Note: According to Joss Whedon's Serenity and Firefly Wiki, the Chinese used in the show is a bastardized, pidgin version of Cantonese. I found all the Chinese phrases in this story at wiki/Dictionary, so don't yell at me if they're not correct.
Summary: An unexpected stowaway on Serenity ends up wreaking havoc on poor Mal's nerves—before Our Mrs. Reynolds.
Spoilers: None, but you should be familiar with the episodes before, and including, Safe.
Size: 4,800 words
Disclaimer: Not mine, never was, no money made, giving them back now.
Stowaway
Rated PG
By Suzanne Feld
"Gorram it, what in the guai is my damn good knife doing in the middle of the dinin' room?" Jayne yelled with annoyance, leaning over to pick up the wide 7" blade that was lying on the floor next to the long rectangular table. He had come in to get a snack, which was now forgotten. "That moonbrain girl been in my bunk?!"
"She's been with me all day," Simon called down the corridor from where he had just left the bridge. "Would you quit blaming everything that goes wrong on this ship on River?"
A small but clear voice spoke from behind him. "Bandits like shiny things," River said, peering around her brother's shoulder as they walked down the main corridor between the crew quarters' doors. "Not a badger, like Badger."
"Shut up with that fa kuang! She's making even less sense than usual," Jayne growled, blocking their way by standing in the doorway with his arms braced on either side, the knife lolling out of his left fist. "Stay out of my room, little girl. You got it?"
"What's the problem?" Mal asked from behind him. "Get outta the way, Jayne, you're blocking the whole ta ma duh doorway."
"Gorram feng le kid been takin' my things," he growled, stepping back and brandishing the huge knife at Mal, who threw one arm up and moved a step away out of sheer reflex. "Found this on the floor in there."
The captain turned and looked down at Simon expectantly over his shoulder from where he stood in the dining room doorway, Jayne half behind him.
"It wasn't her, Captain, we spent the morning playing halma with Inara and Shepherd Book in the commons before I had him go rest, and we just came from giving Wash some meds," Simon said. "She was never away from me for more than a few moments."
Mal frowned. "Wash all right?"
"Yeah, I think he's got allergies or hayfever, probably inhaled some pollen when we dropped off the cattle on Jiangyin," the doctor said. "I gave him a mild antihistamine and he should be fine in a few hours once the allergen is out of his system."
"Shiny," the captain said tiredly. "Jayne, quit raising a ruckus, put that damn knife away, and lock your ta ma duh door from now on."
"Yes sir," the big mercenary said, surly and sarcastic, as he left the dining room and stomped down the stairs. "But I find any more of my stuff out here, I'm gonna start takin' shit out of her room."
"What, you interested in dresses an' hair bows?" Mal said with deceptive calmness but a warning glint in his eye as Jayne pushed past Simon and River and stamped down the corridor to his door. The other man didn't reply, just grumbled under his breath as he swung down into his quarters and the door hissed closed above him.
Mal turned to the other two, who were still standing nearby. "If it was her, you need to keep her outta other people's rooms," he informed the doctor bluntly. "That just ain't gonna—"
Just then Kaylee trotted up to Mal through the dining area, patting the myriad pockets in her tan jumpsuit, a smear of grease across her forehead. He swiveled to face her, wondering what was up now. "Hey, have any of you seen my small crescent wrench?" she asked, looking around. "I could have sworn I put it down for a just a minute while I went to get a piece of wiring, and now it's gone."
"Don't tell me, you think River took that too," Simon said to Mal with clear sarcasm.
The captain turned back and glared at him. "Don't push your ta ma duh luck," he growled. "Kaylee, when did this happen?"
She looked baffled at the exchange but answered the question. "Just a couple of minutes ago. I was working on the wiring to the outside lights and my wrench just disappeared like it'd never been there."
"Couldn't have been River, she's been right here," Mal said thoughtfully, folding his arms across his chest. "Keep looking, Kaylee, and let me know if you find it."
The little mechanic shrugged and turned around to head back to the engine room, still patting herself with a quizzical frown.
"Okay, then, back to what you were doin'," Mal boomed at the other two, spinning on his heel and heading for the kitchen area shaking his head. Other than Zoe, he thought, being a captain is like chasin' escaped monkeys back into their cages.
After making himself a cup of strong black tea, he carried the tin cup to his quarters. There he continued studying the maps that Elder Gommen had sent him of the area around Triumph where they would likely find the bandits they'd been hired to stop. After re-reading the notes that had come along with them, he reached for his tarnished silver pen-like stylus to trace some of the more likely routes before he consulted with Zoe and Jayne.
