Cowboy Bebop Fan Fiction ❯ Truckin' ❯ Truckin' ( Chapter 1 )

[ P - Pre-Teen ]

Session 7 TRUCKIN’ by jak981125

Note: This work is part of a series. It will make more sense if you read the earlier sessions.

        Jet told Lau and Faye he’d be out getting supplies for his bonsai trees. He hated lying to them. The fact was that he was really going to see a therapist. He’s been acting and feeling so strangely lately that he could no longer deny something was wrong. The therapist had been a guy who used to do mandatory counseling sessions with ISSP personnel. Jet always hated going and put up a huge resistance each and every time. So when the therapist got a call from Jet years after he had quit, begging to be seen, the doctor knew something was wrong.

        Back on Bebop, Lau was taking kendo lessons via virtual reality. He held a bamboo sword in his hand and did his best to keep up with the instruction. When he was finished, he put the bamboo sword in a trunk next to a real one. Jet didn’t know about the real sword. After the way Jet had reacted to him merely having a picture of Vicious on board, he could imagine how he would react to him having Vicious’s katana. It was the very weapon that had killed Spike. Faye was in her room and was watching her tape for the millionth time. She almost wished she hadn’t regained her memories. Now that she could remember her parents, she really missed them. They were, of course, long gone. Just then she heard a ringing sound coming from the computer. She knew that meant an e-mail from Edward.

        Jet was flying back to the Bebop after his session. He did feel a little better. The doctor had recognized a couple of things. Jet wasn’t the type to let people know how he felt about them. Then he suffered a major trauma. In one week he lost two of the people who were closest to him in the world. Oddly, he had found himself thinking about Ed a lot more than Spike and missing her terribly. Ed hadn’t been as close to him as Spike, but the therapist pointed out that she was alive and Spike was dead and that realization was bound to have some affect on him. The doctor felt he was dealing with guilt and post-traumatic stress issues. But he told him not to worry about him missing Ed so badly. In fact he felt it was rather touching.

        As soon as he returned he was approached by Faye. “So, how did the bonsai shopping go?” she asked. “

The what?” replied Jet. He had forgotten his own lie. “Oh, the bonsai shopping! Yeah, well, there was nothing on sale so I didn’t get anything.”

“Then why were you gone for an hour?” asked Faye.

“I went to several stores, OK?” replied Jet in a tone telling her to drop it.

“Anyway, I just got another e-mail from Ed,” said Faye. Jet cringed inside. Why did she have to talk about her now? “She just gave me a tip on a hot bounty,” Faye continued. “It looks like a leader in the space trucker’s union was murdered this morning. ISSP is offering eight million for the capture.” Faye had known a member of that union briefly. A lady trucker named VT. She wanted this case badly. Lau and Jet, however, were nowhere near as enthusiastic as she was.

        “What if there’s some involvement by one of the syndicates in his death?” asked Lau. “They’ve got me as a marked man right now. I tick off Akira and who knows what might happen?”

Jet simply muttered that he wasn’t in the mood.

“What’s the matter with you two?” Faye asked scornfully. “We’re almost out of food here and you two are too freaked out to do your jobs? What if I told you that they shot this guy right in front of his family?”

Lau sighed and then stood up. “Alright, that sucks enough to make me want to nail this creep. Jet, you in?” Jet merely nodded.

“Alright, let’s set a course for Ganymede then,” said Faye. Jet slunked off to the control room. Faye watched him with concern. Lau sat on the couch. Faye came over and sat on his lap. “Lau, is it just me, or does Jet seem to be acting weirder than usual today?”

Lau stroked her hair and thought about it for a minute. “Now that you mention it, he does seem a little down in the dumps.”

        Jet wasn’t really all that down in the dumps, but he was being secretive. He set a course for Ganymede on the auto pilot and then went off to tend to his bonsai. He was feeling weird about a recommendation that the doctor had made. He wanted him to leave notes for Lau and Faye letting them know he liked and appreciated them. That was awkward enough. But the real killer was that he wanted him to send Ed an e-mail telling her how he had been feeling lately. This was embarrassing.

        The ship touched down in a Ganymede harbor a while later. This was going to be another case where the identity of the suspect was unknown. Faye had figured the smartest move to make would be to go and start interviewing union members to see if they had heard anything. After all, word on the street is often a cowboy’s most valuable tool. But this was not going to be easy. The members of the union were for the most part rioting outside the local trucking firm. They were all sure that management had gone and hired itself a hit man. Now they wanted revenge. It was clear from taking one look at the riot that they wouldn’t get any fresh perspectives from these people.

