Sorry this has taken so long, I worked 6 nights in a row in the ER and was plum tuckered out.

$$$$

Ed stood chained backwards with her face pressed against a cold stone wall. Her shirt was torn down the back and she was covered in bruises and split skin, her legs barely able to hold her up. She could hear Ein, also chained, nearby desperately struggling to get to her.

"It's ok Ein. Just sit down. We'll go home soon. Edward can take you to the Bebop. Would Ein like that?" She heard him whine briefly as heavy footsteps approached and the door squeaked open. The room filled with a menacing aura and Ed knew who had come.

"Hello, Edward, is it?" he hissed as he came up behind her. "Or, as Dr. Chou called you, the Emotionable Wight Hybrid Procedure Trial #4. Developed in the Solar System Military Genetics Lab, the first successful cross of human and animal DNA. Designed for stealth, speed, and intelligence, the ultimate spy and hacker. Able to climb, crawl, and run through anything, with a photographic memory, and unnatural cognitive abilities. You're worth a ridiculous amount of money, a thousand times more than your data dog over there." He grabbed a handful of short red hair. "The question is, do I sell you to the highest bidder, or do I keep you for myself."

Ed made a gagging sound, disgusted by the insinuation. He slammed the side of her head against the wall. "That isn't very nice."

"I thought you wanted Julia," Ed coughed out as she tried to clear her vision. She could feel the blood trickling past her ear.

She could feel the rage radiating off of him as he seethed. "How do you know about Julia?"

"You said it yourself, Ed is the perfect spy. Ed knows many things."

Her head was jerked back again as he spat in her ear, "There is a reason why they call me Vicious!" The flesh on her back sizzled as a branding iron was pressed to her shoulder blade.

"AAHHHH!"

Ed snapped awake, drenched in sweat and searching for Ein. He always comforted her when she had the nightmares. His empty bed dragged her back to reality and her eyes filled with tears. It had been nearly a year, but she still felt the void that was left when he died. It was like a gaping wound in her chest that refused to heal.

Ed choked back the tears. She wasn't going to get back to sleep tonight so she got up to put on some PJ's and watch television. As she passed the mirror on the closet door she glanced up and saw it. The hideous dragon brand glared back at her, sneering, as if to say, "You'll never be rid of me."

She pulled an oversized t-shirt over her head and a pair of knit pants. With a yawn she opened her door and headed toward the kitchen. Maybe a glass of milk would help. That was Jet's cure-all for her, especially since her recovery. Jet and Faye went through an incredible protective phase right after she came back, and those first few months one of them was constantly on hand if she needed them. It was kind of annoying, but at the moment she would have given anything to have one of them there with her.

Spike didn't know anything about it she was sure. Neither Jet nor Faye would betray her trust like that, but she couldn't help but wonder if Spike would understand more than anyone else.

When she reached the kitchen she smiled when she heard the TV and light snoring coming from the living area. "Just like old times." After pouring her drink she set it on the coffee table and threw away the three beer bottles before gently moving Spike's feet and sitting next to him before swiping the remote. "Looks like he's cutting back on the alcohol."

Not surprising was the movie that was on. Bruce Lee was dancing across the screen, killing any and all those that opposed him. "That's enough of that," she said out loud as she began channel surfing. Not much is on at 3 am other than infomercials, bad movies, porn, and Kung Fu of course, but Ed finally found some cartoons. Little blue elves she vaguely remembered being called Smurfs. This was confirmed when she realized that was also every other word they said.

"What are you watching?" Spike asked as he stared through sleep- blurred eyes.

"Nothing, just bored," Ed flicked the TV off and took a sip of her drink.

Spike stretched and sat up, rubbing his eyes. "What time is it anyway?"

Ed glanced around until she found a click that someone had remembered to changed the batteries in and pointed. "What are you doing up this late, I thought you went to bed hours ago."

"Couldn't sleep. Thought I would get something to drink and try again."

Spike leaned forward and peeked into her glass. He wrinkled his nose, "Milk, bleugh, when I can't sleep a shot of whisky usually does the trick."

"Me and alcohol don't mix. It's the cat genes I think. My body produces too much melatonin. I did a shot of tequila on my eighteenth birthday and was out for 3 days. It took an adrenalin injection to wake me up."

"What cat genes. You mean like denim, right?" Spike inquired, very confused.

Ed wrinkled her brow at his question, "Surely you know. I thought Jet told you years ago. I'm like 1/3 feline DNA."

"No, I think Jet failed to mention that little tidbit of information," Spike snapped, unsure why Jet wouldn't trust him. "Why wouldn't he tell me?"

"I don't know, maybe the massive bounty that has been on my head since the day I escaped from the lab, and the fact that you didn't particularly like me when I was a kid. That really isn't motivation to keep me around."

Spike frowned at her, knowing that most of what she said was true, but if nothing else, he was loyal and wouldn't have turned her in if Jet didn't want him to, and he did like her when she was a kid, or at least had gotten used to her presence. One of the two. "So, how much are you worth anyway?" Spike asked.

"That all depends on who you're turning me in to," she answered in total trust and without hesitation. "A couple syndicates would pay a pretty penny for me and the lab that developed me, the last time I checked the bounty was at 400,000,000 woolongs. The military doesn't like losing expensive stuff like me."

"So the guy that you called your dad was really..."

"The person that helped me escape," Ed finished. "He wasn't always that absent minded, I think he got hit in the head or something, I'm not too sure. He was a research assistant in charge of my simulations. I was five when he was introduced to me, but with growth hormones I looked ten. He snuck in one night about a year later and helped me slip out."

Spike wasn't sure what to think about this new discovery, so instead he grabbed the remote, turned the TV back on and flipped back to the Kung Fu movie, Bruce Lee was his favorite. Ed breathed a sigh of relief when he said, "That sure explains a lot. I always knew you couldn't be all human. Unfortunately this means I owe Faye 200W, because I bet her that you were an alien."

$$$$

I know that this only makes Ed about 16 or 17 years old, but life experiences have aged her, please forgive me. I just felt that Ed would not be able to be that innocent living on her own like that for that long, especially on earth, even with her hermit like ways.

Also, Emotionable and Wight are words, even if it looks weird. Emotionable obviously means that one is capable of feeling emotions and wight means human. I chose those words because they matched up with Ed's name.