A/N: Hi everyone! Sorry it took me so long to get this out!

Disclaimer: (Since it appears I left this out last chapter, please consider this a super duper double disclaimer!) I hold no claim over the plot or characters of Cowboy Bebop.

Title: Fallen Petals of the Rose

Chapter 9: Of Lunkheads and Shrews

Last time...

"Spike, I lived with him for 8 months without a single clue as to what was going on, it's amazing that he didn't decide to kill me during that time, not counting the times when he came home drunk, but that's not the point! I had hoped that I was done with him, I could have even turned him in... but..."

"This has something to do with the fact you couldn't shoot him either, right?" he guessed.

"I just don't think I can bring myself to hurt him," Faye admitted. "Even after everything he's done to me, I just can't."

"Faye," Spike asked firmly, "Were you in love with him?"

Now...


"How can you ask me that?" she asked him taken aback.

"Answer the question, Faye," he demanded.

Faye down casted her eyes, "I, I know I'm not in love with Sekart."

"But?" Spike egged on.

"Dave Truman... might possibly be another story..." she said weakly, "But I know he's not real, so, I guess I'm just an idiot."

"No," Spike sighed, "You aren't an idiot, Sekart's just insane, and damn good at being insane too."

"Huh," she laughed half heartedly, "To think, that's almost comforting."

"This isn't exactly the time for an insult," he replied, leaning back to stare at the ceiling.

"Spike," she said with a pitiful desperation, "What am I going to do? I mean, I just can't keep going like this, God!"

"Well, you're not going to throw yourself in front of him to save his life, are you?" he asked.

"I may not be able to kill him myself, but there's no way I'm going to die for him," she said defiantly.

"That's good to know, because now we have nothing to worry about," Spike cracked a very small grin.

"Why's that?" Faye asked with an impatient tone.

"Because, I know now not to leave you in a vulnerable situation with him anymore," he explained, "When next you see him, you'll have me there, and James too. So there's no way anything will happen to you. And if worse comes to worse, and we have to kill him, I know you won't selflessly throw yourself in front of him to save his life, though, I shouldn't have been concerned with that in the first place, I mean, the thought of you being selfless is laughable."

Faye raised an eyebrow, "What happened to this 'not being a time for insults'?"

"Well, apparently, now is," he shrugged indifferently.

"Stupid Lunkhead," she muttered, folding her arms.

"Shrew," he replied as innocently as if it were her name.

Faye sighed, lying back," I'm dead tired."

"Same here," Spike said. "Maybe we should try and go back to sleep, we will have a big day tomorrow, after all."

"Ugh," she said rolling over and burying her face in the blanket, "Don't remind me."

"Oh, right, sorry," Spike said as he got him self up and over to his cot. "Good night."

"Yeah, good night," she said, fearing another nightmare, "Um... Spike?"

"Hmm?" he mumbled, "What?"

"Oh, never mind," she said.

"Come on," he said impatiently, "Tell me. What is it?"

"Nothing!" she lied.

"Oh, come on," he said impatiently, "What is it? You worried about another nightmare or something?"

"I told you, it's nothing!" she said firmly.

He sat up in an effort to make himself look more demanding, "Just tell- Whoa!"

His cot, however, decided that his course of action was unacceptable and it collapsed.

"Damn thing!" he said, prying himself from the metal carnage that was once his uncomfortable, smelly cot. He managed to salvage his blanket, but there was no way he, or anybody for that matter, would ever sleep on that cot again. "Great," he seethed with malice to the broken down bed, "Now I have to sleep on the floor!"

Faye grunted with annoyance and she moved over on the bed, "Come here, there's room, you don't have to sleep on the floor, but don't think this'll ever happen again."

Spike, who was far more tired that he would have liked to admit, found his sleepy brain didn't mind much about the prospect of sleeping next to Faye. "Fine," he grunted, dragging his comforter behind him like a small child would with a security blanket. Faye smirked at the sight of him, he was obviously exhausted.

He climbed in the bed and was lying face down, "Night." he said into the pillow.

"Yeah, goodnight," Faye said, sliding down to a sleeping position, not as worried about nightmares now. Though she would have never admitted it, she felt a small sense of security around Spike, even though he was a pig headed lunkhead sometimes... Ok, all the time.

Morning came sooner than expected. Some lovely person set the alarm for 6:30 AM before leaving this wonderful hotel room.

