"The ferry goes across once every three hours," Edward told Spike and Vicious. "Spike, you'll leave with Faye and Jet first. I'll stay here with Vicious until the next ferry in six hours. Spike, you have to make sure to keep Jet and Faye busy during the time it will take me to get Vicious settled then get back to the Bebop before you."
"That will be easy," Spike grumbled. "This guy – Varlet – he's smart and violent. He's made a bit of a following from these territory wars, so he'll be surrounded by his posse and people are looking out for him. If nothing else, I guess this will be interesting."
"That's okay, because we didn't really come here for Varlet," Edward reminded.
"Right," Spike sighed, pushing off of the wall he was leaning on. "I'll get on the com when we're on the way back." With the plan in place, Spike pushed off of the wall he was leaning against, intent on getting out of the small space. He was happy to leave Edward with the responsibility of Vicious. He was ready to let Vicious again disappear, and now he had a bounty to worry about, besides.
Spike gave Vicious a small but definite nod as he left the room.
Edward got up as well, and she turned to Vicious. The man stood tall and still on the far side of the room, his hands stuffed in his coat pockets. The position briefly reminded Edward of Spike.
"I'll come down and get you once they're gone," Edward promised.
Vicious gave a nod, so Edward hurried after Spike. She had to help the other Bebop members prepare for their big bounty.
Since they weren't taking their star-ships, they had to carry their supplies in packs for the ferry and the initial decent under the Earth's crust. Once they were in one of the "dens," or underground cities, the three would rent a room in a hotel. There, they would store their electronics and weapon resupply.
Jet's pack was the biggest, because he was carrying all of the electronics.
"Do you want to borrow my Tomato?" Edward asked. "You can carry it on your head."
"Thanks, Ed. But I think I'll be more comfortable with my own computer… packed carefully and safely inside the pack with our other electronics."
"Well you should have Spike or Faye carry your weapons, then," Edward suggested. "It's probably not a great idea to pack the magnetic-based artillery next to the global-magnetic compass."
"You hear that, Faye?" Spike asked. "You're carrying Jet's rifles."
"Forget it!" Faye called.
"You don't need to pack so many clothes, you know," Spike told her. "There may be a couple of nice restaurants down there, but we won't be eating at them."
"Well you better be packing more clothing than just a second pair of pants!" Faye countered. "We could be down there for days, and some of those tunnels are primitive! We'll be crawling around and-"
"If you're only packing clothes in that bag, then you can carry the artillery-"
"I said forget it!"
Ed watched from the landing pad as the other three crew members started across the beach and towards the ferry. Spike was the only one who took a second look at the ship before disappearing over a hill, and Edward enthusiastically waved her arms at him before she lost sight of the group.
When she couldn't see the group any longer, Edward hurried back into the Bebop to tell Vicious he could leave her room. She didn't have to bother, though. He had left on his own. During the time she was saying good-bye to her crew-mates, he had helped himself to two fingers of Jet's favorite bourbon and was spread across Spike's favorite couch.
"Oh!" Edward said when she saw him, surprised. Then, she remembered that Faye and Jet were gone, so she cried, "Okay! Hey, Vicious, do you want a real meal before you're off? I mean, since you've mostly had granola and canned stuff for the last three weeks."
Vicious drowned the rest of his drink before saying, "You can cook?"
"I've always wanted to try!"
"Crap," he sighed. He stood from the couch and started towards the kitchen.
"You can cook?" Edward asked, following him.
"Spike only ever made stake," he said, scowling. "I can't eat the stuff anymore."
Edward grinned. She loved it when Spike made steak.
"So what are you going to call yourself now?" Edward asked, sitting on top of the kitchen table.
"You don't like Vicious?" he asked, rooting around through the cupboards. He ended up grabbing a box of pasta and setting some water to boil.
"It doesn't make a very good first impression," Edward informed him. "Maybe you should name yourself Vinny."
"I won't answer to anything with a 'y' at the end," he snapped.
"Maybe just Vin, then? Vladimir? Or how about Victor? Victoria?"
