Agreement to Disagree

A Trigun fic by Yen

Disclaimer: All characters belong to their respective owners and not me… hence the present emptiness of my wallet.

He hurt.

It was an… interesting sensation, and he reflexively flexed his muscles to explore it further.

The damage to his body was relatively major, but he could feel his body dealing with it rapidly. Soon, he would be able to walk again. The last time he had been hurt this bad had been… had been…

His head turned to the side. Had been a long time ago.

“You’re up.” His eyes opened at that quiet statement filled with certainty.

Vash.

“You were out for quite a while. I was getting worried.”

He surprised himself with a dry chuckle. “Were you?”

“Here, have some water.” Vash gingerly lifted his brother to sip from the glass he held to his lips. Knives looked at the water speculatively before sipping. As Vash laid him back down on the bed, he looked around.

“So where are we?” The room they were in was plainly decorated. Four wooden walls, a cupboard for what he assumed were dishes and odds and ends, a pallet, a table and chairs and a stove. And no bars.

“A cabin.” Vash placed the cup on the table, turned a chair around and sat on it, regarding his brother solemnly.

One light brow lifted. “I can see that. What are we doing here?”

Vash shrugged and started fiddling with the folds of his coat, a nervous habit Knives recognized from young. “For you to heal.”

“For me to what?” Knives stared at him, then suddenly shook his head, grinning. “You want me to repent, don’t you? You expect me to become like you. Vash, Vash, Vash.”

His gaze sliced up, diamond bright and hard. “I don’t think so.”

Lying back down, he stared at the ceiling, aware of his brother’s silent watchful gaze and of the footsteps out of the door minutes later. Turning so that his back faced the door, his face hardened.

I don’t think so.

* * *

“Why do you have to kill them?! What have they ever done to you?”

“Done?” Knives looked surprised. “To me, perhaps nothing, in the great scheme of things; but to others, a great deal.”

Vash pulled back, startled at the sudden defense. Getting up, Knives walked uncertainly over to the chair, his steps tottering, but firm. “Don’t you think Vash?”

“What do you mean?”

“Think of the planet they came from. They’re not native to this world, and you want to know why, because every world knows better than to claim them as their people. They feed and live and destroy the different planets they’ve been to. They’re no better than viruses. Living, breathing, talking ones, but still viruses.”

“They’re people Knives! Just like Lem was a person!”

Knives sighed and shook his head. “Ever the innocent. Look at the evidence.”

Pouring himself a glass of water, he waved the glass in his direction before sipping from it. “They destroyed their last planet and now, once again, they’re destroying this one.”

He shrugged. “They’re parasites, pure and simple. And once they’re done with this one, they’ll go on to the next one, and the next one, and the next one… and it doesn’t end. And the galaxy suffers.”

Vash vehemently shook his head. “No. I don’t believe you. They’re good for this planet. They’ve put so much back into it, life is prospering…”

Knives suddenly laughed. Threw back his head and shouted out a hearty chuckle. “Life? What life? They create plants and rear animals which are not native to this planet. They’re merely trying to recreate the “paradise” they destroyed so many years ago.”

“And what is wrong with that?”

“Wrong? Let me tell you what is wrong, what about the life that already existed here, hmm? What about the bacteria and animals and plants that conceivably exist in this barren landscape?”

“You said it yourself! It is a barren landscape. What could possible exist here? Is it wrong to breathe new life into the planet?”

“And who said that there was no life here Vash? Was it the omniscient, omnipotent power that exists? No, it wasn’t.” His eyes narrowed. “It was the scientists, the politicians, the businessmen, the people who insisted that all the changes they’re instituting is bad. What would they gain by saying they’re destroying the local ecosystem with the construction of their world… nothing. What would they gain but saying that they’re recreating paradise in hell… everything.”

“You’re a cynic Knives.” Vash accused, his eyes cold.

“Yes, yes I am.” Knives laughed, but it stopped abruptly, like water cut off by a quick twist of the tap, “But that’s the way the world made me.”

* * *

“You betrayed me Vash! You betrayed your own flesh and blood, you turned your back on your own kind! How do you sleep at night?!”

“You want to know how I sleep at night?! I’ll tell you how I sleep at night! I sleep badly, I don’t sleep, I watch the stars, the moon, but I’ll live with it, and you want to know why! Because I had to! You were going to destroy the world and all its people, everything that Lem had lived, and died for. I could not let you do that."

