AN: Thanks for the feedback. Seems like I'm attracting new readers somehow. I'm loving it, lol. I appreciate all the reviews. I promise chapter 5 will have a little more action. Hopefully you'll stay interested long enough to finish it. Really getting into it, hope I can stick with the storyline. Thanks all!

Shadowcat - Thanks for the tips, especially about the typos. I hate notepad. x_x

DISCLAIMER - I dont own Trigun or affiliates. Just love the DvD's and stuff. Storyline is my own, no republication please. Other than all that stuff, enjoy. :B

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It was four hours to dawn. Wolfwood hadnt stopped in nearly sixteen hours. His tired eyes squinted against the sun that slanted against his determined visage. The sandcrawler's lights provided little solace from the darkness that seemed not to be, but to lurk. The world was an unfamiliar place now, and he didnt enjoy the implications. He had one arm draped over the passenger seat, wherein rested his Punisher. He glanced at it half-heartedly in the darkness. It wasnt much of a convorsationalist. Sixteen hours and he already craved human companionship again. Hazel had been overly kind, but stern. She had cut his hair, thankfully, and it was to its old length, away from his eyes. She had given him a few shirts, some fuel, rations, and even a few packs of home-desert-grown cigarettes.

Kind of ironic to think that he always guessed smoking would kill him. He took a long pull from one of the pungent cigarettes now, allowing his eyes to close for a brief moment. Back for so little time, and already on another mission. He could convince himself he would have liked to settle down in a village like Hazel's, but he'd be lying. Something deep inside, past his emotions, past rational thought, something near-primal welled inside every time his thoughts strayed to the Gung-Ho Guns. His trigger fingers always seemed to itch.

The crawler ambled on over the dunes for another twenty minutes, or thereabouts, and Nick gauged that he needed some rest and refuel time. He had only just turned the crawler off and flipped on the cab lights when he heard it.

Gunshot.

No mistaking. He knew that sound like a husband knows his wife's scream. It made his blood race and bones chill in the same instant. Several breathless heartbeats passed before Nick realized he had both snatched up the Punisher and clicked off the lights in the open-air cab. He reached up to scrub at his eyes and shake his head, wanting to clear the cobwebs, but he heard it again. And then the night exploded. The rattle of gunfire seemed to be everywhere. Torches and flares danced to life around the dune he had so convienently summitted not two minutes hence.

Nick thought he had stumbled into the middle of a battle. Then it hit him. There were no cries of pain, laments for fallen ones, and no sounds of retreat. He heard the approach of motors, saw the waving of weapons, and the closing of a circle of bodies. They were predators; he was the prey. "Should have known," he shook his head, whispering, "should have known."

He stood in the seat, fully expecting to be shot in mid-action, but no such fate. At the edges of the growing mass, he could see barely restrained hysteria painted across the faces of what could only be described as a horde. Nick stood, one foot on each seat, hand resting on the top of the Punisher for balance. He scanned the closing circle, trying to make out the incoherent mumblings of these savages. Savages. He scolded himself. Who was he to judge so quickly? His mind raced at how to address these people, but he was forestalled. All at once the group to the left of the crawler fell to a hush, and the ripple effect thereafter was total. The horde parted, admitting a tall, lithely muscular man through.

He was bald, and shirtless, and he looked like something from a children's horror tale. He had curving tatoos all over his upper body, outnumbered only by scars. His eyes shone like those of a wolf caged too long, and a sneer hinted at his features. He was in charge, no doubt about it. When he spoke, it was like rocks on sandpaper.

"Seems as though you've been," the man looked around, and grinned, "caught." This brought a ragged cheer from his band. He rubbed his hands together. Nick took notice of weapons. A handle of some kind poking over his shoulder, and two pistols at his hips.

"Seems that way." Nick didnt enjoy procrastinating. "What do you want?" He had begun working his hand under one of the straps of the Punisher. "

"So eager," the bald man mocked a shiver of happiness, bringing a collection of chuckles from those close. "I'm Noctur. These are my people, they - "

"This is your army." Nicholas interjected. The reaction was instant.

"Silence!" Noctur screamed, splotches of red apprearing at his cheeks. "No one interrupts me. No one!" the last was a growl, and a threat the Wolfwood promptly ignored.

"You mean to kill me, and take my things. How very unfair. You would show no mercy to any traveller, would you, you parasite?" Wolfwood's eyes narrowed to dangerous slits. "Women, children, it wouldnt matter." Click. The straps began to loosen. "You would kill them for whatever they ha-"

"I told you not to speak!" Noctor was infuriated, his hand ventured immediately to the gun at his left hip.

"SHUT YOUR MOUTH." Nicholas' resounding command froze the air in every lung within earshot. Mercy had come to these people, and they knew it. "It is people like you, like I used to be, people who kill with no purpose," he was speaking more to himself, now, "people that want to judge when they kill, people who think they are suitable to weigh the actions of another." His breath came in ragged gasps, and his blood was one part adrenaline, one part rage.

Noctur was frozen. His hand gripped the butt of his pistol so hard it hurt, but this fanatical priest represented everything he feared. No one had ever stood up to he and his band. Never. His brain screamed at him to utter "shoot him" or something of the nature, but his motor skills were locked tight. For the first time in ten years, since he attained leadership of these raiders, for the first time, he was afraid.

Nicholas grabbed a handful of canvas and growled, snatching it away from the Punisher. Even to him, his actions seemed contradictory. He reached down, eyes fixated on Noctur, and his impenatrable rage cracked. His fingers probed and searched for the rachet handle in the center of the Punisher. It wasnt there. He looked down at his most trusted friend, and the crack became a gash. It wasnt the Punisher. His mind reeled, his confidence wavered, and his world got suddenly smaller. Until, that is, he realized what it was. The cross he had been toting for the days he'd been alive; it was the Evergreen.

Noctur was afraid, but not unseasoned, his fear was blasted away when he saw his prey falter. His pistol was drawn and cocked, pointed at the ground. "You know, holy man," he growled, angered and embarrassed, having never been usurped in front of his men, "I've seen heat do odd things to men, but I think you've been crazy for a while now." He heard the priest mumble. "What did you say?" He grinned, having suspected a whimper. He was wrong.

"God will sort you out," he whispered again, and then judgement was upon them. Nick tapped the base of the Evergreen on the floorboard, and let both halves dump into either arm. He whirled on Noctur, and he was Wolfwood again. The Evergreen's barrels roared to life, spitting fire and death in whatever direction they were swung. No one retaliated, no one shot back. Hordes of men and some women ran in all directions. Noctur and his entourage had no chance. More than a third of them were cut down by Wolfwood's temporary crusade. He didnt know how the ammunition was still firable, and he didnt care. All he cared about were the lives he was taking.

After countless minutes, Nick sat in the back bed of the crawler, one side of the Evergreen resting against each shoulder, a cigarette hanging from the corner of his mouth. He ran a hand through his hair, looking out over the dunes, and watching the sun rise. Vash had never understood his method to madness. He had no right to kill, but he had less of a right to judge. He always saw things in a deductive line that he believed to be best. If a killer was killed, he was prevented from killing again, and sent directly to where he could be judged. A viscious cycle, but it was simple enough to Wolfwood. He stood, shaking his head again, reattaching the pieces of the Evergreen. Strangely enough, Chapel had built in several pods for extra ammunition. Stranger still, he had it. Too many questions for now. He needed sleep, but as sad as it was, he needed supplies again. He draped the Evergreen over his shoulder moving to the closest body. It was Noctur. Looting wasnt excitable, but it had to be done. Survival against living. Nicholas didnt know which to choose.