Well okay, It's been a long long time since I updated, and I confess the chapter wasn't really as long as I hoped, but it's finished all the same, there should be at one remaining, albeit extremely short, chapter to come which promises to give about as much conclusion as can actually be given to a story as strange as this. I'm thinking afterwards I might take some time to take any questions in case this made no sense for anyone maybe post some answers I don't know. I'm thinking maybe I'll revise this one before I put up a fifth, cause it's not long enough, but I wouldn't count on me actually changing it enough to make a difference usually I settle for a few different word choices. (I already put in a bunch hence a slightly increased length and a slightly later post) Anyway sorry about the really really long non – update. I should also make note that there's a lot of intentional quoting from the series in this chapter so don't like flip out or anything, it's not like I really need to tell anyone that I don't own Bebop, I mean seriously, I just don't have the balls to make a character with thong suspenders. Finally let me point out, people basically put their stuff up here to be reviewed, so please, everyone who's reviewed before, and defiantly some new people, by all means review, pass it on by word of mouth, cause you know I thrive of them.

That being said…

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Chapter 4: Young Man's Blues

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Why in Gods name am I still alive? What happened to the dream? It was supposed to end. All things stop and start – don't they? Isn't that just part of being human? I was ready – I was done with it all – the book had been closed. Here I am though, trying to write chapters to a finished book. When you've been dead for so long – it's hard for being alive to mean anything. That's just the problem though isn't it? I'm just watching a dream aren't I? Nothing means anything.

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Spike might have had too much to drink, but that was hardly the point, those thoughts had been in his head since he woke up, and he hadn't found any answers. He knew it had all come to end on those stairs, or at least he knew that was how it was supposed to end. That was the climax, the final exclamation point to his short and impetuous existence. Death or Glory, nothing else, he was destined from birth to burn out like an over zealous star in the sky. Yet something in this astrological cosmic destiny had gone awry he might even go so far to say seriously wrong, case-in-point -- he was alive. That, as far as Spike was concerned was the most absurd and unfair hand the higher powers had ever dealt him. Was he even alive? He was never sure what it was like in the first place, maybe he didn't know now. Yet despite it all, there was something under his skin, something he could just barely feel, that was just – wrong.

Spike pushed open the door of the bar as beams of light trickled into his eyes, the sun had just began to rise, and daylight only seemed to add another level of mockery to his "dream". Though if he thought he could blame this on daylight now he was still deluding himself, no matter how many angles he took, no matter how he tried to look at it, the fundamental problem was still there; he wasn't supposed to be alive. Julia and Vicious were dead, and as pathetic as it was, that had been the meat of his existence, everything else had really just been a silly road trip with some occasional stops in moments of seriousness, it was really just a bridge between his two lives. He hated saying that, he really did, cause when it was all said and done, he had respect for Jet, and even respect for the rest of them, they were decent people, and it was only fitting that they should have despised him, but he couldn't think of them as anything more than a windy road in his life. It had finally come to an end and he was done with it all now, but yet for some reason he was still here, and he was being tormented, like he was being told to revaluate his life what mattered, what his time had been. Like somebody was playing with him and wasn't gonna let him go out the way he had planed. No matter how he rationalized it, nothing was more of a mockery then the sheer fact that he was still here. Though, as he gazed up into the sky, and saw a familiar flamboyantly red ship, he thought he might have to eat those words.

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Finding the ship had been easy, it had been cruising almost annoyingly slow and judging it's general direction he recognized where it was heading, or luring him, either way it was resolve, and Spike didn't have to think twice about it. Why it was here, or who it was wasn't really relevant, but it was clearly the next step in the direction of is strangely new, and cosmically wrong life. He was walking towards it, heading to the center of the large empty lot when he saw the top hatch open and a tall and well put together, despite his raggedy appearance, young looking man climbed out. He hit the ground with a less than ominous tap, and began to walk towards him. Spike met his pace, following his expressions and his gestures, as they stopped together about ten yards apart. The stood there for a while staring each other down, as if some observer would suddenly shout 'Draw!' and something important would happen. Spike met his eyes evenly, he was searching for resolve too, and end, something more than this nonsense that he too must have had fate throw at him, and Spike couldn't help but grin that for the first time today something might mean something.