It was gone.
Mal got up and shuffled about the flotsam on his desk, then searched around on the floor and under his bunk for a time. The stylus was nowhere to be found. He didn't use it often, but knew that he'd had it just a little while ago while poring over the maps after lunch. It had been sitting right next to his 'pad.
They were barely a few hours out from Jiangyin and already the situation was getting mò míng qí miào, Mal thought tiredly as he plopped onto his bunk, sitting leaning forward, elbows on his knees with hands dangling between them. Was River running about the ship stealing things? he wondered. Mal wouldn't put it past her and yet it didn't seem likely despite the weird go shi he'd seen her do. Simon swore she'd been with him; Mal could always check with Inara and the shepherd as well.
For the moment he picked up his pad and keyed the intercom, asking Jayne and Zoe to meet him in the dining area. As he climbed out of his quarters he heard a battery of rapid-fire sneezes coming from the bridge and detoured that way.
Wash was sitting at his station but instead of his toy dinosaurs, crumpled tissues littered the console in front of him. A large industrial-sized box of kleenex was parked on the astrolabe to his right. As the captain stepped into the room Wash let out another barrage of explosive sneezes, then blew his nose.
"What the hell, Wash?" Mal said, and then stopped a foot or so behind him when the pilot swung around in his chair. Wash's entire face was swollen and covered with red splotches, his nose bright red and puffy eyes streaming tears. "What in the guai is wrong with you?"
"Bad allergies," the pilot said, but due to his bloated nose it came out more like "ad allegez". "Doc says I'll be fine, but it's getting worse. I never reacted like this 'cept to cats or dogs, I'm serious allergic to them."
"Zāo gāo. Think the cows did this to you?" Mal asked, going to stand next to the primary pilot's console. He was relieved to note that the autopilot was on, the bright green light steady. They had a few hours before they were even within hailing range of any planet and with any luck Wash would be recovered by then, because Mal had enough to do without taking over piloting the ship, too.
"Nah, rode horses on my home planet and 'sides, the cows were here two weeks—I woulda reacted before this," Wash said, and then blew his red, raw nose again. "Doc says it's likely ragweed and will go 'way, but I wonder if someone didn't track some in on their shoes or somethin'."
Another barrage of sneezes, which were so powerful that they almost made the pilot fall out of his chair. For the first time Mal noticed that all the equipment around him was littered with shiny spots, and made a mental note to have the doctor come disinfect the bridge before touching anything. "Tell you what, Wash, let the auto fly her for a while—you go lay down 'til you feel better," the captain said, getting up and going to the intercom again, taking the mike down but not keying the button. "You got our course to Triumph laid in?"
"Yeth," the pilot said, then getting out of the chair unsteadily with a handful of tissues in one hand and the box of same clutched in the other. "Tanks, Mal, dose meds the doc gave me ain't working worth crap."
Mal dropped the mike and grabbed his arm. "C'mon, I'll give you a hand, we don't need you fallin' down and breaking your neck," he grumbled, slinging Wash's arm around his shoulders and putting his around the pilot's waist.
But as he helped the other man down the stairs from the bridge Zoe came hurrying along the corridor. "Wash? What's wrong?"
"His allergies are so bad he can't even see the console," Mal answered for him, transferring the pilot to Zoe's expert hands. "Need any help gettin' him down into your room?"
The tall woman shook her head, thick dark hair waving around her shoulders as she half-dragged, half-carried the blonde man to the entrance to their quarters. "No, I've got it, Captain. Let me get him settled and I'll meet you back in the dining area in a few."
Mal left her to manhandle her husband down the small ladder and headed down the corridor, but before he could reach the dining area where Jayne sat waiting at the table Simon came flying around the stairway from belowdecks and nearly collided with him. "Captain, something odd is going on," he said without preamble, grabbing onto the rounded doorway to brace himself. "When I went in the infirmary, all of the hypos I had left out on the counter were gone. Inara was in the commons and said she didn't see a thing."
Mal heaved a sigh, running one hand through his cropped hair. Monkeys, he reminded himself. "You sure you didn't put them away and forgot about it?"
The younger man gave him that flat basilisk stare which reminded him of his first drill sergeant. Without words it told him that he was being a yi da dwei bun chou roh. "No, I think I'd remember that," he said coldly.
"Well doctor, ain't my problem you lose track of your stuff," Mal said, annoyed, pushing past him. Wasn't often anymore that someone made him feel like that and he didn't much like it. "Oh, that reminds me. Need you to take a sonic cleanser to the main pilot's console, Wash done sneezed all over it an' I don't want anyone else to get sick."
