Trigun Fan Fiction ❯ Incompatible ❯ Chapter 0024 ( Chapter 24 )

Trigun Fanfic

Trigun © Yasuhiro Nightow * Shonen Gaho-sha * Tokuma Shoten * JVC * Pioneer Entertainment (USA) Inc.

The following fanfiction was written by me (Chiruken) and is intended for the sole purpose of shared entertainment and not intended for publication or sale.

--Incompatible-

Trigun Fanfic Featuring Knives and Meryl. Knives hates all humans. Meryl just hates Knives. It's a match ideal for the promise of Eden.

By Chiruken

Chapter 24

**~**

Knives made his way down the deserted street silently, taking care to stick as close to the shadows cast by the buildings as he could without being too obvious about it. After getting Millie settled into a comfortable inn and having his much sought after bath and meal, he'd grilled her for answers to the questions buzzing around in his mind after her cryptic comments when he'd first found her. From what he understood, she'd been with his brother since his disappearance nearly two years before searching for him, along with Meryl. That is, up until the previous month when Meryl had gone missing. Vash and Millie had abandoned their search for him in favor of looking for the missing woman, but then they'd somehow gotten separated and that's when he'd found her.

Knives certainly had no intention of staying with Millie and waiting for Vash to arrive. He had a bad feeling about Meryl's disappearance and intended to initiate his own search for her. One thing had become clear from listening to Millie's convoluted explanation…the relationship he'd assumed to be developing between Meryl and Vash had screeched to an abrupt halt and somehow his brother had turned his attentions…and affections…towards the taller woman. He was a little confused by this apparent turn in events, but he didn't have a lot of time to dwell on it. He'd managed to contact his twin through their telepathic link and inform him of Millie's whereabouts and general continued safety before he'd left the inn through his room's window. He didn't quite trust in fate and as far as he was concerned it was much better to be safe and wary than to be discovered through a blatant disregard to her latent abilities to detect movement. If there was one thing he'd learned during his travels, it was that the ones who appeared innocuous usually tended to be the humans to watch the closest.

He breathed a little easier once he'd reached the open desert. He'd managed to escape detection and now he could move freely without fear of discovery. Millie told him that Meryl had last been seen in October City, which was at least a week's worth of hard travel to the west. Once he reached the city, he could search for clues and hopefully learn something his idiotic brother probably overlooked. Vash was many things, but a stickler for paying attention to detail was definitely not one of them. He couldn't help but wonder if one of the reasons they hadn't found her was simply because Meryl didn't **want** to be found. Of course, that didn't make a lot of sense either. From what he remembered of the woman, she wasn't given towards cruelty and by purposely disappearing without a trace she had to know that she would cause her companions much worry and emotional pain. He doubted that she'd willingly do that to them which left only one other explanation…she hadn't left of her own free will.

His eyes narrowed as he increased his pace. Meryl, he knew, was more than capable of putting up a valiant fight in the face of most attacks, but she was still a small woman and could be easily overpowered. He knew she carried weapons, single-shot derringers, but the tiny guns couldn't do much if she wasn't given an opportunity to use them. Besides, if she had managed to get even one shot off Vash would've heard and gone to her aid immediately. No, whatever happened must've been by total surprise. Perhaps while she was sleeping… He scowled and shook his head. If that were the case, then whoever was behind this must have been watching her for some time to have determined the pattern to her movements. He didn't like that line of thinking. It implied that someone had been stalking the small woman for some time and his brother had been too stupid to notice it. **Vash…you are an unbelievable dough head.** He purposely sent the thought out to his brother, allowing his anger and disgust to color the silent words before breaking the connection again. He didn't want to hear Vash's whining and feeble attempts at defending himself. He had more pressing matters to see to at the moment.

If Meryl had been missing for a month already, there was no telling what shape he'd find her in…given that he even found her in the first place. He didn't want to think of permanent damage being done to the young woman…it filled him with a burning rage that left the anger he'd felt in the past mild by comparison. He wasn't quite ready to analyze why he would feel this way and chose to ignore it, pushing the fury down to a controllable level. There really was no point in losing control. He had no target to vent his rage on and it served no good to allow it to fester and boil. He could call on it later when the time was appropriate. His first priority was to get to October City as quickly as he could and begin his search for clues. Unlike his brother, he wasn't above including searching through human minds and memories to learn what he needed. Vash, of course, would call it a blatant disregard to people's rights and freedom, but Knives could care less. He didn't share his brother's aversion to using the abilities he'd been born with and could and would use them as often as necessary to reach his ultimate goal, which in this case was finding Meryl as quickly as possible.