Chapter 2 - Wrong place at the wrong time
Captain Malcolm Reynolds likewise sat silently meditating on a spoon full of gray protein mush. He sat in a small chair with his elbows on the galley table, turning the spoon left and right to view all aspects of the pulpy paste. A few months ago his Verse resembled this mashed up mushy mess, no structure, no direction. His crew was chewed up, his ship was in a shambles and his business prospects were all but dead. His Verse had been turned inside out and he had almost lost everything. He struggled to see a reason for the whole affair, then let it go. It was all just air through the engine, troubles in the past.
Now things were back on track. His ship had been rebuilt, his crew was healing and his sky was once again empty. As he sat in the galley of his small ship considering the spoon full of paste he thought to the job ahead. He could finally get back to business the way he liked it - simple, uncomplicated. He had a job; he had a cargo to move and a buyer to move it to. ThIngs were even starting to look good, for a change.
The galley surrounding the captain was small, yet comfortable. The table in the center could comfortably seat eight people while a couch like booth and table, filling the back corner nearest the engine room corridor, could accommodate another six. The cabinets, appliances and machinery would have blended in to the rest of the bland metal interior if not for his mechanic Kaylee and her interminable cheerfulness, Her decorative flower paintings throughout the ship gave Serenity a more homey feel. He couldn't say she was wrong about that.
A set of windows rimed to forward and aft edge of the ceiling allowing the occutpants to view the stars when they were underway or allowing the light in when they were on planet. The galley was the center of life aboard the small vessel and a good place to just sit – and think. Mal preferred it to the passenger lounge due to its proximity to the bridge and the engine room and spent most of his time here, when he wasn't on the bridge or inspecting the cargo hold.
Mal turned the spoon again in his hands, examining each facet with a thoughtful contentment that could only be attributed to the total lack of activity onboard. River was on the bridge, Jayne was resting in his bunk; Kaylee likewise in her engine room hammock, while the doctor was organizing his infirmary and Inara redecorating her shuttle for her next job. Busy and content. Everyone at least 10 meters from the nearest other soul.
His partner, Zoe, was in the cargo hold strapping things down, or in the airlock adjusting the seals on the enviro-suits, or cleaning her weapons. Keeping busy. She had been doing quite a bit of that since her husband had died a little more than half a year ago. Her Verse was still a bit mushy. He'd have to keep an eye on that, he thought briefly before letting the thought go. She was a strong woman and the war had taught them both not to dwell on loss.
Mal ate the mush and started contemplating the now empty spoon.
"Empty." He mumbled.
The word spilled absently from his lips, tinged with a slight satisfaction. Malcolm Reynolds's sky was again just as he liked it. Since the confrontation at Blue Star both the Alliance and the Reavers had become exceedingly scarce in the outer rim. The battle had hurt them both and they'd retreated to the respective corners for a while. That made the space between the core and Miranda free again – free from Reaver raids and free from Alliance interference. Just free.
Most satisfying of all was the fact that, in all the mayhem and destruction of the battle, Serenity's part in the great conflict had gone largely unnoticed. No fanfare no warrants, no grand recognitions, no bounties, nothing. There was only the slightest undercurrent of rumor that Serenity was even involved.
For once things had worked out to Mal's liking. Save the universe and the universe repays you by leaving you alone. Mal smiled and refilled his spoon. Cosmic justice. Now he could go about his business without all the hassle that had become his life over the past year. No running, no hiding, lots of work and no surprises.
He emptied the final spoonful of mush from his bowl and cleaned up his gear, stowing it neatly in the cabinet. Then he made his way to the bridge, smiling and patting the hallway walls as he went. They should be arriving in Persephone soon and he wanted to be on the bridge when they reached Com range. Having a crazy girl pilot his ship was one thing, but he wanted to be there for the control tower operators when he came down from his Sky Mal wasn't entirely sure what she would say. Still, if that was all he had to worry about he counted that as a win.
"Yup." Again the words smacked of contented satisfaction. "Cosmic justice."
Hoban Washburn stood behind River, his semi-transparent body wracked with tension, an urgent look on his ghostly face. The hall behind him, leading to the galley, was empty and looked misty through his ethereal body. He paced back and forth behind the girl in an agitated fashion, as if there was something important he was trying to say to the girl that she just wasn't quite getting.
"You're drifting!" He insisted.
"No. I'm meditating." River replied to the empty bridge, eyes still closed, knees clenched tightly to her chest in her supple bare arms.
