Archive of Our Own

Hot. It was hot - vapor hissed out of the line in the engine just as Wolfwood opened the hood of their clunker SUV they had pawned off of a caravan two days ago. They were going in the same direction, so they “rented” it under the guise of the caravan picking it back up at whatever town they decide to leave it. It was honestly a bit of a miracle that it lasted this long without more than a few busted luxuries like cruise control and taillights. Meryl, Milly, and Vash were piled in the car, trying to avoid the evening suns and doing whatever they could to avoid boredom. He had decided to leave his blazer in the car til the night chill started to roll through. Angelina and her many permutations gave Nicholas a good idea of the mechanical organs of automobiles, for better or for worse. 

He thought back to his first meeting with the three, one of a handful of times he wasn’t able to cobble her back into working shape. He had dug the Punisher upright for some semblance of shelter, but it wasn’t much help- if it wasn’t for Vash’s wicked sharp peepers, he’d have been a bleached, dry, dry skeleton on that very dune, his ball-and-chain of a bike (with nearly half a damn tank left) serving a reminder and a waypost for anyone taking that particular route. Until the worms gnawed him into fine dust. The devil’s luck.

He stood away from the engine for a bit, letting the heat radiate off enough to be safe to work on. While he stood, he watched the trio in the car chatting amongst themselves. The windows were down, so of course he heard them talking- though his enhanced senses didn’t help numb the sting of them discussing anecdotes from their previous travels. Milly was going on about some mansion they stayed at for a night, he had ducked back towards the engine block before he could focus on any more of the story aside from her remark about the “pretty lady” that was supposedly there. Meryl and Vash laughed at something she said, and Nicholas set himself to inspecting the ever so slightly cooled inner workings. 

The ride prior to this had been fairly quiet, little sparks of conversation budding and withering occasionally. Milly and Vash looked fixedly out the windows the whole time, and Meryl focused entirely on driving. She and Nicholas had taken shifts being chauffeur. From the reclined passenger seat he would watch the way she drummed her thumbs on the wheel as she drove to whatever song they were getting about a quarter of this far out in the boonies. Wolfwood started mindlessly grasping around the coolant line and its associated parts, feeling for leaks or something else amiss. Improper technique, for sure, but the tactile sensation got his mind off of the three in the car for a moment. He heard them roar into laughter again and pulled his hands out of the engine, a thin layer of old grease painting a dark stripe down the side of his right hand. He used his clean one to grab a cigarette from his shirt pocket and lit it after fitting it in his mouth. He inhaled, deep and slow, making sure he tasted the tobacco and whatever the hell else they shoved into those things before puffing the smoke out. Maybe the tar lung would set in faster if he held the smoke in for longer. Another puff and he craned his leg up to put the cigarette out on the heel of his shoe. He walked back to the passenger side and set the smoldering smoke on the dashboard. 

Meryl turned to face him as Milly and Vash continued their chat about the logistics of turning their group into a team of deliverymen as a side-gig. “How's it looking?” Worry creased her brow, as it often did.

Wolfwood leaned into the cabin, resting his weight on his arm propped against the passenger seat. “Like a piece of shit.” He shrugged. “I've fixed worse, but it'll take a bit. Might as well make yourselves comfortable.” 

Meryl knocked on the center console. “Might as well set it up for charging then, huh?” She unbuckled and motioned to the other two to do the same. 

Nicholas nodded. “Little miss proactive, I see.”

“I'll go crazy if I get stuck in here with these two with nothing to do.” She answered.

Wolfwood hummed in agreement. “Might get in on their mailman scheme.” 

Meryl scoffed. “I don't know how they think we would transport much of anything when all we carry are our own bags.” She reached up and knocked on the roof. “And your little package .”

“Letters, maybe?” Nicholas grinned roguishly and motioned to the other three with his index finger. “Saved your sorry butts more than enough times with it.”

“Not without my help!” Vash whined from the backseat. Milly nodded in turn. 

“You like to stand in front of my line of fire, you overgrown gibbon-chicken-hippie hybrid!” 

Vash made an annoyed face at him and the girls laughed raucously.

Wolfwood had settled for the amount of annoyance he had inflicted upon the trio and went back to work. It would do in place of any real conversation. The other three had clambered out of the car to set up its solar panels, Meryl taking charge of wrangling her two massive cats. She barked orders at Vash from the trunk and he would intermittently yelp “Yes ma’am!” Loud enough to nearly make Nicholas’s hands slip while he tightened a bolt here or disconnected a wire there. The enthusiasm in his voice made Nicholas smirk as he worked. 

