DR: Well, I have unexpectadly found some free time, so I can post this chapter now. And as promised, this is where the crew of Serenity start to take a more central role.

Chapter 25: Staring Into the Abyss

They both sat there, in their separate seats, on the bridge. The two of them had found that they both found peace within the vast blackness of space. Of course, anyone looking in would only see young River, and wouldn't see Wash sitting in his chair. River never mentioned that the seat didn't react to Wash sitting in it, nor did it move when he stood up. He hated being reminded of his ghostly state.

As she was the only one he could talk to, they had developed a rapport in quiet moments. Luckily with River's wild 'Reader' abilities, she always knew when someone was coming close and so shut up before they could hear her talking to thin air. No need to start people thinking she was crazy again. Sometimes she wondered if she was going crazy again and not realising it. At least she didn't have waking nightmares any more.

But her dreams were still punctuated by the terrors of her past. She had been traumatized badly by the people at the 'Academy', and by what she had inadvertently learned from one senior member of the government. It still haunted her, how much she almost became like those she had killed on that nameless moon.

But then she remembered the main difference between her and the Reavers. She had killed to save her family, now the whole crew of Serenity instead of just her brother Simon. The Reavers killed senselessly, for sport, to feed on human flesh.

Looking out into the darkness, she could almost block out the thoughts and feelings of the others on the ship. By filling her head with that emptiness, she could almost drown out the lewd thoughts of Jayne, the tightly controlled shimmering pot of emotions that raged within Inara, the wild and primitive passion of Kaylee…

A sudden spike of pleasure stabbed into her thoughts, trailed almost immediately by Kaylee's howl of passion. Past the sudden flush of heat that she couldn't control, she faintly felt the shock and embarrassment that was centred on Mal's quarters. Turning her head, she looked over at Wash.

For himself, Wash was grinning like a fool. He may not have been able to touch anything, but he heard and saw as well as before… before his current state. Kaylee's evident passion cheered him no end, as he had often seen the frustration that built within the young woman. As he was married, they had both felt comfortable with him knowing such things about her. Zoe at first had frowned on it, but when she saw that Wash only had eyes for her and that he was helping little Kaylee work off some steam, she let things be.

Looking at River, Wash could see the flush of heat that ran across her pale cheeks, and some of his amusement faded. Simon's discovery's in the Ariel hospital about what had happened to her had become common knowledge amongst the crew. They all knew that she was simply incapable of suppressing any emotion or feeling. No matter how much she wanted to, she was physically incapable of doing so. Combined with her psychic abilities to pick up on everyone's thoughts and emotions, it was a wonder the poor girl had managed to maintain a semblance of sanity at all.

"Well… at least their enjoying themselves." He tried to get her mind off the evident passion that flowed from the couple. "Though I expect Mal to come out bellowing for them to close the door any second now."

River grinned now, the mental image reinforced by the fact that Mal was thinking of doing exactly that. Turning to stare back out into space, she tried to let it all go. "It's very peaceful out there." She half whispered.

"Yea… it sure is." Wash agreed, leaning his head back against the seat as he too looked into space. Or at least, lent back the way he remembered. He didn't understand it, but despite not being again to touch anything, he didn't fall through the decks – or the hull for that matter – and he was able to sit on things as he would have done. It was a strange thought.

"That view is what really drew me to flying you know. I always wanted to know what was out there…" He sighed wishfully. "To see something new and exciting everyday is… was, my ever lasting wish."

River smiled, understanding where he was coming from. A stray thought, an old folk tale, surfaced from the depths of her memory. Something along the lines of being careful what you wished for. She opened her mouth to speak…

Suddenly she felt something. A darkness, blacker than space itself. But it wasn't empty blackness. There was a presence, the sense of something ruthless and ultimately evil. Even as she tried to reel in her senses, she felt the wash of the beings' power, and realized that whatever it was, it had the power to destroy them with a thought.

River had long ago come to the intellectual conclusion that good and evil simply didn't exist, not in the conventional terms. It was all a matter of perspective and intent. What the government had done on Miranda had been with the best of intentions, but the effects were evil. She knew that Mal saws things in a more black and white way than she did, but he too believed that such concepts like sin no longer held true anymore.

