Disclaimer: acts all disclaimer-y
MystikalCherryBlossom: is annoyed okay fine fine... i do not own Spike, Faye, Jet, or any of those good folks. ummm... i DO own Ryan grins evilly and yeah... enjoy this chapter folks! i am going to update it a bit after the next chapter goes up. i think i'll have to... lol
Ryan: you own me eh? we'll just see about that one...
Julia walked downstairs about 3:45. She ran into Spike as she walked into the living room. "Spike! what happened last night?" He grinned. "It's a long story. Have you seen Jet?" Julia thought for a minute before answering.
"I think he went over to the pool, I'm not quite sure though." Spike smiled. "Works for me. I'll be over at the pool if you need me."
I went back to my house to change into my bathing suit. When I came back out, I had to run all the way back. As I ran around the corner, I almost crashed headlong into 2 girls on roller blades. They screamed and scattered out of the way. Jet laughed and called after them.
"Hey, kids, she cant hurt you, I mean it's not like she's on her bike or anything like that." The two girls smiled and introduced themselves and apologized for being in the way to begin with. As we were talking I heard someone dive into the pool. I looked over and sure enough you could see somebody was swimming underwater.
"Who was that?" I asked Jet.
"Hell if I know. So who is going to head our operation now that Spike is gone?" We suddenly heard the sound of somebody clearing their throat. We whirled to face the dripping figure who was leaning on the side of the pool grinning.
"What, do you people have something against me heading the operation? And who said anything about me being gone? I'm getting the feeling that you guys don't like me too much anymore." He sighed.
Jet and me looked at each other for a minute.
"Spike… are you a ghost or are you really here?" I asked. He flashed a smile at me.
"Yeah, I'm really here. You thought I was dead?"
"Uh well…"
"I thought so. That tells me how much faith you guys have in me. Well you were right, I was dead. Was being the operative word. But at least I finally took care of that guy."
I stared at him. "Hey, didn't you get hurt at all?"
"Yeah I did. But when I… came back to life, all that was hurt was my jacket and shirt. Oh well, guess I got lucky that time."
I laughed. "This makes 3 times that you've been dead. You can thank Vicious for the first 2 times and Mad Moody for this time." Spike looked at me.
"No, thank my stupidity for the first time." I looked at him.
"You? Stupid! Don't make me laugh." He got out of the pool and walked over to me.
"Samantha, everyone has their stupid moments. Me included. Nobody's perfect you know." With that he turned around and began to dive into the pool. I snuck up behind him and pushed him into the pool. Unfortunately, he grabbed my hand and pulled me in the pool after him.
"Son of a bitch! Why'd you do that?" He laughed and shook his hair out of his face.
"'Every action has an opposite and equal reaction'. Don't you know Newton's laws? 'Every action has an equal and opposite reaction.'You push, I pull and laugh my ass of at your lack of grace."
"Idiot", I muttered.
"Hey, Mind if I join you guys?" We turned around. Julia stood there carrying a towel. Spike grinned at me.
"Sure" we chorused. She grinned at all three of us and set her towel on a lawn chair. Julia dove gracefully into the pool. Spike grinned at me again.
"Remember what I said about your lack of grace. Use Julia as your example." With that, he swam off. We spent the entire day at the pool. Spike ended up throwing both me and Julia in to the pool a lot. I landed wrong each time, but amazingly Julia kept her grace, somehow being able to turn the fall into a dive each time.
Later that night, I was already at the shop for our night time meetings when I noticed Ryan was acting very strangely. Instead of his normal bitchy self, he was acting very nicely towards me. Lennon noticed that too and she didn't even begin to hesitate to make fun of him for it.
"Aww, little Ryan finally finished his PMS stage. I'm so proud." Ryan turned blood-red. Then he turned to me.
"Doesn't that slut ever turn off? Any ways I have a birthday present for you. Follow me." We went outside together. It was a beautiful perfect summer night. There was a full moon and the stars shone brightly. Ryan turned to face me.
"Here you go, I got you a new pocket knife." He handed it to me and I gasped; it was the exact same one I had been looking longingly at in the Serrie's knife shop in Tharsis on Mars.
"Ryan… I don't know what to say. I never expected anything this nice from you." I didn't notice how close he'd gotten to me and when I looked up, our faces were less than an inch away from each other. He smiled a nervous smile and kissed me.
"You see that?" Spike and everyone else were inside watching us through the back door. "That's why he's been so damn nervous. Poor Samantha, she looks like she's in worse shape than he is in."
