Cowboy Bebop Fan Fiction ❯ COWBOY BEBOP: THE SECOND MOVIE ❯ Act I ( Chapter 1 )
[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]
By: jak981125 
Anime/Manga: Cowboy Bebop Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Drama / Action | Type: Continuation | Uploaded On: 05.10.2006 | Pages: 3 | Words: 4.1K | Visits: 319 | Status: Completed
Anime/Manga: Cowboy Bebop Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Drama / Action | Type: Continuation | Uploaded On: 05.10.2006 | Pages: 3 | Words: 4.1K | Visits: 319 | Status: Completed
Note: This movie follows the story line of Cowboy Bebop: The Lau Saga by jak981125.
New York City. July 4th, 2074.
The Manhattan sky was ablaze with the finale of the annual fireworks display. It was always quite a sight, year after year. No one could wait for the tricentenial in two years. What a show that was sure to be! When the display was over, the land was dark again but you could hear thunderous applause all over the place, especially in Central Park.
One solitary man seemed to have been paying little attention to the fireworks. He was only interested in the crowd. He was looking for an easy target to mug. There was a man standing nearby who looked to be from out of town. This out-of-towner headed off deep into the park alone where it was dark and there were no crowds. The thug couldn’t help but think he had struck the jackpot. This fool was just ripe for the picking. Or so he thought. The man he was following was Lau.
As soon as they were some distance from the crowd, the mugger produced a gun. “OK pal, this is your unlucky day. Now hand over your money.”
Lau slowly turned around and smiled. “Lo siento, señor, no hablo ingles.”
“Very funny,” replied the mugger. “You ain’t Mexican. Now hand it over.”
“Que?”
“Look buddy, I’m warning you...”
What the mugger hadn’t seen were two other figures emerge from the darkness behind him. One was Jet and the other was Faye. Jet jammed a gun into the mugger’s back. “Now you be a nice little scumbag and drop the piece,” he said with a grin.
The mugger cooperated in dropping the gun but then made a serious error in judgment. He decided to run for it. “Hey, don’t you wanna stay and play some more?” called Faye after him. None of them bothered pursuing him. He continued to run, thinking he had shaken these guys. Wrong. Out of nowhere, the Redtail descended very suddenly and pulled in front of him. It was being piloted by Ed.
“You might want to stop running,” warned Ed over the Redtail’s loudspeaker. “Ed doubts you could outrun this thing but you’re welcome to try.”
And try he did. Ed sat back with a grin. “Silly man. Ed will give him a ten second head start. One...two...”
The man ran blindly as fast as he could.
“...seven...eight...”
He tried to run into a grove of trees thinking he could lose her there.
“...ten! Ready or not, here Edward comes!” Ed flipped on a switch and immediately a heat sensor showed her where the mugger was. She quickly descended and fired a net launcher. The mugger was caught. She giggled at him as he tried to struggle out of it and only got tangled up more. “Tag, you’re it!”
THREE, TWO, ONE...Let’s Jam!
COWBOY BEBOP: THE SECOND MOVIE
By jak981125
ACT I
The next morning, Lau and Jet sat inside a store-front office. They had gone ahead with their plans from the previous year and had purchased Manhattan Fugitive Recovery. They had only a few other bounty hunters working for them but that meant more profits so no one complained. Yeah right. This is Bebop we’re talking about.
At the moment, the two of them were quite uncomfortable. Lau smacked the air conditioner in the window but it wouldn’t start. He sighed and shook his head at Jet. “The previous owners said this thing was brand new!” growled Lau.
Just then an eighteen year old bounty hunter named Matthew walked into the office. “Why the hell is it so hot in here?” he asked.
“Good morning to you too, Matthew,” replied Jet in a surly tone.
“Heard you guys caught a mugger who was actually worth over a million last night,” said Matthew.
“Yeah well, the guy had been around a while and the cops were getting a little sick of him,” replied Lau. “So, did you get your man last night?”
“What, that car thief?” he asked. “Sure thing. He was hiding on the roof of his mother’s apartment building. So Lau, the little woman’s not in yet?”
“If Faye ever hears you call her that, she’ll kill you,” warned Lau.
At that moment, the “little woman” was flying over Manhattan in the Redtail with baby Julia strapped to her front in a baby carrier. Julia loved rock music almost as much as her father did. Faye was playing “Hammer To Fall” from Queen over the speakers and she and the baby were loving it. You didn’t sing “Rock A Bye Baby” to get Julia to sleep. You played “Pinball Wizard” over the hi-fi.
Faye was headed over to the apartment building that Jet, Ed, and Ein now occupied. As promised, Jet had signed the Bebop over to Lau. Faye landed and parked the Redtail on the top deck of a parking garage and then headed inside the building.
