"Life is plurality. Death is uniformity. By suppressing differences and peculiarities, by eliminating different civilizations and cultures, progress weakens life and favors death. The ideal of a single civilization for everyone, implicit in the cult of progress and technique, impoverishes and mutilates us.

Every view of the world that becomes extinct, every culture that disappears, diminishes a possibility of life."

-Octavio Paz

.

River and Victor made their way back to their original group, who were now comfortably positioned in the open back of a large green truck. The truck had two long rows of wooden benches that seemed to be nailed directly into the bed. Snow stood right in the middle, wagging his tail at the sight of his friends returning. One of the donsmen stood on the ground, patiently waiting for the two to climb the ladder into the back. Once they had, he gave the "go" signal to the driver and the truck rumbled off.

"Where exactly are we headed?" River asked, hoping no one would comment on her sudden urge to chase a monster through an unknown city.

Fortunately, everyone else was exhausted. River pondered why she felt fine.

"We're headed to the Don's mansion on the outskirts of town," Zoe said. "Seems he wants to talk to us up close and personal like."

"So is that 'talk'...or like, talk?" Victor asked, drawing a finger across his throat.

"They didn't disarm us," Simon suggested. He and Kaylee sat side-by-side, holding hands. "That's a good sign, right?"

"We should be fine as long as no one starts anything," Zoe said.

Victor, who'd been watching the town roll steadily by, looked around. "Why's everybody lookin' at me? I ain't startin' nothing. I feel terrible." He did, however, set a new record that night. 79 people killed in under an hour. Then again, maybe "people" was too strong a word.

"That's just whatchoo get fer runnin balls first into a Reaver swarm," Jayne grumbled. "Ain't you never heard 'fight smarter, not harder'?"

"I think the proper term is 'scourge'," River said helpfully.

"Huh?"

"Well if I hadn't, Simon wouldn't get to sew me up, now would he?" Victor asked, pulling his coat out away from his body to show his bandage. "Don't worry, Doc. I made sure you didn't get to be left out."

Simon rolled his eyes. "Thank you. I do so love to be included."

.

Serenity's crew dismounted the truck and made their way through the rain and into the mansion. The mansion was very "old world", and appeared to be made of several whole trees, cut down to a vaguely square shape and fitted together. Inside, the crew made their way to the dining room. The dining room was very "old world" as well with wooden everything, despite being large enough to house a table that could hold half again as many people as were present. Already seated at the table were none other than Captain Malcolm Reynolds and Inara Sera herself.

"Nice of you to join us, finally," Mal said, smirking at their waterlogged appearance. "So... how ya' been?"

"Just fine, sir," Zoe said, dryly. She couldn't help but smile at seeing Mal and Inara alright. "Don't worry, I took care of everyone after you ran off to play the cowboy."

Mal suppressed a grin and placed a hand over his chest. "What?" he asked, pretending to be hurt. "I was simply turning the situation to our favor. You can't fault me if some of my crew let a silly little Reaver horde get in the way of regrouping."

"Scourge," River muttered.

"Huh?"

"Wernchoo watchin' the ship?" Jayne asked of Inara.

"I was," Inara said, "but when the gossen hit the proverbial fan I thought it more prudent to contact the local authorities."

A pretty girl in a flower print dress with dark skin, hair, and eyes came into the room. "Ladies and gentlemen, my father will be with you shortly. In the meantime, can I get you anything to drink? Wine, perhaps?"

Victor spoke in a slightly hoarse voice. "If you can get me a couple gallons of water, I'll be your best friend forever."
The girl laughed slightly. "Of course. If noone else wants anything...?"

Mal assured the lady that water would be fine.

"Then I'll see to it. Please, have a seat," the girl said, leaving through the same door she entered.

Taking their seats at a large table, Victor nudged River. "I think she likes me. What do you think?"

River shot him a look that promised a slow death.

Victor turned to Jayne, who was on his other side. "I think she likes me. What do you think?" he asked. Snow wasted no time trying to fall asleep near his feet. When the girl returned with a pitcher of water and a tray of glasses, Victor asked, "Did you hear that?"

