Eleanor Rigby
by La Cidiana
*~*~*
Summary: When lonely people try to cope with grief, it sometimes tears apart what precious bonds they may have....
*~*~*
A/N: It's pretty surprising that this is the first real Bebop fic I've written, seeing as how it's my favorite anime of all time and I have all the episode names and numbers memorized and everything.... Anyhoo. If you know this song, it'll probably cause the fic to make more sense for you....
Post-series, and you can interpret whatever pairing you want. Nowadays, it seems that if a character just talks about another character, it can be considered a hint for a pairing. So yes. The hardest thing about writing this fic was, I think, keeping the characters IC. Especially Faye, since I sincerely dislike fics in which she suddenly transforms into a goody-two-shoes after Spike's death. Tell me if I succeeded in keeping everyone more-or-less true to their character or not in your review, I guess. ^^;;
I was a little bit lazy in the rereading department.... so pologies for stupid errors. ^^;;;
*~*~*
I look at all the lonely people...
*~*~*
Jet hadn't slept in days. The dank, dull smell of sweat and motor oil clung to him the way his clothes did-----loosely and limply. A half-smoked cigarette laid abandoned in the ashtray at the center of the Bebop's old yellow coffee table that he hadn't had the heart to finish. Instead of intoxicating himself into oblivion, he found himself staring up at the room's ceiling fan, mesmerized by the brief second of darkness whenever one of its blades passed in front of the room's main light bulb.
Y'know, you're gonna go blind if you keep doing that, Faye's voice came from the direction of the kitchen. Jet lowered his head and blinked as she emerged from the hallway opposite him, one hand on her hips while carrying a large mixing bowl in the other.
Hey, at least it ain't broken. Jet smiled wryly, aware that his face couldn't have been a pretty sight---probably paler than usual with dark circles under his eyes at well. He hadn't bothered to look in the mirror lately. His beard was probably getting a bit long....
Faye murmured, taking her turn to stare up at it. Not like anything ever gets fixed around here anymore...
Jet thought it was interesting that Faye had added to her usual phrase, acknowledging that he had, in fact, been at one point a somewhat responsible ship owner.
He nodded towards the object in her hand. What's with the bowl?
now, that wasn't a good start for a sentence, I thought I'd try my hand at cooking, seeing as no one else wants to do it around here...
Around here, around here... What the hell's supposed to be here?
Jet grunted in response as he fixed his eyes back upon the fan to avoid any further accusations.
There was a moment of silence before Faye seemed to deduce that she wouldn't get any more conversation out of the space cadet of a captain. Anyway, you aren't getting any of the curry and other stuff I'm throwing together.... He knew she was shooting him a glare even though he couldn't see it. Just thought you'd like to know....
The sound of one footstep came, just before a loud clang rang through the ship, followed by a soft, rain-like padding.
Jet looked down once more to hear Faye muttering and see her bent over the fallen bowl and its spilled contents---dried rice.
...You okay there? Jet said after a moment of hesitation, wincing at the crack in his back as he stood up. He made his way over to the eternally aggravated woman, reaching down to pick up a few of the scattered grains. He looked on dumbly as he felt his hand of flesh being slapped away and found himself looking into Faye's fuming eyes.
You think I'm gonna let you help after what a lazy ass you've been?! She snapped into his face. You've done nothing lately but sit around----you're not acting right, dammit!
Jet felt some faint anger bubbling up through his lethargic mood, but he was too tired to show the brunt of it. He spoke quietly and with a hard tone. I'm not acting right...? He stood up, looking down at her darkly. Let me tell you something about my situation, Faye. More than half my crew is gone--- he let that phrase hang ---I can't sleep, I can't eat---YOU, on the other hand, you haven't shown any kind of remorse, any sort of helpfulness----god dammit, you didn't even go to his...
He trailed off, realizing all at once that he'd defeated himself with his own words.
Faye's lips were contorted in a cynical sort of smile.
