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tampered2007-04-16 08:15 pm
sharpest-knife.livejournal.com) wrote in tampered2007-04-16 08:15 pm
LOG; complete
When; April 16, afternoon
Rating; G... amazingly enough
Characters; Knives [![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
sharpest_knife] & Vash [mildlyreckless]
Summary; After exchanging words during the most recent curse day, Vash goes to Xanadu to find Knives. They conveniently bump into each other and exchange more words from a careful distance.
Log;
Vash stared into one of the streams that flowed through the Xanadu in silence. This was such a bad idea. He hadn't been directly face-to-face with Knives since the Ark and that had hardly been pleasant. Their encounters on the City's network had confirmed the standing bad blood between the two; so why was he here? Vash knew Knives wouldn't change. He hadn't after 150 years and had little to no reason to do so now.
Perhaps it was the fact that Vash knew Knives' power was limited in the City.
...Or maybe it was just the utterly confusing conversation they'd had while under the influence of that curse.
Vash couldn't be sure, but he had gotten the impression that his brother wanted to... talk. Vash seriously doubted that it was because Knives had suddenly undergone a change of heart. If anything, he suspected his brother had simply gotten lonely in the City. If Knives would only associate on friendly terms with other plants, it wasn't that unreasonable to think that being launched into a place completely devoid of their siblings would be jarring. So Vash decided to peek in on Knives, just to see for himself, despite the black terror that was lurking in his stomach.
Knives was out taking a... walk. Yes. He didn't leave his residence often because there were too many humans in the City, but the garden itself wasn't bad. He wasn't going to wander too far from his house anyway, just enough to get away from Legato and Kururu and bask in the fresh air for a bit.
The curse the other day had disturbed him immensely, not because it caused him to sing ridiculous songs, but because it hard forced out of him words he hadn't wanted to say. Especially to Vash. But part of it... yes, part of it was genuine. He knew that Vash had been pulled into the City in a different time frame and he himself, but that didn't change the fact that he had lost everything. They were both on the brink of death when he'd left their world.
He ran a hand through his hair with its black streak and crested the hill that led to a small stream. And then he froze.
There was the devil himself, seated at the bank. Vash.
Vash stiffened suddenly, that familiar sensation telling him that his brother was close by shooting up his spine. He'd grown to hate that feeling. Vash gripped his right arm instinctively and peered back over his shoulder. It was Knives, all right. And the look he gave Vash gave him a very familiar chill.
Vash wasn't entirely sure what he should do next, so he just looked at Knives blankly for a while. For what felt to be an eternity, he simply sat next to the stream and exchanged stares with his brother, running over all the things Knives had done to him, not to mention human beings.
Knives stared back for a moment, letting his arm fall to his side, trying to keep his face calm and his nerves easy. He contemplated skewering his brother right there, but... ah, there was that small problem. Vash was farther away than his blade would allow.
"You're safe where you are," the elder twin stated offhandedly as he sat down, cross-legged, on the slope of the hill. "If you move closer, or if I, then I might kill you." He wasn't sure why he gave such a warning. In the end, killing was killing. "Fancy seeing you here, little brother. Is it safe to say this meeting isn't a coincidence?"
Vash turned so he wasn't just looking over his shoulder at Knives. He wasn't about to turn his back on him; safe distance or not.
"I felt like seeing the garden," Vash replied cautiously. "It's been a long time since I've seen so many trees and flowers." He looked around with quick glances, always bringing his eyes back to Knives' form on the slope. "It's pretty out here. When I first came here I just got really distracted so I never got the chance to visit."
Knives smiled. Of course, whenever he smiled, it was never honest or simple. There would always be some form of skepticism, malice, plotting, what have you. He'd lost the genuinity a long time ago.
"Of course. It's a beautiful place, especially for a home." He glanced back briefly at the house a good distance from where he sat, catching a glimpse of Kururu hanging the laundry out to dry. Knives turned back to face his brother. "Kind of like paradise, don't you think?" A pause. "If you took it out of the City context."
"If it wasn't for the curses and the anxiety, I'd say this is pretty close to a paradise in the City context," Vash replied flatly. He really didn't want to get into an argument with Knives like this. Their face-to-face arguments tended to be... explosive, to say the least, and Vash was still worried about Kururu's safety as well as the other residents of the City.
