Chapter Text
It was one of those days. Today, the bullies had zeroed in on blond and fair-skinned Vash, the soft, disabled boy that did not like fighting and always tried to protect others. But since he did not fight back, he was an easy target.
Vash hated pain, but if it meant the bullies were shifting their beating of someone else onto him, he would always take the hits for them. He could defend himself but that meant hurting others and he hated that the most. No matter who it was, Vash did not want anyone to have to hurt.
He truly did not understand why these guys did what they were doing. What were they getting out of it? It made his heart ache more than his flesh.
Hits and kicks kept raining down on him, and Vash curled in on himself. It hurt, it hurt so much, but he tried to keep as still as possible, hoping for the beating to get boring for his attackers if he didn’t react too much. Tears did sting his eyes, but they were hidden behind his arms – one flesh, the other a prosthetic - shielding his face.
He couldn’t help the little whimpers and huffs of pain that were pummeled out of him.
“Look at this weakling! You’re a plant is what you are! Hah, just a little leaf we’re gonna crush under our boots!” They laughed and ridiculed him, enjoying their combined power over Vash.
“Haha, plantboy is trembling~,” one of them sing-songed sadistically.
“Hey!” A dark growl cut through the mocking. The voice came from someone else, angry, and threatening with only that one syllable shouted. A boy was running towards them, Vash could hear the gravel crunching under fast approaching steps.
“Fuck, it’s Wolfwood! Everyone, scramble!”
The bullies instantly let off and suddenly sounded very nervous and scared. They were not fast enough.
Just when Vash dared to put a crack in his shield and peek through the gap in his mismatched arms, a gust of wind introduced the dark-skinned teen as he literally jumped into his field of vision and threw a heavy punch at the closest target.
There was a sickening crunch and a lot of blood poured out of the nose of the guy who had been hit right in his face.
Nicholas D. Wolfwood, the infamous teen from the neighborhood. Nobody ever called him ‘Nicholas’. There were a lot of stories going around about him, one scarier than the other. They painted him as a cruel and dangerous guy.
He was tall and slim but growing broader around the chest and shoulders with every day it seemed. Hair, eyes, and skin a warm darkness, the hooked nose looked charming amongst his other features. The handsome boy had muscled arms, but they were decidedly not bulky, hiding the power those biceps packed frighteningly well. They were pretty similar in figure actually.
Wolfwood did not pull his punches.
The bullies screamed and yelled, spitting blood as they tried to sound intimidating with stupid insults thrown at Wolfwood all the while shuffling and falling over themselves in their clumsy attempt to escape. They were clearly scared.
“You are deranged!” one of them told Wolfwood and he sounded panicked.
With a wild look in his dark eyes, Wolfwood only shot them a sharp-toothed grin, not deflecting the accusation at all. He really did look crazy, but Vash couldn’t take his eyes off him.
He'd been too baffled to do anything. When he came back to his senses, Vash realized he should’ve told Wolfwood to stop what he was doing, but now it was too late, the cowards had finally managed to stumble back to their feet and ran away.
Wolfwood didn’t chase after them, but he did keep glaring at their backs until they had disappeared, then turned to look down at Vash, eyes suddenly a lot softer and warmer.
“Hey, are ya alright?” He held out his hand towards Vash to help him stand up. The same hand that had just cracked some bones.
Vash nodded stupidly and, without thinking, reached for the offered hand with his prosthetic. Wolfwood did not flinch or react in any way other than take Vash’s hand in a firm grip, like it was a real, fleshy one, and pulled him back on his feet.
A quick, strong tug. No fussing about him, even when injured. No fear that he could be fragile, that Wolfwood could break him.
Would he even worry about that in the first place or was he someone that liked breaking things?
Wolfwood had looked pretty enthusiastic while beating up Vash’s attackers. He had come to his help, but violence was violence. Vash felt a little sick about it.
“You shouldn’t have done that.” Vash let his hand fall out of Wolfwood’s grip, playing with the strings of his hoodie instead. He was torn between feeling grateful and awful.
“Done what?”
“Hurt them like that. It would have been enough to just scare them a bit.”
“Mhm,” Wolfwood hummed and seemed to be thinking about it. “But how else would I scare them? Those idiots are only afraid of pain. Well, they shouldn’t have done what they did, either. So, we’re pretty even in my books.”
Another toothy grin but it wasn’t threatening at all.
Wolfwood casually stepped closer and mindlessly brushed off some of the dirt on Vash’s clothes. He was behaving as if they were friends, weirdly familiar with him, and Vash suspected he might be trying to sneakily check for injuries this way.
It was a little disorienting. He did not dislike it but wasn’t sure how to react to it in turn.
“So, what was it they called ya?” Wolfwood finished his inspection and playfully pulled on the strings of Vash’s hoodie.
“Plantboy,” Vash repeated with a pout, not too pleased with the nickname.
“Why? What does that mean?” Wolfwood looked clearly confused about the weird, supposed insult and Vash in turn was stunned that the other boy had missed out on a lot of social context apparently. And he had still jumped at the chance to come to his defense without even knowing what the issue had been.
“Er, well, they’ve been sorting people into different categories, you know, based on whether they look strong or weak.”
When Wolfwood only blinked at him, Vash had to elaborate.
