Disclaimer: If I owned it, I don't think there'd be much point in writing fanfiction about it... (wanders off contemplating)
Chapter 8: Cats on Mars
The air was cooler than he'd expected, Jet noted silently as he stood alone on the roof of the Bebop. Dusk was encroaching quickly in Tharsis, and Jet was surprised at how good it felt to be in fresh air again. No one had shot at him yet; that was definitely for the better, he decided as he leaned calmly against the railing.
...Calm. That was a word that had had little to no chance of crossing his mind a short while ago. The difference? Now, he had a plan. This was a good thing. Jet liked plans. At times they were the only help he had in holding on to his sanity in the freak show that was his life.
For probably the hundredth time, Jet felt his gaze wander back toward the deck, where Vicious had positioned himself out of sight. He hoped to God that he had done the right thing by giving him that blade. He'd mulled over it for quite a while, and even now, after the fact, he still had his doubts. However, all said and done, it honestly turned out to be the only possible way for him to pull this off. Jet was very aware that he couldn't do this on his own.
And so, here he was, standing nonchalantly on the roof of his ship, using all the ISSP experience he possessed to figure out exactly where these Crows were hiding.
...Well. Technically, it was only one Crow he was looking for. He'd noticed the other one almost instantly upon stepping ouside. The Crows' ship was docked close enough to his that it could very likely be reached with no more than a well-aimed leap, and the Crow sat in the shadow of an overhanging ledge, watching Jet with a keen eye.
That just left Shooter Number Two, who seemed more adamant about staying hidden. Jet had 'absently' paced around the entire roof, checking himself to stay relaxed when Shooter Number One got suspicious and raised his gun, keeping it there for several seconds before deciding that Jet didn't plan on escaping; but no matter what angle he was standing at, the other guy was nowhere to be—
At that point, Jet's senses were jolted to attention as the door to the Crow ship abruptly slid open, revealing none other than Shooter Number Two.
...That explains that...
The new Crow eyed him for a moment before turning to his partner, muttering something to him while gesturing to his commlink. Good, Jet thought to himself as the partner made an attempt to work the dead communicator.
Perfect. This was his opportunity.
Making sure to keep his movements relaxed and natural, Jet silently reached into his vest.
Just as he'd expected, the Crows were anything but incompetent. No sooner had his hand begun to move in that direction, when he suddenly became the target of two well-aimed longarms. They weren't shooting yet, but they were ready to. Don't look at them, don't get defensive, ignore them completely, he reminded himself silently, continuing the movement. Just get them off their guard.
From the corner of his eye, he saw them tense up when he grasped what he was looking for; and after that, he would have liked to see the look on their faces when, instead of a gun, he simply pulled out a pack of cigarettes. From his pocket–at this point their guns went up again—came nothing more than his lighter. Lighting up, Jet took his time smoking, keeping both items in his hands and waiting until they finally lost interest. Shooter Number Two headed around the corner to perch on the adjacent ledge, able to see Jet and be concealed at once. Shooter Number One kept watching Jet suspiciously for some time, however.
Well, until that guy looked away, nothing could happen. Not really a problem; all the more time to prepare himself, the way Jet saw it. He had one chance, and he couldn't miss.
Finally, the Crow slowly pulled out his own communicator and raised it to his mouth. Getting no signal, he frowned in annoyance and held it up, glancing down to fiddle with it. Here we go.
The Crow only glanced back at him once, as Jet put his lighter back in his pocket and the cigarettes back in his vest. Then he glanced down again.
His mistake.
Before the Crow had time even to react, Jet had grasped a grenade and a gun—one in his vest, the other at his waist, at easy access from his pocket—and blown him into the next century. He never knew what hit him.
The moment he saw the guy's partner move, Jet dropped to his stomach on the roof to avoid the bullets that were suddenly flying his way, pulled out the pin of the grenade, and pitched it in the shooter's direction. He had to grimace at what happened after that; as much as he'd seen, it was never a pretty thing to watch a man get blown to bits.
Once his ears had stopped ringing from the explosion, Jet could clearly hear some more voices which must have belonged to the Crows' comrades. They weren't close yet; looking back toward the deck, Jet could only hope that Vicious had gotten the message.
Meanwhile, the atmosphere on the other side of the Bebop was a far cry from the first. The water was calm and placid but for a slow rippling in the wake of the explosion, and only one lone figure stood on the deck of the nearby Crow ship.
Leaning quietly against the side of the ship, Vicious focused only on steadying his breath as he calmly surveyed his handiwork.
It hadn't been difficult. They had made the mistake of underestimating him, perhaps assuming that his injuries were too severe for him to make the jump between ships while they were distracted with the gunfire. They were quick to know a mistake when they made one, however; Vicious could feel it in the way the first one jerked when he grabbed him from behind, one hand over his mouth and the other pulling the blade across his throat.
