Cowboy Bebop Fan Fiction ❯ Suicide Is Stainless ❯ Hard Days Night ( Chapter 6 )

6) Hard Day's Night.

Spike strolled down the darkened corridor, and stopped at a junction with a second, well-lit corridor. Glancing casually from side to side he carefully mapped his surroundings. To his left, just a few meters down the hallway, lay the entranceway to the ring. The metal panel that had previously sealed the fighters into the arena now covered the door once again. Now that the event had ended, there was little activity in this area.

Spike looked to his right. The scene in this direction was in stark contrast to that in the other. Here, the corridor buzzed with activity. All along its length, people were scampering about their business, ducking and dodging amidst one another like a colony of insects, performing innumerable tasks in the pursuit of a single goal. Backstage staff quick marched up and down, chattering into their headsets. Stewards raced about in pairs, shifting body bags and shepherding loiterers from the building, and victorious fighters, many looking more like they had just received a brutal thrashing, staggered in and out of their dressing rooms, bound in rudimentary dressings like embalmed corpses.

Spike stepped out into the corridor. Turning right, he strode slowly along its length, carefully dodging and weaving between the many urgent looking individuals, whilst himself trying to appear calm and unruffled. This tactic appeared to be paying off. Staff, stewards and fighters alike all paid little attention to his presence, each of them being more concerned with their own pressing issues.

It had not been difficult to gain access to the backstage area. In Spike's experience, he had found that the staff would, in general, ignore those who did not appear out of place. Instead, they would tend to focus their efforts on the more disruptive, i.e. drunken, elements. And this was understandable. After all, surely only a drunk would be stupid enough to make trouble in the midst of the system's most dangerous fighters. Clichéd though it was, there was still something to be said for *just acting natural *.

Dodging around a large, particularly foul smelling fighter, Spike emerged into a strangely deserted stretch of corridor. The area was clear of activity, with the exception of a single, familiar face. The ring announcer was stood side on to Spike, thumbing through a note pad, which probably contained a schedule or inventory of some kind.

Spike stopped about ten meters from the announcer, and slowly backed up against the wall that his quarry was facing. He glanced down the corridor in the direction from which he had just come to ensure that he was not being watched, and then discretely removed his communicator from his jacket. Turning it on, he flicked the button to open the comm. link to the Bebop and waited patiently for a response.

"Yeah?" said Jet, as his weary face materialised on the screen.

"Hey, Jet." Spike replied quietly. "I need an ID."

Jet yawned.

"Yeah. Just let me get a shot of him."

"Alright." Spike said.

Glancing around once again, Spike made sure he was still being ignored. He then turned the communicator towards the ring announcer, and allowed it to linger while Jet captured his image in profile.

"Okay." Came Jet's voice after a few moments.

Spike turned the communicator back towards himself.

"So, what have you got?" he asked his partner.

"Just a second." Jet replied irritably.

A faint tapping could be heard as Jet continued to give his attention to something out of the frame of the communicator. After a few seconds, he returned his attention to Spike.

"Okay." he began. "His name is Mao Chen. He's an employee of the Blue Rat Alliance who organises some of the syndicate's pit-fighting events at ground level."

"Yeah, I guessed that much." Spike replied. "Have you got anything new, like a bounty?"

Jet frowned quizzically.

"A bounty?"

"You heard me." Spike said, looking about cautiously. "How much is he worth?"

Jet gave Spike a suspicious look, and then looked to one side. After a couple more seconds of tapping he returned with his answer.

"One hundred thousand Woolongs." he replied. "Saying that this guy is small time would be a gross overstatement."

Spike glanced across a Mao and gave a disappointed grunt.

"I know what you're thinking, Spike." Jet said. "But Steele is the only guy in that building whose worth more than a tin of sardines. You either bring him in, or no one at all."

He then closed his eyes rubbed his furrowed brow.

"You know, I'm beginning to think Faye was right about you and Steele."

"Hey. I just thought we could get a twofer, that's all." said Spike.

Jet frowned sceptically.

"Yeah, right. You just go and find Steele, and don't call me again until you have something worthwhile."

