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Oct. 9th, 2004 06:38 pmIf a shark doesn't keep swimming, it drowns. That's always been a pretty damn curious thing... how the most dangerous predator in Earth ocean history could give it up if it just rested for a bit.
Mao told me that story, back when I first joined the Dragons. He said, "Spike, never stop moving. Never stop swimming. Never rest." I took it to heart. He wasn't a bad guy, Mao Yenrai.
Vicious killed him.
And Mao's partner and friend, Annie, I liked Annie. Anastasia -- she deserves a full tribute. Vicious killed her much later.
They were like parents to me. My own parents... well, who even remembers them. Not me. Just vague snapshots from somewhere really far away, from when I was little. Shit. By the time I was fifteen they weren't even there any more.
But back to sharks. It's why I move and keep moving all the time. Really, Mao was right. If I stop moving, I'll drown. In the air and everything. I'm stuck here, but I can keep moving: I can run around the lake and marvel at how come my lungs don't burn from all the smoking, and I can do some Jeet Kune Do, and I can do target practice if I want (but I don't need to), and I can swim... yeah. Beth and I can swim, that's a different kind of exercise.
Beth.
Beth-with-no-last-name. Never asked her what it was; doesn't matter, doesn't matter at all.
So I want to write it all down for her. All of it. In case we never get to leave this place, I want to write it down before I forget all the details. So she knows, in case I can't take her to the Bebop. In case I can't show her the stars: I can tell her about all of it. About what Earth is like, and about domed colonies on Mars and other planets, and about the Bebop, and about the Syndicate and Vicious and Julia. Even about Julia, because I lied to her a little about that. I didn't mean to, but I lied to myself about her too and it's just in the past couple days things have become clear in my mind.
But before I decided to write, I ran. I ran circles around the lake and it was a fuck of a lot farther than I thought, but it felt good. Ran with alternating step-words in my mind: dead-not-dead-not-dead-not-dead. I'm not dead. I might have been, but I'm not now. I should know: I've been around it enough, almost half my life, and I should have more regrets about it but I don't.
Maybe being stuck here is supposed to be payback for that. But there's a flaw in that lesson: I'm having too damn much fun.
I'm going to write about what the stars look like from out in space. For Beth.
Mao told me that story, back when I first joined the Dragons. He said, "Spike, never stop moving. Never stop swimming. Never rest." I took it to heart. He wasn't a bad guy, Mao Yenrai.
Vicious killed him.
And Mao's partner and friend, Annie, I liked Annie. Anastasia -- she deserves a full tribute. Vicious killed her much later.
They were like parents to me. My own parents... well, who even remembers them. Not me. Just vague snapshots from somewhere really far away, from when I was little. Shit. By the time I was fifteen they weren't even there any more.
But back to sharks. It's why I move and keep moving all the time. Really, Mao was right. If I stop moving, I'll drown. In the air and everything. I'm stuck here, but I can keep moving: I can run around the lake and marvel at how come my lungs don't burn from all the smoking, and I can do some Jeet Kune Do, and I can do target practice if I want (but I don't need to), and I can swim... yeah. Beth and I can swim, that's a different kind of exercise.
Beth.
Beth-with-no-last-name. Never asked her what it was; doesn't matter, doesn't matter at all.
So I want to write it all down for her. All of it. In case we never get to leave this place, I want to write it down before I forget all the details. So she knows, in case I can't take her to the Bebop. In case I can't show her the stars: I can tell her about all of it. About what Earth is like, and about domed colonies on Mars and other planets, and about the Bebop, and about the Syndicate and Vicious and Julia. Even about Julia, because I lied to her a little about that. I didn't mean to, but I lied to myself about her too and it's just in the past couple days things have become clear in my mind.
But before I decided to write, I ran. I ran circles around the lake and it was a fuck of a lot farther than I thought, but it felt good. Ran with alternating step-words in my mind: dead-not-dead-not-dead-not-dead. I'm not dead. I might have been, but I'm not now. I should know: I've been around it enough, almost half my life, and I should have more regrets about it but I don't.
Maybe being stuck here is supposed to be payback for that. But there's a flaw in that lesson: I'm having too damn much fun.
I'm going to write about what the stars look like from out in space. For Beth.
