Disclaimer: I do NOT own Cowboy Bebop…

Angel's Punishment

Chapter 5: Not exactly a pleasant surprise…

2074, Kenji Morimoto's Estate -Venus-

"…or should I call you Nemesis?"

Faye's eyes widened as he spoke the last word. Nemesis was the code name the RD used to identify her, she didn't choose it but she found it really fitting… after all, like the Greek goddess, her mission was to punish people who had done awful deeds and unfairly ruined other's lives; she was a wounded spirit seeking revenge.

Her right hand impulsively reached for the sword that was securely tied on her back, in a swift movement she had it out of its sheath and positioned in front of her. Both her slender hands were grasping tightly the hilt of the katana, its long sharp blade ready to strike at any moment.

Kenji looked at the sword, it was as beautiful as he remembered it, the girl had done a good job in not ruining it; but it didn't matter to him, he wanted that katana at all costs and nothing could stop him. Catching Faye off guard he turned on his left in a quick movement and gripped one of the Japanese swords he kept in his office; his skilled hands draw the blade up at eye level, and stared defiantly at his opponent, his lips still stirred up in an arrogant smirk.

"Wanna play, oh mighty goddess of revenge?" his low voice teased her as the sharp end of his katana pointed toward her.

The beautiful assassin didn't give him a verbal reply; instead she lunged herself at him, her strikes were fast and well aimed, but he wasn't a beginner and could stand up to her without any difficulties. Kenji noticed that, as he had imagined, she was very well trained and rapid in her movements, she was able to put all her rage and desperation in the force of her strikes, but that was her only strong point. What she had in rapidity, she lacked in technique… the blonde girl opposite him was probably in her mid- twenties and surely couldn't have the experience necessary to be an expert as he was with the art of the sword…

As he dodged one of her powerful attacks his mind relived some memories he had shared with Vicious, they had trained together and he remembered that the silver haired man was just like the woman he was fighting… full of energy and impulsive. But along the years something had changed in his friend, he entered in the RD and everything was different for him, especially after he had met with Spike Spiegel. Kenji had entered in the syndicate just because Vicious had asked him to, he hadn't seen him for three years but when Vicious had called him he couldn't refuse… after the showdown at the RD HQ and Vicious' death he had no more reasons to stay in the organization and decided to leave, mainly because now it would have been Spike Spiegel the leader, and he simply couldn't bear it.

"I don't really know why you're doing this… I'm not a dragon anymore…" he said attacking her with his blade just to have it stopped by hers.

"The Red Dragon is more like a charity organization, now…" he continued noticing she didn't reply.

"And as long as it will be led by that coward Spiegel, things won't change…" he said it without any purpose, he just wanted to disturb her concentration with his talking, but probably what he said was more than a little disturbing for her.

'Spike?' it was almost like her heart had stopped beating, how could that be? He was dead… buried on Venus not so far from Julia's grave… could it be that they had been wrong? Maybe he had been saved from the other members of the RD…

'STOP IT!' a voice inside her woke her from her wondering, it was the same cold voice that always haunted her, the voice of her rational part, that part she was used to obeying. And it was suggesting to her that probably since he knew she was Nemesis, he could even know she was Faye Valentine and he was using Spike just as a way to distract her.

'Spike's dead, Faye… stop hoping already' Faye heard the voice more clearly this time; but before she could regain complete control over her mind and body a tearing pain broke out on her right shoulder, she could feel the cold steel of the blade penetrate her flesh and tear it apart. Faye choked out a pained scream and looked wide eyed at the grinning man opposite her; she was about to let the katana slip down her manicured fingers but reached it with her left hand before it fell to the floor.

"Let's see how you can do left-handed…" he drew his weapon above his head before taking a step towards her as he took a swing at her injured figure, Faye managed to deflect his strike with her sword, but with the piercing pain on her shoulder and being forced to use the left hand, she could only try to defend herself.

The blue-eyed swordsman stepped back, giving to his opponent a moment of truce. Faye reached up to feel how bad the cut on her shoulder was, but didn't take her glare from the man in front of her; the wound was pretty deep and it was bleeding freely, it wouldn't take much time before she started to feel giddy… but she needed to finish what she had came to do. On the other side of the room Kenji was studying her and smiling to himself decided to push her control a little more over the edge, now that he had discovered her weak point… Spike Spiegel.

"Spike… just a bastard like him can have such a doggy name" he said looking into her deeply angered green eyes. Faye clenched her teeth and tightened her hold on the katana, she couldn't let him win just because he knew her weakness, and she couldn't let three years of her life get wasted just because of a name. It was time to put an end to this fight, and she would be the one who would do it.

The fake blonde wig was plastered against her forehead and was starting to annoy her as it kept getting into her eyes; she raised her good arm and took off the wig throwing it on the floor away from her. Kenji raised an eyebrow to her, he had to say that she looked better with her real hair color, and now that she had discarded the blonde wig he could almost say she looked familiar, and it was a strange feeling since he didn't know anybody who had deep violet hair.

'Doesn't happen so often to see such a beauty…' he thought, but he couldn't place where he had already seen her.

Taking advantage of his moment of inattention Faye attacked him with a swift strike to his head, but he recovered in time and stopped her blade just a few inches from his neck. He looked up from where their katana was entwined and fixed his gaze on her emerald irises, their ragged breath mingled and he could almost feel her heart hammering in her chest. The more he stared into the depths of her eyes the more he convinced himself he knew her; and then he saw it, he saw past the veil of anger in her eyes, he saw the wild flame of determination and life shone in her pupils. The same flame he had seen years before in a girl Vicious had kidnapped.

