Chapter 2: Desperate Times Require Fluffy Measures

Shepherd Book was the first to reach the shuttle door, closely followed by Kaylee and Simon. Moments later, the whole crew crowded round the entrance and peered into the red and gold room. The safety catch of Zoe's gun clicked.

Inara cowered on her couch, pale but seemingly unhurt. Kaylee sat down beside her and threw her arms around her.

"I'm sorry," Inara said. "I didn't mean to alarm you. There was a rat. It ran over there." She pointed vaguely. Then her voice changed, regaining some of its usual self-assurance. "Jayne, I absolutely forbid you to shoot in my shuttle."

With a grunt, Jayne lowered his gun. Wash, who had never been inside the shuttle since Inara had moved into it, cast a critical look around.

"Nice hide-out! All these drapes. Plenty of places for a rat to burrow into."

"We'll have a look around anyway," said Mal. "See if we can smoke it out."

"I can't sleep here tonight. I can't!" Inara's eyes shimmered. Shepherd Book took her hand.

"You are welcome to join us in the passenger dorm."

"Rats there, too. Everywhere, nothing stops them." River shuddered. "Nowhere's safe."

"Thank you, River, for this uplifting observation." Mal rubbed his neck. "But the shepherd's right. A room in the passenger dorm will be easier to search; it doesn't have any of this fancy stuff in it. Inara?"

"I'll get my things."

"Zoe, Jayne, you go and check out the spare room for Inara. And no more shooting! I'm getting a headache here. Kaylee, what can you do to protect our electrics?"

"Insulation tape, I suppose." She shrugged. "I'm gonna need a helluva lot of it."

"I can help you," offered Simon.

"No," said Mal, "I want to speak to you. Wash, you go with Kaylee."

"Come along, dear," Shepherd Book said to River, who had started sobbing. He put an arm round her shoulder and led her away towards the dining room.

"So, doctor." Mal mimicked Book's gesture, but manoeuvred Simon towards the stairs instead. "Let's have a look at that infirmary of yours. Must be something there that's useful as rat poison."

Simon lifted his index finger to his half-open mouth.

"We have some chloralose," he said. "Not in huge quantities, though. And it only works as a rat poison at temperatures below 15 degrees."

"Life-support can be adjusted. We can go and dig out our cardigans."

Simon grinned. "You have a cardigan?"

"Sure. Don't you? Mine has fluffy bunnies on it. I have a matching floral bonnet."

oOoOo

"All the rats we found in nests among the cargo have been euthanised. We put out poison in the cargo bay and up here in the kitchen. Make sure not to touch it."

"I shot three. One got away."

"Yes, Jayne, you're a big hero."

"Mal!" wailed Wash, "Why did you have to say that? Now I've got that gorram song stuck in my head again."

Mal ignored him and went on, "For the poison to work, the temperature must be below 15 degrees, so we've switched the heating down. Get your cardigans on, or find someone to snuggle with, if you must." He cast a suggestive glance at Kaylee, who blushed because he'd caught her out just as her eyes were about to stray towards Simon. "We have twelve day's travel to our drop-off, and it's possible that we won't be rid of the rats before that. It's going to be a chilly journey."

They nodded gravely.

"Which brings me to the marginal question of our customer's dishonourable intentions."

"It's not his fault," said Simon. "Wasn't the load sitting in that warehouse for weeks? The rats had plenty of time to get comfortable."

"I'm not talking about the rats," said Mal.

All faces turned to him.

"What then?" asked Inara.

"Let's put it this way," said Mal, thumbs hooked in his braces. "I'm happy to do a legal job, even if the pay is not too brilliant, because it gives us that veneer of respectability we so crave. On the other hand, I'm not looking too closely if the job is not legal. But, and I want to be clear on this, if I am smuggling a load of classified Alliance personnel files, I want to be paid accordingly."

"What you mean? Ain't no Alliance stuff in that cargo… is there?" Kaylee looked confused.

"We found them stashed inside an old sofa," said Wash and flung a bundle of printed papers on the table.