Faye found herself too comfortable to move and she struggled to stay asleep. Meanwhile Spike found that he too was comfortable, but, upon waking, all fore mentioned thoughts of comfort completely dissipated. Somehow, during the night, Faye became snuggly tucked under his arm with her head resting on his chest. She had a content looking face as though she was having a good dream. Looking at her peaceful state, he knew that if she awoke to find herself lying with him like that, it would very clearly be the end of Spike.

Deciding it would be best to move himself away from her before poking her awake, he slowing and carefully began to lift her up and move her arm. In the middle of the process, however, the radio show, which was something incredibly boring about some planet's local economy, suddenly lost their clear connection, resulting in a high-pitched screeching noise that made Faye shoot straight up. It was then she turned to see that Spikes arm had been where she was laying.

He laughed nervously, "G-good morning, Faye!"

"What? You, and, huh?" she said sleepily, as though she were mentally trying to deliberate what had happened.

"I um, sort of just woke up and we were like this," he explained.

"Ok," she said, deciding to except his theory, but for the sake of fun, she said, "Or maybe you were trying to take advantage of a sleeping woman!"

"Yes," Spike nodded, "That's exactly right, and I was using radio news to help woo you, but unfortunately, it cut out, waking you before I could inflict upon you my manly desires." He oozed sarcasm with his monotonic voice.

"Well," Faye smirked, inwardly laughing at the stupid game they were playing, "It's good to know that the truth has finally come out, wow, could you just imagine it?" she chuckled, "It would be a coming together for the story books... I could just see the title now... "The Lunkhead and the Shrew."

"Am I imagining things, or did you just call yourself a Shrew?" he asked with an arrogant smirk.

"I was merely going by the lovely pet name you gave me, Lunkhead," she said smacking him lightly on the back of the head. She glanced at the clock and then back to Spike, "What time should we get going?"

"James'll call and let us know," he said, getting up, "We should start to get ready now, though."

"Right," Faye said, standing up, "I get dibs on the bathroom!" She called as she dashed for the door before Spike could react.

"Hey!" he said in a futile argument. "What about me?"

"Lady's first!" she called, "Lunkhead."

"Lady? I didn't see any lady," he said, sulking. "Stupid Shrew."

"I heard that!" Faye yelled.

"That was the point!" Spike called back.

"Lunkhead!"

"Shrew!"

The fight slowly came to a stop, but the incoherent mumblings of many a profanity could be heard throughout the hotel room. At around 8 AM, Spike received a call from James, Faye was still conveniently in the bathroom, much to Spikes disappointment.

"Hey there, Spike," he said. "Every thing's going according to plans, I'll meet you and Ms. Valentine at the diner in about an hour and a half or so, I'm almost to the station, and don't worry about leaving Sekart alone... He seems to be losing it just a bit, I over heard him talking, and apparently he had been looking forward to a little get-together with the girl..." with hesitation he added," I think he was planning to kill her."

"Well then," Spike said, disturbed that Faye could have been killed had they waited any longer, "Our timing was perfect."

"Yeah," James replied. "So, how was spending the night with your lady friend?"

"She was a little shaken up, but she's ok now," Spike said.

"So, did you comfort her?" James asked in a suggestive manor.

"Shut up!" Spike demanded.

"Oh, I'm sorry, you're probably still a little upset by the whole ordeal, huh?" James said in a sincere, yet womanly tone. "If someone that close to me had gone through that I probably wouldn't be in a joking manor, but I didn't mean anything by it, I was just trying to lighten the mood."

"Yeah well, I suppose I can forgive you," Spike said with a lighter approach. "You did help me get her out of there, after all."

"Yes, I did, and now we have the more pressing matter of catching Sekart," James said, "I have a plan, but I'd rather talk to you both about it in person, and since I'll be there soon, I think we should hold all further conversation until then, alright?"

"Alright," Spike said, "Bye."

"Good bye." He replied followed by a click.

5 minutes later, Faye emerged from the bathroom, which lead to Spike locking himself in not 3 seconds later. Faye sighed and wondered if he would notice the phone next to the toilette. Yes, this hotel was defiantly built for an upper crust sort of crowd.

Only ten minutes past before Spike reappeared looking rather pleased with having captured the bathroom, even though Faye was completely done using it and that was the only reason he had been allowed in.

"Spike!" She said with a smirk, "I really didn't know you cared!"

"What are you talking about?" he asked suspiciously.

"You know, this place has some wonderful comforts," she said, seemingly veering way off topic, "Like phones in the bathroom, for instance. So tell me, do you talk about me often to that 'James' guy?"

