This war calls for a new, higher tech battlefront. Of course there are still the ground troops, but now there are sky troops. Roves of small platoons stationed in the atmosphere to go where they're ordered. The platoons aren't regular platoons either, made up of only four or five actual highly trained soldiers, usually followed by a pilot, cook, doctor, mechanic, occasional scientist and diplomat, and – very rarely – there's even a priest. The way they stay up in the air isn't all that normal, either. The platoons stay in the sky with airships. Not like airplanes or helicopters or anything like that. No, they're airships that are much faster than anything before the war. In fact, they're a lot like rockets in a way. These airships spend much of their time either observing the Earth from the atmosphere or orbiting it from space, depending on where they are stationed.
As for me, my story began in a town in Colorado but in all honesty, doesn't really get interesting until after my graduation from college, when the war started. That's where it truely begins. Soon after the war started, the airships started being built in mass. Then came the success of the air troops, sneaking in inconspicuously during chaos to finish a job that needed to be done. I enjoyed the idea of being in the most chaotic place on Earth – looking back on it now, this was probably a death wish – so I signed up for the first platoon I could get with. I already had experience with hand-to-hand combat and weapons training from my hobbies outside of school, so that made me a perfect candidate.
I was signed on with the crew of G-82659, or Serenity, as it's more commonly known. My official title is Warrior SPC, but everyone takes quite a joy in calling me 'assassin'. As far as the rest of the crew, it took me a while to warm up to the most of them. While the Mechanic, Kaylee Frye, and the Diplomat, Inara Serra, were both very kind to me from the start, the rest of the crew were not so pleasant. The Captain – who's not even actually a Captain, but a Sergeant – has never really seen eye-to-eye with me on much, and seeing as Corporal Zoe Alleyne agrees with the man on practically everything, I don't see eye-to-eye with her on much, either. The only reason I started getting along with Jayne Cobb is because he sat me down and started teaching me swear words in Mandarin Chinese so that, in his own words: "if we ever get captured by the Chinese, you'll have the chance to tell 'em to tai-kong suo-yo duh shing-chiou sai-jin wuh duh pee-goo." At the time, I had no idea what he was saying to me, but now that I know, it's my favorite swear. Officially, Jayne and I are probably the most colorful in our vocabulary, calling each other the worst we can come up with. As for the rest of the crew, my friendship with them took some time, but it came around for the most part. The only one that I still can't ever truly connect with is Dr. Simon Tam. While his sister, Dr. River Tam, and I get along quite well, he and I have never liked each other all that much.
Now, this story starts of in the year 2022, a year and a half after the start of World War III. Some of the largest nations in the world are at war with each other and we've been ordered to stop this mass destruction at all costs. My name is Rosalyn Jamison, and I am part of the crew of the airship Serenity.
tai-kong suo-yo duh shing-chiou sai-jin wuh duh pee-goo: shove all the planets in the Universe up my ass