"It won't hurt anything," Simon tossed back over his shoulder as he went stiffly down the stairs. "You can't catch allergies."
"You better hope not, or I'll make sure you'll be the first to get 'em!" Mal yelled at his retreating back, not caring that it didn't make sense. He turned back to the table, set his 'pad down, and yanked out a chair. But before he could sit down, Inara came sweeping up the same stairway that Simon had disappeared into.
"Mal, I know what in the guai is going on—"
"Gorram it, Inara, I ain't got time for this!" the captain growled angrily, glaring at her. "I got attacks to plan, we're gonna be at Triumph in a few hours, an—"
"Shiah hwa! Would you shut the hell up and listen to me?" the Companion snapped as she stopped next to his chair, hands on hips. Since she was wearing a square-necked, almost sheer dark blue robe-dress-thing with butterfly sleeves Mal suddenly couldn't decide where to look that wouldn't get him a bitingly smart remark. He finally settled on staring at her left ear. "I just saw what's causing all the trouble around here, and it's some kind of animal I've never seen before. I found it in my shuttle digging through my jewelry shell, and it got a few things before it disappeared into an overhead air shaft."
Zoe joined them and caught the last part, standing on Mal's other side from the Companion. "When the shuttles dock, those open into Serenity," she noted. "Whatever it is could be anywhere."
"What'd it look like?" Mal asked, calming considerably. If there really was something going on and not his crew losin' their minds, then it was up to him to fix it. Knowing there was a problem to be solved was better than thinking his crew had lost their collective minds.
"About the size of a smallish dog or large cat, say one of those Atrem wildcats, with grayish fur and a tail that was black and white striped," the Companion said.
"Did it have a black stripe, like a mask, on its face?" Mal asked, still intent on her ear.
"I didn't see its front," Inara shrugged gracefully. It was all he could do not to look down at her bouncing fey wu but resisted the temptation when he thought of what she'd say if she noticed. And she would, he knew, this blasted woman noticed everything.
"Could be a raccoon or badger or sumpthin' like that," he mused, daring to look down at the table and reaching out to tap on his 'pad. The Companion leaned over his shoulder and he got a whiff of both her rich, musky perfume and the heady bouquet of sheer woman, making him pause for just a moment and take a deep breath before regaining his senses and forcefully ignoring it. "This it?" he said, tilting the screen so she could see it.
"I think so, yes," she said, frowning prettily at the picture of a Terran raccoon he'd brought up. How was it, Mal thought, that she didn't look ugly even with that expression on her face?
"What is it?" Zoe asked from his other side. "Never seen one of those before."
"Big ass rodent, kinda like a rabbit with hands, only smarter. Had 'em on my home planet," Jayne boomed before Mal could answer. "Creepy, sneaky little hwen dan. Raided barns and henhouses, smart as hell too. Good eatin' from what I heard."
The captain glared at him but Jayne, who was busy eyeing Inara's backside in the sheer robe/dress, didn't notice. "Yeah, we used to deal with them on the farm I grew up on," Mal said with grudging agreement. "Don't know much about 'em 'ceptin' how to kill 'em, though."
Inara turned away, heading for the stairs. "You go back to what you were doing and I'll research them, and let you know what I find out so we can figure out how to get rid of it."
Zoe sat down at the table across from Jayne on Mal's right. "Wash said he had an allergy to dogs and cats, think that critter could be what's causing him so much grief?"
Mal shrugged, changing the screen of his 'pad from the wildlife encyclopedia back to his maps. "Could be. Why'nt you let the doc know when we're done here, maybe there's something else he can do to clear him up."
She nodded, then leaned over to look at the 'pad, which he pushed out to the center of the table so they could all see it. Annoyed by the lack of the stylus, he nonetheless began to outline his ideas of how to put a stop to the Triumph bandits they'd been hired to end, tracing the routes with the tip of his finger. He got busy discussing the plan with Zoe and Jayne and had totally forgotten about the possible stowaway critter until he heard Kaylee cry out, "Come back here with that, you little feh feh pi goh!"
He looked up just in time to see a medium-sized, rotund animal with grayish-brown fur and the distinctive black mask and fluffy, ringed tail of a raccoon run into the dining area, pause and look up at the people around the table with tiny, bright black eyes, then dart past and disappear into the passage leading to the crew quarters and bridge. It moved fast, but he noted that it held what appeared to be a silver chain in its black front paws.
"That little hwen dan took the necklace my mom gave me when I left Harvest!" Kaylee cried with tears in her voice as she ran past the table. "I closed the vents when I saw it, that's how it's getting around the ship!"
