The House of Two Suns

Thanks so much to those who have read and reviewed. It looks like this will be a bit longer than four chapters after all, but I hope to show Sango and Knives growing closer. Hope you continue to enjoy.

Confrontation

Sango awoke to the smell of frying eggs. She wasn't used to such food, but she knew Kagome loved it. Soon both young women were up and dressed. Vash awaited them at the table, cheerfully chattering to Kagome. Sango ate quietly and wondered where Knives was.

Finally she saw him stumble out of his room. He seemed pale and weak.

"My leg wound," he said in Japanese. "It's inflamed. It needs to be cleaned, or it will be infected."

Sango looked up at Vash, but Knives shook his head and continued in her language.

"You do it. I hate my brother seeing me like this, when he's the one who did it to me. You don't matter."

Sango uttered an obscenity but followed him into his room.

He reached for his pants but winced and stopped. "It hurts too much," he said.

"For a killer, you're quite the coward," muttered Sango. He glared at her, then cried out in pain as she pulled his pants off.

The wound did look awful. It was discolored and weeping. Knives pointed out a bottle and cotton on the dresser and winced and cried more as she applied it.

"How did you ever manage to kill so many people when you can't take a little pain?" Sango made a "Hmmmph" noise as Knives stared at her in shock.

"I imagine you had servants to do it for you, and never got your hands dirty with it yourself!" the young demon hunter went on.

Knives flinched then. "I killed Rem's last relative with my own hands! Ask my brother!"

Sango went on, "And obsessed over a woman, too... some demon lord you are."

"Shut up or you'll be the next one I kill!" Knives shouted.

Sango drew her knife. "I highly doubt it, Millions Knives," she replied evenly.

Vash came to the bedroom door and opened it. When he saw the two facing each other down he gasped and said "The time for fighting is over..."

Knives stared at him, and repeated the statement in Japanese, adding, "My brother preaches love and peace." Knives held his crossed fingers up with a sarcastic expression.

Vash left, and Knives sat back.

"It sickens me, really. But in the end, perhaps he's right, I'll never kill them all now I suppose. I'm too weak."

Sango was surprised to see that the expression in the blue eyes was now introspective. Could it be that this man was growing to regret all the blood on his hands?

There was a knock at the door now, and Vash went to answer it. Knives curled up on his bed with his arms around his knees, muttering, "Not them again..."

Sango went into the living room to see Vash accompanied by two women. One was tall and had light brown hair, the other small and black-haired. They greeted Kagome and then Sango. The taller woman even ducked her head into Knives' bedroom and said something to him. He refused to answer, but did come to stand at his doorway and listen.

The smaller women introduced herself as Meryl and the other as Milly. Vash began a rapid conversation with the two of them, explaining where Kagome and Sango had come from. Meryl and Milly replied with excitement.

Finally the miko summarized for her friend. "Apparently some of the people here have been doing experiments with the plants, the ones that provide the power, trying to contact the Earth. These women think that may be what interfered with the wel

"What does that mean for us?" asked Sango.

"It means the plants may be able to send us back!" said Kagome excitedly. "And Vash thinks we're really lucky to be able to get there. He says Rem really loved the Earth and everything on it. Rem was..."

Sango interrupted. "Yes, I know, Knives told me about Rem."

The four English-speakers went on talking and it grew more and more difficult for Kagome to translate. Sango didn't want to be rude, but eventually she went outside and sat on the house's small porch. After a while she heard the door open and looked up to see Knives come out and sit across from her.

"Do they disgust you as much as they do me?" he asked.

Sango laughed. "They seem nice enough. It's just that I don't speak English." She looked at him curiously. "At first I thought they might be your wives."

"Wives?" he asked.

Sango shrugged. "One for you, and one for your brother."

Knives rolled his eyes. "How could I make it any more clear to you that I don't want a wife?"

She looked at him for a while and nodded. "If you say so. Some men are like that, too, even in Japan."

Knives gave her a puzzled look and actually laughed. "That wasn't what I meant, either. But what would I want with a human woman?"

"Even demons take human mates."

His gaze grew in intensity. "And are you a demon's mate, Sango?"

She shook her head. "Not a demon's, nor a human's. I'm too strong for a man to want me, I think."

"Some mene ste strong women. My brother does. I suspect he's after Meryl, the dark-haired one."

"And the other, Milly?" asked Sango.

"She had a man, until..." Knives trailed off.

"Until you killed him?" she asked.

"How did you know that?" he snapped.

"I didn't, it was a lucky guess. It seems to be a pattern with you."

She looked at him again. "Why did your brother try to kill you, Knives?"

The plant man looked off at the horizon. "He doesn't kill. That's why I'm not dead. He was just trying to save the world from me."

"And does the world still need saving?"

"Probably not," answered Knives. "Not that my foolish brother has changed my mind. But I'll never recover from these injuries, and I'll be forced to sit here and watch while humans ruin Gunsmoke like they ruined the Earth."

"How did they ruin the Earth?"

Knives did his best to explain about pollution, and war, and the enslavement of the plants. Sango listened and nodded. She didn't know much about technology, but war, and ruining beautiful places, she could understand.

"And you somehow think that makes it all right, what you tried to do to all those people? It doesn't, you know, and it can't."

"I can't think like that," said Knives. "If I do, I'll go insane."

She watched as an almost sad expression came over his face, and thought to herself that Vash had affected his brother more than Knives wanted to admit.

Finally she spoke again, "My brother tried to kill me, actually."

"Why?"

"It's a long story," she said, and finally told him a bit about Kohaku, and how he had killed so many while under the demon Naraku's possession.

Knives listened in silence. "That was my servant Legato's specialty, controlling others and making them kill," he said.

"And you're proud of that?" asked Sango.

"I was much worse than your Naraku. There's no changing that now."
thi think Naraku could take you in a fight," the young woman snapped.

Knives looked furious for a moment, then simply looked at the ground. "These days, he probably could. And it doesn't matter anymore."

Vash called them in for dinner then, and they went into the house.