He then cut the transmission.

"I guess that's what I get for showing some initiative." Spike complained to himself.

He slipped communicator back into his jacket and looked across at Mao. The ring announcer had not moved, and was still pouring over his note pad. Putting on his best friendly face, Spike pushed himself away from the wall, slipped his hands into his pockets, and began to approach Mao in a casual manner.

"Excuse me." Spike said upon reaching his target.

Mao responded by frowning as he heightened his concentration, trying to block out the disturbance.

"Excuse me." Spike repeated, this time a little more forcefully.

"What?" Mao rasped, not granting Spike the courtesy of eye contact.

"I was wondering if you could help me with some directions."

"Yeah . . ."

"Could you tell me where I might find Stainless Steele?"

Mao relaxed his frown, and looked up at Spike.

"What?" he said, almost laughing as he did.

"I'm looking for Stainless Steele." Spike reiterated, and then smiled. "Can you help me?"

"I'll help you." said Mao. "I'll help you by telling you no."

"C'mon, can't you cut a guy a break?" Spike pleaded. "Just this once?"

"I said no." Replied Mao. "Nobody disturbs Mr Steele after the fight."

"Hey, I only want an autograph. You know, I'm a huge fan of his."

"Is that right? Well, if you're a fan, then you'll know what happens to people who disturb Mr Steele after a fight."

Spike gave a dramatic sigh, and shrugged his shoulders.

"Yeah, I guess you're right."

"Good guess." Mao replied, and then looked back at his pad. "Now get outta here."

Mao waved Spike away.

Spike turned, and paused to look back down the corridor. As before, the busy throng was still unconcerned with his presence.

He took a step forwards, and then stopped. For an instant, he let go his physical senses, and allowed his finely honed instincts to guide his subsequent action. As Spike's mind and body relaxed, the position of every individual in the area, their every move, and their every breath became apparent to him. Then, in a motion that flowed from every part of his being, he pivoted on his right foot and flung his left out behind him.

Spike scarcely felt the impact as his heel struck Mao across the back of the head. In the instants that ensued as Spike followed through, Mao stumbled forwards and struck the wall before him. There was a dull crack as his nose was shattered against the unforgiving brickwork, and then he began to topple backwards. In response, Spike glided effortlessly across to Mao and grabbed him by his lapels before he could collapse noisily to the ground.

Spike turned his back to the crowd so as to hide the unconscious Mao, and then glanced over his shoulder. Good fortune had remained with him as he had yet to attract any attention. Looking back over Mao's shoulder, he spotted a knee-high crate standing flush against the wall. Carefully, he manoeuvred his cargo over to the crate and sat him down on it with his back to the brickwork. He then proceeded to tug the creases out of Mao's jacket and straighten his tie.

Spike looked into Mao's bloody-nosed face, and smiled.

"I'm sure you could use a nap after such a hard night's work." he said softly.

He then stood up and put his hands in his pockets.

"Sweet dreams."

Spike turned and began to make his way down the corridor. If Stainless Steele's reputation was anything like what it had been back on Mars, then there would probably be no one within a mile of his dressing room. It was like Mao had said; nobody disturbs Mr Steele after the fight. As such, Spike felt sure he was heading in the right direction.

He continued up the deserted corridor, the busy hum of the crowd growing ever more faint as they grew more distant. After a short time, Spike came upon a t-junction in the corridor. Peering round the corner, he found the adjoining hallway to be short and dark, and terminated with a dented and rusting metal door. There was a piece of grubby white paper taped to the door with the word Steele scratched upon it in black ink.

"This must be the place." Spike said to himself, and then turned down the corridor.

Approaching the door, Spike raised a fist to knock. He then paused. Lowering his hand, he gave thought to what chance he would have of winning Steele's attention by these means. If Steele really didn't want to be disturbed, then it was unlikely he would open his door to any passer by who happened to come knocking.

Spike looked down at the tarnished door-handle.

"Worth a shot." he said.

He then grasped the handle, turned it, and pushed against the door. It creaked open with little resistance. It appeared that Steele relied upon his own frightful reputation to dissuade would-be visitors, a ploy that was evidently quite effective.

