Peace and love and this gun I found

by BastardCrimes

Summary:

As much as he wishes otherwise, Vash is not human. He has a body that is hard to understand and instincts that he does not want, but he handles it. He’s always handled it. But with Wolfwood in his life now, he’s forced to accept help that he’d sooner die than ask for. Haunted as he is by all the ways he’s been hurt when he’s vulnerable, he’s desperate for that glimmer of hope that this time it will be different

That, and Nick has amazing tits

Notes:

I have nothing to say for myself

Vash is acting fucking weird. Yeah, he’s normally pretty weird, but even for him this is a lot. It’s one thing for him to goof off in towns and crawl like a lizard to escape gunfire, those are instances of the usual odd bullshit that Wolfwood has to put up with from him but can tolerate. It’s not even like his absolute refusal to allow any killing, any harm, the odd bullshit that he can not tolerate. No, this is new, and it’s downright fucking bizzare

 

It started when Vash grabbed a bug out of the sand and ate it

 

He’d spent all day restless. In the car he bounced his leg so much that Wolfwood could feel the floor shake. He would tell him to cut that shit out, he would laugh and apologize, then maybe he’d sit still for twenty seconds before starting again. When they stepped outside at the gas station he wandered off into the dunes. Going for a “quick walk” he said, but Nick didn’t believe for a second that’s all he was doing so while the reporters tended to the car, he followed him. He’d left punisher, staying light and small, he only wanted to see what he was doing out here, what he’s up to

 

He crept slowly behind him, and the blonde thankfully didn’t look back, too single minded in whatever he was doing. There was a taller sand dune, probably built up over some debris from a vehicle that passed by a while ago, and it was big enough to hide behind. Vash sped behind it, he could hear him panting, way too out of breath for such a small walk. Nico inched toward it, staying quiet as he dropped to his knees and peered around the dune. 

 

It was almost mesmerizing the way the mask dropped, the way the Vash he’d constructed to look human fell away the moment he thought he was alone. His eyes went wide and frantic, his mouth dropped open, panting harder, and he could swear he saw drool drip from those little fangs that were always just a bit too pointed to be normal. Vash grabbed his head in his hands, swaying in his feet as his mouth opened and closed. It was then that Wolfwood regretted leaving Punisher behind, because the blonde seemed off in a way he’d seen before. In animals, in test subjects, once in a man crazed by some cocktail of drugs and mental issues that lead to a bullet in his head when he charged at someone. It’s wild, feral, hungry. 

 

The humanoid typhoon was here whimpering, pacing, and emitting some sound from his throat. It was something between a worm and a dog, a clicking, chittering growl that buzzed from him as he looked around and ended in a sob. Suddenly his eyes flitted to a spot on the ground, and he pounced. His hand grabbed something in the sand and pried it out, a worm, one of the small winged ones. 

 

Vash, the harmless pacifist who could never bring himself to so much as allow others to hurt someone, who winced at people’s wounds, who he once saw cry over a thomas that was dehydrated, bit into it without a moment’s hesitation. 

 

Wolfwood had done it before, lots of people had, that’s good protein right there. But this was like a ravenous animal, nothing like Vash. He didn’t even kill it, he tore through it with teeth and tongue while it squirmed and thrashed in his hands and only twitched to a stop when several chunks had been taken out. It disappeared in under a minute and Vash only stopped when he bit his own hand in the hungry frenzy, it was only his own blood on his tongue that made him aware that the food was done.

 

Wolfwood was so mesmerized that he forgot to hide himself, leaned too far, and Vash’s head whipped to face him. 

 

He could laugh at how birdlike the movement was if Vash was not immediately on him.

 

The force knocked him onto his back, and the body on top of him pinned him down. Those blue eyes pierced right through him, and the pinprick pupils gave vash a sense of utter wrongness as Wolfwood struggled to hold him back with hands against his arms as he snapped his jaw over him.

 

“Hey! What the fuck needle-“

Nick cut himself off with a gasp as Vash forced himself forward and drove his teeth into his shoulder. His first instinct was to fight. To hurt him. The put a bullet through his kneecap and beat him until his eyes are swollen shut and demand he explain right fucking now but

 

The teeth sunk in and he was calm

 

Maybe it’s shock, maybe there’s something in his system, but Wolfwood didn’t move and simply lay there for a moment. Vash kept his teeth there, he squirmed against his body, pushing his chest into his, and lapped at the blood for a few moments. He pinned him, drank him, and Nico just lay there and thought to himself this should hurt more.

 

But soon the spell is broken, and Wolfwood gives Vash a solid left hook to the jaw.

 

The blonde fell back in the sand with a groan as Nico scrambled up to his feet, never letting him out of his sight as he got his bearings. Vash groaned and clutched at his face with his metal hand where he was hit, and blinked his eyes slowly open again. Wolfwood wanted to yell at him, he should for pulling that shit, but he could see the recognition register in his face. His eyes were back to normal, and as his tongue swiped the side of his lip and tasted Wolfwood’s blood he whipped to face him again.

 

“I’m so sorry!”

 

There he is, that pathetic, begging tone that he knows so well. 

 

“Needles. what the fuck was that?”

 

“I-it’s- I’m so sorry I can patch it up”

Vash attempted to stand, but Wolfwood kicked him in the chest, drawing a Yelp from him and pinning him down with his foot.

 

“No. you're not touching me until you tell me what’s going on”

 

He can’t take those puppy eyes looking up at him. How dare he look like he’s about to cry over this. Like he hadn’t just attacked him. Vash’s mouth opens and closes.

 

Does he not know? 

 

“What was that?”

 

Vash is taking his sweet time to explain this, and Nico wishes he would just say something. He could just say he was angry, that he hated him, he’d accept that answer, it was common enough. Maybe he figured him out, put two and two together and realized that Wolfwood wasn’t keeping him alive out of the kindness of his heart. But vash wasn’t saying anything, and somehow that was worse. Somehow those eyes filled with so much shame and a mouth empty of excuses were worse than any accusation that would have been completely true.

 

He touched the bite mark on his shoulder, it was pretty clean, and felt almost numbed. It’s not that bad, but Vash looks off to the side.

 

“…I’m sorry Wolfwood”

 

That caused a twinge in his chest that Nico didn’t like. He takes his foot off of Vash’s chest and yanks him up by his collar, his little Yelp and struggle to get his legs under him are almost cute, almost make up for that freaky display. Wolfwood looks him over, and Vash swallows under the scrutiny. He looks mostly normal, save for the eyes. His sunglasses had fallen in the sand so he could see that while The pupils may be back to normal, those markings are clear. Normally they’re hard to notice, between the glasses and the direct light needed to reflect those curving lines, he rarely gets a glimpse of them. He wouldn’t even notice if he weren’t looking for them, if he hadn’t seen him communing with that plant. If he didn’t know what he was.

 

But this time they’re clear, in fact, they’re glowing .

 

And it clicks.

 

“Is this a plant thing?”

 

Vash’s whole body tenses.

 

“How-“

 

“Just answer me blondie,” Nico’s voice softens just a bit, like it does back home at the orphanage when he deals with a troubled newcomer, with the scared little things acting out because they’ve known nothing but violence. It tends to work with them, and apparently it works with Vash too.

 

“…sometimes I… get like this.”

 

Wolfwood stares at him, waiting for him to continue his explanation, and the blonde can’t hold out.

 

“It’s um. I’m… carnivorous. Sometimes. Well, always, but this only happens sometimes”

__

 

The first time it happened, he was barely a year old. It was on the ship, back before everything went wrong. He’d felt this awareness in the forefront of his mind, this frantic need that he couldn’t explain, this hunger. Both of them had. He and Nai were both panicked, fearing this feeling that they didn’t understand, one that Rem, who seemed to know everything, couldn’t explain. She tried her best, she fed them extra (even Nai was eating), she ran with them through the ship to try to handle that energy, she had no way of knowing what they needed.

 

Not until he bit her.

 

He didn’t mean it. He didn’t want to do it. He was just playing. The weird feeling was overpowering, he didn’t know what he needed, so he tried to do what he would normally do. What he normally did was eat, explore, and play with his brother and mom. Nai was in their room, hiding away because he’d rather read up on this, try to figure it out, while Vash would rather ignore it. He really thought he could, he really thought it would pass.

 

So he played with rem. Chasing back and forth in the green room like they always did, laughing and playing in the sliver of living biosphere that made him feel so alive. But it was sharper, he could smell so much more than usual, his body was abuzz with energy and hunger that he thought he could suppress and then-

 

He doesn’t remember it, not really. He remembers the hunger spiking. He remembers hearing her pulse under her skin, feeling her heat from far away, for knowing, for the first time, exactly what meat is.

 

When he came to, he was grabbing onto her arm, biting into the meat of her bicep and drinking down the blood. Rem had looked so afraid, she had looked at him with those eyes that he had come to know from so many lifetimes of being something subhuman meant monster. He let go the moment he realized what was happening, he was sobbing and apologizing and begging for forgiveness. He was more afraid than she was, and he didn’t deserve her warm embrace and reassurance, he didn’t deserve the love she showed him after such a horrible thing.

 

The next day, after she put him and his brother to bed, there was something new for breakfast. A few plates with something ranging from red and dripping to brown and tough. He and Nai didn’t hesitate, they ripped into it with the ferocity of starving animals, both drawn first to the raw meat

 

She told them after that that it was something called “cow.” That they were animals common on earth that had been food. There were some in cold sleep in fauna sections, mostly embryos but some fully grown for when they had cultivated grass wherever they land for them to live in. She had unfrozen one for them, butchered it, cooked some pieces but left others raw because she didn’t know what it was that was driving them, and was able to confirm that some instinct drove them to the freshest animal matter they could find. 

 

Vash cried a lot back then, there was nothing more devastating in that stage of his life than learning he was a carnivore, that his body would send him into frenzies to meet this need, that he would always have to eat things once living. Nai called him stupid for it, he said that it was only natural that superior creatures feed on the inferior. Vash could never think of it that way

 

It was worse after the crash, so much worse. 

 

Because the need to hunt, Vash discovered, comes in cycles. He was fine at first. After so long of eating meat regularly aboard the ship, he was sure he’d start feeling that hungry energy that he’d been sure was kept at bay with bits of cow. He was sure it would return now, but it didn’t. Not when he was wandering through the sandstorm, not even when he tried to starve himself to death in the cell he was put in by people he’d come to think of as family. No, it just didn’t happen. He’d begun to think it was a fluke, that maybe he only needed some meat for some stage in his growth that he was past, that it was a one time thing that would never happen again

 

That was until he had just gotten out, just gotten their trust, and his monstrosity came shining through. He didn’t even realize it was happening at first. He’d gotten so well acquainted with anxiety and night terrors that the nervous energy seemed normal. He’d gotten so used to hunger from his bad habit of skipping meals when he thought people were upset with him that he didn’t feel the difference at first. It wasn’t until he was overcome in the hallway by a wave of nausea that had him gagging and dropping to his knees that he understood. Brad was with him, on “brat duty” as he put it, when vash fell. He asked him what he was doing and reached down at him, and Vash lunged. He got lucky, he’s pretty sure he’d be dead if Brad hadn’t caught him by the throat and pinned him against the wall before he could cause real damage, he’s sure someone would have shot him. 

 

He didn’t process what was yelled at him, he could barely remember Luida directing Brad to bring him to the research sector of the ship, could barely recall being brought into the too-bright room where he was cuffed to an office chair. Only that he struggled and growled and snapped at everyone. He was later told that Luida had to convince the guards not to kill him, that she insisted on reading through more of Rem’s notes on the independents before they terminated him. That Brad had argued against her, that he was enough of a monster in his eyes, in most of their eyes, that his survival was the unpopular opinion.

 

He was lucky that she caught it, that Rem had written about the incident in the green room and the cow she fed him and his brother. The hunting frenzy had blurred everything, so he doesn’t remember much, but he saw a video that was taken of the “test” later. After they’d drawn blood from him in his feral state, they brought in a rat from the labs. It was a small, fuzzy animal that he thought was adorable, but in the moment he was blinded by predatory hunger and drooled for the blood he could hear pulsing through the tiny body. They placed it on the floor of the observation room he was in, and once the door was locked with them both inside, his cuffs were remotely unlocked.