Zoe frowned. "Paper files? Are you kidding? When did Alliance go low-tech?"

"Paper's easier to smuggle. Won't show up on a scanner."

"How do you know it's classified stuff?"

"Says so."

"Hm."

They all stared at the papers for a while.

"What are we gonna do about it, cap'n?" said Kaylee.

Mal shrugged. "Limpton paid for the transportation of his granny's estate, and that's what we'll deliver. If he wants anything else, he needs to negotiate the price."

"That sounds risky," said Simon.

"Really?" snapped Mal. "What do you think this is, a holiday cruiser?"

oOoOo

Within forty-eight hours, five rats were killed by poison. Jayne shot another three. Yet the little scurrying shadows seemed to be everywhere and the constant scratching behind every crate or panel became nerve-wrecking. Inara stayed in her new room with the door closed and only opened it when Kaylee or the shepherd brought her a tray of food. Simon had trouble keeping River calm. She sat crouched in a corner of her bed, hands over her ears, and muttered endless litanies: "Tail and paw, ear and tooth, death comes a-walking, nose and whiskers, gnawing, gnawing…"

Wrapped in three layers of sweaters, Kaylee kept a vigil in the engine room. So far no rats had been sighted there. The rest of the crew spent most of their waking hours rat hunting.

"Our love for him now ain't hard to explain," sang Wash as he disposed of another little body, "The hero of Canton, the man they call Jayne..."

"Honey!" said Zoe with a warning voice.

"It's Mal's fault! He brought it up."

"That was two days ago."

"I've not exactly had a lot of distraction since then. Nothing but rats, rats, rats. How can there be so many?"

"Fast breeders?"

"We're not getting on top of this, are we?"

When she prepared for bed later, Kaylee heard the ominous rustle she had come to dread. She nearly burst into tears when she discovered that a pregnant rat had not only made a nest under her precious pink dress, but had shredded a good part of the ruffles in the process. That shock was nothing, however, compared to the one she had the next morning when she found the upper stabilizer cable half chewed.

"This is getting serious," said Mal. "And Simon's out of chloralose. We need to stop somewhere, get some traps, some proper rat poison. Wash?"

"Deng yi miao." Wash checked his screen. "Sixteen hours to Kerry."

"Make that fifteen."

They made it to Kerry in fifteen-and-a-half hours without any further rodent-related mishaps. Mal chose a modestly populated temperate region.

"This is a fairly harmless town," he said after they'd landed on a grassy plain about a mile from a settlement. "I don't mind if you all want to go and stretch your legs. Zoe and I will do the shopping. Make sure to be back for dinner."

Inara felt too fraught to face even this quiet backwater, but the others gladly availed themselves of the opportunity to get some planet time. The place was harmless indeed, even pretty in a run-down, casual way: half-timbered houses, little overgrown gardens with summer flowers behind dilapidated fences. Fluffy clouds flocked across a blue sky. "Shiny!" said Kaylee and opened her parasol.

Three hours later, the crew arrived back at the ship. Jayne, Wash and Zoe got busy setting the traps. The others hung around at the ramp. They seemed to enjoy it that for once they didn't have to leave a planet in a rush. Inara, who had at least come out to the front of the ship, had set up a delicate easel and was painting a watercolour of the distant hills. Simon and River were looking over her shoulder.

Mal stared down the road that led to the settlement.

"Where's Kaylee? She'd better not got herself kidnapped. Who was with her?"

"River and I, but then River got a bit agitated and I took her back to the ship. Kaylee wanted to stay and look at some goats." Simon screened the horizon. "I think that's her coming there now."

It was indeed Kaylee, ambling towards Serenity as if she didn't have a care in the 'verse. Her parasol was tucked under her arm. She carried some kind of package and kept bending her head towards it. Mal screwed up his eyes. Something was hanging down from the package: an orange, undulating thing, and it moved, snake-like. As Kaylee drew closer, he realised what it was.

"Kaylee, what the hell –"

"Hiya, Cap'n." She smiled at him. "Come and meet my new friend."