A/N: Hey, all! If you guys remember Katerina from Session #1 (Asimov's girlfriend), she's going to be the one that Faye has to fight with for Spikey! You, however, get to decide their fates, so I truly hope you give this fic a chance and enjoy!!!! PLEASE R&R!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

CH 1

Turning and glancing over her shoulder in sheer consternation, Katerina was not the least bit surprised to find the persistent bounty hunter whom she had met earlier on in the streets following close behind in his trusty zip craft, the look of grim determination etched out across his handsome features both awe-inspiring and absolutely frightful due to the confidence that one single look retained.

It was then, at that very moment that Katerina knew that it was all over.

She and Asimov would not make it out alive.

She would never see Mars.

Bowing her head, Katerina fought back tears of unshed pain and woe that had been building up over the years like a suffocating sea of black, her delicate fingers weakly weaving over the trigger of her small firearm within the hem of her dress once she realized what she must do.

She would kill her one true love; she had to. He was within a hair's breadth from death, as it was, so she figured that she was performing a civil duty of justice.

With a heavy heart, Katerina raised her firearm, took a cleansing breath, then pulled the trigger.

BANG!

Feeling a wan smile slip across her lips with a surprising amount of ease, Katerina cradled Asimov's sticky and bloodied head against her bosom in silent adoration, her lovely violet irises shimmering over with an unexplained happiness as she and Spike locked eyes.

He was absolutely stunned.

Noticing the police in the distance up ahead, Katerina then sensed that her untimely end was near, yet, surprisingly enough, she was not afraid.

Curling her lips upward into a sorrowful smile, she nodded towards her mossy-haired onlooker as her silent good-bye, then closed her eyes in preparation for the unknown. "Adios..."

0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000

Jet Black leaned forward in his pilot's chair and smirked upon seeing his partner sailing into the hangar with a shadowed figure lying upon his lap, his parochial mind immediately tallying up all of the woolongs that they would be undoubtedly receiving for this bounty.

Even though Asimov was a small fry compared to most, it was still more money than they had by a long shot, so Jet was definitely not one to complain.

Deciding to assist Spike just in case the bounty tried anything funny, Jet hurriedly abandoned the controls of the Bebop and cheerily trodded over into the circumscribed tunnel that led to the hangar, his mind drawing an immediate blank once his mossy-haired comrade entered the pod-like door with a beautiful young woman draped limply over his left shoulder in a half-assed fashion. From what he could see, she appeared to be unconscious.

"Spike...?," he questioned, immediately not liking where this was going, "That isn't...."

"Yeah," Spike apathetically interjected, "it's Asimov's girlfriend....I managed to rescue her before the ISSP totally trashed their zip craft."

"And Asimov?"

"Dead."

Swearing brusquely under his breath, Jet irritably raked his large fingers through what little hair he had left and snorted, his tone rather uncertain as he asked hopefully, "You're not going to keep her here....right?"

"I have to. She saved my life when Asimov tried to strangle me," Spike insisted forcefully as he handed Katerina's limp body over to a very surprised Jet. "Just consider it a debt to be paid off, alright? I think she's only suffering from a mild trauma and a sprained elbow, so she should be up and at 'em before ya know it."

Jet sighed. "Faye's not going to like this, you know."

Spike grinned. "I know."

0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000

Faye Valentine let out a pitiful whimper as she stretched her long, slender limbs up towards the Heavens, a rather unattractive yawn escaping her full, rosy lips once she finally decided upon entering the Bebop's cramped little kitchen in order to find something to eat.

Checking the cracked clock on the cold, metal wall above the beat-up stove, Faye briefly found herself wondering how long she had slept.

Minutes? Perhaps hours?

All that she truly knew was that something onboard the Bebop felt highly amiss, and it was aggravating her to no end.

Faye was primarily a woman of normalcy, after all, so this unsettling feeling didn't fly by her too well.