 

When he came back to awareness, his hands and mouth were covered in blood and once white fur

 

He’ll never forget the sobbing breakdown under the harsh lights, all the questions the scientists asked, the new samples they took, the demands of explanations by Brad who took it personally for way longer than he though vash knew. But he knew. He’d told them about the first time it happened, that no, he didn’t realize it was happening again. Yes, it’s over now. No, I don’t know, I don’t know.

 

There’s so much about being a plant that Vash didn’t know, and it’s terrifying.

 

It took awhile to come back from that. Even when they were done prodding at him and taking samples, even when he was allowed to go back to his room accompanied by Luida to make sure he didn’t attack anyone, he could feel the eyes on him. She assured him she knew it wasn’t his fault, that now that they’re running tests they can make sure it doesn’t happen again and that he gets the help he needs it’s okay, but that didn’t make him feel any better, that didn’t erase the looks of disgust on so many faces

 

When he was back in his room said a prayer for the rat, and for Nai, wherever he is, to have something to eat

 

He doesn’t slip up much now. In the long run it was a good thing, the researchers determined that independents have biological cycles similar to normal plants. Intake of energy is one of those cycles, but whereas regular plants would draw from a higher plane, independents are apex predators. It’s more vestigial than anything, an evolutionary remnant from being a creature that had a singular source of energy that it could draw from. His adaptation was probably meant to ensure he gets energy right when he needs it to fuel other cycles in the form of meat because it’s similar in construction to his own body. Plants are made of pure energy so they consume pure energy. Vash is flesh and blood, and his body wants more

 

So now he tracks the cycle, and twice a year he needs meat before he goes into a frenzy. He tries to go home for it, there they know what’s going on with him and he can just spend a day or two in his room eating the artificial meat made with the amino acids from their plants. Other times, when he can’t make it, he stops in a town, rents a room, and buys up Thomas or worm meat so he doesn’t have to see it killed. Other times, if he’s unlucky, or if it hits before it’s supposed to, he’s shit out of luck. Sometimes it’s in the open desert when he finds himself with fragments of worm shell around him, sometimes he snaps out of the haze on his knees in a Thomas pen digging through one of the bird’s carcass. Sometimes, if he’s very, very unlucky, he takes a bite out of someone before catching himself and running away.

 

Human blood does the trick a little too well, and he doesn’t like that

 

And this time, he got unlucky. It came early, and now Wolfwood is demanding answers from him. It’s been so long since he’s had to explain this to someone. At home they know what it is, everywhere else he never lets anyone see it, but Wolfwood has become a victim of his hunger, and his the nail right on the head when he asked if this is a plant thing

 

“What do you mean your ‘carnivorous’?” He asked.

 

“Like a predator. Like how some worms hunt”

 

“Blondie I’ve seen you eat normal food. Why’s this only happening now?”

 

Vash is horribly uncomfortable with the whole topic, but at least Wolfwood is… easy to talk to.

 

“I have a lot of… cycles. This is one of them. I just get,” he swallows, he can still taste blood, he still has bug shell on his hands, he feels disgusting.

“I get really hungry, and everything smells sharper, and I need meat and I wanna kill things even though I don’t want to I don’t want to hurt anyone”

 

“You just have to to make this stop,” Wolfwood finishes. Vash slowly nods.

 

“I’m so sorry… I swear I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

 

Nico sighs, runnin a hand back through his hair.

“Well are you fine now? You eat enough?”

 

Vash nods meekly.

“Then it’s fine. Just warn me next time you wanna take a bite out of me.”

 

“You’re not mad?”

 

“I’m fuckin’ pissed but being a dick about it isn’t going to help.”

 

“…thank you Wolfwood”

 

Nick can’t take that sweet fucking smile, looking at him like he’s so kind. He needs a fucking cigarette 

 

“Get your ass back to the car and I won’t tell the newsies about your little love bite”

 

Vash quickly follows him, chuckling a little with relief.

_____

 

Of course Vash’s weird shit doesn’t stop there

 

Wolfwood has been paying much closer attention to Vash since then. His bite healed easily, apparently a plant's mouth is much more clean than a human’s, which Vash is apparently aware of. 

 

He licks his wounds. 

 

Like an animal, he licks his wounds. If Nico wasn’t paying such close attention he could miss it or write it off as a serious oral fixation, but vash has been licking his wounds. Gunshots, cuts, he never uses antibiotics or wipes them down with booze like anyone else would to prevent infection, he just licks them. It’s sort of endearing, he really is like a kicked puppy. 

 

There was a time a few weeks back when they’d gotten caught up in a firefight, Vash shooting the guns out of people’s hands in his pacifistic dance of cowardice, Wolfwood shooting for kneecaps and shoulders to avoid his partner’s lectures, both of them narrowly escaping. Wolfwood was lucky to escape with only a graze on his side. When they had gotten far enough away to regroup and tend to their wounds vash helped him. Nico usually never allows this, never lets anyone close to his injuries because when someone touches an open wound suddenly he is twelve years old on the operating table again, and he tends to lash out

 

But when Vash reached for it he held very still, hitched his breath, and held onto his arm a bit too tight while he prayed away the memories.

 

Vash didn’t seem to think about what he was doing when he pulled up Nico’s shirt to look at the spot, he didn’t seem to think about how fucking bizzare it is as he leaned his head in and licked the injury. Wolfwood delivered a gentle smack to the back of his head and Vash laughed, assuring him the graze should be fine, and it was. The relief was quick, it was like a thin layer of lidocaine over the cut that dulled the sharp pain into a surface ache that he could ignore while they continued to flee. 

 

He tried not to linger on the feeling of Vash’s tongue against his skin, about what seeing the man’s head move low just above his legs made him crave

 

So he does his best to ignore it. There’s plenty more odd shit that he does to think of instead. Unfortunately, far too much of it stirs those same cravings.

 

Some priest he is, but in his defense, Vash is the closest thing to Angel he’s ever seen

 

His teeth are pointed. The sharp canines and doglike carnassials were so easy to miss before he knew what he was, but now that he knows Vash isn’t human he can’t believe he never saw it before. When he bites into food they flash, he’s quick to use his teeth to open packaging and hold items. When he fumbled his gun once, he caught a bullet that fell from the chamber in his teeth and shove it back into place with his tongue, and fuck, he thought of that in the shower that night.

 

Then there’s his sounds. Vash is constantly making little noises, surprised gasps and yelps, humming and singing and whistling when he’s happy, pathetic sobbing every other day for one stupid reason or another. Then there’s the less human. There’s growls of true animal rage in his throat when he saw a man kick his thomas, when he saw someone throw sand at a kid trying to steal an apple from a cart. There’s clicks and trills when he’s happy sometimes, they show up in between laughter, in moments of joy playing with children in towns or petting stray animals they come across. And one time in the car when Vash had fallen asleep and Wolfwood had guided his head into his lap, he found himself petting that blonde hair absentmindedly, and Vash started vibrating. Nick wasn’t sure what he was feeling, he thought there was something wrong with the car at first, but then he could hear it.

 

Purring, he was purring.

 

He felt so soft then, holding this creature that was not a man to him, this thing that was better at its core than he or anyone else could be, and having it be at peace. His hands were calloused, used to pulling triggers and splitting knuckles and ending lives, and underneath them Vash the stampede, the Sixty Billion Double Dollar man, purred like a kitten. Wolfwood didn’t deserve this, to hear such a sweet thing from such a sweet being. Vash didn’t deserve this, to have to walk to earth with someone so far below him. But here they were, and the quiet buzz of it steadied his heart In his chest

 

Maybe he’d gotten too used to Vash’s plant things, or maybe Vash had gotten too comfortable showing them to him, because when the blonde idiot started hiding them again, he got worried. And Wolfwood doesn’t like worrying over some jackass who is so bad at surviving that it’s a miracle he could have made it this long. He knows he shouldn’t be, the normal reasons vash is bad at surviving aren't a problem right now. No one is attacking them, so Vash’s terminal pacifism isn’t putting him in danger. He’s drinking plenty of water, so he isn’t worried about him passing out. No, he seems completely normal. Way too normal.

 

Vash is hiding something

 

He started eating less, which isn’t strange for Vash, he usually skips meals when he’s sad or thinks he’s failed in some way, but there was seemingly nothing to set it off. No fight lost, no idiot he failed to save, no town that chased him out, he just stopped eating. Wolfwood would sometimes offer him some of his food, other times insist he take something, but vash would brush it off or take one bite and say he was full. 

 

He would have thought he was just having some bout of depression or it was a bad anniversary, but then he got fidgety. It was different than when he was in his hunting funk, it’s less leg bouncing and more like he can’t get comfortable. He’s  leaning forward away from the seat, wincing when a bump makes his back hit it, and scratching and pulling at his clothing.

 

“What’s up blondie, you got sand in your shirt?”

 

Vash turned to him with an awkward smiles and laughed.

“Yeah that’s it, downside of having a sick jacket”

 

But Wolfwood doesn’t believe that for a moment, and soon he’s proven right.

 

When at long last they pull into a town, Meryl and her superior are off to report in somewhere, and Vash is making a beeline to an inn. It’s not like him to crash in a new place, he usually likes to find a bar or tavern to get a drink first, but this time he just announced that he was feelings under the weather and wanted to turn in

 

That was two days ago

 

Nick was getting damn tired of waiting around here. Meryl told him vash had a fever, at least that’s what he told her when she went to check on him. Wolfwood tried to check on him to, his knock met with a hurried “don’t come in” followed by a forced sounding cough and an excuse about not wanting to get him sick.

 

Real cute. 

 

Wolfwood went outside and found the window, the curtains were drawn but the window itself was wide open, so after lighting up a cigarette to get him through whatever bullshit awaits him, he dragged over a nearby cart and climbed it to get inside. He poked his head in

 

“Hey dipshit”

 

Vash screams so high that Wolfwood would laugh if he weren’t so shocked by what he saw. Vash is kneeling on a blanket on the floor, stripped down to his underwear, is covered in feathers, and has one wing arcing out of his back

 

His eyes are first drawn to his body, because it’s torn up. There’s massive scars marring his flesh. Some are thick and dark, from burns or stabs or chunks of skin torn off. Others are thin and light, surgeries, slashes, bullets. More than just scars, there’s metal implanted in him. It’s not just the prosthetic attachment, it’s patches all over him. He’s seen enhancements, god knows he’s seen more cybernetics forced into bodies than anyone should, but this is different, it merges so well, so much better than a human body could. But even with all the damage, even with the muscles too defined by a lack of hydration, a body too skinny from lack of nutrition, he looks good. Wolfwood has to tear his eyes away from the cut up thighs and the trail of blonde hair below his belly button.

 

Because the matter at hand is that vash is covered in feathers. Dark, iridescent feathers that are black as night with indigo accents on the ends when the light hits them. It’s like the night sky had shattered and fallen in pieces across his body

 

“What are you doing?!” Vash demands, pulling his arms self consciously over his chest as Nico finishes crawling through the window. 

 

“I could ask you the same thing,” Wolfwood counters. 

“You finally get tarred and feathered?”

 

“I made these myself thank you,” he retorts sarcastically, and Wolfwood barks a laugh, he did not expect that of him.

____

 

The first time it happened was on the home ship. Vash was a preteen, in body at least, in reality he was probably closer to three or four years old but he looked eleven. 

 

He’d been there for awhile, long enough for people to get to know him, for the rumors of a monster on the ship to settle into the gentle reality of the odd child instead. He had started to make friends, he had found his place as the plant worker, and the occasional panel of tests the plant researchers did on him weren’t all that bad. He was far from a normal human, but they saw him as a person, or at least close enough to one that most of them were kind, even Brad started to come around. 

 

They had been kind to him, so when the bumps started forming on his skin, he felt safe telling them. He ran in a panic to Luida, he showed her the rows of tiny bumps on the backs of his arms and his face under his eyes, he complained about them itching and his shoulder blades hurting, and when she felt along his back, she rushed him into the research sector again. Vash was terrified, but at least now they were gentle with him. Luida held him in her lap as they took blood samples and removed one of the small bumps to analyze it, she pet his hair as the pain in his back came in waves, and she told him calmly that there were large lumps rising on his back. As awful and terrifying as that was, he was comforted by her, he thinks her called her rem once when he was delirious from the pain.