"Uh," he said intelligently. "He just seems to think that we are... romantically involved, even though I have told him time and time again that there was no way I'd want to be with a Shrew like you. No offense."

"Right," she said cautiously, "And I guess you just got tired of correcting him?"

"Yeah!" he said, happy that she had come up with such a wonderful excuse for him... Wait a minute! That wasn't an excuse! That was the truth! Or so he hoped. "So, how much of the conversation did you hear, exactly? Oh and by the way, I will get you back for eaves dropping."

"Yeah, yeah," she said, brushing off his threat. "I picked up when you were saying something about 'perfect timing', I think, why?"

Spike sighed with relief, she hadn't heard about how close she was to death, he didn't want to scare her anymore that she already was... Because that would make her lose her concentration later when they would need her help to get Sekart! He thought. ' Yeah... exactly right...'

"Oh, no reason..." he said, trying hard to get her to drop it.

"Did you say something you didn't want me to hear?" she asked, approaching him with an evil pointing finger, "Because I think I've heard enough of your insults not to be surprised by anything you say about me!"

"Honestly," Spike said backing away from the wrath of the poking finger, "I didn't say anything!"

"So, James said something you didn't want me to hear?" she asked, dropping her finger, trying to figure out what could have been said.

"What makes you think there was something I didn't want you to hear?" he asked as innocently as he could muster.

"Because I saw you tense up when you asked, and then relax again after I gave my answer, and being the observant little girl that I am, I put two and two together," she explained.

"I see," he said nervously.

"So, Spike," she said, "What exactly are you hiding from me?"

"Nothing!" he said, shoving her aside.

"You expect me to believe that?" she asked with a scoff.

"Believe whatever you want," Spike spat, "But know that I am not going to tell you!"

"But you just said that there was nothing to tell!" She retaliated.

"You don't seem to believe that no matter what I say, so I don't see any point in continually arguing about something that you are so totally one-sided about!"

"Jeez!" she exclaimed, plopping down onto the unmade bed, "I don't see what the big deal is, I'm just curious."

"Curiosity killed the Shrew," Spike muttered, mentally flinching after he realized what he had said.

"I heard that!" Faye exclaimed as she malled him with a pillow, catching him off guarding and making him fall against the dresser, or maybe it wasn't so much that he was caught off guard than the fact that the pillow was as hard as a rock.

"Hey!" Spike yelled, "What did I do to deserve that?!"

"Stupid Lunkhead, I'm not a Shrew!" she yelled back.

"Um, excuse me," a voice said from the doorway. "I do hope I'm not interrupting anything."

"Eh?" Faye said as she caught a glance at the sight in the door way. Man, that was one ugly woman... 'At least... I think that's a woman,' she thought.

"Oh Spike! Don't be shy! Introduce me to your friend!" the person demanded.

"Um, Faye, this is James, or... Becky, as the case may be," he said with a nervous chuckle.

"This?" Faye said with astonishment, "Is James? This person helped get me out of there?"

"Yes," he nodded his head.

Faye shrugged, "I've seen stranger things," she said as she went to shake his hand, only to pull back at the last second.

"What's the matter, darling?" the man asked, "I don't bite!"

Spike suddenly realized that James had said they would meet at the diner in an hour and a half, it had barley been 40 minutes since he got off the phone with him.

"James," he said, subconsciously moving in front of Faye, "I thought we were going to meet at the diner."

"I changed my mind and decided to meet you here instead! The door man gave me your room number!" he declared. "So let's get going!"

It was then Spike knew for sure that man was not James. He cast Faye a knowing glance, he had an excellent idea of who he was... But he never before hoped so much that he was wrong.

A/N: Well, here you go! Chapter 9! Which gave me a twist that I never anticipated! I'm really happy because I finished all my finals and I'm officially done being a sophomore! Upper classmanship, here I come! This whole 'being out of school' thing will give me more time to write, which is good because you guys deserve more updates! (Besides that, I have to finish this before the 19th of June, just in case I'm not able to write in my summer time location.(Though, hopefully, I will be able to!) If not, don't expect to hear from me at all, whether in reviews or fics, until late August. Sad, I know, but what can you do but hope for the best?)

Please don't hate me for the cliffy! I'll update soon! With no school and my best friend still in school (she's in another school district) I'll have nothing to do during the day except write!

Thank you reader peoples for reading!

Please review!

-DRC -