Spike moved into the room, and closed the door behind him. The dressing room was Spartan to day the least. Its four bare brick walls contained nothing more than a chair, a desk with a cracked mirror and a roll of bandages set upon it, and a worn tan sports bag that sat solitarily in the far corner. The shadows that were cast by these objects swayed gently as the single naked light bulb that hung from the ceiling was disturbed by the draft of the closing door.

The wall to Spike's left housed a closed door, from behind which was emanating the sound of running water. Reaching into his jacket, Spike drew his gun from its holster and began to move stealthily across room, using the fluctuating sound of the water to mask his footfalls as they crunched down against the gravel-strewn floor. Upon reaching the door, Spike raised his gun up to his cheek, allowing its cold contours to almost brush his skin, and pressed his free hand against the door's warm, clammy surface.

Then, something caught his eye. There was an object placed on the seat of the wooden chair, almost hidden by the shadows beneath the desk. From what was visible of the object, it appeared to be a book.

Spike glanced back at the closed door, and then slowly moved away. Overcome by curiosity, or so he told himself, Spike replaced his gun and drifted almost silently across the room. Approaching the desk, he reached down and carefully extracted the object from its hiding placed.

It was indeed a book, and a fairly thick one at that. The tome was bound in a deep red cover, which was itself adorned by a black-marbling design. Its wide spine was held together by a number of lengths of discoloured tape, indicative of many years of repair, or maybe even expansion. The thickness of the book belied the actual number of pages it contained, which was not many for book its girth. The black pages appeared thick and warped from the outside, to the point that the book was close to spontaneously falling open.

Slowly, Spike pushed the front cover aside causing the stiff, aged card to creak mournfully as it was disturbed. He was greeted by the musty smell of matured paper and disturbed dust which swirled from the pages like restless spirits as the lid of their tomb was pulled away. He then pressed his hand down across the inside cover and first page to prevent it from flicking over unintentionally. What he found there captivated him.

The first page had two newspaper clippings glued to it. Each of the yellowed irregularly shaped snippets held a single photograph, a headline, and a couple of blocks of text. The first of these even had the title of the publication from which it had been taken still attached. *Blood Sport *. Spike smiled to himself. He hadn't seen a copy of the syndicate sports weekly in some years.

The title at the head of the article read `Upset At Olympus City Fights'. Intrigued, Spike read on:

*There was uproar at Sunday night's event in Olympus city as Iron-Side Flanagan, number one contender and fan favourite, was killed in the ring at the end of what should have been a routine warm-up match ahead of the main event at Tharsis next week. This upset overshadowed even the subsequent main event between champion, Pincer Chao, and special guest fighter Colossus Mann.

The challenger, a promising young fighter by the name of Stainless Steele, ended Flanagan's. . . *

Spike cocked an eyebrow.

"Promising *young* fighter." he muttered.

He stood bemused for a couple of moments before realising that he had not yet checked the date of the publication. November 15th, 2030. It was an account of Steele's first death-match.

And there was more. Just beneath this article, and just above the one below, was taped a ragged-edge piece of white paper with a short note scrawled upon it.

*Work on left block.

11/16/30*

Spike deduced that this was a note made by Steele himself, jotting down improvements that were required ahead of subsequent fights.

The next article chronicled Steele's victory over The Callisto Kid. Below this was taped another note, this time suggesting work to harden his abdominal muscles.

Spike began to skip to random pages. All through the scrapbook, he found similar such articles, most of which were appended with notes for future training regimes. There were dozens of clippings, taken from the various sports pages of numerous worlds; an entire career's worth.

A thought occurred to Spike. Tentatively, he pushed his thumb beneath the remaining pages and brushed them aside.

The final page was blank. There was just enough room for two more articles and addenda, enough room for that evening's fight, and his retirement bout. This was a sobering sight.

Carefully he turned back to the first page. It was then that he saw something he had not noticed before. At the bottom right hand corner of the inside cover was taped a small newspaper column, so small that it had been obscured from Spike's view by his own hand. There was no headline, nor was there a date, only a single, narrow paragraph of text about five centimetres long. Spike began to read.