He glanced up to see Milly, jacket left in the car same as him, unfolding the car’s solar panel. She had carried the unit solo to its spot a few meters from the clunker. Vash was knocked on his ass behind her for whatever reason he was too focused to recall. He cheered as Milly pulled down on each one of the unit’s folded panels to make it bloom like a triple-pronged flower. In the late-day sun, the car should finish charging in about an hour. Wolfwood furrowed his brow, pulling the corner of his mouth down. He still hadn’t figured out what was even wrong with the damn thing, and now he was on a timer? 

Vash, Meryl, and Milly were sitting on the sand by the solar panel, soaking up the rays like lions in the sun. They had gone back to chatting with each other. 

“Don’t sit out too long,” Wolfwood called, “I don’t want to have to push this thing too hard trying to speed you all to help when you get heatstroke!”

They all looked up, Meryl and Vash waved their hands dismissively and Milly just grinned, her shoulders bounced with internal laughter. They all looked positively radiant. He huffed in reply and went back to work. 

This engine was fucking confounding, is what it was. Almost an hour and not a sliver of progress. No wonder they got the thing practically for free- the car was cobbled from bits of scrap and recycled components. The only thing he had figured out was that the problem was not with the coolant line. He thinks one of the battery lines must’ve come from a personal generator. There’s a bike spring somewhere here. May God strike down the man who crafted this beast.

He chewed on the filter of his cigarette- which was smoked right down to it. The other three had begun packing up the charging unit, and the heat was making him feel more than a little irritated and delirious. He stood back from the engine mount and inhaled sharply with his hands on his hips, the dry air irritating his nose. The suns were lower, so the temperature had begun to get more manageable, still piss-you-off hot out, though. 

The girls started to load the charging unit into the trunk again- Nicholas felt the car shake from the returning weight. Vash meandered his way to the front of the car and looked just as unbothered by the heat as ever. Blonde and chipper and sunburnt. He rested his weight on the side of the car’s rust-eaten hood. 

“Need somethin’?” Wolfwood kept chewing on the smoldering filter.

“You’re struggling,” Vash replied, “need any help?”

Nicholas gained a stern, sour expression. “Buddy, you can’t even drive .”

Vash waved his hand dismissively. “I know engines and stuff.” He used that same hand to point at Wolfwood. “You’ve seen me taking care of lost tech, mister priest .” He said it like Nicholas was stupid.

“The hardware like this is pretty damn different from your fancy screen-mancy, Blondie.”

Vash went deadpan and silent, then took the hand propping him against the hood down. He inspected it a little, and pulled the glove off, then started undoing the belts around it. Why did he need so many of em, anyways? Dull metal plates glinted from under the leather.

Nicholas watched him without saying anything, hands still on his hips but now it was a little expectant. 

Vash held up his left arm to Nicholas. His hand then doubled backwards on itself from the wrist, revealing a submachine gun muzzle. Wolfwood blinked with a surprised frown as Vash wordlessly returned his arm to its human state. 

“Well I gotta be honest, I wasn’t expecting that one.” Wolfwood took the filter out of his mouth and tossed it to be swept away by the sands. 

Vash shrugged. “It needs upkeep, too.” He had already started wrapping it back up. He glanced up, raising an eyebrow at Nicholas. “So, you pinpoint where the problem is, at least?”

“No.” He grumbled. He turned to face the engine again, leaning into it. He was too engrossed in the fucking thing to even care how ruined his undershirt was now. “The only thing I could figure out in this Frankenstein is that the coolant system is fine.” He pointed here and there. “Problem is somewhere else, no clue where.” 

“Damn,” Vash clicked his tongue, “we’re only half a day from the next town, too…” He went around to the front of the car and leaned in next to Nicholas to take a look for himself. He winced at the bike spring. “Yeesh, Frankenstein wasn’t an understatement.”

“Told ya,” he chided, “an abomination is what it is. An affront to God.”

Vash chuckled, his elbow brushing against Nicholas’s as they both leaned into the car. “Just a bunch of spare parts. I know the feeling.” He patted the engine block like it was an old dog. “Should be able to fix you up, buddy.”

Wolfwood turned to Vash with a poker-face. “You’re puppy-talkin’ to cars now?”