The other one hadn't even had time for that much of a reaction. And now, the two of them were no more than paling corpses at his feet.
In fact, the only reason that the two of them weren't the only ones on this ship by now was the fact that their assumptions hadn't been entirely wrong. The moment Vicious had stopped, a wrenching pain had taken hold of his abdomen, and even now it was still holding fast. It would do no good to continue with the plan if he couldn't do something as simple as breathing.
So, he waited, the two dead Crows sprawled on either side of the deck before him. A glance at their faces told him that they were young enough, but they were no fair-faced choirboys. The latter was the image, he was sure, that had most likely gone through Jet's mind when they had come to the matter of whether to kill them all.
Jet's argument had been sound enough. He didn't want to kill if it wasn't necessary. To put it frankly, he was thinking like the cop he once was, attempting to solve a problem with as few casualties as possible.
It was rather sickeningly idealistic, and Vicious had not hesitated in telling Jet as much. These were hired men with a job to do. If they were challenged, they would fight. To spare them would be to slit his own wrists.
After a long moment of apprehension on Jet's part, the bounty hunter agreed with Vicious' argument; however, he did have a decent suggestion. If they left one alive, they could get information out of him. Again, it was police reasoning; he was suggesting no more than an interrogation. The only alteration Vicious made was that they keep two instead of one; if dedicated enough, some syndicate men would take their own life before betraying the order. If that happened, a backup would be to their advantage.
In the end, that had been the comprimise Jet had needed. Few words had been necessary after that obstacle was out of the way; and now, here they were.
Once the pain in his chest began to slowly dissipate, Vicious rested the tip of his blade on the ground for stability, then dared one step away from the side of the ship. A dull ache throbbed slightly at the movement, but it was no longer red and paralyzing as it had been.
As he still had yet to hear any more gunfire from Jet's side of the ship, Vicious allowed himself to take his time. Success in this, after all, was more important than speed. For the sake of aesthetics, if nothing else, he then went first to one of the bodies, then the other, sliding each one into the harbor with his foot, where they disappeared beneath the water's surface. That done, he straightened himself up, listened for a brief moment, then leapt soundlessly back to the Bebop's deck.
Ah, there it was. The sound of gunfire.
Damnit, damnit...where the hell is he? Jet thought to himself just a bit desperately, as the two Crows that had come running were quickly turning into five. His bad leg gave a dull throb, as if to remind him that he wasn't in any condition to take on five by himself. Neither was Vicious; Jet knew that too. He didn't like him, but he couldn't do this without him.
And that brought him back to the question of just what in God's name was taking him so long.
Jet knew Vicious was no amateur at what he did. Certainly, he would be done with the first Crows by this point, wouldn't he? The only thing capable of stopping him would be his own health. However, he'd said he could do it. It didn't seem like he had much reason to lie about that.
That brought Jet to the question of trustworthiness. Now that he thought about it, Vicious never had given him a straight answer as to where his loyalties lay. No matter what Jet wanted to believe, there was always that chance that Vicious had just gotten rid of the Crows and taken off in their ship.
However, against everything experience had taught him, something in Jet's gut told him that it wasn't going to happen that way. It couldn't.
...He hoped.
At that point, a bullet whizzed past his ear and quickly returned him to his more current problem. He couldn't stay ducked down on the roof of his ship forever. It looked like he'd just have to do what he could.
Daring a brief glance outward, Jet found that the two Crows that had first responded to the explosion had now been joined by three others, who looked like they'd come from the direction of the main door. However, he only was able to get a glimpse before he hit the ground again, just in time to avoid the rain of bullets that shot in his direction. They weren't idiots, he reminded himself as the thunder of the guns ceased. They weren't going to waste their bullets unless he gave them a target.
Well, if they wanted a target, he would give them a target.
Taking care to stay low to the ground, Jet carefully slipped out of his vest, making sure to take all the grenades out first, to avoid a particularly gruesome failure on his part. Then he gave himself a moment, sucked in his breath, and chucked the vest outward, in the direction of the wind.
Another thundering of gunfire told him that they'd taken the bait, and with a speed he hadn't had to use in a while, Jet shot forward, aimed quickly, and fired at the first Crow he could focus on. His years in the ISSP had taught him well; the aim was true, and the Crow went down. Jet was ducked down again before the others could make him follow suit.
...Okay. You got one. Now what? Jet couldn't help but give a small huff of annoyance. He highly doubted that they would fall for the same trick twice, and even if they did, there were only so many things he could throw. It would be enough of a pain in the ass to fish his vest out of the harbor once this was done with...
