Drove my Chevy to the levee, but the levee was dry . . .

Spike flicked the ash off his cigarette and took a deep swallow of cheap draft beer. The room was filled with the haze of smoke and clicks of billiard balls. He didn't particularly like this joint. It was a new place. He'd been ousted from the old one, and rather forcefully, once they'd figured out that he was, in fact, hustling. It was either pure greed or pure hunger that set him to hustle some rather large and intimidating Hell's Angels and he'd nearly escaped intact.

This place might not be too bad, as it was somewhere between a Dew Drop Inn and a frat boy hangout, with just enough dumb asses to earn a few woolongs. Tonight might turn out just fine. Just then, a pseudo-tough tapped him on the shoulder, slurring his words and challenging Spike to a round of Cutthroat. Spike couldn't help but smirk slightly; Cutthroat was his best game. The deal went down, woolongs were won, and as an added bonus, Drunk Guy was just indignantly drunk enough to throw a punch or two, and Spike happily returned the favor. Two busted chairs and a tray of broken glasses later, Spike was ushered onto the sidewalk.

Chuckling, Spike pocketed his cash and checked on the status of the two packs he'd kited from the open purse of the woman at the bar while the melee was going on. Both decks were intact and unblemished, as opposed to his already open packet, which looked a little worse for wear. Spike shrugged. They'd still burn the same.

Spike shoved his hands into his pockets, put his head down, and began his signature amble towards the Bebop when he noticed a woman walking about a block in front of him. He began to check her out carefully as she passed under the circles of light from the streetlamps. She wasn't dressed like a hooker, and she actually looked like she was heading somewhere. It wasn't until the distance between them had diminished greatly that Spike realized that the woman was aware of his presence. Frankly, he'd been too interested in checking out what he could see of her rear end, covered as it was by a suede jacket, but from what he could tell, it looked pretty good to him. The woman never broke stride as she veered into the bright parking lot of a convenience store. Now, he could see that her hair was a deep red usually reserved for those people who colored their hair with drugstore formulas, and her boots had high, chunky heels.

Then she stopped walking. Spike stopped as well. She threw an annoyed look over her shoulder, then turned slightly and said, "Can I help you?"

Spike shrugged. "Enjoying the view."

The woman snorted. "Take a picture, then."

Spike studied her briefly. She was not the beautiful of the girls in the magazines, nor even of the same beauty that Faye had (all right, yes, he did think Faye was quite attractive). Her beauty was one of nails and barbed wire and broken glass, the kind of beauty that killed to protect what was hers. Her hair was short but feminine. She wasn't thin, but he guessed that out of her jeans and suede jacket, muscles rippled under that porcelain skin of hers. And she wore glasses.

Spike opened his mouth to say something to the woman when her hand whipped out of her pocket and sprayed mace right into his eyes.

Spike fell to his knees, cursing, and he heard the woman say, almost reflectively, "Serves you right." And then he heard her climb into a passing taxi and disappear before he lost the urge to claw his own eyes out.

Some time later, after thoroughly and repeatedly sticking his face under the outside spigot at the convenience store, Spike boarded the Bebop. He lit a fresh smoke from one of his brand-new decks, and moseyed his way out of the hangar. The door slid open, and Spike paused for a moment to let Ein and Ed continue at their break-neck speed down the corridor, avoiding a collision. He took another drag and continued down to the common area, where he paused again at the top of the stairs to allow the book that Faye had sent flying in Jet's direction complete its parabolic trajectory. Noting that her aim was improving, Spike made brief eye contact with the woman, and immediately regretted the action, as Faye took this as an invitation to enter into some sort of conference with him.

"Well?" she snapped, hand cocked on her hip.

"For water," Spike muttered, as he attempted to continue on his way.

Faye looked confused for a moment, and then rolled her eyes. Holding out her hand (or, as Spike would characterize it, grubby little paw), Faye said, "Cigarettes. The two packs you owe me."

"Discounted from the five you owe me, you still owe three."

"And you owe me three as well!" Jet's voice chimed from the kitchen.

"Shut up, Baldy!" Faye screeched. Her hand was still out, still expecting smokes. Spike dug in his breast pocket, coming up with a single half-smoked stick that was dribbling tobacco out of a tear on the side. He dropped it into her palm. She looked at the scant offering, then back at him. With a humph, Faye retreated back to her room. Jet was now leaning up against the door jamb to the kitchen, wiping his hands on a rag. "She's been testy all day. I think it's that time for her." Spike muttered something under his breath about pirates and bad luck having a woman aboard ship, and Jet replied, "Just wait 'til it's Ed's turn."