“Faye, didn’t you say you knew a trucker who worked for this company?” asked Lau.

“Yeah, but I don’t see her around here. VT didn’t come off as the rioting type when I met her,” replied Faye.

        Indeed Victoria Terpsichore, the self-proclaimed Heavy Metal Queen was nowhere near that riot. She and Zeros were at home watching re-runs of twenty year old sitcoms. She was surprised by a knock on her door. She figured it was going to be her fellow truckers come to hassle her about not being at the rally. “Look, I already told you, I got better things to do with my time than go scream at management!” she shouted through the door.

“VT, it’s Faye Valentine! Remember me from that mine that we blew up?”

VT may not have remembered the name, but she never forgot a voice or a face. She opened the door right away. “Well, long time no see, little miss bounty hunter,” she said. “Haven’t been chasing down any more explosives smugglers have you?” She invited Faye inside. Faye was alone, having left Jet and Lau on the Bebop. She knew VT wasn’t fond of bounty hunters and might take a special dislike to two she didn’t even know. “So where’s your friend, the fuzzy haired fellow that likes to float around with no space suit on?”

“He’s sharing a hangover with your husband right now,” replied Faye.

VT shooed Zeros off the couch. “So he’s dead, is he? That’s a shame. He seemed like an all right guy for a scumbag bounty hunter. What happened? He get shot chasing a bounty head?”

“Not exactly,” replied Faye.

        “I gave your friend my address when we last met,” said VT. “I see you guys kept it, eh? So let me guess, you’re here to catch the guy who killed Steve?”

“Steve?”

“Yeah, Steve Greeley, the guy who was killed,” replied VT. “Sheesh, you’re trying to catch a killer and you don’t even know the victim’s name. That’s just sad.”

“Everyone we’ve talked to so far thinks management hired a hit-man,” said Faye.

“And you disagree with them?” asked VT.

“I noticed you weren’t at the riot, er...rally,” replied Faye. “I thought that might indicate that you had a difference of opinion.”

“Or maybe I just had better things to do with my time,” replied VT. “I’m flattered you thought highly enough of my opinion to come here though.”

“So do you know anything about what happened?” asked Faye. “I hear rumors,” replied VT. “I don’t know. I suppose management could have done it but they usually aren’t that underhanded. I did hear a rumor two months ago that the Blue Snake syndicate was trying to get in on running the union. If there’s any truth to that, I wouldn’t go messing around with them. The syndicates can mean real trouble.”

Faye smiled. “Like I said before, I’ve never been the delicate type. I don’t scare easy.”

“Figures,” replied VT. “Your dead buddy likes floating in space with no suit and you’re ready to take on the mob. I hope you live longer than he did.” Faye thanked VT for the information and then left.

        Back on the Bebop, Jet was secretly writing his e-mail to Ed. He felt more than a little embarrassed doing this. He kept looking behind him every two seconds to make sure no one was watching him. He told Ed in detail what had been going on and how he had been feeling lately. He heard the Redtail coming back in, so he quickly finished the message and sent it. Faye walked in and sat down. “Well it looks like it may have been a syndicate after all,” she said. “Management is a possibility but VT didn’t think they would stoop that low.” She turned and saw Lau enter wearing a chef’s apron. She couldn’t help but think he looked ridiculous in that thing and laughed.

“Dinner’s ready,” he announced. “Oh, and thank you Faye for demeaning me like that.”

“Anytime,” she replied. “So anyway, if it’s a syndicate, is it worth it to go after them? And would we even be able to find out who in the syndicate was responsible?”

Jet thought about that for a minute. “Finding the assassin’s identity might not be so hard. The hard parts are finding him and preventing retribution for doing so. And let’s not forget that with a John Doe bounty, we have to dig up some evidence against him.” Just then Lau came in with dinner. Welsh rarebit.

“What’s this?” asked Jet.

“Dinner. All we had left were bread and cheese,” replied Lau.

Jet groaned. “I’d rather have the syndicate come after me than starve to death.”

“Just let me ask this,” said Lau. “Which syndicate was it? It wasn’t the Dragons, was it?”

“If the rumors are true, it was the Blue Snake,” said Faye.

“I always hated those guys,” replied Lau.

