SESSION 12

Mao shut the door behind him, each footstep on the stairs echoed as he dropped down to the nearest landing. With Spike's hands in his officer's coat he stared blankly, watching his mentor's unreadable face as he approached.

The silence continued unbroken as they walked down the next flight of the stairs in the open marble of the decorative casing. Mao glanced up at him. "You presented yourself well, Spike. I was relieved to see you showing acknowledgment of the all ceremony this time. Thank you for demonstrating to the guard you were disarming yourself before entering. They were watching!"

Spike nodded slowly, a hopeful expression on his face.

Mao tugged on his cuff, his eyes lowered to the floor taking Spike's hopes with it. "I did not ask, but they reminded me of your duty. I am sorry. I wish I had better news."

Spike heaved a sigh. "I don't blame you, Mao. How could I, you've given me everything."

Pausing for a moment, he leaned in close and whispered, "I know this has been hard for you. But thank you for respecting my request. I can only hope that if you can purchase enough time, Vicious will come around."

"I hope you're right." Spike murmured and dropped down the rest of the stairs, his shoulders slumped forward.


"Are your orders clear?" Vicious gazed through the strands of white hair hanging over his forehead. Leaning back in the chair, he had one knee over the other. Dozens of men gathered in the room on the other side, their attire ranged from syndicate suit to street clothes thug. Their expressions were awash with everything from confusion to all out shock.

At last one of the lessers lowered his hand, no longer staring at the little screen with his orders. "Sir, we'll basically be running all-out-rogue, against the will of the syndicate if we do this. Won't that attract the Hellhound's attention?"

Vicious narrowed his eyes at the ridiculous nickname before he nodded. "I am counting on that. Through Wolffe's rather tame baiting we have already gotten his attention. Some of Spike's men have been on constant surveillance, stretching his resources." He templed his fingers. "The Van idolize him, but they fail to see what he is made of. I intend to divide his attention so extremely by casting you all in different directions that the whole of the syndicate will glimpse his visceral essence."

"But … but what if he takes us out, Sir? I'm not so certain I want to die a traitor."

Wolffe's glare sent the outspoken lesser quailing.

"He won't." Vicious stood. "Wolffe proved the extent that fool will go to when he witnessed Spike covering up the evidence of what he failed to prevent. If any of you go missing, then he will have to answer to the Van. He won't risk looking like a failure, a demonstration he has repeated in reporting nothing we have done. You have little to fear with his precious honor on the line. Keep to the timeline over the next months. I want everything in order for the final plan."

More than a few heads snapped up in confusion.

"By then," Vicious continued, "we will need him fully in our grasp. I will not allow him to spoil the surprise. Dismissed."

The men left the room in silence. Wolffe quietly came to the desk and bowed his head. "This is a long shot."

"On the contrary." Vicious straightened the braid on his officer's coat. "This is a precision strike."


Julia's hands brushed down the lapel as she gazed into her full length mirror. "It's the perfect fit." She smiled at Spike's appraising reflection over her shoulder.

His arm rested on her shoulder, he pulled her closer for a quick kiss. "I was hoping you'd like it. They say black goes with everything. And since it's been raining a lot, well, I know how nice my own trench coat is for that."

She giggled, glancing at his own flung over the couch. "We can be a matching pair, except yours is tan." Julia spun around, letting her new coat flare out, the golden curls spun in the afternoon light. When she stopped she tugged on Spike's thin black tie. "Come on, you're dressed up and clean for once. Let's go out on the town. Somewhere. Anywhere!"

He laughed and flung his arms a bit wide, gesturing at the indigo blue leisure suit he wore. "This is dressed up? It's not even my best jacket."

"For you, baby, this is polished." She eyed his jacket, a deep double breasted design with two clasps holding it far on his right side. It left a wide lapel of lighter blue spilling down the other side. The deviation into asymmetry was an amusing choice for Spike, a man she new to be obsessive about balance. "Besides, I love this one. Blue is a nice color for you."

In an embarrassed silence, Spike picked up his trench coat and tucked the Jericho into the holster.

Julia pulled open a drawer and took her Ruger. She tucked it into one of the inside pockets.

Spike whistled. "You lookin' to paint the town red? It's a little bit early in the day for that. And I don't know if I can hang out with a dangerous girl like you. Might tarnish my reputation."

Glancing over her shoulder, Julia threw him an mocking icy glare.

He opened the door and held it for her. They walked along without saying another word, comfortable simply wandering the streets. Julia leaned closer and rested her head on Spike's shoulder. He draped an arm over her shoulder and savored the contact. The streets were blessedly quiet.