Another fucking hour passes. At least the suns were almost set. They were both nearly hysterical from the work. Vash and Wolfwood had stepped away from the engine entirely to loudly argue about who was going to crawl under the heap of metal to see if the problem was down there. 

Meryl and Milly had emerged from the car to watch/bet on/eventually break up the fight. 

“Look, I’m just saying– your shirt is already ruined from dusting yourself in engine grease for the past two hours, what’s a little sand?!” Vash cried, gesticulating wildly to Wolfwood and the car. 

“No!” He shouted back. “I’ve been bustin’ my ass for two hours out in the hot-ass suns while you and the girls tanned on the dunes and played cards, and you want me to squeeze myself under that fuckin’ deathtrap?” He jammed his finger into Vash’s chest. “You selfish, good-for-nothing, bird-brained-”

Meryl leaned over to Milly as they watched the two, leaning on the side of the car. “It’s kind of hot when they yell at each other like that.”

“ Well it’s not my fault you’re the only one here who knows about cars! ”

Milly scoffed, covering her mouth so the boys wouldn’t hear. “Meryl!” She leaned back to Meryl. “I can kinda see it, though.”

“ YOU TOLD ME AN HOUR AGO YOU KNEW WHAT YOU WERE DOING!? ”

Meryl shrugged. “You wanna take a look at the engine?”

“ I JUST WANTED TO OFFER SOME MORAL SUPPORT- ”

Milly hummed. “Yeah, I think we’ve got them back in working order enough.” She started laughing. “It’s probably just the battery.”

“ MORAL SUPPORT? MORAL SUPPORT ? YOU WERE BLOWING SMOKE UP MY ASS THE WHOLE TIME AND YOU CALL THAT MORAL SUPPORT?! ”

“It's pretty in-character for them to miss something like that.” Meryl nodded and stood up from the side of the car. “Glad we waited til it cooled down a little, I think the heat would’ve made us just as bad as them.”

“ WHY ARE YOU GETTING MAD AT ME ?! YOU’RE THE ONE THAT- ”

Milly smirked. “You’re probably right.”

Ten minutes into Vash and Wolfwood’s desert brawl, the girls strided triumphantly towards them. Vash was held helplessly in a chokehold on the sand with Wolfwood pinning him down as they both yelped indiscriminate obscenities at each other. 

Milly and Meryl looked at each other with devilish grins as Meryl held Vash’s canteen. She tilted it, slowly. Only a few drops at first to get their attention. Their continued roughhousing gave her the go-ahead to deepen the incline, the water going from a trickle to a dribble to a sputtering pour. The boys froze stone-stiff when the unmistakable sound of water being wasted finally registered in their little pea-brains. They instantly scrambled apart and bolted for the canteen shouting approximately seventeen variations of “ WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?! ” before managing to snatch it out of her hands. 

Meryl stood with a victorious smirk and her right hand on her hip, standing over Nicholas and Vash flat on their asses. Milly stood at her side with a hand behind her back and a matching grin. She slowly extricated it from behind herself with all the sleaze of a car-salesman. 

A battery cable, nearly torn in half. Worm damage. They liked to gnaw on unattended things. Vash and Wolfwood sat and stared at it for a moment, like it was something they had never seen before and had to figure it out. Wolfwood was the first to slap his hand over his face and fall back into the sand with a groan of agony. Vash followed suit, though much more dramatically, kicking up a little cloud of sand by thrashing his legs.

“We replaced the cable, too.” Meryl chimed. “It turned on but you two were too… busy.” She gestured at them like they were garish clothes. They were evidently too busy groaning and writhing to be listening to her now. 

Vash was the first to start laughing- then Meryl- then Milly caught on and joined in. 

“You two were so engrossed!” Milly said. “We didn’t even really want to step in, entertainment’s hard to find in the desert y’know.”

Wolfwood dragged his hand down his face in exasperation. “Could’ve been much more entertained in a town, y’know.” He mimicked her chipper tone, then sat up straight. “You two aren’t going to make me pay for our rooms again after that, right?” There was a crook in his brow and a slight upturn to the corner of his mouth that the trio had deduced to be his pleading face. 

Meryl smiled like a nun. “Maybe.”

Milly tossed the chewed wire at Vash, who didn’t bother catching it. “Let’s get on the road, you two! The sooner you can wash all that sand and grease off, the better!”

