Millions Knives

Millions Knives is a male anime and manga character who features in Trigun.

Biography

Million Knives (Japanese: ミリオンズ・ナイブズ, Hepburn: Mirionzu Naibuz)

After Knives and Vash escape the SEEDS ship, they crash land on the planet Gunsmoke, not far from the other ships. Knives talks with Vash about joining him in destroying the Human race. However, upset that Rem had just passed away, Vash refuses, but follows Knives since he does not want to be alone. After fifteen years of wandering Gunsmoke, Knives and his brother come across a specific piece of a SEEDS ship. Leaving Vash alone, Knives goes alone into the ship in search of two .45 Long Colt revolvers. After a year of searching, Knives returns and gives a silver revolver to Vash, keeping a black one for himself. However, Vash was uncomfortable having a gun (keeping the pacifistic ideals that Rem had taught him) and shoots Knives in his right thigh. Terrified that he had hurt another (especially his brother), Vash runs away, leaving an injured Knives behind. Several years after that incident, Vash discovers that one of Rem's last surviving relatives is still alive, and living in the city of July. He does find the man related to Rem; however, he also finds that Knives murders the man, breaking all connections between him and Rem. Left utterly dumbstruck, Knives takes his left arm, and once again offers Vash to join him. He somehow controls Vash's remaining arm and summons the Angel Arm. However, Vash aims the Angel Arm at Knives, and fires it, destroying all of July and nearly killing Knives as well.

It was speculated that some of his hatred toward mankind originated from the abuse he suffered as a child from one of the Project SEEDS crew member, a human named Steve. It is hinted that his ideologies may also have begun differing from Vash's at an early age before his resentment for mankind developed. While Vash had the mother figure of Rem who stressed emotional values, Knives particularly looked up to Joey, who stressed logic and rationality. He started innocently, until Knives made up his mind about humanity ("That is the true nature of these pathetic beasts known as humans. They're all are selfish, arrogant, insolent, grossly imperfect organisms. They make me sick to my stomach.", episode 26 "Under The Sky So Blue".) He began to kill the crew of the SEEDS main ship, one by one, then attempted to cause all the ships to crash into a desolate, barely habitable desert planet. Only a sacrificial effort by Rem Saverem managed to save some of the ships. He first tried to convince Vash to join his quest, but eventually the two became bitter rivals.

The origin of Knives' hatred towards mankind is a bit more developed in volume 7 of the Trigun Maximum manga. As plant-children on the sleeper ship carrying humans to a new planet, Vash and Knives eventually discover they once had an older sister, Tessla, whose ghost often appeared to them. Because Tessla was the first fully-evolved plant known to mankind, she was subjected to endless tests and experiments, until she developed cancer and died. Upon discovering what is left of her dissected body, Knives passes out and Vash literally lashes out at Rem, fearing that the same fate awaits his brother and himself. Rem eventually convinces Vash that humanity will accept them and that no harm will come to them. For a while, it seems as though Knives is also convinced, but this turns out to be a mask: Knives believes humanity will never accept powerful beings such as Vash and himself and he has reached the conclusion that the only way to survive is to exterminate humans before they gang up on and destroy him. Contrary to his purpose now, it is implied that the purpose of fully evolved plants like Vash and Knives was to serve as guardians of the colonies of newly settled humans by Project SEEDS. While Vash attempts to do this, Knives has taken it upon himself to contradict it.

Knives took Vash to the wreckage of a SEEDS ship 14 years after their arrival, and spent a year rummaging through it, making a pair of very special guns: the Angel Arms, one black, one silver. Knives gave the silver one to Vash with the intention of using the guns to wipe out humanity ("These are our new siblings, and this one will be yours. We will use these guns to dispose of mankind"), but Vash wouldn't stand for it and he did something he never thought he'd do: he shot Knives in the leg and ran off with Knives' gun. He eventually made contact with the humans.

In the manga, Knives and Vash explored the planet before separating after an argument when Knives slaughtered a city that had captured Vash. Vash panicked and shot Knives in the back, and Knives retaliated by using his Angel Arm to cut off Vash's left arm.

In the anime, after making contact with the humans, Vash searched for the last blood relative of Rem, only to learn that Knives had killed him. It was then that Knives returned the favor from over 80 years ago and shot off Vash's left arm and took back his own gun. Then he unlocked the hidden power in Vash's gun, threatening to unleash a catastrophic blast in the city. Desperate, Vash then turned the gun on his brother and fired.

In the manga, Vash was searching for Bill Conrad, a crewman aboard the SEEDS ship he and Knives grew up on. Knives found him first and used Conrad's knowledge of plants to study his and Vash's powers. Knives decided to test Vash's powers by activating Vash's Angel Arm, which led to the July incident.

In both the anime and manga, the July incident left Knives' body shattered. He regenerated it through plant manipulation and advanced technology. While recuperating, he hired a special group of skilled assassins, the "Gung-Ho Guns". The manga also shows his destroying of satellites to keep the humans on No Man's Land from contacting Earth and sending people to rescue the planet's inhabitants.

