Leaning against the metal wall, Spike lit a wrinkled cigarette out the corner of his mouth. The room was empty, the muffled sound of a large engine hummed outside the windows, the sporadic flickering of a single fluorescent light broke into the darkness with instances of foggy white. Each flash would momentarily illuminate the destroyed features of the rubble-strewn room. Spike took a few puffs before sliding to the floor. "You know what. I think I'll miss her."
***
"You're ruining it stop moving!" Faye shrieked at a clueless Ein, who was staring glassy-eyed into a camera lens with an empty can of tuna perched on his head.
"Leave him alone Faye". Her face turned into pout as she remembered a question. The one she couldn't keep from asking herself in between the various moments of every day, "What... What is my earliest memory?" Since finding that videotape, she had started remembering again. And so what first took her back to junior high, took her further to elementary school, and then even further, to the strange figures in a dark room. She was growing older with each one, adding months and years to her life. But lately, it seemed, she has having trouble coming up with a new answer. It didn't help that the Bebop had been floating in the orbit of the same backcountry planet for the past few weeks- on a tip that a contraband-smuggling light gate was being rerouted through there. The location had been guessed, at best, in the information they received, but the reward was huge, big enough that they wouldn't have to work for awhile. That's how Jet put it at least. Without much to do, he had taken Ed to see if they could access a monitoring station on the planet's surface. Four days had passed since they'd left.
The tuna can fell to the floor with a clang. Faye swung her gaze apathetically to the sleeping Spike. A newspaper lay unfolded on his face, arms crossed neatly behind his head. The twirling fan overhead sent lazy shadows over his ankles, and his feet dangled over the edge of the couch. Sometimes, Faye thought, when he's like this, I don't actually want to kill him. "You don't have to stare you know", a muffled voice came from under the newspaper. Faye hesitated, before regaining her composure.
"Listen you smug a-", just then a low rumble followed by crash echoed through the vents overhead, caused Faye to redirect her attention. Spike remained motionless. She began to open her mouth to speak, but was cut-off by a click, as darkness swallowed the room.
Everything was silent for a moment. Then out of the pitch black came Faye's voice, "Spike, the lights went out."
A voice called out from right beside her, "I can see that." Faye felt her heart jump. She could hear the echo of his voice in his throat, the piney smell of his soap and his cigarettes. She could feel his leg against her shoulder. Wait what?
"Hey I!-" Above her head there was a sound like fingernails on metal followed by a small clang. Spike's voice reached down."Well looks like the lighting network failed."
"Thanks for the update."
They both remained motionless for a moment before Faye asked, "Can you fix it?"
Spike was silent for a second.
"What do I look like, a mechanic?"
***
In the center of the room two fragile orange flames flickered. Spike was laying on the couch again, measuring the glow. "Don't kill us now."
Faye's face was lit up as she fiddled with the metallic base of a flame, taking a screwdriver to its contents. "If you just shut up for a second I can make them brighter" Hm, but where do they hide the safety valves on these things, she thought. Spike found it harder and harder to fall asleep. The candles held his attention, suspending Faye's strong features in their light. Still fiddling with the screwdriver, Faye spoke in a softened voice, "Spike?"
"Yeah."
"What's the first thing you remember?"
"I couldn't tell you", Spike replied.
"You mean you don't know?"
He had been taken back by her uninhibited question, though the darkness obscured any noticeable reaction of his.
Faye grunted as she struggled with the screwdriver. "You're no fun you know that?" Spike sat up on the couch and fumbled in a pocket for his carton of cigarettes leaning towards the light to see inside. Only two left. Where's Jet?
Something clicked and the flame in Fayes care slightly swelled. A smile lit her face.
***
"Spike?"
"What is it."
"When you were a kid, did you ever have nightmares?"
Spike was lying on the floor, watching the candles, as if they were telling a story, a word of which he didn't want to miss. "What I mean is", Faye's voice came from the darkness across the table, "did you ever have a nightmare you thought was real? I'm talking about the kind you wake up from, feeling like it'll start again at any moment, right where it left off. Like you escaped from it too soon. That kind of nightmare?" Spike said nothing, trying to match the movements of the soft lights, to find some pattern between the independent flickering.
"Sometimes I feel like a kid, like I don't want to grow any older. If there was a drug that'd stop it all from adding up I'd take it. And instead I could find somewhere good and just start grabbing everything I can think of. Stars and planets, ships, and I'll start adding them to this picture, to this galaxy that ends at the borders of the frame. And then I'll imagine a girl on one of those ships, travelling to one of those planets, a girl with no name and no age, just a shape in someone else's painting. And when she gets there, I don't know what she does, but I feel like she might just watch the clouds go by, or lay in the sun, but whatever she does down there, she stays that way forever. And whenever she starts to wo-" a choked sob broke through the darkness. Her body created a faint outline, slowly standing up. Wiping away the tears as they dripped out, she followed the edge of the coffee table to where Spike sat. Without a word she knelt down, tucking her legs beneath her and resting her head on Spike's chest.
In a dark room, suspended in space, two candles softly flickered. On a distant planet, beneath the clouds there was a girl, who wished for nothing more.