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The first time Wolfwood heard Vash sing was by accident.
It was a standard mission for them and the insurance girls - a small town, a struggling plant, bandits who wanted to steal it. While Wolfwood, Milly, and Meryl were tasked with holding off the bandits, Vash was tasked with the responsibility of getting to the plant control room and soothing the panicked plant. The bandits weren’t anything special, but an unlucky chain of events and Wolfwood’s struggle not to kill them (he really didn’t feel like getting a Vash earful today) had allowed them to push back Wolfwood through the corridors and up winding, echoey stairs into the control room. Wolfwood busted in, hiding behind the wall, fully intending to slam the Punisher into the criminal’s skulls as soon as they set a foot in.
“Wolfwood?” Vash, interrupted, stopped what he was doing to look at his panicked partner-in-crime.
“They’re stubborn.” Wolfwood answered the unspoken question. “Damn idiots — I think the girls got ‘em, though.” A few gunshots and a few cheers from Milly shortly after confirmed that theory.
Vash, however, didn’t seem comforted, suddenly tearing his head upwards and making a gentle, calming, ‘shhh’-ing noise. It was Wolfwood’s turn to ask questions, but anything he could’ve said died in his throat as he watched Vash work. He’d stepped away from the control panel, stretching his hands upwards, palms open and outstretched. The way he pointed his head to the sky and closed his eyes reminded Wolfwood of a prayer.
Then, the singing began.
It was a wavering, melodic chorus, changing pitch and creating tones Wolfwood had never heard before. It was like someone had tried to make a song out of rushing wind and rustling leaves, had written down the notes to sunrise, and it was utterly, fully inhuman. Wolfwood felt small in the song’s presence, as if he’d listened in on the words of angels themselves, as if Vash’s song was the kind of thing that merely hearing it could drive a mortal to insanity. It was slow, calming, coaxing, full of confidence and reassurance, and Wolfwood stood entranced until Vash finished only a few minutes later. It was beautiful, beautiful in the way the endless sky was, calming and larger than life.
Then, just like that, Vash returned to the control panel, doing god-knows-what before turning back to Wolfwood. Wolfwood suddenly felt guilty. He shouldn’t have been here for that. He isn’t deserving of hearing something better than gunfire and whiskey-raw insults, let alone — shit, what WAS that? Vash must have noticed his array of emotions. “You can hear that?” Vash asked, genuinely surprised. “I was, uh, calming it down. All the commotion scared it.” Vash laughed a bit nervously, moving away from the control panel.
“You were talking to it?” Wolfwood asked. “Was it talking back?”
“It wasn’t exactly talking , most plants can’t do that, it was more like… oh, it’s hard to explain. Its how plants communicate. We can communicate through touch or vocally, its how we tell each other there’s threats or if we’re healthy without actually having language. More like dogs growling or birds singing than anything else.”
Wolfwood’s gut feeling was offense. Offense that Vash compared what he did to something as carnal and animalistic as dogs and birds. Wolfwood fought back the urge to say as such. To Vash, being separated from the mundane was an insult. To say he’s different than birds and dogs and humanity would be to say he’s different from what he loves most in the world.
“Is it happier now?” Wolfwood said somewhat dumbly, in lack of anything better to say.
“It’s calmer, but tired. It will take a few days until it’s back in full production again.” Vash answered. “No permanent injuries or trauma, though. The town’s going to be fine.” The gentle relief in Vash’s voice almost made butting into some random town’s business worth it for Wolfwood. Almost.
If that didn’t make meddling worth it, the free drinks and room for the night from the grateful townsfolk sure did. Wolfwood collapsed on his bed that evening, tipsy and content from a mission gone right. The haze of growing exhaustion and one too many drinks wasn’t enough to forget Vash’s song, clear and sharp as church bells in his mind. He wanted to hear it again.
“Get changed,” Vash scolded. “You’re going to get your suit all wrinkled.”
Wolfwood shrugged, completely blowing his partner off and snickering at the slight pout that pulled from him. “Hey, Blondie, uh…” Wolfwood wanted to ask the question, but even with the alcohol embarrassment stopped him at the last second.
“Yeah?” Vash asked, watching Wolfwood struggle to find the words. It was unusual to see Wolfwood like this. He was a man with charisma and confidence that kept his voice smooth and tongue sharp even in the toughest of spots, a way of speaking that got people to listen and believe him. Vash had always admired him for that. Unless… shit, was Wolfwood scared of him? It was an unspoken truth between them that Wolfwood knew, knew the legendary Vash the Stampede was something other than human, but this is the first time Wolfwood had actually heard or seen him do something explicitly inhuman. Vash suddenly felt insecure, a sudden bout of loneliness tearing through him. “Wolfwood, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have talked to the plant while you were there. It was an emergency, and if I didn’t calm it down fast it might have gotten hurt, and-”
“Spikey.” Wolfwood barked out. “Calm that pretty head down, I’m not freaked out by some donut-loving dumbass. I wanted to ask if you’d, uh, sing for me. Like you did for the plant. It was nice, and I wanted to… I want to know more about you, Vash.” Wolfwood’s voice softened. “I want to know what the song means, how you communicate. You’ve spent so long learning how to talk with humans. I want to know the ways you talk, too, if you’d be willing to teach me.”