"Yes," the girl said, simply.

"Good," Victor said, winking at her. She smiled politely but rolled her eyes, which could have meant any one of a thousand things. When she left the room again, Victor poured a glass of water for himself and one for Snow.

"So, why are we here, Captain?" Simon asked, trying to keep the conversation on point. "On point" (in this case) meaning: not causing problems that would result in the local militia trying to kill them.

Mal slouched in his seat and shrugged. "The Don wants to talk to us. What the Don wants, the Don gets."

"Any idea what he wants to talk about?" Zoe asked.

Mal nodded towards the door the crew had entered in, his face serious. A man in a smoking jacket, eyes hair and skin dark, entered. He had a distinguished look to him. The silver on his temples mixed with the faintest hints of crows feet at the corner of his eyes served only to enhance his appearance. It also placed his age at around sixty.

"Ladies and gentlemen," he said. He seemed friendly, but reserved, and spoke in a Latin accent. "I am Don Agricola Chavez and I would like to take the opportunity to welcome you to my humble town of farmers."

"It's a fine place," Mal said in as friendly a voice as he could manage.

"You must be infamous Malcolm Reynolds," he said smiling, still friendly. He had a politician's easy grace and ability to dominate the room. "We met once before, you know. You were very little then, and I was still a boy." He took his seat at the head of the table.

"Really?" Mal said, interested. He still wasn't sure where this was going, but small talk seemed destined to reach out and suck the life from him. The Don seemed friendly enough, but the friendliest older man Mal had ever met was a man named Niska, and he was... scary. The Don didn't seem as scary, but he had his own private militia.

Then again, who was Mal to begrudge a man his fighting force?

"Yes, indeed," the Don continued. "I still have a fairly large herd of Reynold's finest beef on my estate. Tell me, how is your mother?"

"She passed some time ago," Mal said, trying to match the Don's friendliness, but falling into his blank poker face by default.

"I'm sorry to hear that," the Don said in a grandfatherly way. Such is life. Looking around the room, he said. "I guess you were all wondering why I had you brought here?"

"We had a guess or two, but didn't want to assume," Inara said, smiling sweetly.

"Yes well, there has been a bit of a... going on... in the town," the Don said. "As the Don, or what you might call magistrate, it's my job to see that the day to day keeps running... smooth." He lowered his eyes, looking for all the Verse like a disappointed parent. Finding his words, he looked back up. "Tonight was... not so smooth."

"Things do tend to get that way a bit from time to time," Mal said trying not to be put on edge by the Don's choice of words.

"First and foremost, I need to know what happened," the Don said. "I have to report this to the Feds."

Mal felt his heartbeat double but showed no outward reaction. "And why's that?" Mal asked. "You seem to be able to take care of yourself just fine."

The Don sighed and made himself more comfortable in his chair. "How to explain?" he thought about it for a second and then began, "You all know that New Corona was technically neutral in the war, yes?"

Some heads nodded and some shook side to side.

"See... the Don's at the time all banded together and made a deal with the Alliance. They respected our neutrality, and in return we didn't sell to the Independents. Our goods (tobacco, fruit, corn, and what have you) had been feeding the people of dozens of systems for years. As anyone who's spent too much time in space can tell you, packaged food and protein bars get old quickly and fresh food is a treasure."

There was a round of nodding and the Don continued.

"So afterward, we voluntarily joined with the Alliance but managed to negotiate better terms than most systems. They let us continue as we had, with our own elections and such. The only concession we had to make was that no Don would raise a fighting force of more than a thousand men."

"So your an Alliance magistrate then?" Mal asked, doing a good job of keeping up his poker face.

"Technically, yes," the Don said. "But the situation is what you might call 'don't bother me, I don't bother you'. To that end, I need to know what happened."

"So you can tell the Alliance," Mal finished. The fighters at the table (Zoe, Jayne, River, and Victor) tensed up in anticipation of Mal's next move. They may need to fight their way back to Serenity, which was hopeless on the Don's home territory. Still, they were ready to back up their Captain's decision.