Absurd. The laughter hit Nicholas like earthquake aftershocks, and he doubled over himself. He was absolutely hysterical, his chest heaving in ways he hadn’t felt in a long, long time. Before he knew it the other three had picked him up by his arms and legs and swung him into the passenger seat. He didn’t even care. He rode the high the whole time up until Meryl told him to take the wheel. 

It was some time in the early AM hours. The clock on the radio was busted- it definitely wasn’t 2:44 PM. Milly was fast asleep in the back. Vash and Wolfwood had both taken the time to shake the sand out and wipe off with a towel when Meryl finally called for a tap-out. The night chill shook both of them wide awake, and Nicholas tried to not think about the bounce in his leg as he cruised over the rolling dunes. According to their satellite map they would be in a settlement sometime after sunrise. Wolfwood drummed his thumbs on the wheel to the jaunty jazz tune coming in a little better over the radio. At least he could keep up the tempo now. 

Vash was looking out the window again, the cool light from the moons framed his angular face, despite the disheveled and sand-ridden state of being he was in. Nicholas occasionally glanced into the rear-view mirror to look at him or Milly, who was starting to snore a little. She had her trench coat draped over her like a blanket. She was gradually slipping towards Vash, who didn’t seem to catch on yet. He looked over to see that Meryl was shifting endlessly in the reclined passenger seat while trying to get comfortable enough to sleep deeper than a light doze. Her cape was bunched up against her torso.

Boredom had started to gnaw its way into his skull, and his mind began wandering. Not like there was any traffic to worry about hitting out this far, anyway. His knee ached for the luxury of functional cruise control, he could only imagine how Meryl’s short little legs were feeling after four hours.

Vash had started humming to the trumpet solo on the radio. Quiet, only on the exhale. Wolfwood got his head bobbing in response, feeling the staticky, choppy music flow over and through him like an old memory. Vash looked away from the window to peek at Nicholas, smiling a little. 

Milly’s body finally succumbed to gravity and completed its descent onto Vash’s right shoulder. His cool expression shattered and burned red as he turned to look at Milly with eyebrows raised higher than Wolfwood thought was possible. He suppressed a snicker right as the drums kicked back in, then left them to enjoy whatever that moment was. Milly was good at surprising people. He peeked over at Meryl again, who was more still, but still a victim of her own preported blanket-stealing habits. Keeping his knee and left hand on the wheel, he slowly adjusted her cape so that it laid over her more neatly. 

He could feel Vash’s eyes burning a hole through his skull through the mirror, and he turned to look at him while waving his hand dismissively. He bunched up a bit of her cape in his hand and presented it to Vash as if he would understand what the fuck he meant, shrugged, then fixed it again.

“Guess they’re not used to the sleepless nights.” He said softly, turning his attention back to the dunes. 

Vash hummed in reply. He brushed some of Milly’s long hair out of her face, tucking it behind her ear with his left hand. There was an obvious fondness painted on the little smile he wore.

“They’d follow you to the ends of the earth, Blondie.” Wolfwood mused, mostly to himself. 

“We’d probably find you somewhere along the way.” He murmured. 

Something pulled and ached in Nicholas’s chest. He huffed and leaned into his headrest. “Ya’ probably would. Hopefully not in the state I was the first time.”

Vash laughed once, quietly, from the back of his throat. Wolfwood saw it more than anything from the way his shoulders went up and down. “I wouldn’t mind if we didn’t have to look for you so much.” He said softly, not looking at the mirror anymore. The lights from the dashboard seemed to reflect off his eyes more than normal, they were probably a little wet, the guy cries at the drop of a hat. He started stroking and smoothing Milly’s hair, seemingly trying to ground himself with something tactile. 

Wolfwood felt a little pang of jealousy. “I try not to worry about the future too much.” Seems like you get lost in it , he thought. “You’ve got a pretty sweet thing going, if you ask me.” He lazily pointed at Milly and Meryl with his thumb and index finger respectively.

“ What ?” He blurted, suddenly beet red again, shifting the dead-to-the-world Milly down from his shoulder a bit. Meryl hardly stirred. “They’re not-” he continued blurting, caught himself, and adjusted his volume, “they’re not– we aren’t-”

Wolfwood laid his hand flat, palm up to accentuate his theatrical shrug. “Your word, Blondie. Just calling it as I see it.” He started. “Looks nice, is all.”

Vash went quiet and looked down at his lap, then glanced at Milly whose jacket was slowly but surely falling down her shoulder and pulled it back into place. He stole another look at the back of Meryl’s sleeping head. Nicholas couldn’t really read what his expression was trying to convey. 

