"Alchemy, Parts One and Two" A/N: My apologies for sticking an Earth song that will probably be long lost to the universe past the 21st century in here, but it's an in-joke with myself and I couldn't resist.

KARMA: Alchemy, Part I

Spike makes dinner.

He's not a good cook, but he knows how to make edible food out of inedible not-food, so he does that. Basically, you put things in hot grease until it sizzles and tans, and then you eat it.

"Where's Faye?" Jet asks.

"Off somewhere being a pain in the ass to herself and everyone around her," Spike mutters, breaking an egg over the skillet. He relents when he catches Jet's expression. "She's just run off again. Hey, do we own a spatula?"

"She could be anywhere," Jet says. He intercepts the broken eggshell Spike throws over his shoulder and flicks it sharply into a wastebasket. Spike sees this out of the corner of his right eye and grins.

"Well, she's got no money, no gas, and no place to go, so give her a few hours to cool off and she'll be back. She's like that cat in that song."

"Cat? Song? For a man who hates cats, you sure got a lot a lore stored up about 'em." Jet hands him a bent and rusted spatula that looks like it'd been used as a hammer at some point in the past. Spike shrugs and uses the flatter side to flip the egg. The yolk breaks, running into the hot grease, turning opaque. Jet sighs and bites. "Okay, what song?"

"You know." Spike inflicts Jet with his singing voice, tuneless at best, a flat roar at worst. "'The cat came back, he didn't want to roam, the very next day it was home sweet home.' Something about this cat nobody wants and they keep dumping it places and it keeps turning up 'til finally they just get over it and keep the damn thing."

Spike scrapes the fried egg onto the spatula and realizes he forgot to grab a plate. As he turns around to find one, the egg begins to slide, trembling gelatinous white headed down. Jet shoves a plate under it before the last egg on the Bebop becomes a tiny slimy floor mat.

"I'd'a just shot the varmint, but Earth people were real sentimental before their moon blew up," Spike says, eating the egg directly off the plate. It's still hot from the grease. He sucks in air to cool his burning tongue.

"What did you do to piss her off this time? Dammit, Spike, I keep telling you not to needle that wench. Every time she pulls a dash I gotta check the whole damn Bebop to make sure she didn't screw us again." Jet surveys what Spike has done to his kitchen and frowns. "Get the hell out of here while I clean this up and make us something to eat, wouldja please?"

"I didn't do anything," Spike says, re: both Faye and the kitchen. "That twitch gets annoyed you so much as tell her it's Wednesday." He puts the plate on the counter nowhere near the sink. "'Sides, she didn't pull anything this time. She bailed quicker than usual."

Jet moves the plate to the sink with the patience of a man who does this too often to fight over it, the metal of his cybernetic arm clicking against the metal of the plate. "And you're supposed to be in bed," he grouses.

"Yeah, yeah," Spike says, lighting a cigarette as he wanders off.

KARMA: Alchemy, Part II

The hangar smells of old cooking when Faye brings the Redtail, sputtering on the last of its fuel rods, back in. It's too late to expect any for herself and with Spike mobile, there's no way there'd be leftovers, but Faye creeps into the darkened kitchen to forage.

"So where'd you go this time? Blow the money from the safe playing pachinko slots on Ganymede?"

Faye startles at Jet's rough voice. Fire flares as he lights a cigarette. The glow gilds the metal fingers of his cybernetic hand and sparks in one gray eye.

"I didn't take anything from the safe and you know I don't have any woolongs for a Gate jump. I just drifted on the ice rings for awhile and then came back. Don't worry so much." She opens the little fridge and takes out a can of—she looks at the label in the cold light—baked beans? Oh well. She pops the top and tips the can into her mouth.

"Your charge was up and about," he says.

"What, the hairball? Yeah, sure, I know that," she says, licking the can clean as she kicks the fridge door shut.

"I figured if anyone could keep him in bed, it'd be you." Jet's voice is bland as baby food.

Faye slams the can onto the counter. "And what exactly is that supposed to mean?"

"Nothin'. Generally speaking, the guy goes out of his way to keep from tangling with you. Figured he'd possum up until you got bored baby-sitting him and found something else to do."

"You know damn well that Spike actually goes out of his way to tangle with me," Faye says. "Or at least he acts like it." She leans against the counter and accepts Jet's lighter for her own cigarette. The only illumination in the kitchen is their small, burning coals.

"He oughta thank you."

"What for? We played card games 'til even I was bored out of my mind." This darkness is good but also dangerous. Faye senses that both she and Jet find the dark freeing: that things can be said here, with their faces hidden from each other, that ought not be said at all. She should walk away, but she's curious, and her curiosity has always trumped her better sense.

"You sat with him for two months straight, just like you always sit with him when he drags his busted ass back in here to be fixed up."

"And when he wakes up, I usually sock him with a pillow. Not exactly the act of a Florence Nightingale."

"A what?"

Faye doesn't explain. She gets bored, sometimes, sharing her old-world knowledge with people who really ought to be wheeling her wizened body around in a chair by now. Besides, Jet has her story second-hand, probably from Spike or from whatever he's pieced together himself, and the last thing she wants to do is run through it all again.

"Whatever. Why do you do it, Faye?" Jet asks.

"Who proclaimed today 'Ask Faye Dumb Questions' day?" Faye stomps one foot, the sound echoing through the silent, sleeping ship. "How in the hell should I know why I do it? I just do, that's all."

"Keep your voice down," Jet says automatically. They'd gotten into the habit over the last two months of behaving as though they were in a hospital—especially that one nightmarish week when Spike had tossed in fever dreams, screaming the names of his dead. Jet had been two steps away from having the ship shriven for ghosts after that, Faye remembers.

"Right," she whispers.

"Look, all I'm sayin' is, if he's ever said anything nice to or about you, I wasn't there for it. Watch yourself, Faye," Jet says. The coal of his cigarette bobs and rises a few feet in the air as Jet stands.

"You're both neck and neck in the pissing-me-off race," she says, annoyed by his concern, as she usually is. "I always watch myself. And for your information, the only person on this ship who ever made a habit of sucking up to me is on Earth getting beaned by moon meteors."

"Ed can take care of herself. Get some rest. I'm getting you up early tomorrow. Big bounties to catch, a universe of riches." Jet's voice fades in the distance, riding the tang of his smoke back to her.