"Yes," the Don said simply. "Depending on how you answer, however, I may just wait until you leave."

"Come again?" Mal asked, blankly.

"The Alliance is going to hear about what happened here anyway," the Don said. "This way I get to choose what the official account is."
"Huh," Mal grunted, his rapier wit showing itself again.

"You should thank God for your good fortune. Had this disaster taken place in another Don's territory, he may have reacted differently," the Don said. "Here's the situation as I see it: my people report that your crew came to town and had what could be described as a small battle with the demon possessed bodies of their fallen neighbors."

"Sounds about right," Mal said.

"They also mentioned how you rallied the town and kept the situation from getting worse," the Don said. "While I appreciated that, I have to ask: 'Was what happened your fault?'"

"No," River spoke up. Everyone turned to look at her. "Do you know what the Pax is?"

"Yes," the Don said. "I'm familiar with the leaked documents from Miranda."

"One of my old classmates released a newer, weaponized version of it on your people, turning them into Reavers."

"Reavers? This far in?" the Don asked. His eyes widened in surprise. "Dios mio."

"Don't suppose God had a whole lot of a hell to do with it," Mal said dryly.

The Don rubbed his tired eyes as the pieces of what had happened fell into place. "I take it your a God fearing man?" he asked.

"He and I don't exactly see eye to eye," Mal said blankly. "You could say it's kind of a 'you don't bother me, I won't bother you' thing."

The Don laughed. "I have felt that way many times in my life as well. If you're no true believer, then why was the first place you went after docking a church?"

A chill creeped up Mal's spine. The Don knew more than he was letting on. Mal was in the middle of a game and he didn't know what the rules were. Hump the rules then, Mal thought. Honesty's probably the best policy today. This man has no love of the Alliance and everyone the galaxy over knows by now the same is true of me. "Unrelated business. The kind it'd be best to keep off an official report."

"I can relate to that as well," the Don said. He sighed. "Do you know what a Catholic is?" he asked suddenly.

"Fancy word for them that believe the Bible," Mal said frowning. His mother's ranch had once had a church called by that name. "Also known as Flocks, Brotherhoods, Lutherans, Families, or a million other things."

"I'm afraid the word is much older than that," the Don said. "It dates back to Earth-That-Was."

"Catholicism is the oldest and largest of Christian faiths, the second most notable being Protestantism which started primarily as a rejection to Catholicism in the early fifteen hundreds," River chimed in, talking almost on autopilot.

"Quite right," the Don said, smiling. "See, on Earth-That-Was, there was a Pope," (Mal was familiar with the concept. On some moons the head Sheppard would be referred to as the Pope.) "The Pope was revered as the absolute authority on all matters relating to God."

"Whenever someone uses words like 'absolute authority' when referring to a man, the ending of the story can't be good," Mal said.

"It depends on what you mean when you say 'good'," the Don said. "The Roman Catholic Church basically rose to become an empire unto itself, which in several instances was a good thing. The church was responsible for feeding the hungry, clothing the poor, and schooling children. However, it also had a nasty habit of interfering with politics and could be, at times, self serving in the way it practiced."

"If they were so mighty, then..." Mal started.

"How has it become another word for any old believer?" the Don asked. He thought a moment about how to answer. When he finally put his thoughts together he said, "You'd think that being forced to leave Earth would have forced people to leave their gods behind, in favor of the Big Two; the gods Science and Technology. The truth is: such a thing just makes us cling to our beliefs that much tighter. As such, the Union of Allied Planets saw fit to bring along another Earth tradition pioneered by one of the 'superpowers' called 'separation of church and state'." The Don paused again.

Mal thought about that for a second. He'd been on less "civilized" little moons where the local elder, or whatever the religious leaders were called, had complete control over people's lives. He tried to imagine what a whole planet would be like under that kind of rule and couldn't. It was too terrifying.