“You scared?” He peeked at the mirror to see Vash staring right at him. 

He wrung his hands a little, it seemed difficult on account of Milly using her Millyness to reserve most of his right arm to herself. “People…” He started.

“Get hurt around ya’. I know how it is with outlaws.” Wolfwood sighed. “Maybe lighten up a little? Enjoy the moment?” He went back to drumming his thumbs like Meryl. “You seem to be living everywhere but right now.”

Vash frowned and abruptly turned to look out the window again. He sat quietly for a moment before uttering “Sorry,” softly. 

Wolfwood clucked his tongue, a little irritated. “Dunno what you’re saying sorry for.”

“... Sorry.” He said, even more hushed.

Nicholas rolled his eyes and stopped putting his attention on the wet cat behind him. He wasn’t much of a music guy, but the jazz guitar was getting really good.

He heard a sniffle behind him. A stretch of pure music. Then another. He sighed, loudly, then turned around to look at Vash once he cleared the incline they were rolling down. “You’re a good guy, you know that?”

Vash rubbed his nose, listening but refusing to reply, staring fixedly out the window to the chilly dunes.

Wolfwood turned back to the sand. “They know it, too. Else you would’ve sent em’ runnin’ for the hills.”

“They walked up to a twelve feal tall man with a box of donuts as a weapon.” Vash rested his elbow on the window sill and put his chin in his palm. “Thought he was me, actually.”

“ Twelve ?”

“First shot failed, so they busted out an even bigger box.” He mused.

“So that’s how they’ve got you in the palm of their hands, huh?”

“Mmhm…” Meryl mumbled, curling into her cape again. 

Vash and Wolfwood looked at each other in the mirror, and couldn’t hold themselves back from snickering.

A shower was, in fact, exactly what Wolfwood needed. They had done the usual- shit-ass backwater town with no name and no one with enough free time to care about Vash. They told the guy who looked like he was either in charge, knew people, or was just an asshole about the car and the caravan and he nodded like he was going to do something about it. After that, they had sent Meryl and Milly to find bed and board for the day. Or the next few days. However long it took to get every single grain of sand out of his tender bits. Meryl had made good on her non-answer from the day before. She tracked down a vacant house a short walk away from the main street and called the number on the door to arrange payment. Wicked businesswoman she was, the four of them had board for three days for the price of two rooms anywhere else. 

Of course, the house was a little decrepit and creepy, Meryl mentioned the homeowner said it was just an old piece of property they held onto from their parents and rented out to whomever decided to call- and to leave the payment in the second drawer from the top at the end of the kitchen counter in an envelope. There wasn’t any food in the dusty kitchen, but all the utilities worked. No hot water- but Nicholas didn’t really mind, it was nice to wash the accumulated sweat off even with room-temperature, brackish water. 

Meryl had volunteered to do the laundry once everyone had gotten clean. Miracle of a woman, blessed was he to be in her company . He dried off, threw his ruined clothes into a hamper next to the bathroom door, and walked down the hallway into the nearest room. He heard Vash nearly sprint down the hall and slam the bathroom door behind him, ripping on the water faucet and sighing loud enough for the whole house to hear after about two minutes of the shower going Shaaaaaa against the tub. He assumed the delay was for how long it took Vash to get every little bit of cloth and leather off of him. He wouldn’t make Meryl clean his nasty-ass leathers for him, right? Even stalkers have standards. 

He huffed in amusement to himself as he pulled his pants up and threw his other plain white shirt on loosely. He pitched forward and violently shook the last of the water out of his hair with his towel. Nicholas ran his hand through his hair a few times to smooth it out and look less like a ragamuffin. Of course, it fell any way it pleased, but it looked a little more well-kempt than the shaken, not stirred look he was rocking a moment ago. He grabbed his handheld goods and made his way to the kitchen, where the girls were chatting as they waited for their turns. 

They all nodded at each other as Nicholas went out of the house to get all of their luggage out of the clunker, he dragged it all into the living room without so much as a peep. Not much to complain about when the other three’s things didn’t weigh even a quarter as much as his. He hopped in the SUV for a final time after getting everyone’s things inside, and drove it to the edge of town with a note for the caravan taped to the dashboard. 

“Thanks for taking care of that, Mr. Priest!” Milly chirped once Nicholas got back in the house. (An arduous walk on foot in the midday sun.) She was alone in the kitchen, Meryl probably ran to go get clean, herself.