"But even with the curses... I sort of like it here."
Curses. Right. Knives didn't exactly want to remember those, particularly the ones that made him say and do things against his own will. Damn deities.
"I hate it here." He shifted to lie down, hands folded behind his head. He never really found time to watch the clouds, but that's what he caught himself doing as he stared at the sky. "Too many humans. Too many curses. Too many... limits."
He closed his eyes, brow slightly furrowed. Knives knew Vash well enough to know that his brother had something more to say besides idle chitchat. That's how it usually was when they met. He only wondered what it could possibly relate to and hoped to whatever gods were out there--certainly not the City's own--that it would not increase his headache.
Vash's facial features twitched slightly as he watched Knives lay back. He wished he could take the encounter that lightly. He shifted his gaze upwards and looked at the sky for a second or two. What should he say?
"I got a fish," he blurted out stupidly.
"What the hell was that?" his mind demanded, but he ignored it.
"He's blue and red. He's a lot of fun to have around."
It took Knives a few seconds to process the change in conversation, and such an inane one at that. Hadn't Vash mentioned he'd gotten a fish on the network a few days ago? He was looking for a pet, the last Knives remembered. What was the point? The creature was probably going to die in a few weeks anyway.
His next words surprised him.
"What's his name?"
"Doitzel Kaiser III," Vash replied easily, looking at Knives to see how he would react to the odd handle.
Knives lifted his head to quirk an eyebrow at Vash. Then, out of a habit as old as the brothers themselves, he closed his right eye. "How typical of you. Why would you name a fish, anyway?"
He lowered his head and refocused his gaze to the sky. "Now what did you want to talk about?"
"Why wouldn't I name a fish?" Vash asked obstinately. "He needs a name so I'm not just calling him 'fish'. Anyway, I'm not the one who named him."
Vash considered his next answer carefully.
"I don't know... I didn't really plan on talking about anything, really. I guess I was just thinking about yesterday."
Knives wasn't about to get into an argument over a fish, so he let that one drop. Instead, he went over Vash's last statement, the answer to his question. Of course.
"Yesterday..." Knives sat up and folded his hands in his lap. He was deathly curious about what Vash had to say about it, and at the same time didn't want to be reminded of it at all. "Yesterday was a ridiculous curse. There's not much more thought that can go into it."
Vash shifted slightly, brow furrowed as he pondered all that had been said-- er, sung the previous day.
"Yeah, I guess," he said, rubbing his arm. "Several people and I sang to one another. Some of us ended up singing some... pretty surprising things to each other. ...But I don't think anyone else ever bothered to filter what they were singing."
Knives was silent for a considerable length before replying, "I guess that means I'm the only one with some tact." It wouldn't do if Legato--or, God forbid, potential enemies like the Major--to hear the final pieces of his and Vash's sung conversation. He'd already spilled more than enough without the filter.
"Tact?" Vash echoed, cocking an eyebrow. "Sorry to sound so surprised, Knives, but you've never really had much tact."
Unless tact meant wiping out entire towns just because humans lived there. Vash didn't think it did.
"And you have?" Knives grinned. "Because allowing yourself to be shot up and scarred in more than a dozen places really isn't tactful. Ah, but wait; that's common sense."
He stood up and brushed away dirt from his pants. "If you've nothing better to do than talk idly, then I'll be on my way. The garden gates are that way." He gestured in the opposite direction of his residence, hoping that Vash would take his hint and start off, because contrary to his actions, Knives had no desire to return home at the moment.
As Knives began to turn to leave, Vash suddenly felt an odd panic. For some reason it reminded him of the day his twin sliced off his left arm. It was probably just the fact that he wasn't ready to let him leave yet. So Vash scrambled to his feet and said the first thing that popped into his head...
"Why did you apologize after I did yesterday?"
The question froze him to the ground. That was exactly why he refused to speak about yesterday, especially with his brother. Why had he apologized? What was he sorry for? Certainly not killing all those humans. Certainly not carrying out his plans for vengeance, for paradise.