"You got something?" Spike asked coyly, his subtle grin showing.

The other man paused and frowned slightly, and the returned the grin, "Really Spike?" he said stretching the grin, "Is that the best you can come up with? Or is it just a bad translation?"

Spike might have felt the urge to act puzzled, or throw him a sideways glance, had the tension not already been brewing high. So this guy knew his name, he certainly wasn't going to give him upper ground, no point in even reacting.

"Well if your feeling that way," Spike said pulling out his pistol and adjusting his stance, "I can be more direct," he evened the barrel focusing on the kid, "If you don't have much else to say but corny cinema one liners -- Kid, then let's at least settle this much, you've got my ship."

He returned his glare and stepped forward softly, "Cinema?" he said coughing out a dry laugh, "That's all you got here, Spike," he continued, repeating his name again as a threat, " There's nothing else, except violence, music, and some eye candy."

"Stop moving." Spike ordered, this was either about to become very trite and boring, or very strange.

The kid ignored his request and continued his rant, "But that's okay though, that's really good enough, hell it was wonderful, I'd die for the chance to live on melodramatic brilliance."

"…Then just keep moving and we'll work something out," Spike replied cockily, tightening his grip on the gun.

"Strange as this may seem to you," he continued ignoring Spike's witty outburst, "I think there's mutual gain in this situation, after all I'm sure you're as confused as to why you're here, as I am."

With those words, Spike lunged on him, a fast kick to the side follow by a sharp left knee to the gut, sent him sprawling, and like that Spike was on him gun pointing down eyes burning.

"Why am I here? How am I alive? How did I get here?" he demanded gun rattling in his hand. No reaction. He started back blank, prone, and limp, "Answer me Damn it!" he said crossing his face with the back of his hand as bits of blood trickled out of his mouth, "You gonna talk, kid? Why am I here?" he said very quietly in whispering rage.

"Because," he muttered back irritably, "Because, it's all just a dream." And with that his left elbow flew up knocking the gun out of his hand, as he rolled back kicking him off and sending him flying to the ground with a scraping thud. He rolled to his feet, standing and looking at Spike who was beginning to push himself up, "The names Dylan by the way," he said punctuating it by spiting blood out of his mouth.

"Yeah," Spike groaned, "So what,"

"So like you said, 'It's all just a dream right?'"

It was Spike's turn to ignore him, "Why didn't I shoot you?" he grunted.

"Because I can't imagine it happening." Dylan replied flatly.

"Who the hell are you anyway?" Spike groaned, "and please spare me the cloak and dagger responses."

"I already told you, I'm Dylan," he said with minimal dressings, he said as he caught Spike's raised eyebrow, "But if you're looking for something a bit more useful, well I'm your biggest fan."

Spike stopped and looked straight down his eyes, and then he laughed smugly, and smiled, "Well thanks Kid," he chuckled picking up his gun, "I'm glad to know people someone appreciates me, I'm gonna go take my ship back now, ok?" he said grinning with cynicism but holding the gun on him. Spike began walking back towards his ship in frustration as he re holstered his gun, resolve didn't come so easy after all, and well he found his ship anyway. But then his voice caught him again.

"When you got here, or remembered waking up…" he began, "Well I bet you don't even remember it, sure you remember the steps the final words the stars and all the brilliance, but waking up, recovery never really happened didn't it? You just sorta faded back in and you don't really know how or why you got here, but it just sorta became clear you were okay, you can't remember how or any sorta beginning, it was just like…"

"…Like a dream…" Spike finished for him turning around and staring back with honest interest.

"Yeah, just like a dream, I can't say a whole lot more than that, except I'm the reason why you're here, I'm responsible for this little dream."

Spike looked up at the sky longingly, it wasn't the clear blue he had seen before, it was dense fog, and it was getting darker.

"So you're the sandman?" he asked.

"No, I'm no mastermind," Dylan replied sadly, "I don't have answers, and despite the fact that this all might be my doing, I'm really just a dreamer."