Just then the intercom beeped. "They like shiny, reflective things," Inara's voice crackled tinnily from the tiny speaker. "We can set a trap for it with something like that."
"Feihua! Tell us sumpthin' we don't know!" Mal snapped, and then looked at Zoe and jerked his chin at the intercom as he jumped up and followed the engineer. "Kaylee, ai ya, wait, you ain't gonna be able to catch it!" he yelled as chased her towards the bridge. "Them things bite, be careful!"
By the time he caught her Kaylee was standing at the secondary pilot's console, hands on its edge and staring down at the floor, panting. "It went down there, Captain," she said, pointing at a metal access panel that was ajar beneath the console.
"Where's that lead to?" he asked, moving around the chair to the other side.
"Anywhere in the ship," she said unhappily. "Like I said, I closed all the air vents 'cause I saw it come out of one, but it can get in between the walls from below the bridge."
"Ta ma de hun dan," Mal snarled, kicking the base of the chair. "Ain't like we ain't got enough to worry about."
"The good thing is, Kaylee, that if we can find its nest we should be able to get all of our stuff back," Inara said, and they both turned to see her just stepping onto the bridge. To Mal's relief she had put a long, fringed red shawl over her sheer dress. "From what I just read, they like shiny objects and will steal anything they can carry to line their nests with. They also eat almost constantly and will go after any kind of food."
"How the—" Mal started, reconsidered, and then said, "Musta got on the ship back on Jiangyin when we offloaded the cattle, it's a pastoral planet. Go neong yung duh, I hope it don't chew up any of the wiring or nuthin' like that."
"Maybe that's why there've been having problems with the outside lights, the wiring is inside the walls," Kaylee said, toeing the metal sheet on the floor and pushing it back into place. "I had to remove two access panels to get to it this morning."
Faintly, he heard the sound of sneezing coming from the corridor. "Wash!" he said suddenly. "If Wash is reacting to the raccoon, we can tell where it's at in the walls by his reaction." Both women looked at him like he was a chwen joo. On second thought, he mused with silent embarrassment, maybe that wasn't the best idea.
"I think we'd do better setting a trap for it, Mal," Inara said in a neutral voice. Kaylee nodded, and they began to head back towards the corridor.
Why was it, Mal mused as the women preceded him, that he said the stupidest things when he was around one of the few people in the 'verse that he cared what they thought of him?
. . .
"Wait! Stop! Babies, babies!" River babbled, jumping in front of the cage. Most of the crew, with the exception of the preacher who was still resting from his recent gunshot wound, were gathered around one of the large open-mesh shipment crates in the cargo bay, which they had finally caught the stowaway in.
"Go shi!" Jayne yanked his gun upwards towards the ceiling, letting go of the trigger just before he pulled it. Wouldn't be a good thing if he put a hole in Serenity, though the little popgun he was going to use to kill the critter probably wouldn't penetrate the hull. Better to not find out, though.
"River! Get out of there!" Simon lunged forward to grab her arm, but the lithe teenager spun out of his way without leaving her spot in front of the cage, strands of her dark hair and the ruffles of her pink skirt flaring as he went by. Simon tumbled past her from the momentum he had going, and Zoe caught him by the shoulders and righted him. "What in the ai yah tien ah are you doing?!"
"Babies! She's got babies!" River said, her dark eyes flashing at the crew who were assembled around the cage. Inside it, the unconcerned raccoon sat grooming its face with human-like forepaws. They had baited the trap with both food and a shiny object, in this case one of the cheap trinkets Jayne kept for his occasional hooker, and the creature had enjoyed its dinner of a chunk of molded protein. "She's got baby furries, she's been looking for a safe place to put them," River said, gazing around with big, dark, pleading eyes peering through strands of long, dusky hair. "Don't hurt her."
"You're telling us that the raccoon is pregnant?" Zoe said, hands on hips. "How do you know?"
"I don't wanna know how she knows, I wanna kill the little hwen dan and make it my dinner," Jayne snarled, but shoved the un-cocked gun back into the thick leather belt around his waist. It had taken nearly a day of searching to find the raccoon's nest, which had turned out to be right below the primary pilot's console. In it they had found over two dozen items, including but not limited to Inara and Kaylee's jewelry, several hypos, Mal's stylus, a half-dozen tools and eating utensils, and three of Jayne's smaller knives. The big one, they figured, it hadn't been able to carry and had dropped in the dining room.
"We're not that far from Santo and it's not too much out of our way if you want to stop there and let it loose," Wash said. Now that the doctor had identified the allergen, he'd been able to treat the pilot's symptoms so that he could both breathe and talk.