Finally deciding upon a meal of rather dry bell peppers and beef without, of course, the ever-so-desired beef, Faye closed the fridge and began to spoon-feed herself the absolutely nauseating mush before egressing the kitchen and casually entering the main room.

There, spread out limply on the beat-up couch was Spike, a book that read Walking on the Moon draped carelessly across his face like a mask, thus indicating that the exhausted cowboy was, indeed, asleep.

Rolling her eyes at her comrade's idle manner, Faye unceremoniously pushed his legs off of the couch so that she could have a seat, as well; Spike's ireful grunts of protest only causing the vixen to wear a proud smirk as she continued to greedily shovel her food into her awaiting mouth.

Giving him an innocent look with her deep jade eyes, she then placed her bowl off to the side, teasing sweetly, "So what's eating you? Did something crawl up your ass and die, or something?"

"Back off, Faye."

She immediately held her hands up in mock surrender, then laughed, inquiring inculpably, "No, seriously....what's wrong with you? You look as if you've been through Hell and back."

"Gee, thanks," Spike grumbled, rolling his eyes before turning in towards the couch. "If you've got any other flattering remarks, please....do tell."

Faye blanched. "Oh! I didn't mean....well....maybe I did, but-"

"Just let it go," Spike pleaded, wearily draping a thin arm across his face before letting out a heavy sigh. "Kat was a real handful to take care of this afternoon since she's hurt and has PMS, so please....no more 'I'm a bitch' from you today, alright?"

"What?! Who the hell's Kat?! Did I sleep that long?!!," Faye demanded, by this point completely beet-red in the face.

Spike couldn't help but smile at her off-the-wall reaction, then shrugged, returning apathetically, "Kat's Asimov's girlfriend. He was our bounty that was killed, and you've been asleep for....oh, I'd say about 12 hours, maybe?"

Faye snorted. "Greeeat, that's just what we need! Another female onboard to hog up the hot water!"

"Hmm...so does that translate to 'she pretty, me jealous'?," Spike teased, completely unable to prevent the grin that was tugging dangerously at the corners of his lips from forming upon seeing his comrade's terribly distraught face.

Faye, on the other hand, did not appear to be the least bit amused.

In her opinion, Spike was being an ass, and, as far as she was concerned, she had absolutely no time for asses.

With a seductive switch of her hips, Faye then drew herself up and off of the couch in a terribly nonchalant manner, her voice cool and completely aloof as she noted aloud, "If you need me, Spike, I'll be in my room."

He smirked. "The day that I need you will be when all Hell freezes over."

Faye stiffened.

Asshole.

000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000

Katerina stubbornly wiped away the tears that had been forming along her lashes, her violet irises glistening with a radiant beauty as she continued to stand there amidst the moonlight upon the dock outside of the old fishing ship.

Oh, how she missed her sweet, beloved Asimov.

She had been so sure that she would have died with him, but Spike had foolishly intervened and saved her life before it could be taken away.

And Spike.

He was so different from all of the other men that she had ever met....so carefree.

Katerina truly believed that he was man that she could eventually fall in love with, yet she was completely determined to never give herself the chance.

After falling so deeply for Asimov, she was afraid of love and its poisonous residue that constantly pumps throughout one's veins like fiery embers, forever eating away at every living fiber until there is nothing left.

Love is the universe's deadliest toxin; there was no doubt in her mind about that.

Sighing deeply, Katerina wrapped the tiny burgundy shawl that she had taken with her about her small, slender shoulders, her eyes closing as she dolefully allowed the evening chill to settle deep within her bones and freeze her very heart and soul.

She had no idea why on earth Spike was being so nice to her; she didn't deserve such kindness from an individual whom Asimov had nearly killed.

It was almost odd to her at how eager Jet had been to take her in, despite his gruff appearance and rather cold, clipped tone. It wasn't him that she feared, however. It was the girl; Faye Valentine.

Ever since they had met a few hours ago, the woman had regarded her with nothing but cold and bitter resentment. Why, she was not sure, yet she desperately wanted to befriend the vixen since she had been longing for a fellow female confidant opposed to the particular drunken, brazen-faced men that she had grown so accustomed to over the years.