The air was dry and a bit chilly, so she huddled in the warmth of the pilot's chair with its curly lambskin fir. The light of the Vid screen console flickered on and off, reflecting off her face and arms, giving her an eerie blue complexion more ghost like than the specter behind her. Wiggling her toes in the deep sheepskin curls of the seat cover; she rolled her head in a slow carefree circle, letting her long black hair cascade over the shoulders of her sleeveless gingham summer dress.
"I mean we're drifting, Serenity is drifting!" The apparition pointed both ghostly hands toward the window of the bridge in an exasperated, open palmed motion that so characterized their former pilot that it made River smile just remembering.
"You shouldn't interrupt, even if you aren't real; it's not polite." She retorted.
"Just thought you'd like to live a little longer - that's all."
He had always been melodramatic, funny, quirky and offbeat but most of all good at what he did. Before dying at Blue Star he had been arguably the best small craft pilot in the 'Verse'. Since then he had been a somewhat nagging presence in River's mind that often made it know that, 1) she was only in his seat because he liked her and 2) she was doing things all wrong.
In the past three months he had decided to visit her while she was on the bridge. River had determined it was the fault of his chair. Somehow it had clenched onto his spirit when his heart was punched through it by the Reaver harpoon that killed him. River could feel him when she sat in his chair. Most of the crew just felt uncomfortable in his chair, but River liked it. It made her feel that he was looking after her, keeping her safe.
Then it suddenly dawned on her what the familiar spirit was trying to tell her.
"I'm drifting?" She considered slowly. "We're drifting!" She shouted.
Her deft hands snapped to the controls, her body at full attention, her eyes now focused on the position display. A large swirling orange moon dominated the display and simultaneously Serenity's windshield. It was huge and gaseous and imminent. The small vessel was within seconds of an irreversible collision with the celestial body and River had to act fast. The young pilot gently swerved around the large toxic mass with a practiced skill that belied her age. Then she examined the sensors to find out where they had drifted to. Poking at the display a few times to stop the flickering she assess the magnitude of her error.
'Maybe no one would notice.' She hoped, as Mal entered the bridge.
"We're what?" He asked nonchalantly, unaware of how nearly dead they all were.
"They were lost but not alone." River replied by way of explanation.
"That proximity alarm is broken," The ghost of Wash interjected, but only River could hear. "You're gonna have to get that fixed."
"Shhh." River scolded the figment, who was now sitting in the passenger seat behind the captain.
"What?" Mal shook the words around in his head hoping they might make more sense in a different order. That often worked in conversations with the girl.
"The particles. They are all together. Not alone. "
"Okay." He prompted her to continue.
"They are dense when you go fast enough."
"So?"
"Serenity's not flat." A flood of red streaks smeared along and over Serenity's port side to accentuate her point. "That's what he was trying to tell me."
"Get that fixed is what I'm saying" The ghost retorted, pointing at the proximity alarm.
"Shhh."
"… It's your life."
"Who?" Mal looked around the empty room and then to the display on the co-pilots console, as the girl at the controls drifted into a new contemplation of stray particles. "River?" He asked, his voice calm.
"Yes Captain."
"Where the hell are we?"
"Not Persephone." The smiling face answered proudly.
"Why?" He continued patiently.
River proceeded to explain that space is not empty and that each particle, when passed at great enough speed, acts just like an atmosphere. Those that travel over the top of Serenity, and not under, impart a small, but cumulatively greater force because of her shape. She explained how Wash would have instinctively compensated for this force, having had an unspoken synergy with Serenity, but that she had been communing with the particles and made a mistake.
"Ok." Mal replied, now wishing her hadn't asked. "But why are we not at Persephone?"
She continued her explanation apologetically, however, Mal checked out when she started describing how small particles tend to spherical symmetry and how Serenity tended to the asymmetry of manmade constructs and how she had not been focused enough and how she could fix it and …
"Just tell me what happened." The captain interrupted, not patient enough to weather the slight whininess that accompanied her explanation.
"We drifted."
"Okay. How far?"
"Four clicks phi and a half theta."
"To the third moon. Okay, we'll be a little late, but Badger will still be there and Inara will forgive us."
Had he known they had nearly hit the third moon, he might have been more agitated. River felt it was probably better she keep that to herself for now. Another flood of red particles distracted her again and her gaze drifted to the windshield. This time she reached her hand out to them hesitantly.
"Wash liked the red ones, but the blue ones taste better." River was frowning, sadly. She turned to the captain with a forlorn expression. "They were all warm and fuzzy 'til they all got sad."
Mal just looked at her. He wasn't sure he would ever understand the girl, but she was generally harmless – when she wasn't killing things that is.
"The atoms." She explained.
