AN: I have no idea what I'm doing here… If anyone has any ideas as to where I should go from here, PLEASE!!! Lend me a hand… or just your thoughts. I don't want to be flooded with rogue dismembered hands. That would be gross.

I also just enrolled in a medical assisting training thing, so for the next 36 weeks, if I don't update regularly, I apologize, but I really do need to focus on my studies. I'll try to update once more before I start on Monday, no guarantees though.

Disclaimer: They ain't mine. *hmph grumble grumble grumble*

Mal knew he was losing a lot of blood. He knew that Karáh was still in danger until the chip in her was destroyed. But all he cared about right now was that he was holding the woman he had fallen in love with in a matter of days.

He could hear Jayne shout from the next room over. They needed to get out of there. Havers was dead, But they weren't in the clear just yet.

"In here!" Mal begrudgingly released the nearly catatonic Karáh and stood up with a great effort. He extended a hand to her. "Karáh… sweetheart, we need to go now. I can't carry you out of here."

She slowly lifted her head to him and stared at his hand as if she didn't understand its meaning.

"We need to go, Karáh," Mal repeated as he painfully bent down to lift her hand in his. He pulled her to her feet, ignoring the pain in his side.

Jayne and Zoe burst into the room and took in the sight of their captain bleeding heavily, holding Karáh's hand gently in his own.

Mal couldn't take his eyes off of her. She was bruised, bloody, and beaten. Her hair was caked with blood, her eyes black, tears carved streams of order through the chaos covering her cheeks. Despite all of this, she was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

Jayne cleared his throat, breaking the moment. "Captain, we gotta get goin', or them guards are going to start followin' us."

Mal pulled Karáh along. She stumbled, putting pressure on her injured ankle and cried out.

"It's alright. It's alright. I got ya," Mal told her as he draped her arm around his shoulders. "I can't handle a weapon right now. You two cover us. We're making a break for the door."

The four of them headed towards the back entrance as fast as Mal and Karáh could move in their injured states. Their path lead them through increasingly charred walls and ceilings, remnants from their last visit. Mal saw the bullet holes dimpling the already marred furnishings.

Slowly but surely, the guards Jayne and Zoe had temporarily incapacitated began to regain focus and bullets started whizzing by Mal's head.

"Jayne! Guards!" Mal warned.

Together, Jayne and Zoe shot down their aggressors and Mal was able to half drag, half carry Karáh out of the building for the last time.

Luckily, Zoe hadn't landed the shuttle too far away from the main house. Twenty yards of perilous dodging of bullets, Mal was carefully dumping Karáh into the shuttle while Jayne was slamming the door behind him and Zoe.

"Take us home, Zoe. Tell the doc to be ready for her," Mal ordered.

Zoe took a cursory look at her captain and immediately saw the growing blood stain on his shirt. "I'll tell him to be ready for the both of you," she amended.

His first mate deftly piloted the shuttle to Serenity while Mal and Jayne did their best to make Karáh more comfortable.

The first thing Mal decided needed to be done was reset her dislocated arm.

"Karáh, baby, this is going to hurt, but it'll make you feel much better, ok?" he warned her. He gripped her upper arm in one hand and her shoulder in the other. "On the count of three, alright? One… two…" He pushed the disjointed appendage back into place. "Three."

Karáh gave him a half smile through the pain in her eyes. "Knew you were going to do that," she told him with a wince, the edges of her vision growing dark.

Jayne, who had been looking for the first aid kit, grew frustrated in his futile search and kicked the wall.

"Where in the gorram hell is that box?" he asked Mal.

Mal gave him a dumbfounded look. "Where they always are. Up next to the pilot's chair," he told him and pointed him in the right direction.

Karáh pawed at his shirt lightly. "Mal…"she sighed. "Mal I-I'm…" she didn't finish her sentence as her hand fell to his lap and she slid softly off the bench, puddling on the floor.

"Dammit. Zoe, get us to Serenity ASAP. She needs to see the doc yesterday," Mal shouted and he bent to cradle her head.

AN: I'm sorry! I know it was short! I'll TRRRYYYYY to post once more before Monday, but that seems fairly unlikely.

Please review and tell me what you though/where you'd like to see this thing going.