Down near a park Spike hopped up onto a narrow railing and walked along it with his hands in his pockets. Julia grinned up at him from the sidewalk. "You're going to fall if you keep that up."

"Eh, I could do this with my eyes closed. Watch." Shutting his eyes, he slowed his pace only a touch. "See? Easy as … " His phrase was cut short by the vibration of his phone. He opened his eyes with a weary scowl and reached into his jacket.

Suddenly his objective changed. Spike's head snapped up, his eyes wide. He reached down, grabbed Julia and flung backwards off the railing, rolling with her into the grass. A moment later a speeding car broadsided the railing, flattening it in the process. Spike shot to his feet. "Wait a minute … Wolffe? What the …?"

He knelt down and grasped her elbows. "Are you alright?" She nodded shakily, he hugged her tight. "Go home, right now. Run there! Lock the door!" He spun and went to dash away.

She held onto his wrist, and pleaded with him, "Baby! Come home!"

Hastily he brushed a finger on her jaw. "I will."

He took to flight, racing after the car. It wasn't hard to follow given the course of debris left behind. His phone vibrated again. "Alright! What the hell is going on?" He snapped into it.

Shin answered, "Not sure, but we were on Wolffe's tail. He shook us off, Spike. Trying to reroute others to intercept. He stole a car."

"A late model silver roadster!" Spike huffed as he slid around a corner, almost bringing his knee down in the process.

"Yeah, how did you know?"

"Intuition. You want the license plate number?"

"You saw him?"

"He almost ran me over! I thought you had guys watching them!"

"We have … but nothing was happening."

Spike snorted and vaulted over a car crash, breaking through the smoke. The silver roadster had been t-boned on the other side. Vials of the new drug lay shattered all over the street, dying it red. Wolffe was nowhere to be seen down any line of sight he had. "Shit!" Spike kicked the car and the radiator burst into a jet of loud steam.

"Did we loose him?"

He slid down beside the car and grumbled. "Yeah. Get your asses over here. I don't want to have to explain this before I figure out what just happened." …

The un-abating storm rolled in with that savage first blow. From that moment onward, Spike's finger scrambled for a pulse he could never hope to find. Between covering his official hits, he was bombarded with an erratic string of reports of activity veering further off the map. In some cases he was forced to take the Swordfish to another city entirely to intercept a deal or rogue hit by one of Vicious's cronies. At first they were able to keep tabs on most of it, intercepting and stopping the majority of the events. But as the months dragged on, keeping up proved humanly impossible. Spike felt more like a janitor, cleaning up the evidence so no one else would ever catch word of it.

Witnessing the turbulence Julia suffered the effects, powerless every time Spike staggered in the door and tried to scrape a few hours of rest before something called him away. He hadn't smiled in weeks by the day he collapsed into her arms. Julia dragged his limp body to the bed and tucked him in.

Leaning over him, she rested the back of her hand against his forehead. He stirred, his eyelids fluttered open. "Just making sure you weren't ill. You look terrible, Spike."

He mumbled something and rolled onto his side, his arm trailing to the floor limply.

Reaching into his shirt, she started to rub his shoulder. The muscles were warm, swollen from overuse. His body was literally being shredded by the pressure. By some miracle he had only taken a few small pieces of shrapnel lately. No serious injuries. "Honey, you can't keep this up."

He heaved a long sigh. "And I can't stop. So please … stop arguing about it and let me get a few hours of sleep before I'm out running again."

"This is killing you."

He rolled his bleary gaze up to her, black bags underneath both eyes. "Julia … don't tease an exhausted man. You know why I have to go, each and every time. The Van still believe Vicious is behaving himself. My life depends on that belief."

She leaned down and kissed the back of his neck. He barely reacted to her caress. His eyes already shutting. Julia pulled the blanket up over him and watched his chest rise and fall in a deep sleep. How long before that damn little piece of tech beckoned him?

She glared at the phone that had tumbled to the floor from his pocket, her fingers longed to pry the battery out. Just give him one solid night's sleep this month. He needed that so desperately.

She picked it up off the floor and flipped it over. Her gaze drifted back to him. If he failed to respond … he already looked dead beneath the covers. Her eyes drifted to the dress she had picked out for the plans they had previously made for the evening. So much for their fancy dinner. Spike would be fortunate to wake up long enough to eat at all. Leaning in close she kissed him on the cheek. "Happy birthday, Spike."

With a somber smile, she took his phone out to the kitchen table and pulled the battery out. "They can't call you now, at least for tonight. And what would you do if they did? Stumble out the door? Someone has to look out for you."


See you, Space Cowboy!