Vicious scowled and began to turn to Edward. "You expect me to call myself something like Victori-" his words died away as he met her eyes and remembered who he was talking to. "No," he finally said, and he began to slice some vegetables.
"How about Daniel, then?" Edward asked.
"Stop it," he demanded.
Edward knew better than to annoy Vicious while he had a knife in his hand, so she considered the dilemma silently as she watched the man cook.
The guy really knew how to use a knife. Jet's vegetables wouldn't be bad if he fried them instead of cooking them into stews all the time. They always turned out too soft or too firm. Vicious' slices were quick and even, and Edward thought that the meal would be delicious. He should have been around for the cook-out. Faye's salad had been nice and all, but Edward thought that Vicious could have made something better.
"Spike bought me a gun," Edward found herself telling Vicious as she watched him chop some carrots.
"What kind?" Vicious asked. His voice was soft, low, and flat, like it usually was, but Edward could still tell that the man was interested.
"A Ruger," Edward answered. "MK II, I think."
"A suppressor?" Vicious asked, one of his eyebrows raising.
"Yeah."
"How unlike him."
"What do you mean?" Edward asked.
"Spike likes his guns loud. He wants people to know where the shots are coming from."
"Oh." It made sense. Spike never was much for stealth. "It's not loaded or anything right now. Spike says I'm only supposed to use it as a bluff until he shows me how to use it."
"He's never going to show you how to use a gun," Vicious told Edward.
"What?" Edward asked.
Vicious turned to stare at Edward. "I said he's never going to show you how to use a gun." He appraised the girl, scanning her body and studying her hands. When he finally met Edward's gaze, she thought his eyes looked black, even though she knew they were a cold gray. "You couldn't kill anyone," Vicious finally said.
"Kill?" Edward asked. "Of course not! But that's the whole point: once I know how to use a gun, I won't accidentally kill anyone."
"Don't be so naive," Vicious demanded. "What do you think guns are for? You shoot to kill."
"But… Spike said-"
"Spike? Who do you think taught me that? Someone had to buy me my first gun, too. Come on, Edward," he snapped. "You know this. He doesn't believe in warning shots, and he doesn't aim to scare. You've seen him kill people before."
"No I haven't!" Edward argued. And technically, she hadn't. But she knew that it happened. She had seen the crew loose plenty of bounties only because Spike was trigger-happy.
Vicious knew Edward was lying. He turned back to the vegetables, satisfied.
Edward wasn't satisfied, though.
"I know he's not a good person," she said to herself.
"Then you won't be surprised when he breaks your heart," Vicious said loudly.
"Why do you call yourself Vicious?" Edward asked as she shoved the carrots into her mouth. She was right, they were perfectly cooked.
"I don't," the man answered. "Spike gave me that name."
"Why don't you just go by your actual name while you're here, then?" Edward asked.
Vicious looked up from his food, another deep scowl on his face. "I can't," he said slowly. "That name isn't real anymore."
"We could ask Spike to give you another name," Edward suggested. She made the suggestion because she knew it would make Vicious mad. She considered it pay-back for their conversation in the kitchen.
Vicious didn't react the way she predicted he would, though. He acted as though he hadn't even heard her.
"Okay," Edward finally said. "You don't like Vinny or Victoria…"
"You're right," Vicious confirmed.
"I guess you could look like a… Logan?"
Vicious' eyes narrowed and his lips pursed. Edward supposed it was as close to "making a face" as he got.
"You're right," Edward sighed. "That sounds so human. You should be called something like Adrian, Andrus, Damian, Lucifer or-or, I don't know, Gunn-"
Again, Vicious made a face to show his disgust. Edward decided to interpret this displeasure not at being associated with the devil, but at being associated with a gun when he was obviously better with knives.
"Okay, how about Cutter, then?" Edward asked. "Andrus Cutter, Adrian Cutter, Lucifer Cutter-"
"Let's just go with Cutter for now," Vicious interrupted, his expression growing more dangerous.
"Okay," Edward agreed easily.
The ferry turned out to be a submarine which submerged after they'd been in it for only ten minuets.
