Here's the update, please enjoy!
* * * Ch. 3 – IS THERE A GHOST? (Band of Horses) * * *
Tarbell ended up being just what the Bebop needed. Jet was able to purchase some parts for the ship; Ed upgraded her computer; and I got to buy the good kind of cigarettes. I don't know what exactly Faye got out of it. New shoes is my best guess, but who knows.
Haven gotten to work together again really helped us to get true normalcy back. It's not there completely, but it is significantly less strained. Everything still isn't right. And it's impossible for it to be. Jet still continues to talk about those stupid cats. Ed refuses to say the word July. Faye. Well, Faye is Faye. I can't figure out what she's thinking most of the time now, so I just give up on it.
The only time I really know what she's thinking is when she talks to Jet. Like right now, I can hear them chatting from the room next door. I bet they think that I'm still sleeping. And I had been at one point, but Ein woke me up and it's inevitable for me not to hear them now.
"I think that it's just better if we didn't have to work together," Faye tells Jet. "You know how things go. Just last time. He…I—"
Jet snickers quietly. "Things went fine Faye," he responds. "Is that what bothers you?"
Faye doesn't answer.
"…Those things. Just give them time. They're bound to get better for you."
"It's easy for you to say that!" Faye says, probably louder than she had intended because there is a sudden second of silence and then she mumbles something ending with "after him like an idiot."
"That…it doesn't make you the idiot," Jet says very clearly, as if trying to make sure she understood it well.
"I know that now," Faye answers shortly.
It doesn't surprise me. But actually hearing it, I can't help but feel guilty…I guess it's human for me to feel this way. Although, it's not like the feeling eats me. I may feel guilty. But it's nothing compared to the urge I had to follow back then. And to be honest, I still feel that urge, and it's still stronger than the guilt…even if it's completely useless now.
I sit up quietly and pick up my coat from the arm of the couch. I walk out of the room and leave the Bebop to roam around in the streets. I don't return until the remorse has faded and by the next morning, what I have heard has already sunk in and it doesn't bother me anymore. All I have left again is Julia.
I lay in bed although it's already past ten in the morning. I can't sleep at all, so I'm hoping that somehow just resting my body will be enough. My eyes feel so tired. I lay my arm over them to force myself to keep them shut. Rather than helping any though, my mind starts to wander again. It seems all I can do is think. But I just want to sleep.
As I lay there, I remember her over and over. And I remember how we kissed and how we touched and...I'm so tired.
I wish I could forget her. I wish that I wasn't here. I just…wish that I could sleep.
For days, no matter how much I wish and hope, nothing ever changes and I'm still tired. Then, a wonderful thing happens: I can't sleep but I'm not awake either. I enter a strange state of insomnia that manages to keep me going. Because of it, I can continue thinking about her while simultaneously doing everything else that I need to take care off.
I live like this for over two years.
But before I realize it, I can't remember her like I used to anymore. Regardless of how much time I'd spent trying to assure I didn't forget her. I can feel her slowly fading away from me, like she's a ghost that's became bored of haunting me.
To make things worse, all the advice I've ever been given comes back to me whether I want it or not. See the glass half full, not half empty. Don't cry over spilt milk. Better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all. Everyone's advice: my mother's, the stranger's from the liquor store, and, of course, Jet's.
I've never completely listened to anything they've said. But now, it all seems to make sense. I should have listened to my mother when she told me to make something of myself. I should have listened to that stranger about the hangover I would get if I bought that cheap bottle. I should have listened to Jet and his stupid cats.
But. The thing with advice is that it never really helps like you want it to. It never makes you feel any better or continues to give you hope. It never changes anything. No matter how much you take all that stupid advice, no matter how much you mull things over trying to apply it, by the end of the day that pit in the bottom of your stomach is still there. Your chest still feels cold and there is nothing you can do to change the feeling.
That's what advice does. It makes you realize that there is nothing you can do to change what has happened. It doesn't make you feel any better. It takes every hope or thought and then breaks it down to nothing.
Advice tells you that you're wrong.
