Faye curled her fingers around the door jambs, and leaned into the observation deck. The only light behind the window dome was the faint, red point of a lit cigarette. The rest was sunk in darkness behind the glowing curve of Mars' horizon. "I've been gone for eight hours! You're still in here?"

"Right where you left me." His voice was unusually low and quiet.

She dropped her hands and wrinkled her nose. "What's with all the bleach? I nearly choked when I came in."

"It's called cleaning up. A concept foreign to you, I've noticed."

She stared at him peevishly. "You're in a mood."

He rolled his eyes sideways at her under his brows. "Sorry I'm not more chipper right now."

"A little gratitude would be nice. I did what you asked me to do. A favor for a cripple. I didn't want to go out there, and I'm not going anywhere near there again." She winced and covered her nose with her cupped hand. "Jesus Christ! From the smell of this place, I think you could eat out of the john!"

"Are you going to sit there whining, or are you going to tell me something useful?"

Her cheek twitched. Okay, so he's upset, she thought. But does he always have to be such a jerk? She bit back a tart reply and said only, "I couldn't get within a kilometer for a flyover. The airspace around the site is secured, and the whole place is crawling with ISSP." As her eyes adjusted, she made out his silhouette. He was motionless, still in the same position as when she had left him, still staring out the window. His wounded leg was propped on the short table in front of him, a half-empty whiskey bottle leaned against his hip. He held the side of his glass pressed against his mouth.

"There was no way to get close enough to look for him," she finished.

"That figures." Jet said sullenly, then mumbled under his breath. "I don't know what I was thinking, anyway…"

"But I did get close enough to intercept an ISSP vid crew's transmission."

A blast of smoke curled around Jet's head as he swiveled as far around as he could without moving his leg. "And…?"

"He...won't be coming back."

"What did you see?"

Her gaze strayed to the panorama outside the window. "Look." Her voice was almost gentle. "You've seen even more dead people than I have, and I can tell you..."

"Did you record the transmission?"

"I tried. Haven't played it back yet. But I brought it." She lifted his black laptop. "It's out of juice. Any of the ports in here working?"

"That one," he gestured to an outlet below the window and crushed out his cigarette. Gritting his teeth as he swung his leg around, he got up and leaned against his brace. She had plugged in the computer and was punching at the keyboard. "Damn. Where'd I save it…?"

Jet shouldered her away and rapidly tapped in the commands. He lowered himself to the bench again, and as the flickering images began reflecting over him, Faye moved away. She had already seen it live, and didn't want a re-run. It would be bad enough to watch it again on Jet's face.

His brow furrowed. "Sound's messed up. There's Bob. I figured he'd be on the scene. I can probably get the straight story from him." He squinted with sudden interest. "Holy crap. Harvey Baum. He never leaves his office any more. Why the hell is he out there in the field?" He frowned, staring intently. "He must have known it was Spike. That's the only thing that could have brought him out. Ah, jeez…" His face screwed up in disgust.

Faye glanced at the screen, and saw the replay of officers dragging half a corpse out of the wreckage, its entrails dragging behind.

Bob's face filled the screen, and his hands waved the recording crew to the left as he mouthed unheard commands. The camera's eye bounced wildly about for a moment, briefly snagged a square, small-eyed face, and then came to rest on dark, blood-drenched shape sprawled on the steps. It was a body. A body in a black suit and trenchcoat.

"Ah, shit," Jet uttered a hoarse whisper. "Spike. You idiot."

He thought had resigned himself to the inevitable as he'd watched the Swordfish spear out of the hangar and arc down towards Mars for the last time. But the sight of his partner gave him an unexpected shock.

They were lifting him onto a black body bag, tucking in his legs, and zipping it shut. A hand motioned in the camera's eye, beckoning it to the corpse's face. It held there for a moment, while the hand held the bag open. The grey visage, eyes barely open, a string of blood trailing from the edge of the mouth, was unmistakable. Faye glanced at Jet again, and in the bluish light, he seemed to have gone even more pale. He blinked as a hand slowly zipped the bag over Spike's face, and the camera panned up again to the square-faced man.