They’d gone years keeping their distance from each other, and here’s Wolfwood’s blatant invitation for something more vulnerable. It came as almost a surprise to Vash. A part of him was scared. To accept this would be to shatter that safe barrier between them, for Vash to lay himself bare. He knew Wolfwood would lay himself bare in kind, he always met Vash in the middle, but were either of them really ready for this? Vash needed more time to think about it. He deflected in a way he hoped didn’t come off as a rejection, not yet. “To be honest, nobody’s been able to hear it before besides the other plants. I think it might be lower than human range of hearing, or something like that.”
“It probably is.” Wolfwood responded. “Probably something to do with all the shit they did to me, messed with my senses or something.” Wolfwood felt a small sting in his gut. Just one more difference between him and humans. He wasn’t as sensitive to having his humanity questioned as Vash was, but it still hurt to think about - he’d had his humanity, and little by little it had been physically and mentally ripped from him. No matter his opinion on humans in general, he still couldn’t help but feel as if something had been stolen from him.
They sat in silence for a bit, then. Wolfwood watched the light from the nightstand lamp catch on the dust in the room. Vash considered Wolfwood’s offer, pensive and melancholy on his own bed by the window. Wolfwood almost wanted to tell him to settle down and forget he said anything. It almost felt as if he had reached out too fast, too intensely, scared Vash off like a startled cat.
Until, to his surprise, Vash got up from his bed, taking his place on the edge of Wolfwood’s. They were facing each other now, legs crossed, Wolfwood’s back against the headboard. “Okay,” Vash said. “I’ll teach you.”
Wolfwood braced himself, taking a breath and situating himself to sit more straight. “Alright. Let me hear it.”
Vash taught him all he could about plant song - the shriller cry of alarm, the soft, calming whale song to communicate safety, the low, neutral hum of contentment, almost like a purr. They spent hours like this. Wolfwood wished they could spend hours more. Wolfwood attempted to imitate the hums on Vash’s request, but only ended up sputtering out a cough and grouchy complaints about it ‘sounding bad when he did it’. Vash called him cute. So it goes.
“You said you also communicated by touch.” Wolfwood said. “Can I learn that, too?”
“Maybe? It kind of, uh, scares people when I do the touch thing. If you get nervous, just tell me and I’ll stop, okay?” Vash replied. Wolfwood nodded, and Vash took his hands gingerly. They were calloused where his trigger fingers were. Vash shuffled around, closed his eyes, and took a deep breath.
Then, Wolfwood felt it.
It was a little like the songs, exce i
☐☐☐☐☐☐☐☐ v☐☐ HE ☐☐☐ a ??
Wolfwood took his hands away. Holy shit. His whole body buzzed, his mind struggling to make sense of what just came into his head - like trying to grasp a dream after you just woke up, the incoherency of thought as you drift to sleep.
Vash flinched. “Told you.” Wolfwood felt guilty, but more than that, he felt stubborn. He grabbed Vash’s hands.
“Again,” Wolfwood asked. “I’m not going to stop as soon as I don’t understand. This is about learning about you , Spikey, and sometimes not even humans really get each other.”
“Okay. Alright, I’m going to do it again.”
Wolfwood took a few deep breaths, willing himself into calming down and bracing himself to experience that again.
☐☐☐☐☐HE L
Sand ☐☐☐sand atmidnight, chilled by desert moon
Whispers of cigarette smoke, comfort of a meal
☐☐ Redemption, redemption
☐☐
Wolfwood felt the humming in his bones, like too-loud music or gunshot or
What does that mean?
“That was your name. In plant.”
It was gentle. Like a poem.
So are you. Full of mercy.
Vash ran his thumb over Wolfwood’s hand reassuringly.
Bullshit.
To you.
Teach me more?
Ok.
☐☐☐ X ?x
I don’t understand.
Sorry.
Sweet temptation, golden in sun’s rays, warm as morning
What was that?
“Donut.”
Are you kidding me. How do you have a word for that.
“I told you, it’s not really words, it’s more like - feelings.”
You okay, Spikey?
Warmth of another on your back. Joined by gunfire
Longing, nights apart
We can take on the world together. As much of it is left, as
Much of you as you’ll let me have.
We have each other, for whatever that’s worth.
Wolfwood took his hands back for completely other reasons this time, the gentle thrum of Vash’s plantsong still buzzing through him. The feeling of what Vash had told him was so inexplicably tender, so full of longing, that Wolfwood felt himself well with tears, blinking them back rapidly as Vash watched him with gentle curiosity. Wolfwood struggled to translate that into anything in human words. The comfort, the reassurance, the feelings of safety — it was like Vash’s first song for the plant, except it almost felt custom-tailored for Wolfwood, as if Vash was telling him, specifically, that he would be okay somehow. It felt so sincere that Wolfwood almost had no choice but to believe him.
“What did that mean?” Wolfwood asked.
“Uh, just, uh, ‘you’re going to be okay’, or, like, y’know.” Vash awkwardly danced around the question. He loved doing that. Wolfwood smirked, poking Vash’s stomach.
“You telling the truth, Spikey?”
“It means I love you,” Vash blurted out, backing up to the end of the bed.
Wolfwood froze. Shit. Shit — it was no question that he loved Vash, too, but, god, this wasn’t the world for it, wasn’t the time, in any other universe, anywhere kinder - he sighed, willing himself to relax. “Oh.”
“I thought it was only fair to tell you that I love you in plant.” Vash laughed a bit, unguarded. “After all, you’ve been telling me you love me in Wolfwood all evening.”
Wolfwood couldn’t bring himself to disagree.