In the anime, Vash manges to locate Knives and the two have a massive gun battle progressing from their normal pistols to their angel arms. In the end, Vash manages to gain the upper hand and defeats Knives by hitting him in his legs and arms disabling him. He then picks up Knives and heads back into the town he was currently staying at with Milly and Meryl, leaving the anime open ended on what became of the two.

In the manga, Wolfwood leads Vash to the ark Knives and the remaining Gun-Ho-Guns were currently residing in. Vash goes on ahead alone and confronts Knives. However, he is overwhelmed by Knives, who tries to absorb Vash into himself. However, true to what Conrad told him, Vash's flow is more powerful than his own and he would've been overwhelmed had Legoto not stopped him. Knives then has Vash taken prisoner while he activates the ark and steals every Plant he come across, plunging the planet into chaos.

Even though Knives was nearly killed in the July incident, he slowly regenerates, and later forms the Gung-Ho-Guns to act for him in his stead while he recovers. Like the manga, the Gung-Ho-Gun's purpose was to eliminate Vash, however, there are no special coins that Vash had to collect. However, despite never actually killing the Gung-Ho-Guns himself, they were either killed or committed suicide rather than to go back to Knives and admit their failure. Eventually, after all of the Gung-Ho-Guns are dead, Knives himself waits for Vash to find him. Vash manages to find Knives, and the two have a massive battle. Because of his better knowledge of the Angel Arm, Knives gains the upper hand at the beginning of the fight, Nearly killing Vash with his and his brother's guns in the Angel Arm form. However, with Wolfwood's Punisher cross, Vash disables Knives by shooting him in both of his shoulders and thighs. Then, falling unconscious, Knives is taken back to the village by his brother where Milly Thompson and Meryl Stryfe await Vash's return.

Knives launches "The Ark", a floating ship designed to leave humans without any resources by absorbing their plants. As he absorbs more and more plants, his Ark takes on the form of a sentient organism, capable of defending itself and, in some cases, even teleporting short distances. Vash and Knives eventually fight for a final time, and with the help of the humans Vash is successful in breaking Knives' control over all the other plants. Robbed of nearly all of his remaining power, Knives and Vash clash one last time, before escaping together from the vengeful ships from Earth. The two apparently make peace and take refuge at an isolated house occupied by a father and son, who provide the wounded pair with medical care. Knives seemingly uses the last of his power to raise a small fruit tree beside the house as a final gift to the father and son and to Vash, and seemingly vanishes afterward. He is never seen again (probably died due to loss of his energy and as Plants die, he withers).

Overview

Personality and attributes

In appearance, Knives was a tall man with short blond hair and blue eyes. Due to his features, he was virtually identical to his twin brother Vash the Stampede. Knives has a beauty mark under his right eye, mirroring Vash's beauty mark under his left eye.

As a child, Knives was a kind and caring boy much like Vash, but more naïve. In the manga, Knives was more curious about Humans than Vash and wondered if they'd accept them while studying Earth's history. Knives' hatred towards humans began when he and his brother discovered the abused remains of Tesla, an independent Plant that was "born" before himself and Vash. Both of the boys were shocked when they discover Tesla, and, seeing what the humans did to her, caused Knives to develop a distrust of humans because of their cruelty and lack of self-control. Seeing Tesla's abuse also caused Knives to begin inflicting pain on himself whenever he was left alone.

Compared to his brother, Knives's personality was noted for being far different from Vash. In contrast to Vash's playful and boisterous nature, Knives is quiet and observant. While Vash can be emotional and intense, Knives is contained and casual. Vash seeks companionship as comfort, whereas Knives revels in his loneliness. While they were children under the care of Rem Saverem, he often comforted his sensitive twin brother and shielded him from the abuses of fellow crewmen such as Steve. As an adult, Knives continues to act as an older brother towards Vash and seeks to dissuade him from basing his life around the "idealistic nonsense" preached by Rem. Ironically in the manga however his actions are also fueled by the remembrance of someone, i.e the sight of the remains of his sister Tessla.

As Trigun unfolds, it becomes apparent that Knives believes that humans are parasites that need to be exterminated. His ideology is first reflected as a child when he crushed a spider to save a butterfly. Despite Vash's outrage, he claims that by killing the spider, he saved the butterfly. Contemplating what to do would have only given the spider time to kill the butterfly. He counters Vash's argument, saying that by only saving butterflies, that spider starves, therefor there is no purpose in its suffering - there is no way to save both without allowing one to inevitably die. This example is reflective of his ideology on the relationship between plants and humans. He wants to create a peaceful and fair world with Vash and his other plant brethren, and he believes the only way to do this is by killing off all humans. Knives never claims to be a god; simply a superior and more logical being to homosapiens. If Knives were able to kill all humans and begin creating his "Eden" on Gunsmoke, it is very likely that he would act similarly to Vash, and act as a kind and loving individual. This can be seen in the final episode of the anime, where Knives peacefully rests amidst the oasis he has created and greets Vash as his brother arrives, but this could actually be a facade of placidity.

