I'm bad, I'm sorry I should've written sooner, please review.

Cowboy Bebop: Dream Sequence

Session 29:

Pain Inside

She flew through the clouds, immense wings curving against the frigid air. Below the jagged rents of civilization stretched out in a glittering sea of phosphorescence. She felt free and powerful, a heady combination to be sure.

She banked left and found herself sitting astride a large creature. Slender limbs replaced the tissue thing wings and she hugged the sleek neck of the beast she rode. Its scaled hide abraded her bare legs and arms and she knew it to be a dragon. She glanced down and found the cities aflame in crimson fires. Great jets of flames spewed forth to snare her mount and drag them down. The graceful creature wheeled adeptly through the air, brushing perilously close to the deadly ribbons.

With a horrified scream they fell, the dragon bellowing in pain. A geyser of blood drenched her in the sticky fluid as the beast's head fell roaring from its body.

* * * *

Angel slid through the dark waters of the subconscious and opened her eyes. She saw the man shifting nervously. She had to remember something. Who was he? She couldn't quite grasp it. The knowledge skirted brazenly around the edge of her clouded mind. She felt that he was important, perhaps if…no, he wouldn't be coming back. Lewiston, brother…dead? She held an image of blood and death to her mind and couldn't decipher it.

Spike. Dragons. If only she could remember. She needed to remember. A faint pricking swam up through her thoughts, an idea perhaps.

Her body jerked as she shook off the power of the haze. The man, Spike, the new leader of the Red Dragons, looked at her. Lewiston had died, died to protect them. She had become Death's Angel.

"Where do you think you're going?" she demanded as her ward started to move towards the door. She knew he was going to leave something she couldn't allow.

"You're back," he muttered.

"I never left." He shrugged and reached into his shirt pocket. He glanced down and apparently found it empty of whatever he had been going to take. A cigarette? Her brother had mentioned something of his smoking habit.

"Mentally you did. So is that what Dream does?" She ran a hand through her black hair and nodded.

"It's hard to stay coherent for long periods of time and the longer I do the longer it takes until I can be lucid again. I haven't tried for a long time so I can stay here, mentally, for a couple hours at most. I haven't tried to stay longer," she remarked. She noted the lack of shirt and the white bandage wound about her chest. He noticed the direction of her gaze and had the decency to blush.

"I had to bandage it."

"I know. And your wound?"

"Couldn't be…" His voice ended in a drawn out hiss as he stretched his injury. "Better. Damn it." She laughed softly and scouted off the small cot.

"We can't stay here forever. Do you know anyone or anyplace to go? I'm afraid I haven't been out of the apartment for a long time."

"The Bebop." She flinched at the mention of that name and looked away. He didn't know that the crew of his old ship thought he was dead. They were probably solar systems away by now.

"Anywhere else?" He gave her a hard look, suspicion flared in the depths of his whisky brown eyes.

"Why not the Bebop? I have friends…well, friend there. Faye's an acquaintance, a damn annoying one at that." She sighed in frustration. She would have to tell him sooner or later, but she had the feeling that as soon as she did he would go gallivanting off to find them. The rumors made him to be a very stubborn and outspoken man and she heartily agreed with them.

"They're not here anymore," she told him carefully.

"What happened to them." He took a threatening step forwards and then checked his anger. "Where are they?"

"They think you're dead, Spike. Everyone except for those in the Red Dragons believes you to be dead. We even had a funeral for you and Vicious. They're gone." He stared at her, disbelief plain on his angular face.

"Dead?" She nodded. He threw back his head and laughed.

* * * *

Okay it is a little short, but I have been updating all my stories like crazy and I only have so much creative energy to spare. So please review and I'll try to get another one out by January.