He was quiet for a long time again, trying to piece together his answer in such a way that it left no room for questions. Finally satisfied, he turned around to face Vash.
"Because I'm sorry I wasn't a better brother."
Vash stared at him. For quite a while. He hadn't expected that. He wasn't even sure what that was supposed to mean. Was he sorry for not being a better brother in the cutting-off-Vash's-arm-and-making-him-wipe-out-entire-cities way, or the not-being-able-to-make-Vash-see-things-differently way?
Vash had a feeling it wasn't the former.
He tried to think of something clever and disarming to say.
"...What?"
...That wasn't it... But he'd said it, so it was a bit late now.
Knives scoffed. "You heard me. I'm not going to repeat myself." Really, Vash was stupid sometimes. ... No, that would be all the time. His brother had hardly done anything intelligent since they had crash-landed into the planet's surface 150 years ago.
"If you can't fathom answers, don't ask questions." He turned to leave again.
"Sorry if it's a little hard for me to get," Vash said irritably, resisting the urge to throw a rock at his brother. Knives always did have the tendency to treat him like an idiot. "It's only been, what, a hundred and fifty years of you never saying you were sorry for anything. I can fathom it..."
See? I can use big words too.
"...It's just surprising, that's all."
Vash felt another twinge of desperation as Knives continued to act like he was going to leave.
"And I meant what I said too, you know!"
Again, Knives found himself riveted to the spot. "I'm not sorry for anything else," he replied, not looking at Vash, instead letting his gaze wander back to his house in the distance. "It doesn't matter if I'm the last person alive, in this City or back in our world. I am proud of the actions I have taken to get where I am."
But...
"What you want can't be done." He looked over his shoulder at his brother, at the desperate expression on his face. "We are too far apart now for you to fix this. One day I will kill you, or you, me."
"I know that," Vash said flatly in response to Knives' last remark. He also knew the rest was true. Knives would never be sorry for all of the horrible things he'd done. Vash had figured that out a long time ago.
"Maybe it'd be better if we both ended up dead."
A smirk actually graced Knives' face. He'd always imagined he'd be the one to do the killing, though he personally disliked the idea of Vash dying. If there was a way to remove his brother's existence without killing him, then he would take that route. But of course, it would take a lot of the right persuasion to make him admit that.
He had also always told Vash that they could not live in the same world as humans. Almost like... "Paradise," Knives said simply. "Don't you agree, brother?"
Vash looked up at the tree that stood near him and thoughts of home and all he had learned about what dying in the City meant flashed through his mind. He had been thinking about it carefully for a few days now, and he had made up his mind. As long as Knives was in the City, he couldn't carry out his plans to wipe out the human race. And Vash didn't want to leave his brother alone. As different as they were, they were still brothers.
There was only one way to make sure that Knives couldn't get back home, and Vash intended to share his fate.
"Yeah," he said finally. "I guess I do."
It was about time, Knives thought, satisfied, quite sure that Vash had something on his mind judging from his vacant expression. But he wasn't about to ask. Call it a hunch, but Knives had a feeling he knew what his brother was thinking about, and he looked forward to finding out whether he was right or not. But it wouldn't happen today. Knowing Vash, there were still loose ends to tie up, last things to say and do, before they could find their paradise. In a way, Knives was glad his brother was there.
"Do you have anything else to ask, or will you finally let me go?"
Vash shrugged.
"I'm done," he said. "I need to go home and feed Doitzel."
Actually, he wanted to go home and sleep. Vash had only slept for a total of four hours over the past few days. He had a feeling that now his mind was officially made up, he could finally get some rest, but he still wasn't ready to turn his back to his brother. Old habits die hard, and the peaceful conversation hadn't been nearly enough for Vash to settle that tingle up his spine.
Knives knew Vash wouldn't budge until he did, and he had no qualms about turning his back on his brother. He'd done it more times than he could count, once getting shot in the shoulder. That had started it all, hadn't it?
The cells in his left arm tingled, eager to slice.
Still smirking, he started back down the other side of the hill towards his house, small blades ripping through the sleeve of his jacket.
Vash watched Knives walk away and cautiously made his way back towards the garden's entrance. If anything, he was glad he came, if only because it had confirmed what he had been thinking about doing.
