#bebopcrew

The list from the engineering inspector read like a full length novel - probably it was easier to simply identify what wasn't busted or rusted or in need of a complete overhaul.

It was going to cost him an arm and a leg but hell, his previous occupation had already cost him an arm, literally, so he was beyond caring about the cost of things that would help him escape this moon full of memories.

He still had to get the insurance in order and the registration had been filed so he just needed the official paperwork back from that. The important thing was the title to the ship and that was neatly folded in his breast pocket.

The ship, for all intents and purposes, was his.

A home away from home. A place solely his.

He was the king and this was his castle.

It was a bold new step in an intriguing new direction. The entire universe waited at his fingertips to see what he could accomplish next.

***

Years later and not much had changed.

The Bebop still reeked of fish. It was much more faint but it had proved impossible to eradicate entirely.

The repair list never seemed to get any shorter and parts kept increasing in cost. And every damn year he had to renew the insurance and registration and ensure all the other bureaucratic bullshit was properly maintained.

In addition, he now had a crew.

Three jesters and a dog.

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Cowboy Bebop (Anime) Rating: Explicit Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Jet Black/Faye Valentine Characters: Jet Black, Faye Valentine Additional Tags: Beboptober (Cowboy Bebop), Femdom, Handcuffs, Collars, Leashes, ill advised gambling practices, even more ill advised BDSM practices, Always negotiate your scenes first kids, Bad BDSM Etiquette, Puppy Play, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, author wrote this over the course of 21 hours, Author Is Sleep Deprived, The Author Regrets Nothing, Humiliation, Blackmail, sort of anyways Summary:

…but always keep them on a leash.

A very bright, needlessly short, string of red yarn had been tied to the pinky on his right hand and the pinky on her left hand so they could traipse down the street side-by-side.

He had no idea what it meant. What were he and Faye supposed to be?

He figured it was probably a loose string that had come from Ed's own costume which was easily recognizable despite how many centuries had passed since anyone donned a striped shirt, billowy pants, a curved knife and an eye patch.

As for Ein, she had affixed a shark fin to the middle of his back by taping one onto a doggy sweater she'd managed to get him to wear. Spike guessed that the shark was meant to be a part of her own costume.

Even the dog's getup was more elaborate than a simple red string!

"The patsy is more important than knowing how to play the game?" Ed looked puzzled.

"Cheating the chump is the whole point of the game." Faye replied.

"You do need to know the basic rules of the game." Spike told her. "It's best if you know the rules very well but give off the impression that you aren't skilled at all. You want to look like the patsy to other people to draw gullible folks into the game. If they think they'll win against you because they think you're a fool...well, he who laughs last and all that."

Ed frowned. "Ed is even more confused! We aren't supposed to laugh?"

Faye sighed and made a face at Spike. "I told you to join us because I didn't think you'd start spouting proverbs like Jet! Jeez!" She turned her attention back to Ed who was spiralling.

"Ed wants to laugh! Games are supposed to be fun!" The teen cried.

Faye eyed her speculatively. "Maybe you'd do better as a shill."

Ed swayed back and forth on her seat. "Ed wants everyone to win!"

"Well, that's not really how any game works." Spike replied.

"Yeah, you want to win! That's why you play and why you need to know how to spot the-"

"No!" Ed interrupted with a shout. She shot to her feet. "Ed plays for fun. Games are best when everyone is having a good time!" Her shoulders slumped. "Ed does not want to dupe anyone."

Faye and Spike exchanged concerned looks. But before either could try to fix things, Jet appeared in the round doorway with an assortment of paper bags clutched against his chest and plastic bags hanging from his wrists.

"A little help would be nice!"

Ed, grinning, dashed over to offer assistance while the other two remained seated across from each other.

"We got the bounty that afforded all those groceries." Faye replied.

"Yeah, we've helped a bunch today." Spike added, leaning back in the chair.

Grumbling about lazy bums and making idle threats about only feeding the people who gave him aid, Jet disappeared with Ed into the kitchen.

"Well, some folks just aren't made to take advantage of others." Faye remarked a moment later. She was still shuffling the deck. At this point it was mostly a meditative motion. "At least food cheered her up."

"Food would cheer anyone up." Spike noted. He looked at Faye and gave a little smirk. "How about a two person game? Since you got the cards out."

Jet eyed her with some measure of amusement dancing in his gaze. Discussions with Ed were endlessly insightful, often bewildering, and always a good way to pass the time.

"What do you think is down there?" He threw the question right back.