“Anything for you guys.” He smiled wearily. The night of driving was finally starting to nip at his heels. He hoped it wasn’t too obvious on his face.

Milly raised her eyebrows like he had asked her a question, blinked, then grinned back. “You’re looking worn out.”

Damn .

“You and Vash stayed up all night, right? You two should go get some rest, me and Ms. Meryl will get everything sorted.” She looked even more radiant than the day before. Guardian angel .

Wolfwood laughed deflatedley. “That sounds amazing, Ms. Milly.”

“Always happy to provide our services, Mr. Wolfwood.” Said like a proper insurance agent.

Wolfwood managed to keep a straight face at that remark. He nodded curtly, then started towards his room. He lingered after the doorway a bit, put his hand into the kitchen and waved. “I’ll see you whenever I decide to return to the land of the living, big girl.”

Milly hummed a laugh. “See you then.”

Nicholas passed the bathroom and Vash’s room on the way to his. The Humanoid Typhoon seemed to be wrestling a button up and pair of drawstring sweatpants.

Each step towards his bed seemed to make the specter of exhaustion ever more apparent. He trudged into his room, kicked his shoes off, drew the thin curtains, and more-or-less fell onto the mattress. Sleepiness washed over and consumed him in an instant. God it was nice to have a bed. Oh, to have one every night - maybe his lower back would shut up for a day or two.

He closed his eyes, and drifted off after one nice, long sigh.

Dreams were a funny thing for Nicholas, he didn’t have them often- nights came and went with blackout, restless sleep. Nightmares were more common, but he still didn’t have that many of them, either. 

They were all sitting in a theater alone- the movie was nonsense blobs of color and noise. Vash was on his right, Milly to his left, and Meryl to hers. Vash was crying, Milly was laughing, and Meryl was intermittently going “Aww”, and “Ohh.”

Nick hooked his arms around Vash and Milly, like it was just the thing to do, like he had done it millions of times before. Meryl leaned forward with a little sour look, stood up and sat directly between him and Milly, leaning back onto his arm as well. 

The theater started to melt away, and they were then on a much more comfortable couch, watching a small TV. The movie was still nonsense, and he furrowed his brow trying to make sense of it. 

The other three were closer now, his elbows hooked behind Milly and Vash’s necks. Meryl curled herself up on his and Milly’s lap, resting her head on his shoulder. Vash was doing the same thing.

Nick reached up to-

Nicholas awoke with a little start. He had somehow found his way neatly under the covers of the bed. It was sometime in the evening, and the smell of food started wafting through the house. How long had he been asleep, anyway?

Of course the first dream he has in months is about those three, of course. Of course! He reached up to wipe his eyes, sighed, then sat up. On the wardrobe next to the closet there was a full glass of water. It was clearer than the stuff from the shower, someone must’ve boiled it for him. His chest squeezed a little at the thought, and he threw off the covers to go and get a sip.

It didn’t taste all that refreshing, but damn if it didn’t do the trick. After setting the glass back down, he stretched out his back and winced a little as it popped. The food smell didn't go away, so he made his way back down the hall to the kitchen. Meryl and Vash were busy with… something in front of the stove. There were two untouched grocery bags on the counter farthest away from whatever those two were doing. 

Nicholas knocked on the doorframe and cleared his throat to announce his presence. “I smelled… food…?”

Vash and Meryl whipped around bearing an excited grin and exasperated grimace respectively.

“Wolfwood!” Vash yapped with a dopey grin. “Just in time, I-”

“You’re RUINING my dish!” Meryl cried, she took advantage of the distraction to wrestle the pan from his iron grip. “Go be a good boy and sit at the table,” she pointed at the table in question, “next time I see you adding any kind of anything to this I’m going to bash you over the head with this pan!”

Vash laughed nervously, hands up in surrender. “Alright, alright. Don’t whack me with that!”

“I’ll give you three seconds before I do.” Oh, she was serious.

Vash the Stampede squawked and bolted to the nearest pulled-out chair, jumping over it and landing impressively elegantly, still turned towards the other occupants of the kitchen. 

Wolfwood scoffed, then leaned against the doorframe with his arms crossed. “Now who's a good boy?” He asked with a little smirk.

Vash flushed a little then blinked at him. “ Hah -! Heh. Heheh.” He quickly trailed off then put his attention back on Meryl. “When’s that gonna be done, anyway?”