His attention was caught by motion occurring at the periphery of his vision. Glancing up, Spike found that the shadow of the desk before him had once again begun to dance from side to side. What was more, the sound of running water was gone.

Spike leapt back as streak of silver light raced by before his face, dropping the book to the ground as he did. He did not even have the time to feel the cool lick of the whipping air current before ducking a second bolt of silver.

Skipping back a couple of paces, Spike saw the angrily grimacing Stainless Steele, who was dressed only in black sweat pants. However, a glance was all he was allowed before the gargantuan fighter glided effortlessly across the room toward him. He unleashed a third attack.

Spike sidestepped as quickly as his reflexes would allow, but still he felt the sting of honed metal slicing across his right ear. Turning to face his assailant, he watched as Steele's outstretched fingertips cut inches into the solid brick wall behind where he had been stood. There was a burst of clay-dust, followed by a frustrated growl. Shattered clay poured from the wounded brickwork as the fighter hauled his hand from the fissure, and turned to face Spike.

He was a frightening sight, even more so at close range than when viewed from the dubious safety of the bleachers. Steele towered over Spike, his broad shadow spilling over him like a surge of pitch-black. His impressive musculature writhed beneath his clammy skin, seeming to desire the commencement of battle as a being onto itself. And his eyes, set into his war-torn face, seemed to suck the very warmth from the air around.

Steele began to raise his lustrously knuckled fists, bearing a look of threatening intent; his haggard face twisted and creased into a cast of inhuman anger.

"Get out." he growled.

Spike returned Steele's glare. He stood with his limbs loose in readiness to dodge another attack, and with his right hand lingering at his chest, longing to tend to his sharply stinging ear.

"Not until I get what I came for." he replied.

"Get out." Steele repeated.

Spike smiled slyly.

"You can drop the act, Steele." he said. "I know you're not going to kill me."

Steele's poise and expression remained unchanged.

"What makes you so sure?" he snarled.

"Because if you wanted me dead, then I already would be. You're a hell of a lot quicker than that."

There was a short pause, filled only by the rumble of Steele's breath and the soft patting of the blood that dripped from Spike's injured ear against the concrete floor. Then Steele slowly began to mirror Spike's smile.

"Maybe I'm just getting old." said Steele.

"Pit-fighter's don't get old." Spike replied. "They can't afford to."

"You seem to think you know a lot about pit fighters."

"I do. For example, I know that you've never killed anyone outside the ring."

Steele emitted a short, almost laughter-like grunt.

"Who told you that?" he asked.

"Don't get me wrong, Stainless. I've heard the stories, but that's all they are." Spike replied.

The two men beheld each other for a while longer, with the stare of each of their unusual sets of eyes attempting to cut through the other's defences. At first neither seemed ready to surrender his position. But after a protracted stalemate, both began to gradually lower their guard.

Steele gave a rumbling sigh.

"You're not going to go away, are you?"

" `fraid not." Spike replied.

Steele grunted with tired frustration, and turned away from Spike. He inhaled deeply, and then slowly exhaled. With this laboured breath, the frightening rage that had seemed to fuel his previous acts of brutality was expelled from his body. As he had appeared to increase in physical size just prior to his fight, so he seemed to reduce as this ballast was released. The fighter began to march across to his desk, his slouching shoulders denoting a weariness derived not only of a night's exertion, but of a lifetime of violence and savagery.

"Usually, all I have to do is show my face and it's enough to get rid of someone." he grumbled. "Failing that, the clip across the ear always finishes the job."

Spike watched as Steele turned and paced to the desk. The man before him was a far cry from the vision of primal rage that had so mercilessly annihilated Tiger Po, to the jubilation of a horde of bloodthirsty fans. This was a man who was beginning to look his age.

"I guess not everyone has followed your career as closely as I have." Spike said.

Of course, this was something of a white lie, since Spike had fallen out of the pit-fighting loop in the last few years.

As Steele approached the chair, he leaned down and plucked the scrapbook from the floor. He dusted it off, and then dropped it down onto the desk.

