A/N: It's the usual drill, Vicious is dead, Spike isn't. Yeah…that's about it
Disclaimer: I do not own Cowboy Bebop or any of its subsidiaries, subordinates or indeed classy whores. Goddamn it…
The fabric just wouldn't stop sticking to her fingers.
Faye Valentine tried stiffly to extricate herself from a burgundy 'satin' wrap that was wound through her thin elbows. The more she struggled with it, the more she was absolutely certain that street dealer had been lying through his teeth.
Just ignore it, stay in character
She narrowed her jade eyes and looked around slowly. Taking a drag on the sixty-eighth cigarette in the room, she soaked up the surroundings, automatically checking the barstools for 'unsightly' bulges and burning all possible exits clear into her memory.
Scanning the room again, this time with a thin trail of smoke hanging over her head, she saw the hit. Big teeth, patchy tan and a shirt that vaguely resembled her wrap. Just older. And shinier.
Stifling a grimace, Faye hitched up her skirt a little and sashayed over to within two feet of him and ordered another whiskey sour.
"Let me get that," drawled a lazy voice at Faye's left ear.
Bingo.
Turning slowly, her eyes cast 'demurely' downwards, Faye took a proper look at the hit from the feet up.
"Johannes Masterson."
Ugh, his ankles are even dripping in sweat.
"It's amazing to see a lady," Faye suppressed a shudder, "of your calibre around here."
"Hmm."
Faye surveyed his face from beneath her eyelashes, wondering how someone with makeup that patchy could possibly be worth 8 million Woolongs.
Fraud, Jet had told her. Something to do with the ISSP, security issues, she hadn't really been listening. More important things to worry about.
But that was beside the point, and Faye fought to keep her face purely coy.
"Strange, I thought the jazz clubs on Tharsus were the place to be," she purred.
"Not when you dig this deep underground sweet thing."
Faye wasn't sure how much longer she could smother her reactions. Somehow she was able to stop her gag reflex and continue to regard the man through her eyelashes.
"Oh well, more for me then…"
The eagerly sweating bounty-head was swallowing her baby steps into his lap a little easier than she could stomach, but Faye's experience with this kind of hit won over, and instead of vomiting into her now empty tumbler, she merely bit her lip and went in for the kill.
Within five minutes Faye and the (now drenched) Mr. Masterson were in an alley behind the club. Faye had learned long ago how to maneuver situations such as these so as her back ended up nowhere near a wall.
Making as if to kneel down (and judging by the preparatory intake of breath she was greeted with, it was undoubtedly the right course of action) Faye Fluidly produced her gun and pointed it squarely at Masterson's crotch.
It took a few seconds to register.
"Wh-What do you think you're doin you crazy broad! Christ I-I take you out her for a little fun an-an y-y-you just, you just-" he broke off, panting incoherently.
Faye allowed herself a tiny smile.
"Now don't be silly Mr. Masterson. I'm surprised you didn't tell me about that 8 million bounty on your greasy head inside. I must have given in a little quickly huh?"
If it was possible for his face to drain of any more colour, in that instant it did.
"Oh man, oh man..." he repeated, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, his beer gut wobbling accordingly.
"H-hey, you there! Buddy, y-you gotta help me, this girl, she's crazy man, you gotta help me man, c'mon!"
"Not my problem anymore. Sorry."
The reply had come from over Faye's left shoulder.
She blanched and whipped around, but the alley was empty, one faintly glowing cigarette butt on the ground behind her.
That split second was all he'd needed.
Something hard connected with the back of Faye's head and threw her to the ground.
Struggling to see through the violet hair blocking her vision, she managed to see the saem sweat drenched ankles rounding the alley corner and disappearing from sight.
"Shit."
Scrambling to her feet Faye half ran, half fell to the corner and fired.
No aim, no target, just fired.
And promptly lost consciousness.
Faye was twirling, wrapped in a single white sheet. Looking down she realised her feet were in mid air and the floor was nowhere in sight. All around her was the same misty, out of focus void that her that her feet were dangling in, the kind of atmosphere that flecks of dust are suspended in for weeks.
Over her head she saw what looked like the surface of a pool of water. It was rippling and Faye was sure she could see a light behind it. It hurt her eyes to look at, but she flinched trying to turn away. She was sure she could see something behind it. Propelling herself through the dense atmosphere she stretched upwards towards this phantom presence. The closer she got to the rippling surface, the image above began to come into focus. It was a man. She was sure of it.
She was just about to break the surface. There was a twinge of recognition in the back of her mind. She had to see who it was. She reached above as far as she could.
"Spike."
Faye heard her voice as if it was a long way off, and somehow her eyes snapped open automatically.
"What did you say?" countered a gruff voice somewhere near her feet.
Gradually Faye came to. The dilapidated table before her came into focus and she registered that the yellow mass underneath her was the same familiar couch. She was back on the Bebop.
"Did he get away?" Faye's voice had a definite croak to it that she didn't remember hearing previously. She tried to sit up, but a sharp pain shooting from the crown of her head down her spine cut the endeavor short.
"Hey, hey, easy now. You took quite a turn out there. Just lie back. No, you got him all right. I got that signal you sent and made it down there quick enough. You were passed out and he was in a heap not too far away. You managed to get him in the shoulder and the calf. It was enough to keep him put but the cops were sure happy to take him off our hands."
That's funny.
Faye was sure she'd only fired one shot, and she certainly didn't remember sending out any kind of distress signal.
Concussion'll do that to you I guess…
Faye's eyes widened in shock. Those words. They were spoken in his voice. She could almost believe he'd been speaking in her ear. She couldn't hold it in.
"Jet, Spike was there."
The only movement from the aging man in front of her was the ash falling from his cigarette, which oddly seemed infused with the same sort of wide eyed disbelief that had registered in Jet's face.
"Don't joke about that Faye." Jet's voice had become cold and hard.
"Do you think I would?" Faye's edged on feminine desperation. She'd learned by now how to stem the flow of tears this subject woke in her, but she could never keep her voice steady.
She still hadn't forgotten the day Spike had gone out to die. How she'd acted. How she'd dropped her guard so completely, knowing well Jet could hear them. Faye couldn't stand to lose control. But then she couldn't stand to lose family either.
The bullet holes still hadn't been filled.
Jet's head sunk slightly towards his chest, and he smiled that odd sardonic smile that strangle suited him, while clashing with all his features.
"It must have been the knock you took Faye, he hit you pretty hard."
Jet's voice was conversational, injected with a measured amount of laughter. Faye had been around long enough to know when those southern inflections were forced.
"It was him. We know he's still alive out there."
"No we don't."
Jet got up and stood with his back to her.
Faye sighed and looked up towards the ceiling. It had been a good six months. Six months since they'd broached the subject.
Six months since they'd stopped looking.
"We don't know he's alive or dead. Even if he is still alive, he won't be found until he wants to be. If that happens at all."
Jet spoke as someone that had known Spike much longer and much better than Faye could ever have hoped to. That stung her to her petulant, childlike core. She had every intention of storming off the ship in a childish rage like so many times before, but yet again she hit an invisible brick wall halfway off the couch.
"For God's sake Faye, lie down. There's no point going through all this again. I collected the bounty and bought some food, you want some? You must be hungry."
It suddenly occurred to Faye that she hadn't eaten since 3 hours before entering that club. It was now noon the next day.
"Is there any point asking what you've got ?" Faye asked resignedly, wearily totting up the amounts she'd owed to various casinos threatening to take the Bebop as payment.
"You know the answer to that."