It shoves your face so hard into reality that it's impossible to continue ignoring it. And when you admit reality, that's when advice really kicks in. By accepting what has transpired, you accept that you're wrong.
I can't change what has happened. I can't go back. There's nothing I can do now.
Before I realize it, I can't continue thinking that what I've so strongly believed is right. I'm wrong. That's all there is to it. What I've been doing. How I've been thinking. It's all wrong. And I can't go back.
My mother was right. That stranger was right. Jet is right.
Time really does have a way of changing things. I thought I'd be immune to it, advice or time, whatever it is that is responsible for this change. But I'm not. No matter how hard I try to continue keeping my feelings alive–I'm wrong.
Reaching this mindset, it's not a pleasant thing. I have no purpose so it feels like a waste to even be alive. It's like I'm being cheated out of something. But I don't know exactly what that something is. And I'm not sure whether I want to find it again or not.
This way of thinking seems to have only one redeeming quality: sleep.
I'm sitting on the yellow couch looking through some bounty reports. I take a drag out of my cigarette and flip a page. Faye walks through as if looking for something. I flip another page. Another drag.
The words on the sheets start to blur. I rest myself on the arm of the couch and support my head with the palm of my hand. I've read through a paragraph, but I don't remember anything of it so I look through it again. My eyelids feel heavy. The words turn into a gray mass spread over the sheets and I can't even make them out anymore. I blink trying to get some focus back, but I…
"Fuck!" I say jolting awake.
I shake the butt of the cigarette away from my burning hand. Drop the bounty reports on the ground. And quickly stand up to step on the cigarette.
The knuckles of my hand sting. I stare at the burns on the side of my two smoking fingers and curse again. The pain only seems to increase as I look at the wound. Instinctively, I place the burns against my lips. After a few seconds and a few more curses, the hurting becomes commonplace and I kneel down to pick up the sheets from the floor. I sit down again and try to organize the papers.
"Have you seen my purse?" Faye asks walking into the living room.
"What?" I say, my fingers still against my lips.
She looks at me oddly. "My silver purse…I can't find it. Have you seen it?" she asks again.
"It's in the kitchen," I say flatly while continuing to collate the papers.
"That's right…" she mumbles and starts to walk away.
I face her as she moves and notice that today she's opted to wear her dark blue dress. Her hair is pinned up and her skin is bare from the base of her hair to her lower back. I call her and she turns around. The dark neckline of her dress makes her skin look nearly translucent.
"It's by the toaster," I tell her.
"What's it doing there?" she says.
"How should I know?" I respond, "It's your purse after all."
As she leaves, I think I see a small imperfection on her skin. Just where her collarbone meets her shoulder, there's a suck mark. Is she aware of that? I wonder, did it come from the same guy she's seeing tonight, or is it from someone different. The longer I wonder, the more I realize that I shouldn't have noticed.
My fingers sting but I feel like smoking just the same. I place the bounty reports down on the coffee table and, just as I do that, Ed comes from the kitchen carrying a large bowl of dry cereal on her head. She sits it down besides the papers and takes a handful of the bright shapes into her mouth. She turns on her computer as she tries to chew and swallow.
"Is Jet back?" I ask her.
She tries to answer, but the cereal in her mouth prevents anything but a colorful powder to come out of her lips. Instead, she just shakes her head no.
I make my way out to the deck of the Bebop. Maybe if I smoke standing up, I won't fall asleep. The sky is turning darker. It must be around seven.
I've resorted to seeing what others do to make time pass a little faster and a little more eventful. It keeps me momentarily distracted from my problems, and more importantly, it keeps me from going mad out of boredom.
It's a calm afternoon. There a few people walking about, but for the most part, nothing much happens. A black car stops nearby. The motor on it keeps running and no one steps out. It stays there for nearly five minutes and nothing changes.
Having appeased my nicotine urge, I decide to head inside again. I enter the ship just as Faye is walking out. I catch a glimpse of her shoulder and notice that there was no mark there anymore. Had I been hallucinating? I don't let it bother me and we walk past each other nearly ignoring that the other exists.