----- Flashback -----(A/N: set in session 5 – Ballad of Fallen Angels)

"Who's she?" Kenji asked to his younger boss coming into his office and noticing the tied up girl sitting on a chair; she seemed not so happy to be there and she didn't try to hide it as she moved incessantly on the chair sending infuriated glares to the men in the room.

"She's just a little incentive to get Spike here faster… right Miss Valentine?" Vicious' cold gray eyes looked in her direction and she tried to insult him through the gag on her mouth.

"Spiegel has always been the ladies' man…" he commented, suddenly regretting saying something like that in the presence of his silver-haired friend.

"Yeah… even when they were already taken" Vicious replied his cold gaze changing into a vacant stare, as his lips showed a sad smile.

----- End Flashback -----

His eyes widened with realization as the mysterious girl opposite him finally had a name, but that knowledge would have been useless to him because as soon as he tried to speak a bullet was shot into his chest. His sword slid down his palms onto the floor as he looked with a shocked expression at the hole in his upper body, and then back to the face of his murderer.

"It's not a doggy name…" were her last words to him as she stared at his body falling on its knees and then slowly went to lay on the cold floor, a bloody stream running down his lips.

Faye replaced her Glock into its holster on her thigh, and sheathed her katana on her back, before stepping out of the room gripping at the wound on her shoulder, trying to stop the blood from flowing out. Her footsteps could be already heard in the hallway when a dying Kenji Morimoto spoke one last word before falling into the abyss of death.

"Valentine…"

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Faye ran to the door in the back of the building where she knew she wouldn't have any problems getting away, she didn't find any guards in her path and wasn't surprised since they probably were all gathered in the room where she had shot their boss. She didn't know what could have made Morimoto be so careless, when she reached her gun with her aching arm she was almost sure he would have stopped her, but he didn't, and we all know well what had happened next.

The ex-bounty huntress found the small exit door on the perimeter wall open, thanks to the ability of a hacker she knew well (A/N: hinthint), and reached the Ducati 999 she had parked there the day before. Faye took off her leather jacket and bright green t-shirt, leaving her chest clad only in her black bra, she tore apart the t-shirt and bandaged her wounded shoulder tightly, at least she was sure it would stop bleeding leaving her the time to reach a place she needed to visit as soon as possible.

She wore a black tank top and replaced the skirt with a pair of jeans she had left the day before along with the motorbike. She couldn't wait a minute more; she put on her helmet and drove to the road that would take her to the graveyard. She needed to get there as fast as she could, she needed to get a hold on her raging emotions, she had to stop the butterflies that were messing around her stomach since Morimoto's lips spelled Spike's name.

Faye knew what it was that feeling that was nagging her heart, it was hope, and she had learnt long ago that hope was a sneaky emotion… since she was a child everyone she met would say to her things like: 'your eyes are the color of hope: green'… she grew up with a great faith in hope. But every time she had hoped something good happened in her life, her faith would be betrayed, and at the point she was now, hope was a sentiment she happened very rarely to feel. And when she felt it all she could do was reach that desolate cemetery and deny every little flame of hope with the power of truth.

The florist was watering his flowers when he noticed the familiar black motorbike stop in front of the massive metal gate of the graveyard, he stared as the woman got off of it and walked toward his shop. The old man prepared two red roses; she knew already that the woman would ask them; the dark haired lady nodded to the florist and got the flowers after paying, the older man smiled to her and watched as she disappeared past the gate.

The florist knew well that strange girl, she had come almost every two weeks for the past three years, she would buy two roses and then take them to some graves; he was tempted to ask her about this weird habit, but as soon as he saw the sad expression on her face he bit his tongue and let the girl confront her ghosts alone… after all, from the vacant look in her eyes the old florist could tell that girl was used to deal with ghosts.

2074, Red Dragon HQ, Technological Division - Tharsis city - Mars-

---- Few days later----

A man in his mid- thirties was pacing back and forth in the technological laboratory of the RD; he was bald with deep brown eyes, almost black, and he wore glasses. He was clad in the characteristic black business suit with a dark gray shirt and red tie.

"Did we have something, or she erased it all, like always?" he suddenly asked the younger woman sitting at the computer.

"The cameras didn't record anything of the fight… but I believe this time our infallible assassin did a little mistake" the blonde woman answered with a mischievous smile.

"What?" the man inquired with a grave tone.

"Come and take a look at this…" she pointed at the screen opposite her "initially I didn't notice anything, but looking at it for the second time I saw that Morimoto seems to be saying something…"

"Can you work out what he's saying?" he asked looking at the record with curious eyes.

"He's saying 'Valentine'… I'm not sure but maybe he knew her, maybe she was in the syndicate before, or they've done something to her, or her family in the past and he recognized her."

"Find everything you can about this name, Leila… this is our turning point, after three years we finally have something, and I'm sure she's nearer than we could imagine…"

"Do you believe I should tell the good news to Mr. Spiegel?" she asked looking into his deep eyes.

"Keep it between us for now… I don't trust him completely."

"Ok, Maxim, I won't say anything…"

"Thanks…" he replied smiling to her before leaving the room.

A/N: so, was it good? Bad? Tell me in a review!