But now, faced with this, she suddenly began to believe in evil once more, for there was no other way to describe what she felt coming off this thing, like light from a sun. And she suddenly realised something else. It was focused…

…right…

…on…

…them…

X-X-X-X-X-X

The being that watched the tiny Firefly ship scowled as he took it in. This tiny speck of wreckage was the thing responsible for causing almost the total failure of his most daring experiment? The seven souls on board, all human, had managed to rock the very foundations of an empire which he was slowly but surely shaping without any direct intervention?

Despite his anger and fury, a tiny thread of pleasure ran through him when he felt the fear that poured off the one in the nose of the craft. She was special, one who's brain had advanced to that next stage. The Colonials had been skirting that level for some time, a small number showing talent for using the power of the mind to affect the universe. So far the humans on this side of the galaxy had not reached that level, but he had known it was coming, so the program to find those who showed the raw talent was started, at his nudging.

He felt her mind scrabbling about, trying to latch onto something. He knew what had happened to her; he had been the one to implant the suggestion in the men overseeing the project to do it, supposedly to help the study of psychic abilities. Smiling cruelly, he reached out with a tiny fragment of his power, forming a barbed hook.

River's wild talent clasped that tiny thing, and quick as lightning he reeled her in.

He wanted to have some fun before he destroyed them, after all.

X-X-X-X-X-X

River struggled to get free, but she couldn't pull her mind out of the darkness that seemed to be sucking her in. Faintly she heard Wash asking her what was wrong, but she couldn't react. All she could see was the shape, darker than the blackness that surrounded it. Pure evil was draped over it like a cloak, and a terrible malice seemed to fill the air.

She struggled, but it was for nought. She felt like some tiny creature, trapped within a glass fist, being brought up to the predator's mouth. As she was dragged deeper into the darkness, the real world seemed to fade behind her, until the sparks of the rest of the crew grew dim and began to fade. For the first time she felt totally alone, and it frightened her.

But what truly terrified her was the figure she was being draw inexorably closer to. She could now see that it was vaguely humanoid, but the features were still cloaked in darkness. Slowly she was drawn up level with the things head, and then held there, frozen in place.

Then slowly the face emerged from the darkness. At first just a trace of form, then the rest could be seen.

What River saw caused her to scream in pure, unadulterated terror.

X-X-X-X-X-X

Malcolm Reynolds was sitting on his bunk, head in his hands, trying to put Kaylee's passion out of his mind. Trouble was, it wasn't just the fact that she had become the sweet, innocent little sister he had never had. Nor was it just the fact that for him, she was like a part of him that he felt was long lost. She was his trust, the simple joys of life which for him had always been cynical and harsh.

There was also a note of jealousy in there too.

The last time he had lain with anyone had been Mandi, Inara's old friend back on that boarder world moon. At the time they had both been seeking reassurance before the battle the next day, though it had caused him much grief after her death. He felt like he had failed not only her, but also himself and Inara. In the dark corners of his mind, it had been her who had been with him that night. It had taken him a long time to get over that.

Before her, well… he didn't like to think about that gap. For a grown man to go so long without the touch of a woman… it was embarrassing.

So for Simon, who he had once described as having 'to stop worrying for more than five seconds to get his share' to be getting more loving than he had in a long, long time within the last few days was more than a little bit frustrating.

Trouble was, there was only one woman Mal wanted, and he couldn't have her. Not in that sense anyway. Her stance that they should keep their relationship purely business, despite everything that had happened, made any kind of intimacy impossible.

Add to that the serious hurdle of their mutual disrespect for each others' professions, and it was clear even to someone as slow witted as Jayne that things were going nowhere.

He sighed once more as he glanced at the ladder at led out of his quarters. After Kaylee's loud howl, he had almost torn up the ladder and yelled at them both for not closing the hatch. But then he realised what he'd see, and that he couldn't face it. No, he'd have words with them both in the morning. It gave him something to take his mind off the doubt that gnawed at his gut.

When he had been talking with Badger, Mal had noted there was a look in the fence's eyes. As if he wanted to say something but couldn't. While Badger had not said anything directly, Mal had gotten the impression, when he had a chance to think it over, that he had been trying to send a message without saying anything.

