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It's quiet, at night. It's surprising to think about, but the daytime is much noisier, at least in Vash's experience. The buzzing of worms, the whirr of the truck's engine and the droning of the radio inside. Meryl's quiet hum as she sings along to a song from memory. The tapping of cigarette ash and the long exhales both Roberto and Wolfwood take after a particularly nice drag.
So yes, it's much quieter at night, when everyone has separated off into their rooms at a dinky little inn— Meryl and Roberto in one, long gone and probably asleep, given how high the moon is, Wolfwood and Vash in the other, both restlessly awake.
Wolfwood is chain-smoking at the window, a grimace permanently painted onto his expression, but silent all the same. He looks…beautiful, is the word Vash would use to describe him. His hair, still drying from the shower, is dripping liquid moonlight reflected from it. It's shaggier, when down, but still looks soft to the touch, and Vash's right hand twitches a little at that thought. He's in a sleep shirt and baggy pants, almost cozy, but both of them know he probably won't sleep tonight.
Vash still found it quiet. There was no ringing of gunshots in his ear, none like the ones from earlier that day as they were yet again chased out of town because of someone's six million double dollar bounty causing a fuss. He feels…guilty, after all of it. Dragging everyone along for the ride, for Meryl and Roberto sticking with him when he clearly doesn't deserve it, for getting Wolfwood shot again, and again, and again.
He aches, from the bullet wounds he has untreated. He pretended he was fine— of course he did! They didn't need to care about him, didn't need to be worried about…something like him, and he'd be out of their hair soon enough. That's what mattered, anyway, so he put on a pleasant smile, shook them off, and accepted his dues.
He still wears his overcoat and turtleneck top. He wonders if the blood has seeped through yet, and if the bullet has been pushed out, or if it's stuck in there. He doesn't think he minds the latter, once again reminding him what he's fighting for, and feeling like it's something he deserves. He's partially responsible for all of this mess, anyway, all of them here on Noman's Land, in a world of sand and smoke and illusions.
He thinks he must be staring for too long, because Wolfwood is staring back at him too, a long sigh ripped from him as the smoke tendrils crawl off into the night.
"Blondie. I can hear your thinking from here, spit it." He snaps, with much less vitriol than usual. He seems almost concerned, and that alone makes Vash put on a pleasant smile again. No one should be concerned about him.
"Oh? Huh? I'm fine! Sorry, just got in my own head a bit," he laughs, without any joy in it, a quiet thing in its own right.
"I can tell," Wolfwood drawls, tapping out his cigarette, leaning against the sill. He quirks an eyebrow at Vash, encouraging him silently to continue.
"I mean, nothing really, you don't need to worry about it," Vash says placatingly, going to rub the back of his head, and the motion makes him wince imperceptibly. Wolfwood notices, because Wolfwood always notices. It's unfair, how he's able to read Vash as easily as he does.
Wolfwood's lips turn into a frown, and that's more than enough for Vash to read it as concern. He steps away from the sill, not before tucking another unlit cigarette between his lips, approaching Vash with only a few strides as he stands still, praying to every god that Wolfwood will leave him to his own personal way of penance.
But he doesn't, he sees the red that stains a black undershirt and his lips quirk downward around the cigarette, poking the wound unkindly. It makes Vash hiss, revealing his weakness.
"Jesus, Spikey, did you get shot?" He bites, looking at Vash like he's insane for not saying something earlier.
Vash laughs hollowly again, stepping a pace away from him and pulling his coat over himself. "Um, it's fine! I've dealt with worse before, this really isn't anything-"
"Spikey, if you don't sit down within the next minute and let me wrap that up, then I'm going to drag your ass to the bed and tie you down until I wrap it anyways." Wolfwood snaps, interrupting Vash's nervous prattling.
It makes Vash debate his odds, before deflating and sitting down on the edge of the bed, shirking his signature red overcoat and laying it haphazardly next to him.
Wolfwood takes the time to grab medical supplies, grumbling to himself before pulling a chair up to the bed and sitting down on it harshly. His hands reach forward, slowly, gently grabbing the hem of Vash's black undershirt. He pauses, for a minute, looking up at Vash with charcoal grey eyes in a questioning expression.
Baby blues behind a sunset orange must give him the answer he wants, because he starts removing the shirt with care, care that Vash doesn't think he deserves, that he'll ever deserve. After it's off, he gently folds it and lays it on top of the coat to the side.
Wolfwood looks at Vash's shirtless body with something that looks like anger, before fettering out, hidden behind a steely gaze. It's not the first time Wolfwood has seen Vash's scarred, mangled (broken, his mind hisses) body, in some places more scar tissue than organic flesh. He's dressed Vash's wounds before, and this probably won't be the last time either. And yet, every time he looks at it, he seems angry. Vash wishes Wolfwood would be angry with him instead.
