Disclaimer: As always, Cowboy Bebop and all its characters belong to Sunrise, Inc. and its creative geniuses. Please forgive me if Spike seems a little out of character on this or any of my other CB stories. My flair for the dramatic sometimes gets to be too much. Much love to any readers kind enough to leave me reviews.
I never wanted to pretend I'm something that I'm not. Yet somehow, I managed to land here, with a group of sideshow circus freaks starving for a bounty and us all living in our own emotional hells. It's kind of ironic, considering my track record of starting out as one of the bad guys and ending as one chasing them down for a living. It's funny how life can come full-circle sometimes. Bad man to good man trying to redeem himself, living by whatever orders he gives himself to get by in this waste of time called life, or some crap like that.
In my mind, however, things hadn't always been like that. A person with the will to become a Red Dragon never questioned his orders once he was proved himself and was IN. To be IN meant you'd be eternally grateful for the protection of the Syndicate, and willing to do whatever you could to protect it. Even if it meant your life. The Syndicate was always right; to deny that was to deny the air filtering in and out of your lungs. Either way meant death.
When I was young and still stealing fruit from the street vendors on Mars, I wasn't exactly sure what the Syndicate was. All I knew was that I wanted to be one of its members: men in the long trench coats with the rich clothes and a sense of danger hovering about them like the young women who hang on an old millionaire, sipping champagne and giggling like idiots.
The day Mao Yenrai caught me trying to pickpocket him was probably the best and worst day of my life. The small Asian man grabbed my arm, and instead of threatening to cut it off like most of my other victims had, he smiled down at me.
Panicking, I struggled to get out of his grasp. I had lived on the streets for 6 years since my father had died when I was only five, but it had given my young mind the insight to know that a smile could be more dangerous than a sneer from a stranger.
Instead of taking me into a back alley like I feared, Mao took me to his headquarters, and I had my first view of the giant building that housed my future. The Red Dragons took me in. I had Mao to vouch for me, even though he was only just a rising star in the business, people listened to him.
Before I knew it, I was one of the trench coats. Mao took me into his lavish apartment, and became the father I had lost so many years ago. The years went well for me. I suppose that's all I can really say now.
I learned to fight, I learned to shoot, and I learned to view the Red Dragons as my home and family. In short, life was good. A little too good, perhaps. I was never really able to trust any of my fellow Dragons, but then I met Vicious.
Two years younger than my scant 17 years, Vicious was the opposite of everything I had become. Where I excelled with a gun, he ruled with the sword. Looking back, I suppose it would be fair to say he was jealous of me, but I had no idea at the time. Being taken in at such an early age-especially under the wing of Mao-I had quickly became the beloved child, and had no wish to give up my position within the Syndicate.
Vicious had no chance. He came in off the streets much as I had, but on his own accord. I never did learn much about his past; maybe he trusted others about as much as I did. Nevertheless, we became fast friends.
Known for his vicious swordsmanship and quick thinking in a fight, the white-haired mystery soon became as well-known as I was, but there was a difference. Everyone feared him. Where I would laugh and smile at a joke, he would simply glare until the joke teller found some polite excuse to remove themselves from his presence. Once, he admitted to me that this pleased him to no end. I had merely shook my head and smiled, somewhat afraid myself to see the cold glint in his eyes.
More years flew by, and Vicious and I had grew to be like brothers. We always watched each other's back in a fight. Sometimes it was eerie how we would move, back-to-back, like a two-headed serpent striking out at its enemies. I never questioned my loyalty to Vicious, or his to mine. We were a team, only to be separated upon death.
I guess the beginning of the end started the day Mao chose me to head up a group whose objective was revenge on a band of thugs who had the balls to jump one of our own men out for a stroll one night. The Dragon, Briez Whitman, was still in the hospital, recovering from a broken right leg, fractured left arm, and a stab wound to his right side.
It was supposed to be a simple job, really. All I had to do was lead my band into the hideout, and wait until the gang leader made an appearance. From there, it would be easy to give him a taste of Red Dragon vengeance and send a warning to the rest of his thugs and any other criminal scumbags that we would not put up with their antics. Sounds easy, right? Wrong.
From the beginning, I had a feeling in my gut that something was different. Not really wrong, but somehow like the air had changed on this showdown, and I didn't like it. I tried to keep my cool in front of my men, but Vicious as my right-hand was acting strangely himself.
The leader of the gang crawled out of his hole around 5:03pm. By 5:10, he was dead and the mission was over. Valadez, one of my men, had gotten himself shot in the left shoulder scuffling with one of the gang leader's underlings. But aside from a few scrapes and bruises, everyone was fine. Except me.
Oh, physically I was fine. The adrenaline was still pumping when I got back to my own apartment, and I shucked off my gun and holster as I dropped my coat and shucked off my boots. My hands were shaking as I sank down onto my bed. Vicious had openly defied my order to not expose himself until I took the first shot.
Thankfully, the white-haired man was a decent shot, and he got the leader right in the forehead. I had held back while my men ran in, cursing Vicious' action under my breath. My best friend... God, why? He hadn't exactly betrayed me, but I felt like he had anyway. To make a fool of me in front of my men, on my first command mission! I sat on the edge of my bed for a long time that night, wondering what had gotten into him.
At last, I dropped back onto the deep red comforter. Vicious would have to be dealt with in the morning; by then I'd have things under control, just the way I liked it. With a sigh, I crawled up to my pillows and fell into a deep troubled sleep filled with dream images of white-haired demons with cold eyes full of hatred.