Chapter One
- Helping Hands -

Avalon: Valley
Gunshots ring through the low, sunlit valley in intermittent eruptions. It's a cacophony of thundering sound that breaks the quiet calm of the moon. Everything is bathed in the golden, orange glow, the glow of a setting sun.

It's a strange little corner of the 'Verse with shallow turquoise seas, deep blue lakes and golden sanded beaches that stretch hundreds of miles. When the sun sets on this tiny little moon, it actually sets behind another, in this case Albion, and it's already beginning to cast a long shadow which is creeping up the valley towards the gunfight.

Gunshots ring out again in short, deep bursts this time from a huge mounted Gatling gun on the top of a low gray Alliance control building near the mouth of the shallow valley. The bullets spray over a large area, including a large pile of Alliance marked crates where they bounce off and ricochet into the surrounding area like a deadly hailstorm.

Tucked behind these pitted and blackened shipping crates is Zoe Washburne, an athletic woman dressed in military style clothing. She brushes sweat and hair out of her face and checks her gun. It's a lever-action sawed-off carbine and although lacking in size, it kicks a mighty powerful punch.

She checks how many rounds she has left. Fourteen. Not enough to fight her way out of this scrape, and the range of her gun wouldn't be far enough to reach the closest man, let alone do any lasting damage. She tries to calculate the chances of getting out alive and growls as she realizes that it's more or less lambs to the slaughter. She looks over at a man positioned further along the pile of crates, and shakes her head. He frowns back at her, the flaps on his gray hat hiding the rage on his face.

His name is Jayne Cobb, and he's a grim faced, hulking mercenary. Unlike Zoe, he's dressed in civilian clothing which comprises of a pair of light gray cargo pants and an old, faded black t-shirt with a red design of Chinese characters below the picture of a skull.

He's loading a SK 12 gauge, which he has lovingly named Vera, with brass-cased rounds the size of his thumb. He pulls round after round off the bullet belt slung across his chest and loads them into the gun with speed and efficiency. There's not many rounds left on his belt though, and the fact seems to make him all the more angry at the situation.

Around his waist is a worn belt holding his Bowie knife and his Greer Model B gun. Scattered about his feet are the pins from several frag grenades, of which he has run out of. His first finger on his left hand is bleeding heavily from catching it in his gun's clip and blood smudges the guns stock.

This man is a true warrior, and this is definitely a man you're better off keeping on his good side with. Not that he really has a good side, he generally tends to go with the people who pay him the best and right now he feels like he should be paid double.

Jayne looks up at Zoe sharply as a loud primal roar draws closer to their cover. Jayne's eyes widen and he dodges out of the way as a man in a rust red coloured shirt and military style tan pants dives over the crates, and lands heavily next to Zoe, who is not at all surprised by his sudden appearance. It's not the first time she's seen him use this tactic in battle.

He groans in pain, and pushes himself up, scrabbling back into cover breathing heavily keeping his head low. Zoe rolls her eyes at him and risks a peek over her shipping crate. The situation is getting more desperate with each passing second, with more men joining the shoot out from the gray Alliance building. She leans back and shakes her head at her companions, including the new arrival.

This man is Malcolm Reynolds, Captain of the Firefly class scavenger and transport ship, Serenity. He's also likes to think of himself as a con man and a smuggler, but right now he would describe himself as an idiot.

Mal took this job on the sly from Ivan Moskowitz - a small time crook they had dealt with once before - hoping to make a fast buck. What he wasn't expecting was a barrage of bullets come his way the moment his ship dropped off the goods, and Mal got down to negotiating business with these bungers. It seemed Ivan had cheated these people in the past, and they'd decided to take it out on anyone who ran for him. Zoe had said this was a risky venture, but had Mal ignored her. After all his fuel tanks didn't run on dirt, and nothing as cheap as either.

Mal takes a few deep breaths to calm himself, and pulls his Shacorp IX semi-auto from its holster rather haphazardly, catching it on his braces. His hands are filthy, and shaking with adrenalin. He laughs manically, grinning at the moment of chaos within the ranks of the enemy and checks his clip with trembling fingers.