At the end of the anime, Vash and Knives finally meet and have one last epic duel. They first shoot each other, but the exchange is futile. When Vash takes cover behind a rock, Knives throws the entire clip over him and shoots, distracting him long enough to get close. In the following shootout, both brothers become disarmed and rush for their guns. They grab and point them on each other simultaneously. Then they both unload the other's gun, grabs one bullet, load it and point to the other's forehead, Russian-roulette-style. After two attempts of shooting, they both panic and pause. Then Knives' gun discharges, hitting Vash in the shoulder. He then reloads, activates his Angel Arm and fires, but Vash does the same just in time so that he's able to display a new use for the angel arm, that is as energy absorber. Knives angrily remarks that he didn't make the guns for this purpose, to which Vash answers that it's the only way to use them with some meaning. They then fire on each other again with the Arms, to no avail. They both seem exhausted, until Knives acquires Vash's gun and activates both Angel Arms. Before he is able to fire, however, Vash hears Wolfwood's voice, telling him to use the Punisher. Vash then pulls the weapon out of the sand and fires a burst into the Arms, deactivating them and sending Knives flying, screaming in pain. Vash then fires into Knives' shoulder, reloads and empties the majority of the clip into Knives, who passes out with wounds on all limbs, disarmed. Vash then patches him up, throws his coat and carries Knives back to town, deliberately leaving the guns in the desert.

Although Knives is technically the biggest villain in the series, he is seen very little in the anime. Because Knives is seen so little in the series, it is hard to get much of his personality aside from his hatred for humans and Vash's softness. He loves Vash and believes he is misguided, just as Vash cares about Knives and believes him to be misguided. In the manga, Knives is shocked and saddened by Vash's scars, which become a new testament to his beliefs. He does, however, have genuine interest in Vash's ideology, whether it be out of disgust or fascination, as he continues to ask Vash why he continues to try and save humanity, a lost cause in Knives' eyes (Trigun Maximum # 5). He wants Vash to pay for shooting him, but other than that, Knives’ main goal is convincing Vash to join his side - something he realizes he will never be able to do as the story progresses.

He loves Vash and believes he is misguided, just as Vash cares about Knives and believes him to be misguided. In the manga, Knives is shocked and saddened by Vash's scars, which become a new testament to his beliefs. He does, however, have genuine interest in Vash's ideology, whether it be out of disgust or fascination, as he continues to ask Vash why he continues to try and save humanity, a lost cause in Knives' eyes (Trigun Maximum # 5). He wants Vash to pay for shooting him, but other than that, Knives’ main goal is convincing Vash to join his side - something he realizes he will never be able to do as the story progresses.

Powers and abilities

Knives understands his origins and powers better than his brother Vash and as a result he knows how to tap into his powers and create weapons such as the Angel Arms. On the surface, they resemble Mateba Autorevolvers, but a special power core is hidden above their barrels. These power cores, when held in either of their hands, transforms the guns into very lethal weapons. It can actually cause their arms to morph into miniature versions of one of the SEEDS guns, the true power of the Angel Arm. At even a 13% maximum output, the results are nothing less than devastating.

Knives is also a powerful telepath, using his ability to manipulate other plants, evident in two flashbacks (Ep. 26: "Under the Sky So Blue"): when he almost causes a plant to combust in order to kill humans, and the instance in which he manipulates Vash's Angel Arm. He can also use this power on humans, evident in Episode 17: "Rem Saverem". In this episode, Knives kills the crew members one by one via manipulation and the apparent insanity that the crew members seem to suffer from.

According to one account, the Angel Arm was a natural ability of a plant, and did not require a revolver to use his power. Knives' power manifests itself as an array of extremely sharp blades. Also, Knives further learns how to increase his power by merging with other plants, demonstrated on multiple occasions in the manga where he absorbs his "sisters" into his left arm, taking their power source into his. This power, however, includes a nasty side effect. When using his power, parts of the plants he has absorbed can be seen. Arms, legs, and the occasional horrified face peek through the cloak he wears from his left shoulder to keep it concealed. Later he tries to use this ability to absorb his brother, Vash, yet he is almost overpowered due to Vash's more potent "flow." In this instance Legato steps in to pull Knives away from the brink before he is lost.

After fusing with thousands of plants, Knives launched his Ark that was a floating ship which travels around the Planet Gunsmoke, absorbing almost all the plants on the planet. This results in the near total collapse of human civilization on Planet Gunsmoke, as cities are left with no means of producing power, water or food. He claims that when he removes all the plants, the humans will kill each other over resources, thus proving to Vash that that is all humanity is good for. As he absorbs more and more plants, his Ark takes on the form of a sentient organism, capable of defending itself and, in some cases, even teleporting short distances.

Notes

• Millions Knives was created by Yasuhiro Nightow where he featured in the setting of the Trigun universe.

Appearances

• Trigun:

External Links

• Trigun Wiki Entry
• Comicvine Entry

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