Julia smiled. "At least he's finally being nice to her." Spike put his hands on Julia's shoulders. "Yeah no kidding." He pulled her face close enough to kiss and kissed her.
Ryan pulled away and I started to calm down. My heart was beating so fast I thought I was hyperventilating.
"Well", he said nervously. "I got to go, I have a shit load of homework to do. See you later." And with that, he hurried inside.
The next day when I went outside, all my friends noticed that I was a little nervously happy. Sally was the one who brought it to attention.
"What's up with you?" she asked. "It's like you're on top of the world or something. Well? What happened?" I looked at her.
"Oh nothing of any interest. But something great happened to me last night. I got a great birthday present from my friend Ryan. Remember I told you about him?"
Sally looked at me. "What did you get?" I pulled out my new pocket knife and showed it to her. She recoiled when I pulled it out. "But where did he get it?" I grinned at her.
"Serrie's knife shop in Tharsis City. It's a very prestigious store. All their stuff if so expensive thought but it's good quality, so this'll last a while."
"Can I hold it?"
"Um, I guess so, just be careful." She took it and looked it over.
"Wow, this is really pretty. Hey I got a question, when do we all get to meet this guy, and how old is he?"
"I don't know exactly when you'll get to meet him, and he's 14. But he is so nice- the exact opposite of Chad." Sally and Anna looked at each other.
"I bet he's your boyfriend." Anna said annoyingly.
"No he's not." I vehemently protested.
"Oh come on, admit it." I glared at Anna and shook my fist at her.
"I'm not telling you something that's not true. But I'll tell you this much- he likes me I think." "Ah ha, I TOLD you…"
"Anna, I'm not saying we're going out or anything. He hasn't even asked me out." Just then, Stephanie walked outside (Author's Note: I only added her to the Washington part of my story for fun and games).
"Hi Samantha, what's up?" Sally and Helen burst out with
"Samantha's got a boyfriend" before I could stop them.
"I do not, leave Ryan out of this." Stephanie started laughing.
"Of course you don't have a boyfriend. Not a cute one anyway. I bet I have a cuter boyfriend than you do." I stared.
"YOU HAVE A BOYFRIEND! Since when?" she smiled.
"Since last week. So can I meet this 'Ryan' guy? Is he nice? What does he look like?" I sighed. "Ryan is not my boyfriend… he's just a really good friend."
"Yeah, that's why you're blushing."
"Oh shut up. Anyway, I think he's cute, he's really sweet, and if you want to, you can come over to the shop later today and meet him." Stephanie smiled.
"Thanks, I'll meet you at the park about 4:30. You can take me there then." With that, she turned on her heel, and left.
At 4:30, she was actually waiting for me. I groaned inwardly and walked over to her.
"You'll need your bike, its pretty far away." She grinned.
After about 15-20 minutes, we arrived at the shop. Ryan ran to greet me, holding a paper. "Samantha, you are not gonna believe this, they're letting me take the SATs early. I'm not even supposed to think about them until next year! Oh uh hi there." His excitement was interrupted by Stephanie putting in an appearance.
Later, at our late night meeting, everyone ditched after about 5 minutes. Spike said he had to take a shower; Julia said she had to go to bed so that left me and Ryan alone together. Ryan sat down next to me and opened his calculus book. Then he slammed it shut, making me jump. "You know what's weird? We started off as enemies now and we're really close." I blushed.
"Yeah. I remember how we met…
I pulled up at the Spaceport and sighed. The transport wasn't supposed to arrive for another 20 minutes but I went inside anyway. I walked straight up to the reception desk and talked to the receptionist.
"Has the 3:15 transport shuttle arrived from Tharsis yet?" I asked.
"It was actually 2 hours early because they're doing major overhauls on the gates." She said. "Are you waiting or looking for someone?"
"Yeah, I'm looking for a guy about the same age as me."
"Oh, him. Poor kid has been sitting there for about 2 hours."
I closed my eyes for a second. "Oh shit… well I'm here to pick him up now. Does he have anything with him?"
The lady sighed. "Nope, just that little backpack. No suitcases, bags, nothing. It's kind of sad he traveled all that way without any food…"
By this time, I had heard quite enough. I walked over to the hunched figure sitting on a bench and poked him lightly. He looked up and I could see bruises on his cheeks and the black eye he had. Otherwise, he might've been handsome. His black hair was a tousled mess, clothes were basically rags, they were so threadbare and his hands had fresh cuts on them. He also had sadness welled in his eyes, but was too proud looking to really show it.