Oh... so it's all about THAT, she said calmly, confidently. She turned away and began to walk off, giving out an exasperated sigh. I guess I'll just leave your useless self to your own devices, then...
there it was again, this time from him, I don't know about you, Faye, but where I come from, he raised his metal fist solemnly to his chest, a ritual of an honorable man, people do something called grieving.
Faye's shoulders stiffened for a split second before she whirled around, clearly affected by what Jet had just said. In case you haven't noticed, there are no people left where I came from... and besides, I think the people there did something like... oh, what was it called again...? she scratched her chin mockingly, before she smiled. Oh, right.... Her voice dropped under freezing temperature. Getting over it.
She took a step towards the captain. He was a selfish, egocentric, careless, thoughtless, Jet wondered if she had memorized all these, pointless, simplistic, worthless, stupid little shit of a human being.
Jet's voice was just as cold and perhaps just as loud as his wrinkled brow furrowed. And how would you know all that?!
Because he lied about the girl.
What? That she was dead?!
No. That he loved her.
Jet was taken aback by not only the statement but by the concreteness she managed to say it with, as if giving testimony under oath in a murder trial, (or maybe one of suicide....)
How can you....? Jet whispered in dangerous anger.
You see... Faye said, tone cold as ice. If he really had loved her... He would've known that she would've wanted him to live... and be happy.
Happy.... Happy how?! Jet's face was set like stone. Living alone without any hope? I knew him longer than you did, and let me tell you, he might've acted like he didn't care, but those dreams of his were his life.
His life? Faye began to giggle in a rather disconcerting manner. His life... was to die, then...?
He had nothing else, Jet said stubbornly, carelessly. He was tired out of his mind and tired of this argument, so he decided to throw everything on the table against his better judgment. He had nothing else and neither do you.
A very long, hard silence.
That's not true.
Oh, for the love of God, Faye! Jet finally roared, throwing his arms up in the air. You're just as much of a damn romantic as he was! A finger pointed in her direction. Look at yourself! As if he's gonna come back any minute... That's why you aren't grieving. Because you can't accept the fact that he's dead. And look at where you are! He waved his arms around in a wild gesticulation towards the room around him. If you hate this place so damn much, then why the hell don't you just leave?!
Jet answered his own question. Because you have no where else to go.
He finally chanced a direct look at her which she returned it with a strangely apathetic expression.
Jet sighed, worn out and sucked dry from his long rant. Face it, Faye. He wasn't the only one around here who lives... lived in a dream.
Around here, around here...
So damn screwed up around here...
She had stormed off by the time he came out of his thoughts. Just like her, to abandon an argument when she was losing.
He took a deep breath as he looked down at the rice grains still scattered every which way on the ship's steel flooring, like the remnants of some morbid wedding gone awry. He began to bend down once more to pick them up, but then stood up straight again as he decided against it.
Probably'd just make her angrier, he thought as he walked towards his bonsai room, the only thing he'd kept decently maintained during his current slump. Barely any bounties and barely any cash, though the money went further now that he didn't have to worry about feeding a kid, a dog, and a Spike.
Damn woman, he grumbled as he climbed the steps to the hatch. I'm cravin' curry now...
*~*~*
I look at all the lonely people...
*~*~*
By some stroke of unbelievable luck, Jet managed to avoid Faye for most of the next day in all of the compact, interconnected rooms that formed the Bebop. The only sign of her he was able to find was a jar of makeup lying on its side by the door of her quarters. Upon closer inspection, the top was off and there was a crack down the middle, though its contents were solid enough that they hadn't spilled like the rice the night before. He picked it up and looked towards the door; it was slightly ajar.
She wasn't in, then. She would've kept the door closed and locked.
Where the hell...? Jet got the sudden urge to see her, if only to admonish her for dropping things left and right. He began to go back through the rooms he'd hung around in that day----the living area, storage area, control room, hell, even the bathroom. Suddenly, Faye's tried-and-true reaction to any uncomfortable situation dawned on him and he found himself racing towards the ship's hangar.
