In the early hours of the morning, everything aboard the Bebop was silent. Though he was awake, Spike didn't need to open his eyes to know that he was not alone. He could feel Faye curled around him, her head on his chest, her arm draped across his bare torso.

He desperately tried to will himself to fall back into a slumber that he knew would not come, the gears in his brain were already turning full force.

Slowly opening his eyes, he glanced down at his companion. A small, half hearted smirk graced his face. Any man with a heart beat could clearly see that the woman was attractive, himself included. Yet here in the early morning hours, there was something different about her. The world weary, sarcastic woman who had searched so long for a past that meant so little, was gone. Her soft, sleeping features more resembled that of the bright eyed teen from the damned beta max video. She looked so peaceful, so at ease, so….beautiful. Beautiful? Yeah, that was what it was, though he'd never dare tell her that.

Letting his eyes slip closed once more, the faint traces of a smirk still on his lips, Spike tried to relax his already tense body, to no avail. He longed for nothing more than to slip back into the dreamless void of sleep, to forget the world a little longer.

He focused on the warmth of Faye's soft breath against his skin, the corners of his mouth slowly turning to a frown. The shared warmth of the body heat radiating between them felt almost comforting in some odd way. Opening his eyes once more, he furrowed his brow at the notion of how disgustingly good all of it felt. Faye most certainly was not supposed to make him feel anything remotely close to this. It was all wrong, wasn't it?

Sure, when he was sleeping with her he didn't have to dwell on lingering thoughts of the fragments of his fucked up past. He didn't have to dwell on much of anything for that matter, except for the exhilarating sensation of skin on skin. Did that mean he was using her? Possibly. He could see how it could easily look that way.

Carefully slipping out of her grasp, he tensed when she shifted, snuggling into the pillow that now occupied the spot he had moments before. When he was sure that she was still asleep, he let out the breath he had failed to realize he had been holding.

Silently dressing, he headed for the door, pausing with his hand on the knob to steal a glance back at Faye. In her shifting, the covers had slipped down, exposing her nude body to him. With a sigh he turned back for the bed, gently pulling the covers up, it was cold on this damned bucket of bolts.

He scowled slightly as he briefly questioned his actions. Why should he care? He felt a knot in the pit of his stomach. Was it regret? No that wasn't it. As unethical as the situation might be, he definitely didn't regret what they had been doing.

If he had taken a moment longer to let his thoughts linger on the subject, he would have realized it was guilt that twisted his guts, but there wasn't time for analyzing any of that. For now all he needed was to get away and clear his mind.

"Sorry." He mumbled, giving Faye one last look over. The knot in his gut tightening as he turned back for the door once more.


The last remnants of the sun painted the sky a deep crimson, as Spike sat on the wing of the Swordfish, parked on the furthest outskirts of Tharsis. He had spent the afternoon making himself comfortable, getting acquainted with his new friend. Just who might this friend be? The kind that was strong, dark and comforting, and the kind that just happened to be a fifth of cheap whiskey.

Off in the distance a zip craft buzzed low to the ground, stirring up a cloud of dust just as blood red as the sky. Spike smirked. Probably some punk ass kid. He had been that punk ass kid once. Reckless, stupid, thinking he was invincible; maybe not much had really changed.

Taking another pull off the almost empty bottle, he swallowed hard. Given his whirlwind romance with booze, he was certain his liver must hate him. He was sure one day he would vomit the damn thing up as the poor organ made a desperate attempt to be free of its liquor soaked prison.

Lighting a cigarette, he inhaled deeply, a smirk twisting its way onto his lips. Maybe his lungs could join in on the mutiny as well. Maybe that's how he would go out in the end, with his organs all trying to escape his body at once; probably all while he dozed carelessly on the worn yellow couch, leaving poor Jet to clean up the mess.

He could just see it now. Jet would bitch to Faye the whole time while cleaning up the well worn heap of organs, and then they'd probably dump him in the harbor, and have a drink while commiserating over what a bastard he had been. Hopefully they'd at least have the decency to pour one out over the side of the deck for him.

Flicking the rest of his cigarette to the ground below, he drained the rest of the bottle in two large gulps, tossing it out into the vast nothingness before him. He winced slightly as he felt his stitches pull, despite the alcohol coursing through his veins.

Un-holstering his Jericho, he squinted as he lined up a shot with the bottle. As he pulled the trigger his nostrils were filled with the scent of gunpowder, and through the reverberating report of the shot, he could hear the faint shattering of glass, a strange feeling of peace settling over him momentarily. Sometimes there was something just so beautiful amidst destruction.