Knives sneered. “All of this for a dead woman. How touching.”

Vash sprung, grabbed him, struck him. “Don’t you ever,” he panted, “ever talk about her in that tone again!”

Knives looked coldly at his twin and slowly wiped away the blood that tricked down his chin. “Still have that schoolboy crush Vash? How constant you are to a pile of bones.”

A gun was suddenly to his temple but Knives still regarded him as calmly as ever.

Vash’s feverish eyes stared into his.

The hand holding the gun dropped. Vash re-holstered the gun and turned away. “I’m going for a walk.”

* * *

Knives regarded the butterfly in the web with interest.

Its deep yellow wings fluttered helplessly against the sticky silken threads of the spider’s trap and instead entangled it even further into its’ enemy’s lair. He looked at it clinically. At this rate, the butterfly would be dead by the next 15 minutes.

A spider scrambled out from under some leaves.

Maybe less.

Suddenly a shot rang out and the delicate web ripped apart in the bullet’s noisy path. His ears still ringing, he turned to see Vash re-holstering his gun and watching the butterfly flutter away while the spider climbed back into its hidey hole.

“You do know that you just deprived the spider of a meal don’t you?” He asked conversationally.

Vash stood tall against the afternoon sun for a minute more before turning away.

“What? The silent treatment?” He called out mockingly. “I thought you were more mature than that. Still, I guess since I am two minutes older, you are allowed to be childish.”

Vash stopped, then silently strode off. Knives sighed and turned back to the web. Prodding the leaves, he watched the spider scamper out of its hidey hole. His hand reached out as if it grab it. Then stopped.

He watched it stand in the pale shot of sunlight for a few seconds, quivering, before heading back to its quiet shade.

He stood up and left.

* * *

“Why did you kill Lem’s lover?” The quiet question caught Knives by surprise and he stared down at his hands to recollect his thoughts.

“What do you mean?”

“Just that, why? Why did you kill him? What did he ever do to you?”

Knives shrugged. “Felt like it.”

“Felt like it?” He stared at his brother.

“Felt like it?!” He got up and loomed over Knives.

“FELT LIKE IT?! What sort of answer is that?!”

Knives stared up at his brother calmly. “The only one you’re going to get.”

“Give me a reason Knives. You owe me that much.”

“Really?” His eyes cooled to pieces of blue flint. “And what do you owe me, brother of mine? What do you owe me for that first bullet in the knee, then the second one, and the third one in my other knee, fourth one in my right arm, fifth one in my left arm… what do you owe me for all that pain?” His smile turned mocking. “And oh yes, mustn’t forget the time you turned the big guns on me. Fortunately you missed, still, what was that for?”

Vash pulled back. “That was repayment.”

“Repayment for what?” sneered Knives. “Repayment for the death of just one more vermin. Just one more nest of vermin?”

Vash looked pleadingly at the figure in front of him, an almost carbon copy of himself save for the haircut and the lighter shade of hair and eyes. And the fanatical glimmer that lived deep in the crystal blue depths.

“Why do you hate them so much Knives? What did they ever do to you?”

“Do?” It was Knives turn to get up. Knives’ turn to loom. “Do?! You ask me what they did to me? They taught me everything I knew. They molded me into the… the… thing I am today. With every beating. With every insult. With every jibe, with every sneer. With every kick, punch, slap, threat. And all I did not deserve. That’s what they did to me. Humanity should be proud for teaching its destroyer so well.”

He sneered as Vash took one step back, then another. Stepping forward with Vash’s every retreat, his eyes blazed with hatred. “They taught me that only the strongest survive. That when you’re alone, you fight to stay alive. That if you’re strange and unknown, you fight to be. That when you’re on the other side, the wrong side, you fight so that you can live. That you can breathe, that you can eat, that you can exist!”

He whirled around, his back facing Vash and stared up at the sky. “That if you’re an outsider, you have no one to count on yourself. That if you’re not one of them,” He bit out the words with rage, “You just have to endure being all alone and just continue on. By yourself.”

Vash listened shocked, and then shook his head. “I don’t understand. Rem and I…”

“That’s just it.” Knives whirled back, enraged. “Rem and I… I and Rem,” His voice lightens, a furious mockery of a little child, “Knives, why don’t you come with Rem and me, we’re going to pick flowers? Rem and I are going to water some plants? Do you want your hair cut? Rem’s going to cut mine now. Sorry Knives. Rem’s waiting for me. Can’t talk to you now.”

