That gorram idiot…. Mal ran when he heard the pained howl. Jayne had fallen asleep. He skidded to a stop when he reached the cargo bay, his brain frozen by an impossible scene. Zoe stood with a gun in her hand and cold, empty eyes as she watched Jayne.
The man wobbled as if having trouble keeping upright, blood stained his clothing and dripped from his upraised arm - the arm was what his mind kept tripping over. The skin was warped out of shape and it looked for all the world like the bone had been replaced by a gun - the barrel sticking out of his palm did tend to support that theory but… how?
"Jayne… put the… arm down." Mal said, well aware of the insanity of that statement.
If the man heard him there was no sign of it, he simply wavered where he stood, eyes half open and unseeing as he aimed his hand at Zoe. Silence fell again and seemed to stretch as the three stood, Mal and Zoe weighing options and Jayne dripping in the expanding puddle of blood below his arm.
Mal took a breath to speak and the two fired at each other. How did Jayne fire a weapon with the trigger embedded in his arm? He held that breath as both slumped to the floor - Jayne's chest quickly turning bright red while Zoe stared with unseeing eyes, a hole between them.
He stumbled a step back, unable to look away from one of the last things he wanted to see. Zoe was gone. Jayne was gone. This was impossible… the dream Reaver had been controlling Jayne. Somehow he had to have pulled the trigger. Nothing left…
There was nothing left to fight for.