Call her crazy, but Katerina truly, genuinely liked Faye, and it crushed her to realize that the feeling most definitely wasn't being reciprocated.

Bark! Bark! Bark!

Gasping, Katerina whirled around in utter consternation, only to find the sudden assailant to be none other than a small, beady-eyed Welsh corgi and its rather ridiculous-looking boy at its side.

Laughing at her easily-frightened nature, Katerina held out a hand for the dog to sniff, then smiled, greeting warmly towards the boy, "Hello....my name is Katerina Muscovitz, but, since that's rather long, you can just call me Kat. What's yours?"

The flaming redhead beamed, then wrapped his long, spindly arms about his torso, chanting erratically, "Ed is Edward Wong Hau Pepelu Tivrusky IV, reporting for duty, Captain Kit-Kat!"

"Oh! Well you're a girl!," Katerina exclaimed, now quite embarrassed as she placed a beautifully-manicured hand upon her bosom and let out a nervous laugh. "Y-you're also a very pretty girl, at that.....is this your dog?"

Edward nodded proudly. "Yep, yep, yeppy, Kit-Kat! Ein is Ein, and Ed is Ed! Friends for all eternity and never separated until the end!"

Katerina couldn't help but smile. It was, at that very moment, that she realized that she wasn't dealing with just any ordinary kid.

Ed was....well....Ed, and she couldn't help but be reminded of her distant cousin, Jamie, whom was as crazy as they come and completely obsessed with chickens.

Jamie had been, however, a surprisingly very good surrogate mother to Katerina. Ever since her parents' tragic, untimely deaths, Jamie had taken her under her wing (no pun intended) and had tried to make life as cushioned for Katerina as humanly possible.

Living on a chicken farm proved to be rather irritating at first, yet, over time, Katerina grew to love the senseless clucking and her cousin's off-the-wall manner and speech as much as any other child would love their own home and family.

Once puberty came into play, however, things were a completely different matter.

Katerina's breasts had ballooned to such an amazing size that she began to fear that if they got any bigger, she might just sink into the ground due to all of the unbearably extra weight.

When she told this to Jamie, however, her cousin had merely let out a loud, booming laugh and had wondered how on earth Katerina had been blessed with such a well-endowed bosom when she and her mother, on the other hand, had mere mosquito bites for breasts.

All of Katerina's ex-boyfriends had most certainly enjoyed her large assets, yet she hated being so damned buxom. It prevented her from being able to run long distances without pain, and often attracted the wrong type of crowd; for better or for worse.

In Asimov's case it had proven to be for the better, yet Katerina most certainly refused to believe that he had merely fallen in love with her for something so shallow as her breasts.

She had loved him in spite of his terrible addiction to drugs and his strong desire for alcohol, and would most certainly continue to do so for many years to come.

Katerina was, after all, supposed to be floating alongside him in limbo, yet now that all of her plans had been foiled, she no longer felt the tremendous desire to see Mars that she had had the few minutes before she had taken Asimov's life.

Casting her glistening gaze up towards the Heavens, Katerina fondly interlocked her fingers with Edward's tiny hand and smiled, urging gently, "C'mon, sweetheart....let's go back inside. I think Jet's done with dinner, by now."

"Oh, boy!," the young adolescent exclaimed at the top of her lungs, breaking loose of her new friend's grasp and somersaulting over towards the Bebop's entrance without even waiting for her to follow.

Laughing at this, Katerina smiled, then wistfully turned and gazed over her shoulder at the twinkling stars above.

Letting out a light-hearted sigh, she brought her fingers up to her lips, then extended them out towards the Heavens, acknowledging breathlessly into the cool night air, "Goodnight, my sweet Asimov."

A/N: Erm...so how was that??? Any good??? PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE REVIEW!!!!!! Only your support will make me continue, and I mean it! It gives me inspiration, so PLEASE give me some feedback! Thanks, I love you guys!!!!!!! :-D