“I had a run-in with them myself once,” said Jet. “It doesn’t surprise me at all that they would execute a guy in front of his family. Let me handle this.”

        The next day, Jet followed his usual routine of obtaining information. He tracked down some Blue Snake guys and strangled them with his mechanical arm until they told him what he wanted to know. Apparently a syndicate man had indeed been responsible for Greeley’s death. The shooter was a new guy named Roscoe who had actually acted on his own to impress his bosses. Greeley had been doing a good job pushing management to meet demands, but the syndicate guaranteed they could get better results. Greeley turned them down flat which upset them. Roscoe interpreted that upset to mean that they wanted Greeley done away with. Wrong.

        Jet had insisted on going out on his own. The reason for that was that he didn’t want to be around when Lau and Faye found those notes he left for them. It may have been therapeutic but damn, it was humiliating. When Jet came back with his results, he found things as he had left them. Faye and Lau were snuggled up together on the couch watching cartoons. A horrible thought entered his mind. Maybe they hadn’t read them yet. He didn’t want to be around when they did. He felt a sudden temptation to get back in the Hammerhead and take off. But he noticed the notes were not where he had left them. They must have read them. He decided to sneak in quietly to check out the bonsai. The two had barely even noticed him come in. So he crept down the hall...

“We love you too Jet,” called Faye with a laugh. So close, almost got out of there and then she had to go and say that.

        Rather than put his tail between his legs and slink away, Jet got mad and came back in. “You could show a little sensitivity you know,” he growled.

“Sensitivity? OK, who are you and what have you done with Jet,” replied Faye. “Seriously, all joking aside, you’ve been acting a little odd lately and it’s starting to worry us a little. What’s going on?”

Jet sighed and sat down and explained the whole thing.

“Aw, that’s so cute, you miss Ed,” said Faye with complete sincerity when he had finished. “She said she missed you too in one of her e-mails. I didn’t say anything because I didn’t think you cared.”

“That’s the problem,” replied Jet. “I sometimes wonder if the people who know me best think I care about anyone.” This was a side to Jet that was new to Faye and she wasn’t quite sure how to react. She was still hurting from everything that had happened that horrible week too. She hadn’t considered how it affected Jet.

        Jet tried to change the subject. “OK, here’s what I’ve got. A rookie in the Blue Snake named Roscoe acted without the knowledge or consent of his superiors in killing Greeley. We know who we’re looking for, but we still have to prove that he did it. I’m starting to think that maybe the syndicate won’t come after us for busting Roscoe if he went against them. The problem is that now they know we’re looking for him. We have to act fast if we want to collect on this guy.”

“Maybe someone caught the whole thing on tape,” replied Lau. “Local governments have hidden cameras set up all over the place, ATM machines have cameras, maybe a satellite caught something...”

“Lau,” Jet interrupted. “This happened in a suburban neighborhood. If it happened downtown you might be right, but...”

Jet never got to finish. Faye called out to them to come look at the computer. A bounty had been placed specifically on Roscoe. Lau had been right. The police reviewed a tape from a camera set-up on a nearby stop light. “Oh great, so I strangled two mafia guys for nothing?” groaned Jet. “If I turn up in cement shoes, just carry on without me.”

“Oh don’t worry Jet, nothing like that is going to happen,” said Faye. “But if it does, can I have your stereo?” Jet glared at her.

        As it so happens, Roscoe had been kicked out of the Blue Snake for his little blunder. Now that he had been charged with Greeley’s murder, he was afraid that some trucker would recognize his picture on the internet and get him. That was indeed a realistic concern. He had stolen some red eye from the syndicate and was now going around trying to sell as much as he could to fund his escape. He knew he would have to disappear very soon before a trucker, cop, bounty hunter, or syndicate man got their hands on him. He started trying to peddle his drugs at bars, much like Asimov had. Unlike Asimov, however, he didn’t know where the market was and kept coming up empty. So after going one for twelve he walked into his thirteenth bar. It would indeed turn out to be his unlucky number.

        He walked up to the bartender. It was a tall young Amerasian bartender with a metal hand. “I’ll have a Bloody Mary,” he announced. “Well I’ve got the Mary, but I don’t have the blood. Let me correct that.” Lau hit the guy with his metal fist, knocking him to the floor. “Oh good, now we have the blood!”

