yourself," she decided with a scowl.

He laughed, but half-raised a hand to stop her retreat. "Wait. You don't have to leave. I don't mind the company."

Meryl frowned contemplatively. Well...she ought to stay a few minutes until Millie got back, she reassured herself, and hesitantly retreated to a hard wooden chair near his bed. Trying to tell herself that this wasn't where she wanted to be, yes.

"So...where'd you pick it up?" Meryl wondered with a facade of exasperation.

"Probably in the last city. A lot of the kids were sick."

Meryl had to contain a smile at that. For a supposed cold-blooded killer, Vash was extremely good with children, boys and girls alike. No doubt it was one of the infectious little wads of germs that had passed it on to him. Who caught cold in the desert, anyway? She never understood that term.

Before she could brood on the curious vocabulary any more, Vash took up the nose-rubbing again, momentarily flustering her.

"Do you want some tea? I'm sure the lady can spare some hot water," Meryl began hesitantly, in reference to the keeper of the inn they were currently boarded at.

"Heh-eishu!"

"Bless you."

"Heh'ishu!"

"Bless you."

Vash fisted a hand beneath his nose and rubbed at it irritably, eyes scrunched into creases as he sniffled. So cute. She couldn't resist reaching out to touch an unscarred patch of skin on his shoulder gently.

"Vash! You should stay in bed."

"Well...that was the plan," he smirked.

"Yeah...well. It means less work for us, too." He couldn't get in too much trouble if he was sick in bed. Hopefully, he just wouldn't get /out/ of bed.

"Eshu!"

"Bless you," Meryl bid again, politely, then sighed and stood. "Tea?" She inquired again. Vash shook his head stubbornly, sniffling softly and leaning over to her chair. She jumped away in surprise, and then felt silly as she realized that his coat was draped across the back of it, and he was rooting in one of the pockets for something. Probably a handkerchief. Meryl sighed again but relented, bowing and moving towards the door.

"See you at breakfast, then."

"Night!" Vash called back cheerfully from somewhere within his coat. Meryl rolled her eyes.

Millie was snoring again. Meryl growled to herself and turned over in her bed, pulling up the thin covers a bit more. For being in the desert, the nights were surprisingly quite cool. Cool and sleepless. She had always been an insomniac but still... this was ridiculous.

Lifting her head from the pillows at last with an exasperated sigh, Meryl swung her legs out of bed and stood, leaving the snoring Millie behind. On tiptoe, she padded down the quiet and dark hallway of rooms to the single bathroom upstairs, flicking on the light and closing the door behind her as she plopped onto the edge of the tub and sighed. Too much travelling had overtired her, she assured herself, pouring herself a glass of water from the faucet.

She sat for some time on the cold porcelain, drinking and staring at the shower curtain sighingly. This brooding went on for several more minutes before at last, with a sigh, Meryl refilled her glass and rose, slipping out of the bathroom and back down the hall.

"Heht-ishmph..."

Meryl froze alongside Vash's door, glancing aside in mild curiosity. He was still up? And still sneezing. Where was the harm? Testing the doorknob silently and, in finding it to be open, she cautioned a glance inside the newly created crack of open door.

There was Vash, in bed as he had been before, although he was lying down now with thin blankets drawn up about him and face buried in a pillow. He didn't appear to have noticed her presence or, if he did, had not acknowledged it. Meryl put her money on the former, however, as the man's deeply scarred shoulders tensed up faintly beneath the fabric and he shuddered all over with another sneeze.

"Heh-pfft!"

Gathering her courage, Meryl spoke aloud a soft, "Vash?" as she stepped into the room. In starting surprise, his head came up and eyes clear as some distant aqua sea blinked at her. A nose-wrinkling sniffle, and then he spoke her name in soft greetings.

"Meryl... what are you doing up?"

"Well, I-..." She hesitated as the gunman's features formed an odd expression all at once and he held up a forefinger to stay her explanation. A terrible, wrinkling twitchiness came upon Vash's features, and with a sudden, sharp inhale he bent his head into the pillow to muffle the sound of another sneeze.

"Heh-mmph!"

Groaning softly and withdrawing from the pillow again with a delicate sniffle, Vash turned an apologetic gaze to Meryl.

"I'm sorry..."

The End

Wish it was mine. But it's not. Trigun belongs to Yasuhiro Nightow, and Madhouse & Pioneer Entertainment. A/N: For those that haven't seen the anime: Renegade gunman with sixty-billion double dollars on his head is blamed for the destruction of July City, a few months ago. Words and rumors will tend to spread, and sooner or later the aforementioned gunman, Vash the Stampede (nicknamed Humanoid Typhoon), is blamed for much more than he's guilty of. In fact, Vash acts never kills anyone, but try telling that to everyone else ^^; In any case, most of the early part of the series is just him being followed around by a pair of employees (Meryl and Millie) from an insurance agency, to monitor his actions and the amount of damage he causes. There's...quite a bit more to the story, but it's not addressed here, and it's all a huge spoiler anyway so... ^^;