Kaylee was the first to feel it. She typically was the first to feel anything that Serenity had to tell her, so in tuned with the ship was she. The first tremor of the floorboards under her sneakered feet told her that something was amiss with her girl, and sent her sprinting for her engine room. By the time she discovered the cause, the little tremor had developed itself into a serious shake. No one could help but notice it, things were falling off the walls, and maintaining a dignified standing position was becoming more and more difficult. “Kaylee!!!” This was the Captain’s voice, of course, it was always the Captain’s voice whenever something like this started to happen. He always seemed to forget that he could comm down to the engine room without screaming, but he seemed to take so much more satisfaction from the screaming itself. She was scrambling around the engine compartment, looking for something to be immediately amiss, and easy answer to their problem, and there it was. The answers were always easy when you knew your girl as well as Kaylee knew Serenity. Mal was in a full fury by the time he reached the engine compartment. He had already called Kaylee’s name three times, and she hadn’t answered him. He knew, of course, that Kaylee couldn’t yell back to him from across the ship, but that didn’t irritate him any less about having to repeat himself. He hated to not be answered, and as far as he was concerned, every human should be able to yell as loud as him. “Now, Captain, sir, don’t go getting all in a twist,” Kaylee told him. “It’s shinier than you think, it really is. We just need to set down for a spell--” “Kaylee, we have three tons of Alliance stamped, sealed, signed and blessed fertilizer scattered all over this boat. Setting down for a spell is not on my list of things I’d really like to be about right now. Unloading my cargo and getting paid is what I’ve got closest to my heart.” Zoë poked her head into the engine compartment at this moment. “Sir, why are we falling apart, again? The crew finds it a mite unsettling.” “Because young Kaylee wants to take us parking planetside,” Mal said grouchily. Zoë looked at Kaylee. “Can’t you use a shuttle for that?” Kaylee ignored Zoë, and spoke to Mal. “Sir, the secondary exhaust converter has come all out of alignment, and needs to be put back straight again.” “And we have to park for that?” “Sir, we can’t have the engine running, or the whole ship will be flooded with exhaust,” Kaylee explained, trying not to sound like she was speaking to a child, even though she sometimes felt like she was. Malcolm Reynolds was a fine captain, an excellent criminal, and an all around scary man, but he didn’t know diddly about an engine and what made her go. “And that’s bad.” “Yes sir, that’s bad.” “So is getting caught with our cargo, sir,” Zoë offered. Malcolm and Kaylee both looked at her. “Is this going to get worse?” he asked. “When the secondary converter comes completely out, then the primary with come out of alignment, and when it starts to spin, the exhaust that the boat has filled up with will explode, and her two thrusters will more’n like be on two different planets. Is that enough worse for you?” Mal looked at the two women. “I’m not a very happy man about this. See my face? It’s not very happy. If we don’t get this fixed right expediently, it might change to genuinely angry. “So let’s get it fixed.”

Mal boarded the bridge after being asked by both Jayne and Simon why the boat was shaking, and ignoring them both. He passed River, and she smiled at him and told him this was a fun ride, could they do it some more. He opened his mouth to say something irritable to her, but memory slapped his mouth shut when he gave thought to what she had been through, not at her mysterious Academy, but at the hands of flesh peddlers. He screams during nighttime had become a relatively regular time marker, and he supposed it was just as well that something be giving the child a good time. Wash was moving his hands across the control boards with considerable speed, somehow managing not to knock his dinosaurs down in the process. “Sir, are we going to blow up very soon?” “I am surely hoping not, Wash,” Mal said. “If we do, I’m throwing Kaylee off my boat once and for all.” “If we’re going to, could you let me know? I’d like to see my wife naked once more before we do.” “That seems a reasonable enough request, Wash. No reason for me to tell you no.” Mal bent over the copilot’s control board to look at computer screens. “Where is the nearest rock you can put us down on for a spell?” “That would be Evangeline, right over here,” Wash said. “it’s some sort of a religious retreat moon, very cut off from everyone else.” Mal picked up his intercom handset and called Shepherd Book to the bridge. The older preacher came in moments later. “Did I hear a call for spiritual guidance?” “If you did, then it was over a wave,” mal said. “Not a lot of call for such on my boat.” “Surely not verbally, Captain,” was the Shepherd’s reply. “How can I help you?” “What do you know about this rock here?” The captain recalled what Wash had told him. “Yes, I’ve heard of these folk. They are an offshoot from Earth-That-Was called the Amish.” “And this means……what?” “The Amish sought a simpler way of life, one not so burdened with technology and materialism, as a way to get closer to God. As I recall, there were different sects within the faith, each having different rules regarding the use of technology. There was quite a hub-bub in and amongst the sects regarding boarding a spaceship and taking advantage of terraforming, but it was widely agreed that this would lead them to a paradise-type situation where they could cut themselves off completely from the rest of the core and get closer to their understanding of the Christian God.” “So they are completely cut off?” the Captain asked. “I am sure there must be some sort of comm centers planet-side, but for the most part, they are self sufficient, so there is probably no coming or going in terms of commerce.” “And this far out on the rim, the Alliance isn’t going to pay much attention to them,” Zoë offered. “Most likely not,” the Captain agreed. “But let’s not draw any unnecessary attention to ourselves. Put us down a nice distance away from any townships. I want to be far enough away for no one to see us, but let’s stay close enough to keep an eye on them until we leave.”