There is nothing to eat for dinner but dry cereal or ramen. I don't really feel hungry, but I know I should eat something. I boil some water and prepare myself a cup of ramen. I join Ed in the living room and continue reading the bounty reports.
At around eight thirty, Jet comes back. He'd gone to cash in the latest bounty we had captured and he returned with groceries. After he had put everything up, he also came to sit in the living room. He sat next to me and gave me my share from the cashed bounty.
"Is Faye around?" he asks.
"No."
"Do you know when she'll be back?"
"No."
Jet sighs. "You two," he says before allowing his voice to fade away.
I shrug my shoulders.
I don't know what he's expecting Faye and I to act like. I thought that he would be satisfied if, for the most part, we just pretend we'd forgotten what had happened. Anyway, it's not like Faye and I despise each other.
Well, I guess I don't have the right to say that. I should say, I don't not like Faye. I don't hate her either. Though, it wouldn't seem unlikely if she hated me. It's weird realizing that the same stupid event had two entirely differing effects. Back then, for me, confessing to Faye what I thought at that time made me feel a bit closer to her. But for Faye, I presume the same scenario pushed her further away from me…So now, the one person that at one point I believed could understand what I thought, hates me.
But it's not right for me to generalize her feelings into just that. The truth is, I have no idea what she thinks of me anymore. It's extremely annoying, mostly because now she seems able to read me particularly well. Though I would like to believe I don't know how it became like this, I can't even convince myself of the lie.
I feel egotistical thinking of this as the reason, but I think Faye's just decided to stop wasting her energy in someone like me. She severed whatever connection we had. That's why I can't understand her anymore. And it's also exactly why she can understand me so well.
What kind of shit is that?
I'm so selfish thinking all of this is just about me. I'm nearly sure that that's not the only reason anymore, but I can't figure out the rest. So that's all I'm left with. It's all I know. Just that.
Besides, it's not like anything we had was much of anything to begin. I don't think that neither Faye nor I have ever understood what connection is between us. Keeping things that way, so unclear and often troublesome, though it's a pain, I think is the only thing we know how to do.
When Faye returns at 2:20-something in the morning, she ignores that I have fallen asleep on the yellow couch. As for me, I pretend that the echo of her stilettos and the thick stench of alcohol have not woken me up from a nap I didn't realize I had begun to take five hours prior. When I can't hear her shoes anymore, I stand up from the couch and force myself to walk to my bed.
The next time that we see each other, a week has passed.
However, it's nearly impossible to keep this performance up for too long. Whenever we begin any hunt, things change just for a bit. To a point, we become obsessively aware of each other's behavior. But this is strictly out of necessity.
After nearly an hour of seriously chasing after our bounty, we've finally managed to trap him… though it's proving more than we expected to actually capture him. He has hidden inside the attic of an old abandoned house; his hideout as it turns out. Though he has no means to escape, neither do Faye or I have the means to bring him under our custody. The only entrance to the attic is a small square door that you have to pull down to open. Since the door remains closed, it probably has a lock in the inside as well. As if that wasn't an inconvenience, the only way to reach this door is by climbing on a cheap aluminum ladder. The hinges of the attic door are crooked and the screws are all different sizes. It's an amateur's job, which leads me to believe that the attic is not supposed to even be there. And if that's the case, the boards separating us from our target could be thinner than we expect.
"I'll hold the ladder," I whisper.
"You're expecting me to try and enter the attic," Faye says, or rather, mouths. I try to respond but she continues, "He's a sniper! What do you think he'd be able to do with my head being the first thing he sees coming in through that stupid door?"
"You say that, but you know that if I hold the ladder it'll be easier for you to move. If you hold it, I'll probably end up falling."
I'm not necessarily mocking her and she knows that. This is simply a fact. The ladder is warped and obviously dangerous to climb. I can stabilize the ladder much better than she can for two viable reasons: one, I am stronger than she is and two, she is much lighter than I am.
She looks at the ladder but I can already see her eyes saying 'I'm not doing it.'