The Don had everyone's attention now, even Jayne's. After the silence grew uncomfortable, Mal spoke. "At the risk of sounding like a bad guest... I can't shake the feeling your getting to a point."

"Yes," the Don said, sighing. "You see, my ancestors learned the hard way about blindly following the status quo. When you leave your life in the hands of men with more money, fancier titles, or fanatic believers, one always comes to regret it. That's why I can appreciate your cause, even if it is not my destiny to fight."

"What is your destiny then?" Mal asked, respectfully. He felt genuinely curious. He'd spent so much of his life fighting and running, he had a hard time imagining any thing else.

"To take care of my people," the Don said simply. "As a child my father insisted that I work the first half of everyday to learn what my people did. How they lived. How the decisions my father made affected their life. I spent my childhood divided between studying and learning everything that I was to be responsible for: one piece at a time. One day, I'd be picking fruit. The next: I'd be learning how to drive tractors. As I got older, my father weened me onto organizing and planning."

"Sounds like a nice childhood," Inara said.

"It was," the Don said. "So I feel for your cause. Since you chose to help my people when the smarter option would have been to run away, you all have my gratitude." He grunted and stood. Mal took this as a sign to do the same. Shaking hands with Mal, the Don said, "It is in the spirit of that gratitude I must chase you off of my world. Please try not to take it personally."

Mal smirked. "As an Alliance magistrate, I imagine you'll be so very disappointed to tell your 'superiors' about your failure to apprehend the evil Malcolm Reynolds after he left your town in shambles."

The Don matched Mal's lopsided smirk. "Quite right, Captain," he said.

.

The rain was clearing and the sun was just starting to rise when the crew finally made their way back to Serenity. The cargo bay door was open and donsmen were loading the hold with new cargo, mostly fresh fruit, vegetables, and even coolers containing beef and horseflesh. It seemed the Don didn't believe in sending his guests/assailants away empty handed.

No sooner than Mal stepped foot on his boat, a man in green fatigues flagged him down. "For you sir," the donsmen said holding up a wooden box about eighteen inches wide and opening it.

The box held a pistol in a holster. Not just any pistol either, it was a Moses Brother engine, finished in silver, almost a twin to Mal's own. Mal removed a small card and the pistol and the donsman took the box away.

"What's it say?" Inara asked, stepping up to his shoulder.

"Si tan sólo no hubiera necesidad de tal, o a aquellos que aplicarlos," Mal read.

Inara waited a moment. "You're going to make me ask what it means, aren't you?"

Mal laughed a little and hugged her close, kissing her forehead. "It means 'If only their were no need for such, or those who wield them'."

Inara sighed. "If only."

.

The Reaver Queen sat in her ship. It was a more modern cargo hauler than most, even featuring built in Magna Cannons in case of pirate attacks. Her pets milled about the bay as she plot her course to Persephone. She'd managed to pull the bullets out of herself and stop the bleeding, but she still needed medical attention. Her left arm was turning a sickly shade of purple from the bicep down.

Her red eyed Reavers were starting to look more normal, now that they'd had time to cut on their flesh. They were even starting to form "packs", each one centered around a banshee. Her Highness found that useful. It was easier to extend her psychic control over a handful of banshees than it was to exert the same influence over an entire scourge.

The Queen set her autopilot and leaned back in her chair, sighing. She'd underestimated her opponents and it was looking like that oversight was going to cost her and arm.

No matter, she thought to herself. I may lose an arm, but I'm coming back for their lives. That's a fair trade.

AUTHOR'S NOTE

Sorry this took so long. I had to re-write it several times. I'm still not sure I found the right line between "fun" and "pretentious". I'm not convinced I got the subtext right, either. Don Chavez is supposed to be a living example of how Mal's life would have turned out without the war. Kind of like how Victor is a living example of what kind of person would be as violent and capable as River without having it forcibly shoved into one's head.

The next chapter will be Michael and Dan on a Firefly style adventure (do the job, then get paid). After that, I have one more plot point to hit before revealing Mal's crazy plan.