She knocked on the door to Jet’s apartment and Ed answered. Ed was now sixteen. She was Julia’s sitter. She could watch the baby all year long since she had passed a high school equivalency test at the age of twelve. Even at sixteen, Ed’s personality had changed only a little. Ed’s wardrobe had changed again, though. It was summer and she had traded in her green sweatshirt for a red tanktop and navy shorts.
“Oh, come to Auntie Edward!” she cried as she reached out and took the baby from Faye.
“She’s had a little colic lately,” warned Faye. “If she starts crying, you know how to calm her down, right?”
“Take her for a ride in the jet and play loud music from the twentieth century, right?” asked Ed.
“Ed, what would I do without you?” replied Faye. “You know, you were a lot of help yesterday.”
“See, Ed told Papa Jet that she could be a bounty hunter. But he always says I’m too young. That’s silly. Edward caught that mugger, right?”
“Yeah, but you had the Redtail,” replied Faye.
“Edward could have done it just fine on her own. Ed knows how to fight now. You think I could be a bounty hunter, don’t you Julia?” The baby let out a loud burp in response. “See?”
Faye grinned and headed back to the parking garage while Ed took the baby into the apartment. Faye boarded the Redtail and headed to work. She was not necessarily always in the habit of observing her surroundings while flying. Nevertheless, as she flew, she noticed a young woman about thirty years old with black hair and green eyes who was standing on the edge of a rooftop. “Gees, I hope she’s not going to jump or something,” said Faye to herself. But when Faye turned the ship around to take another look, the woman was gone. She looked down but didn’t see anyone splattered on the pavement below. “I must be seeing things,” she groaned to herself. “It must be the heat.” She flew off towards the office.
Back in Central Park, not far from where Ed had caught the mugger the previous night, a girl was jogging when she was suddenly snatched into the bushes. A knife was put to her throat. “Alright you little wench, take it all off right now and don’t scream of I swear I’ll slit you open!”
The girl was terrified and fainted. The rapist smirked and walked over to her. “Now don’t do that. It’s no fun when you don’t put up a struggle.” Just then he sensed he wasn’t alone. He turned around and sure enough, that woman from the roof was standing right behind him. “Get lost or you’re next!” he warned. He was trying to act tough, but he was frightened of attracting any additional attention to what he was doing. As it was, she didn’t answer but her green eyes suddenly glowed. “Huh? What the hell? Hey, you want a piece of me or something?”
The rapist raised his knife in a threatening manner. Before he could react, the woman grabbed his arm and forced his knife into his own gut. She quickly put her hand over the man’s mouth so he couldn’t yell out. She looked him in the eye and gave him a sickening grin. She continued covering his mouth until he dropped dead. Just then, his would-be victim woke up. She saw no one except the dead rapist. She started screaming as loud as she could.
Faye opened the door to the office but as soon as she sensed the heat, she stood in the doorway, not taking another step. “Haven’t you people ever heard of air conditioning?” she complained.
“It’s busted,” replied Lau.
Faye walked over to a mini refrigerator and pulled out a bottle of water. Rather than drink it, however, she dumped it over her head. “Ah, that’s much better. Hey Jet, I was talking to Ed and she’s still pushing the whole bounty hunting thing.”
“I knew it,” groaned Jet as he looked up from his newspaper. “I never should have caved in and let her come with us last night.”
“Well she’s not in school so it’s not like she has anything better to do except baby-sit,” replied Faye. “Besides, she’s not a little girl anymore. She might be able to handle herself out there. She’s been sitting on the sidelines watching us do this for years. You can’t blame her for feeling that way.”
“I don’t blame her, I just don’t want her getting hurt,” replied Jet.
“Hey, you could send her out with me sometime,” said Matthew. “I wouldn’t let anything happen to her.”
Faye grinned. “Why Matthew, are you carrying a torch for Ed? That’s so cute.”
“Cute?” growled Jet. “Kid, if you so much as look at her the wrong way you’ll be looking for a new job, got it?”
“Gee, I guess that means I’ll have to call her and tell her the wedding’s off,” replied Matthew with a grin. If looks could kill, Jet’s glare would have destroyed Matthew right on the spot. “Just kidding.” Matthew skulked off and sat down with two other young bounty hunters around a table.
Lau handed a computer printout to Jet. “Check this out. It’s a car- jacker worth two million. You want us to take it or should we hand it over to the three stooges over there?”
“You and I will get this one,” replied Jet. “Another minute in this office and my brains are going to fry like an egg. Faye, you want to come with or man the phones?”
“I’m gonna get on the phone and get someone over here to fix the damn air conditioner,” she replied. “You guys go ahead.”