He poises himself behind the crates, getting ready to shoot over them, when Jayne catches his eye. He's staring wide-eyed at Mal's shoulder with a sickly look on his bearded face. He points at the Captains shoulder with his bloody finger. "Uh… Mal?" Jayne mutters.

Mal looks down to see what's bothering the mercenary so much, a little frown on his face. "Agh!" Mal yells in surprise. Then he groans loudly, sinking behind cover into a low slouching position.

Sticking out of his left shoulder is a large, sharp shard of blackened metal from one of the crates. Mal grimaces as he checks the damage. A small trickle of blood runs from the wound and soaks into his shirt as he wiggles it. He closes his eyes, takes a firm grasp of the shard of metal, and yanks it out of his shoulder with a pained grunt. He immediately regrets his decision as the little trickle of blood is more like a flood now and he presses his grubby hand to it desperately to halt the flow. The doc would sure as hell have something to say about that if they ever got out of here alive. Correction, he'd sure have something to moan about. He looks over to Zoe who has a disgusted look on her face, Mal isn't quite sure if it's the blood or him that's offended her.

"Okay," he groans, "Zoe you were right this WAS a really dumb idea."

"Thank you for admitting that, sir." she fires her shotgun blindly over the crates at the sound of approaching footsteps.

There's a yelp of pain as the shot hits the man and a sickening crack as he falls to the ground, cracking his head open on the concrete. Zoe looks back at Mal, who nods his head in approval at her shot.

"It's nice to know I'm right from time to time, sir." she adds with a small smile.

She pops up over the crates and fires her gun at the approaching enemy. More yelps and yowls of pain tell her that she's hit her targets. Two attackers fall to their knees and hit the floor, dead. A third man ducks behind cover clutching at his arm. Zoe ducks back down into cover. Jayne checks for more cover further out of the valley and swings back as bullets glance off the top of the crates dangerously close to his head.

"Might wanna tell Wash to pull at his gorramn finger and git us outta here." he yells at Zoe.

She wouldn't usually do as Jayne says with being under her in rank, and him being a world class ass and all, but she nods and hunkers down low behind the cover of the crates. Jayne and Mal - who is still clutching his shoulder hard - continue to fire as Zoe radios Serenity. She slips the radio from her belt and curses under her breath. A bullet has grazed it and it hangs in a mess of tattered wires and twisted plastic. Close one, she thinks as she pulls at the wires in an attempt to see if it would still work. This was going to be something that genius mechanic of theirs wouldn't be able to fix. She tosses the useless hunk of plastic aside, yanks Mal's radio from his belt, and holds it close to her mouth.

"Honey, some support would be great right now. Job's gone south and the landscape of things with the locals is… not so shiny." she says slowly and precisely.

The radio crackles with static for a few seconds, and she silently hopes that Serenity isn't in a communications black spot.

"I was really, really hoping those bangs were just fireworks celebrating how fantastically well the job went." Wash replies sarcastically over the radio, his voice crackling.

Zoe rolls her eyes, now is not the best time for Wash's sense of humour. She holds the radio back up to her mouth.

"Just get here." she snaps.

She slips the radio back onto her own belt and gets ready to fight once more.

Mal slumps behind the boxes holding his shoulder with the opposite hand. Blood pours through his fingers and onto his shirt, what isn't absorbed into the material streams down his arm and drips off his elbow into the dirt. He curses under his breath as the wound throbs painfully and his head begins to spin.

His only thought is that help was on the way and all they got to do is hold on, but he'd been told that before and it turned out to be a lie. He grips his gun as hard as he can, grits his teeth and gets up to fire at the aggressors.

Serenity: Bridge

Hoban 'Wash' Washburne is a flurry of activity on Serenity's bridge. He hits three main switches above him and pulls the yoke out towards himself. He presses more buttons, flicks more switches and twists more dials, prepping the Firefly Class ship's engines for a quick take off.

Serenity wobbles as her engines come online and a low hum fills the engine room, the wobble turns into a comforting vibration as the thrusters warm up. It's a sound Wash would normally enjoy, maybe even sit back and listen to for a moment, but right now the captain, and more importantly, his wife were getting shot at by some angry stick wilding locals. Jayne he was not so bothered about.