Roscoe stood up and pulled out a knife. “What’s the matter with you?” he snarled. “If you didn’t want to buy off of me a simple no would have sufficed.” He jumped over the bar and attacked Lau. Big mistake. Lau slapped him around a few times and then put him in an arm lock and forced him to drop the knife.

Faye and Jet got up from a table they had been sitting at and strolled over to the bar. “Well now Roscoe, I really have to question your judgment,” smirked Jet. “I mean pissing off your employer as much as you have in your profession is typically considered a rather big no-no.” Try as he might, Roscoe couldn’t break loose from the hold that Lau had him in. It was a picture perfect capture. Or at least it would have been. The Bebop crew made a little mistake of their own. They didn’t do their homework before showing up at this bar. It was happy hour and this place was popular among truckers. Just as Jet was going for his cuffs, five truckers walked in.

“Hey, it’s that Roscoe feller!”

Uh-oh!

        Lau was so surprised that he let go of Roscoe. Roscoe sprang loose and ran out the back door as fast as he could. The truckers took off after him. “Oh man, we almost caught this one without chasing him,” complained Lau as he tore off after them. Roscoe ran for several blocks down city streets with the truckers and Lau on his tail. His only thought was getting away. He wasn’t looking where he was going. That’s when he made another mistake. He fell down an open manhole. The truckers pulled up short. They looked at one another to see if any of them had the guts to go down there after him. Lau pushed his way through the crowd of truckers. “Where’d he go?” he yelled. They pointed down into the sewer. Lau took out a flashlight and looked down. Not seeing Roscoe lying at the bottom unconscious, he figured he must have been running through the sewers. “Oh the things I do to make a living,” groaned Lau as he climbed in after him. The truckers just stood around gawking in amazement.

“Well I’ll be a son of a mongoose,” said one of them.

        Just then, Jet and Faye showed up. “Where did they...”

“They went down there,” interrupted one of the truckers.

“Man, Lau must really hate Welsh rarebit,” remarked Faye as she caught the aroma of the open sewer. All of them stood around waiting for Lau and Roscoe to come back up. When they didn’t, Jet, tried contacting Lau on the communicator, but the transmission wouldn’t go through.

        Lau had actually caught Roscoe a lot earlier. The problem was that he didn’t want to take him up the manhole where they had fallen in. There were a bunch of angry truckers up there waiting to tear this guy limb from limb. Lau lead him through the sewer, looking for the next nearest manhole. He had an empty stomach and wound up with the dry heaves several times. And yes, dead rats do float, in case you were wondering. Lau found that out for himself. Finally Lau saw some light. He took him up the nearest manhole. What luck! They came out right in front of a police station. Lau had never received such a hostile reception from the police upon turning in a fugitive before. He had also never received such a hostile reception from his crewmates when he caught up with them. The man literally smelled like crap.

        Back on the ship they made him throw his outfit overboard and he had to take three baths before his aroma was satisfactory enough to be allowed in their presence. Even then, Faye refused to cuddle up with him on the couch.

        “So Jet, feeling any better?” asked Faye when they had all settled down and were enjoying a smoke.

“I was so occupied with catching Roscoe, I really didn’t have much time to think about much else,” Jet replied.

“Well keeping busy might just be the most therapeutic thing for you to do then,” replied Faye. “It’s less embarrassing than writing a bunch of touch-feely notes to us.”

“Maybe it is, but I think you guys still deserved to hear what I had to say,” replied Jet.

        “Well I’m exhausted,” said Faye. “And my Lau, you look absolutely pooped. Pun intended.” Lau did not dignify that with a response. Faye allowed Lau to come close enough to kiss her goodnight and then the two of them headed off for bed.

Jet was feeling pretty tired himself. He was about to go to bed himself when he remembered something. He went over to the computer to check his e-mail and sure enough, there was a response from Ed. He stared at the screen for about a minute. He was scared to open it. Finally he went ahead and clicked on the message. What he saw was one of Ed’s big smiley faces. Underneath it read the following “Don’t be sad Jet. Edward still loves you even if she’s not there right now. Edward wishes she could send you a hug over the computer. Oh Ein says “arf”. That means he loves you too.” Jet was almost embarrassed at how good that cute little message made him feel. He felt better than he had in weeks. He crawled over to the couch and fell fast asleep.

SWEET DREAMS SPACE COWBOY

(c) 2004 Joseph Kerner jak981125@catholic.org

Disclaimer: I did not create Cowboy Bebop. I wish I had, but I didn’t. This is just fanfiction