 

It all came to a head as the the bumps transformed, little needles pushed out through his skin, breaking open to reveal downy feathers, and at last the lumps on his back burst to form wings. 

 

It stopped hurting then, and they understood what it was.

 

Plants that were open, revealing their form, had wings and feathers. Apparently Vash did too, it just developed later than the rest of him. The scientists confirmed that his vitals were okay as Luida helped him preen the new feathers, rubbing at the keratin sheathes to free them, and soon enough they were all free, and Vash gained a sense of his wings. He had four, two large ones from his shoulder blades and two smaller ones on his lower back, and with them came dark feathers on his shoulders, biceps, back and some under his eyes. He could retract them into his body, and extract them when he wanted to, but for the most part he kept them hidden away. Sometimes he’d take them out to flutter about, finding he could glide down from tall structures or catch some air in sandstorms, but they don’t work well with clothing, and tend to get him weird looks, so he hid them

 

Molting is a yearly occurrence, they found. Once a year in the late summer his wings would ache to come out, and his feathers would fall out and regrow. It was a week or so of itching, discomfort, and always feeling too hot, but it was just a fact of life. It didn’t hurt anymore, not like the first time at least, it just isn’t pleasant 

 

Of all the unsettling things he had to learn about his body, this was the most gentle

 

It’s another thing he tries to do at home, but can do at inns if he needs to. He just can’t let anyone outside see his wings, they are not as kind as those at home. They’d have him killed for being a monster

___

 

Being laughed at for it hurts too. Wolfwood already knows what he is, he’s not going to kill him over it, but he hates being reminded how weird it is

 

“I know…”

 

“Seriously blondie since when do you have a wing? Do you just grow em and shed em like baby teeth?”

 

“Wolfwood…”

 

Wolfwood’s laughing tapered off as he realized that Vash isn’t having as much fun with this as he is. But he understands. He knows that he and his body are freaky, the knows that what it does is unnatural to this world, that he’s a monster. He isn’t surprised that Wolfwood finds it funny, it is funny, if he didn’t have to live through it himself he’d find it funny too. 

 

“Ah relax needle noggin, I’ve seen weirder shit”

 

Vash looks up a bit.

“You have?”

 

“Actually no but you know what I mean,” he comes closer, taking a drag of his cigarette and crouching down in front of him.

“So what’s up with this? This why you been acting so weird? Christ you could have told me you were growing fucking feathers, probably would have been more comfortable taking your jacket off.”

 

“Can you just go?”

 

“Nah, I wanna know what this is”

 

Vash’s wings droop a bit as he resigns himself to the humiliation of explaining yet another weird part of his biology, and Wolfwood notices the second pair.

 

“It’s a plant thing”

 

“No shit”

 

“…molting. I'm just molting, happens every summer”

 

“What do you need?”

 

Vash blinks 

“What?”

 

“What do you need? This doesn’t seem comfortable”

 

“You’re not… freaked out?”

 

“I have seen too much freaky shit in my life for you to be the thing I can’t handle. You drive me fucking crazy Vash but this isn’t why. Now just tell me what would make you feel better because you look uncomfortable as shit”

 

Vash could damn well cry. He does need things. He needs so fucking much and of all the people in the world beyond the home ship walls he could trust to give him that, Wolfwood is who he would want. He sniffles.

 

“Water and… could you help get some of the pin feathers off?”

 

“Yeah, I can do that”

Nick tussled his hair as he walked past him to the bathroom, and Vash leaned into it so hard that he almost toppled over when he let go. He slowly put his arms down from his chest, Wolfwood didn’t say anything about the scars, he wasn’t too disturbed by the feathers, maybe this could be okay. 

 

When he returned he nudged a freshly filled canteen into his hand which Vash took gratefully and chugged, and Nico lit a new cigarette as he sat behind him on the blanket. Vash finished off the water with a gasp.

 

“Thanks man you’re a lifesaver!”

 

“No problem,” once his hands were free he got right to tending to the feathers. Vash startled, then chuckled nervously when Wolfwood took one of the pin feathers between two fingers and gently rolled it until the sheath broke away and the feather inside was freed.

 

“You know how to do this?”

 

“We had thomases at the orphanage, sometimes they needed help preening where they couldn’t reach”

 

He definitely knows what he’s doing. Vash’s back is covered in the white needles of pin feathers ready to come off. His wing and upper arms are soft with feathers since they were easy enough for vash to reach himself.

 

“Do you usually do this on your own?”

 

“Yeah, it just takes longer, hard to reach those back ones”

 

With each feather freed, the itching subsides. One less hard thing scratching at his back. It’s an amazing relief, little sighs escape him as his friend works.

 

“You could have told me, I would have helped you from the start.”

 

“I know, it’s just kind of embarrassing ya know?”

Vash tries to chuckle but it comes off as a said, forced thing.

 

“So you're too embarrassed to ask for help but you’ll absolutely bark on command for hot chick?”

 

“What, you wouldn’t?”

 

This time they both laugh a little. A big feather at the base of the wing is freed and he tries to swallow the relieved noise that makes.

 

“Why are you embarrassed about this anyway, it’s pretty”

 

Vash’s breath hitches.

“Come on you know they’re not”

 

“Don’t try to tell me you don’t look good looking like a damn angel. I get why people would freak out over it but it’s objectively pretty cool.”

 

Angel

 

“You’re a lot nicer to me than you need to be.”

 

“Yeah and you should thank me for that more often,” Wolfwood flicks him playfully in the back of the head and resumes preening.

 

“…could you tell me how that nub looks? On the right?”

 

There is indeed a nub of flesh growing up on the right shoulder blade, at the same spot as the base of the wing.

 

“What’s up with that? Did you have another wing get chopped off? It would match the rest of ya”

 

“No it just has a hard time growing, the scar there kind of makes it difficult for the wing to get out”

 

Wolfwood feels over it, and Vash whimpers.

“That hurt?”

 

“No! No it’s just. A lot”

 

Wolfwood smiles behind the cigarette and pets it again, relishing in the cute little noises that drags out of him. He’s careful of course, clearing out the pin feathers around it, petting gently, knowing damn well that Vash feels good but doesn’t like admitting to pleasure. It’s like he’s allergic to joy or worse, Catholic. 

 

Finally, with what he could only call a moan, the nub burst forth into another wing. It was slightly damp and covered in the pins of unopened feathers, and Vash had to catch his breath from the exertion, but Nico stared at it.

 

“Fucking gorgeous”

 

He ran a hand up it, drinking in Vash’s sweet little noises as he broke up the pins. The relief of this being out of him and tended too must be great, and the shudders of his body prove it.

 

Soon, vash is purring, and Wolfwood could just die

 

This is the closest he’s ever gotten to divinity, and it’s almost funny. How many truly devout priests would kill for the opportunity to touch an Angel? To tend to their wings to free them of pain? To witness a holy creation and feel its contentment as its feathers fluff up? Wolfwood gets to have this, and he can feel the purring buzz through his body. Under his hands, Vash’s body is perfect. All the scars, the cost of his unrelenting kindness, stand as painful proof that he is good. His skin, freshly cleaned in the inn Shower, is so much softer than it has any right to be. Maybe he’s taking advantage of the situation letting his gaze fall to this body and imagining what he could do with it besides preening wings. Maybe he’s earned the lapse in piety

 

 For vash, it’s no less intimate. The only people who have every helped him with his wings were Luida and very rarely Brad, never anyone else, never anyone hardened from the outside. But Wolfwood’s hands on him feel right. It feels safe being cared for by the man who would bitch and moan about everything but would spare lives at his request. It feels okay letting himself be tended to on such delicate limbs as his wings with such a private affair as this. It feels good being touched. 

 

This has never been anything more than uncomfortable before, sometimes relaxing when he was home and had help, but this time it feels like more. He leans into the touch, and when he could feel Smokey breath on his neck he turns his head around. Their eyes met as one of the last pin sheathes comes crumbling off

 

They don’t know who started the kiss, only that they were eager for it

 

Wolfwood finished tending to his feathers so that he could retract his wings and all signs of them

 

Vash promised him that the next time he felt something coming, he wouldn’t leave him in the dark

 

Between that, and the pretty penny they made selling what they told the shop were rare black Thomas feathers, it was worth the long stop

____

 

He wishes he never made that promise. He knew it was coming, like clockwork he knew it would start in the fall, but he hadn’t told Wolfwood yet. He’d been putting it off because…

 

Well, it’s humiliating 

 

But now that it was closer, it would be impossible to hide. The early signs have already begun, the feverish heat, the photosensitivity, the loss of appetite and now in the car, he can smell the floral stench he’s oozing. Wolfwood certainly can too, and it’s getting him some looks. Nico watches him shift his legs uncomfortably for the umpteenth time, but doesn’t comment on it

_____

 

This time, Nicholas is acting fucking weird. Vash’s strangeness is ever present, an often quiet backdrop over their day to day life, and this new set of jitters and odd quiet may very well be some new plant thing. He doesn’t know, and at the moment, he doesn’t care, because he has other things to focus on. 

 

Namely, he’s turned on for no apparent reason.

 

At first it was just some annoying morning wood, nothing unusual, but not what he wants in a car with three other people. He just ignored it until it went away, but an hour later, he’s hard again. Rinse and repeat for a day in the car, and Nicholas is pissed. There is no reason for his body to be doing this. There’s nothing he needs that for! He’d get it if he were blackout drunk at some city strip joint but there’s nothing sexy about a 16 hour trip in a cramped space with a small annoying woman, a drunk old man, and…

 

Well, maybe his little whimpers when they hit bumps are kind of hot, but not enough for this.

 

Come to think of it, Vash has been silent aside from the occasional noises like a Thomas chick that’s been stepped on. Looking over at him, Vash is leaning against the window, eyes shut tight and mouth slightly parted, panting as quietly as he can. What little skin Nick can see is slick with sweat and his legs are crossed. Now, any other time, he’d call Vash out for hiding an apparent fever or injury because there’s something wrong with him. And if Vash has something wrong with him besides the usual, he can’t do his job. But this time he recalls a saying about throwing stones and glass houses, because if he stands up, his own problem will be apparent. What a dilemma. 

 

He keeps an eye on him, trying to find the bloodied clothing, waiting for the strained cough, anything that would tell him what’s wrong. Vash doesn’t notice, too caught up in his own little world, but when he uncrosses his legs and then recrosses them tight the other way to satisfy his jitters, Wolfwood almost gags at the wave of arousal that hits him. He coughs, and fumbles for his cigarettes, ignoring a little jibe from Roberto about how his lungs must be empty by now. He needs to clear his head, clear his throat, because he’s getting the idea that Vash is somehow causing this. It’s like when he was put under anesthesia as a kid on those merciful days where he was spared the pain of procedures, only instead of near instant sleep, what he gets is painfully hard

 

If this is a plant thing he’s fucking killing him

 

Wolfwood lights his cigarette and rolls down the window to blow out the smoke. With fresh nicotine to sate his craving and ground him, he turns his attention back on Vash.

 

“Hey,” he nudges him. “Hey blondie”

 

Vash gives a quiet groan, and Wolfwood grabs one of his shoulders, shaking him.

“What, are you dying?”

 

Rather than fight him off or make some stupid joke, Vash whimpers. That, and his head lolled to the the side and pressed against his hand. Nick’s breath stilled as the blonde rubbed his head against his hand and blinked his eyes open. The scleras and irises glittered with plant markings and unshed tears, and the pupils, unlike when he was in his hunting frenzy, are blown wide. Like specs of starless night eclipsing the sky blue. His face is flushed, and he pants a heaving breath. Sick as he clearly is, Vash is awash in truly uncanny beauty. Nicholas knows that something inhuman is crawling from the cracks in his facade, yet Vash, feverish and unwell, looks ethereal. Wolfwood doesn’t even remember why he was so uncomfortable a moment ago. Not until Vash slumped. He leaned too hard into Nicks touch and his body fell to the side, landing first against him and, after Nick tries to shove him off, into his lap.

 

“Hey! Get up! This ain’t a good time!”