He flicks another few switches above his head and clears his throat to make an announcement over the internal communication system to the rest of Serenity's crew.

"Guys and girls, the job's gone south. Surprise, surprise. We're needed as support and rescue. Kaylee, prep the engine for full burn, we may need to make a quick exit. Simon, get to the med bay ready, there may be casualties… I hope to Buddha not," he allows himself a pause, and a little mouthed 'please' up to the ceiling, "Inara, Shepherd can you be ready to open up the airlock and get the guys back in, hopefully in one piece or as close as." he says quickly, his voice echoing around the ship.

He shuts down the intercom, and pulls his Hawaiian shirt off, throws it onto the co-pilots seat. Hen tightens the straps of his chair and takes a deep breath, blowing it out slowly. It's going to be a bit of a bumpy ride but nothing he couldn't handle and certainly nothing he hasn't done before. If he had to orchestrate another daring rescue this month, he was going to ask for a pay rise. He wipes his brow and puts his sweaty hands onto the yoke.

Wash pulls Serenity into the air, and she shudders as she is driven forward. He feels like someone pushed him down by his shoulders as the center of gravity is suddenly shifted. He'd have to talk to Kaylee about that, it was cutting down on performance, and he didn't fancy being a smear on the wall anytime soon - which he would be if it was left unchecked.

"What should I do?" asks a small voice from behind him.

Wash is so Zen master and in the zone that he doesn't even jump. He allows himself to glance back at the waif-like form of River Tam. She's a pale, thin young girl with long dark hair that falls either side of her face in messy, bedraggled curtains. Today she's dressed in an ill fitting pink flowery number that really doesn't suit her in any way shape or form, in fact it makes her look even more deranged than she actually is. Wash's eyes snap back to the window. His right eye twitches slightly in annoyance, but he remains calm and polite as ever.

"You just go and make some tea for when everybody gets back, okay sweetie?" he says kindly.

River, however, doesn't take the tone of voice well. She narrows her eyes, and glares at the back of his head in anger. It must get to him, being stared at, because for a split second he looks back at her again.

"I'm crazy, not dumb… boob," she says coldly, "By the way, its your flying not the Grav Boot that's causing the gravity to shift." she adds.

She wasn't being nasty and she understood that Zoe was in danger, but she found it hard to understand how these factors effected his flying. She would have to ponder this later when her world wasn't moving quite so fast. Wash, who wasn't paying any attention whatsoever to her, just nods. He's not even bothered that she seems to have read his very thoughts.

"That's nice sweetie, you do that. Uncle Wash is trying not to smoosh us all into human jam, okay?" he says sweetly.

"And there's no need to be so patronizing." River snaps. Wash just ignores her and concentrates on the job in hand.

River looks out of the window for a few seconds, imagining what it would be like to just spread out her arms and fly through the clouds, their gentle mist falling on her face. Serenity shudders, jerking her back into reality. She drops her arms back to her sides, the moment passing.

River walks silently down the connecting corridor from the bridge to the dining room unfazed by the pilots refusal of help. She runs her hand along the metal work as she goes, feeling every dent and imperfection under her fingertips. Her long hair flutters behind her and her floaty pink dress ripples as she makes her way through the corridor, and down the steps into the dining area.

The ship suddenly bucks, complaining about being pushed so hard without the engines being warmed up fully. This little hiccup doesn't bother River and she doesn't even flinch as a stack of tin plates and cups slide to the floor. She just carries on as sure footed as ever.

Serenity: Engine Room

River steps into the warm orange glow of the engine room. A wave of heat makes her dizzy for a second, but she stands firm right in the middle of the doorway. For a moment she stands their in quietly, breathing in the scent of slightly burnt metal and engine grease. It takes her back to when, as a young girl, she used to sneak off the industrial quarter with her brother. The city streets always smelt of burnt metal there from the machines that worked tirelessly behind closed doors.

The ships mechanic, Kaywinnet 'Kaylee' Lee Frye, is busy at work prepping the engine for hard burn. She talks to it as she makes the necessary adjustments with a large wrench.