"Hitchcock," he said coldly. "Slimy bastard."

"Old friend of yours?"

His lip curled. "Top ISSP brass, and on the Dragon payroll. He'd sell his own mother to upgrade to leather seats for his little Porsche zipcraft. Anyone who ever got close enough to link him to the Dragons always seemed to get into some sort of unfortunate accident and end up in a nice, engraved ISSP urn." He tapped the edge of the keyboard. "But he's supposed to be stationed on Europa. What's he got going here that he's willing to risk a pissing war with Baum? "

"Jet, you saw Spike. Even if this Hitchcock guy is involved, it's over now. At least for us. There's nothing more we can do."

Jet stared blankly at the screen, some part of his mind noticing that in the background behind Hitchcock's talking head the officers carrying the bag containing his partner's body had broken into a jog, and quickly disappeared from the screen.

He crossed his arms, slumped back against the bench and shut his eyes. "So. That's it, then," he growled. "He went out with the intention of getting himself killed. Seems he can do things right when he gets the notion into his thick head."

He picked up the whiskey glass, filled it, and gripped it so tightly that his knuckles turned white. Faye absently thought it was a good thing he wasn't holding it in his cybernetic arm, or the thing would have shattered. He slammed back the drink in one gulp. "Damn him!" he croaked, seeming to have forgotten that Faye was there. "I don't care."

"At least you got to see it for yourself," she said, almost meekly.

He turned and looked her in the eye. "Thanks."

She knew she probably shouldn't push it further, but said anyway, "You okay, Jet?"

"I'm fine!" he snapped so sharply that she flinched.

Sure you are, she thought. You're always fine. You never need anything from anyone, even when you're feeling like this. Why do I pretend I care?

And suddenly the sensation was on her again. The dizziness. By now she'd started to recognize the sickening feeling that always accompanied a memory emerging from the fog of her amnesia.

Alice. That old lady with the purple hair whose house was so filled with cats that you could hardly breathe for the smell when you walked in the door. Alice's ancient, parchment face was leaning into hers. What brought this on? she wondered. But she already knew better than to suppress the return of her old life, and so she blinked and let the thing run its course.

Stinky Old Alice. The nuns had always made Faye bring Alice food once a week. Protest fell on deaf ears. "It cheers her up so to see you, so young and sweet," she could hear Sister Mary Bernadette chirp. "She's so lonely. She needs the company. And it will bring you grace."

She shuddered. Cats everywhere, with their big, mooning eyes, staring at her. Alice could never turn away a stray. The smell of stale urine and cat food was almost real in her mind. Every one of those stray cats had a name and a story, and the old lady's eyes would go all wet in the endless telling and retelling while Faye sat helpless, holding her breath and trying to take air only through the slit of her mouth. Alice seemed to feel special, thinking she'd saved all those worthless cats. But all it really did was suck her dry of money and cloud every waking thought with worry. Faye had never understood why anyone would saddle herself with so much responsibility for so little reward.

Alice was proud. She'd made a great show of not wanting to accept gifts of food from the nuns, but always taking them in the end. Faye remembered the look in Alice's eyes--eager and ashamed--as her knobby old fingers rattled through the jars of jam and crackled against the plastic-wrapped buns and fruit. Faye felt her face screw up with revulsion. The old lady was needier than her scrawny cats, and didn't even know it.

A wave of nausea tensed the back of her tongue, and then came the shocking memory of her last visit. The day she'd knocked on the door and gotten no answer. Clouds of flies blackened the windows. The cold looseness in her bowels--pure fear--came back. Why she'd opened that door, she didn't know. But the vision that assailed her was as clear now as the day she'd actually seen it: the corpse sitting upright in its big, lobed chair, its face and hands eaten away by desperate cats who'd had nothing to eat or drink for the week or more that their caretaker had been dead.