Shit. He swore, if she'd taken one cent of his money this time...
To his great surprise, the Redtail was in place next to the Hammerhead, though the absence of the Swordfish's familiar red hull still panged him some. In any case, although none of the engines had been revved up, there stood Faye, leaning against her zip craft while taking a drag on her cigarette. Her eyes were fixed on the hangar's single window, currently displaying the half-barren landscape of Venus.
Jet stared at her for a moment----the purple dress, tied-up hair, jewelry, and heavy makeup probably taken from the jar in his hand... Everything done up classy.
...Who's it for? He finally said, bringing himself to the dominatrix's attention---though that really wasn't a fair thing to call her right now. She looked more beautiful than sexy, and frankly, he thought she did better that way.
Faye looked back, blowing smoke in his direction before she fixed her eyes on some object far away. I'm.... not really sure.
A pause in which Jet tensed instinctually. She was speaking in the tone of voice she had used when speaking about Julia to him that time---a soft, distant tone. He didn't like it one bit, but at the same time, he let her go on. It was good to see her act honestly for once....
She continued. You, I guess. A shrug. I wanted to go out... maybe get some money myself, con some rich guy out of his spare change... But then... Her voice began to fade away, as if coming from farther and farther off. I started putting on all this and I realized that I was just trying to.... I'm always trying to... prove myself.
She laughed, once, twice. It almost sounded like a sob.
Jet wasn't very good at sentimentality, and so he contemplated the actions he could take for a few seconds before he heaved out a sigh and closed his eyes. He brought his free hand to the back of his neck and scratched it.
Listen, Faye, he sounded like a broken record even to his own ears. I'm sorry for what I said----
No, no, she said. His eyes snapped open in surprise at the sound of Faye's uncharacteristically small voice. You're right... I... She gave a sad smile. I really don't have anything at all.
Jet stared, dumbfounded as Faye gave out another laugh, this one fuller and somehow more final than the other ones. As she looked towards him, the nonplussed expression on his face caused her to grinned somewhat mischievously.
You're too damn hard on yourself, she seemed to be her normal self again as she turned away and gestured backwards at him. You're all right, really----you just think too much.
She sauntered towards the entrance to the Redtail's mono pod, hopping in as casually as she could in the dress and turning towards him a last time. She seemed to give him the once-over before she waved cheerfully and began to close the hatch.
Stop worrying and get some fucking sleep!
Then, the hangar was open, there was a whirr of sound, a bluster of wind, and the blue zip craft had disappeared into the yellow clouds.
Jet stood motionless for at least a full minute before he walked towards the hangar's controls to close the door again, whereupon he discovered that the small makeup jar was still in his hand. Somehow, it seemed like a little bit of Faye herself...
Slowly, he opened his hand of flesh and loosely let it fall from his palm. It landed with a sharp crack on the floor, but it seemed fine enough as it rolled on its side until it hit the hangar's wall and split in two.
....Women.
Jet turned back towards the control panel and pushed the buttons. He then looked up and watched as the lowering of the door slowly blocked out the light from Venus.
*~*~*
All the lonely people,
Where do they all come from?
*~*~*
Jet didn't seem to be getting any fucking sleep as he sat awake in the ungodly hours of the night. This time, however, he knew that there was nobody else at all on the ship, and that somehow gave him consolation. Still, he felt like an idiot and a half as he bent over the small desk in his room, a keyboard under his hands and the light from a screen boring into his eyes with a little blinking line that told him where he was supposed to enter text.
Hello there.|
Damn, this was a pretty stupid idea now that he came down to doing it. But he continued anyway, figuring he had nothing better to do except maybe fix a pair of hole-filled socks.
Though I guess you won't be responding anytime soon, will you?|
He cleared his throat.
You know, you were a good partner most of the time. I mean, sometimes you'd screw everything up so bad that we'd lose a million dollars and officially be banned from setting foot in a city for a month... But that only happened a few times. The other days we were able to get away without paying and decide to stay away from the city ourselves.|
Jet had to chuckle at that, but it drowned into a heavy sigh when he realized who this was addressed to.
