Disclaimer – Roses are red, violets are blue… me no own, so you no sue. (I thought it was cute!)
Overall Content – A little suspense, weirdness (Duh, the story's about Ed mostly), POV changes, some betrayal, lurking shadows, heavy sarcasm, and some other stuff. Maybe fluff. *eats the fluff*
Chapter Content – I'm not sure if I want to change the POV… Spike's POV is working well for me. Anyway, back to the content. Spike gets to strip down to his birthday suit for cigarettes! Just kidding, and sorry to disappoint. More weird crap, lots of bounty-hunting-for-drunken-losers ACTION!!(Or maybe the next chapter… God, I'm dragging this out *cringes*) Edward is running around with strange intentions. And Faye gets pissy over some stuff. Not far off from the regular sessions, eh?
Dancing in the Dark
-
Chapter 3
Jukebox Tune Swinger
"We're here," Jet said over the COM channel, voice echoing through the ship like so many things before it. I didn't move from my position on the couch. It wasn't worth the rush. Earth had proven itself weird and occasionally annoying, judging from its only export that was aboard our ship. As if on cue with my thoughts, the tanned little sprite flipped over the couch and landed in front of her computer. Once there she squatted down and began typing furiously, then waiting… tapping, then clicking at it. It was an endless cycle, a spinning chain… one that included me being bitten by Ed.
A chain I was beginning to not like very much…
With a satisfied squeal, Edward then rushed by me and out the ship, white shirt waving in the passing air. I blinked in my confusion. Edward usually hated leaving the ship and her poor Tomato alone, and if she did leave, she didn't go without Ein. Luckily, I wasn't the only one who noticed her quick departure, because I didn't feel like moving to stop her. As Jet came into the room to root Faye and myself up from the couch, he saw Ed scurry away. "Hey! Ed! Wait a second!" he yelled after the girl. A returned yell was heard, but it was muffled by distance. But, since I had witnessed her outbursts of over-excitement in the past few days… hours… whatever, I knew that she had screamed something about 'blue' again. Jet watched her go, shaking his head as he did.
"Hey Jet, think of it this way, maybe she'll leave for good this time," I said, my throat tingling in the hope that I could buy or pick some cigarettes off someone. I had smoked the last of them in the bathroom a few hours earlier, forced to sit upon the porcelain throne because Faye was in the same boat I was and would beg me to share it. It wasn't that I was greedy with my cigarettes, it's just… okay, maybe I was. But it was for a good reason.
"Spike, that's not a nice thing to say about Edward," he said. I shrugged, standing up from the couch. "Hey, be grateful. She's saved you from starving more than once," he said, riling. I could tell he was getting a little pissed. It didn't matter anyway. I hadn't meant it. "I'm sure she can make it on her own. This is more her territory than it is ours," I said. My fingers twitched and my system ached with the want for a cigarette
Beside me Faye rolled her eyes. "I seriously don't think a trip to Earth is worth that much money…" she grumbled and stood up from the couch, wiping off the butt of her yellow shorts as if the seat had been dirty. "It's not just the money, Faye. It's the food and the smokes… and we need it or we might get rusty," Jet said. Faye held her sarcastic tongue, even though I knew it desired to escape.
After we exited the ship, I stood on the dock we were on. It wasn't a space dock. It was a fishing dock. I turned on my heel to face the two behind me. "I'm going on my own. Whatever you two want to do, you can. But I'm finding this guy on my own," I said. Faye crossed her arms in front of her chest with a frown, as if I had been staring. "Are you going to split it, or what?" she nearly demanded of me. I shrugged. "Whatever happens… happens," I raised my arm as I turned and gave the two a wave before tackling the city on my own.
----
The streets were filthy. That was my first impression of Earth, and it wasn't a very good one to last. I figured that if I was going to find this guy, I wasn't about to find him by air. This being the circumstances, I figured the dirty bastard was hiding underground or something. So I wasn't taking the Swordfish II. But I was taking my dear, sweet time. Maybe not working had made me lazy…
I kicked at a soda can lying on the ground. It skittered away and into yet another pile of garbage. I decided to take my search elsewhere. Like anybody would be hanging out here, I thought. A familiar squeal came from around the corner and a blur shot up the fire escape to a building. I stared up at the moving figure. "What the—Ed?! Is that you? Edward!" I shouted up at the figure. It stopped and leaned over the edge, almost toppling.
"HELLO SPIKE-PERSON!!"
Above her head, she swung a hefty object. I squinted up into the contrasting shadows of the building wall and the noon's bright sun. "Edward! What are you doing?" I shouted to her. She was wobbled a little with her load and then I could see the grin flash on her face.
"EDWARD GOING TO SEE BLUE!!"
My shoulders slouched with disappointment. She was still going on about this 'blue' thing she seemed to be suddenly obsessed with. As I watched her ascend with giggles floating down until she disappeared inside an opened window, I began thinking, pondering over what she could mean. Was Blue a new computer program that could help with our bounty-tracking? Was it a hacker's sort of Holy Grail?