“Mal, judging by the scorch marks, I’m kind of thinking we’re not the first ship to set down here,” Wash said. “”I shouldn’t ‘spect we are,” was the captain’s reply. “We are way out here at the ass end of nowhere, on a rock don’t look too kindly to receiving outside visitors, with no law to speak of in sight. Honestly, Wash, this may be a good day for us, after all…….I can’t much think of a better get-together spot for naughty men and lady-folk, much like our own selves, t’do their business. I’m glad we happened on it!” Serenity’s landing gear stretched out to meet the ground that the two thrusters brought the ship to slowly. Mal returned to the engine room, and found Kaylee already busy. “Can it be fixed with the parts you have, Kaylee?” “Oh, sure’s can be, Captain!” Mal closed his eyes and breathed a sigh of relief. No one on this rock was likely to have parts for a Firefly-class transport, or for any other sort of spaceship, for that matter. Kaylee had already solved one of his problems. “Now, how long?” Kaylee stopped for a moment, stood up, and looked at him with her fists on her hips. “Realistically, sir? I am going to need to disconnect the secondary and primary converters, clean them out, and rethread them in. And that’s after I’ve powered the whole ship down……..ten hours, after I’ve powered her back up.” Mal closed his eyes and leaned against a bulkhead. Kaylee was a witch with anything that had moving parts (a fact the good doctor could stand learning about was the mean thought that flew through his brain), but she had never learned that greatest skill of any sort of mechanic: the ability to under promise and over deliver. Mal did it himself when telling a client when he would have a cargo delivered by, and every mechanic he had ever known worth a good gorram did the same. Except Kaylee. If she told you a given job was going to be a ten hour business, then that’s how long it would really take her. Mal had learned long ago to stop second-guessing her estimates. “Let me open the cargo doors and get the shuttle platforms extended then,” he said, knowing it never could hurt to be ready.

“Ten hours! God’s balls, what are we gonna do for ten hours?” Jayne demanded, slamming his hand on the table. The doctor and River were not in the dining area, but everyone else was. Inara rolled her eyes at Jayne’s outburst, and looked at Zoë, who rolled her own in return. “I know, we could have a ballroom dancing competition, “Wash said. “I call Jayne as my partner!” Jayne threw an empty tin at Wash, who had long ceased to get the bigger man’s goat the way he once could when they had first met. “No? Then perhaps a haiku writing exercise?” “Those are wonderful ideas, Wash, but let us be very clear about a couple of things. No one, Jayne, is to go into town, Jayne, looking for whores, Jayne. These are very simple people living here, who don’t happen to know we are on their rock, and I see no good reason in the ’verse to make a broadcast about the fact,” Mal said. “Then why do you got the shuttles out for launch?” Jayne asked. Every day, Mal wrestled with himself not to just say none of your fucking business, Jayne, knowing it would be the wrong tact to take with them man, but his incessant question asking could drive even Shepherd Book out of his mind. “That, Jayne, is a just in case,” Mal said. “Serenity’s going to be shut all the way down for a spell, and until Kaylee finishes what she needs to do, she won’t be powering back up in a hurry. Odds are, it’s an unnecessary precaution, but it’s a precaution just in case.” “Well, I have a fribee.” No one had seen or heard Simon or River walk into the room. “A what?” Wash asked. “It’s a plastic disc from Earth-That-Was, they called them fribees. My father had a bunch of them, we used to love playing with them when I was young. I don’t even know why I packed one, but I did when River and I….” “Well, let’s see it, doc, since you’re doin’ such a piss-poor job of describing it,” Jayne said good-naturedly. Simon held a red plastic disc out and showed it to everyone. “Oh, wow!” Wash exclaimed. “I’ve seen one of those before! Those are great fun!” Zoë looked at him quizzically. “They are?” “Yes, dear, you can knock people down to try to take it away from them.” “Oh, hell, then, I’m in!” Jayne said.