"I thought we was gonna kill it!" Jayne grumbled, but turned away to head for the stairs. "You said you'd let me kill it, Mal. Bao xin jiu huo. You let me know iff'n I get to shoot it here or when you let it go, if you're dumb enough to do that."
Mal's eyes caught and held River's for a few moments. Moonbrained or not, he understood and empathized with her concern. The animal had led them a merry chase but, he thought, it certainly had broken up the usual monotony of space travel and had done no real damage. Even the few wires it had chewed through were easily repaired. "Santo would be a good place to let it loose," he allowed, remembering the last time they'd been there. It had been nice to relieve those slavers of some of their cash, but they'd have to be careful just the same. "Too bad we're not closer to Whitefall, I wouldn't mind giving them a little grief."
River smiled, transforming her face from its usual morose sadness to that of a pretty teenaged girl without a care in the world. "Little baby monsters nibbling on Patience's toes," she giggled, and danced away up the stairs in Jayne's wake.
The others stood watching her go for a moment, and then Wash shook his head. "I'll set course for Santo, have us go in on the dark side," he said, following the others with Zoe at his side. Mal just shook his head and turned away, heading for the dining area to retrieve his 'pad.
"Well, then, guess I'll go check on the Shepherd," Simon said to no one in particular, though the caged raccoon did look up at him momentarily before going back to its bath.
. . .
The dark, featureless plain stretched away into the distance, differentiated from the sky only by the sparkling flecks of stars that rose from the horizon and covered the pitch-black night sky. Wash had found a good place to land on Santo, on a mostly-deserted landmass that was covered with forest and mountains. There were few settlements, none within more than a few hours' walk, and Mal hoped this made River happy enough to leave him be about it. In the time since he'd agreed to let the animal go instead of having Jayne shoot it, the girl had babbled on and on about the thing and its babies while he sat at the table and tried to plan. He could have left and gone to his bunk, he supposed, but it was kinda nice to see the kid happy for once even if her babbling had gotten on his nerves and it'd been all he could do to ignore it.
In the glow of dimmed lights from the airlock the large wire crate sat at the bottom of Serenity's ramp, a rope stretching away from its gate to the girl's hand. "Well, what you waiting for? Let it go," Jayne said with annoyance. Mal had made him swear on his mother's name that he wouldn't shoot the damn thing, or at least not while River was around. "We got a job waitin' for us, what we doing screwing about around here?"
"Go ahead, River, let her go," Zoe encouraged. She and Wash stood off to one side, Kaylee and Shepherd Book nearby, all four with their feet on the dirt of the planet. Mal stayed on the ramp, the interior airlock door closed behind him. After all this grief he was determined to make sure that the critter didn't get back on his gorram ship.
With no warning River yanked on the rope, which popped the catch on the gate so that it swung open. The raccoon took a few steps out, sniffing, and then sat up, turned, and looked back in the direction of where Mal, Jayne, Simon, and River were standing on the ramp. Dropping the rope, River waved happily at it. "Congratulations! Many happy returns! Happy anniversary!" she called as the large rodent turned and lumbered away into the darkness.
"Coulda made a good stew outta that animal," Jayne grumbled, heading down the ramp to retrieve the crate and then carrying it back into the airlock, biceps popping as he lifted the heavy steel container as if it weighed nothing. "Get tired of having protein this, protein that."
Kaylee went to help, coiling the rope and tossing it over her shoulder as he set the crate in the airlock. It was she who had designed and set the trap, which had worked perfectly. "Oh, quit being so mean," she said as they all stood at the top of the ramp, waiting for it to close before they opened the inner door, at Mal's insistence. As soon as it did, Zoe hit the button and the heavy, foot-thick steel panel swung open. "It wasn't that much... that much..."
The entire crew of Serenity stood staring through the open doorway into the cargo bay, speechless. All except for River, that was. "See, there's her babies!" the teenager chortled gleefully. "Now we get to play with them, too!"
Mal stared in at what seemed, at first glance, like dozens of young raccoons but was hopefully no more than five or six, about half the size of the other one, which were running back and forth across the cargo bay making little chirping noises. Probably looking for their mom, he realized. The mom they'd just gone to all the trouble of capturing, then gone out of their way to set free on the gorram planet.
Suddenly Wash sneezed, and then groaned. "Not again!"
Jayne's eyes lit up. "Gonna have me some raccoon stew yet!"
"Them ta ma duh things better not have got into my room again!" Kaylee cried.
Mal almost leaned forward and closed the door, leaving the ship to the critters. As it was, he looked over at River to see her smiling hopefully at him past Simon's slack-jawed face.
Just another day on Serenity.
finis