"Just like Cyberspace," Edward mumbled as she watched some fish swim by her window. At least, she thought they were fish. The water was murky from pollution, and she wasn't sure if life forms still survived in the seas.
Across from her, Vicious didn't react to Edward's words.
"Why do you and Spike hate each other so much?" Edward finally brought herself to ask. The question had been building in her since she'd first seen Spike and Vicious meet eyes. It sat in the back of her throat, and she felt like she'd already gagged on it several times.
"You could stay on Earth with me, you know," Vicious answered. "You came from this place, didn't you? Wouldn't you like to live here again?"
"I guess," Edward answered slowly. "I mean, I've thought about it, and I've left the Bebop before, but then I always somehow find my way back."
"Annoying, isn't it?" Vicious asked. He didn't blink, he didn't move.
"You don't really want me to stay here with you, though, do you?"
"Of course I do," Vicious said, as if it were a simple, obvious fact.
"Why?"
"Because I want to take something from him just once. I want him to know how that absence feels."
Edward grinned. "You're going about it the wrong way. You should take his Swordfish, or his Jericho or something. He won't miss me."
"I'm sure he would," Vicious argued. "And what would I do with that stupid ship or a gun?"
"What would you do with me?" Edward asked.
"I'd do plenty," he answered.
The den-city wasn't large. At least, it wasn't by den-city standards. It consisted of eight square city blocks, and the ten-story buildings helped support the cavern's ceiling and walls.
Edward was quick to find Vicious an apartment. It was on the ninth level of one of the edge buildings, which meant it was more susceptible to cave-ins and leaks. But it was clean (despite the general scent of dirt which lingered in the air), well lit, and it was private.
"It will do until you get yourself settled and established," Edward told Vicious as he scowled around the small, sparsely furnished apartment. It had no windows, but then what would there be to look at if there were?
Vicious' new landlady had left them to mosey around the apartment while she went to grab some lease documents for Vicious to fill out.
"I'm going to need proof of identity," Vicious told Edward, his tone very business-like. Edward wondered if he spoke to all of his business partners with such directness. If not, he should; his flat, even tone offered on room for argument.
"I've already got some for you here," Edward answered, pulling some registration papers and identity cards from her bag.
Vicious looked over them with a scowl. "They're missing most of the information. They don't even have a name on them."
"That's why I brought this!" Edward declared, reaching into her bag and pulling out a porta-lectric-printer.
Vicious cursed. "Didn't you think this through? These are obviously falsified documents-"
"Relax," Edward demanded. "No one here has real papers. I told you, this is sector seventy-two. There's no real law. The only time people worry is when someone doesn't have any papers at all."
Edward took the papers from Vicious and stuffed them back into her bag along with the porta-lectric-printer. She'd just replaced the bag on her shoulder when the apartment's door opened and the landlady hobbled back into the room. The woman was short, overweight, and ugly, and she limped on her left leg. However, she had a cheery attitude and a bright smile, and Edward immediately liked her.
"Here they are!" the woman proudly declared, waving a pile of disorderly pages over her head as she made her way into the room. "You still want to stay, right? You haven't changed your mind?"
"Of course not!" Edward answered. "It'll be fine."
"Good! Good! Here you go, Mr…. Um…" the woman squinted questioningly at Vicious.
"My name is Cutter," Vicious told her.
"Oh! Um… Lovely. Cutter, what, exactly?"
"His first name is Lucif-!"
Vicious put his hand on the back of Edward's neck and gripped her skin tightly to silence her. "It's Luce," he told the woman. "Luce Cutter."
Edward tried not to laugh. It sounded like Loose Cutter.
Then, however, the cold of Vicious' hand began to seep into her skin, and she shivered.
"Oh! And you, dear?" the landlady asked.
"I'm Edward!"
"People sure are giving their children interesting names nowadays," the woman told the pair, the smile returning to her face. "And you two are married, aren't you? We may have a little problem if not-"
Edward's eye's widened. Married to Vicious?
"No," Vicious answered easily. "And she won't be living here. It will only be me in the apartment."