But Vash didn’t seem to care about the shoving and protests. He didn’t even seem to notice Wolfwood’s dick hard in his pants. He only curled on his side, head in his lap, and writhed, pushing his body into Nick’s as much as he could.

 

“You doing alright back there?” Meryl asks from the driver’s seat, starling Nick.

 

“Yeah don’t you priests usually do that in confession booths?” Roberto adds, and is the only one to laugh at his own joke. It was a little too close to the things running through Wolfwood’s mind, so he was quick to refute it.

 

“Needles is sick. How far’s the next town?”

 

“Does he need a doctor? What’s going on?”

 

“I don’t know.” He brushes the hair plastered to Vash’s face away from his eyes. There’s something very wrong with him, and it’s effecting Wolfwood.

“I think he just needs somewhere to cool down. Maybe a shower. Definitely a shower”

 

Meryl nods, and the car jolts as her momentary distraction led them over a rough hill.

“We should be there soon”

____

 

The first time it happened, Vash was barely a teenager

 

In body at least. In reality he was probably six or seven, but that didn’t matter to him, he aged fast back then. It was a slow sickness, overtaking him in that first week in autumn when the weather finally got cooler. Luida told him it was probably just a cold. The scientists he asked about it saw nothing wrong with him and gave him some mild medication to help him sleep it off. But while the codeine lulled him gently to rest, it did not stop what was coming. 

 

He awoke to feverish heat, a killer headache, and a feeling in his stomach that he did not know was arousal. It was a horrible combination that had him nauseous from sheer sensation, stomach roiling with new overwhelming feelings and his reaction to his own hormones that he didn’t get a gentle introduction to. His memory there is spotty, coming in bits and pieces. Vash remembers crawling out of his bed in a panic, he remembers collapsing in the hallway on his way to find someone, he remembers yelling and crying, arms shaking as he drools, certain he was going to throw up but nothing coming out. Nothing was clear until he was at the laboratory.

 

Luida was speaking to one of the scientists as others crowded around Vash, some taking samples, others administering drugs, all trying to figure out what’s happening. It was a mess of confusion and technical jargon as batteries of tests were run, and it took quite some time and many lapses of consciousness before anything started to make sense, but they began to piece it together. New hormones were found in his blood that they were able to match to recorded phenomena in regular plants, something found secreted into the fluids around them in times when they’d bloom, the time before, ever so rarely, they’d birth a new plant. Between this, the rise in temperature, and Vash’s desperate grabs for everyone close to him, trying to cling to human touch, it made sense.

 

Receptive, they called it. 

 

Luida called off the rest of the tests, refused the researcher’s insistence that it was crucial to take samples and images now, and had them clear out of the room. She had the authority, if not the agreement, to cut off the experimentation in progress because she insisted that this is a private matter that Vash has the right to keep to himself. She let him curl up in his misery on her lap and gave him merciful contact, she let him rest and tried to explain it as best she could to the poor plant with a body that was betraying him

 

She told him that what he was going through has something to do with sexual maturity in plants, that he must have reached whatever his equivalent of puberty is and is now in some period of receptivity. That they don’t know why or even how, but his body is preparing to reproduce, however there’s no telling how it would work for him. It’s not exactly what he wants to hear, that he’s suffering for a purpose he is too young for in a body that no one understands, but it would explain things. 

 

He could have stayed like that until it was over. However long it took, as rough as it would be, he would have liked to stay in her lap where he had affection and gentle pets like an overgrown lapdog until it was over. But of course, he’s just not that lucky. There was an issue with the ship and Luida was called away. She promised to be back as soon as she could, and she left Vash to sleep it off until then.

 

They waited until she left to continue their testing.

 

Vash didn’t put up a fight, he didn’t see why he should. Aside from squirming away from cold metal tools on instinct he was as cooperative as always. The ct scan was easy, as were more blood panels, but as anxious as the bustle around him made him, he wasn’t afraid until he was handcuffed. He asked them why and they said it was a precaution. It dawned on him through his fogged mind that something bad was going to happen that he was now unable to fight

 

He won’t be forgetting the table any time soon. It was like the one he’d been on before so many times for tests and checkups where nothing went wrong, where they treated him like a person. Only this one had straps. He was horribly lucid as they secured him down and he stuttered through promises that he wouldn’t fight back. He was entirely aware when they stripped his already little clothing away before trapping another part of his body against the cold metal. When he was bare and shivering his attempts to speak were met with no responses. He began to wonder if he was talking at all, or if he was just so delirious that he only imagined he was.

 

The attention was on the thing between his legs. He’d become very aware of it, feeling hot and tight where before there had been nothing. Hell, the plant researchers had seen his body before and knew about the blank spot in his anatomy, but this time it was different.

 

There was a slit in place of human genitalia, normally it was little more than a shallow dip like lips pressed together, but this time it was dripping fluid and the skin around it was raised. Something is wrong with his body, something is wrong . But rather than say anything to him, one of the researchers began prodding at it with the tools they had beside them, noting the reactions as he squirmed and the skin around it moved. Slowly, but surely, it was coaxed out to reveal what’s inside. After enough uncomfortable presses, it opened . The skin around it seemed to raise and fold out like the outermost leaves around a flower bud, revealing the bloom underneath.

 

All at once it hit him how wrong this is. He could hear them talking about his body like he wasn’t there, like he couldn’t hear them saying disgusting, or fascinating, or comparing him to flora, to objects. He felt as naked as he was, the cold of the room and fear of the prodding implements making him tremble. This is humiliating. This is humiliating . He doesn’t like this, he doesn’t like being put on display, being toyed with, being helpless to stop it. He asked them to stop, but his protests fell on deaf ears. With no warning gloved hands and something cold shoved their way into the petals, making him cry out in pain he didn’t know he could feel and attempt to close his legs. The asking turned to begging and the begs to sobs as his overwhelmed mind was trapped in his exposed body. More researchers moved to secure him down tighter while the one at his… whatever you call it, continued

 

Vash is shamefully glad how much it blurred together, that way at least he doesn’t have to remember each uncomfortable detail alone and can try to block it out as one event. They weren’t gentle. They wouldn’t know until after the fact that his bloom is a fragile thing and the harsh handling was hurting him. They wouldn’t listen to his pleas as he tried to back out of this, to find some way out of the instinctive panic he was in as he was held open and exposed in a time he would learn he’s far too vulnerable. They took their samples, they examined what they wanted, they didn’t make any attempts to pretend that they saw him as anything more than a test subject. He is a plant, not a human with rights, not a person who can consent to or reject a study, he was their object to cut open and see what’s inside. Worst of all was the way his body wanted. Wanted more touch, wanted more heat, mourned the hands as they drew back. How disgusting, he’s terrified and in pain but he still wants pleasure from it

 

After so long, when they finally got their notes and were satisfied with what they’d found, they wanted one more sample. He was already exhausted and on edge from the examination. As much as his body craved touch and the tendrils between his legs reached out for more, he couldn’t do it. He didn’t want it. He wanted to crawl back to his room and hide under the covers until this whole nightmare was behind him, but that’s not what the researchers had in mind. They came back with a new implement that they shoved unceremoniously into his opening, drawing a pained cry from him

 

And then it started to vibrate

 

He choked at the sensation, his body twitched, and he was immediately overwhelmed. He’d never felt this before, any of it, and now it was coming all at once, unprepared, and with so many eyes on him. 

 

The thing is, Vash never touched himself before then. He may look like a teenager, but he grew fast and had yet to experience the kinds of desires that would usually lead to this feeling. This was his first. First time being aroused, first time being aware that his body could do this, and the first time feeling sexual touch. It was so many firsts, and his introduction came in the form of a medical setting and something too big and too quick moving inside of him. It wasn’t long before he was crying again, but he’d given up on asking for it to stop. He just has to be good and let it happen, he just has to let them get the information they need, and then it’ll be done. Maybe it’s good. Maybe this can help the humans

 

It lasted two hours.

 

By then most of the researchers had left the research floor in favor of the observation room behind the two way mirror, opting to avoid the presence of the creature they were tormenting for data. One or two remained, occasionally asking him if he was close to climaxing, to which he kept shaking his head, feeling guilty that he wouldn’t even know if he was. It just wasn’t working. He wouldn’t learn until later, well after this when he would explore his sexuality as something for him to enjoy rather than a medical problem to be forced, that this kind of stimulation doesn’t work for him. Maybe his first experience with it just soured it, but they went too fast and didn’t give him enough time to prepare. It was a long time shaking on the table before anything happened, his body rejecting the stimulation and attempting to curl up like one of the dormant plants wasn't helping, but at least one thrashing attempt to free himself from the object moved it in a way that helped. Suddenly the overstimulation became sharper and spiked into a false mimicry of pleasure, and he cried out as the petals closed around it 

 

His first climax was a pleasureless, aching thing ripped out of him that left him unsatisfied and raw, but at least it was over.

 

Ignoring the tears and nauseous drool on his face, the researchers remaining in the room removed the object none too gently and swabbed at the fluids and dry blue dust he produced. He couldn’t help but feel insulted. All that for just two more samples they could have extracted with a needle

 

He was still there when Luida came back, and even knowing that what the researchers did was not sanctioned, he was still surprised by the hell she rained on them. There was yelling, threats, and it was the first and only time he’s ever seen her punch someone. She rushed to free him from the medical restraints and get him redressed, she half carried him back to his room where she kept promising him that they would be punished, that this wasn’t supposed to happen, that she’s sorry. But Vash was just tired, humiliated, and felt like his nerves were standing six inches out from his body. Even with how much he yearned for the touch and warmth and safety she could give him, he asked to stay in his room alone, and she didn’t argue

 

It was four more days before he felt normal again. Only now he didn’t trust the researchers the same, and there was a rip between two of his petals that he told no one about. He didn’t want any more hands on it 

 

He prayed that wherever Nai was, he was safe and warm

 

This is the one cycle that he didn’t come home to handle for a century. Even though rationally he knew it was the safest place, even though logically he knew that wouldn’t happen again, he did not come back for this cycle until the last researcher involved in that test was dead. Because of what they did they were not allowed to reenter cold sleep and would instead take the place of the scientists who had to stay awake to tend to affairs and die of a normal human lifespan. And while Vash never stopped feeling guilty over being the reason they all perished faster than the others, he understood why. They disobeyed direct orders in a way that hurt him, but still, at least he learned from it

 

They learned he was genetically viable. That he had a yearly cycle in which he was fertile and while it was unclear if he could get pregnant like the other plants, he could potentially impregnate others. Plants apparently have an extreme and unusual gender ratio of many that could be called female, but very few that are intersex. None are fully male, which would explain why Vash’s various hormone tests and physical exams could never conclude any biological sex that humans could understand. It was supposed to be a lucky find, Vash was supposed to be proud of being one of the chosen few capable of breeding, but it just made him sick. Who is he to create lives any more than he can create deaths? 

 

Vash is certain that he never wants to procreate, an easy thing to choose for himself as it would take a lot more deliberate choice than it would for the average human for him to have a child, but he keeps quiet about it. Who knows what humans would do to him if they knew he may be able to create new plants. They would have much worse than cold tables, much worse than the implements used on him before. So he never tells anyone, and just deals with the cycles as they come

 

Sex, as it turns out, is one of the most difficult things about being a plant

 

Because vash has desires. Dear god he has desires. Not for the plants who he can’t help but see as siblings like his brother, but for humans. Women in skirts that hug their hips, men with big guns and bigger chests, any and all in between who show more skin than ever before in history under gunsmoke’s blazing sun, all of that gets to him, and he’s just human enough to love it. He loves them, their bodies, their voices, the images they conjure with dirty words in the backs of bars and in hotel lobbies. He loves the chase, flirting over drinks or bullet shells, talk of all the things he’d give them for just a taste of their beauty and of all the things they could do to him. And how fortunate he must be to be just pretty enough that so many take him up on it

 

But then there’s the issue of biology. The fact that he has a wet flower in his pants is a little difficult to pass off as the side effect of some strange childhood illness. 

 

Sometimes he’s lucky, he’ll meet someone so kind and so gentle with whom he can quietly admit to being inhuman, who will not be bothered by it and can find that it’s surprisingly compatible with their human organs. Those are the magical nights he cherishes in his memory, more often than not when he’s alone in a hotel shower or far enough into the dunes no one will see him.

