"Course." Maddie said grimly. "River's got'm."
Jayne held out his hand to River who effected an expression rather like that of a child caught playing with a toy that it was not allowed and handed over the three grenades.
Grimacing Jayne rose and strode to the doorway, grenade in hand. For a moment he paused, looking back at Maddie who stood stiffly clutching the old Sharps in front of her as though she half expected it to go off in her face.
"You sure you kin handle that thing?" he asked. "It's gotta real kick to it."
Maddie glanced down at the Sharps briefly and said honestly, "No, but what choice do I got?"
"Right." Jayne looked momentarily at River as she stood beside Maddie with the sniper rifle resting comfortably on her shoulder. A scary sight had they not been trying to break out of a secure facility. For now Jayne clung to the militant optimism instilled in him by Ma Cobb. They were going to get out of here. Turning he pulled the safety pin from the grenade, stared at it a moment then chunked it down the hallway.
The floor and ceiling rocked with the explosion. Maddie flinched at the sound of it. Whipping out two pistols Jayne rushed out into the hall followed closely by Maddie and River. Immediately Jayne and River began firing, but Maddie hesitated. Four or five men were already dead from the grenade blast and the rest were falling back to the main hallway. Maddie froze. What if her aim went haywire like it always did? What if she hit Jayne or River?
Jayne glanced back and saw Maddie freeze, tears flowing down her face. He grabbed her arm and jerked her forward. "Gorrammit, girl, hurry up, the roof's gonna cave."
Maddie nodded dumbly and started moving again. Jayne was doing the most shooting and while River took down men less frequently, she did so with absolute precision.
Oh God, oh God, Oh God, Maddie's mind said over and over.
They were almost to the light. Behind them chunks began falling out of the ceiling where the grenade had exploded.
A man by the corner took aim at Jayne and Maddie realized Jayne did not see him. Shaking she raised the Sharps and pulled the trigger. The rifle's powerful kick threw her to the ground. She lay there stunned by the force of it. She had to get up. She had to keep moving. Her hand moved to her throbbing shoulder as she started to sit up. Started, but did not succeed as she was struck by something. She fell back and lay unmoving.
Somewhere in her increasingly fuzzy mind, she heard Jayne shout her name, but dismissed it as implausible. Jayne was working far, far away, on Santo helping folks get what was theirs. He'd sent her a new dress…
Mal, Zoë, Simon and Lil' Jimmy could hear the shooting. For the last ten minutes, they'd heard the shooting, which was punctuated by bellows of rage. As they rounded the corner, Mal and Zoë drew their guns not knowing what to expect.
The hall was strewn with dead or dying men. The last eight or nine of what had been a twenty-five man team were barricaded in a battered guard station about twenty feet from the main carnage as Jayne stood stock still in the center of the hall facing the guard station. A blood stained bowie knife clenched in on and a massive rifle in the other.
"Jayne?" Mal shouted as he approached.
The berserked man spun, leveling the rifle at Mal, who slowly holstered his gun.
"Jayne," Mal said again still moving slowly. "You're gonna wanna put down that gun, now."
The rage filled glazed drained from Jayne's eyes. "Cap'n?" he dropped the gun and knife and turned to an adjoining hallway. "Maddie."
Zoë also holstered her weapon and the trio rushed to the side hall leaving the bound Lil' Jimmy surrounded by his dead employees.
Jayne knelt beside his sister as she lay bleeding on the floor. A little ways away River sat arms rapped around her knees, whispering incoherently. Instinctively Simon started for his sister.
Jayne stood, grabbed Simon by the shirt, lifted him off the floor and said, "Fix her." That was it no 'or,' no threat of any kind. Jayne didn't need one; the pained look of wrath on his face said it all.
Simon began looking at Maddie's wound, amazingly calm for a man who knew Jayne would kill him slowly and painfully if the girl died. She'd lost a lot of blood. Simon needed to get her back to the ship to perform surgery, but first he needed to staunch the bleeding as much as possible.
As Simon worked, Jayne knelt again at Maddie's side. He took her and looked at her nail bitten fingers. Maddie's eyes flickered open and she whispered in a small, child's voice, "Bubba, I got an owie."
"I know, flower-eater, but Doc's gonna fix you up right." Jayne whispered back in an almost ragged voice.
"Bubba?" she whispered plaintively, "Please, don' go away, again. Don' make me go away. I'll be good."
"I ain't goin' no where's, Flower-eater."
"Promise?"
"Promise."
Maddie smiled vaguely and closed her eyes. Her hand slipped form Jayne's and his face went stone cold.
