Ok, I just watched the entire series of Cowboy Bebop and I loved the movie. I havn't read any of the Manga, but anywho... This takes place in the time before Real Folk Blues and before Ed and Ein leave to somewhere. Just an story designed for an episode. There will be some Jet and Faye, but Ed is also a main character in this.
I don't own any recognisable characters.
Spike rolled over in his bunk; no sunlight penetrated his window, only starlight. It was once again another morning on the BeBop. As his stomach grumbled, he realised it was an all too familiar morning. He pinched out a cigarette from its box and lit it up; if there were two things about Martian cigarettes that he liked, one was that the flavour was sweeter, stronger and more soothing than the toxic Earth ones; the second part was that there was no tar build-up. That still didn't erase the possibility of lung cancer, but Spike highly doubted that he'd live long enough to see the effect of cancer. Cripes, he'd already lived out his use-by-date, like most of the items of the floating wreck that was the BeBop.
Yawning, he wrapped a towel around his waist and went into the living area, stepping over the sleeping Ed who was sprawled across the floor happily. Spike opened the refrigerator with some hope and was surprised to see a single beer can amongst the emptiness. Shrugging, he decided that one little beer in the morning wouldn't hurt; besides, first in, first served. The beer fizzed as he opened the can, dripping a little down the sides. As he raised the beer to his lips, he heard the click of a gun being loaded beside his ear.
"Put the beer down gently, Spike." A woman threatened. Spike mildly wondered where she had hidden.
"Alright, I'm putting the beer down," he smiled, placing the can on the ground. As soon as Spike's hand released the beverage, it was quickly grabbed and gulped down by a ravenous Faye, "You're going to get sick and drunk drinking that too fast on an empty stomach." He informed.
"Who cares? It'll keep me going for the next few days." Faye grunted.
"You know, for a woman, you sure do act like a man." He said, turning to the buxom young woman. She looked at him with a slight sneer.
"Couldn't you at least get dressed before you came down? I hate to think what I'll see if that towel accidentally slips off."
"And this is coming from someone who looks dresses as if she waltzed out of a soft porn hologram." Spike mused, rubbing his fluffy greenish hair. Faye glowered at him and was about to retort when she was interrupted by Ed's alarm clock: it sounded like a jazz tune played by a music box. Almost immediately Ed was up and running.
"Morning Faye-Faye! Morning Spike! Edward is hungry, is there food in yonder refrigerator?" The pre-teen hacker chirped, cart wheeling towards the duo.
"Sorry Ed, Faye ate the last thing, and she didn't share." Spike said walking back up to his room.
"Awww, not fair Faye-Faye." Ed pouted before somersaulting towards the TV, turning it on with the flick of her big toe.
"It was beer, Ed. You don't like beer." Faye said, before sitting herself in front of the monitor. Hot Shots made its opening appearance, and the usual hosts greeted its audience with the pseudo-Western enthusiasm.
"Howdy Cowboys, my my my, have we got a haul for you!" The black cowboy said.
"Yes, tonight we have a never-before-seen bounty appearing on our show!" The near-topless cowgirl giggled. An ID shot appeared of a smooth-faced man with ginger hair and brown eyes, "His name is Lee Jonathan Amos Parker, most people know him as Eljay, the man that left Titan womanless."
"For those who don't know, he and his cronies kidnapped so many women and left them in brothels on Titan that no woman worth her salt lives there anymore. They're so scared of being sold as Slaves!" The cowboy informed, holding up a cue card to his face.
"It has now been confirmed that he is now targeting young children for his Slave Trade and is bounty has been raised to 300 million Wulongs!" Faye chocked on her own breath. 300 million would wipe out most of the debt that she owed.
"300 million! But that's huge!" the cowboy gasped.
"But that's not all! You see, bounty heads must be captured alive in order to collect the bounty. With Eljay, he is wanted alive or dead. You get 150 million just by bringing in his body alone! But don't bring in any old look-alike; the police have his DNA and dental records." The girl waggled her finger.
"But where do we find this guy?" The cowboy asked.
"We don't know! But we do know that he owns a brothel in every major city on every planet, the largest one on Venus after the Titan one was burned to the ground. Not surprising considering what he had done there."
"So catch this scumbag, dead or alive! And catch you next time on Hot Shots!" And the show finished.
"Wow," said Ed, "300 million! 300 million! Edward is going to tell Jet and Spike about the Big Fishy Fish-Fish we're going to catch!" She laughed zooming up the stairs with Ein the corgi racing behind her.