"So I'm just part of your dream huh?" Spike replied irritated, and a little put off, now that he was in the pseudo-afterlife and all he hoped he'd be living on his own merit, even if it was only for living a selfishly, short, and impetuous life.

"Don't take it that way," Dylan replied with little humor, "You might not exist, but maybe I don't either, I'm not really sure who's living in the real world and who's living in the dream world, but I don't think it really matters. The fact is were stuck here Spike, neither of us are supposed to be here – and I don't expect it to make any sense, but I figured out that your alive, and it's my fault."

"Yeah you're right," said Spike his voice quivering, with something between arrogance and anger, "It doesn't make any sense at all."

"Look you've got to take this in stride here…" Dylan began.

"No, wait, if this is a dream, and you've spawned this all, why am I alive, what purpose could this all serve?" Spike demanded glaring at him.

"That's fucking classic Spike isn't it?" Dylan said chuckling, "It's so unfortunate that I brought you back from the dead."

Spike just kept on glaring.

"Look, just listen," Dylan began, "If you outlived all this dark shit, the gloomy melancholy past, the sins committed in another life, then what? What did you want? Maybe you could find Julia and make it work, you could go off get a home, or at least an apartment somewhere, get kids, a dog or a cat or something, but just live have some peace, die happily ever after."

"So, It didn't happen – it couldn't," Spike replied, who had apparently given up any hope of being confused by the fact that this kid he never met knew his inner desires and past, "What's your point?"

"The point is that's an end." Dylan said fast and flatly, "That's what you strived for -- an ending, and when it became clear you couldn't have that one, you opted for the other, you went out in a ball of flame like the burning star you always were."

"So?" Spike asked, "I can recall the past too, you know."

"You don't care very much for it though do you?" asked Dylan, "Because everything you've done up until this point was just trying to follow a road to an end."

Spike sighed and then groaned, this was really not what he envisioned, he didn't want the spiritual, he wanted an explanation, nothing felt real, and he needed something sturdy to stand on but all this kid was doing was trying to throw him off balance.

"I'm sorry but do you have anything like relevant to say?" Spike asked, "Because as much as I understand the value of this whole I didn't 'cherish the moment' enough analysis, it's really not doing us much good. I get it okay? But I could be doing something far more interesting, like eating or sleeping… or standing in the middle of an empty room."

Dylan glared back at him, with eyes that reminded him of Jet, that fatherly glare, that he had seen so man times, that 'you should really know better' look, but there was something more – sadness? Christ, Spike thought to himself, what was this kid on about?

Dylan paused once, cleared his throat, and rolled his head around in a full loop before coming back to glare at Spike.

"No," said Dylan, "You don't get it, see to you," Dylan continued, "an end something you desire, something unattainable and joyous. That may be fine for you and all, but where I come from, that's all there is. The ending you desired, that's all and everything that goes, so no one does anything. It's an end there's no need to keep on doing anything, and then everything is static, so there's no real action or means. You see?" Dylan asked.

Spike wasn't sure what to make of this, there wasn't really any proper reaction, to this philosophical tangent, and moreover, there was even less continuity to this allegory when you tried to consider what it had to do with his existence, let alone him being alive unharmed and confused. He just shot a sideways glance to Dylan and cocked an eyebrow.

Dylan made an effort to continue, "You see," he went on, "The ends are all we have so we justify our means through them, no matter how nonexistent they are. We just live means to an end."

"So?" Spike repeated, "Why I am alive?"

"Because the end is bullshit," Dylan spat out a little faster and harsher, "an end is still and end, and there's no fucking point in writing a book after the end, even if they did live happily ever after. You can't write more chapters, you just read it again, and it's not even as good, all that you want to remember is the first time it happened. See Spike, after the end, the only thing worth remembering are the means, but we don't have that Spike, you do."

Spike cocked his eyebrow up at him, he wasn't really sure if this was the definition of his life, but it did remind him of something. It clicked in his head suddenly, and then he slowly began muttering the last piece of advice he could remember, "Men only look back on their lives right before they die, as though they were trying franticly to prove they existed."