He just wasn't sure how he was going to explain his upcoming temporary absence to his new friends.
Rating; G... amazingly enough
Characters; Knives [
sharpest_knife] & Vash [mildlyreckless]Summary; After exchanging words during the most recent curse day, Vash goes to Xanadu to find Knives. They conveniently bump into each other and exchange more words from a careful distance.
Log;
Vash stared into one of the streams that flowed through the Xanadu in silence. This was such a bad idea. He hadn't been directly face-to-face with Knives since the Ark and that had hardly been pleasant. Their encounters on the City's network had confirmed the standing bad blood between the two; so why was he here? Vash knew Knives wouldn't change. He hadn't after 150 years and had little to no reason to do so now.
Perhaps it was the fact that Vash knew Knives' power was limited in the City.
...Or maybe it was just the utterly confusing conversation they'd had while under the influence of that curse.
Vash couldn't be sure, but he had gotten the impression that his brother wanted to... talk. Vash seriously doubted that it was because Knives had suddenly undergone a change of heart. If anything, he suspected his brother had simply gotten lonely in the City. If Knives would only associate on friendly terms with other plants, it wasn't that unreasonable to think that being launched into a place completely devoid of their siblings would be jarring. So Vash decided to peek in on Knives, just to see for himself, despite the black terror that was lurking in his stomach.
Knives was out taking a... walk. Yes. He didn't leave his residence often because there were too many humans in the City, but the garden itself wasn't bad. He wasn't going to wander too far from his house anyway, just enough to get away from Legato and Kururu and bask in the fresh air for a bit.
The curse the other day had disturbed him immensely, not because it caused him to sing ridiculous songs, but because it hard forced out of him words he hadn't wanted to say. Especially to Vash. But part of it... yes, part of it was genuine. He knew that Vash had been pulled into the City in a different time frame and he himself, but that didn't change the fact that he had lost everything. They were both on the brink of death when he'd left their world.
He ran a hand through his hair with its black streak and crested the hill that led to a small stream. And then he froze.
There was the devil himself, seated at the bank. Vash.
Vash stiffened suddenly, that familiar sensation telling him that his brother was close by shooting up his spine. He'd grown to hate that feeling. Vash gripped his right arm instinctively and peered back over his shoulder. It was Knives, all right. And the look he gave Vash gave him a very familiar chill.
Vash wasn't entirely sure what he should do next, so he just looked at Knives blankly for a while. For what felt to be an eternity, he simply sat next to the stream and exchanged stares with his brother, running over all the things Knives had done to him, not to mention human beings.
Knives stared back for a moment, letting his arm fall to his side, trying to keep his face calm and his nerves easy. He contemplated skewering his brother right there, but... ah, there was that small problem. Vash was farther away than his blade would allow.
"You're safe where you are," the elder twin stated offhandedly as he sat down, cross-legged, on the slope of the hill. "If you move closer, or if I, then I might kill you." He wasn't sure why he gave such a warning. In the end, killing was killing. "Fancy seeing you here, little brother. Is it safe to say this meeting isn't a coincidence?"
Vash turned so he wasn't just looking over his shoulder at Knives. He wasn't about to turn his back on him; safe distance or not.
"I felt like seeing the garden," Vash replied cautiously. "It's been a long time since I've seen so many trees and flowers." He looked around with quick glances, always bringing his eyes back to Knives' form on the slope. "It's pretty out here. When I first came here I just got really distracted so I never got the chance to visit."
Knives smiled. Of course, whenever he smiled, it was never honest or simple. There would always be some form of skepticism, malice, plotting, what have you. He'd lost the genuinity a long time ago.
"Of course. It's a beautiful place, especially for a home." He glanced back briefly at the house a good distance from where he sat, catching a glimpse of Kururu hanging the laundry out to dry. Knives turned back to face his brother. "Kind of like paradise, don't you think?" A pause. "If you took it out of the City context."
"If it wasn't for the curses and the anxiety, I'd say this is pretty close to a paradise in the City context," Vash replied flatly. He really didn't want to get into an argument with Knives like this. Their face-to-face arguments tended to be... explosive, to say the least, and Vash was still worried about Kururu's safety as well as the other residents of the City.