Jayne sat in the infirmary watching Maddie sleep. Simon had finished operating on her two hours before, but she was still sedated. Jayne clenched and unclenched his throbbing feet. He wanted to get up, to pace, but Simon had ordered him not to. That didn't really matter to Jayne, but his feet were really too swollen to walk on, anyway. The doctor had gone into conniptions when he found out Jayne was walking around with his feet tore up like they were. They'd had to cut his boots off to get his feet out of them. The look on Simon's face would have been worth the loss of a good pair of boots any other time, but this wasn't any other time.
Maddie, his lil' flower-eater, was lying on the operating table, still unconscious. He remembered how he'd felt that time Lil' Kaylee got shot. This was worse. Maddie was his kin, his only kin as far as he knew. He'd never realized how fragile she was. When she was little, back before he'd left home, she always seemed to be nursing one hurt or another. She was always cutting her feet open on oyster shells, bumping her head, getting fishing hooks caught in her knees, tripping and coming up with odd scratched and scrapes, but never anything like this. Certainly nothing that Jayne ever felt responsible for.
Only time Jayne had ever worried was when she cried. He could never stand to see her cry. Whenever she thought she was in trouble or she was scared about something, she'd cry and Jayne would have to come up with something to make her cry, to take her mind off whatever made her sad. He'd pick her up on his shoulder and spin her around or do funny voices for his fingers.
Jayne swallowed hard as he looked at her now, all pale under her tan, her face an empty sheet. No Santo Tornado or Mr. Pinky was going to make it all better now. He wanted to hit something, someone. Someone had to be punished for this. Maddie being hurt could not go unpunished. The last time he'd been around when someone had hurt her, he'd beat that kid with the soccer ball silly.
But, there was no one left to punish, no one but himself. Brady was dead; those guards were dead. Jayne had promised Maddie wasn't going anywhere and damned if that promise was mocking him now.
Some one cleared his throat and Jayne looked up to see Mal holding a cream colored sheet of paper and a blanket. "Come t' see how your lil' homicidal maniac's doin'."
"Doc said she wouldn't be comin' 'round fer 'nother twen'y minutes yet." Jayne said tiredly, not really noticing Mal's comment.
"I s'pose, it's a good thing I came down here now then." Mal said with a touch of humor in his voice.
There was an awkward pause during which they both stared at Maddie.
Mal broke it. "Doc wanted me t' give you this." He said passing the blanket.
"Why ain't he the one givin' it then?" Jayne asked unfolding the blanket and laying it across Maddie as best he could from his place on the infirmary's auxiliary bed.
"He's havin' difficulties with his sister." Mal said. "Not unlike you."
Jayne grunted and looked at his sister. "Maddie ain't nuts." He said defensively.
"You are aware she tried to kill me?" Mal commented.
"She a'ways did tend t' overreact 'bout the little things." Jayne said in a distracted tone.
Mal rubbed his shoulder. "You're not kiddin' there." Again there was silence. It made Mal uncomfortable. It wasn't natural for Jayne to be this pensive. He remembered the real reason he'd come down. "I… uh found this in your sister's room." He said glancing down at the paper in his hands. "Thought you might wanta have a look at it."
"What were you doin' in Maddie's room?" Jayne asked taking the paper from him.
"Lookin' t' make sure she wasn't hidin' any more knives." Mal said.
Jayne made a sound and looked down at the paper. It was a drawing; the one Maddie'd been working on since she'd come on Serenity. Not just any drawing either. It was a portrait sketch of the whole crew. A damn fine one at that, even if it wasn't finished. Every one was natural, as though they were all just sitting around the galley. Jayne cleaning his guns, Zoe and Wash looking at each other soulfully, Mal and Inara arguing about something, the Shepherd praying, Kaylee and River playing some game while Simon looked on, and in the corner a vague shape that Jayne suspected to be Maddie herself.
"Girl's a good artist." Mal commented. "Even if she's not exactly flattering."
Jayne looked up at Mal, that militant optimism returning. "She ain't finished yer head yet, Captain."
Mal was watching Maddie begin to stir awake and as he exited he said, "I imagine she'll be finishing it soon enough."
No fun Chinese translations this time. This was a little emtional for me to write. I cried while I was laying it all out in my head. All the big brotherly things Jayne did for Maddie when she was little were things my big brother did for me and my beloved little sister when we were little. My big bubba lives far far away in California and I don't get to see him a whole lot. Mind you him and Jayne have nothing in common. Nathan's a youth minister, is married and has two little boys (the cutest nephews in the whole 'verse they are), but protective sibling-ness is universal I figures.
Oh! And Militant optimism. That's a thing my mom has and I noticed it in Jayne too. No matter how bleak anything looks or is she's gonna get out of it by sheer force of will. Power of postive thinking with violence. Well, my mom doesn't do the violence, but she doesn't need it. She just scares people with her kindergaden teacherdemeanor. shudders Well I believe I've shared to much. I need to get a life.
Reveiw me, you're all I got. Tell me you love me, I live by your support.