They were drifting aimlessly on the Great Ganymedian Sea which meant he knew plenty about the marine life below. Much more interesting, undoubtedly, was whatever her mind could come up with.

"Sea monsters." She immediately responded. "Leviathans with looping tails leagues in length! Big bellied beasties with bulbous fins so it floats underwater like a bobber!"

Jet chuckled. "You're in an alliterative mood, eh?"

"Faye's funky flotsam!" Ed continued with delight.

That one turned his chuckle into a noise of confusion instead. "Huh?"

Giggling, Ed drew herself up into a sitting position with her legs dangling over. She pointed at the offensive bit of nastiness moving atop the waves. "Technically it would be considered jetsam." She added. "Faye-Faye is a ship in distress, but her chum may draw the fishies to the hook!"

Spike, whose stomach so often seemed made of iron, made a face. "I don't think I want to eat a fish that fed on Faye's vomit." He stood with his fishing pole to move to the other side of the ship to try his luck over there.

"I told you not to drink so much!" Jet hollered over his shoulder.

A piteous moan reached their ears from the figure sprawled further back on the deck, though she was draped perilously close to the edge. Ein, who had been laying in concern at her side, scrambled to his paws and darted away when Faye made to blindly swat at the dog.

"You yelled at me to leave your booze alone!" She shot back weakly. "Nothing about taking it easy! And now you set your damn dog to fart right next to me?!" She rose up enough to contort into a painful looking lump as she threw up again.

Jet rolled his eyes. "Leaving my damn booze alone would've kept her from a hangover." He muttered.

Ed chortled, gathering Ein into her arms when he got close enough to her.

"Faye-Faye also snuck into the super secret hidden food stash down down down in the bowels of the ship..." Ed revealed.

Frowning, Jet thought about her words and realized he had no idea what she was referring to so he told her as much.

"Spike-person snuck a picnic basket aboard weeks and weeks and weeks ago! Said he was gonna hide the goods in the freezer after everyone went to bed. Got into his cups with Faye-Faye instead and forgot!"

Jet sighed. "Have you learned nothing from that lobster mistake?" He asked of the other man.

"Faye's fault for not considering how perishable some of that shit was." The lanky man replied breezily.

"Perhaps the pieces will mutate into new life in the sea!" Ed gasped. "A monstrous conglomeration of moldy rotten chunky monkey bile and —"

"Enough, Ed!" Jet ordered, feeling slightly ill himself at her description.

Ed laughed. "Still waters run deep, deep waters run deeper... Annnnnd puke doesn't sink! Not drawing in fishes most delicious but looky-look! Gulls wanna gobble it up! Let's hunt some birds for dinner!" And she set Ein down to jump to her feet and dash off, presumably for a slingshot or something to accomplish her hunting quest.

"Well, maybe she'll have more luck than me." Spike muttered. "Wanna take a cast?"

Jet accepted the pole and the task. "Don't shoot the birds, Spike."

"Wasn't gonna. Faye fell in, figured someone should probably pull her out." And he ambled away towards the empty space where Faye had been.

She was so fucking tired of petty shit.

Which included the petty behavior of her shipmates.

Like Jet drinking half her whiskey and replacing part of it with tea as if she wouldn't fucking notice. He should consider himself lucky to have escaped her wrath simply because she was so dumbfounded at his juvenile attempt at problem solving. Was he fucking twelve years old? Did he think she was an idiot with no ability to fucking taste the difference?

Or Spike who had recently decided to snip her cigarettes in half so he could smoke the pre-rolled now filter-less section leaving her a measly fragment of a smoke to assuage her own tobacco cravings. Like what, should she be grateful he hadn't just stolen entire cigarettes? Who the fuck steals half a smoke in such a bizarre yet methodical fashion?!

And Ein who always chose her to shake off beside after any of the incidents that left the data dog wet (which was a more common occurrence than one might expect given their lives aboard a fucking spaceship but, well, no doubt they had Ed to thank for the majority of the wet dog instances)

Ed was the least petty of all but Faye figured the kid just hadn't figured out the subtleties of human nature.

"Hey," Jet's voice boomed out over the living room as the man himself stepped onto the landing leading from the bridge. "Got a couple good leads on some small fries."

Spike, sprawled inconsiderately out on the entirety of the couch - he'd begun slumped next to her and kept inching closer and closer, taking up more and more space, until at last she'd stood with a huff and stomped over to the chair instead - cracked one eye open to glare upwards.

"Small fries again? What the hell, Jet?" He grumbled.