"But even with the curses... I sort of like it here."
Curses. Right. Knives didn't exactly want to remember those, particularly the ones that made him say and do things against his own will. Damn deities.
"I hate it here." He shifted to lie down, hands folded behind his head. He never really found time to watch the clouds, but that's what he caught himself doing as he stared at the sky. "Too many humans. Too many curses. Too many... limits."
He closed his eyes, brow slightly furrowed. Knives knew Vash well enough to know that his brother had something more to say besides idle chitchat. That's how it usually was when they met. He only wondered what it could possibly relate to and hoped to whatever gods were out there--certainly not the City's own--that it would not increase his headache.
Vash's facial features twitched slightly as he watched Knives lay back. He wished he could take the encounter that lightly. He shifted his gaze upwards and looked at the sky for a second or two. What should he say?
"I got a fish," he blurted out stupidly.
"What the hell was that?" his mind demanded, but he ignored it.
"He's blue and red. He's a lot of fun to have around."
It took Knives a few seconds to process the change in conversation, and such an inane one at that. Hadn't Vash mentioned he'd gotten a fish on the network a few days ago? He was looking for a pet, the last Knives remembered. What was the point? The creature was probably going to die in a few weeks anyway.
His next words surprised him.
"What's his name?"
"Doitzel Kaiser III," Vash replied easily, looking at Knives to see how he would react to the odd handle.
Knives lifted his head to quirk an eyebrow at Vash. Then, out of a habit as old as the brothers themselves, he closed his right eye. "How typical of you. Why would you name a fish, anyway?"
He lowered his head and refocused his gaze to the sky. "Now what did you want to talk about?"
"Why wouldn't I name a fish?" Vash asked obstinately. "He needs a name so I'm not just calling him 'fish'. Anyway, I'm not the one who named him."
Vash considered his next answer carefully.
"I don't know... I didn't really plan on talking about anything, really. I guess I was just thinking about yesterday."
Knives wasn't about to get into an argument over a fish, so he let that one drop. Instead, he went over Vash's last statement, the answer to his question. Of course.
"Yesterday..." Knives sat up and folded his hands in his lap. He was deathly curious about what Vash had to say about it, and at the same time didn't want to be reminded of it at all. "Yesterday was a ridiculous curse. There's not much more thought that can go into it."
Vash shifted slightly, brow furrowed as he pondered all that had been said-- er, sung the previous day.
"Yeah, I guess," he said, rubbing his arm. "Several people and I sang to one another. Some of us ended up singing some... pretty surprising things to each other. ...But I don't think anyone else ever bothered to filter what they were singing."
Knives was silent for a considerable length before replying, "I guess that means I'm the only one with some tact." It wouldn't do if Legato--or, God forbid, potential enemies like the Major--to hear the final pieces of his and Vash's sung conversation. He'd already spilled more than enough without the filter.
"Tact?" Vash echoed, cocking an eyebrow. "Sorry to sound so surprised, Knives, but you've never really had much tact."
Unless tact meant wiping out entire towns just because humans lived there. Vash didn't think it did.
"And you have?" Knives grinned. "Because allowing yourself to be shot up and scarred in more than a dozen places really isn't tactful. Ah, but wait; that's common sense."
He stood up and brushed away dirt from his pants. "If you've nothing better to do than talk idly, then I'll be on my way. The garden gates are that way." He gestured in the opposite direction of his residence, hoping that Vash would take his hint and start off, because contrary to his actions, Knives had no desire to return home at the moment.
As Knives began to turn to leave, Vash suddenly felt an odd panic. For some reason it reminded him of the day his twin sliced off his left arm. It was probably just the fact that he wasn't ready to let him leave yet. So Vash scrambled to his feet and said the first thing that popped into his head...
"Why did you apologize after I did yesterday?"
The question froze him to the ground. That was exactly why he refused to speak about yesterday, especially with his brother. Why had he apologized? What was he sorry for? Certainly not killing all those humans. Certainly not carrying out his plans for vengeance, for paradise.
He was quiet for a long time again, trying to piece together his answer in such a way that it left no room for questions. Finally satisfied, he turned around to face Vash.
