During the final story of the series, "The Real Folk Blues", Julia comes out of hiding and sends a message to Spike through Faye: the two meet and resolve to flee as originally planned. Vicious, having staged a "coup d'état" and taken over the Red Dragon Syndicate, sends assassins after the two. During a battle, Julia is shot and killed. After saying his goodbyes to Jet and Faye, Spike storms the headquarters of the Syndicate and has a final confrontation with Vicious: Spike is severely wounded and Vicious is killed. Shortly after this, Spike walks into and collapses in the entrance hall. Spike's ultimate fate was deliberately left ambiguous, with Watanabe eventually unable to say whether he lived or died.