Just then, a strange sound reached Jet's ears, followed by three gunshots that definitely weren't in his direction. His curiosity piqued, Jet allowed himself another glance.
The sight before him gave him such relief that he could have collapsed. The sound he'd heard had most definitely been a Crow's dying protest; and with his blade still lodged through the unfortunate Crow's spine, Vicious had apparently used him as a shield against the bullets of the Crow's comrades, for he was unharmed. He didn't even acknowledge Jet but for one quick, expectant glance in his direction.
Got it. Keeping his gun at ready, Jet shot up, braced himself, and vaulted over the rail, sliding down the Bebop's sloped exterior in their direction. One of the Crows seemed to find him more interesting than Vicious, but thanks to a stroke of luck on Jet's part, he managed to catch the Crow in the arm on the way down, just throwing him off balance enough that Vicious had time to wrench his katana free and put it to better use in the wounded Crow's gut.
By that time, Jet had made it down the side of the Bebop, coming now to a ledge at the bottom. Seeing his only option, he winced slightly in preparation, then used it as a springboard to propel him to the Crow ship.
He didn't have time to think about how his leg now felt about ready to fall off, or to marvel at his success in making the jump as he landed at one of the Crows' feet. All he could do instead was to stand up and, in the process, to show the Crow what a metal fist in the gut felt like.
The lifeless thud of the unconscious Crow hitting the ground was closely echoed by another, and Jet looked up in time to see Vicious straighten up, trembling only slightly from the exertion, and silently sheathe his katana. By the look of the welt that was already beginning to form on the side of the last unconscious Crow's head, it was clear that the katana's hilt was no less fearsome than its blade.
The silence that descended then was abrupt, but welcome. After allowing himself a subtle deep breath, Vicious acknowleged his audience and met Jet's gaze without a word.
...Okay. As though, in their silence, they had managed to confirm something, both of them reanimated then, disposing of the dead ones and inspecting the unconscious ones before hefting them back into the Bebop.
Once he'd dumped off the Crow he'd brought in, Vicious had no problem taking a backseat while Jet disarmed and restrained the two. Returning to his perch on the arm of the couch, Vicious took an opportunity to briefly close his eyes, for it had taken more effort than he cared to think about to keep from buckling at the waist when he brought the Crow inside. It seemed that his unhealed body was feeling less agreeable with every passing moment.
For a short time, he kept his eyes closed, only dimly allowing the sounds of Jet tightening the ropes and Ed's enthusiastic gibbering to penetrate the back of his consciousness. A faint thumping against the opposite wall told him that something had pleased the dog, though that sound ceased after only a moment. Beyond that, the only other sound he cared to listen for was the breathing of the two Crows.
After listening a moment, Vicious silently opened his eyes, instantly letting them fall upon one Crow, the blonde one that Jet had brought in. His breath was starting to quicken slightly. He would be awake soon. The other one, who had swiftly become acquainted with the hilt of Vicious' katana, would be a bit longer.
By now, Jet had retired to his chair and busied himself with reloading his gun. Vicious observed him in silence for a bit, then returned his attention to the Crow. Ed seemed to have entered into a cease-fire against the two, and now sat back on her heels, peering sideways at the Crow in question through her goggles.
Just as Vicious moved his gaze from the girl to the Crow, the latter began to squint as his mind approached consciousness. To that, Ed abruptly snapped out of her pensive state, alerting the Bebop—and likely the rest of Tharsis—to his movements with a delighted squeal.
"Wakie, wakie, WAKE-UP CAAAAAAALL!" she announced gaily, proceeding to flip backward and stand on her hands, clapping her feet with relish. From across the room, Ein seemed to be heartened by her jubilance and trotted over to get a better view, tail wagging and tongue lolling out. Jet looked up, took note of the Crow's condition, and got to his feet. Vicious only remained where he was. Jet was the cop. Let him interrogate.
The Crow's eyes heavily slid open, then widened when he found he couldn't move his arms. Jet managed a faint smirk of satisfaction.
The interrogation had begun.
To my superbly excellent reviewers:
VanillaRose-Yay! I'm so glad you approve! n.n It was only when I'd already decided that the scene MUST exist that I realized that Vicious was much more intelligent than myself...(meo.o;;) so it's great to hear that you liked it!
jdchs-o.o Wow, I'm floored that my li'l old fic got such an enthusiastic response from you! Addicted? Wonderful! (happy-dance) I hope the rest of the story meets your expectations as well as the first part seems to have. Thanks so much! n.n
Shteve-Yes, it shall be fun!...Well, it was fun to write, at least. The update's coming soon, so no worries, ne?
Picon-Ah, college stuff...I've no room to complain, as that'll be me next year...(gulp) Buuut anyway, indeed, things are being set into motion. It's wonderful to see you pondering it :)