His use of the phrase, 'Pick up times not too critical…' at first look suggested that the people on this moon could store it indefinitely. But Mal had recalled the shifty, nervous look in the smaller mans eyes. The more he thought about it, the more he began to get the feeling that Badger was trying to warn them.

And that meant one of three things: Reavers, Niska, or Alliance. Reavers were a constant threat, and no one could predict their movements. That left the other two…

River's sudden scream reached not only painfully deep into Mal's ears, but also into his brain, touching places he had thought had long died. He had never heard anyone scream like that before. Not even the best horror movies had featured screams that blood curdling. He couldn't remember climbing that ladder as fast as he did then.

Within seven seconds he was in the cockpit, while behind him he could hear Simon scrabbling up the ladder from Kaylee's bunk. Two long strides took him to River's quivering side. "Hey, what's with all the screaming?" He asked concerned, gently gripping the young woman's shoulder.

Getting no reply he twisted her chair so that he could see her face… and found himself taking an involuntary step backwards at the look of pure horror on her face. Mal was not the most well educated man on the ship, but he knew enough to know that if River was terrified, then everyone should be.

"River?" Simon's panic filled voice came from behind him, and Mal stepped to one side as the doctor came forwards to his sister. Mal was so concerned about his current pilot that he didn't even notice that Simon was clad in only a pair of thin sweat pants.

"What's wrong?" Inara's voice preceded her entrance, dressed in a simple gown that still showed off her splendid figure. For the moment however Mal didn't even notice as he looked about the cockpit, running his gaze over every screen and display, looking for any hint of what might have frightened River.

Behind him Simon was clutching his little sister, trying to calm her down. She was shrieking again and again, her high pitched voice sending the hairs on the back of every ones necks crawling.

"That goram girl's finally lost it." Jayne muttered from the open hatch.

As one the rest of the crew turned to send their most vicious glare at the big merc, who visibly wilted under the barrage.

"…Devil… he's watching…" River murmured, her screams having died down. Mal checked the scopes, but they were clear.

"There ain't anyone out there little one." He told her.

"He's there…" She carried on, apparently not hearing him. "…Watching… laughing… oh God… he means to destroy us!"

"Who?" Mal asked.

"…monster… in the dark… pure evil!"

X-X-X-X-X-X

In the blackness of space, the one responsible laughed cruelly as he tasted the fear that pounded out from the small ship. The terror of the young girl was infecting the others, and it was sweet.

He would have loved to let it shimmer a little more, but he knew he couldn't stay long. The others were watching him far more closely than ever now. He had to finish his business and be gone quick.

Focusing his power, he began to place pressure on certain points in the space-time lattice. He knew that what he was about to do would draw attention, but he also knew how to make it look like a natural occurrence. It was rare, but sometimes the fabric of space and time ruptured, with varying effects. Some created a means of travel across dozens of light years in seconds, and were generally known as wormholes. Others created a shift in time, which had happened to that one colony ship from that tiny mud ball of a planet called Earth by the people who lived there.

And then there were the ones that created nothing but a swirling maelstrom of destruction, ripping apart anything they touched. Nothing could withstand these ones, as each molecule was shifted about in space and time, scattered to the high seas. He had even seen black holes torn apart by such breaches.

That was what he aimed to create. Pushing just a fraction more, he felt something give. Stepping back, he smirked as the delicate balance began to collapse.

X-X-X-X-X-X

On the bridge of Serenity, the crew were gathered on the bridge, trying to understand what had so terrified River. Mal was beginning to lose his patience while Simon, Kaylee and Inara tried to calm the hysterical young woman down. Jayne was leaning on the door frame, while Zoe stood silent.

Wash was also wondering what was going on. One moment he and River had been talking peacefully, then she had frozen, eyes going wide and frightful. He had tried to snap her out of it, but nothing had happened. Until she screamed. His head was still ringing.

And yet… everyone was beginning to feel an oppressive force. There was a feeling that something wasn't right that clawed for attention. Slowly eyes turned to regard the blackness outside the ship, which was feeling very small and fragile that moment.

