New Firefly/Castle/Chuck fic. Enjoy. Set after BDM-Firefly, Castle s2, and Chuck s3. Pairings may change but some surprises in store if go as planned! ;)
Firefly belongs to Joss Whedon and Castle and Chuck belong to their respective owners. I own nothing!
Blood and Faces
Chapter 1
Serenity screamed as another laser bolt shot through her failing shields. It had been a terrible half-hour since the dreaded cry had shrieked from the ship's intercom.
"Reavers!"
Now Mal wrestled the controls at the helm, river in the co-pilot's chair. Bilingual swear words were strewn through the air in the stuffy room, intermixed with incoherent babble from the little assassin.
The rest of the crew was dispersed throughout the ship.
Zoe sat in the weapons locker, counting. Grenades, shotgun shells, magazines. Anything she could get her hand on.
Jayne was in his bunk, surrounded by his favourites. Vera was cradled in his arms, his hand caressing the newly installed grenade launcher like a bond villain and his cat.
Inara sat in her shuttle, draped in copper silks. Her gas-powered bow and poison tipped arrows at her feet, engraved silver dagger at her hip and a delicate syringe inches from her hand. The Companion's mind was set. Should they be boarded, the Reavers would find no sport with her. For one of her occupation, there was no worse death.
The final crew members were to be found in the engine room and infirmary. Kaylee was in the engine room, pushing, tinkering and sometimes begging Serenity to go faster. Simon was tidying the infirmary. Desperate to keep himself busy, he was ordering the cabinets, righting jars and moving bottles of pills around. It was an endless and thankless chore with all his hard work being undone with the erratic twists and evasive rolls of the ship. Instead of becoming irate, the young doctor was glad of the distraction his compulsive tidying was providing him with. It kept his mind from the dreadful fate that his sister and the captain were trying so hard to avoid.
The aforementioned pilots twisted the ship sideways, narrowly avoiding the savage laser that was threating to sever Serenity's engine turbines. Mal threw himself across the console to check the output status and cursed.
"Kaylee, gorram it, quit findlin'! I need us firin' on all cylinders here!"
"No can do Cap'n. Reavers took out a part of our tail, we're runnin' on 'alf an engine. 'Less we wanna be dead in the water before we hit Fiore's atmo, we gotta go on this. Can we…um?"
"We c'n make it Kaylee. Good girl. You just keep us in the air an' me an' Crazy 'ere 'll do the rest." Mal switched off the intercom and swore vehemently. Turning to his co-pilot, he asked the wide-eyed girl,
"We gonna make it?"
"Three, two, turn!" The ship dove sideways to avoid another hit. The Brown-Coat sergeant gave a brief sigh of relief before River shrieked.
"Under, over! Under, over! Behind us and beneath! From beneath you it devours. It takes the embers and gobbles them up. Pretty thinks the sparks won't reach. The fire is going out!"
"Cap'n!"
Mal grabbed the intercom, dreading a translation from River-speak. The girl looked terrified.
"Cap'n!" It was Kaylee again.
"Cap'n! We're hit!"
"What?"
"The Reavers hit us with a spider."
"From beneath you it devours."
"The fuel cells were hit."
"It takes the embers"
"We're running on empty."
"The sparks won't reach"
"We're not going to make it to Fiore!"
"The fire's going out!"
Mal's worst fears had been realised. There was no escape. Almost dead in the water, deep in space with Reavers on their tail. It was a hideous fate. They would be butchered. Kaylee, Inara, River and Zoe would be raped and poor River was only…laughing.
Yep, she'd finally cracked.
The little assassin fixed her gaze on the old soldier.
"She's not cracked. Space is!" River laughed. "Spiders, spiders, spider's web! Home through the cracks. Home through the pieces. Safety in numbers but what happens when the numbers don't add up? Haha! They can follow but they won't find us." She stared back at Mal's uncomprehending stare and bluntly explained. "We can make it."
Once again yelling into the intercom, Mal broadcast to the entire ship,
"the Doc's sis is either completely a gonna or the lil' bit's got a plan to get us outta here so everyone strap in!"
The crew belted themselves in and begged any god they knew for survival.
"Please, let us live! Please, River!"
"Come on, mei mei!"
"Please, pet, let this work."
"Come on moon-brain."
River spun through the outskirts of an asteroid belt and swung the ship around to face the black. She accelerated hard into the vasty nothingness. Mal stared as the fuel battery flickered with its last vestiges of life.
"Riv…er?"
Out of nowhere a blue glowing ring had appeared in the middle of space. River drove Serenity faster and faster towards the glittering doorway. Seconds before collision, she turned to mal and laughed.
"Cake is a lie."
Everything went white.
It had been 6 months since the crew of the Firefly class ship "Serenity" had disappeared in the depths of space. Now a gleaming Skyplex gunship floated on the edge of an asteroid belt, coldly studying the anomaly in space that glimmered before it.
"Fascinating," mused the Хорошийбизнес's commander, Adelai Niska. "What is it about you that draws you to the volcano's edge, Mr Reynolds? I look forward to meeting the real you, Mr Reynolds, for we have unfinished business, you and I. Forward!"
The Хорошийбизнес followed its quarry through the portal.
A day later a government stealth fighter slipped through the portal after the Russian ship and its quarry for they come when you call. Two by two. Two by two
Hands of Blue.
Well, what do you think? click the little button below and reveiw!
and cyber cookies to anyone spotting the Portal tribute! and extra cookies to anyone who can translate and get the reference to Niska's ship's name!