The last sentence seems to defuse his anger and he slumps down, the passion and emotion fuelling him dying down. Vash looked startled, his eyes wide with shock… and gradual realization.

“I’m sorry Knives.” He apologized softly. “I didn’t realize.”

“Yeah well it’s a little too late isn’t it brother?” Knives laughed bitterly. “It was supposed to be us against them. Rem turned it into everyone against me. Into you against me.”

“Knives I... don’t know what to say.” One of Vash’s hands reached out, only to drop slowly.

“You know what the ironic thing is?” Knives asked softly, his tone wry, his eyes still on his hands, unaware of his brother’s aborted gesture. “Even despite of all of that, I couldn’t really hurt her.”

Dead eyes rose to stare into clear green ones, softened by sad understanding. “I couldn’t hurt her because you loved her. She took you away from me, shaped you into something I don’t understand and I still couldn’t hurt her. Because of you.”

Shaking his head, he turned around and slowly walked into the cabin, a stricken Vash behind him.

* * *

“It was you, wasn’t it?”

“Hmm?” Knives idly flipped through the book, half-unaware of the question.

“It was you. You killed everybody on the spaceship and activated the launching mechanism prematurely.”

The hand on the book stilled.

“Didn’t you?”

Knives looked up with a half-smile. “Why are you asking this?”

“Because I want to know.” The hands gripped tightly on the back of the chair, knuckles white. “I need to know.”

“Why? What would it achieve?” Knives stood up, delighting in the almost absence of pain save for a mild twinge in his knee. Standing by the window, he stared out at the wide golden desert, the sands shifting and slipping into a myriad of hills and valleys with nothing constant. “Would it change the past? Or perhaps it would change the present…”

Turning around, he studied his brother dispassionately and smiled coolly. “Would the knowledge make you happy brother dear? That you were right? Or maybe sad? That you have a psychotic twin brother who wishes to destroy the human race? Or maybe angry? And you’ll try and kill me again?”

Vash turned away, and murmured sadly. “I just want to know. I just want to understand.”

“Understand?” Knives shook his head. “Understand what? That I single-handedly almost destroyed the entire human race? And not by accident?”

“No. I just want to understand why.” Vash’s head rose to face his brother’s, twin verdant orbs staring determinedly into azure ones. “Why you have made it your life’s mission to destroy them?”

“Because…”

“And no excuses.”

“Excuses?” Knives looked at his brother, one brow arched coolly.

“You know what I mean.” Vash’s eyes hardened. “I don’t need to hear the whole shebang about you doing it for the love of this planet. I won’t insist that it’s not a reason but I’m certain there’s much more to that. You’ve made it hard for me to believe that you’re creating genocide out of the goodness of your heart.”

“Well, I’ll be…” Knives sat back down, tipped back the chair and gazed up at his twin, half-impressed. “So little softy Vash isn’t that much of a soft head is he?”

Vash stared back in silence and Knives shook his head. “Not a bad strategy; freeze out all digressions with silence. Well, since I’m also kind of tired of being misunderstood, I guess I will answer your question. At least that way, if you still want to kill me after the whole thing, I’d at least know that I’m being killed by someone who understands what I’m thinking… even if he doesn’t agree with me.”

Smiling sunnily back up at Vash, he kicked out the chair opposite from his and nodded towards it. “C’mon, sit down. I don’t want to get a neck ache while I’m trading philosophies of life with you.”

Seating himself gingerly on the chair, Vash stared back at his brother, waiting.

Tapping his chin, Knives looked thoughtfully at his brother. “Well it wasn’t really something that I was born with. It wasn’t like I was born with the thought, ‘Hey let’s kill every human being on the ship, which would also mean every human being in this universe. Or we could hope. It developed over some time with every bit of abuse I received and every e-book I read. I came across a few interesting ideas in the course of our journey but one particular one that stood out was the idea of  “Survival of the Fittest”.”

“It was first conceptualized in some book from ages back concerning the evolution theory by a man called Darwin or something like that but it had always been around. Animals attacked the weak and the old to cull the herd and the same happened to humans. Sure, it wasn’t quite the same thing, especially since they liked to make claims towards civilization, but still, it was obvious that only the best survived. The definition of best would change from year to year, age to age but it was always the same. If physicality was the criteria of the day, only the strongest and fastest would survive. If brains, then the geniuses and if money, then the billionaires. The weak puttered around in the grass and survived the best they could until someone took them out. The corporate world on Earth was called a jungle and its name was well-deserved where larger companies swallowed the smaller and faster took the glory.”