 

 Other times he needs to be careful, he knows he can’t trust them not to report him to some authority to have him stripped and experimented on again, but he’s only a man and he can be desperate. He has a mouth, and he can be satisfied with his own hand while he pleasures someone else, sometimes he even prefers it, he likes feeling like he’s helped and isn’t always up to being touched no matter how much his body wants it. He has a prostate, or at least something similar enough that he can enjoy penetration that way. You probably wouldn’t be surprised by how many men don’t even try to touch the cock they have no reason to believe isn’t there. He has a body that is so close to being human in every way that he can have sex without people noticing that there’s something not quite right about him. He doesn’t like taking all of his clothes off anyway, too many comments about his scars give his insistence that he’d rather keep his jacket on some truth. In 150 years he’s become quite good at making excuses, it’s almost impressive that he could fuck his way across the planet with so few people ever seeing the alien thing between his legs. But let’s not give him too much credit, he often remains bitchless

 

The cycles make a difficult situation worse. Vash has every reason to be cautious of intimacy. He has every reason to want to keep his clothes on and people away. He has every reason to hide where no one can ever find him and shut out any desire to leave. So it’s such a horrible, horrible thing that when the days start to cool down, his body lights itself on fire in search of the opposite. 

He knows what to do by now. He always has money saved so he can get a week at a hotel for the worst of it. If something goes wrong he can hide in an abandoned building, he can pay someone to stay in their barn’s hayloft, hell, he’d even risk a few days out in a sand drowned ruin if it meant privacy. Very rarely and cautiously he’s started going home for it and staying in his old room. He appreciates Brads little “masturbation cave” jokes less than he lets on with his forced laughs, because being home while feeling like that brings bad memories, but he still appreciates the security. Because he’s in for days of horny hell and would like to be sure no one sees him like that. 

 

He’s only ever allowed a small handful of people to stay with him for it before. Luida bringing food and water doesn’t count, she’s family. It’s a difference to really spend it with someone. An old traveling partner who was a more than a companion, a prostitute he was close friends with some hundred years ago, a man who was more than a little interested in his alien biology who he will reluctantly admit left him feeling like he was under the microscope again. Those were the times his Receptive cycles didn’t feel as awful. His body got the heat, the touch, the sex it wanted. He got to feel close to someone, like he was loved when he felt more disgusting than ever. It was so nice to be able to relax for once with someone he could trust

 

But those are few and far between. The companion died in a firefight, his friend got old as humans tend to do, and the last man’s “interest” led to him wanting more of Vash’s body than he was comfortable giving and he had to run before he took it. Humans are mortal, and they are cruel, so he tries not to want those little mercies. It’s been so long since he’s had that anyway that he’s begun to forget the euphoria of it. Maybe it’s for the best that way, he shouldn’t miss something that would always leave him raw and broken when it ended

 

It’s dangerous to let people so close when he’s so vulnerable, which is why when the days got cooler faster than usual, he panicked. 

 

He didn’t even realize it was happening at at first because he was distracted. Meryl, Roberto and Wolfwood were fun, they were new people who were kind to him, they were humans he was having fun with. How long has it been since he relaxed like this? Since he drank and laughed and had fun like he wasn’t carrying the weight of the world? He felt happy, he felt safe, that’s why he didn’t know until too late that it was starting. That when he was in the car in a haze of fever and wetness between his legs, he went silent in fear of just how exposed he was. He kept his mouth shut, and prayed for the best

____

When the car finally pulled into town, it took several nudges for Vash to wake up. Meryl and Roberto had already left to set up rooms for them, and Wolfwood alone was there, jabbing his hand into Vash’s face until he moved. He made a whimpering noise as it all hit him. The sunset is too bright, the cigarette smoke was too strong, his stomach hurts and his neck aches and his pants are wet and everything is terrible forever.

 

“Five more minutes…”

 

“Nope”

 

Once Nicholas got the confirmation he was alive, he was out the door and dragging Vash with him. He stumbled over his own legs, his cycles always make his prosthetics feel off, and being carried by the scruff like a kitten wasn’t helping. He was half walked, half dragged a little ways away from the car and tossed to the ground, his back hitting the tin wall of a building. He shielded his eyes from the sun while he tried to look up at Wolfwood, who was eying him cautiously, like a trapped insect.

 

“I’m going to give you one chance to tell me what this is”

 

It took a moment for the words to register, hunger and arousal battling for his focus. God from this angle Nicks tits looked huge

 

“H-what?”

 

“Last time you said you’d tell me when more weird plant shit is happening, so I’m going to let you try to explain yourself before I beat it out of you”

 

It’s after a solid ten seconds of staring at Wolfwood’s chest that Vash can muster up a response.

“…explain what?”

 

“This!” Wolfwood gestures vaguely to Vash, then the tent in his own pants, then back to Vash. Oh, oh wow. This has never happened before, not like this at least. Yeah once or twice Vash has been near another plant during his cycles and some chemical he produced caused them to open up. Once he’d even been near a plant in its own receptive cycle, and Vash was thankful for the several layers he was wearing with how much his body reacted to that. It took a while for him to piece it together, His cycle, Wolfwood’s reaction, the things that Wolfwood was subjected to that he only heard of in bits and pieces but enough to know someone was trying to make him like a plant… oh shit. Vash smiles in pure dismay

 

“…well… when a man loves a woman very much his-“

 

Nicholas grabs him by the collar.

“Don’t go spitting that shit at me, this isn’t fucking funny, what’s going on with you?”

 

He’s so close, he’s warm, his arms are strong and his tits are huge and vash has been staring at his chest for a long time.

 

“Vash!”

 

“Please… be quiet”

 

Nicholas doesn’t say anything, but he crouches, putting his face close to Vash’s.

“I don’t know what’s up with you, but it’s affecting me and you promised you’d tell me next time you were going through something. Now I don’t know why you’re so hell bent on suffering through everything alone but you need to say something because you gave me your word.”

 

Amazing how Vash can be ashamed of so many things at once, but he was just reminded how truly pathetic he is. That’s right, he promised that he’d tell Wolfwood when another cycle was coming, he promised that he’d let him help and he even assured himself that he would be okay with it. And he really meant it, he just didn’t realize that it was this cycle. Being seen as a predator was okay, being seen with his wings out was okay, but this one is not okay. Suddenly all too aware of the sticky, wet feeling of nectar drying between his legs, he’s terrified of Nick knowing what’s happening. It’s bad enough to suffer through these alone, but these in particular are steeped in so much shame that someone just knowing they happen is bad for him. He doesn’t even like Luida and Brad knowing and they’re the safest, kindest people he knows. 

 

But he made a promise, and maybe it’s just instinct, but he wants reassurance more than anything right now. Maybe it’ll be okay. It’s a stupid hope, but he wants Wolfwood to be okay with it. It would be a mercy for him to just not be disgusted. Vash sighs and averts his eyes 

 

“You know… how worms lay eggs in the fall where it’s cool enough to breed?”

 

“Yup”

 

“And flowers open up in the spring?”

 

“Get to the point blondie”

 

He swallows.

“It’s like that. My body is trying to…”

 

He doesn’t finish, nothing he can say doesn’t feel awful, but Nick puts it together.

 

“Oh Jesus Christ you’re horny? This is just you being horny?”

 

“Well-“

 

“I’ve seen you horny before and it wasn’t like this!”

 

“It’s different!”

 

“Yeah no shit, why?”

 

“…weird plant-“

 

“Weird plant thing of course”

 

Nicholas huffs, and Vash already regrets telling him. He should have lied, should have-

 

“What do you need?”

 

“What do I need?”

 

“Yeah. For this, whatever this is, what do you need?”

 

Vash doesn’t know what to think, maybe it’s just hormones making him emotional but it means so much. Before he knows it he’s crying, and Nick couldn’t look more uncomfortable if he tried

 

“Can we talk about it inside? It’s embarrassing”

 

“Buddy, all of this is embarrassing”

 

He helped him up, supporting him as he had the coordination of a man who’s been drinking since sunrise, and lead him inside. He got the room key from Meryl, and their questions about why Vash looked half dead were stopped by a quick glare from Wolfwood that was sufficient to convey a general sense of “if you ask about these emotional problems I’m going to make them your medical problems.” He doesn’t want to explain what he already barely understands about Vash’s undignified situation, and he just hopes that the sobbing, feverish blond was taking away attention from his dick which had not gone down in far too long.

 

By the time they reached the room and had the door locked after them, they couldn’t care less about the state of it. The old wallpaper was yellowed by age and there were stains on the carpet and curtains that were questionable at best, but there’s a bathroom and a bed with fresh sheets, and that’s all that matters. Wolfwood dumps Vash on the bed and he drops like a wet bag of sand. He just lays there face down in the bed for a minute before rolling over and looking up at Wolfwood. He doesn’t seem upset, it looks like some privacy calmed him down as well. 

 

Vash sniffles and breathes, it’s better here, so much better. The light isn’t harsh, the smell of cleaning product and cigarettes isn’t too bad, the bed is soft. Best of all, he’s not exposed. He’s inside, he’s safe, he’s going to be okay. His head doesn’t ache as badly, his stomach hurts less, he grabs at the blanket to feel it in his remaining hand. It’s good here.

 

“So?”

 

“Huh?”

 

“Stay with me blondie, tell me what’s going on”

 

Oh, right, explanation. And Wolfwood. He should be worried by how fast and easily he relaxed while Nick is still in the room, usually when he’s in this state he’s panicked if anyone is near him, but Nico isn’t setting it off. It’s so comfortable, Vash squirms as his cunt throbs now that his need is the strongest sensation he has. Since when had he gotten so comfortable with Wolfwood? He always thought he was pretty but now there’s instinct that wants it. Wants to soak in his presence, wants to devour his perfect body, wants to be filled by it. Words come so slowly, but he’s okay with saying them

 

“I’m… everything is a lot. I’m hot and hungry, I can’t walk very well, I need to be in here so I’m safe… I’ll be fine to leave in a week…” 

 

“And you’re unspeakably horny”

 

“That too”

 

“I could help you, if you want”

 

Vash blinks.

“Sorry?”

 

This is all a lot for Wolfwood as well. Because… fuck, he’s feeling it too. It’s not like he’s never looked at Vash this way. Christ alive the man is beautiful, lean muscle most would kill to have, perfect skin and hair despite living just as rough as everyone else, and those eyes… not to mention the steady stream of gasps and whimpers he often supplied which became a common detail in Wolfwood’s fantasies. His body alone would be enough for him, but then he just had to be the sweetest thing on top of that. So needlessly kind, so inexplicably caring, Wolfwood took this job expecting another Knives and instead met a real Angel that he did not deserve

 

And now that Angel is writhing on the bed before him, aching for sex that he’d be more than happy to be a part of.

 

He wanted it. Wolfwood wanted to pin him down and have his way with him, he and his fruity plant shit has been fucking with him all day and now that he knows what caused it he can’t think of a better use of his time than giving both of their bodies what they want. But he’s stopped by his own sense of care that was supposed to be dead. Because slightly more than he wanted to give in to his desire to ravish him that he’s kept quieted in the back of his mind since they met, he cares about him. If he were anyone else it would be easy, any of the previous questionable partners that he slept with and left like he’s supposed to, he’d just do the same. But this was the sixty billion double dollar man who he had grown quite used to patching his wounds, to hearing his troubles, to leaning his head on him in the car and hoping he was asleep as he listened to his heartbeat

 

More than he wants to fuck him, he wants him to be okay. 

 

God that’s annoying

 

“You’re not a bad looking guy, and we’re friends. If you don’t want to I’ll leave you alone, if you do, you’ve already gotten me ready”

 

Vash tensed on the bed, and Nick worried for a moment that he was too pushy with his offer.

“You don’t have-“

 

“Your tits are amazing”

Vash blurts out. He doesn’t even think about what he’s saying until it’s out there. He’s just been thinking of nothing but the fear his cycles bring him and Nick’s pecs and the very moment it registered for him that Wolfwood is okay with that attention, the floodgates broke. The embarrassment catches up to him a moment later, and he presses one of his hands to his face to cover his aching eyes as he tries to save face.

