No Gentle Love

This is a fanfic. I don\'t own anything.

~~~ Chapter 1 ~~~

A short, bald man emerged from the building, carrying something in an unassuming brown paper bag. He looked to his right and then to his left before walking towards his black car parked near the sidewalk. Opening the front door, he slid in and revved up the engine. Then slowly, the black car pulled out and rolled along to the highway.

From the top of an adjacent building, Spike Spiegel, bounty hunter, watched all this through the eyes of his telescope.

\"That him?\" Jet\'s voice came from the speaker of Spike\'s headphone. He had been watching the same scene through a video feed from the telescope to the Bebop\'s receiver.

\"Yep,\" Spike said nonchalantly.

\"Well, what the hell are you waiting for? Christmas?\" Jet said, his annoyance clear even through the crackling transmission.

\"Relax, baldy. I got a tracer on him,\" Spike replied with a smirk.

\"He\'s at Route 41.\" Another voice joined them. It was a woman.

\"Roger that, Electra,\" Spike returned as he sprinted towards his waiting mini-spaceship, the Swordfish II.

\"Looks as though he\'s headed to Central Station,\" Electra spoke again. She was driving a blue, unmarked car, expertly navigating her way through the traffic while keeping an eye on the monitor that blinked on the right-hand side of the driver\'s wheel.

\"Copy.\" Spike\'s voice sounded metallic over the speakers but she could almost see the mocking half-smile that usually graced his face. \"Hey, soldier girl,\" he said, assigning her the nickname she hated, \"how\'s about a date after this gig? Y\'know, you still owe me one from last time.\"

From Jet\'s end of the transmission a grunt could be heard and Electra\'s lips curved in amusement. Poor guy, she thought, sympathisizing with the hulking ex-ISSP. Unperturbed by his partner\'s obvious discomfort, Spike continued, \"C\'mon. Hot broad like you, hot guy like me -- we\'re made for each other.\"

This time, Electra couldn\'t help but chuckle a little bit. If there\'s anything, Spike\'s audacity was amusing, if a bit unnerving. From the first moment they met, Spike had made clear his attraction towards her. Now, two years after, he was still playing the game with her. And a game it was, Electra thought. One that she wasn\'t willing to play.

Her thoughts drifted towards the night they met outside her apartment building. Apparently, Spike had heard about the bounty on her head and decided to look for her. It was no trouble finding where she was, especially with Ed, the genius hacker doing the work for him. When they met, there was the initial clash that was common among two people with strong personalities and not to mention the fact that Spike had clearly intended to get the bounty.

But then a compromise was made. Spike never told her why but she suspected that the laidback bounty hunter somehow understood the amount of pain she had gone through with Vincent\'s death. Perhaps he was remembering his own pain over Julia. So instead of taking her in for the bounty, he introduced her to the Bebop crew.

The crew was more like a whacky, disparate group of individuals really than a real crew. There was Faye Valentine, a woman who used her sex appeal to hide the vulnerability that Electra, as a woman herself, had glimpsed only briefly. There was Ed, the genius who wasn\'t quite up there. Ein, the dog. Jet, the ex-cop who was fiercely fatherly. He was the first one in the Bebop who actually made her welcome by offering her partnership, much to Faye\'s annoyance and Spike\'s amusement. And then, there was Spike, of course, the most laidback of all. Electra, with her own unusual past, fitted right in.

A loud honk pulled Electra from her thoughts as a huge truck appeared in front of her. She stepped on the breaks, gritting her teeth while trying to keep the wheel steady. Her small, blue car screeched to a halt near a curb.

\"Son of a...Electra, are you okay?\" It was Jet\'s voice, obviously worried.

\"I\'m okay,\" she replied, drawing a steadying breath. She could have kicked herself for being careless. Just then, a black car stopped just a few blocks away and out came a bald man. It was the man they were after. \"Spike,\" she said to her com.

\"I\'m on it,\" Spike replied. He had been following Electra\'s car the whole time and had also seen the black car. He maneuvered the Swordfish towards the building that the man was preparing to enter. He landed on top and stepped out, gun ready.

Electra also slipped out of her car and followed the bald man in. She had her gun in her jacket pocket, careful to keep the bulge from showing. The building turned out to be a shopping mall so there were a lot of people. She spied the short form of the man carefully making his way up the escalator. She followed some distances behind.

Gunther Planchet. Involved with the black market. Six million woolongs on his head. Electra\'s lips thinned into a line as she maneuvered her way through the crowd. The man was an unusually fast walker considering his height. He disappeared in the next bend and Electra followed suit.

\"Hold it right there, missy.\"

Electra gasped to find herself facing the barrel of a gun. The short, bald man was smiling at her unpleasantly, clutching the gun in one hand. The brown paper bag was nowhere in sight. She thought about her pistol but it seemed as though man read her thoughts as he shook his head. \"Uh-uh. Don\'t do anything stupid now. Come along,\" he said, gesturing for her to walk ahead of him while he continued to point his gun at her.

Ok. That\'s Chapter 1 for now. The next one will be interesting. Oh, and yeah, thanx BlueVixen2071 for the review. ^_^ To all who don\'t know, it was actually her story that actually inspired me to write this fic. Thanx!