"I see." he said. "So, what is it you want? If it was a drink that you were after, then I'm afraid you're out of luck."

"Actually, I was wondering if I could get an autograph."

"I'm afraid I can't help you with that, either." Steele replied. "I have a reputation to uphold, you know."

The fighter pulled the chair out from beneath the desk and dropped down into it wearily. Steele echoed the tired creak of the aged wood as his immense frame fell limp into the seat.

"Hey, I won't tell anyone if you won't." Spike assured him.

Steele exhaled hard through his nose, and rubbed his forehead with the metal tips of his fingers. He then looked at Spike.

"Alright." he sighed. "But I haven't got a pen."

"I think I have one here." said Spike.

He reached into his jacket, but it was not a pen for which he was reaching.

"You know, I wouldn't normally do this," Steele continued. "But with my retirement coming up, I guess my reputation isn't going to be that important anymore."

"Oh, that's right. It's your retirement fight soon, isn't it? I wish I could be there *that * fight." Spike said as he grasped the handle of his gun.

"Well, I'm afraid it's been sold out for weeks." Steele informed him.

"That's too bad. I bet it's gonna be one hell of a party."

"Yeah. Everyone's going to be there." Steele said with a soulful, almost sarcastic tone of enthusiasm.

Spike paused, and then relaxed his grip slightly.

"Everyone?" he said.

"That's right." Steele replied. "Governors, Blue Rat top brass, even a couple of guys I used to work with on Mars."

"Really." said Spike as he pulled an empty hand from his jacket.

"Yeah, really. . . Hey, have you got that pen?"

"No. Guess I must have left it in my ship."

"Oh." said Steele. "Too bad."

"Don't worry about it." Spike replied.

There was then a lull in the conversation. For a short time, Spike stared uncomfortably into Steele's narrowing eyes, and began to suspect that the fighter's keen instincts had pierced through his pretence. The fingers on Spike's non-pocketed hand began to twitch as he readied himself for a second confrontation.

"You know, I'm sure I've seen you somewhere before." Steele said, pensively. "You used to come to the fights on Mars, right?"

Spike relaxed a little.

"You remember me?" he asked.

He fought to contain a small smile, as he felt both surprised and flattered by the idea.

"Yeah, I have a pretty good memory." Steele said. "You used to come to the fights in Tharsis, front row centre every time. And there was usually someone with you. Let me think. . . yeah, there was a guy, kind of slim with long, silver hair?"

Spike's smile evaporated, and his expression hardened.

"I think you have me confused with someone else."

"No, I don't think so."

Spike's cast remained stony.

"I guess you could be right." Steele conceded.

He clasped his hands and cracked his knuckles, causing them to produce a sound one might associate more with a metallic mechanism than flesh and bone. He then yawned.

"Listen, uh. . . what did you say your name was?" Steele enquired.

"Spike. Spike Spiegel."

"Listen, Spike, it's getting kind of late. We've gotta pack up soon, so if it's all the same to you. . ."

Spike gave his trademark skewed smile.

"No problem. I think it's time I headed back anyway. The folks are probably getting worried."

Steele's face creased up into a half-hearted smile.

"Thanks, kid. Oh, and could you do me a favour?"

"Sure thing, Stainless."

"On your way out, could you try and make sure no one sees you? It wouldn't look good if I was just letting people waltz in and out of my dressing room without at least crippling them."

"No problem." Spike replied, and then turned for the door.

He began to walk across to the doorway, but then stopped just before reaching it. There he stood for a couple of moments as he mulled over an idea that had been percolating in his mind for a couple of minutes.

Spike knew that Jet probably wouldn't like it, and he was certain that Faye wouldn't. Perhaps these were the reasons he chose his following course of action. He couldn't be certain. His crewmates often complained of being unable to understand him, and this was more than likely due to the fact that he himself often could not put a finger on his own motives. But if there was one thing that was sure of, it was that, in life, there were times when it was best to simply follow one's nose.

"Was there something else?" Steele asked, his voice heavy with fatigue and drizzled with impatience.

This was one of those times.

Spike smiled to himself and, without turning to face Steele, said,

"Actually, there was one other thing."