"Now come on honey, don't complain. I know you don't like me preppin' you 'fore we even break atmo, but we might need you, 'kay?" Kaylee mutters lovingly.

She shifts around the engine as it winds away, wrench in hand, using it in some places like a hammer. She picks through the parts scattered all over the floor with delicate footsteps, to River it looks almost like a dance.

River waits patiently watching the engine spin, counting the rotations to work out how many times it spins a minute. She waits like this until Kaylee realizes she she's there and looks up from her work, blowing a strand of hair out of her eyes, smiling a little. "River, sweetie, this ain't the time-"

"Can I help you?" River butts in, tearing her eyes from the engine as it spins faster.

Kaylee freezes and looks at River quizzically. After a moment she breaks eye contact and continues her work, now avoiding Rivers eyes.

"No honey, I'm fine. You just go and take a nap or somethin', 'kay?" she says softly.

River stands as still as a statue for a second, then sighs casting her eyes to the floor. She twists her hands together and looks at Kaylee reproachfully.

"'Kay," she says, imitating Kaylee's accent perfectly, "Oh Wash want's you to check the Grav Boot… he thinks it's not working, I've told him it's just his flying."

"The Grav Boot?" Kaylee asks frowning, not even chastising at River for imitating her accent.

She hunkers down to check the Grav Boot and shrugs. Finding no fault she returns to reconnecting the stabilizer to the internal damper. River drops her eyes to the floor again, leaves Kaylee to worry about the engine and heads off in search of the rest of the crew.

Serenity: Cargo Bay

River wanders down the hall and heads for the cargo bay, the spring that she had in her step now gone. She looks down at the lower level of the cargo bay where Shepherd Book is sat astride the old beaten up mule looking strangely, right at home. Inara Serra is stood, pistol in hand, by the controls for the airlock doors. They don't look up as River trails down to them slowly. Inara finally looks up at her as she gets to the bottom of the stairs, gives her the hint of a smile, then checks her Astra 400 pistol.

River looks over to Book, who is checking the fuel gauge on the mule. She watches them closely, judging the right time to talk by their body language. She quickly finds a break.

"Is there anything I can help you with?" she asks before one of them has a chance to brush her aside with a quick witted comment.

Book and Inara give each other a glance that confers more than they can say.

"River, honey, we're fine here." Book says smiling warmly.

"Everything is sorted. Why don't you take a seat and leave this all to us?" Inara adds, giving River the same sort of smile.

River's own, now rather fixed smile, falls. She nods sullenly and drags her feet towards the med bay without another word.

Serenity: Med Bay

Simon Tam, River's older brother and the ships doctor, is washing his hands in the round metal sink, ready for any possible casualties. He's muttering to himself under his breath.

"Gunshot wounds, got to be… every time, when is it not?" he mumbles, shaking his head and frowning.

River leans against the frame of the door and crosses her arms, watching as Simon washes each finger of his hand methodically. He turns and smiles at River lovingly.

"Hey mei mei, what's up?" he asks lightly.

"Do you want any help?" River asks in a sullen monotone.

"You're alright, I don't need any help. Just go and-"

"NO! Why does everyone treat me like a child running with a pair of scissors," River yells, completely loosing it, "Nobody wants my help. I just sit around all day, half a girl, half a lab rat and every time I reach out to someone they push me away because they think I can't take it. I may as well be back at the Academy being experimented on and this whole thing be a dream. Except I pinch myself," she grabs a patch of skin on her cheek and pinches, hard, "And it hurts and I'm left with a red mark. Your minds are so closed and tiny, you can't even comprehend how I feel. I can't even take comfort in someone else's head. Everything comes back, and I'm not a girl, and I can't dance… and I hate it, I hate it, Simon, I hate it so much." She gives a huge racking sob and holds her arms around herself, hugging herself tightly, her cheek becoming red.

Before Simon has a chance to reply, River disappears in a flurry of hair and flowery pattern. Simon goes to run after her but he gets as far as the door and Serenity shudders to a halt. He sighs and blinks tears from his eyes, her words hitting him like a fist. Right now he had to be professional, he'd have to talk things out with his sister later.