But Wolfwood is quiet, and looks mortified for a split second as he pulls out one, two, three bullet casings. The flesh has already started to knit together, and Vash feels a certain sense of loss with the casings being put to the side. Like it's part of a story he should carry, to punish or to save he doesn't know.
"These are going to scar," Wolfwood says flatly, glancing up at Vash as he dances featherlight touches on the outside of the wounds, applying ointment before gauze before bandaging.
"I know," Vash says, a sad smile on his features. He's happy they'll scar, though, in a horrible way. It means he's here. It means he did something to protect. It means he did something right, somehow.
"I don't get it," Wolfwood bites, making Vash tilt his head in confusion. "Why you'll let them do this to you, over 'n over." He says it almost disbelievingly, like he thinks Vash is disillusioned, somehow.
And Vash just continues to look confused, that sad smile still painting his face. It's as if the thought never crossed him, to stop doing what he's doing, to not accept blow after blow, all for someone else. Maybe it hadn't, or maybe it was something he put off until he simply never thought about it again.
"I mean, that's what I'm supposed to do, right?" He says, humming to himself. Wolfwood pulls particularly tight on a bandage, and Vash winces. Wolfwood's hands feel strange on his skin, light. As if he was being gentle because Vash was something holy. Vash feels anything but. "They don't- they can't take it- and- I don't- that's not to demean them! I just….I'll heal. They just…they'll have a funeral, instead."
"Just let them have their open caskets, then," Wolfwood says under his breath, pulling away. "You're too good for em, Spikey."
Vash recoils, as if slapped. He hates those words, words that go against everything he's ever thought, words that go against the very things ingrained in him. He wasn't good enough. If he had been good enough, they wouldn't be here in the first place. He could do better, that's what he was doing, after all, as he made his way to July. To fix everything.
"I don't- you're-" He sputters, and Wolfwood only stands up, looking at Vash pointedly as he wipes overly bloody hands on the towel he grabbed earlier with the rest of the supplies.
It's intentional, of course. It shows him just how much life he lost, how much he's spilled for these people. Vash can't find it in himself to regret any of it, but he feels guilty for making Wolfwood care for him yet again.
"I'm sorry," is all he says, as much as he'd like to beg for countless apologies from Wolfwood, he cannot be vindicated for his sins. And oh, does Wolfwood look holy enough to do so, standing as the moonlight spills over his shoulders, dancing across the drying tainted blood on his palms that he wipes away. His eyes look pretty, without their usual sunglasses to hide them. He looks like an angel, higher than the priest he pretends to be on occasion. I'm sorry, he thinks again. I'm sorry.
And yet, again, Vash reminds himself he cannot be absolved of sins by those hands bloodied by himself and others. That he does not deserve to be, despite it all. That Wolfwood is better than him, in most ways, no matter what misdeeds he thinks he's committed.
Wolfwood places the towel down, reaching for Vash's prosthetic hand that flutters against his thigh, anxious and unable to rest. Wolfwood runs his fingers along the cool metal, and gently pulls Vash to stand, looking his dressings up and down. And Vash…he wants. He's no angel, never will be, and if he can't be vindicated…he thinks it's alright, this once, to sin for comfort. If he's already had a sip of temptation, he might as well drink from the bottle.
He tugs Wolfwood against him, letting out a hiss of pain at the same time Wolfwood grunts out in surprise. Vash wraps his arms around Wolfwood's back tightly, pressing his head slightly downwards to tuck underneath Wolfwood's. After a moment passes, Wolfwood's arms slink around Vash's shoulders, one hand pressing his head gently into Wolfwood's chest, the other rubbing soothingly along his spine.
Vash's fingers twitch wordless apologies as he buries himself into the man he clutches onto. It's dozens, hundreds, thousands of them, ones that Vash could never hope to say aloud.
Wolfwood cradles the man against him in a more careful way. He gives back thousands of forgivenesses, of dismissals because he doesn't think the apologies are even warranted, as he pets through both blond hair gone limp and an undercut that desperately needs to be washed.
Distantly, Vash remembers he's still shirtless. He forgets to care. He's too hung up being comfortable hugging someone in a rumpled white dress shirt and a black suit jacket.
It's quiet, still, this night. There is no buzzing of worms, there is no faint humming of a car, there are no gunshots in his ear. There is only the inhale and exhale of Vash and Wolfwood, and the scent of cigarettes and ash, of citrus and honey to contrast it.
Vash doesn't regret taking the bullets that got him here. He'd do it again. But he also doesn't regret holding Wolfwood as long as he's here. And after all, Wolfwood doesn't seem to mind.