"Because I'm sorry I wasn't a better brother."
Vash stared at him. For quite a while. He hadn't expected that. He wasn't even sure what that was supposed to mean. Was he sorry for not being a better brother in the cutting-off-Vash's-arm-and-making-him-wipe-out-entire-cities way, or the not-being-able-to-make-Vash-see-things-differently way?
Vash had a feeling it wasn't the former.
He tried to think of something clever and disarming to say.
"...What?"
...That wasn't it... But he'd said it, so it was a bit late now.
Knives scoffed. "You heard me. I'm not going to repeat myself." Really, Vash was stupid sometimes. ... No, that would be all the time. His brother had hardly done anything intelligent since they had crash-landed into the planet's surface 150 years ago.
"If you can't fathom answers, don't ask questions." He turned to leave again.
"Sorry if it's a little hard for me to get," Vash said irritably, resisting the urge to throw a rock at his brother. Knives always did have the tendency to treat him like an idiot. "It's only been, what, a hundred and fifty years of you never saying you were sorry for anything. I can fathom it..."
See? I can use big words too.
"...It's just surprising, that's all."
Vash felt another twinge of desperation as Knives continued to act like he was going to leave.
"And I meant what I said too, you know!"
Again, Knives found himself riveted to the spot. "I'm not sorry for anything else," he replied, not looking at Vash, instead letting his gaze wander back to his house in the distance. "It doesn't matter if I'm the last person alive, in this City or back in our world. I am proud of the actions I have taken to get where I am."
But...
"What you want can't be done." He looked over his shoulder at his brother, at the desperate expression on his face. "We are too far apart now for you to fix this. One day I will kill you, or you, me."
"I know that," Vash said flatly in response to Knives' last remark. He also knew the rest was true. Knives would never be sorry for all of the horrible things he'd done. Vash had figured that out a long time ago.
"Maybe it'd be better if we both ended up dead."
A smirk actually graced Knives' face. He'd always imagined he'd be the one to do the killing, though he personally disliked the idea of Vash dying. If there was a way to remove his brother's existence without killing him, then he would take that route. But of course, it would take a lot of the right persuasion to make him admit that.
He had also always told Vash that they could not live in the same world as humans. Almost like... "Paradise," Knives said simply. "Don't you agree, brother?"
Vash looked up at the tree that stood near him and thoughts of home and all he had learned about what dying in the City meant flashed through his mind. He had been thinking about it carefully for a few days now, and he had made up his mind. As long as Knives was in the City, he couldn't carry out his plans to wipe out the human race. And Vash didn't want to leave his brother alone. As different as they were, they were still brothers.
There was only one way to make sure that Knives couldn't get back home, and Vash intended to share his fate.
"Yeah," he said finally. "I guess I do."
It was about time, Knives thought, satisfied, quite sure that Vash had something on his mind judging from his vacant expression. But he wasn't about to ask. Call it a hunch, but Knives had a feeling he knew what his brother was thinking about, and he looked forward to finding out whether he was right or not. But it wouldn't happen today. Knowing Vash, there were still loose ends to tie up, last things to say and do, before they could find their paradise. In a way, Knives was glad his brother was there.
"Do you have anything else to ask, or will you finally let me go?"
Vash shrugged.
"I'm done," he said. "I need to go home and feed Doitzel."
Actually, he wanted to go home and sleep. Vash had only slept for a total of four hours over the past few days. He had a feeling that now his mind was officially made up, he could finally get some rest, but he still wasn't ready to turn his back to his brother. Old habits die hard, and the peaceful conversation hadn't been nearly enough for Vash to settle that tingle up his spine.
Knives knew Vash wouldn't budge until he did, and he had no qualms about turning his back on his brother. He'd done it more times than he could count, once getting shot in the shoulder. That had started it all, hadn't it?
The cells in his left arm tingled, eager to slice.
Still smirking, he started back down the other side of the hill towards his house, small blades ripping through the sleeve of his jacket.
Vash watched Knives walk away and cautiously made his way back towards the garden's entrance. If anything, he was glad he came, if only because it had confirmed what he had been thinking about doing.
He just wasn't sure how he was going to explain his upcoming temporary absence to his new friends.