Just as I'm about to speak, a shower of bullets penetrates down through the ceiling. Faye grabs the collar of my shirt and pulls me near as she leans closely against the wall. I hear the bullets landing right behind me and I curse myself for being distracted by such a worthless discussion. We stand still, listening for any more signs of fire. After a few seconds, Faye's grip begins to loosen. As she does this, I lift my chin away from her shoulder. We move slowly.
Then, it starts again.
Faye pulls me in once more but she unconsciously whimpers. I push her back against the wall and cover her mouth with my right hand. Though it's quiet again, we shrink our bodies as much as possible against the wall in anticipation for the next firing. I can feel Faye breathing irregularly. Then, I realize that I'm putting too much pressure over her mouth. I lift my palm off of her lips, but my fingertips are still against her skin. After a few seconds, I can feel her steady, balmy breath under my palm.
Then it happens another time. The firing opens. A few bullets haphazardly shot in all directions. The faded mirror on the wall shatters. Faye and I shrink together again. A few bullets land just inches away from our feet. Dumb luck, no doubt. But still too much to risk.
I feel Faye's lips moving soundlessly under my hand. She breathes once then whispers very softly. "The table."
In the midst of all the bullets, I hadn't even noticed. In the end of the room, right under the broken mirror and besides the bones of a rusted bed was a relatively thick table. It wasn't very big, but if we could hide underneath it, it would suffice to cover the cores of our bodies.
We count silently and simultaneously make a run. Though the floor is scattered with sharp pieces, we slide underneath as quickly as possible, a few more bullets fire behind us. The table really is small, and in the end, our legs and arms end up without protection. The mirror's dust and shards have covered the palms of our hands. I rub them off against my sleeve, but Faye picks out the larger pieces out of her wounds first.
"How much ammo do you think this guy has," I ask her quietly.
"Too much…"
Then, as if on cue, he begins to fire again. I stare at the ceiling quietly. Through the holes he's created, I can see cool fluorescent light. The room is dully lit by a few streaks of sun penetrating through a small window, so it's easy to differentiate one from the other. I fix my eyes on the blue light. It flutters. I shoot.
Bullets come raining down of the area perpendicularly. Noticing this, I empty the bullets of my gun in that general region. Then, I hear him curse. Faye, whose last bullets are counted, shots only once. I smirk and reload my gun again.
I stare at the same area for a second time, but the light doesn't flicker anymore. Then the bullets rain down again. This time, it's hectic. Faye and I shrink under the table and somehow her head rests very close to my chest. After this round, my ears are ringing. If I strain myself, though, I can hear the snapping of metal.
"NO!" the man shouts in a deep, raspy voice, almost as if someone was ripping his throat out. He shouts incoherently. The ceiling boards creak. Suddenly, I can hear the clicking of empty guns and heavy metal objects being tossed chaotically. "NO! NO! NO! DAMN IT! NOT ME! YOU'RE NOT GONNA CATCH ME!"
Something tears through the boards and falls towards the center of the room. It get's caught in the wiring of the light and remains suspended a few feet under the ceiling. Faye shoots. I hear another guttural scream. "NOT ME! NOT ME! YOU WON'T EVER GET ME!" Then he laughs and he cries. And then a shotgun blast. A loud thud. And then nothing.
Faye and I don't move. With her so close, I wonder if she can hear the racing of my heart. We stare at the broken ceiling boards and then we see it. Through the bullet holes, the wood begins to stain red and then it drips. Drip, drip, drip. The floor is covered in red splashes and it really does look like it's raining blood. If I look carefully enough, I can see the warmth escaping the blood and the room begins to fill with the rancid stench of death.
I shoot up at the ceiling. Nothing. After a few seconds, I step out from underneath the table and walk towards the attic door. I stare at the hinges and shoot at them until they've loosened up. Seeing this, Faye repeats my actions though she only has three bullets left. Afterwards, she grabs the shaky ladder and I begin to climb it. Once I stop, Faye braces her body against the aluminum. I curve by shoulder under the door and thrust my body upward. The hinges completely break and the door shoots awkwardly up. My footing becomes unsteady and I grab unto the entrance to keep myself from falling while thinking, "I should have made Faye do this." After recuperating my balance, I undo the bolt lock used to close the door from the inside and toss everything aside.