“Carnivores and herbivores? They say plants are just fodder for the weakest creatures.”
Wolfwood crossed his hands behind his head, all relaxed, kicking at the dirt in front of him.
“That’s so stupid,” he said, sounding almost bored, and yawned.
“Humans are omnivores. And what do they even mean with ‘plants’? That literally entails everything.” And now Wolfwood was starting to go on a tirade.
“They produce oxygen. We need them to live! And ‘just fodder’? Well, without food there ain't no herbivores and without herbivores there ain't no carnivores, duh! I’d say plants are essential for everything, which makes them pretty important, don’t ya think?”
Vash didn’t want to laugh but he was pretty amused by that building outrage. Of course, he knew all that, his mom was a biologist, and even without that he’d know. He was also sure that the bullies knew it and it was just an analogy for their stupid world view, really.
He was surprised to see that Wolfwood had taken that at face value, though.
“Uhm, yeah, I mean, I think they just meant to say that I am weak, is all.” He shrugged. It didn’t really matter what they’d called him.
“I don’t think yer weak. Yer strong, aren’t ya?”
Wolfwood’s intuition was spot on. It was a bit eerie how well he seemed to read Vash.
“Yeah, as proven by my bruises…,” he tried to deflect.
“Nah, I bet ya could’ve defended yerself but ya didn’t.” Wolfwood dropped his arms back to his side, seemingly dropping the topic, too.
Wolfwood’s knuckles were bloody and bruised.
“Why do you punch people if it hurts you?” Vash carelessly grabbed Wolfwood’s hand, inspecting the swollen and bleeding skin over those abused bones.
“It hurts either way, doesn’t it?” Wolfwood shrugged and pulled his hand out of Vash’s just to grab the wrist of his fleshy arm instead, slipping the fabric of the sleeve up to the elbow.
Calloused fingers caressed the skin around Vash’s forearm where it had split open to bleed a little, the touch surprisingly light and gentle.
“I’d rather stand up to them. I want to get stronger, so I can protect what’s important to me.”
It sounded like he was talking about something specific. Vash was admittedly a bit curious but did not want to pry, it wasn’t any of his business and he had just talked to this mysterious boy for the first time.
The strong protecting the weak. Now there was a thought Vash could get behind.
He liked Wolfwood. They might not agree on everything but deep down Vash got the impression that Wolfwood was a good person.
“You are a nice guy!” he exclaimed, excited about his discovery, and it startled Wolfwood. He opened his mouth and it looked like his first instinct was to deny it.
“Yer a real weirdo, Spikey,” he said instead.
“My name is Vash.” Vash realized, belatedly, that he hadn’t introduced himself yet.
Wolfwood waved it off like it wasn’t needed or he didn’t care and did not offer his own name in return. He knew people knew who he was. The bullies had screamed his name loudly enough for Vash to catch it at least. Still, he would have liked to hear it from Wolfwood himself.
“Spikey fits ya better.” Wolfwood shrugged and just decided on that weird nickname for him like Vash couldn’t do anything about it. He figured he probably really couldn’t.
“Hey!” He retorted weakly, but Vash wasn’t actually offended by the name.
It did not have the same ring to it as ‘plantboy’ had. There was no mocking, just affectionate teasing, or at least that was what he read that cheeky glint in Wolfwood’s eyes to be when he was talking to him.
It was probably crazy but Vash felt like he was about to make a new friend. There was something about the other teen that made him curious to learn more about him.
Now that they had talked, maybe he’d get another chance to get to know him better. Vash smiled to himself at the prospect.
“Ya can smile after all! I always thought ya looked kinda fake.” Wolfwood looked elated. He might come across as brash but he seemed to just be saying what was on his mind, his honesty somewhat bold but refreshing.
“You know me?” Hearing that Wolfwood had had a pre-existing impression of him came as a surprise. He did not think that someone like him would be aware of someone like Vash.
“Of course, I’ve seen ya around and… yer pretty infamous.”
Vash blushed. He did not want to imagine what was being said about him behind his back. What weird stories and rumors might have reached Wolfwood’s ears.
“N-not as bad as you!” he blurted out and instantly covered his mouth in shock as he realized that might have been something insensitive to throw back at Wolfwood.
Before he could open his mouth to apologize, Wolfwood burst into laughter. Like, doubled over, tears in his eyes, he cracked up.
It was a beautiful sound and sight, a little dorky and cute. He was just another boy, so different from what he had heard about him.
Vash really started to like him a lot.
“Point for ya, Spikey. Yer really shooting sharp when ya do shoot back, huh? Ya should do it more often.”
His comment did not seem to have hurt Wolfwood at all, instead he sounded happy and proud that Vash had mouthed off to him. Who was the weirdo now?
Vash. Still, definitely Vash. For having that strange, tickling sensation in his stomach whenever he looked at Wolfwood, especially when he was flashing him that cocky grin.
“Naw, that was on you,” he mumbled, trying to put the blame on Wolfwood’s provocation.
“Yer saying my bad influence is already rubbing off on ya? Then yer pretty suggestible. Better be careful around me!” It was supposed to be a joke, wasn’t it? It didn’t really sound like it was said in jest though.
“Yeah.” Vash just nodded stupidly. He wondered how dangerous this boy really was.
Something told him he was about to find out.