Faye groaned, and bent forward over her knees, crossing her arms over her middle.

"Faye!" His breath was hot against her neck, and the sharp tang of whiskey on it brought her to her senses. "You okay?"

"I'm...fine." She rocked forward until her forehead rested on her knees. "Just another bad memory coming back. I don't know what triggered that one, but it was nasty."

His hand was warm on her shoulder. His other was holding the glass to her face. "Here." His voice had lost its harshness. He stifled a burp. "I sure don't need any more than I've already had."

She downed it and gasped. "Thanks."

He slumped back against the bench a few arms' lengths from her. The angle of Mars' reflected light had changed with their orbit, and he was now faintly outlined in burnt amber. She breathed deeply and stared at him, realizing that she had not often looked at his face. She'd spent more time avoiding him than seeking his company.

"So," she said. "What do we do now?"

"We?"

She smirked in the darkness. The moment was gone, and his shields were back up. She ignored his snide tone and draped her arm over the back of the bench. She studied him silently for a moment. "Will you go back to Ganymede? That's your home satellite, isn't it?"

"There's nothing for me on Ganymede," he said, propping his leg back up on the table. "I lived there for about fifteen years, but that's over. Anyway, I wouldn’t call it home. I was born on Earth."

Faye's mouth opened slightly. He had never shared anything with her about his background or personal life, and even this small revelation seemed monumental to her. "Earth?" she breathed. "Like me?"

"Canada. New Toronto."

"Will you go back there?"

"Haven't thought about it." His tone said clearly that he wished to end the subject. For once, she respected his hint and sat still, watching him. His eyes seemed unusually bright. Almost as if…. No. That was impossible.

"Jet," she leaned towards him, squinting. "are you okay?"

He continued to stare soundlessly out the domed window.

She clambered across the cushions on all fours and brought her face close to his temple. Though he tried not to react, she sensed him recoil. "Jet, you're not…"

"Don't be stupid." His voice was gruff. "I just overdid the damned bleach."

"You know…it's okay to be sad."

"Why should I be sad? He was nothing but trouble from Day One."

She snorted. "Fine. Say what you want." She settled back against the bench and glared out the window. "Personally, I feel like shit."

Jet seemed to consider this for a moment. "Yeah, well, it was pretty obvious how you felt about him."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

He shot her a sidelong glance. "Whatever you think it means."

"We were a good team. The three of us."

"Yeah, you kept saying that."

She wasn't sure whether she wanted to put her arms around him or cold cock him. One moment he could seem almost caring, and the next he'd be the same old grouch as always. She was tired of fighting.

"Will you stop with the attitude for once?" She surprised herself by roughly dropping a hand on his shoulder. "There's just us to remember him now. You can be a cold bastard to me if you want, but you know that's something that we share, whether we want to or not."

There was no reaction from him for a long moment. And then, amazed, she felt his hand close over hers. For a while, they sat motionless and unspeaking. And as she studied him, an odd feeling came over her. Was it pity?

The reddish light from the planet below faintly outlined his hard, chiseled features, and his haggard expression made him look even older than he ordinarily did. Spike's death seemed to have shaken him more than she could have imagined. She'd never wondered or cared whether there was a human being inside this distant, annoying man. Now he drew her in.

"Hey, Jet," She gave his shoulder a squeeze. "He wouldn't want us to be sitting here all gloomy like this."

"Yeah, I know," he growled. "Always running his own show and not caring what it did to anyone else."

Faye stared out into the umber darkness. The whiskey still burned in her throat, and not having eaten for many hours, she was already feeling its effects. She leaned back against the couch and pondered a strange new feeling: Suddenly, she wanted to be able to comfort Jet.

This was weird. Why should she care about the old grouch? When he wasn't harrassing her over money she owed him, he was making some snide comment about her.