“No- I mean- I’m sorry just. You and-“

 

Nick laughs, it’s such a rare thing to hear it like this, with no sardonic bite carved by years of hardship and horrible truths. It’s unguarded, even more than Vash’s own laughter which is always less joyful than it sounds, his own smiles which are always less happy than they look.

 

“Shit why didn’t you tell me sooner! I could have unbuttoned my shirt more”

 

God that’s what he needed. The seriousness of the situation fades gently away as a laugh builds up in his throat and cracks through his lips with a grin. This is stupid. This is so stupid. Here they both are turned on and out of their minds just saying shit. He just got dragged into this room because he’s so wet his legs hurt and Wolfwood has been sitting weird for miles because he’s gotten infected by Vash’s category seven Plant Sex Event. He’s so used to it being dangerous and vulnerable and so horribly tainted by the first painful time he was touched that he easily forgets that this is kind of funny. And how wonderful is it that he can laugh about it, and so can the man with him who he could wholeheartedly trust would be kind to him in every way that matters. Vash has more tears in his eyes by the time it dies down.

 

“You’re really okay with this? You don’t just have to do it to be nice, I don’t look good when my clothes come off”

 

“Blondie I’ve been waiting to see you undressed”

 

Vash is quickly reminded of what’s going on in his body when his cunt aches . Wolfwood’s voice, gravely and low, Wolfwood’s smell, tobacco and dust, Wolfwood , is all around him, and his body knows it. His blush reaches his chest.

“We can stop whenever you want- if you still want to”

 

“I should be saying that to you because I won’t want to,” Nick insists. He moves forward, placing his hands on either side of Vash so he can lean over him. They haven’t even done anything yet and already he looks wrecked. He’s sweating and panting and so red from heat and embarrassment, and the way he looks up at him, hungry, makes him want to sink his teeth in even more

 

Wolfwood wanted this. He’s wanted this for a while, and with it so close it's all he can do not to drool like an animal. He’s so close to getting his clothes off and tasting him, so close, and even he knows that Vash wants the same. He leans closer, he can see the adam’s apple bob as his companion swallows

 

Vash knows that it always ends badly past this point. He knows that most are disgusted by his torn up body, others are disturbed by his genitals, the rest are either uncomfortably obsessed with his inhumanity or only tolerate it until they get what they want from his flesh. That or they’re kind, and then they’re gone. Normally he is so careful with sex, dancing around reasons why he doesn’t want to remove his clothes and doesn’t let other people’s hands between his legs or feigning drunken sleep to cower away from it all together. He’s been so good at satisfying urges in all the ways that will earn him the least scorn, the least suspicion, that will let him walk away still feeling like a person and without gunfire behind him, that his addled brain is able to eek out a then I deserve this . He’s denied himself reckless indulgence for so long, and with the possibility of the first truly satisfying lay with no threat of violence or pain, he caves.

 

Vash has been so good, and he’s so desperate that the risk is worth the reward

 

“Please”

 

Lips are on his in seconds, and kisses back with all the fervor that’s been building between them. The kiss held all the warmth of their first, all the care that comes with trusting someone with a gun at their backs, but it did not have the same careful hesitance. They were past that, past all the nervous politeness and posturing, and now they took greedily. Wolfwood’s tongue broke past his lips, carrying with them the taste of cigarette smoke and cheap whiskey. Vash leans into it, savoring the overpowering bitterness as hands moves to his side and his arm, pinning him gently and allowing him to feels back. Tracing his teeth, Nicolas took the opportunity to feel every one of them for what they are because, as he’s discovering about himself, he loves the inhuman things about Vash

 

Despite how he Carries himself, Wolfwood has surprisingly little experience. By the time he was twelve he looked twice his age, then never seemed to age again. Now at twenty four, looking a few years older, few would guess that despite good looks and a confident manner, Wolfwood has only slept with exactly four people. 

 

The first was a man he met at a bar who had no reason to believe he was his first. Wolfwood looked far older than sixteen, and he was embarrassed by being a Virgin who looked like he was in his mid twenties, so he talked a big game and ended up bruised by how rough he claimed to enjoy it when he had no point of reference for what sex is like besides filthy talk he’s overheard. It wasn’t good, and he just felt dirty being kicked out of the hotel room the minute it was over, but he was too excited about the idea of getting laid and feeling good, what horny teenager isn’t? He walked away from it feeling a little better once the initial shame of being used died down, like proof he was an adult, despite how he’s been treated as one far earlier than he should have been. The next was a woman who came onto him on a sand steamer, he figured he may as well try it out, and found through clumsy sex and a brutal lack of knowledge of what a female body even looks like, that women aren’t for him. At least there he got some experience, she would at least show him the ropes and didn’t kick him out before he could get his shirt back on. The third was out of necessity. His bike needed gas, he needed money, and no one was buying a preacher’s services. In his desperation he got an offer from a man who had a truck, and a ride to the next town and some pocket money made him reluctantly accept the conditions. It isn’t like he never considered prostitution. It was a brutal fact of life for an orphan, so many of his brothers and sisters were products of it, so many more would survive on it once they aged out of a roof over their heads. Even when he was too young to be thinking of it, he knew what it was from the older kids, and he’d told himself that when they were grown and if it came down to it, he’d rather do it than let Livio go through with it, he was always too sensitive. 

 

But Livio wasn’t there, and there was nothing noble about what he did to get a ride and a meal

 

That was the first and only time he’s been on the receiving end, and from that experience, he doesn’t want to again. He’s heard that men who pay feel entitled to anything they want, and being tossed out of the car in the next town with bloodied thighs and a limp that he would tell the next innkeeper was a bullet wound to save his remaining pride, he understood what that meant. But he got paid, and he took a shower, so it’s fine. It’s fine.

 

The last was the only one he could confidently say was good. It was a man he met doing an odd construction job when he was strapped for cash who lost an eye and an ear to shrapnel from a bombing when the town was raided by thieves. They talked for a long time that day, about the work, then about injuries, and maybe since it was a full decade since the eye of Michael took his youth from him, or maybe because his companion had made it look so easy to talk about something that stole half his face from him, he was able to mutter out a half truth about looking older than he is, but he said it was from a chemical spill. He doesn’t know why he lied, maybe he still wasn’t ready to talk about it, but it felt good to share a secret with him. They talked a lot before they slept together. Maybe it was because he saw him as a friend, or maybe it was because he just had enough experience to know what he was doing or enough fear to know what to avoid, but the sex was good. Wolfwood held himself like a seducer who knew how to be in charge and he bluffed his way into the role. They were only together for a few weeks before his friend was called home to care for an injured sibling and Wolfwood was unable to abandon his responsibilities to go with him. It was the only adult relationship he ever mourned.

 

It makes sense that he’d think about that now, because that was the closest thing to what he has with Vash. He’s tried not to think too hard about what made that one better than all the others, because all the answers feel humiliating. What, is he one of those people who needs to feel “the connection” before he can get laid? Is he honestly like those insufferable people who never shut up about finding “the one” or “saving it for someone special?” Does he get scared of rejection and abrupt ends like some clingy kid? 

 

Or worst of all, does he need to be loved?

 

They’re all terrible answers. Wolfwood wants to be a womanizer, he wants to use and lose people, he’s actually wished he could be as much of an asshole as he seems, but it just doesn’t work. He has the body for it, he would be breaking hearts across gunsmoke if he could, but something in him is saying no. It’s saying don’t give yourself to someone who will leave. Saying you can’t just want this the way they can . Saying you will always be 12 years old and scared of everyone who doesn’t want you

 

And maybe, god he hopes not but maybe, that’s why he loves that Vash is a monster.

 

When Vash hides his body for fear that the scars will scare him away, when he folded his wings to his body as if that would conceal his inhumanity, when he cries and the glowing lines in his eyes show through, it makes him hungry. Because he is the same creature. When Vash said that he could see in his eyes that he’s not that kind of guy , that he’s not as awful as he needs everyone to believe, he knew then and there that they are the same. And it worries him that all the terror and insecurity and utter monstrosity that he wants to carve out of himself, he finds so alluring in the man under him. No one else has ever understood so viscerally what it is to have a body that betrays them in ways you can’t tell anyone, no one else has ever been so gentle with a body built for power, no one else can convey with eyes bluer than the sky and a smile that they know what is in his soul more than god could make him admit

 

And it’s hot

 

So now he takes and takes and takes. He wants Vash with all the carnal, animal lust that seems to come naturally to everyone else, and is bathing in the fact that Vash wants it too. He can feel the metal hand in his hair and the flesh one moving up his shirt as he licks over the blonde’s teeth, not even caring when the sharp edge of one of them cuts his tongue. It’s like a razor, like it should belong to one of the great beasts of the old planet he’s only heard about in books, and he savors the blood it draws. The sounds this man makes, god, that alone would have been a reward. Vash whimpers and chokes back moans as his over eager body presses up into his own, and his hands trace over metal and flesh alike.

 

“Wolfwood…” he whines when their mouths part, like a plea, like a prayer.

 

“Yeah?”

 

He despises that pause in his voice, that moment in which Vash pulls back ever so slightly. He knows him well enough, has seen himself mirrored in how worries enough, to know that Vash is just as nervous about giving in as he is. Maybe even more so, because Wolfwood, for once, may not be the most fucked up one.

“Are you sure? You can still stop, I’m… I’m not human-“

 

“Shocking.”

 

“No, I mean…”

His eyes flit nervously downward and his legs move together slightly, and Wolfwood understands.

 

Christ, there must be something fucked in his head because that makes it even more hot. Wolfwood grins and moves one of his hands between Vash’s legs, digging into the wet spot on his crotch and feeling something there. Vash gasps and chokes, flinching but not pulling away. Nick doesn’t know what he’s feeling, it’s definitely not a cock, he suspected Vash didn’t have one but this doesn’t feel like a pussy either. Especially not when it moves.

 

“I don’t care what you are or what you have, I’ll make it work, just tell me how to make you feel good,” he kisses his throat and feels him swallow.

“So don’t think about what I think, tell me what you want.”

 

Vash shudders, rutting whatever it is that’s soaking his pants into Wolfwood’s hand and gripping at the back of his suit jacket. He doesn’t have to worry about what he thinks, he doesn’t have to worry about his body and everything wrong with it, he’s been given permission he didn’t know he could have and breaks even more.

 

“ Fuck me Nick”

 

“There we go,” he practically purrs, voice thrumming with excitement. Hands go to his hair and tug at his clothes as he dives back into the kiss, the blood of his tongue smearing over teeth and lips as Vash sits up to shove his coat off and Wolfwood pushes his hands up his tight black shirt to remove it. The blonde allows it, moving his arms up to make it easier as warm, calloused hands trace up his chest. They feel everything, every unhealthily lean spot that shows his self punishing starvation, every scar and metal implant that marks a failure or triumph that left a mark on his body, every bit of damage that he’s seen before when he held his wings and called them beautiful. With the shirt off Nick takes his sweet time feeling him up, his abs and pecs are no less impressive with the damage over them. 

 

He shuffles down to untie his shoes and pull them off, and by now he’s barely even surprised to find metal in place of limbs. Curiously he feels up his legs, seeing how far they go. On the left he feels the stump of his leg just below the knee, while on the right the prosthetic goes just above it.

 

“It was a Landmine”

 

“What”

 

Vash is still smiling, so giddy on excitement that even the bittersweet information doesn’t fully kill it as he answers a question his friend has yet to ask.

“My legs, lost em in a landmine”

 

“Sorry to hear that”

 

“Eh, got pretty lucky it didn’t reach any higher, I could have lost much worse” 

He chuckles nervously, and Nick moves his hands up to his belt

 

“Can I see it?”

 

Vash tenses, but despite his nerves he nods, but catches himself. This is all a risk, he can take one more. He’s not a selfish lover, in fact he’s so afraid of being a selfish lover than he almost never asks for anything he wants, but in for a penny…

 

“First take your shirt off?”