Spike grimaced. "Remind me to be dead when that happens."

Jet grinned in reply. "How'd it go?"

Tossing one of the pilfered decks of smokes at Jet, Spike replied, "Cake."

Jet immediately tore into the packet, and then his eyes narrowed. "What's wrong with your eyes?"

"Allergies."

Jet shrugged. "Want a job?"

"When do I get out of here?"

Jet lit a match with his thumbnail and fired up the smoke. Taking a deep drag, he replied, "I'll take that as a yes." A short while later, Jet had managed to corral Ed and tether her to her Tomato, where she was pulling up new information about a bounty. "How do you feel about eco-terrorists, Spike?"

Spike shrugged from his prone position on the old sofa. "How much?"

Jet smirked. His partner never cared much about the details. "1.5."

In response, Spike rolled off the sofa, ambled over to Jet and Ed, and held out his hand for the printout. Scanning it over quickly, he saw that his quarry was a woman in her early thirties by the name of Miranda Braun. She was the heir of an oil-refinery holdings group, and apparently she didn't particularly care for her old man's business that fed her and raised her and sent her to university to have her head filled with subversive and fern-sniffing thoughts. Once the old fart died, she began to sabotage the whole business, complete with total pipeline and refinery destruction. As he was reading, Jet handed him another sheet. This one had a picture.

It was the woman with the mace.

Spike decided that one way to locate this woman was to retrace his steps. He started at the bar, although he didn't go in – he'd had enough of fighting for once – and then he made his way down the same street and walked toward the same convenience store. He checked his watch, and it was the same time that he had seen her the night before. Perhaps this wasn't her normal digs. He went into the convenience store to replenish his smokes, wondering briefly if he wouldn't save a lot of money if he didn't smoke the damn things. Dismissing this thought as temporary insanity, Spike showed the picture of Braun to the minimum wager behind the counter. The kid looked like his parents might have been blood relatives, as the pinhead bobbed his skull up and down in affirmation that he had seen her fairly regularly. Didn't know where she lived, but that she drove one of those electric cars.

Figures, thought Spike, and then there was a tell-tale tinkle of the front door, and a familiar voice said, "You again?"

Spike turned to the voice and before him stood none other than Miranda Braun. She stood, her arms folded, glasses reflecting the harsh fluorescent lights of the store. Spike was taken slightly aback, but then he did what he normally did when he found his bounty: pulled his Jericho out of his holster and pointed it directly at her nose. She looked at him for a moment, and he looked back into her green eyes. Braun shifted her vision to above his head, and then, she suddenly looked very startled.

Spike glanced up.

The next thing he knew, she had grabbed his wrist and kicked him extremely hard right in the groin with those same chunky-heeled boots of hers from last night. Spike doubled over, and she managed to snap the gun right out of his hand. Braun then flew out the front door, sprinted into the parking lot, and leapt into a little car that started with a click, and then she sped away. Spike made it out into the parking lot to see her toss his gun out the window, sans ammo. The Jericho clattered across the tarmac and ended up about four feet in front of him. Cursing himself for being so gullible, Spike grabbed his gun, and decided to give it up for the night.

The ship was silent when he returned. The Redtail was missing. Spike breathed a silent hallelujah for that fact as he made his way down to the sofa.

Jet poked his head out of the room with his bonsais. "Spike? Are you limping?"

"Allergies."

Jet frowned, and then shook his head and returned his attention to the diminutive plant in front of him.

The next day, once the swelling had gone down, Spike sicced Ed on the tag number from Braun's car. Ed was able to get her address, and Spike ruffled the girl's hair and called her a good little hacker. Ed responded by climbing up Spike like a monkey, giving Spike's sore groin a knock in the process, and wrapped her long limbs around his ribcage, saying, "Little Hacker Pollywhacker All the Doo-Dah Day!" before giving Spike a huge kiss. Spike managed to extricate himself from the girl's grasp before anyone else saw the two of them, but as he made his way down to the hangar, he was chuckling.

Using Ed's info, Spike made his way back to the neighborhood where he'd been savagely abused twice (by a woman, no less) in the past two days, cursing himself for not paying enough attention to what he was doing. He slipped into the parking garage of a tony complex and found the little electric car that Ms. Braun drove. He sat on the hood, lit a cigarette, and proceeded to wait. After a while, he heard the clattering noise of someone coming down the stairs pell-mell, and he turned to see the legs and high-heeled boots that he now considered his nemeses come into view. Braun hadn't seen him yet, and she was sprinting toward her car, looking over her shoulder, when Spike pulled out his Jericho and said, "Yo."