With a sigh he set the gun down beside him, leaning back against the body of the zip craft. He stretched his hands out before him, splaying his fingers, intently studying the thin, long digits. Dropping his hands to his sides, he closed his eyes, his mind entertaining thoughts of the previous night.

Those very same hands had gripped Faye's hips hard, as she was above him, pushing both of them up and over the walls of ecstasy. He briefly wondered if he had left bruises. Did it matter? He quickly decided that it didn't. He was pretty sure he could fuck Faye into oblivion for the rest of his life and still feel no better or worse for it at this point.

He tried to push Faye from his mind, but failed, as thoughts of their brief conversation over the existence of heaven flashed through his mind. He found himself suddenly hoping, secretly, that she was right. Turning his mismatched eyes to the blackening sky, Spike felt a bitter smile tug at the corners of his mouth. "Gee mom and dad…bet you're real proud of who your little boy grew up to be huh?"

What exactly was he? That was a simple enough answer, though it brought no solace. He was a former syndicate member, a man who had chased ghosts. He had been a drifter, a killer, a lover. He was moody, sarcastic and quick witted. He kept those closest to him at a distance, but when he cared, he was loyal to a fault, but carefully kept it hidden.

He was the tiger striped cat, a beast that had lost its fangs, the swimming bird, a bounty hunter, and even a lunkhead. He had cheated death more times than he could count. Still, he was alive. Yet none of that seemed to mean a damned thing.

Lighting another cigarette, he closed his eyes once more as he exhaled. He thought back to a Thanksgiving when he was a kid, probably around eight. Seated between his father and uncle on the couch, he had watched them drink beer and watch football, unable to figure exactly why they would yell so damn much at the TV when it was obvious the players couldn't hear them.

Later on when his mother had tried to get him to add more vegetables to his plate, he had argued with her that potatoes counted as one. She had simply laughed, and added a healthy scoop of green beans to his plate. Before the meal, she had everyone at the table share what they were thankful for. He recalled that he had stated that he was thankful for his bicycle. It was red and shiny, fast on the side walks and reliable. He felt invincible on the seat, his hands tight around the handle bars. A pre-cursor to the Swordfish, of sorts.

As an adult, he never gave much of a thought as to what he was thankful for. In retrospect he knew he had plenty of things to be thankful for. He was thankful for the fact that Mao had taken him under his wing and seen the potential in a young man who couldn't see it himself. He was thankful for Annie for seeing through all that cockiness and bravado, making sure to knock him down a few pegs to keep his ego in check, in a way that only she could.

He was thankful for having known Vicious and Julia, though he couldn't pin point exactly why. It was all a twisted blur of camaraderie, love, and borderline obsession. But it was a pivotal part of his life, they molded him into the man he now was, the good and the bad, they had left their mark on him.

He had betrayed Vicious and stuck the knife in the proverbial back of their friendship, all for Julia. The blonde woman however, had walked both sides of the fence, pitting the two men against each other, unintentionally, until neither knew what exactly it was that they hated each other for more. Yet his love for her still lingered in the deep recesses of his mind. He couldn't be sure that it would ever fade entirely.

Now however, in the present, he wasn't sure what he was thankful for anymore. Finishing off his cigarette, he knew he was only lying to himself, and doing a poor job of it at that. He was thankful for both Jet and Faye. The only two people that were the ties to his present and future. All three of them where closed off, emotionally fucked people. It was because of that, he knew, that they all needed each other. Even if they would never voice it. It was a silent mutual pact that they had all willingly entered into.

He was thankful that Jet, despite his gruff exterior, was far too fond of him to ever totally throw him off the Bebop. He might make a big show of putting his foot down, but Spike knew the former cop would always welcome him back, no questions asked. Maybe the old man was just tired of being alone, or maybe he saw that one something that Mao had seen years earlier, the one thing that Spike himself was still so unsure of.

He was thankful for Faye, though he didn't quite know why, Was it that she was so willing to offer up her body for the night to let him forget the past that stalked him like a predator? Was it because she was a part of his present that refused to let go? Someone that was always there at his side even if he didn't want it? He wasn't sure what part of it that he was thankful for, but he was damn sure he was.

Staring out at the vast nothingness of Mars, the blood red sands now turned maroon by the barely visible sun, Spike rubbed the bridge of his nose. He needed to sober up, he needed to get back to the Bebop. There were some long over due apologies to be made. The sooner he could spill the words trapped in his throat, the better.

He just hoped that they were as willing to listen as he was to talk for once in his miserable life.