"No need to tell me, I heard the show." Jet said gruffly, rubbing his eyes, "Just knock before you enter Spike's room, Ed-" But before Jet could finish there was a loud male yell of annoyance.
"Too late." Faye smiled.
"What have I told you about coming into my room in the mornings?" Spike yelled, racing after Ed, dressed in his boxer shorts and shirt. Ed leapt out of Spike's reach, swinging by her legs on a piece of the roof.
"Edward thinks you look funny without your pants on," She giggled. Faye giggled as well, while Jet massaged his forehead. Spike flushed and then spun on his heels.
"I give up," He threw his hands into the air, "Animals, women and kids: they've taken over. I'm just going to the airlock and throw myself out into space."
"Edward is sorry. Edward only wanted to tell you of a 300 million Wulong bounty head that Spikey might like to catch." Ed said, now swinging by her arms. Spike stopped in his tracks.
"300 million?" He asked.
"He finally comes to his senses." Jet said, lightening up his own cigarette, "300 million alive and 150 million dead."
"That's going to buy a lot of food. Who is this guy?" Spike asked, sitting on the couch, forgetting completely about Ed's trespass.
"He's the infamous Eljay from Titan," Jet said, brining up Eljay's profile on the computer, "the government wants him because he's making a lot of people very miserable: over three hundred certain accounts of murder; one hundred a ninety counts of rape; numerous files of slave, gun and drug trafficking; prostitution, assault, kidnapping and paedophilia. This guy would've been sentenced to death over two hundred times, plus nearly two thousand years of prison time; and the guy is not even thirty-five yet."
"Wow, he sounds like a challenge." Spike lit up another cigarette.
"His brothels are like fortresses, nobody sees the ladies except for the customers and anyone who is not a customer ever gets out of there. The brothels are all called The Labyrinth."
"Ooooh, the Labyrinth, an old old old tale about a monster that lives in the middle of a impossible maze," Ed piped up, waving her arms about, "Every year, seven boys and seven girls are fed to the monster, and the hero went into the dark maze and killed the beast. He only got out because he had a long piece of string that he dragged along the way, and he followed it on the way out."
"That's nice Ed; can you track anything to do with the Labyrinth down?" Spike asked, not too nicely.
"Sure can!" She said putting her goggles over her gold eyes. Almost immediately she was waving her arms as if she was swimming through the net, "News news news, myths myths myths, where may ye be, oh Labyrinth? Ah ha!" She laughed, triumphed, "The maze of links has led Edward to the Labyrinth." She pointed to a site that looked like a search engine.
"Search for Eljay." Faye suggested. Ed typed in her command and an error window popped up.
"Ah, Edward thinks that this must be a login page. Password! Password!" She sang as she began to hack, with the three elder cowboys looking over with curiosity. But after several attempts, Ed was getting impatient, "Ed wants in now!" Ein began to whine, then barked at the screen, "what is it Ein? Ah! A virus!" She yelped as an image of a bull began to tear up the login page.
"You've taken to long to hack in, Ed. They've found you." Jet said. Ed ignored him. She drew a spiral in the air. On the screen the bull started going around in circles. Ed then typed in several logarithms and the bull sparkled out of site and several of Ed's own cute faces began to eat at the page. Ed typed madly away when a new screen popped up.
"Ewww, it's an icky porn site." She made a face at the women posing naked and video clips of men grunting over women. Jet and Spike suddenly became interested, while Faye rolled her eyes. Ed motioned towards the link "Become an exclusive Labyrinth member". She bypassed all the prompts and commands and followed the email through the twists and turns of the matrix. After several near misses Ed produced an ID.
"Ed found a guy! His name is Akira Yamamoto; he lives on Earth in a place called Melbourne, a country formally called Australia. He lives near the old Rialto towers. Ed thinks that he might know where the bounty head is hidden." She informed them, taking off her goggles.
"Fantastic, we'll be there soon. Thanks Edward." Jet said, moving towards the flight controls. Ed flipped backwards and did a handstand smiling. Spike moved off, dropping his cigarette butt into Faye's empty beer can.
"I'm going to put some clothes on; and I'm reminding particular people onboard this ship that no one is to enter my room. Ever." He mumbled.
"Ed can see your coin slot!" She giggled upside down. Spike tensed and hitched up his shorts a little higher.
"Remind me to make fun of you when you reach puberty." He muttered up the stairs.
First chapter over! Seen you soon! Oh, and coin slot is slang for butt-crack.