"Fantastic!" the woman declared. "Now why don't we get started on these papers and-"
"Is that you, Mrs. Yortivich?" a man called from the hallway, then he let himself into the apartment without knocking. "Mrs. Yourtivich, that Driblin kid is hitting the outer wall again, and I think this whole place is going to cave in!"
"Evan, the walls were reinforced just a month ago, and that toddler isn't going to damaged the braces-"
"But Mrs. Yourtivitch-" the man whined.
"Excused me for a moment," the landlady told Vicious and Edward as she pushed the man into the hallway. She closed the door behind herself, and they could hear the two voices fading as she escorted him down the hall.
"Perfect distraction!" Edward declared. "Time to create your identity, Mr. Luce Cutter!"
Vicious sneered. "You almost told her Lucifer."
"She had the right to know that she was renting an apartment to the devil," Edward told him as she pulled out her equipment and began to print Vicious' new information. Edward finished her project just as the landlady made her way back into the apartment.
Edward watched over the procedure, glad that Vicious knew what he was supposed to do to properly fill out the lease forms. Edward wondered if she would see documents like those ever again.
After the landlady had left with the lease documents and Vicious had been given the key to the apartment, Edward said good-bye to the man. "It was a fun adventure!" she declared as she started towards the door.
Vicious caught Edward's wrist. "You could still stay," he told her. His grip was loose, but firm, and he pulled her away from the door.
For a moment, Edward considered the option. She seriously considered it. After all, Earth was familiar. To an extent, it was easy. It wasn't as easy as staying on the Bebop, but the planet's disorganization and chaos was familiar, and familiar was always good. And it had been a while since the ISSP had last been on Radical Edward's tail. Edward had a feeling that staying with Vicious would be easy, too. Unlike Spike, he already wanted her around. Vicious wasn't Spike, but he was close-
But then, Edward remembered. She remembered that she wanted Spike, when she'd never really wanted anything before.
"I can't stay," she told Vicious.
He slowly let go of her wrist. She used her newly free hand to give him a wave good-bye. "See you around, Lucifer. Be sure to warn me if we're ever in the same part of the universe!"
"Of course," Vicious answered.
The Bebop crew plus one appeared back at the ship four days latter.
"You did it!" Edward cried when she saw a stumbling along behind Jet, his hands cuffed. "You got him-!"
"This isn't Hutch Varlet," Spike snarled. "He and his friends were untouchable!"
"What?" Edward asked. "You couldn't find Hutch?"
"Oh, no, the guy was easy to find! There were fucking signs and banners pointing the way," Faye raged.
"He's wanted on three different planets and a dozen different satellites for everything from running over some guy's dog to gunning down a dozen police officers. There's almost two hundred million woolongs on his head, but then we get here and find out the guy's a fucking war hero," Spike told Edward.
"He's at the head of these territory wars around here. The people love him, and there was an entire army protecting him," Jet sighed, dejected. "All that work…"
"Then who's this guy?" Edward asked, motioning to the wounded and incoherent man who Jet had thrown to the Bebop's deck.
"He's our consolation prize," Faye snarled. "Thanks for playing, folks!"
Edward looked to Spike, who said, "He's only worth two hundred thousand."
Well damn.
Jet picked the captured bounty up by his collar and began to drag him into the ship. Faye followed, loudly talking about food and bathing and burning clothes. Edward fell into step with Spike.
"I got to give Vicious a new name," she told the man. "He's now called Luce, short for Lucifer."
That managed to bring a curl to Spike's lips. "You gave him hell, right?"
"Not as much as I could have," Edward answered. "But his new landlady will make up for all the opportunities I passed up."
Spike fished out a cigarette as he walked. "That bounty was miserable," he told Edward. "I don't know why you're in such a hurry to be included in this shit."
"I haven't hurried," Edward told him. "I've been here for almost five years, you know."
Spike chuckled. "That's right. I keep forgetting that you've gotten old."
"Me?" Edward scoffed. "Jet's the one loosing all his hair!"
"What was that, Ed?" Jet roared from inside the ship.