Lau walked over and gave Faye a peck on the cheek. Then he and Jet headed out in search of their car-jacker.
Meanwhile Julia was starting to cry at the apartment. Ed couldn’t get her to settle down. She sighed. “Ein, Ed’s taking the baby for a ride, OK?”
Ein showed no interest one way or another. Ed took the baby over to the parking garage. Ed now had a zip craft of her own called the Falcon. It was shaped like a guitar pick and had a bubble cockpit on top. She got in and placed the baby in a carrier next to her. “Are you ready? OK, hold on.” She started up the jet and took off.
She flew over the New York skyline at speeds exceeding three hundred miles an hour. The baby, who normally would have been thrilled, merely quieted down a little bit. Ed flew between buildings, over the East River, and right above traffic. She looked over at Julia and smiled. The two of them had a real bond. They were quite fond of each other.
“Hey, Ed knows where we can go. We were at the park last night. We’ll fly over Central Park. You would like that, wouldn’t you cutie pie?” The baby gave no response. “Poor kid, you must have some bad colic.” As Ed flew over the park, she slowed the jet a little and lowered her altitude. She wanted to check out the scenery a little. She thought it was beautiful to have all these trees and this grass right in the middle of a massive metropolis such as New York.
Just then, Ed saw something she couldn’t believe was real. It was that green eyed woman. She was flying! “Aye ya! How’s she doing that?” The baby looked and saw what Ed was staring at and giggled. The woman didn’t seem to notice Ed at all. She flew off towards the city. “That is very strange and Ed is an expert on strange,” she said to the baby. The baby burped again in response.
Jet and Lau were standing on a rooftop in the Bronx. They were watching their suspect arguing with his girlfriend in a nearby apartment building. “Honestly this is getting boring,” complained Jet. “Although it would be amusing to hear what they’re arguing about.”
Lau grinned. “What do you mean you spent the grocery money on drugs?” he mimicked.
“Given this neighborhood it would be more like ‘What do you mean you spent the drug money on groceries?’ or something to that affect,” replied Jet. “Oh goodie, he’s leaving.”
About then, Faye was on the phone with the air conditioning company. “I don’t care if you have a backlog of service calls. None of your other customers can send a disgruntled bounty hunter after you if you don’t show up. I have three here right now...well same to you!” She hung up angrily. Just then Ed came in. “Ed, what are you doing here? You’re supposed to be watching the baby. There’s nothing wrong with her, is there?”
Ed handed Julia over to Faye. “Nothing is wrong with Julia but I think Ed is seeing things,” she said. “Could Ed have a word with you in private?”
The two of them stepped into the back room. “This had better be important Ed,” said Faye.
“Faye Faye, you said you saw a man fly once, right?”
“I said what?”
“A man who was trying to kill Spike.”
“Ed, everyone and his mother was trying to kill Spike...wait a sec, now that you mention it...Pierrot, he was able to levitate. Wait a minute why are you asking me about Mad Pierrot now?”
Ed sighed. “Promise not to think Ed is cuckoo?”
“Cross my heart. Now what’s up?”
“Ed saw a woman in the park who was flying and she had no jetpack on.”
Faye stared at Ed for a minute. “That’s impossible,” she said slowly.
“I’m telling you, Ed saw a flying woman in the park with black hair...”
“And green eyes,” interrupted Faye. She suddenly understood. “I saw her too. This morning. But how is that possible?”
Back in the Bronx, the carjacker left his apartment and climbed into a vintage white convertible parked on the street. He took a parking ticket off the window and threw it on the ground.
“Hmm, I wonder if we can get a little extra on this guy,” said Lau. He just committed another crime; disregarding a citation.”
“Don’t forget littering,” replied Jet with a grin. The two of them boarded their zip crafts.
As the carjacker drove down the streets of his Bronx neighborhood, he was too busy listening to the rap music on his radio to notice the Hammerhead and Swordfish flying overhead. “Let’s wait a little while until he gets to an area with fewer people around,” said Jet over the radio. “We don’t want anyone getting hurt.”
The two of them followed the car until it reached a more industrial area with fewer residents. Lau aimed at his tires and fired his machine gun. He timed it just right. The tires blew out but the car didn’t crash because it was traveling at a relatively low speed. The surprised carjacker looked up to see Jet and Lau circling around him like buzzards. He pulled a shiny metal handgun out and opened fire on them. Jet responded by dropping a canister of tear gas down onto the street. The carjacker dropped his gun and started coughing. He decided to run. The two crafts landed. Jet and Lau emerged and ran after him. The day was hot and not a pleasant one on which to chase a suspect. After only a couple of blocks, Lau pulled out his gun and fired a warning shot. “Alright, that’s enough. It’s too damn hot for this. Now get over here and keep your hands up.”