Well, at least she was re-phrasing the sentence of the week.
I kicked another discarded soda can. What was with Earth and garbage? But above the stench of dirt, I caught something. I paused and sniffed twice. Could it be? I sniffed again. Yes! It was!
Cigarettes!
I followed my trained nose out of the streets and to the door of a bar. I stared above the entrance. Dehlia's Drink was its name, scrawled upon a long piece of wood to replace a neon sign that was not well discarded beside the building, broken and filled with bullet holes, twisting colored glass fragmented across the cement sidewalk. I looked at the destroyed sign for a long time before smiling. My kind of place, I thought with a smirk and pushed on the swinging door.
Inside, it was dark because of the lack of windows, but I could make out the shadows of sneaky poker players and a prostitute loitering in the shadows of the room's corner. The smoke of both kinds was heavily present, that was a good sign. Then I collided with a very solid object.
"WATCH IT YOU CREEP!"
I stood there, staring into the darkness, trying to find the shorter person's face and eyes and finding only a shifting outline. But I should've recognized the person by voice anyway. I crossed my arms in front of my chest. "Faye, go to hell…" I said in an unperturbed manner. I could feel her scowl press across the dark air and onto my skin.
"What the hell are you doing here?!" she demanded of me. "Looking for cigarettes. I ran out this morning," I answered truthfully. "WHAT?? THIS MORNING?!? You said you ran out last night!" she yelled at me. I shrugged. I couldn't remember when night was anyway.
When my eyes shifted to a burning amber in a different part of the room, she took the opportunity and grabbed my hair. "Listen here, Mr. Fro…" she growled, "You held out on me! You said you didn't have any!" She pulled hard on my hair, yanking me down to her eye-level. I smirked as she glared at me. "Did you get your panties stuck up your ass again?" I mocked, "Or did your job on the corner not give you equal backup money if I decided not to split the bounty?"
She slapped me.
And I wasn't a bit surprised.
"You creep! You're only saying that because I haven't screwed you yet, you horndog!"
"Well, I think you've got too many maxi pads shoved up your ass, missy!"
A body pushed between us, smelling of sweat and alcohol. "Helayy.. les jus be fri'nss.. 'kay?" the drunk said to us both, trying feebly to push us apart. Faye shoved him away. "Hey you piss-drunk old man! Leave us the hell alone!" Faye screamed at the man. The drunk backed up, stumbled a bit and then shrugged before dragging himself up to the bar. Faye turned back to me. "Now you bias freak… I really ought to…"
"Lester! For God's sake! You know I can't serve you more than eleven shots of that shit within four hours… it's lethal, man!"
…Lester?
"Hold on Faye…" I said, shoving my hand in her face and my palm into her mouth. She tried to bite me, but I ignored her. I calmly walked towards the bar. A click could be heard as I cocked my gun behind his head. He was drunk, but he knew this sound well and came to attention. But that was when I heard another click, louder… meaning a bigger gun. I turned to face the long black tube of the rifle, held in the hands of the young bartender. "H-Hey! I can't let you treat my customers this way, p-punk!" he said, lowering the rifle to meet my forehead instead of just the top of my skull. He shook, rattling the bullets inside the barrel with tremendous force.
"Yes, you can."
All three of us turned to find Faye, smirking like the cat that ate caught the canary, with her pistol to the bartender's head. "You gonna give up, kid? Or do we have to end such a great career early?" she said.
The rifle clattered on the top of the counter, sound echoing loudly throughout the bar. I grinned. Faye had turned out to be useful for one thing, finally. I grabbed our bounty up by the collar.
"Lester Hernandez?"
He stared lazily into my eyes and nodded… and then his face squirmed. I knew this was ominous, but I wasn't sure how much. His features twitched and bulged.
And then he spewed all over my shoes.
"Well, Lester, you're under arrest," Faye said with a cocky smile on her ruby lips. I stared down at my feet, now covered with puke. "Lester Hernandez, you're under arrest…" I began. I looked at him again.
"And you're buying me a new pair of shoes."
-------
I ain't nothing but tired
Man, I'm just tired and bored with myself
Hey there baby…
I could use just a little help…
The updates, the updates… well, during the week, I might be a little slow since I'm spending most of my time at school. But on weekends, I usually spend my entire day typing, surfing, and chatting. So on weekends, it's more likely that I'll update. Just wanted to clear that with you ^_^ Oh yeah, and I'm beginning to think that Jet's a bit OOC, especially since he seems really smart every time he opens his mouth. But I'm not real sure. Hey, we need a voice of reason in this fic anyway. And I'm sorry if I seem to make Faye too pissy. She's just having an attitude problem (caused by nicotine-deprivation) at the moment, this I will be fixing later. And Spike x Faye fans, don't flame me because of the argument they had earlier. And I apologize if this chapter is a piece of crap. I'm not that good with action scenes and I don't have a map of the ship. And I might just start those POV changes soon. And the big mystery is revealed in the next chapter!! Yes, what you've all been waiting for! BLUE!!
I LOVE NIRVANA!!!