They've been followed for the last fifty iles. A dark figure too low to the ground to be a carrion bird, she'd seen it come up that afternoon from the east, appearing in bits and pieces in the heat-haze rising off an endless sea of suns-baked sand. Vash hadn't said a goddamn thing, hadn't glanced back once, not even when Wolfwood caught herself glancing in the rearview for the tenth time.
When they pull into town and throw the last of their cash on the innkeeper's desk in exchange for a key, Wolfwood hangs back, feeling a hundred eyes on her in the dark on the other side of the door behind them. Vash pausing halfway up the stairs, eyes half-hidden behind golden lenses when he turns towards her.
"Wolfwood?"
"You go ahead and make up the room," she says and puts a cigarette between her lips. "I'm gonna have a smoke."
Vash, standing quite still, looks through her for a moment and she about crawls outta her own skin. Then it passes and he shoulders his pack higher, smile coming a few seconds too slow, and says, "You're getting the crappy bed, then." Moseys on.
"Like hell I am," she throws back, except she's already one foot out the door, instead of hot on his heels to prove him wrong. Wolfwood isn't about to count on him to believe her for a damn second anyway.
She finds the guy waiting for her a couple blocks down where the town's all but falling apart. Hears the gun cock before she turns the corner and has the Punisher under his chin a heartbeat later. There's no surprise on his face, just a whole lotta that cold nothing. He's younger than she'd thought. Doesn't say a damn thing, but the gun goes off like clockwork, right out here in the damn open. It glances off the Punisher and buries in the wall by her temple. Grabbing on quick to the adrenaline, Wolfwood goes ahead and pins him there, too, cross bearing into him hard.
"How much are they promising you? Huh?" Already knows that answer. Her corpse is worth a lot to them. "Better be worth it, coming all this way to die like that old man."
He laughs, rictus grin, eyes lit up like he's got hellfire inside. "It's worth it just to see the look on your face," he says, and twitches his trigger finger a couple more times, until the Punisher's as pitted as the rest of the damn planet. "We don't even have to do anything to you yet. Your paranoia... just knowing we can find you as easily as this... you're driving yourself to the end of your own rope, Chapel, and once you do, the Eye of Michael will close in to enact our justice. Remember you did this. Vash the Stampede won't be able to protect you from what lays ahead—how do you know he'll even want to? They are brothers, after all."
And she blacks in to her hand splayed across his face, nails drawing blood and the Punisher's edge cutting against her chest where she leans into it into him. She's shaking, anger and something even harder to keep a grip on. How much have they fed back to that place? "That's a name you shouldn't've said."
Just gonna make her job harder, down the road, but she can cut this part of it out right here and now.
Takes about ten seconds. Scrabbling, twisting, sweat-slick fingers slipping on metal, strapped to her ribs and pressed to her jaw, wrenched back, fingers cracking, twisting again, the harsh ragged breathing of someone who's realised they aren't as ready to die as they'd figured they were. That's the thing about people like them. They'll do damn near anything to survive. But tonight it's her, it's always gotta be her, a chamber emptied into his heart and his head and Wolfwood holding him up by the cross until the ringing in her ears fades out to a buzz.
Feels—nothing.
She has to feel nothing.
Vash is sitting at the open window when she gets back. His back turned to her, arms folded loose across the chair he's straddled, and glasses pushed up high over his eyes. The room is made up. Without a word, Wolfwood lets the Punisher down and takes the bed that hasn't got his knapsack beside it. Shoes still on, arms folded behind her head when she lays down. She turns her face to the wall.
"Hurry up and close that before we catch our death." It's in the pit of her stomach, how she can't shake the feeling that he can smell it on her. Wolfwood keeps her eyes closed. "Got an early start tomorrow."
Seems like he's ignoring her for a few seconds. No sound, no agreement. Then the chair scrapes slowly against the floor, Vash standing and brushing past the foot of her bed. A few seconds later, she sees the light go out through her eyelids, worn mattress sighing beneath a new weight.
He doesn't say a goddamn thing.
in sum: • Vash seeing right through her, as usual • no lectures this time, though, but the knowing, unquestioning silence is so much worse • the willingness to kill on Vash's behalf, again and again, even when it's her that's under fire • whatever this "Eye of Michael" is, they very sincerely wish her dead—and possibly Vash, too, though there was a reverence to the mention of his name that was deeply unsettling • You Are (Not) A Priest • "They are brothers, after all." • now that's interesting
points of note: • AN ACTUAL (extremely vague and nameless) REFERENCE TO KNIVES, HOLY SHIT • this harkens back to severalearlier memories in which she correlated hitmen and mentions of her being a "traitor" to meddling done by "the eye", now revealed to be "The Eye of Michael" • additionally, the hitman refers to her as "Chapel", much as Midvalley had • with her current memories, the situation reads as having pissed off the wrong crowd, which is... not inaccurate
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#15. TAKING OUT A HIT. OF A SORT.
canon equivalent: none. au-specific.