At least the weather was pleasant enough, Mal thought. They had split into teams. Simon, Book, Inara, and Mal against Jayne, River, Wash and Zoë. The game followed little or no rules, except as everyone seemed intent on keeping the disc away from Jayne, who tended to throw it far beyond where anyone was, making everyone stop and go searching for it. It was Inara who heard it first. “Is that a ship?” she asked, referring to the low, low rumbling off in the distance. Wash heard it next. “I think, I don’t know, it might be.” “Everybody down on the ground,” mal barked. “Zoë, Jayne, get on board, get weapons, everybody else, down into the ground, now!” “Mal, what is it?” Wash asked. “It’s on the other side of the township, I can’t see yet, but just stay down!” Zoë and Jayne came back, hunkered down to the ground, each carrying a sack full of weapons. “Captain, what do you see?” Zoë asked. Now he could see. “Other side of town, moving a good clip, big and dark, see it?” Zoë could, and so could Jayne, as well as the others. “See all that smoke?” She looked at Mal. “It’s Reavers, ain’t it, sir?” “No no no no, don’t you go saying that gose, that’s just dumb-ass bad luck, ain’t no Reavers, just some criminals like us, maybe their captain lets them go do a little whorin’, is all,” Jayne spat out in rapid fire speech. Jayne’s fear was contagious, and Mal and Zoë had been in more than enough battle situations to know it. He would come apart, and everyone else would follow suit, except for maybe the preacher, Mal would never really know about that old man. “Jayne,” he hissed harshly. Zoë already had her mare’s leg out of its holster. “You pull yourself together this gorram instant,” he said. “Or I will tell Zoë to gorram shoot you!” Jayne turned quickly to Zoë, and saw the business end of her sawed of rifle not three inches from his head. He looked at her, and back at Mal, and then at everyone else, the childish look that Jayne could sometimes get spreading across his face. “Well, y’know, it could be.” Mal knew that was as good as Jayne would get. Things were simpler with the big man. He was in a panic or he wasn’t. Now, he wasn’t. “Do you think they’ve seen us?” the Shepherd asked. “Hard to say right now, but my guess ‘twould be they haven’t,” Mal considered. “They would have come in and attacked us first, assuming we might be armed.” “So what now,” Simon whispered. “So now, we stay put, and hope like hell they don’t come this way.” “Mal, those people down there will be slaughtered,” Inara said. “Inara, we have a grand total of three gunhands amongst us, maybe four,” he said, glancing at the preacher. “What exactly would you like for us to do for those poor folk down there? Scare them off? Reavers don’t scare, you know that. They don’t think, they don’t care, they just kill. Right now I’d like to stay out of the way of that killing today.” Mal glanced down at the township, and so did everyone else. They were too far to see much, except for Mal and Zoë, both of whom had their binocs, and Jayne, who had a rangefinder ‘scope on Vera. They couldn’t hear any of the the screams, and for that mal was grateful. A man or woman can tolerate only so much of that before panic takes them over. They didn’t want to watch what was happening, but still, they did. They couldn’t bring themselves to turn away for too long. The slaughter followed a standard Reaver visit. Gang raping of men and women alike took place on the spots where they had been run down. Children were no exception. The worse things, things mal knew he never should have seen, things he knew would make him wake up screaming probably for the rest of his days, took place in a larger group, they biggest and most mutilated Reavers taking their turns first, the smaller getting their share after. Waves of revulsion and horror mixed with waves of damning self-hatred. He knew that he was right, they had limited fighting capability, and if they tried to help these people the he and his crew would end up as a meal and a fashion accessory, but God Be Damned, his mind swore, how do you watch something like this? He looked over at Zoë, who looked back at him, he face empty and pleading for orders. Please tell me what to do! her face screamed out at him. She would rush the massacre herself if he told her to, he knew that, and that power he held over her had created no short amount of friction between himself and her husband Wash. A look at Jayne showed the big man with his mouth hanging open in awful disbelief, unable to fully get his mind wrapped around what he was seeing through his rifle scope. He watched as Jayne put the rifle down, and put his head down on his forearms. And so it was that no one saw the soldiers or the small gunboats swoop into the town. It was the gunfire that got the crew’s attention, who retrained their devices on the new happenings. Soldiers in black body armor devoid of any rank or insignia took the wild Reavers, slaughtering them on a wholesale level. Zoë was the first to take notice, however, of the fact that they were not all being slaughtered, a fact that she pointed out to the others. Some were being kept alive, getting their knees blown out from under them, and other soldiers were bagging them in nets. By the crew’s count, they snatched maybe a dozen or fifteen Reavers, and killed all the rest, dragging their catch to one of the bigger gunboats, one which probably had a small cargo hold. It was over as quick as it started, and the gunboats, which bore the unmistakable insignia of the Alliance, took positions around the township and rained fire over what the Reavers had not already destroyed. They were leaving nothing behind. “Sir?’ Zoë said, looking at him as did the rest of the crew. “Fishing,” Mal said. “Gorram whoremasters went fishing here, brought prizes home to their masters. Put this whole damn town on a hook and waited for them to take bait and run.” “You’re saying the Alliance used these people to catch some Reavers? What could they want with Reavers that would be worth a whole town?” Simon asked. River spoke for the first time. “To be more like us,” she said with a dreamy smile on her face. Jayne turned on her, his mouth open to say something harsh, and a look from mal shut it for him. “Alliance wants to study them, wouldn’t you say that’s so, Doctor? You were part of the system, isn’t that what a system does?” “I could see how they might, but to go to this extreme?” “Doctor, I grew up on Shadow,” Mal said flatly. “Don’t you go telling me about The Alliance and extremes.” Simon shut his mouth at that. “Captain,” Book said. “Why do you think they didn’t come to find us?” “Most likely they took no notice of us, just another smuggler ship or some such to conduct clandestine affairs. You can see where this piece of ground has been used so much, they just took it that we’d come and gone about our business.” Mal picked up his comm. “Kaylee, how much longer?” “An hour, maybe less, sir,” was her reply. “Make it less, I’m ready to leave.”