Jet, hands balled into fists on his hips, glared right back down. "Even small fries fill a stomach to some degree." He argued philosophically.

"Small fries, medium drink, combo meal if you please!" Ed chirped from her spot cross-legged in front of Tomato on the floor. Ein, at her side like usual, gave a hungry whine at her words.

"Any fucking meal..." Spike grumbled. His stomach growled in agreement.

"Sounds like you just signed on for the bitch work." Faye told him with a smirk at his expense.

"Both of you." Jet ordered, switching his glare to her instead. "Someone owes me for draining the gas outta the Hammerhead and leaving an IOU post it note on the inside of the gas cap!"

Faye flushed guiltily.

Not content with just one admission of guilt, Jet went on.

"And someone bent the tools to recalibrate my arm," he grabbed the offending limb at the elbow, "because they apparently needed to extract some BBs from the hull of their ship!" He concluded with a roar.

Spike lazily closed his eye. "Damn crater crust brats," he muttered.

Faye snorted. "Like you never took potshots at zipcraft streaking by."

"The point is," Jet interrupted before they could set to squabbling, "that we need these small fries no matter how petty the work is. So, go on. Get!"

Tracking down his various online personas was her self-appointed mission this afternoon, much to his chagrin. He didn't think he could possibly be more embarrassed than he had been earlier when she uncovered a decades' old email account he'd had as a teen...and the handful of very adult sites he had managed to access by lying about his age.

"if it's the Black Dawg one... Just understand that Good Boy is a dog treat coupon site!" He hastily explained.

Ed snorted but before she could respond, Faye - who had been leaning against the bridge rail that overlooked the living room as she filed her nails - decided to stir the pot.

"Sounds to me like maybe somebody has a praise kink..." She teased.

Spike, ambling out of the kitchen, smirked. "Maybe a collar kink."

Faye's eyes went wide. "Ohh... The whole cop thing makes so much sense now. Collaring perps but the whole time hoping the perps collar him!"

Jet glared at each of them. "That's enough out of you two! Spike, what were you just doing in the kitchen? If you added anything to that stew and messed it up... You won't be getting any of it for dinner! And Faye! Those nail polish bottles cluttering up the bridge are a damn hazard! We've got too many unsecured items that can crack someone's head if we get in another hit and run accident!"

Faye rolled her eyes. "Oh yeah, those bottles will sure do some damage."

"If I did add any spices - which I'm not saying I did - and dinner was somehow ruined...well, we'd all be out a meal, not just me." Spike muttered.

"It's my ship and I don't want to feel like I'm surrounded by clutter! And I don't want anyone screwing up the last of our food just because they smoke so damn much they can't taste shit anymore!" Jet roared.

Spike kicked at the floor sullenly. "I didn't even do anything."

Jet stared at him icily until Spike hunched his shoulders and made to climb to the bridge.

"Whatever. I'll help clean Faye's mess."

Faye scowled at him. "Volunteering to help is something a guilty person does to make up for being an ass."

Spike snatched the nearest bottle of polish on the rail and chucked it at Faye. It bounced off her shoulder and she yelped even as she grabbed at several to hurl back at Spike.

Jet grumpily crossed his arms. He could feel his eyebrow twitching as a vein throbbed in his forehead. Those two would be the death of him.

"Well, Ed understands why Jet-person made this throw away account on the 'toddler moms' app and the 'how to deal with teenage assholes' blog." Ed told Jet quietly as she watched the other pair switch from pelting one another to instead opening the polishes to swipe smears of glittery color on each other. "Mike and May, my monster twins." She giggled. "But why did you name yourself Paisley?"

Jet felt a smile crack his cranky expression. He looked away from the nonsense up above and focused instead on Ed's inquisitive face.

"Have you seen any of the other names on there? Braydonlee, Vanesalyn, Brunswick, Chereigh... You can't stand out in these places. Blending in helps you keep your anonymity. I figured 'Paisley' fit in pretty good."

Ed nodded. "One of the crowd, Ed sees! Have any of the other moms and dads had any good advice on child rearing?"

Chuckling, Jet shook his head. "Parenting is a game you can't win. Often it's fun...more often, someone is upset and flipping the table so no one gets to play anymore. It's mostly just a place to bitch and have others tell you that you're doing okay. Validation is important, especially when your kids are such pricks. Sure, I have to edit my posts a bit but it helps sometimes just having others admit they're struggling just the same."

"Same same, all the same! No one wins still we play the game!" Ed cheered.