The blue light hurts my vision. I blink and try to focus on the area responsible for the red dripping. I squint my eyes trying to see better. The man's body is sprawled on the boards, a shotgun crossed over his chest. I look up and see the wall splattered with blood and pieces of flesh and brain. My eyes move towards his face. There's nothing left there but a nearly disintegrated jaw with a few protruding ivory teeth. My mouth turns sour and my nose burns.
I lift my eyes up and scan the room. On one of the corners is a desk and a lamp, the source of the light from before. Above it, there are hundreds of pictures taped messily together and circled or crossed out with red marker. To its left, there is a large and empty gun rack. I look around the room and find enough firearms, including the shotgun, to fill it up.
Realizing that I'm taking too long just looking, I climb down. When my feet touch the ground, Faye takes her arms away from the ladder and sighs heavily. Then, she stretches her arms over her head and swings her arms down and circles her shoulders.
I pull my communicator out and call Jet. As I'm speaking to Jet, Faye and I walk out of the house. We stop at the porch and sit down on its steps. I talk with Jet for a few minutes longer and then I hang up.
"Damn, I'm tired," I say purposelessly. I dig into my pockets to find my cigarettes, but no matter how much I look, I can't find my lighter.
"I don't have mine with me," Faye tells me.
I shove the cigarettes back into my pocket and try to forget that the adrenaline has rushed out of my body and that my eyelids are becoming harder and harder to maintain open. Now that it's just Faye and me, with no particular reason to be together, things return to the same dullness they have been. Faye and I say nothing to each other, not even as the police vehicles slowly start to park by the house.
"You guys okay?" Jet says as soon as he arrives.
"I guess," I say.
Faye shrugs her shoulders.
Jet stares at both of us for a second then says calmly, "Go to the ambulance and get checked up." Then, he says in frustration, "It's going to take forever sorting this mess out anyway…Damn…if only I hadn't heard about this guy from my police friend..."
"You see Jet," I say mockingly, "next time one of your buddies asks you a favor, don't involve us."
Jet looks at me annoyed. "Spike, you and Faye are the one's who decided to do it once you heard how much they'd pay. Having to go through this if something happened was a risk you decided to take."
"Whatever," Faye interrupts us, "just, see if you can straighten this out."
When Jet leaves us, Faye and I walk to the ambulance and sit in the back. As a nurse begins to wrap Faye's hands, a man with slick blonde hair comes to interrogate us. It takes him forever to get the information. Even after my wounds are tended to, he's still asking questions.
"Are you positive that this body belongs to Thomas Beckett?"
"Yes," Faye and I answer simultaneously. We glance at each other quickly, it seems this is the only other time during the day when we unconsciously manage to agree with each other.
"Did you see his face?"
Faye says bitterly, "Can't you just match prints or give the body a DNA test and get this over with? He was already a convicted felon to begin."
The man's eyes sharpen and he responds, "There are procedures to which we must conform to in order to maintain a high standard…"
So begins what must be hell to every bounty hunter. You'd think that a simpler procedure would be established, but it isn't. I mean, do they seriously expect that criminals are going to turn themselves in so easily? Of course someone is going to die. It could have been me. It could have been Faye. But this chanced to Beckett. And now we're stuck trying to settle things with people who don't have enough guts or brains to capture these criminals to begin with.
Faye and I had first walked out of the house at around six in the afternoon. Now, the sky is completely darkened and we are still not allowed to leave the premises. Our firearms have been taken away. We are being guarded by a couple of cops. We say nothing. For hours, it seems like nothing happens. The only difference is that, while we're stuck sitting on the curb of the street, the body of Thomas Beckett has already been taken to the morgue. All of this for someone who had killed twenty-three people.
From the moment we begin waiting, nearly five hours pass before the commissioner finally arrives. He steps out of his silver car carefully. He is a very normal looking person. He's average height and wears a dark grey suit. He has short, black hair and sports glasses. The only thing that seems impressive about him is that he appears to be in his early thirties or late twenties, much too young for his position.
Once he's there, things move quickly. Not even half an hour spans when he and Jet walk towards Faye and me. The guards straighten up their posture and salute.