“When it’s done you broomhead, I’m going to add five minutes every time you talk from now on.” She stirred some kind of sauce. 

Vash whined, but kept his mouth shut for once. 

“So what is it you’re making, anyway?” Wolfwood put a stop to the strange vibe starting to form. 

“Oh,” Meryl paused briefly, “I guess you haven’t had my go-to yet, huh?”

“That being…?”

“Just spaghetti and meatballs. I make the sauce myself, though.” She saped the bottom of the pan and reached to her left to pour some broth in it. “I sent Milly to get groceries before she hopped in the shower, enough to last us the three days we rented.” 

Nicholas smiled in satisfaction. “Little Lady, you are the smartest person I know.”

Meryl hummed, gloating. “I get that a lot.”

“Humble much?” Vash interjected.

“Oh, would you look at that, I’ve got to let this sauce simmer for about five minutes extra, I think I forgot an ingredient!” Meryl said to no one at all.

Wolfwood had sat down and started chatting with Vash about anything at all. He tried to ignore the dark circles under his eyes- maybe he was just holding off rest until he could get into bed for the night. Meryl had just pulled the meatballs out of the oven as Milly waddled into the kitchen, hair damp and the rest of herself swaddled in her quite frankly adorable corduroy pajamas. 

“Oh, Milly!” Meryl perked up. “Perfect timing, food’s almost ready. No garlic bread this time though, I’m saving the bread for later.”

Milly booed silently with her hands while Meryl’s back was turned. “That’s okay, there’s always next time.”

“I missed out on garlic bread ?” Wolfwood complained. “I might as well not be eating at all…!”

“You’ll just have to stick around until next time she makes it, then.” Vash said as he tried his best to fold his napkin into a crane. “Maybe,” he gasped, “we might even have enough to eat out !”

Meryl and Milly’s death glares shut him up instantly. 

“I’d…” He chuckled, it was bitter. He didn’t feel like he could fit in, even if he really truly wanted it. “I’d like that.” He settled. “We’ll see, Needle-noggin’.”

Vash lit up like he just got handed one hundred double-dollars “I mean it, Wolfwood! You’re a big help!”

“You’re good for lifting things.” Meryl added.

“You make me laugh all the time!” Milly chimed.

“ And I’m a pretty face.” 

“We’ve got enough of those.” Meryl chided. She dumped the meatballs into the pot with the sauce and carried it to the table, then leaned over to set it down. She didn’t really stand that much higher than him as he sat. “You’d fit in, I think.”

Wolfwood’s face went hot as he rasped out some kind of honking shocked noise.

“Meryl…!” Milly squealed. 

“What, I’m not allowed to flirt a little?” She smirked. “You agreed with me yesterday… Plus I made this romantic dinner.” She motioned towards the pot. Some of the sauce spilled onto the table but she pretended not to notice. The noodles were overcooking on the stove behind her.

Milly went a little pink at that. “Well I-” she started, “I guess~” She chuckled. “Mr. Vash, Mr. Priest,” she turned to both of them as she addressed each of their names, “I think it would be wise to tell you both that Ms. Meryl th-”

The rest of the sentence was muffled by Meryl’s hand bolting across the table to slap over Milly’s mouth. “WE SHOULD EAT FIRST!” She spouted, withdrew, flinched, then ran to the pasta boiling away into nothing. “ My noodles !” She cried, dumping the pot into the sink where the strainer waited. 

Vash looked like he just saw the son of God. Wolfwood probably wasn’t much better but at least Meryl’s food distraction worked on him- he was starving . A meal block in the morning didn’t really cut it. He snapped himself out of it enough to use his napkin to wipe up the spilled sauce, still in shock. 

Meryl stomped back over to the table and whipped the strainer full of noodles straight into the pot of sauce, launching even more all over the table. She silently stirred them into each other and tucked a pair of tongs into it. “Um.” She looked at everyone, Milly was stifling laughter hysterically, Vash was staring at the pot with a slack jaw, and Wolfwood looked a little irritated at the sauce. “Bone… appa…”

Vash blinked. “Buon appetito." He finished.

“Bon appétit.” Milly added, cracking a grin.

Wolfwood let out a shaky, wheezy laugh, then went straight for the tongs. He almost felt the urge to say grace. Despite the mushy noodles, this was probably the best damn plate of spaghetti he’d ever had.

He did have a pretty sweet thing going.