Tristamp Knives and Dr. Conrad drive me insane, because what are they like? What’s the nature of the dynamic that’s clearly there? Unlike other trigun iterations they seem a lot closer to each other in tristamp, Dr. Conrad clearly cares for Knives (and by extension Vash) and the way he acts with Knives is just *honk honk* Yes, it could be the guilt and fear for his life, but the one thing we do learn about Dr. Conrad is that he’s trying to atone for what happened with Tesla, and he almost jumps on the chance when Knives confronts him. Which again. could be the fear for his life, but it somehow doesn’t feel like that. And the work Conrad does for Knives, he’s not lost in the sauce like Legato but he’s very deeply invested and believes in what he’s doing, or at least his older self does. It would be interesting to see just much those two affected and changed each other over the years, because the Knives and Conrad during the events of Stampede are not the Knives and Conrad we see in flashbacks. Past Knives and Conrad are more emotive, more impulsive, and to a point, both not really sure what they’re doing, at least until the events of that one fated Last Run in July. And the thing about Conrad is that he cares. We see it in the picture he has with Tesla, his arm around her shoulders, the way he calls Knives “my boy,” the way he’s overjoyed to see him alive, the way he protects Knives when he’s witnessing the Last Run, first trying to keep him from seeing it all, and then from the guards that come, the way when we first see him in tristamp he’s holding Elendria’s hand, the way he objects to Legato’s ragdolling of Wolfwood, those are the most apparent examples, although there’s more. And then there’s his interactions with Knives. He immediately catapults to Knives’ side when Knives finds him in July, and afterwards he presumably puts his resources at Knives’ disposable, since Conrad was loaded in July, and because later we see that his penthouse has been converted to the EoM headquarters. It’s not apparent as much with past Knives and Conrad, (although the most salient point is when Conrad runs up to Knives when first seeing him) but there’s a camaraderie there that’s apparent in present day stampede, when Dr. Conrad shows up to Jenora rock and Knives tells him “Oh, you finally decided to show, Doctor,” it comes off almost as teasing. Later, we see Knives sitting around very informally to talk to Conrad, and then there’s the way he always calls Conrad Doctor, and how Conrad always addresses him as Knives in turn, even though Knives is Lord Knives to everyone else. There’s something there, some measure of trust and equality between them, and again, Conrad cares, and cares rather deeply for Knives. It could be that Knives fosters that care unconsciously, reciprocates or responds to it in someway. After all, Dr. Conrad was there for some of the most traumatic or defining experiences of Knives’ life sans Tesla, the Last Run, Vash’s arm, Vash’s rejection of him, he was the only one Knives was close to for years after, until the EoM was formed. They did have one hundred and fifty years together, after all. You don’t survive that long a time without having an understanding with each other. There’s so much that’s interesting in their relationship, at least what we see of it onscreen, and it’s even more interesting to consider just what they were to each other.