The carjacker knew he was finished. He put his hands on his head and slowly walked over to Lau. Then it happened. No one noticed a black haired woman with green eyes hovering twenty feet over their heads until she descended, placing herself between Lau and Jet and their intended target. “What the hell?” exclaimed Jet. As for Lau, he was too stunned to say anything.
Very slowly, she walked over to the carjacker. Lau and Jet watched in amazement. “We should be stopping this, right?” asked Lau. Jet didn’t respond. The woman came right up to the stunned carjacker, smiled, and then produced a gun. Before Lau or Jet could do anything, she ruthlessly gunned the man down, smiling the whole time.
“Alright lady, drop the hardware!” yelled Lau as he and Jet pointed their guns at her. She slowly turned around and looked at them. The smile was gone. She seemed to be looking straight through them.
“They all must pay,” she said at last. “He was only money to you. Don’t interfere with me.” She raised her gun. At that moment Lau and Jet opened fire on her. To their horror, a green force field appeared around her and blocked their bullets. Lau had no idea what this was all about but Jet immediately thought back to Mad Pierrot.
“LAU! HIT THE DECK!” Jet immediately jumped behind a parked car on the left side of the street while Lau jumped behind a mailbox on the right side. She returned fire at them and kept shooting until she ran out of ammo. “Lau, stay put!” yelled Jet. He knew they weren’t safe just yet.
Just then, a patrol car came up the street straight towards the girl. A look of anger came over her. Before the car came to a stop, something truly horrible happened. The woman pointed the palm of her hand at the police car and a green burst of energy emerged from it. The energy burst flew straight at the police car and it exploded. One police officer was killed right away. The other jumped out. His clothes were on fire. Before he even had a chance to extinguish himself, she reloaded her gun and shot him dead.
At this point, Lau pulled a gas grenade out of his pocket. He threw it onto the street and immediately it released a dark gray cloud of gas. He signaled to Jet that they should make a break for it while her vision was obstructed. The two of them ran down the street as fast as they could. Just then, another green blast emerged from the cloud of gas. It hit the pavement, sending chunks of it flying everywhere. One chunk hit Lau in the ear, causing it to bleed. Another hit Jet in the back pretty hard. I’m sure that left a big bruise.
Just then, there was a strong wind, which blew away the cloud of gas. The woman was gone. Jet and Lau had no time to ponder over that. Within moments, over ten police units showed up on the scene. The two of them spent the better part of an hour trying to explain to the cops what they had witnessed.
“Sure pal, we’re always getting attacked by young women with supernatural powers,” scoffed one officer.
“Look, I know it sounds crazy,” replied Jet. “But the security footage from that ATM over there ought to confirm my whole story.”
“It sounds more than crazy,” replied the cop. “It sounds like the kind of thing you see after sniffing paint fumes.”
“Just get the footage!” growled Jet. The cop walked over to the ATM and downloaded the security footage. He took it back to his car and watched in on his computer.
“Whoa!” He ran over and signaled for his fellow cops to come join him. All of them were astounded at what they saw. The cop walked back over to Jet. “Well cowboy, we may have one very big bounty for you.”
Ed stepped outside of the MFR office for a moment. She told Faye she was going out to get some fresh air. Just then, someone snuck up behind her and covered her eyes. “Guess who?”
Ed grinned. “Winston Churchill?”
“Aw, you guessed.” Ed turned around to see Matthew standing behind her. He leaned over and kissed her. “So, you still haven’t told your old man about us yet?”
“Ed with an older boy, one who’s a bounty hunter? No, he wouldn’t like that one bit. Ed would hate to see you get fired or anything.”
“So where do you tell him you are when you and I are together?” asked Matthew.
“I tell him Ed is hanging out with friends in the Village,” she replied. “Ed just doesn’t tell him which friends. It’s still technically true.”
“I hate sneaking around like this behind Jet’s back,” said Matthew. “Hmm...speak of the devil...”
At that moment Jet and Lau approached the building. “What are you doing here, Ed?” asked Jet. “Aren’t you supposed to be baby-sitting? And Matthew, I KNOW you should be doing something.”
“Uh, now that you mention it, there was a red eye dealer I wanted to catch today,” replied Matthew. “I’ll go get him right now. See you Ed.” He walked off in a big hurry.
“Where’s Faye?” asked Jet.
“Inside feeding the baby,” replied Ed. Jet started to head towards the office. “Did I mention she was breast-feeding?” Jet immediately turned around and walked right back to where he had been standing. “Lau, what happened to your ear?”
“That’s what we wanted to talk to Faye about,” said Lau. “We were going after this bounty head and out of nowhere this crazy lady kills the guy we’re after and starts attacking us.”
