Dark Wanderer

Mars, autumn, 2071. A man in his late twenties wandered the raining streets. He looked heavily disheveled. He looked as if he hadn’t bathed in weeks. His clothes were badly torn. Many people avoided the man like the plague because they thought he had some sort of mental illness. Who could blame them? The man was staggering around mumbling to himself like a drunk. He could never tell them anything about himself to passersby. Either they couldn’t understand or they never believed him.

One day, the beggar stumbled across Oko Hospital in the rain. The place looked so warm and inviting. But that’s not what caught this man’s attention. A young nurse was standing in the door way helping a group of kids into the building. The poor wanderer studied the woman closely. She was a beautiful sight to behold. Strawberry pink hair back into a bun, deep green eyes, perky breasts, cute curves, and long graceful legs. The only thing that was missing was the halo and wings.

The poor man was enamored by this nurse’s beauty. He just had to have her. The beggar hurried over to the nurse. He grabbed her by the wrist tightly. The nurse looked at him startled. The beggar looked at her with big eyes.

“Sakura-chan!” he exclaimed. The woman didn’t seem to recognize him at all.

“HELP!!!” she screamed out. “HELP ME!!!”

“Shhh!” the man tried to quiet the nurse down. “I don’t want to hurt you! Just listen for a moment!”

“HELP!!!” the nurse kept screaming out. This definitely drew a crowd of people around them. The nurse still kept struggling to get away but the beggar held on to her wrist tightly. She was now hitting at him hard to get him off. The crowd was shouting at him to let her go, but he just didn’t listen. The man just refused to let go. Something in him wouldn’t let him. The deep bubble in his soul was growing quickly. The man couldn’t explain why, but he just had to touch this nurse in some way.

The nurse kept fighting until someone yelled out, “Hey! Let her go!” The beggar and the nurse quickly looked up. Dr. Shoji Himura was standing in the doorway glaring at them. He had heard the noise from his office and came out to investigate. The beggar’s eyes grew big at the sight of the stick in the doc’s hand. The doc came charging towards him in a rush.

“Take your hands off of her now!” he yelled. “GET OUT OF HERE!!!” The beggar quickly let go and fled away as fast as he could.

“You okay Nurse Tenshi?” he heard the doc ask the scared nurse.

“Yes!” she whimpered out. The beggar disappeared in the deep streets.

 

 

 

The beggar couldn’t piece together what had happened. Why didn’t she remember him at all? What happened? Why couldn’t he remember a thing about himself? The beggar froze and shut his eyes tightly. Nothing was coming to him. It was as if someone took an eraser to his mind and wiped it clean. All of his memories were gone! He couldn’t even remember his own name. The beggar had lost his purpose years ago! Now, he was trapped in this endless search for anything.

The man was walking along when he bumped into a hooker.

“Hey!!!” she yelled out. “Watch where you are going, damnit?!?” The man stared at her as if in a daze. There was something so familiar about this woman, but he couldn’t say what. She heavily resembled Faye Valentine in every way. The street walker kept staring back at him.

“What are you looking at, you freak?!?” she yelled out. Then the woman hit him hard on the wrist. The man stared at her startled and hurried away. The whore just shook her head in disgust.

The man wandered around for hours. The hunger was getting worse for him. Being hungry at this time of the year wasn’t good on the poor. But still, it was much more decent compared to the winter at night. But it didn’t matter. The poor man had to eat and soon before he lost his mind even more. He kept looking until he came to a large grey spaceship with the word Bebop painted on the side parked near the dock. The man’s eyes lit up in joy. Salvation at last. He hurried over to the ship.

The man pounded on the doors hard. An older man came to the door. Something caught the beggar’s attention. The resident looked somewhat familiar, but he just couldn’t place the man at all.

“What do you want?!?” the older man barked. The beggar looked desperate.

“Excuse me sir,” he said in a weak voice. “May I have some food and shelter for the night?” The older man looked at him as if he was crazy.

“Why should I?!?” he snapped. The other man tried to stand his ground.

“I feel that you can help me!” the beggar pleaded out. “You are my friend!” The older man had really thought this guy had really lost his mind.

“I don’t know who the hell you are!!!” he shouted out.

“But sir…” the beggar tried again.

“GET OUT!!!” the residence hollered. Then the door slammed shut. The beggar was left in the chilly night rain alone and hungry.

The man continued to wander the streets in need of something. He still couldn’t remember anything at all. Doubt that anyone would ever help him kept on growing. At long last, the beggar felt to his knees in a deep alley. Garbage and rotting waste was all around him. The rain kept pouring down hard. The man looked all around him. “Is this to be my fate?” he thought. “A nobody without a past or a purpose?” The man just laughed to himself in misery. This was a cruel joke indeed.

“I know who you are!” a voice called out to him. The beggar looked up at that statement. Sakura Tenshi was standing before in her nurse uniform. She was like the ray of sunshine in his life once again. The beggar slowly rose to his feet. The tenshi-chi looked just as beautiful as ever. He could help but to smirk at her.

“All right then,” he called out loud. “Who am I?”

Then with a serious face, Sakura, “You are Spike Spiegel, famous bounty hunter of the ship Bebop!” Those words did something strange to his ego. That sentence… built him back up. He suddenly felt high as a kite.

“Say that for me again, miss!” the beggar said again. Sakura kept her face.

“You are Spike Spiegel, partner of Jet Black, famous bounty hunter of the ship Bebop!” she said again as their true reflections showed in the abandoned store’s window. The beggar began to smile at long last. It was all coming back to him now! His past, his purpose, his love! It was all back.

“Well okay,” he said. “If you say I am Spike Spiegel, then I will be Spike Spiegel!” Then the cowboy ripped off his torn garments and revealed his regular clothes. Spike Spiegel that he was!

See You in Space, Beggar