Disclaimer: I do not own Faye, Jet, Spike, Ed, Ein, Vincent or the Bebop, or anything else mentioned in this fic which obviously belongs to the creators of Cowboy Bebop.
A/N: My first Bebop fic, so be kind. Just a snippet set after the movie, Knocking on Heaven's Door, so it's around sessions 20 and 21. Faye-Faye being a little protective of her crew, in a Faye sort of way.
Apologies if it's shitty – I had a fit of inspiration at about ten and wrote this while I was really tired. -_- Put it down to that.
Kicking Down Doors
He was really beat up when we got him back to the Bebop. He always is. I don't know why I expect it to be any different. It's almost as if he goes out and tries to get himself shot. I know our line of business is dangerous – hell, I think I know that better than anybody on this tub of a ship – but you would think by now that he'd be a little more careful.
The point of this nostalgia? There's been a bad virus around lately, and I don't mean the kind that Vincent Volaju was trying to release on an unsuspecting humanity. And no matter how much I may yell at Spike, I don't want him to die. I don't want any of them to die. I've seen too many things die in my relatively short time in this new world. Now that I've found this small measure of peace, there's no way I'm letting go of it without a fight. That's why I'm doing this.
I'd already given Jet some of my blood; I'd slipped a bit of it into a Bloody Mary. I know that sounds disgusting and morbid, but it had to be done, and I sure as hell wasn't going to go up to him and get him to kiss a bloody finger better. I'd gotten some into Ed, who had then paraded around acting like a crazy vampire for a day or two. The face on Tomato even got some honorary fangs for that particular period of insanity. I'd even persuaded Ein to lick a cut finger (which I'd then disinfected viciously afterwards.) Spike was the only one left and, I supposed, the only one I really needed to do this to at all. He always got the worst of everything: diseases, broken hearts and battle wounds. I thought I had bad luck; I had nothing on Spike. He didn't just knock on Death's door, he kicked the damn thing down and used the Reaper's head as a bongo drum.
For once he had made it to his room to collapse. I procrastinated for a few minutes outside his door, then slid it open and wrinkled my nose. The place was a mess. I wondered if it would've been a better idea to get Ed to turn the artificial gravity off for a while.
Spike looked surprised to see me. It was a Spike sort of surprise, though, which meant he looked at me and didn't fall straight back to sleep. "What do you want?" I had anticipated this. I had promised myself I wouldn't get angry.
I guess I lied.
"Oh yeah, great. Nice to see you, too, Spike." I scowled, flinging myself down, uninvited, beside his legs. He raised one eyebrow and sneezed. Even in this semi-groggy haze, he managed to look sceptical.
"I don't have any money."
"That's all you think of me, isn't it? That's all I want? Money?" I sneered. "You know what, you can just forget it. I was going to make sure you didn't die on me, but for all I care you can just rot."
"It's just the flu, Faye." Why did he always have to be so calm? He only really came alive in battle. To the rest of the world, he was just a sleepy cowboy in an ill-fitting suit. I flicked my knife up and he watched it warily.
"I wasn't talking about that." I said snidely, before reopening the wound in my abused finger with a wince. Spike sat up and snatched the knife off me, looking at me like I'd gone crazy.
"What the hell are you doing?" It wasn't even a yell, just an annoyed demand, like I was wasting his time. I sighed and held the finger out to him, having been unable to think of a better way to do this.
"He said I'd never die. Vincent. We took the vaccine from Electra's blood, but this is something else. Everyone else on this ship had a dose of the vaccine, but everyone else also got the flu. But not me. It's the blood. He gave it to me, and now I'm giving it to you.
"You're crazy." He said flatly, flopping back onto his pillow. "Just wake me up when you're over it."
"Spike, I'm not kidding! This doesn't exactly tickle!" I can't believe I just cut my finger for this son-of-a-bitch!
"Go find a bandaid." He said unfeelingly. I scowled and stuck the wounded finger in my mouth, sucking furiously at it. Damned if I was gonna let him get away with making me cut my goddamn finger for nothing.
It wasn't a kiss, exactly. It was more an "I've got something in my mouth and I'm gonna damn well share it" kind of kiss. A CPR kiss with blood involved. It might've been disgusting if I hadn't been so pissed off. If I hadn't kind of been enjoying being this close to him.
No, Faye.
I pulled back and he stared at me and swallowed. A thin trickle of my blood escaped the corner of his mouth. For a few moments he forgot to be a complete pain in the ass. For a few moments he was a normal guy looking like a deer in headlights and thinking something along the lines of "Holy shit, I just got kissed by Faye Valentine."
I remembered to smirk the same moment he remembered to splutter in disgust and wipe his mouth with his hand. "Euuuuurgh. That's really nasty, Faye. What are you, a vampire or something?" He had remembered to be angry and sarcastic as well.
I waved the finger in front of his face, teasing, the way I was supposed to. Sidled out of the room like nothing had happened. That was the way this façade of ours went; there were doors in this house of psyches that no one dared open, or even peer through the keyholes of.
I had the feeling I'd just kicked one down.
~*~
A/N: I know, Spike was probably dosed with the antidote and any other immunities Vincent and Electra had when he was hit with the rain. Still, give me the liberty to make things up or give me bigger plot holes, dammit! ;P
Please review.