 

Wolfwood grins, there, now that’s a normal way to have sex. He wants to tease him, but it’s already such an accomplishment to get Vash to ask for anything unprompted, so he slips out of his jacket and unbuttons his shirt, then makes a show of stripping it off. Vash is staring straight at his pecs and getting somehow redder. It’s not often that Nick feels particularly good about his body, but when he’s looked at like that, he can’t say it doesn’t make him feel pretty. He watches as the plant markings glow ever so slightly for a just a moment as the blonde drinks him in, and knows it’s about time he really touches him. He puts his hands back to Vash’s belt and he tenses.

 

Vash prepares himself, because as tolerant as Wolfwood has been so far, this is always shocking to people. Even if it’s fine, it’s a lot for someone else to know about, and a lot more for them to touch. But before he can eek out one more promise that it’s okay to back out, more to himself than he’s willing to admit, Nicholas kisses him on the hip, meeting his eyes to reassure him as he unbuckled the belt and rubbed one of his thighs, getting him to relax the leg so he could slide down his pants and underwear 

 

“Easy blondie, you’re fine”

 

He pulls it down, and as Vash squirms and stops his hands before he can reach to cover it, Wolfwood is honestly surprised that he didn’t expect what he found

 

He had expected mutilation, he thought that like the rest of Vash’s body, this would be all scars and stitches. At first he thought he was right. He thought it was a vagina that had been cut through and healed wrong by the suspicious lack of pubic hair, uneven slits and raised parts. But even if he couldn’t see it moving, the smell alone would tell him it was off. He was hit by a wave of sweet scent that was like something he’s smelled rarely before. Perfumes some of the eye of michaels rich patrons could afford, the honey sold in bottles that he once splurged on after a payout, it smelled like something alive in a way he’d never seen before. Vash’s legs start to close but he grabs his thighs to hold them apart, not disturbed so much as curious.

 

“It’s- uh, not like yours. Or. anyone’s. Sorry,” Vash mutters.

 

“Don’t apologize,” Wolfwood squeezes his thighs with the assurance. He moves one of his hands forward, tracing the edge of the slit and drawing a quiet gasp from his partner. He can see now that the skin folds together to create a smooth cover over his crotch, and it’s been half opened by whatever Vash is going through. At the touch the skin writhes, and then it opens.

 

The four corners fold out, and so do more layers of dark blue. He’s seen this in books, old ones from the ships. Flowers they were called, pretty things that were alive but not animals. It’s blooming out of him, the petals opening up and splaying like stretched fingers. They all lead down to a center from which five small tendrils emerge, little yellow strands that end in soft nubs that are moving like the soft bodies of burrowing worms crawling up from damp earth. Towards the top of the center base of the petals is a short protrusion, thicker than it is tall and poking out from under smaller petals ringing it. He could piece together that, as utterly alien as it is, it’s not beyond his understanding.

 

“It’s pretty”

 

“You’re just saying that”

 

“I’m serious! And don’t lie to me. I don’t care how much you love humanity, not all of it is pretty. I’m not talking about evil.”

He looks up to him, meeting fearful eyes.

“I want you to look me in the eyes and tell me anyone’s dick looks interesting”

 

Vash let out a dismayed laugh. Failing to choke it back and Wolfwood continues. He’d so much rather Vash be laughing than meekly apologizing for a body so beautiful.

“You’ve got wings and patterns and a fucking flower on you and you act like you’re some big awful monster, but you’re not. It’s pretty, I’m telling you that it’s pretty”

 

And there he goes now, looking at him with those big eyes like he’s perfect, like he’s free of sun and is worthy of this, of him.

“ Wolfwood”

 

The petals splay even further, some carrying strands of thick wetness from where they separate. Vash is ready, he can tell he’s aching for it, so he keeps going. He touches the petals gently, and the little stamens reach toward his hand. It’s sort of cute how they tap his fingers, like they’re getting a feel for them. Vash whimpers.

 

“Sensitive?”

 

“Yeah… oh- oh yeah it’s delicate there”

 

Delicate, it’s cute to think the six billion double dollar man is in any way Delicate. 

 

As the little tendrils tap at his fingers, the base of the petals parts and a small hole opens up. It’s not very big, but the perfect size for his fingers. It’s measuring him. The blonde tries to cut off his whine, but it’s clear that as hot and bothered as he was before, the teasing makes his body all the more desperate. 

 

“Oh come one” he whines, and who is Wolfwood to refuse him? Vengefully, he gives no warning before brushing two fingers over the small nub above the hole. Vash’s legs snap together and he yelps, trapping his fingers there as he first tries to pull away, then ruts back into them. Nicks guess was right.

 

“How…”

 

“That’s your clit right?”

 

Vash looks at him confused, apparently that guess came more easily to him than it did to his past partners. He can read him like a book, especially with how far he’s let his guard down. For Vash this is rare, not just letting someone see and touch his genitals, but them being so quick to figure out how they work. The only human who immediately guessed that the stamen was his most sensitive spot was a lesbian who apparently thought he was a lesbian. It was some of the best sex of his life actually

 

“I’ve seen enough paintings of christ’s wounds to know when something is vaguely pussy shaped”

 

Vash chokes at that.

“You can’t say that!”

 

“What? I’m not a real priest I can say anything I want”

 

On his back and with legs spread his laughter bubbles up.

“…the jesussy”

 

He’s so distracted by laughing at his own joke, he almost doesn’t realize that the fingers are prodding at his hole. It’s when one slips inside that he whimpers.

 

This is the hardest part. Even when he’s as totally relaxed as he is now, even when he’s completely ready and willing and so, so eager, this part is always hard. Wolfwood notices him going quiet, and despite the petals folding in like they’re trying to hold his hand there, he checks in.

“This okay?”

 

Vash nods, fending off memories are sudden intrusion and painful vibrations. They always come back at this point, and it helps to move his hands, to feel the lack of restraints and focus on the warm body with him.

 

“Just go slow.”

 

It would be enough just to have his fingers, just to have the feeling of something inside him, but of course Wolfwood does more. The fingers slip inside gently, not pushing any deeper than his body is prepared for and letting him relax into the sensation, but also bringing his tongue down on the stamen, lapping gently at it before wrapping his lips around it.

 

It’s heaven . He didn’t dare hope for this, not to have it touched, not to have a warm wet tongue buried in his cunt. He always feels anxious about this, it seems wrong to take without giving in return, but it feels so good he doesn’t want to stop it. Fingers working inside him feel like both so much and not enough, and the tongue on his stamen sends shocks of sharp pleasure through his body. He buries his hands in Wolfwood’s hair, holding his head there, chasing his pleasure. It’s almost sad how little satisfying sex he’s had in the century and a half he’s been alive, but it makes him sickeningly grateful that this time it’s good. He gasps out his name like a prayer, squirming and moaning and rutting up into his mouth. At any moment Wolfwood could admonish him for being so selfish, but he wasn’t. Wolfwood seemed to enjoy eating him out as much as Vash did, and he couldn’t complain about that.

 

Nicholas did. He knew how to do it well enough between his first time with a woman and his one companion who was a man but not male, he gave him a chance to learn how to do this well. But now he has to admit that with Vash it’s all the more exhilarating. The smell, not of meat and bodies like any human’s but of something light and delicate. The taste, so sweet, like the honey he’d licked clean from the jar when he’d had it. The body that was not human and therefore made it perfect, too unique in its construction for him to compare it to any human he has ever been with. It makes him even more eager, his hands occupied by holding his thigh and feeling his insides leave him to rut his cock against the bed like an animal. He wants to be inside him, he wants to claim him, but first he wants to see the face he makes when he comes.

 

It didn’t take long. Much to Vash’s surprise, he found himself reaching the edge fast. Maybe it was the cycle’s oversensitivity, maybe it was how safe he felt, maybe it’s the fact that he let Wolfwood touch him in the way that works best for him. He doesn’t always get off. In fact more often than not he fakes it, or is left to handle it on his own when his partner is done. It’s one of the many downsides of not liking people seeing or touching his genitals, but even when they see what he has they often don’t get how to do it right. It’s his own fault really, he has finicky biology and weird genitalia and he can’t honestly expect anyone to know what he needs, even when he’s brave enough to try to explain. That, and sometimes sex is just tainted by nervousness, or he feels like they don’t care about him, or he just gets too ashamed by how long it’s taking and pretends he’s satisfied so he doesn’t have to waste anyone’s time. There’s a lot of reasons he’s used to being left wanting, and now he’s barely able to register that it’s happening. It’s so soon, it’s so good

 

“I’m close,” he whines, voice and body tense as he braces himself for it. Wolfwood hums in acknowledgment, only adding a buzz to his tongue that had Vash’s eyes rolling back. It didn’t even occur to him that Wolfwood doesn’t know why that’s a warning.

 

He comes hard, shaking with the feeling and petals trembling, and Nick learns why he may want to move his mouth away in the future.

 

Something dry shoots into his mouth and down his throat. Not five seconds ago he was collected and confident, holding his partner by the thighs and making him take his pleasure. But now, feeling like he inhaled a bag of flour, he’s coughing.

 

Vash rides the high of the rare climax from someone else’s hand and not his own, his plant markings flash and his petals tighten, but as he comes down from it he becomes aware of Wolfwood coughing his lungs out more than usual. He snaps up

 

“Sorry! I’m so sorry! Oh- shit I didn’t tell you-“

 

“Fuck- blondie” He coughs a great deal, light blue dust coming out in small bursts before he finally slowed down and swallows

 

“What the fuck…” 

 

“…I’m sorry, I… forgot to tell you about that”

 

“It’s” he coughs more, slowing as he gets his throat cleared.

“It better not be poisonous”

 

“No! It’s just pollen it’s fine!”

 

“Pollen?”

 

Vash can think of no tactful way to put it but he has questions to answer anyway.

“…plant jizz”

 

Wolfwood doesn’t even look surprised at this point. His expression is more that of ‘I chose to eat alien angel pussy so I am responsible for the weird shit it does in response.’ He nods, just accepting the situation, and Vash feels the shame creep back in. Nick did something so nice for him and what does he do? He pollinates his lungs. And those are the hardest working lungs on the planet!

 

“Hey”

 

“What?”

 

“Stop giving me those eyes”

 

“What eyes?”

 

“You know. That look! Like ‘oh I’m so awful because I came during sex’”

 

“I should have warned you!”

 

“Newsflash asshole, if I cared about sex being predictable I would have hired a hooker. So are you still turned on?”

 

“Am I- you’re not mad?”

 

“No. So are you still turned on? Cause I want to keep going if you do”

 

Vash swallows. This time of year he’s always turned on, one climax never does it. Even when he is satisfied it’s not long before he wants more. He nods, and Wolfwood resumes his position over him

 

“Are you okay with having me in you?”

 

“Fuck, yes” Vash pleads, he can think of nothing better. He’s so ready for it, between his receptivity making him crave it and an orgasm that left his body ready for more, being penetrated sounds good. He wants his fingers, his cock, anything he’ll give him. When they kiss again it’s just as hungry as before, and Vash spreads his legs so Nick can reclaim his place between them. As lips lock and hands roam, Wolfwood unbuckles his belt. Vash watches hungrily as the brunette hooks his thumbs under the waistline and pulls them down, moving his knees to kick it off. He has nice legs, but what Vash is interested in is even closer. Nick’s cock is so hard it’s dripping, he’s been affected by Vash’s cycle as well thanks to his genetic augmentations, and he’s been painfully turned on almost as long as he was. But unlike Vash, Wolfwood was neither used to being left wanting, nor accepting of it. He would get his, and Vash had no problem with that. 

 

He pushes his knees under the blonde’s and rubs his cock between the petals, forward and back to brush against everything, but not giving him what he wants just yet. It’s close, so close to filling him up, and he whines.

 

“Come on, put it in!”

 

“Aww, getting desperate?”

 

“I’ve been desperate!”

 

Nick runs his thumb over more of the petals, drawing a hitched breath from him.

“How careful do I need to be?”