"See, you both understood," Dylan said calmly, "You just never knew it, the means justify the end, they make it – it's all that's worth knowing, and it's all that's worth remembering, and despite what people want to believe, they aren't there to be forgotten. Do you understand?"

Spike sighed, "Yeah I understand, as If."

Dylan looked back at him, "Don't expect me to have all the answers either man, all I'm trying to say is maybe you need to reevaluate something, maybe that's why were here."

"Like what?" said Spike, feeling more than a bit put off again.

"Remember how you were told that 20th century television was brilliant, but yours was garbage."

"Yeah," Spike said chuckling.

"It ain't all bullshit," Dylan replied with an equal chuckle, "I can't imagine you guys have much in the way of exciting drama, what's the need? You've got it right in front of you, we have drama – and I know you – I know the story of your life, because drama is vacant from our world. We don't real have anything of meaning, nothing really happens, so we just make it up. You've got no need bullshit, your life's worth watching."

Spike sighed again, lighting a cigarette "I thought this was just a dream, what do you want from me? Do you want me to love and acknowledge some sorta brilliance in my life, or my world? Do you expect me to change or something?"

Dylan grew red with frustration until he spat it out, "This isn't a damn dream Spike! You are the fucking dream! If dreamed this whole pile of shit up it's because I wanted in…"

"What?" asked Spike flatly blowing smoke out of his nose.

Dylan felt smaller suddenly, smaller so he could look up at Spike watching him casually take another drag from his cigarette, "I wanted in on it." He said with utter sadness in his voice, tears welling up in his eyes, "Were not here for you, you can't change, and god bless you for it, it would ruin it all if you ever did. You don't need change, you're beyond any sort of answers, you're better then all this." Dylan sighed once more to himself "We're not here because you don't appreciate the means we're here because I can't take the end, because I'm weak, and your not, and I wanted part of that. You had the means and one way or another you found an ending, so we're not here because you needed some sort of value for your world, were here because I can't find any meaning in mine."

Spike just started back, unknowing of how to react, but Dylan just kept going, "See I have to fear the ends, because I never lived by the means, but you embraced them because you lived by something, and I wanted in on that," Dylan was stuttering now tears dripping slightly from the corner of his eyes, "I wanted some sort of control of my own life, something to believe in, something worthwhile to be part of, it's just like the movies you know? In my script there weren't any good parts, so I tried to go to another set, but it's all bullshit really, and I could never belong here, it's better than I am, that's why I love it so much. I was looking for a way in but you know better than anyone else – there is no door."

Spike sighed slowly, hoping he had something worth telling him, "You can't be missing that much, I'll promise you that."

Dylan wiped the tears from his eyes smiling, "If you only knew, you were out looking for 'true sadness', but you don't know what true sadness is. It's not watching your long lost love die in your arms, as the tears pour down your cheeks, that's bliss, sadness is watching that on television, moved to tears, and wondering exactly why you exist," Dylan spat out choked up wiping the remaining drops from his eyes, "No Spike, you don't know, you always had meaning, and when it died, you bravely went with it, but I'm left here forever watching reruns, because I'm still alive, not you, because you always had the faith."

Spike wanted to chuckle, or cry, or just react some how, but this kid was right about one thing -- he couldn't understand, but for all that he thought he should have something worth saying, "I never thought of myself as faithful," Spike began, searching for a way to pass on whatever he saw in this world back to him, "but you've put an awful lot of faith in me, if you have that much faith, maybe there's faith for you too."

Dylan just grinned dryly, a hollow empty stare, so alone, so out of place, like a black in white photo in the middle of color collage. He stared at him like every infant so hopelessly glued to and love with the television, and from that hollow dry stare he sighed his last words, "You really don't understand, do you Spike?" he said, "Don't you get it? We don't have faith," Dylan said slowly, pausing for the last time, "We don't need faith, we have entertainment."

With that, Dylan turned, and he walked back into the fog.

WELL A YOUNG MAN AIN'T GOT NOTHING IN THE WORLD THESE DAYS…