Vash shook his head. “That still doesn’t rationalize genocide.”

“Doesn’t it?” Knives smiled, eyes sharp. “Think about it. I’m actually following nature’s blueprint. Right now, the humans are the weaker race. They’ll be replaced soon enough.”

“By who? By us?!” Vash was incredulous. “Knives, we don’t belong here. In fact, I don’t think we’re even supposed to be here. Besides,” he leaned back, shaking his head. “I don’t think your Survival of the Fittest theory holds.”

“Really?” His eyes narrowed. “And why not?”

Vash shrugged. “Simple, for every example that you throw at me about the strong destroying the weak, I can quote the same back to you.”

Knives’ eyes gleamed with amusement. “You can give me more examples about the strong killing the weak?”

“No.” Vash glowered at his brother’s mock obtuseness. “Don’t be an idiot. I mean examples where the weak protect themselves. Or the strong protect the weak. In old Earth, there were tales of large creatures with tusks that protected their young by encircling them and protecting their weaker members in the centre.”

Knives shrugged. “So it’s the weak banding together to fight the strong. Again, survival of the fittest. It’s not your Love and Peace philosophy brother.”

Vash shook his head. “Even then, you’re twisting it.”

“Am I?” Knives had a skeptical expression on his face. “Regardless of whatever you say, it’s still always the weak banding together to destroy the strong.”

“They’re just protecting themselves,” Vash protested, arms flailing wildly.

Knived smiled, a gleam of irony in his eye. “As am I.”

“Against what?” Vash yelped in indignation while Knives shrugged.

“Against bigotry and hate… and all of the actions that spring from that. We’re not human Vash. How long do you think it’ll take for them to realize that and decide that we’re a threat and destroy us? He shook his head. “It’s a mixed up world and everybody dies alone.”

“No, you won’t.” Vash disagreed firmly. “I’ll be there.”

Knives smiled without humour. “Because you’d be the one shooting at me.”

Vash frowned, then grinned. “Maybe, but I will stay with you. Trust me. Someone has to keep an eye on you. (1)”

Knives snorted. “Yeah right, until the next time I want to blow up a town.”

Vash narrowed his eyes. “You wouldn’t dare.”

“Try me.” Knives’ eyes twinkled with something that almost resembled hope. “Besides, who knows? If you hang around me long enough some of my philosophy might actually rub off on you.”

Vash’s mouth opened, all ready for the indignant retort, but something held him back. Tilting his head, he looked at his brother, really looked at his brother and grinned.

“Maybe I’ll rub off on you.” He joked and leaping up, widened his stance and did his trademark gesture. “Love and peace!” to his brother’s chuckles.

As the two clowned around in a way they hadn’t for a very long time, Vash realized that they would never really agree. Instead, all he could content himself was the fact that they would agree to disagree.

And sometimes that was enough.

~~ owari ~~

(1) All together now…. *SWEATDROP*

Writer’s Comments:

I don’t normally do this but I thought this fic merited a special comments section if for apologies if nothing else. I’m really really sorry about the weak and lousy ending and the long winded-ness of it all. Unfortunately I like the Knives-Vash dynamic and the different philosophies hence the ramble on for this fic. It started out okay… well, at least I *think* it’s okay but the ending… erm… kind of fizzled out. I know I started becoming quite lecture-y so I apologize for that as well. Oh and how disjointed the whole thing is and the stiltedness at the end. *sweatdrop* I probably wouldn’t even post it up but I haven’t seen that many Knives and Vash fics around (If anybody has, please send me the link!) so I thought I’d just post it up for that…

And if anybody is interested in my writer’s block for this, it was one year ago that I started it… and where I stopped writing then was about several paragraphs up. I was really tired of having a fic that was 98.6% completed hanging around and so I decided to finish it off and throw it out my door. *wince* Sad but true.

Anyhow, once again, sorry for the ending. I might rewrite it one day but *shrug* I don’t know. Depends on inspiration and most of it for this fic has been tapped out. If anybody has an idea on how it might be better ended, just drop me a line @ joppoyen@writeme.com . I’m always interested.