 

“Just start slow, it’ll open up”

Wolfwood hums in acknowledgment and kisses his cheek, then ever so carefully lined the tip of his cock up with the finger sized hole he’s created. The little tendrils find his dick, they tap it, sizing him up, and the petals adjust accordingly. The hole widens, and he presses in. Vash half moans, half sighs as he’s penetrated, and Nick can’t hold back his own groan. He’s been so turned on for so long that it’s all he can do to not cum before he can even start. The pistils slowly send signals to his body as they feel up his shaft, making Vash’s cunt deepen until he bottoms out. Once they meet his navel and confirm the extent of penetration they need to prepare for, the petals tighten. Nick shudders and holds still, gathering himself before he tries to move because he’s already so close to the edge

 

It’s been awhile for Vash, much longer than he’d like to admit. He used his fingers, and a small toy he’d gotten from a sketchy shop that he keeps hidden under his mattress along with some magazines at home, but the last time he did this was some… 10 years ago. He’s had sex plenty of times sure, but his mouth and his ass are what he offers up to partners more often than not. This, what is this even called, floral sex? Was intense after so long without it. His body welcomed it eagerly, but the tightness his cunt insisted on and the fullness in his belly are a lot. It’s so much pleasure, just bordering on pain, but it quiets the ravenous lust within him. It told that awful instinct that wants him to breed and be bred, to pollinate and be pollinated, that he’s doing what he’s supposed to

 

When Nick finally caught his breath and calmed himself down, he thumbed at Vash’s clit and kissed up his neck.

“Tell me when you’re ready”

 

“I’m ready,” the blonde immediately insists.

 

The pace starts slow. Wolfwood making sure that as he pulls out he doesn’t displace any petals, and as he thrusts back in he doesn’t hurt any pistils. But Vash’s body is built for this, and he soon sees that there’s no need to be so careful. The petals and tendrils splay harmlessly out of the way in an arc of blue and yellow, Vash’s arms grab at his back, his chest, his hair, and oh his sounds. Nick imagined what angel’s singing would be like, picturing heavenly choirs and the trumpets at the end of the world, but in reality it sounds like high moans and breathy whimpers as this man’s body is ravished.

 

Vash writhes, the building pleasure making his plant markings stand out, glowing ever so faintly. Wolfwood thumbs at his clit, drawing a sharp Yelp and little cries of yes and so good and more. His blonde hair is a halo as his body shudders with overwhelming need. Vash nears his second orgasm, and Nicholas can feel the nails, metal and keratin alike, digging at his back. With satisfaction he thrusts deep, dragging his cock along his insides with steady force and holding his thumb to his clit. 

 

The second time he comes today, he can feel himself tightening around Wolfwood’s cock, and little feathers pricking through his skin. It’s so rare that he feels so physically good that it summons them, and dumbfounded he feels at them under his eyes with his hand. 

 

He’s still raw from the aftershocks when it happens. 

 

Wolfwood lets up on touching his stamen, not wanting to overstimulate him, not yet at least. But Vash’s body seems to have its own plans. As Nick continued his gentler thrusts, trying to give his partner awhile to build up to his next peak, the petals around the stamen separate further, and it begins to push out.

 

It never happens like this. Vash understands that his body can do a great many things that no one knows the meaning of, and he knows that there’s even more things his body can’t do. And extracting his stamen during sex is one of them.

 

This part of his anatomy is finicky. It’s much larger than it looks on the surface, but it remains retracted, safe, hidden away as though protecting itself from all but the slightest touch. It emerges occasionally, but not during sex. There is a huge difference between other people touching him, and touching himself. On his own he has no fear of judgment or pain, he can take his time chasing pleasure and relax in ways he just doesn’t with anyone near him. Maybe a little less than half of those times, when he’s somewhere perfectly concealed and has been well fed, his stamen would allow him to reach the full sensitive appendage. But not for anyone else, not after his body’s first experience was cold tools and invasive prodding and every lay since has been marked with searching for exits if he needs to run when they see he’s a monster

 

Vash didn’t think he had anymore firsts to experience in his long life, but as the thing emerges at a time where it has never emerged before, he’s shamefully happy that he had one first left for him to give Wolfwood

 

Nick was surprised too, because what he’s been thinking of as a weird plant clit is growing upwards. The petals adjust to allow it, the yellow nub turning into a cockhead as a shaft that turns gradually blue as it gets closer to the base emerges. Like the rest of Vash’s genitalia it doesn’t look remotely human. It’s thin at the top, tapered and textured like tightly packed petals that don’t unfurl. Plant markings up the side only serve to emphasize the strangeness of it

 

“This… never happens,” Vash admits, not so much another of his many apologies for his body, but more surprised 

 

“You didn’t tell me you had a dick,” Wolfwood teases. He runs a finger up it and it twitches. Vash chuckles nervously.

 

“I didn’t think it would happen, it’s never come out when someone else was around before”

 

Somehow that surprises him more that the sudden appearance of an alien dick, and it does something to him. To think that he could elicit something from the immortal that has never happened before, like he was worthy, like his touch was holier than anyone else at this altar. And on his hands and knees he can’t think of it any other way

 

For a sort-of priest, he’s never been all that sold on god, but he believes in angels, and he’ll worship they way Vash wants him to. He starts gently, wrapping his hand around it, the appendage making its own slick, more like a membrane than skin. His partners reaction, throwing his head back against the pillow with a moan and the petals tightening around his cock and making Nick hiss, tells him that the whole thing is so much more sensitive than a human’s, and he need to be careful. So he is. He resumes his thrust, slower and deeper as he strokes Vash’s cock and tries to hold his own climax back. But it’s coming, and he hopes to get him off one more time before he’s spent.

 

Vash is so lost in pleasure he can barely think. This has never happened, as much as he fantasized about having his cock when he had sex and letting someone else touch him to way he touches himself, he never dreamed it could actually happen. He always imagined it as being as difficult as everything else. Even in his fantasies he’s so weighed down by the knowledge that his body is wrong and most partners wouldn’t want to touch it, but he thought that if somehow he got it out and found someone who wasn’t disturbed they’d be rough, their touch would be too harsh, because people are always too harsh with him.

 

 But Wolfwood is so kind. So much sweeter than he wants him to know, so much gentler than he has any right to be, and is as full of mercy as the cross he bears. His thrusts are strong but not painful with how well he prepared him. His hand on his cock isn’t too tight, it glides along it with the help of the nectar he secretes and the wet sound of it, along with the shocks of pleasure, drive home that it’s real. He’s teetering between too much and not enough, overstimulation and what he craves. It’s not too much the same way as when he was strapped down and tested on, not overstimulated the way he felt when he was helpless, it’s different now. Normally that memory always creeps up when he crosses the line of pleasure into too much, but now he feels entirely in the moment, entirely here, entirely under Nick and he can feel every inch of his skin.

 

His markings glow, the petals close around Wolfwood’s cock like it’s trying to trap him inside, he’s getting close again. The kisses between them grow sloppier as they both near their peaks, and the cracks in Vash’s moans and the volume of Wolfwood’s heavy breaths make it clear neither of them will last much longer. There are tears forming in the blonde’s eyes as he’s overwhelmed by it. He’s always been the type to get overly emotional during sex but it’s never felt so safe. He’s been yelled at for crying before but it doesn’t make him stop, but he doesn’t think Nick will be upset by it. He’s used to his weird shit, and he’s been so, so kind about it. Maybe it’s the swarm of emotions, maybe it’s the Cycle making him too desperate to think straight, maybe it’s just him and Nick and everything between them that makes him want to say it. Normally he wouldn’t, but he’s breaking in too many ways to refrain. There is no confession booth for him to speak it, so he whispers it now

 

“I love you”

 

Nick doesn’t even realize what it means when he says it, he’s just as desperate as Vash and just as needy. His guard is down, and his secret is pulled out of him

 

“I love you too”

 

Before either of them can realize the weight of what they’ve said, Vash comes with a whimper, arching his back off the bed and clawing at Wolfwood’s back. His cock spurts more of the odd blue dust across their stomaches, and his petals tighten. That’s all Nick needs to follow, a strained grunt tearing itself for him as he climaxes, buried inside of him. For a few seconds they cling to one another, glowing marks and heaving chests, until the last aftershocks of their orgasms fade. They’re left there, satisfied at last, and breathing heavily into one another. 

 

Very slowly, Nick pulls out. There’s some resistance as the petals have tightened up, Vash whimpers as his cock slides out. Now that he’s gotten what he needs and is no longer aroused his bloom is trying to close. Right as the head pulls free Wolfwood watches as the petals fold in a circular pattern, closing the hole with his cum still inside and covering it. He’s nearly mesmerized by the process. The cunt folding in on itself back into a bud, Vash’s cock slowly retracting back until just the tip showed, then finally, the outer folds pressing back together, concealing it in a nearly perfectly smooth cover, only the small slit remaining as proof there was anything there.

 

This is the part where he’s supposed to leave, Vash thinks. It’s over, he did his part, he tolerated him long enough to satisfy his urges, now it’s done and he has nothing else to offer.

 

“Thank you…” 

 

The shame always hits him when it’s done. As if the shame while having sex wasn’t enough, when it’s over and he’s too emotional because the high of a climax makes his mood drop way too hard when it’s done, it has to get worse. With no more touch and pleasure to take his mind off of it, all he can think of is all the ways his body is awful, all the weird things he said and did, of how if he could only be human he wouldn’t need to lecture people on how his body works when they don’t want to hear it. Usually he’s correct, usually it’s for the best that his partners leave and don’t have to see him crying like a bitch. Especially Wolfwood, because it’s sinking in that he told him he loves him and he can’t take that back. When Nick moves his knees out from under his legs and shifts. Vash closes his eyes, taking a deep breath to keep the tears from falling until Wolfwood is gone, but instead the bed shifts next to him. When he opens his eyes, he’s sitting next to him, he’s only gotten a cigarette and was lighting it up. Wolfwood puts the lighter on the bed stand and takes a drag, exhaling the mole into the air before looking down at him.

 

“How ya holding up blondie? Did I fuck you stupid?”

 

“Wolfwood…” He smiles so much more than he should when he’s like this, and one of his tears falls.

 

“Oh come on it can’t have been that bad”

 

“No! No it was good, you were good!” He insists, wiping at his face.

“It’s just- we’re done”

 

“What, want me gone?”

 

“No! I’m just… surprised is all.”

 

Wolfwood sighs and flicks his forehead, earning an insulted little noise from him. He’s happy that it’s one of Vash’s more Bitchass noises and not so much a sad one

 

“I ain’t going anywhere yet, I’m comfortable and im not moving”

That’s what he says instead of I meant it. Instead of I can’t leave you when you look like you’re about to cry. Instead of I really do love you . And Vash, who has survived on half truths, understands. He risks putting his head back on his lap, this time with no witnesses and nothing between them. A hand goes to his hair, stroking gently and making him half close his eyes. He cries near silently, Nicholas doesn’t chide him for it like he normally would, and Vash doesn’t think about the depths of self hatred that should await him. Instead he cries because he’s relieved to be safe and satiated. Because the chemical rush is too much for him, the same as it’s always been. Because this time, more than any other, it was good. 

 

“Hey you can’t get pregnant right?”

 

Vash is so surprised by the sudden shift in energy that his tears stop for a bit.

 

“What?”

 

“You heard me”

 

“Isn’t that something you ask before jizzing in someone?”

 

“I forgot!”

 

“How do you forget?!”

 

“Look, you were whimpering and moaning and looking hot, then I saw your,” he gestures vaguely at his crotch

“That thing. I didn’t think about it I just wanted to fuck you so bad I forgot kids were a thing”

 

“You own an orphanage”

 

“Yeah and it occurred to me that this is how it gets filled up!”

 

Vash laughs , he looks so worried and confused that it breaks him out of his post-sex drop and has him laughing.

“No! No I don’t think I can”

 

“You don’t think you can or you know you can’t? Stop laughing!”

 

“I can’t I can’t!” Vash catches his breath.

“I know I can’t. Relax.”

 

The absurdity of it, along with the relief that he’s only a father in the priestly sense, makes his shoulders droop.

 

“I can’t believe you”

 

“Oh and now the plantfucker is going to judge me?”

 

“You’re the plant!” At least now Nick is grinning too. Because this is, despite everything, an objectively funny situation.

 

They wouldn’t have it any other way. Nick will keep complaining about his stupid little mannerisms while holding him like he’s something precious. Vash will keep crying and whining like a bitch while looking at him like he means the world. They will not talk about the exchange of I love you s they let slip while lost in each other. Instead Vash gets him another cigarette from the pack when Nick’s is almost done, and Wolfwood passes him a bottle of water, and they talk about anything else instead