Something suddenly occurred to Ed. “She didn’t have black hair and green eyes, did she?”
“How did you know?” asked Lau.
“Lucky guess.”
END OF ACT I (c) 2004 Joseph Kerner
Disclaimer: I don’t own Cowboy Bebop or any other registered trademarks I may have mentioned in this story.
New York City. July 4th, 2074.
The Manhattan sky was ablaze with the finale of the annual fireworks display. It was always quite a sight, year after year. No one could wait for the tricentenial in two years. What a show that was sure to be! When the display was over, the land was dark again but you could hear thunderous applause all over the place, especially in Central Park.
One solitary man seemed to have been paying little attention to the fireworks. He was only interested in the crowd. He was looking for an easy target to mug. There was a man standing nearby who looked to be from out of town. This out-of-towner headed off deep into the park alone where it was dark and there were no crowds. The thug couldn’t help but think he had struck the jackpot. This fool was just ripe for the picking. Or so he thought. The man he was following was Lau.
As soon as they were some distance from the crowd, the mugger produced a gun. “OK pal, this is your unlucky day. Now hand over your money.”
Lau slowly turned around and smiled. “Lo siento, señor, no hablo ingles.”
“Very funny,” replied the mugger. “You ain’t Mexican. Now hand it over.”
“Que?”
“Look buddy, I’m warning you...”
What the mugger hadn’t seen were two other figures emerge from the darkness behind him. One was Jet and the other was Faye. Jet jammed a gun into the mugger’s back. “Now you be a nice little scumbag and drop the piece,” he said with a grin.
The mugger cooperated in dropping the gun but then made a serious error in judgment. He decided to run for it. “Hey, don’t you wanna stay and play some more?” called Faye after him. None of them bothered pursuing him. He continued to run, thinking he had shaken these guys. Wrong. Out of nowhere, the Redtail descended very suddenly and pulled in front of him. It was being piloted by Ed.
“You might want to stop running,” warned Ed over the Redtail’s loudspeaker. “Ed doubts you could outrun this thing but you’re welcome to try.”
And try he did. Ed sat back with a grin. “Silly man. Ed will give him a ten second head start. One...two...”
The man ran blindly as fast as he could.
“...seven...eight...”
He tried to run into a grove of trees thinking he could lose her there.
“...ten! Ready or not, here Edward comes!” Ed flipped on a switch and immediately a heat sensor showed her where the mugger was. She quickly descended and fired a net launcher. The mugger was caught. She giggled at him as he tried to struggle out of it and only got tangled up more. “Tag, you’re it!”
THREE, TWO, ONE...Let’s Jam!
COWBOY BEBOP: THE SECOND MOVIE
By jak981125
ACT I
The next morning, Lau and Jet sat inside a store-front office. They had gone ahead with their plans from the previous year and had purchased Manhattan Fugitive Recovery. They had only a few other bounty hunters working for them but that meant more profits so no one complained. Yeah right. This is Bebop we’re talking about.
At the moment, the two of them were quite uncomfortable. Lau smacked the air conditioner in the window but it wouldn’t start. He sighed and shook his head at Jet. “The previous owners said this thing was brand new!” growled Lau.
Just then an eighteen year old bounty hunter named Matthew walked into the office. “Why the hell is it so hot in here?” he asked.
“Good morning to you too, Matthew,” replied Jet in a surly tone.
“Heard you guys caught a mugger who was actually worth over a million last night,” said Matthew.
“Yeah well, the guy had been around a while and the cops were getting a little sick of him,” replied Lau. “So, did you get your man last night?”
“What, that car thief?” he asked. “Sure thing. He was hiding on the roof of his mother’s apartment building. So Lau, the little woman’s not in yet?”
“If Faye ever hears you call her that, she’ll kill you,” warned Lau.
At that moment, the “little woman” was flying over Manhattan in the Redtail with baby Julia strapped to her front in a baby carrier. Julia loved rock music almost as much as her father did. Faye was playing “Hammer To Fall” from Queen over the speakers and she and the baby were loving it. You didn’t sing “Rock A Bye Baby” to get Julia to sleep. You played “Pinball Wizard” over the hi-fi.
Faye was headed over to the apartment building that Jet, Ed, and Ein now occupied. As promised, Jet had signed the Bebop over to Lau. Faye landed and parked the Redtail on the top deck of a parking garage and then headed inside the building.
She knocked on the door to Jet’s apartment and Ed answered. Ed was now sixteen. She was Julia’s sitter. She could watch the baby all year long since she had passed a high school equivalency test at the age of twelve. Even at sixteen, Ed’s personality had changed only a little. Ed’s wardrobe had changed again, though. It was summer and she had traded in her green sweatshirt for a red tanktop and navy shorts.