"Alright then." Mal concluded.
He knew River had been talking to his former pilot since she had started sitting in his chair three months ago, a fact that Mal tried to keep to himself as much as possible. It might disturb the others; even knowing she was somewhat of a psychic. Although talking to ghosts was generally considered strange, by River's standards it was fairly normal. Readers were like that. But it seemed to have made her a better pilot, so Mal didn't question it. Mal just clicked on the intercom and spoke calmly.
"We'll be another twenty to Com – so everyone adjust your plans accordingly."
No sooner had Mal reattached the intercom microphone to its holder than the ship lurched and the bridge suddenly flashed blinding green. A huge energy bolt blasted past their starboard side, raising the hairs on the captain's neck and arms. Unlike the multi-colored glow on random ions this bolt came from behind Serenity, was directed and was lethal. Mal grabbed the control and jerked Serenity around abruptly. River spilled from the pilot's chair and sprawled face first to the deck.
"Ouwwa!" The teen complained.
"What the…" Mal yelled.
A second shot skimmed just over Serenity's port engine.
"Zoe!" Mal jerked the control the other way, sending River tumbling down into the sensor pit. "Get up here!"
"Speed." River suggested as she struggled up the steps toward the pilots seat. "We're not alone here."
"No kidding! - Zoeee? - Kaylee? You with me?"
A third and forth shot flashed by. Mal swerved and dove after each shot.
"I'm shiny Captain, but a little tied up right now." Kaylee's voice chirped over the intercom.
The engineer's right arm dropped from the Com switch and hung limply at the side of the tangled bundle of arms, legs, hammock, cords and overalls suspended three feet off the deck that was now her cocoon. Serenity's Grav-gen and the proximity to the great orange gas covered ball had managed to twist the small mechanic into a tight wad she was unable to extract her self from. There would be no speed.
"Yup. Just a little tied up." she mumbled struggling to get her knee out of her face as the hammock-net tightened around her.
"What's happening Captain?" Zoe replied from down the hall as she tumbled to the floor yet another time.
"I need speed." Mal yelled. "I can't shake this hundan."
River braced herself against the console as she struggled back into the pilot seat and closed her eyes. "What would Wash do? What would Wash do?" she repeated.
"I'd damp out the shim, boost the angle, you'll get your speed, and Ta Ma Di quit banging the rails!" Wash's apparition poked his ether like finger at the red knob and blue lever.
River grabbed the wheel, turned the red knob left, slid the blue lever up and turned the wheel slowly right, pulling back on the control. "What would Wash do?" she chanted the mantra calmly, rhythmically.
"Down, rock side." The ghost said pointing to the moon. "We can't out run this piyanr. We need cover."
"Why is there a Gorram G8 trying to blast us?" Mal complained as Zoe crawled through the hatch. "And Wuh De Tyen Ah why is my ship headed down."
"Can't answer that, sir."
"Bring her down into those clouds, but not too deep. Then left and stop." The figment continued, passing a concerned glance toward Zoe, as his former wife struggled to the passenger seat he just vacated.
"What would Wash do?" River mouthed, doing exactly what the ghost told her.
Mal stared at the teen as she maneuvered the ship deftly to a sudden stop. Zoe looked to the Captain for an explanation as she pulled herself to her feet, but received only a shrug.
"Isn't this moon unstable - sir?" Zoe offered.
"It surely is."
Serenity was a Firefly, version 3, K64, VTOL craft that was extremely popular in its day both for its versatility and maneuverability, though it didn't boast much speed or cargo capacity. Its true value was in its range. For its size it could out distance many larger craft. It was, however, no match for a fighting ships speed. What it could do that the G8 pursuing it could not was stop and hover.
The G8 shot by the stern of Serenity, punching through the clouds into a sudden festival of lightning bolts, arcs and massive discharges that broke the small vessel into chaff. The gunship was destroyed within seconds. Zoe and Mal remained braced in their seats staring at each other.
"What would Wash do?" The girl said once more, gazing calmly out the windshield. Then she stood, walked over to Zoe and planted a huge kiss on the woman's confused lips and left the bridge.
Mal quickly grabbed the wheel, keeping Serenity in her hover and looked desperately around the bridge for an explanation. "What the hell was that?"
"Can't say Sir." Zoe replied with a dumbfounded blankness in her expression, her heart still pounding from the chase and her lips still tingling from the kiss.
Jayne pushed by the exiting teen and entered the bridge ready for action, a gun in one hand and a crust of bread in the other.
"Wha'd I miss?" the burly man asked, taking a bit of the crust.
"Don't rightly know." the captain replied.
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