Anyway, I can see why you didn't want everyone else aboard. They messed us up bad, didn't they? Soon as THEY chipped in, all our own costs started going up.|
He paused.
But, damn. It's lonely without all you people bugging the hell out of me about the the next meal half the time. Ed's gone with my dog, but you already knew that. Faye's still hanging around, but you know that woman, always going off somewhere for no damn reason. She's probably wasting money at one of those crooked Venus casinos. Yeah, we're on Venus. Been stuck here for a while ever since we left the hypergate from Mars. Dunno why I've waited so long to write something like this. Dunno why the hell I even wanted to write something like this---I mean, it's not like you or anyone else is ever gonna hear or read it. It's just that Faye said something about getting sleep... So maybe if I do this I'll get some sleep...? Does that sound like crazy talk or what?|
He considered vaguely for a moment whether he should go through with this or not. The socks seemed more and more tempting...
Anyway, I think what I'm trying to say is that |
The black line blinked stubbornly back at him. He'd never have any peace if he didn't fulfill its call. God damn it.
bell peppers and beef just ain't the same without you.|
Before Jet let himself hesitate any further, he pressed the enter button. He gave out a sigh as the text SENDING MESSAGE... flashed across the screen.
ERROR: Address could not be found. Please check the address for spelling errors and/or the right port number and try again.
He looked away and slinked off of his chair onto the bed beside it.
Well, what where you expecting? He berated himself harshly. That his face would pop up on the screen and he'd tell you thanks for the text message, I'm glad you care? His communicator is gone with the rest of him. You know that.
Jet snatched up the socks and some thread that had been lying at the foot of his bed. He was glad for once that he had a thumb of metal as he found himself poking it repeatedly as he darned the damn things in a fury borne of great frustration. He would've just not bothered with it if his money could go into a new set of clothes instead of being constantly poured into the junk around here...
Around here, around here...
It seemed easier and harder at the same time with nobody else around here... He felt empty---the same way he'd felt when he'd come home that time to find that Elise had left, like everything in the world had abandoned him for no real reason.
He stopped thinking so hard and focused on the socks instead.
What did he care, anyway?
*~*~*
All the lonely people,
Where do they all belong?
*~*~*
He didn't realize he'd fallen asleep until the simultaneous sound of the hangar opening and the Redtail coming in awoke him. That was strange. Loud noises usually didn't wake him up after so many years on a creaky old ship, but maybe he was just jittery after having not slept in such a long time.
He heard Faye's faint footsteps coming up and down the hall, going far away, pausing here, resting there... He was still half in a dream where he heard Spike whistling as he brushed his teeth a few rooms away and felt the slight vibrations in the floor as Ed ran around with Ein tagging along. There was a faint sound of mechanical drilling in the background, but it didn't bother him much and didn't upset the zen-like peacefulness he felt. The only reason he could think of for going out to greet her was to ask her whether or not she'd spent all the bounty money, and so he laid silent.
Suddenly, a thud and a crack from the living area brought him back to his undesirable reality. He sat up with a low wondering what it was that Faye had broken this time He stood to his bare feet, opening the sliding door to his room and lumbering groggily down the hall towards the source of the noise.
Jesus, Faye, you're really startin' to get on my nerves--- He turned in the direction of the aforementioned room and froze at the sight that met him, though he had to admit he could have predicted it himself if he'd thought hard enough about it.
An almost unbearably tired sigh escaped his throat. He bent down and began to clean up.
The coffee table, usually more or less fastened to the Bebop's floor, had somehow been unbolted and was lying sideways on the ground, its ashtray and its contents, along with a few half-filled transit registration forms, all lying pell-mell around it.
Next to that, to Jet's faint annoyance, was his toolbox, opened and ransacked with all of his neatly organized screws and nails in a hopeless disarray. As he knelt down and sifted through the mess with a listless hand, he noticed that his six feet of coiled wire had vanished---but that was all right because he already knew what Faye had done with it.