Wash, with his partial higher level state, was the first to sense that something was about to go seriously wrong. Whatever was about to happen, it was going to be close… dangerously close.

Suddenly there was a bright glare, causing the crew to throw up their hands in reflex. Outside a swirling vortex appeared, a flowing blue mass like water swirling into infinity within its depths, pulsing and wavering unstably and sending out pulses of strong and unstable gravity out into space around it.

"What in the tyen shiao-dun is that?" Jayne yelped.

"Whatever the goram thing is, we're not staying here!" Mal dropped into Wash's old chair, saying a silent pardon to him as he did so. Gripping the controls, he tried to turn Serenity away.

A terrible groaning and trembling ran through the ship, the shuddering causing everyone to stagger. Mal slammed his hands on every control he could reach, searching for the one that would give him the power to get away. The screaming of metal close to yielding filled their ears as the vortex grew larger.

"We're not going to make it!" Kaylee shrieked, fear in her eyes.

"Everyone brace yourselves!" Mal ordered.

X-X-X-X-X-X

Tumbling from her desperate attempts to escape, Serenity was dragged into the spinning wavering vortex. As if reacting to the presence of the ship, the wild pulses of gravity wrapping around the small craft, yanking her from real space and into that region were neither time nor space hold sway. On board the crew felt both compressed and stretched, an intense feeling of vertigo combined with the weight of the universe bearing down on them as their ship 'fell' into the infinite depths of the wormhole.

The ship fell down the hole in space so fast that if one blinked it would be missed. And as if satisfied with the firefly transport, the swirling vortex collapsed in on itself, rapidly shrinking until it vanished.

Nineteen seconds after it erupted it was gone, taking with it any trace of the small ship. To anyone who missed the show, it was as if it had never happened.

X-X-X-X-X-X

He stared at the point in space, quietly seething. That was not meant to happen! He had triggered a total cascade failure, not the formation of a wormhole. Hadn't he?

No matter, it achieved the same purpose. Removing the ship from this area of space had been his goal all along. So now they were somewhere else, rather than dead. It was a minor detail. He could track them down and deal with them correctly later. In fact, the chances were that when they emerged they would die anyway. It all depended on where the other end was.

Laughing to himself, he slipped away.

A few seconds after he vanished, a bright white light raced up to the point where Serenity had been moments before. It stopped in an instant, hovering just beyond the threshold. Within the glow of light a ship could be made out, though it was unlike any ship ever seen. It appeared to be a mass of crystal tubes all at right angles, forming a six pointed star.

Looking out from within that ship, a white haired man in a white suit smiled. Their calculations had been right on the money this time. It had taken a lot of work to rig the local space-time lattice to fall the way they needed it to, but it had worked. Now all the pieces were in place. At last they could right so many wrongs… assuming the humans acted the way they expected them too.

Nodding to himself, the man stepped away from the window. In a flash the ship was off, racing across the stars.

X-X-X-X-X-X

On the bridge of the Alliance Cruiser Dominator, commander Lefcourt stared out into space, waiting. He had been waiting for almost two weeks now for a certain small ship. The crew were getting restless, the lack of action dulling the routines.

Still, it wouldn't be long now. They had picked up the faint readings of a Firefly heading their way a couple hours ago. He actually hoped Serenity would try and run, so that he could blast the junker apart. Lefcourt hated Fireflies with a passion.

He heard the click of boots behind him, barely auditable over the general sounds of the Bridge. "Sir?"

"Well, what is it?" He asked the crewman without turning. "Have they altered course?"

"Sir… they've disappeared."

Now he turned to regard the young man. One eyebrow arched. "Disappeared?"

"Yes sir. One moment we were reading their power core… the next it was gone. Same with the navsat and pulse beacon."

Lefcourt snorted. "That means they've just cut power to avoid detection. Do a sensor sweep."

"Sir, we tried that… nothing."

"Are you telling me that we have all this fine equipment, and you lost a single, pathetic Firefly?"

Shadow: (scarstic voice) Ohh... where do you suppose they'll end up?

DR: Now there's no need for that tone of voice Shadow. Next time, Serenity drops in on Zi space, and Mal gets the fright of his life.

tyen shiao-dun name of that's sacred