"What? Am I loitering or something?" he asked. His voice was very close to Spike's voice, but a little younger.
I sighed. "Ryan Speigal?"
"Who wants to know?"
"A friend of your brother's. He asked me to come get you."
He looked away. "Yeah I'm Ryan. Who the hell are you? 'A friend' tells me nothing."
I held out my hand. "I'm Samantha. Nice to finally meet you… Spike has been talking a lot about you in the last few days-"
Ryan stood up and I noticed he was just as lanky and almost as tall as his brother. "If you don't mind, I'd rather talk on the way home, wherever that is. I… I haven't eaten in 3 days. I'd like to do something about these cuts and my face must be swollen to all hell."
"Oh, of course, I'm really sorry. Follow me."
We walked out to my car and got in. He held his backpack on his lap and I could see more of his badly cut and bruised arms.
"Um, if you don't mind me asking, what happened to you?"
He sighed and tilted his head back against the seatback. "I came from an orphanage in Tharsis City… my mother owns it and she placed me in it when I was 4. The kids there aren't treated like they are in normal orphanages, we have to work hard just for a meal. When you don't do enough work…" he closed his eyes, but continued anyway. "when you don't work hard enough or long enough, they beat you. No meals."
"Your own mother put you in that hellhole? What about clothes and bathing privileges?"
He gave a wan smile. "Clothes? Ha. Once every 2 years if you're lucky. Bathing is only when the smell gets to the wardens. Since I was being sent out, they hosed me down and tried to make me look pretty. Why? Do I still smell like dirt and clay?"
"No, I was wondering about the hair…"
Ryan laughed at that one. "Oh, this mess? They don't issue brushes to males. Only the girls. It's actually kind of sexist there, the girls are treated great. 3 meals a day, clothes every 3 months and they actually get to pick them. When the girls are adopted out, they don't have to do any work for 2 weeks leading up to that. With us… am I rambling?"
I blinked and looked over at him. "Nope. I just can't believe how badly you were treated."
"What do you care? You have probably never had to work for a meal."
"I care because I hate seeing people treated this way."
"Whatever. Like I was saying, with us, it's up at 4 everyday. Breakfast for those who earned it and beatings for those who didn't. Then, it's off to the sad excuse for a school they have there and we spend about 6 to 7 hours learning basic stuff. After that, we spend from 2 until 9 doing hard labor and then we're hosed down and sent to bed."
"How long were you there?"
He sighed and kneaded his hands together. "10 years. I'm 14. I haven't had a birthday, a real birthday since I was 3. My supposed birthday was 4 days ago." He shrugged.
I pulled the car in front of the shop and stopped. "Why don't you go ahead and go inside. Rose will have a look at those cuts and bruises and you can eat something."
Ryan gave me a long look. I couldn't tell if it was gratitude or spite. "Thanks I guess. And sorry about the sob story, I tend to ramble when I don't eat. I usually get hit for it."
"It's okay… just eat something."
I came in after I'd run the errands I left for. Ryan was sitting at the big table eating. He looked a lot better than when I'd first seen him. His hair was damp and actually kind of long, the actual color of it was dark brown and it was now shiny. His hands had scars, something I was surprised at Rose for. He was also looking at a booklet with the word "Fairview" written on it in big letters.
"What's that?" I asked.
"High School course guide. Spike wants me to go there. Unfortunately I have to be tested before I can be enrolled."
"I just got tested to see where I'd be if I went to a real school… I place at 12th grade reading level!"
"Well goodie for you, " he said sourly. "I have no idea what level I'm gonna place at. What education I got was really crappy, but I am good at figuring things out, so there may be hope yet."
I sighed and walked off.
A few days later, Spike informed us that Ryan was joining the team. I sighed. Me and Ryan were not getting along at all and he was supposed to be my partner when Jim was gone. Gene, Melfina, Aisha and Suzuka had left on a mission and Jim was scheduled to join them. Our first bounty with Ryan on the team was a tough one but we made it… but not before I got hurt protecting Ryan. My arm was partially immobilized and all Ryan did was bitch at me.
"I don't need people protecting me! Especially a girl!"
"I saved your life you ungrateful asshole!"
"Oh bullshit, I could've just as easily taken that bullet…"
That argument continued for about an hour and even the bounty was getting annoyed. Spike decided to separate us and make Alex my partner until he went back to live with his parents in November. After November, who knew what was going to happen.