Or...was that really true? Scenes of their forays together--often to save Spike from some predicament--began to run through her mind. Suddenly she recalled the brief, warm looks she'd caught him sending her way when he'd thought she wasn't watching. He'd always quickly mastered them and turned away when she looked up. She'd never really thought about those, until now.

What about that time he'd nearly gotten himself killed rescuing her, on the pretense that the only thing he'd wanted was the money she'd stolen from him. It came back to her in a rush that he had laughed when she'd told him the stolen money was only 20 Woolongs. It had puzzled her then, but now it became clear. She slowly turned to stare at him in the darkness. More and more small incidents ticked through her mind and added up.

He cared for her.

Impossible. But try as she might to convince herself otherwise, she could not go back. Snap out of it, Faye. It's the booze. But this new, small warmth felt better than wallowing in grief. Slipping her hand out from under his, she slid it across the broad span of his shoulders. She had to suppress a smile when he uncomfortably cast a furtive, sidelong glance at her cleavage, now nestled close against his biceps. He let loose a long, tired sigh. That was strange. She knew men well enough to know it was his way of inhaling her while pretending not to. She'd never imagined Jet doing anything so familiar, but now it suddenly made weird sense. The alcohol. He was letting his guard down. To her surprise, the subtle attention from him wasn't unpleasant. What the hell.

She leaned her head on his shoulder, and let her free hand trace across his chest and rest on his hard, cybernetic shoulder. He stiffened and tucked his chin to look at her, but seemed at a loss about how to react.

"Are…are you okay?" he stammered.

"No. I told you. I feel like shit."

"Yeah." The word slipped through his teeth, and he fell silent again.

She shifted, and all at once they were holding each other, their faces pressed hard, cheek to cheek. They stayed that way for a speechless moment, neither knowing what move to make next.

"I'm….glad you came back," Jet mumbled at last.

"You are?"

"Yeah." He lifted his head so that hers was cradled in the hollow of his throat, and put his live arm around her shoulders. She felt his Adam's apple working furiously against her temple. His voice was thick. "This ship's too big and quiet for one right now."

That foreign feeling--warmth--rushed through her again. Was he actually saying he needed her? She held her breath, analyzing this odd turn of events. It was the whiskey talking, no doubt, but still the last thing she'd expected upon returning to the ship. No one had ever needed her. Not for anything except money, anyway--or to get her on her back. The realization that tough, self-reliant Jet had perhaps cared about her all along...it made her feel better than she'd felt in a very long time.

She had never touched him. Nor had he invited it, except in those infinitely short moments that she had never paid any attention until now. She'd always figured it was because he was captain of the ship, distant and serious in case things got dangerous. Always in control of every situation and of himself. He had always been too huge, too overpowering, unapproachable. Her only defense had been teasing and heckling. She would never admit, even to herself, that anyone or anything intimidated her.

Had all his roughness towards her been just...fear?

She drew a breath at his throat and tasted the tobacco, the liquor and the smell of the man himself. Again she was surprised at how pleasant it was. His pulse against her temple was so human and real.

She felt him loosen and try to pull away. She briefly wondered whether she wanted to stop this now, too, but dismissed the thought.

She pulled him back. He did not resist. Her bracelets slid up her arm and jingled as she traced her hand back along the line of his shoulder. She'd never even imagined touching him. It was strange and somehow exhilarating to feel his bone and muscle, one as hard as the other, under her fingertips. She feathered a finger up one of the muscles forming the taut "V" at his collarbone. He drew a quick breath and tensed.

Without thinking, she drew his face down, and kissed him.

He responded for only a second, then flinched and pulled away.

"Faye," his voice was husky. "You're upset and you've had a big slug of whiskey on an empty stomach. This isn't what normal people…"

She turned and straddled his thighs, rising so that her breasts brushed his chin. His eyes widened momentarily, and his breath stilled.

Her eyes were defiant. "What's so great about 'normal'?."

She lifted one of his hands, which had dropped in shock to either side of his hips, and spread his fingers over the curve of her waist. She felt them flex and then go rigid.