Braun skidded to a halt, nearly falling over as she whipped her head around to the sound of the voice. Her eyes crossed as she stared down the barrel of the gun before her. The two times he'd seen her before, she had the look of a petulant and bored child. Today, the eyes behind her glasses looked terrified. She stood still for a moment, looking like a frightened mouse about to run. Breathlessly, she said, "Please don't."

Spike shrugged. "Sorry. It's my job."

"I'll give you whatever they're paying you."

"1.5 mill."

"To kill me?"

Spike tilted his head and frowned. "Not kill you. I have to bring you in alive. Otherwise I don't get paid. And anyway, you took my last clip. The gun's not even loaded."

Braun rolled her eyes, and handed him the clip from her pocket. "You're a cowboy." Spike nodded. "I thought they hired you."

Spike took a last drag on his current smoke. "Who is 'they'?"

The woman looked at Spike, and then said, "Get in the car." And after a moment, Spike shrugged, and complied.

Spike was actually surprised at how quickly the little electric car could go. Braun drove the nearly silent vehicle like a Formula racer, her expression set in a worried frown. She remained silent as she drove. Finally, bored, Spike lit a new cigarette. Braun said, "Don't smoke in my car." Spike didn't answer. He found the automatic window button and rolled down the window a bit, holding the smoke out the window. Braun then punched the main control on her side, rolling up the window – which effectively cut Spike's cigarette off at the filter. "I said, don't smoke in my car."

Spike snorted. "Tobacco abuser." Braun smirked, but said nothing.

After a while, the car pulled up behind a steel-and-glass office building, and Braun pulled the car into a slightly secluded spot. "Listen," she said, "You'll get your bounty. But I need to do something first. I'll make it worth your while." Her eyes then met Spike's, and she rolled her eyes. "No, not like that, cowboy." Braun then got out of the car and dashed to a heavy steel door. Spike followed her through the door, and up a narrow stairwell. On the third-floor landing, Braun unlocked another door and passed through. Once inside, she went straight to a wall safe, and after opening that, took out a key and then crawled under the immense desk that took up half the room. Spike smirked, and whispered, "Want company?"

"Not particularly, no. And be quiet." Braun flipped back a section of carpet, exposing a floor safe. She used the key to pop open the floor safe, and she extracted a slim file. Braun then quickly buttoned up both safes and whispered, "Let's get out of here." She slipped back out the door, which Spike had just then realized was a hidden door within a large bookcase. He briefly caught a glimpse of a photo of Braun, probably from her high school prom, when he heard a shriek and a gunshot. Spike moved quickly to the landing, where he saw Braun pressed up against the wall, the file held against her chest. Spike pulled out his Jericho and went quickly down the stairs, firing down towards the bottom. He heard the unmistakable grunt of a target hit and he began to then take the stairs two at a time, Braun, at his heels.

On the last landing, Spike saw the thug he had shot on the ground, and another thug was coming through the door. Spike took a flying jump down the last few stairs, connecting his boot heel with the lower jaw of the thug, who went down like a bag of rocks. Spike burst out the door into the back lot of the building, holding his gun level to learn where more shots would be coming from. One bullet whizzed by his ear and Spike began firing back. He took a quick look at Braun, then grabbed her hand and began pulling her towards the car as he continued to fire bullets in the direction of the bullets coming his way.

They were about 50 feet from the car when Braun's hand suddenly jerked out of his, and she went to one knee with a cry. She'd been hit in the upper thigh. Spike doubled back, slipped an arm around her ribcage, and half-dragged her behind the wall where the car was concealed. Braun managed to get herself into the passenger's side and threw the keys to Spike. She was in the process of ripping her shirtsleeve off when she noticed that Spike was simply sitting in the driver's seat, staring at the console.

With a grunt, Braun tied the sleeve around her leg. "What are you waiting for? Get us out of here!"

Spike looked at the keys, then back at the console, "I . . . I can't . . ."

"It's not like it's a stick shift, for heaven's sake!" Spike turned to Braun, a look of desperation on his face. Then it dawned on her. "You . . . can't . . . drive?" Spike shook his head. Braun's eyes nearly bulged out of her head. "ARE YOU KIDDING ME?" Braun snatched the keys away from Spike, screaming at him to shove over as she dragged herself across the center console. Spike ran around to the passenger's side as she turned the car over and threw the vehicle in drive. They caromed off the curb and began driving at a breakneck speed out of the city.

After a few moments, Spike looked at Braun, who was breathing harshly. Her color, pale to begin with, was becoming more and more grey. Her makeshift bandage was already soaked in blood. They hit her femoral artery, thought Spike. "Talk to me," ordered Spike, as he reached inside his shirt with a pocket knife.