He had already seen it dangling from the fan.
And from it, he had already seen the dangling Faye.
He stood up, staring at the high-heeled shoes that hung just at his eye-level. He walked around her, noticing how the fan had been rendered motionless by her weight and how she hadn't even bothered to change out of the dress.... There was a slip of paper clenched in one of her hands.
He reached up and pried her fingers open gently. He took a step back and collapsed onto the yellow chair that matched the couch as he read the single sentence printed neatly upon it.
It's broken now.
*~*~*
Nothing dramatic had taken place at Spike's funeral, and now nothing dramatic happened at Faye's. This could be, of course, attributed to the fact that Jet was the only person who had attended either time, but at least the I.S.S.P. had paid for the burial expenses--as well as the autopsy--in Spike's case.
He wondered if this would all leave a lasting affect on him. Two deaths a month apart. Damn.
He had entertained the idea of bringing her body to Earth and laying her to rest there---or even better, lug her off to Mars and bury her next to Spike if they hadn't already managed to put Julia there. She would have appreciated that, but then again, he didn't really want the angry ghost of Spike haunting him for all the days of his life...
He guessed that deciding to die in the Bebop instead of a Venus casino was her weird sort of way of saying She trusted Jet to take care of her body and all that... Though he really would have preferred it if she had just up and disappeared overnight, leaving him without the burden of thinking constant what ifs...
The dates on her gravestone seemed eerie enough. Some seventy-two year old woman who lived a nice long life, people would say if they browsed the markers someday. He wasn't even sure if Valentine was her real last name, but hey, what was a man to do when some girl decided to hang herself in his living room?
He'd paid for the burial plot and casket, along with the services.... What the hell else did she expect from him? Dress in black? He hadn't bothered to waste money on something so miserable, not even for a good friend like Spike. After a Bebop refueling, the twenty-thousand some odd woolongs that jangled emptily in his pocket were all the monetary funds he had.
Still stealing my money, that bitch...
And he felt like laughing. Laughing and laughing until he collapsed into tears and passed out on the well-trimmed lawn of the cemetery. Maybe he'd even fall into the hole in the ground in front of him. Crack his head open on the wood or something.
But his name was Jet, and Jet never did anything irrational unless honor or pride were involved. So all he did was stand calmly, his arms hanging limply at his sides. He moved only once, reaching down to pick up a handful of slightly muddy ground. He tossed it halfheartedly down onto her slim casket, causing a padding sound that was quite similar to when her rice had spilled on the Bebop's floor.
He turned away and wiped the dirt off his hands as he walked from her grave. This whole bounty hunting gig just didn't sit well with him. Like some kind of cool fad that ended with abandonment or disillusioned suicide. Maybe if he got out of it soon enough, he'd be able to escape the inevitable finale and save himself.
You're too damn hard on yourself.
You just think too much.
Stop worrying.
Get some fucking sleep!
He paused for a long second before turning on his boot's heel away from the direction of the docking bay and instead began to walk towards the town's commercial district.
He wondered if there were any good curry restaurants around here...
*~*~*
I look at all the lonely people...
I look at all the lonely people...
Eleanor Rigby--
Picks up the rice in the church where a wedding has been.
Lives in a dream.
Waits at the window--
Wearing the face that she keeps in a jar by the door...
Who is it for?
All the lonely people,
Where do they all come from?
All the lonely people,
Where do they all belong?
Father McKenzie--
Writing the words of a sermon that no one will hear.
No one comes near.
Look at him working--
Darning his socks in the night when there's nobody there...
What does he care?
All the lonely people,
Where do they all come from?
All the lonely people,
Where do they all belong?
Eleanor Rigby--
Died in the church and was buried alone with her name...
Nobody came.
Father McKenzie--
Wiping the dirt from his hands as he walks from her grave...
No one was saved.
All the lonely people,
Where do they all come from?
All the lonely people,
Where do they all belong?
*~*~*
DO YOU HAVE COMRADE?