"Faye, I'm not sure this is a good idea." By now he didn't sound sincere or convincing. "There are other ways we can get through this without straining what little there is of our…" he lost his words with a small yelp as she fearlessly slid her hand lower. "…friendship!"

He gripped her wrist, but did not remove her hand. His teeth were clenched, his face taut with indecision.

"How do you know it wouldn't make our friendship stronger?" she whispered earnestly.

He surrendered and pulled her close. He brushed his mouth against her throat and exhaled a slow, warm breath. The thrill that shivered through her at the idea that she could so quickly make him forget his despair was as delicious as anything she'd ever known.

Her hands were under his shirt, lifting it. She spread her palms and ran her fingers over the sparse, coarse hair fanned across his chest. His hands mirrored hers, unfastening her clothes with such smooth ease that she briefly wondered how often he had fantasized about doing just this. She touched the edge of his chin and lifted his face up with a fingertip. "Look at me."

He opened his eyes, and instantly she saw the doubt there. It surprised and annoyed her.

"What's wrong?"

"Faye," he said, looking tortured. "I'm not Spike. I know how you felt about him. I'm not Spike."

So that was it. Jet would never have confessed any feeling for her while there was Spike. And here Spike was still, a ghost between them.

"I had no idea."

She led his hand down the curve of her haunch, then took his lip in her teeth and bit him, none too gently. It was as if she had provoked a crouching lion. Jet rose up and met her, enveloping her. She hardly knew that he had risen over her and turned her on her back. She made a small sound of protest, but he surged over her, his fingers at once powerful and gentle. As quickly as she had aroused him, she felt herself lost in a wild swirl of pleasure of his design, not hers. She lost all sense of time.

He read her completely until she screamed with release. Only then did he allow himself the same.

What had just happened? She'd tried to give him a gift, but he'd somehow wrested it away and shoved it back. It was as if he had rejected her in the very act of taking her. It hadn't been exactly against her will. She had to admit that. But it certainly hadn't been what she'd naively hoped. With the whiskey sour in her mouth, a rush of revulsion washed over her. She felt small and violated.

All at once, the memory of Spike crushed down upon her, and a wave of unbearable grief overcame her at last. Jet's body spooned against her back felt foreign and unwelcome. She shifted away and turned to face him, backing away from contact.

His face was close and relaxed, and she could at last see that he really was younger than he seemed. His skin was unlined, his hair and beard dark and soft. It would kill him to know how vulnerable he looks right now,she thought.

Spike. She felt unfaithful, unclean. Spike might not have loved her--but he never would have made her feel this way.

Jet wasn't Spike. That was painfully clear now. What had given her the delusion that she might be even a partner in anything she did with Jet?

Fury surged through her. The man beside her was a stranger again, cold and controlling.

She pulled out from under his arm and slid down to sit on the floor where he had dropped her clothes. As she groped around and pulled them on, she heard him stir. His hand found the small of her back, and stroked up to her shoulder. She roughly shrugged him off.

"Cold?" he said sleepily. "It's cold in here. Don’t get dressed. Let's just go to your bunk..."

"Your bunk," she said shortly. "It's your bunk, isn't it? You've been sleeping on the couch ever since I got here, right? Maybe it's time you had your bunk back." She jerked the lace of her top tight, then felt around for her stockings.

As he watched her gather her clothes and yank them on, his half-closed eyes widened in puzzlement. "Faye," he said at last. "Are you mad at me?"

"Mad?" she said, glaring at him from above the curve of her folded leg as she pulled a silk stocking over it. "Why would I be mad? I should feel great, right? I mean, I've never had sex like that before. Why would I be mad?"

Slowly, he sat up, wincing as he flexed the wounded leg. "I have no idea."

She stopped dressing and sat staring at the ceiling. "That figures."