"How's everyone," he says.
I don't answer. Faye says fine. The guards nod their heads while saying 'good.'
"Sorry to have kept you for so long, but things have finally been cleared." As he's speaking, it seems that he appears to be smiling. He extends his hand towards me, "Mr. Spiegel, right." I shake his hand hoping that he'll let us go faster. Then, he turns to shake Faye's hand, "Mrs. Valentine?"
"No," Faye responds amiably, "Ms. Valentine."
"Oh, sorry about that," he says really smiling this time. He's got a good hold of Faye's hand and she doesn't seem to be objecting.
Jet glances at me. I notice this and blankly glimpse back.
When the commissioner finally releases her hand, he's all business again. Although I just want to leave, I stand there listening to him explain the entire procedure yet again. All of this bullshit reminds me of why we had never collaborated with the police before.
Someone brings a tablet to the commissioner and Faye and I have to sign several forms to finally be discharged of any responsibility regarding Beckett. Unfortunately, in doing so, we lose any right to the bounty compensation as well. And if I hadn't been so good, there would have been no possibility of us being affiliated with the police.
It feels like this is going to last forever until finally someone approaches the commissioner. "Commissioner Knight," a young woman addresses him politely. She's small and frail with brown eyes and short, curly blonde hair. "Mr. Carlisle called," she says, "it seems he needs you ASAP. Also, the news want to interview you. They've already managed to get into the morgue and take pictures of Beckett's body without any consent. And as if that weren't enough, they want the details of the story."
"Thank you Kat," he answers pleasantly. "Please get me Carlisle on the line, I'll be there in a minute." He turns to face us again. "Well, looks like that's all we need here. We have all your information and we'll contact you if need be. Also, let me give you my card."
He pulls his contact from the inside of his coat and hands it to Faye. As he does this, it seems that the motion takes longer than it should, but Faye maintains her eyes on him without the least bit of awkwardness. Thanks to that, the whole action appears calm and natural.
"Sir!" the woman from before calls again.
"If you'll excuse me," he says and walks away with his shoulders squared.
Jet glances at the card in Faye's hands, "So that's the guy my friend mentioned…Damian Knight…He just got appointed to this position recently."
"How long ago?" Faye asks.
"Not much, just a few months. Four at the most."
"Is that so…"
"Yeah," Jet continues, "though not everyone is happy with the choice."
"Why? He seems to do a pretty good job," Faye responds.
"Things never are that easy," Jet tells her.
"I'm leaving," I say as I begin to walk away.
"Do you even know where to?" Jet says. I keep walking. He shouts after me, "It's by 13th Street and Elm Avenue."
But I really don't care where I'm going; I just want to get out of this place. I decide to follow Jet's directions, simply so that I can get to bed as soon as possible. I don't look back, but I can hear Jet and Faye following behind me.
I'm so tired, I think I might fall asleep even while walking. I take my coat off hoping that keeping cool will keep me awake, but it doesn't help much. Eventually, I decide to wait for Jet and Faye to catch up. As an excuse, I ask Jet if he by any chance has a lighter. As it turns out, he was carrying mine; he'd picked it up from the living room table before coming, knowing that I'd be needing it after dealing with this mess.
I let Jet and Faye walk ahead of me and I finally light a cigarette. My mind is nearly blank and the nicotine relaxes all my muscles. My body is numb. I feel like a ghost surrounded in a cloud of smoke, following voices to lead me home. Everything feels so surreal and my chest feels so empty. It's like I'm not even here. But, isn't this what I've wanted?
* * * Ch. 3 End, Continued on Ch. 4 * * *
Updates: I will try to finish proofreading the next chapter by Friday, but I have an important test and a research paper due within two weeks, plus a big design project for a competition with a deadline on the 17th. For these reasons, I cannot guarantee the next chapter to be up Friday…but I will try.
About the titles: My metal side nearly dominated here…the preliminary title was going to be Raining Blood (Slayer).
Interesting fact:…I had to write this chapter twice because the original file was corrupted...
Please be patient for the next update, until then!