“Oh, come to Auntie Edward!” she cried as she reached out and took the baby from Faye.
“She’s had a little colic lately,” warned Faye. “If she starts crying, you know how to calm her down, right?”
“Take her for a ride in the jet and play loud music from the twentieth century, right?” asked Ed.
“Ed, what would I do without you?” replied Faye. “You know, you were a lot of help yesterday.”
“See, Ed told Papa Jet that she could be a bounty hunter. But he always says I’m too young. That’s silly. Edward caught that mugger, right?”
“Yeah, but you had the Redtail,” replied Faye.
“Edward could have done it just fine on her own. Ed knows how to fight now. You think I could be a bounty hunter, don’t you Julia?” The baby let out a loud burp in response. “See?”
Faye grinned and headed back to the parking garage while Ed took the baby into the apartment. Faye boarded the Redtail and headed to work. She was not necessarily always in the habit of observing her surroundings while flying. Nevertheless, as she flew, she noticed a young woman about thirty years old with black hair and green eyes who was standing on the edge of a rooftop. “Gees, I hope she’s not going to jump or something,” said Faye to herself. But when Faye turned the ship around to take another look, the woman was gone. She looked down but didn’t see anyone splattered on the pavement below. “I must be seeing things,” she groaned to herself. “It must be the heat.” She flew off towards the office.
Back in Central Park, not far from where Ed had caught the mugger the previous night, a girl was jogging when she was suddenly snatched into the bushes. A knife was put to her throat. “Alright you little wench, take it all off right now and don’t scream of I swear I’ll slit you open!”
The girl was terrified and fainted. The rapist smirked and walked over to her. “Now don’t do that. It’s no fun when you don’t put up a struggle.” Just then he sensed he wasn’t alone. He turned around and sure enough, that woman from the roof was standing right behind him. “Get lost or you’re next!” he warned. He was trying to act tough, but he was frightened of attracting any additional attention to what he was doing. As it was, she didn’t answer but her green eyes suddenly glowed. “Huh? What the hell? Hey, you want a piece of me or something?”
The rapist raised his knife in a threatening manner. Before he could react, the woman grabbed his arm and forced his knife into his own gut. She quickly put her hand over the man’s mouth so he couldn’t yell out. She looked him in the eye and gave him a sickening grin. She continued covering his mouth until he dropped dead. Just then, his would-be victim woke up. She saw no one except the dead rapist. She started screaming as loud as she could.
Faye opened the door to the office but as soon as she sensed the heat, she stood in the doorway, not taking another step. “Haven’t you people ever heard of air conditioning?” she complained.
“It’s busted,” replied Lau.
Faye walked over to a mini refrigerator and pulled out a bottle of water. Rather than drink it, however, she dumped it over her head. “Ah, that’s much better. Hey Jet, I was talking to Ed and she’s still pushing the whole bounty hunting thing.”
“I knew it,” groaned Jet as he looked up from his newspaper. “I never should have caved in and let her come with us last night.”
“Well she’s not in school so it’s not like she has anything better to do except baby-sit,” replied Faye. “Besides, she’s not a little girl anymore. She might be able to handle herself out there. She’s been sitting on the sidelines watching us do this for years. You can’t blame her for feeling that way.”
“I don’t blame her, I just don’t want her getting hurt,” replied Jet.
“Hey, you could send her out with me sometime,” said Matthew. “I wouldn’t let anything happen to her.”
Faye grinned. “Why Matthew, are you carrying a torch for Ed? That’s so cute.”
“Cute?” growled Jet. “Kid, if you so much as look at her the wrong way you’ll be looking for a new job, got it?”
“Gee, I guess that means I’ll have to call her and tell her the wedding’s off,” replied Matthew with a grin. If looks could kill, Jet’s glare would have destroyed Matthew right on the spot. “Just kidding.” Matthew skulked off and sat down with two other young bounty hunters around a table.
Lau handed a computer printout to Jet. “Check this out. It’s a car- jacker worth two million. You want us to take it or should we hand it over to the three stooges over there?”
“You and I will get this one,” replied Jet. “Another minute in this office and my brains are going to fry like an egg. Faye, you want to come with or man the phones?”
“I’m gonna get on the phone and get someone over here to fix the damn air conditioner,” she replied. “You guys go ahead.”
Lau walked over and gave Faye a peck on the cheek. Then he and Jet headed out in search of their car-jacker.
Meanwhile Julia was starting to cry at the apartment. Ed couldn’t get her to settle down. She sighed. “Ein, Ed’s taking the baby for a ride, OK?”