He fumbled for the tee shirt he had draped over the bench and absently covered his lap. "What did I do to make you mad?" He sounded almost plaintive. "It sure seemed like you enjoyed that as much as I…"

"I wanted to give you something!" she snapped. "I wanted to make you feel better!"

He looked as if he had been slapped. "You…you did."

"No I didn't!" she said. "You did! You made yourself feel better. I was just a convenient outlet."

His jaw dropped, and he gaped at her.

"I can't give you money," she said, her voice rising. "And I'm no good at helping around here. I can't cook or clean or fix things. Hell, you don't even like me. But we've been through a lot together. I just wanted to make you forget for a little while. But you couldn't let me do that. Not even that!

"I..." his voice trailed off, and his confusion enraged her even more. She wanted more than anything to erase what had just happened. She no longer cared about his grief. She wanted him to hurt even more.

"I felt sorry for you, Jet. Just for once, I wanted to help you before I left this place for good."

Her tone and words had the desired effect, and she had to stifle a triumphant smile as he crossed his arms and turned his face away. The baffled look in his eyes had become cold and expressionless.

"Well. This is new. I don't think I've ever been the victim of a mercy fuck before."

She stood and rocked back on her heels. "And if it was?" she said, thrusting her chin. "How does that feel?"

He slowly turned his glare on her, but said nothing.

"Not so hot, huh? That little taste of your own medicine is bitter, isn't it!" The flash of anger in his eyes made her wonder for a moment whether she had pushed him too far. But he did not rise or make a move towards her.

"I don't understand." His words were clipped. "You started it. And I'm going to have a hard time believing you didn't enjoy it."

"I had nothing to do with it!" she snapped.

A baffled look, quickly mastered, flickered across his face.

Her voice grew cool and steady. "Do you have any idea what it's like to live with a control freak like you, Jet? You smother anyone who gets close to you. You always have to be in charge. No one can make their own decisions or think for themselves when you're here to do it for them. It's got to be your way or no way!" She waited, watched her words pierce him despite his efforts to hide their impact.

"Didn't one of us say this was a bad idea?" he said, his voice flat and emotionless. "Maybe one of us was right."

"Yeah, you're always right!"

"Are you finished?"

"No. I'm going to give you something after all, Jet." She crossed her arms and glared at him from above. "I'm going to give you some advice: Stop treating every person you meet--including me--like we're props the universe delivers to you so you can feel big and strong by taking care of everything for us."

His look of shock goaded her. She leaned forward, her short, dark hair bobbing forward, taunting. "If you really were strong, you wouldn't be afraid to accept kindness. But can't stand to owe anything to anyone because then you could be controlled. And that's your job, isn't it? Controlling everything! That's why you keep everyone in your debt. You think that's how to own them and keep them--and it's why you always drive them away. Inside that big, tough guy there's nothing but weakness...and fear of being alone.

He could not hide the wound that dealt him. "That's…not true."

"Then why are you alone again, Jet? Everyone you supposedly cared about has left you. Ed. Spike. Even Ein! What kind of man gets dumped by his own dog! We're probably just the last in a whole parade of people who got fed up with being smothered and controlled, and finally had the guts to leave."

He stared stonily out the window. "I don't ask anyone to stay, and I don't need gratitude. I prefer being alone."

She stared. "You really believe that. Then again, maybe you're right. As long as you're alone, no one can make you owe them anything by actually doing something for you."

"That's enough!" His thick brows were tight and low over his eyes.

"You haven't heard a word." she said. "You'll spend the rest of your life taking in strays and smothering them until they escape and leave you alone again and again." Her lips tightened. "I almost feel sorry for you."

"Save that sincere pity for yourself." His voice was lifeless. "I don't need anything from you."

"Just as I said."

He met her eyes steadily, but said nothing.

"Since you're so fine on your own...." She paused, half wondering if he would send some sign of surrender. "I'll be going. For good." She spun on her heel and stalked away.

He watched her sweep out of the deck. He closed his eyes, but blocking the sight of her retreating back only made the knifelike pain in his throat worse. She was wrong. She was dead wrong about him. He hoped to god she was wrong.