"About what? And what are you doing?"

Spike sawed his way through the straps of his undershirt and pulled it over his head. "Who are they, and why do they want you snuffed?"

"Why do you care?"

Spike ripped the shirt in half. "I don't collect if you die on me. Talk."

Braun looked at him, and then said, "It's the Board of Trustees. From Papa's plants. Refineries." She paused for a moment, but moaned in pain when Spike tied his undershirt tightly around her wound in her upper inner thigh. "You're getting mighty fresh, there, fellah."

Spike grinned. "They pissed because you blew up a couple of Papa's plants?"

"Would you believe that I didn't do that? I didn't think so. Yeah, I protested against my own father about his environmentally destructive refineries . . . his plundering of non-renewable resources. But terrorism. . . never. . . I think it was the Board . . . trying to get rid of me . . ." She trailed off, blinking. Spike was about to give her a pinch or something to make sure she didn't fade out on him when she took a shaky breath. "He'd actually managed to agree to try some new technology that would allow him to keep refining but be less of an impact to the environment. Protect it better than they did with Earth at the beginning of the century. . ."

"But the Board didn't like it?"

Braun smiled wanly. Her hands were shaking as she gripped the steering wheel. ". . . Cut into their profits. Only at first. They didn't care. Money lost. . ."

Spike reached over and pulled his tourniquet on her thigh even tighter, and Braun cried out. He looked behind them, and cars were following. Ahead, he could see the roadblock. "What's in the file?"

"Records . . . outlining . . . new technology. For my lawyer. He said he'd help. He's not theirs . . . Papa's real will. Not . . . the fake . . . they drew up."

Braun's head began to bob. Spike put his hand under her chin to steady it. They were closer to the flashing lights now. But the copper smell of blood in the car was overwhelming. He looked down to her seat, and it seemed that Braun was sitting in a pool of her own blood. "Stay focused, Braun. We're almost there."

"Miranda. Who . . . you?" Tears were running down her cheeks.

"Spike Spiegel."

"Nice . . . to meet . . ."

Miranda's eyes started glazing over. The car began slowing down. Thankfully, the roadblock was very close. The cops started running over. Spike gave her a little shake. "Miranda?" She didn't respond. He shook her harder. "Miranda!" Her eyes fluttered open, and the car came to a complete stop. Whether she braked the car, or it just ran out of power, Spike would never know. "Stay with me, Miranda."

Miranda gave the tiniest smile. "Don't worry. . . You'll get . . . bounty." The doors of the car flew open, and the police and paramedics descended upon the vehicle and its driver.

Later, Spike went back to the Bebop. He walked through the hangar. The Redtail was back. Spike sighed, and lit a cigarette. He opened the hangar doors and waited for Ein and Ed to pass. He walked the familiar passage to the common area, dodging another Faye-driven projectile. He smelled the familiar food stylings from Jet's wok. As he passed the door, Jet called, "Did you get it?"

"Yeah."

Jet looked over his shoulder at Spike, and then turned to face him fully, frowning. "You have blood all over you."

Spike shrugged. "Allergies."

After setting his suit to wash, Spike ambled over to the sofa, and Jet handed him his dinner. The television was on. The news had a breaking story about Miranda Braun and the conspiracy against her by the Board of her father's corporation, as well as her attempted murder. She was listed in stable condition at the hospital. Jet stole a glance at Spike, who continued to shovel noodles into his mouth. Jet changed the channel.

A few days later, an envelope was delivered by a courier to the Bebop. Spike took the envelope and managed to get back to his room without Jet or Faye or even Ed learning of the delivery. He opened the letter in silence, and then began to chuckle as he read. The chuckle turned into a guffaw, and the guffaw turned into full-fledged laughter. The rest of the Bebop crew heard the unfamiliar noise of Spike laughing, but no matter how much they needled him, he wouldn't tell why.

On a Tuesday evening, a woman was setting up a table. She had just finished setting out all of her important papers when a young man walked up to her table. She squinted up at him, a lanky fellow with a mop-top of hair and a surly-looking face. "Can I help you?"

"I think I'm registered for this class."

"Your name?"

"Spike Spiegel."

"Do you have your handbook? Yes? Ah, here you are. Your fees have been paid. Go right in. The class will be starting soon."

Spike went into the room and folded himself into an uncomfortable desk. After a while, about half the desks had occupants, and a middle-aged man with a pot belly and a flattop haircut got up in front of the room and announced, "Welcome to Driver's Ed."

Space Cowboy, You Can Drive My Car . . .