Ein showed no interest one way or another. Ed took the baby over to the parking garage. Ed now had a zip craft of her own called the Falcon. It was shaped like a guitar pick and had a bubble cockpit on top. She got in and placed the baby in a carrier next to her. “Are you ready? OK, hold on.” She started up the jet and took off.
She flew over the New York skyline at speeds exceeding three hundred miles an hour. The baby, who normally would have been thrilled, merely quieted down a little bit. Ed flew between buildings, over the East River, and right above traffic. She looked over at Julia and smiled. The two of them had a real bond. They were quite fond of each other.
“Hey, Ed knows where we can go. We were at the park last night. We’ll fly over Central Park. You would like that, wouldn’t you cutie pie?” The baby gave no response. “Poor kid, you must have some bad colic.” As Ed flew over the park, she slowed the jet a little and lowered her altitude. She wanted to check out the scenery a little. She thought it was beautiful to have all these trees and this grass right in the middle of a massive metropolis such as New York.
Just then, Ed saw something she couldn’t believe was real. It was that green eyed woman. She was flying! “Aye ya! How’s she doing that?” The baby looked and saw what Ed was staring at and giggled. The woman didn’t seem to notice Ed at all. She flew off towards the city. “That is very strange and Ed is an expert on strange,” she said to the baby. The baby burped again in response.
Jet and Lau were standing on a rooftop in the Bronx. They were watching their suspect arguing with his girlfriend in a nearby apartment building. “Honestly this is getting boring,” complained Jet. “Although it would be amusing to hear what they’re arguing about.”
Lau grinned. “What do you mean you spent the grocery money on drugs?” he mimicked.
“Given this neighborhood it would be more like ‘What do you mean you spent the drug money on groceries?’ or something to that affect,” replied Jet. “Oh goodie, he’s leaving.”
About then, Faye was on the phone with the air conditioning company. “I don’t care if you have a backlog of service calls. None of your other customers can send a disgruntled bounty hunter after you if you don’t show up. I have three here right now...well same to you!” She hung up angrily. Just then Ed came in. “Ed, what are you doing here? You’re supposed to be watching the baby. There’s nothing wrong with her, is there?”
Ed handed Julia over to Faye. “Nothing is wrong with Julia but I think Ed is seeing things,” she said. “Could Ed have a word with you in private?”
The two of them stepped into the back room. “This had better be important Ed,” said Faye.
“Faye Faye, you said you saw a man fly once, right?”
“I said what?”
“A man who was trying to kill Spike.”
“Ed, everyone and his mother was trying to kill Spike...wait a sec, now that you mention it...Pierrot, he was able to levitate. Wait a minute why are you asking me about Mad Pierrot now?”
Ed sighed. “Promise not to think Ed is cuckoo?”
“Cross my heart. Now what’s up?”
“Ed saw a woman in the park who was flying and she had no jetpack on.”
Faye stared at Ed for a minute. “That’s impossible,” she said slowly.
“I’m telling you, Ed saw a flying woman in the park with black hair...”
“And green eyes,” interrupted Faye. She suddenly understood. “I saw her too. This morning. But how is that possible?”
Back in the Bronx, the carjacker left his apartment and climbed into a vintage white convertible parked on the street. He took a parking ticket off the window and threw it on the ground.
“Hmm, I wonder if we can get a little extra on this guy,” said Lau. He just committed another crime; disregarding a citation.”
“Don’t forget littering,” replied Jet with a grin. The two of them boarded their zip crafts.
As the carjacker drove down the streets of his Bronx neighborhood, he was too busy listening to the rap music on his radio to notice the Hammerhead and Swordfish flying overhead. “Let’s wait a little while until he gets to an area with fewer people around,” said Jet over the radio. “We don’t want anyone getting hurt.”
The two of them followed the car until it reached a more industrial area with fewer residents. Lau aimed at his tires and fired his machine gun. He timed it just right. The tires blew out but the car didn’t crash because it was traveling at a relatively low speed. The surprised carjacker looked up to see Jet and Lau circling around him like buzzards. He pulled a shiny metal handgun out and opened fire on them. Jet responded by dropping a canister of tear gas down onto the street. The carjacker dropped his gun and started coughing. He decided to run. The two crafts landed. Jet and Lau emerged and ran after him. The day was hot and not a pleasant one on which to chase a suspect. After only a couple of blocks, Lau pulled out his gun and fired a warning shot. “Alright, that’s enough. It’s too damn hot for this. Now get over here and keep your hands up.”
The carjacker knew he was finished. He put his hands on his head and slowly walked over to Lau. Then it happened. No one noticed a black haired woman with green eyes hovering twenty feet over their heads until she descended, placing herself between Lau and Jet and their intended target. “What the hell?” exclaimed Jet. As for Lau, he was too stunned to say anything.