It's too damned cold on this ship. He pulled his tee shirt and shorts back on, still shivering enough to make his teeth chatter. It's just the cold. There was no way that crazy female could deliver him such a bellyful of ice.

In the nearly empty vessel, it was impossible not to hear her banging around in her bunk--his bunk, he corrected himself--packing her belongings. And some of his, no doubt. He fumbled around the cushions for his cigarettes, lit one and dragged deeply. Slowly, he released the smoke in a narrow stream. It was the loss of Spike--not Faye--that was drilling into his throat and behind his eyes. Now it was his turn to feel unclean and used.

About an hour later, the thrum of the bay door motors vibrated the Bebop's hull. At least she was bothering to open the doors this time, and not simply blasting through them. It wasn't out of consideration, since he doubted she'd come crawling back to him for repairs.

The Redtail darted out from beneath the observation deck, hung in mid-space as the yellow-white of its afterburners sparked to life, and then arced out of his sight.

He shuddered, his humiliation complete. Was he really such a naive idiot? For a brief, warm moment, she'd seemed human and caring. He'd really believed they were drowning their sadness in each other's touch. Where had that harpy come from, with a block of ice where her heart should be?

He ran a hand across his scalp, and knitted his brows. Maybe she'd just gone crazy from the pain of losing Spike. Women could go out of their minds over things like that, right?

She was gone. It no longer mattered. It's a good thing I don't care.

He rose and limped out of the observation deck, leaving it in a haze of blue smoke.

As he'd suspected, Faye had pretty much gutted his bunk. Anything remotely of value had not-so-mysteriously disappeared. The desk lamp, two sets of ISSP handcuffs he'd let her borrow, an assortment of lock-picking tools--he was sure she'd make good use of those--had all gone missing. She'd even taken the laptop, though she thoughtfully had left a disc lying on top of the bare desk. He didn't have to guess what was on the disc, though as he picked it up to toss it into the drawer, he saw the quickly scrawled label, "Spike." He didn't want to think about that right now.

At least she'd left the sheets, dirty and jumbled though they were. An hour ago, he would have happily tumbled into them with her. But now the thought of touching them was distasteful, and the smell of her perfume clinging to them was suddenly one of the most unpleasant sensations he could remember. Pavlov was right , he thought sourly. He dumped every last washable thing down the laundry chute, and turned to collecting the trash strewn everywhere but in the trashcan.

What was I thinking?

You weren't. Not with your head, anyway. Idiot.

An hour later, his old bunk was his again. And like the rest of the ship, it smelled of too much bleach.

The galley was picked as clean of supplies as his bunk. One forlorn can of liver-flavored dog food stared up at him from the top shelf of the refrigerator. Nice touch, Faye. He wasn't that desperate yet. A bit more searching unearthed a box of stale saltines that had fallen behind a shelf. Better than nothing. He washed them down with chlorine-flavored tap water just as his hangover started to kick in.

He could barely hear Coltrane's saxophone wailing through the walls as the hot shower roared across his ears. The water had made his wounded leg burn hellishly at first, but it felt better, now that it had gone numb. He stared down, letting the cascade of water from his head wash over it. The whole leg was swollen and bruised, but the wound itself was clean, and starting to heal. He wondered how long it would take the rest of him to follow suit, especially now that he'd have little to do but wander aimlessly on the Bebop until he was able to hunt again. It was too risky to take on even a minor bounty in his condition.

He'd almost forgotten what it was like to hunt alone. For three years it had been Spike at his shoulder, the two of them working as smoothly together as a pair of wolves. He closed his eyes when the ache came back, and tried not to think. The water thundered against his back and neck. Momentarily, the automatic thought of turning off the shower so there would be enough hot water for Ed and Faye flicked through his mind. And then the reality slammed him again. He bent his head and let the hot water pummel him until it ran cold.

Continue the story in sleeping dragon.

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