They've been followed for the last fifty iles. A dark figure too low to the ground to be a carrion bird, she'd seen it come up that afternoon from the east, appearing in bits and pieces in the heat-haze rising off an endless sea of suns-baked sand. Vash hadn't said a goddamn thing, hadn't glanced back once, not even when Wolfwood caught herself glancing in the rearview for the tenth time.
When they pull into town and throw the last of their cash on the innkeeper's desk in exchange for a key, Wolfwood hangs back, feeling a hundred eyes on her in the dark on the other side of the door behind them. Vash pausing halfway up the stairs, eyes half-hidden behind golden lenses when he turns towards her.
"Wolfwood?"
"You go ahead and make up the room," she says and puts a cigarette between her lips. "I'm gonna have a smoke."
Vash, standing quite still, looks through her for a moment and she about crawls outta her own skin. Then it passes and he shoulders his pack higher, smile coming a few seconds too slow, and says, "You're getting the crappy bed, then." Moseys on.
"Like hell I am," she throws back, except she's already one foot out the door, instead of hot on his heels to prove him wrong. Wolfwood isn't about to count on him to believe her for a damn second anyway.
She finds the guy waiting for her a couple blocks down where the town's all but falling apart. Hears the gun cock before she turns the corner and has the Punisher under his chin a heartbeat later. There's no surprise on his face, just a whole lotta that cold nothing. He's younger than she'd thought. Doesn't say a damn thing, but the gun goes off like clockwork, right out here in the damn open. It glances off the Punisher and buries in the wall by her temple. Grabbing on quick to the adrenaline, Wolfwood goes ahead and pins him there, too, cross bearing into him hard.
"How much are they promising you? Huh?" Already knows that answer. Her corpse is worth a lot to them. "Better be worth it, coming all this way to die like that old man."
He laughs, rictus grin, eyes lit up like he's got hellfire inside. "It's worth it just to see the look on your face," he says, and twitches his trigger finger a couple more times, until the Punisher's as pitted as the rest of the damn planet. "We don't even have to do anything to you yet. Your paranoia... just knowing we can find you as easily as this... you're driving yourself to the end of your own rope, Chapel, and once you do, the Eye of Michael will close in to enact our justice. Remember you did this. Vash the Stampede won't be able to protect you from what lays ahead—how do you know he'll even want to? They are brothers, after all."
And she blacks in to her hand splayed across his face, nails drawing blood and the Punisher's edge cutting against her chest where she leans into it into him. She's shaking, anger and something even harder to keep a grip on. How much have they fed back to that place? "That's a name you shouldn't've said."
Just gonna make her job harder, down the road, but she can cut this part of it out right here and now.
Takes about ten seconds. Scrabbling, twisting, sweat-slick fingers slipping on metal, strapped to her ribs and pressed to her jaw, wrenched back, fingers cracking, twisting again, the harsh ragged breathing of someone who's realised they aren't as ready to die as they'd figured they were. That's the thing about people like them. They'll do damn near anything to survive. But tonight it's her, it's always gotta be her, a chamber emptied into his heart and his head and Wolfwood holding him up by the cross until the ringing in her ears fades out to a buzz.
Feels—nothing.
She has to feel nothing.
Vash is sitting at the open window when she gets back. His back turned to her, arms folded loose across the chair he's straddled, and glasses pushed up high over his eyes. The room is made up. Without a word, Wolfwood lets the Punisher down and takes the bed that hasn't got his knapsack beside it. Shoes still on, arms folded behind her head when she lays down. She turns her face to the wall.
"Hurry up and close that before we catch our death." It's in the pit of her stomach, how she can't shake the feeling that he can smell it on her. Wolfwood keeps her eyes closed. "Got an early start tomorrow."
Seems like he's ignoring her for a few seconds. No sound, no agreement. Then the chair scrapes slowly against the floor, Vash standing and brushing past the foot of her bed. A few seconds later, she sees the light go out through her eyelids, worn mattress sighing beneath a new weight.
He doesn't say a goddamn thing.
in sum:
• Vash seeing right through her, as usual
• no lectures this time, though, but the knowing, unquestioning silence is so much worse
• the willingness to kill on Vash's behalf, again and again, even when it's her that's under fire
• whatever this "Eye of Michael" is, they very sincerely wish her dead—and possibly Vash, too, though there was a reverence to the mention of his name that was deeply unsettling
• You Are (Not) A Priest
• "They are brothers, after all."
• now that's interesting
points of note:
• AN ACTUAL (extremely vague and nameless) REFERENCE TO KNIVES, HOLY SHIT
• this harkens back to several earlier memories in which she correlated hitmen and mentions of her being a "traitor" to meddling done by "the eye", now revealed to be "The Eye of Michael"
• additionally, the hitman refers to her as "Chapel", much as Midvalley had
• with her current memories, the situation reads as having pissed off the wrong crowd, which is... not inaccurate