Very slowly, she walked over to the carjacker. Lau and Jet watched in amazement. “We should be stopping this, right?” asked Lau. Jet didn’t respond. The woman came right up to the stunned carjacker, smiled, and then produced a gun. Before Lau or Jet could do anything, she ruthlessly gunned the man down, smiling the whole time.
“Alright lady, drop the hardware!” yelled Lau as he and Jet pointed their guns at her. She slowly turned around and looked at them. The smile was gone. She seemed to be looking straight through them.
“They all must pay,” she said at last. “He was only money to you. Don’t interfere with me.” She raised her gun. At that moment Lau and Jet opened fire on her. To their horror, a green force field appeared around her and blocked their bullets. Lau had no idea what this was all about but Jet immediately thought back to Mad Pierrot.
“LAU! HIT THE DECK!” Jet immediately jumped behind a parked car on the left side of the street while Lau jumped behind a mailbox on the right side. She returned fire at them and kept shooting until she ran out of ammo. “Lau, stay put!” yelled Jet. He knew they weren’t safe just yet.
Just then, a patrol car came up the street straight towards the girl. A look of anger came over her. Before the car came to a stop, something truly horrible happened. The woman pointed the palm of her hand at the police car and a green burst of energy emerged from it. The energy burst flew straight at the police car and it exploded. One police officer was killed right away. The other jumped out. His clothes were on fire. Before he even had a chance to extinguish himself, she reloaded her gun and shot him dead.
At this point, Lau pulled a gas grenade out of his pocket. He threw it onto the street and immediately it released a dark gray cloud of gas. He signaled to Jet that they should make a break for it while her vision was obstructed. The two of them ran down the street as fast as they could. Just then, another green blast emerged from the cloud of gas. It hit the pavement, sending chunks of it flying everywhere. One chunk hit Lau in the ear, causing it to bleed. Another hit Jet in the back pretty hard. I’m sure that left a big bruise.
Just then, there was a strong wind, which blew away the cloud of gas. The woman was gone. Jet and Lau had no time to ponder over that. Within moments, over ten police units showed up on the scene. The two of them spent the better part of an hour trying to explain to the cops what they had witnessed.
“Sure pal, we’re always getting attacked by young women with supernatural powers,” scoffed one officer.
“Look, I know it sounds crazy,” replied Jet. “But the security footage from that ATM over there ought to confirm my whole story.”
“It sounds more than crazy,” replied the cop. “It sounds like the kind of thing you see after sniffing paint fumes.”
“Just get the footage!” growled Jet. The cop walked over to the ATM and downloaded the security footage. He took it back to his car and watched in on his computer.
“Whoa!” He ran over and signaled for his fellow cops to come join him. All of them were astounded at what they saw. The cop walked back over to Jet. “Well cowboy, we may have one very big bounty for you.”
Ed stepped outside of the MFR office for a moment. She told Faye she was going out to get some fresh air. Just then, someone snuck up behind her and covered her eyes. “Guess who?”
Ed grinned. “Winston Churchill?”
“Aw, you guessed.” Ed turned around to see Matthew standing behind her. He leaned over and kissed her. “So, you still haven’t told your old man about us yet?”
“Ed with an older boy, one who’s a bounty hunter? No, he wouldn’t like that one bit. Ed would hate to see you get fired or anything.”
“So where do you tell him you are when you and I are together?” asked Matthew.
“I tell him Ed is hanging out with friends in the Village,” she replied. “Ed just doesn’t tell him which friends. It’s still technically true.”
“I hate sneaking around like this behind Jet’s back,” said Matthew. “Hmm...speak of the devil...”
At that moment Jet and Lau approached the building. “What are you doing here, Ed?” asked Jet. “Aren’t you supposed to be baby-sitting? And Matthew, I KNOW you should be doing something.”
“Uh, now that you mention it, there was a red eye dealer I wanted to catch today,” replied Matthew. “I’ll go get him right now. See you Ed.” He walked off in a big hurry.
“Where’s Faye?” asked Jet.
“Inside feeding the baby,” replied Ed. Jet started to head towards the office. “Did I mention she was breast-feeding?” Jet immediately turned around and walked right back to where he had been standing. “Lau, what happened to your ear?”
“That’s what we wanted to talk to Faye about,” said Lau. “We were going after this bounty head and out of nowhere this crazy lady kills the guy we’re after and starts attacking us.”
Something suddenly occurred to Ed. “She didn’t have black hair and green eyes, did she?”
“How did you know?” asked Lau.
“Lucky guess.”
END OF ACT I (c) 2004 Joseph Kerner
Disclaimer: I don’t own Cowboy Bebop or any other registered trademarks I may have mentioned in this story.